If you have always had the desire of learning how to draw, the only thing from stopping you is yourself and your fears.

Fear of failure is a powerful barrier to overcome before we can achieve our goals. If you want to learn to draw, but are afraid to do so, you must learn to overcome your fear, and you do that by confronting it.

But don't get me wrong here. You shouldn't just go to the town's art supply shop and buy all your equipment and try to develop a masterpiece from the word "go". That would be like confronting the school bully with no mental or physical preparation....

There are 10 things I can recommend to overcome your fear to draw. You can do one, or as many as you want:

1. As Nike's slogan goes: "Just Do It!" Make a decision to start learning how to draw, and start your research to get familiar with terms, tools, materials and techniques. You could start by visiting my site (www.Learn-to-Draw-and-Paint.com) where I have a growing collection of free articles, tips and techniques on drawing and painting. That's a good start! ;-)

2. Get some basic drawing equipment. It sounds expensive, but it does not have to be. To begin with, you can start by getting a pencil, a drawing pad, an eraser and maybe a ruler. If you have access to discarded photocopy paper, you could "recycle" it by drawing on the blank side of the paper.

3. Re-wire your brain in relation to drawing. This is perhaps the most important thing you can do to overcome your fear of drawing (or any other fear, for that matter!). Drawing is just a skill, and there is nothing preventing you from learning anything whatsoever. Anyone can bake a cake! Just follow instructions and easy to follow steps, and the result will show. Once you convince yourself of this, learning to draw will be easier than you think.

4. Go slowly but steady: Unless you're some sort of genius, if you're a normal mortal like the rest of us, you should start from the most basic exercises and techniques, and build upon the following steps, until you are sufficiently skilled to draw something you can be proud of.

5. Don't be too critical of your drawings. Remember, you are learning something here. You are not expected to produce a facsimile copy of whatever object at your early stages of your drawing "apprentiship". You are expected to do your exercises well. That's all.

6. Understand that most of the basic skills you'll learn are so basic that a child could learn them, and so will you. You start by learning to draw simple shapes, how to hold your pencil, different pencil strokes, and gradually moving onto drawing stick figures, learning about shading, proportions, perspective, and that kind of thing. It may sound overwhelming... but it doesn't have to be.

How do you eat an elephant? A/ One bite at the time! That's how you learn to draw too!

7. Develop a learning routine. Depending on your time commitments, you could set aside an hour or so a week to learn new concepts and practice new skills. This is also important because doing so will ensure that you keep your interest alive. An enjoyable commitment to ongoing learning will build up your skills rapidly.

8. As Yoda says: "Practice you need." A few weeks ago I watched a TV interview of famous Australian Guitar Player Tony Emanuell. This guy has been playing the guitar since he was 4! When the journalist asked him how did he get that good, Tony's answer was: "I played the guitar more than I eat, sleep, talk, and go to the toilet. When you do something over and over you got to get good at it" [or words to that effect].

You get back what you put in. If you just want to learn to draw, you should practice regularly. If you want to become a master... you know what to do.

9. Do a drawing course if you can. Sure, you can learn to draw from books. But to take your skills to the next level, you should do a course at your local community school, summer school, or even online.

10. Keep a record of your progress. I do my exercises on lose paper, and my practice drawing on a pad. That way, I keep a record of my progress.

You will be amazed at how good you get at drawing if you keep records of your early work and compare it to the latest drawing. This translates into a confidence boost which will help you keep going.

I hope you find these tips useful, and I wish you all the best in your artistic learning journey.

Yours truly,