A list of publications to help you get unstuck
from
artist career blocks, offering inspiration,
guidance
and advice on artist creative
challenges. 

PUBLICATIONS ARE LISTED IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER
(As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.)

 

Title: The 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women Journal
Author: Gail McMeekin
A companion to The 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women. Offers readers a place
to track and record their progress with their creative work. It follows the
format of the original book, highlighting the 12 Secrets, Keys, and Challenges of
each chapter with prompts and inspirational quotes to motivate women to write
about their creative lives. The journal features this is all original material organized
into an advanced creativity program to deepen your creativity and get you into action
on your goals with new insights and success strategies.
Publisher: Conari Press
Publication date: 2017
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Title: The 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women:
A Portable Coach for Creative Women

Author: Gail McMeekin.
Profiles 45 women. Each chapter offers secrets, keys, and
challenges to help women work through the creative process.

Publisher: Conari Press
Publication Date: Revised 2011
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Title: The 12 Secrets of Highly Successful Women:
A Portable Mentor
Author: Gail McMeekin
Focuses on advice for the specific challenges creative
women face today: thinking too small, underestimating the
need for change, fearing the future, and lacking of self-confidence.
Publisher: Conari Press
Publication Date: 2011
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Title: Affirmations for Artists
Author/Editor: Eric Maisel
Deals with issues of introspection, self-examination and a
willingness to take risks.
Publisher: Putnam Publishing Group
Publication Date: 1996
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Title: Art and Fear: Observations On The Perils (and Rewards)
of Artmaking
Author/Editor: David Bayles and Ted Orland
Explores the way art gets made, and the nature of the
difficulties that cause so many artists to give up along the way.
Publisher: Image Continuum Press
Publication Date: 2001
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Title: Art from Intuition: Overcoming Your Fears
and Obstacles in Making Art
Author/Editor: Dean Nimmer
Practical self-help for artists who want to free their creativity.
Offers artists a unique system for freeing their own creative intuition, the
sixth sense that directs an artist’s drive and work. By letting go of the
self-criticism, doubt, and insecurity that discourage artmaking,
artists will be able to soar to new heights of creativity.
Publisher: Watson-Guptill
Publication Date: 2008
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Title: The Art of Asking: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and
Let People Help

Author: Amanda Palmer
Musician Amanda Palmer raised more than a million dollars from
25,000 backers. In learning that many people are afraid to ask for
help, and it paralyzes their lives and relationships, she explores these
barriers in her own life and in the lives of those around her, and discovers
the emotional, philosophical, and practical aspects of “the art of asking.”
Part manifesto, part revelation, this is the story of an artist struggling
with the new rules of exchange in the twenty-first century,
both on and off the Internet.

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Publication Date: 2014
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Title: Art without Compromise
Author/Editor: Wendy Richmond
Challenges artists to investigate their work through multiple lenses –
with commentaries, exercises, and wide-ranging references to contemporary
thinkers to inspire artists to change the way they think about their creative
landscape, from personal goals to cultural influences to technological realities.
Publisher: Allworth Press
Publication Date: 2009
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Title: An Artist Empowered: Define and Establish Your
Value as an Artist — Now
Author/Editor: Eden Maxwell
A primer for understanding the truths and myths about rejection.
Publisher: Eden Maxwell
Publication Date: 2014
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Title: The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity
Author: Julia Cameron
Revised. A twelve-week program to recover your creativity from a
variety of blocks, including limiting beliefs, fear, self-sabotage,
jealousy, guilt, addictions, and other inhibiting forces.
Publisher: J.P. Tarcher
Publication Date: 2002
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Title: The Blank Canvas: Inviting the Muse
Author: Anna Held Audette
Includes strategies for getting unstuck. Offers advice
to artists who are struggling with creative blocks or personal expression.
Publisher: Shambhala Publications
Publication Date: 1993
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Title: Bridges in the Mind.  An Artist’s Handbook for Everyday Living
Author: Marianne Roccaforte.
Examines the realities, delights, and challenges of having a strong sense
of wonder and an imagination that’s constantly “on.”  The author weaves in
voices of successful writers, visual artists, musicians, actors, and dancers,
and offers easy-to-practice techniques for such situations as transitioning
from an absorbing session of art-making, communicating effectively in social
and business settings, managing intense sensory and emotional experience,
and sustaining a healthy and active creative life.
Publisher: Benu Press
Publication date: 2010
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Title: The Career Guide for Creative and Unconventional People
Author/Editor: Carol Eikleberry and Carrie Pinsky
Offers advice and support for creative people who are uncertain about
their future and finding a place in the world.

