Trains, Toons, and Toast - how to start building a drawing habit.
Today I’m going to show you how I’ve built a drawing habit around train travel and how a slice of toast might help you to come up with a doodle.
Some folks have asked me about my drawing routine, so I thought I’d outline what I do and then see this might apply to your own situation.
Regardless of my specific situation, there are three points that we are going to look at:
routine
trigger
time limit
While your own situation is likely to differ a lot from mine, it should be possible to apply these three points to your own drawing practice.
Routine
I live in Tokyo and taking trains is a part of my daily routine. In fact it is rare that a day goes by without I catch a train.
The trains here can br pretty busy, and as a result of this I have mastered the art of drawing while standing up on a swaying train, which is a bit of an exercise in concentration in and of itself. Of course not just any subject matter lends itself to trains in motion, very detailed work is a bit of a no-no, so it’s best if I leave that until I’m stationary.
Because I have a lot of commuting, I like to put it to good use and do it’s invariably drawing or writing that I choose to do.
How can this apply to me?
Is there part of your daily routine where you might have some free time? Pre-smartphone erawe probably would have called this deadtime.
Some examples would be:
standing in line in a queue
the five minutes at the start of the day before everyone else comes into the office.
waiting for the kettle to boil.
You’ll notice that none of the above examples last for very long. The main thing at this stage is to look for a little time in which you get started. It is better to do one Two-Minute doodle than no doodle at all.
Over to you:
Can you think of one space in your own routine that you could use yourself?
Trigger
The trigger is the prompt that starts you drawing.
The trigger for me is basically as soon as the train starts moving, I start drawing.
Some examples of triggers could be:
the moment you sit down at your desk in the morning
the moment you get in your car after going to the gym
after you have brushed your teeth at night
Over to you
Can you think of a trigger in your life that you could use?
Timer
Have I got a limited period is great if you want to force yourself into doing something. They say that work expands to fill the time available, and I’m sure that found that you sometimes get as much or more done in a short period of time when there is a bit of pressure on, as opposed to when you are given an entire day to work at your own pace.
For me, my train drawing sessions are limited by the journey itself. I can even do a shortened version where I use the time inbetween station to draw, or even the time when the train is stopped at a station.
Some examples of timers could include:
the time it takes for the kettle to boil
the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee
the time. you spend while waiting in a queue.
Over to you
Can you think of a natural timer in your own life?
Okay.... I still don’t get what toast has got to do with it....
So let’s see how we can apply routine, trigger and timer to this
Well, imagine that you are going to make a piece of toast, something you do every morning. That’s the routine part that was mentioned earlier.
You put the slice of bread in the toaster, and switch on the toaster - that’s your trigger.
Now wait two minutes, or however long it takes depending on whether you like your toast golden or charred. However long it takes, you now have a natural timer - the length of time before the toast pops up.
If toast is something you eat regularly, then it is part of your routine and you can link doodling with it.
Maybe you don’t eat toast, you might even be an anti-toast. That’s fine by me, however…
Over to you
Can you think of another activity instead of making a piece of toast that might provide you with a routine, a trigger, and a timer you can utilise?
I hope that this was useful for you.
I’m off to make some toast now. Hope there’s some jam left.