Welcome back to the conversation on the creative process! I have been engaging in conversations with the makers and creatives here at Make-It Springfield about the challenges they face in their process and the support they have in their lives.
In this post, please enjoy an interview I did with Donald who runs his business out of Make-It Springfield.
Jamila: What are you working on?
Donald: “I’m passionate about making things look nice. I like designing things. I like taking something and making it in my own vision. I work with furniture, primarily wood.”
Jamila: Who has been supportive of your work?
Donald: “My wife Sarah has been very supportive of my work. She likes seeing what I’ve worked on and she supports me financially because I’m not making active money from this. So far I’ve sold a couple of things. And when I run into a problem, she will let me just ramble to her for a while until my brain is just like, ‘oh, I got it.’”
Jamila: When you’re making, when you’re working on your creative process, what do you do when you reach a place that feels challenging or you get stuck or you feel overwhelmed or blocked?
Donald: “I’ve been working on a new tabletop for our kitchen island for a month because I keep messing it up. Learning what I’m doing and encountering things that didn’t go as I intended, or that didn’t work out and I have to try something else, is frustrating. Ideally, what I intend to do is to step back from it and keep a couple of projects going at once. So I can say, ‘this one is beyond me at the moment, so I’m just going to go do something easier and then I’ll come back to it later.’
Thank you Donald! To get in touch with Donald, email him here.