Publisher: Ten Speed Press
Publication Date: Revised 2015
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Title: Career Solutions for Creative People: How to
Balance Artistic Goals with Career Security
Author/Editor: Dr. Ronda Ormont
Focuses on how to find the time and freedom to pursue art
while making a stable living.
Publisher: Allworth Press
Publication Date: 2001
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Title: Coaching the Artist Within
Author: Eric Maisel
Shows you how to defuse your own excuses and break through the dreaded
“artist’s block” with provocative questions, stimulating challenges,
real-life success stories, and common sense. Maisel, a family therapist,
counselor, and national creativity consultant has heard every excuse in the book.
Publisher: New World Library
Publication Date: 2005
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Title: Create Your Art Career: Practical Tools, Visualizations, and
Self-Assessment Exercises for Empowerment and Success

Author: Rhonda Schaller 
Provides insights and practical tools for readers to cultivate an inspired,
sustainable art career. Discusses how to visualize a better future,
empower their creativity, and build a career plan for artistic success.

Publisher: Allworth Press
Publication Date:  2013
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Title: Creating a Life Worth Living
Author: Carol Lloyd
Dreaming is easy. Making it happen is hard. With a fresh perspective, the author
motivates the person searching for two things: the creative life and a life
of sanity, happiness and financial solvency.

Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks
Publication Date: 1997
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Title: The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life
Author: Twyla Tharp
Delves into the nature of creativity, exploring themes of process versus product,
and the influences of inspiration and rigorous study. Part memoir, the author
shares the lessons she has learned in her 35-year career as a choreographer.
Also includes various exercises to ease the fears of facing a blank beginning
and open the mind to new possibilities, regardless of the creative impulses
and disciplines you follow.
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: 2005
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Title: The Creative Path
Author: Carolyn Schlam
An inquiry into the creative process from philosophical, psychological,
spiritual, and practical points of view. The author encourages readers to
embark upon his or her own journey of discovery, identity, and wonder
through art.

Publisher: Allworth Press
Publication date: 2018
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Title: Creatively Self-employed: How Writers and Artists
Deal with Career Ups and Downs
Author/Editor: Kristen Fischer
Covers how to build confidence and self-esteem in your work; cope with
rejection; handle creative voids and time issues; combat loneliness and
isolation; and deal with anxiety, depression, and stress.
Publisher: iUniverse, Inc.
Publication Date: 2007
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Title: Ego is the Enemy: The Fight to Master Our Greatest
Opponent
Author: Ryan Holiday
From the author:“ While the history books are filled
with tales of obsessive visionary geniuses who remade
the world in their image with sheer, almost irrational
force, I’ve found that history is also made by individuals
who fought their egos at every turn, who eschewed the
spotlight, and who put their higher goals above their
desire for recognition.“
Publisher: Portfolio
Publication date: 2016
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Title: The Energy of Money: A Spiritual Guide to Financial
and Personal Fulfillment
Author: Maria Nemeth
Provides spiritual and practical techniques to create a unique program
for achieving personal life goals and financial wealth.
Publisher: Balantine Publishing Company
Publication Date: Revised 2000
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Title: How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy
Author: Jenny Odell
Written by an artist and writer. “She struck a hopeful nerve
of possibility that I hadn’t felt in a long time.”—Jia Tolentino,
The New Yorker. “How to Do Nothing is genuinely instructive,
elaborating a practical philosophy to help us slow down and
temporarily sidestep the forces aligned against both our mental
health and long-term human survival. You can knock the hustle
— and you should.”—Akiva Gottlieb, Los Angeles Times.
Publisher: Melville House
Publication date: 2020
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Title: How to Survive and Prosper as an Artist:
Selling Yourself without Selling Your Soul, New edition

Author: Caroll Michels
See chapters “Launching or Relaunching Your Career: Overcoming Career Blocks”
and “Rejecting Rejection, Rationalization, Paranoia, Competition, and
the Overwhelm Factor.” The author is the founder of the Artist Help Network
and a career coach and artist-advocate.

Publisher: Allworth Press
Publication date: Revised 2018 
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Title: A Life in the Arts
Author: Eric Maisel
The author has applied his training and experience as a therapist to
the problems encountered by artists and performers. Here, he addresses
many of these problems, including the idea of talent, the artist’s
personality, creative blocks, and aloneness.

Publisher: Tarcher
Publication Date: 1994
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Title: The Money Mirror: How Money Reflects Women’s Dreams,
Fears, and Desires
Authors: Annette Lieberman and Vicki Lindner
Helps women understand and overcome cultural and personal barriers
to intelligent money management.
Publisher: Allworth Press
Publication Date: 1997
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Title: Overcoming Underearning®
Author: Barbara Stanny
“Underearners are self-saboteurs who don’t live up to their
earnings potential,” says the author, , a financial educator,
motivational speaker, and career counselor. Whether they make $10
an hour or six figures a year, they tend to live paycheck to paycheck,
are often in debt, and have a high tolerance for low pay. Ironically,
many work incredibly hard. The good news is that underearning is
a self-imposed condition. By focusing on overcoming it, underearners
will not only earn what they deserve, but live a richer life.
Publisher: Harper Paperbacks
Publication Date: 2007
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Title: Overwhelmed: How to Quiet the Chaos and Restore
Your Sanity

Authors: Kathi Lipp and Cheri Gregory
Discusses five surprising reasons why you become stressed, why
social media solutions don’t often work, and how you can finally
create a plan that works for you.

