As of the end of October, I’ve got a job again!

Being a contractor and creative, that simple statement always comes with caveats. I’ve been employed all year, but without an active client I’ve essentially been a full-time creative. Now I’m actively engaged with programming work again, I’m falling back to being a part-time creative.

And while I’m genuinely excited to get working on my new contract, it also gives me a chance for a moment’s introspection, looking back on the past ten months and seeing what I did with that time.

One final caveat, before I dive in: I’m fully aware that being able to take a number of months off to solely work on unpaid creativity is a huge privilege. In this case, it’s somewhat built into the transient nature of contract work. I hadn’t intended to be without contract for this long, but when I realised that the market was as barren as it has been this year, I was determined to make the most of it.

With hindsight, I think I did.

At the end of last year, I made myself a three-page list of things I wanted to do once I finished my existing contract. I ended up doing maybe half of them.

Top of the list was to build myself a website. If you’re reading this, I guess I succeeded!

Second was to rework my piano setup so I could start playing around with composition and arranging, which was a major focus of the past few months.

I didn’t anticipate the third major creativity of the past year; I probably spent more time working on my Elden Ring photography than anything else during this period, and loved the whole process.

“Three things,” says my brain. “Is that all you did?”

Calm your neurons, let’s do some reframing.

Something I’ve figured out over the past few years is that I’m not great at having perspective on my creative work when I’m not in the midst of it.

In the desire to avoid “laziness” (which in itself is a whole loaded term full of unreasonable expectations and Puritan work ethic which I don’t have time to unpack right here), my brain is wont to ignore piecemeal creative endeavours, to dismiss subconscious effort and the need for rest and the endurance of rolling with life’s punches.

And given the caveat at the top of this piece, I felt it doubly-so: devoting this time to creativity was A Privilege. I’d better Make Good Use Of It.

Taking each creative task in isolation, I’m always going to feel like I didn’t do enough.

Which is why timelines soothe my brain:

Laying out all my work this year in its various categories and seeing how each piece fits into the chronology of my year so far puts everything in perspective in a way that my brain cannot deny.

With this perspective, it’s undeniable: I spent the first chunk of my year focused primarily on my website, the second chunk focused on Elden Ring photography, and the last few months on piano arranging.

And even amongst those blocks, I kept up with writing, bursts of photography, and various other things. This is what I want my creative life to look like, but sometimes when I’m in the midst of it, I struggle to see the contours.