Publisher: Harvest House Publishers
Publication Date: 2017
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Title: Persist: In Praise of the Creative Spirit in a World
Gone Mad with Commerce
Author: by Peter Clothier.
Examines  the qualities of compassion, perseverance, and
discernment in his reflections on the artist’s predicament in a
world that judges success in terms of celebrity and material reward.
Explores ways today’s artists in any medium can find fulfillment,
a sense of purpose, and joy in alternative and more lasting values
Publisher: Create Space Independent Publishing Platform
Publication Date: revised 2013
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Title: The Power of Positive Choices: Adding and Subtracting
Your Way to a Great Life
Author: Gail McMeekin
Making the right choices can be as easy as adding and subtracting.
A step-by-step process of throwing out the bad to accommodate the good
by identifying deterrents, such as bad habits, issues, and people who
cause drama in our lives – and adding goals, priorities, and people
to support your journey.
Publisher: Conari Press
Publication Date: 2011
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Title: Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections:
A History of Insult, A Solace to Writers
Editors: Bill Henderson & Andre Bernard
A collection of nasty reviews and ridiculous rejections of great
authors and classical books.
Publisher: Pushcart Press
Publication date: 1998
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Title: Second Acts that Change Lives: Making a Difference
in the World
Author/Editor: Mary Beth Sammons
A wake-up call, an intervention of sorts to help prod readers to pursue
their dreams — to turn the “someday I’d love to” into “today I will” and,
in doing so, make a profound difference in the world.
Publisher: Conari Press
Publication Date: 2009
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Title: The Secret Life of Money: Teaching Tales of Spending,
Receiving, Saving, and Owing
Author: Tad Crawford
Reveals ways in which money impacts our lives both for good and
evil, using illustrations from ancient myths to contemporary times.
Publisher: Allworth Press
Publication Date: Revised  1996
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Title: Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You
About Being Creative

Author: Austin Kleon
Filled with new truths about creativity: Nothing is original, so embrace influence,
collect ideas, and remix and re-imagine to discover your own path.
The author advocates following your interests wherever they take you.

Publisher: Workman Publishing Company
Publication Date: 2012
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Title: Thank You for Being Such a Pain. Spiritual Guidance for
Dealing with Difficult People
Author/Editor: Mark I. Rosen
Provides insights, anecdotes and guidelines to help you overcome
the distractions and energy drain of dealing with difficult people.
Publisher: Three Rivers Press
Publication Date: 1998
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Title: Trust the Process. An Artist’s Guide to Letting Go
Author: Shaun McNiff
Expands the reader’s view of what it means to live in tune with
the labyrinthine ways of the creative spirit.
Publisher: Shambhala Publications
Publication Date: 1998
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Title: The Van Gogh Blues: The Creative Person’s Path Through
Depression
Author: Eric Maisel
Creative people will experience depression—that’s a given. It’s a given
because they are regularly confronted by doubts about the meaningfulness
of their efforts. 
 Theirs is a kind of depression that does not respond
to pharmaceutical treatment. What’s required is healing in the realm
of meaning. The author teaches creative people how to handle these
recurrent crises of meaning and how to successfully manage the
anxieties of the creative process.
Publisher: New World Library
Publication Date: 2007
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Title: Your Inner Critic Is a Big Jerk: And Other Truths About Being Creative
Author: Danielle Krysa
Considered duct tape for the mouth of every artist’s inner critic. Silencing that stifling voice once and for all, this salve for creatives introduces ten truths they must face in order to defeat self-doubt. Each encouraging chapter deconstructs a pivotal moment on the path to success—fear of the blank page, the dangers of jealousy, sharing work with others—and explains how to navigate roadblock.
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Publication date: 2016
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Title: The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win
Your Inner Creative Battles
Author: Steven Pressfield
A practical guide for succeeding in any creative sphere. Delves into
what keeps so many of us from doing what we long to do? Why is
there a naysayer within? How can we avoid the roadblocks of
any creative endeavor.
Publisher: Black Irish Entertainment
Publication Date: 2012
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Title: Where Does Art Come From: How to Find Inspiration
and Ideas

Author: William Kluba
Takes an in-depth look at the origins of inspiration and ideas, to help us better
understand where creativity comes from in our bodies and minds,
and to understand how this intangible force translates into artistic expression.

Publisher: Allworth Press
Publication Date: 2014
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Title: Work With Passion. How To Do What You Love for a Living
Author/Editor: Nancy Anderson
Packed with inspiration for taking chances, making choices, and recognizing
opportunities. Revised edition.

Publisher: New World Library
Publication Date: Revised 2004
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Title: Work with Passion in Midlife and Beyond: Reach Your Full
Potential and Make the Money You Need

Author: Nancy Anderson.
The author demonstrates that it is never too late to rewrite your
life story so that it aligns with values that bring fulfillment and money

Publisher: New World Library
Publication Date: 2010
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Websites
“When Artists Are Rejected – and a Fear of Failure”
Penned by Caroll Michels. Blog: Comments, News,
and Ideas about Artists’ Career and the Art World
https://blog.carollmichels.com/2020/09

 

Categories: Career