I read this wonderful little book called How to Avoid Making Art (or Anything Else You Enjoy) by Julia Cameron. It’s well over 100 pages long, but I read it in about ten minutes, which is because I’m a genius.

Actually, the book is more like a picture book, with each page containing a drawing accompanied by a sentence or two of text.

But I’m still a genius.

The book provides gives a long list of things you can do to avoid doing the creative things you dream of doing, and for me it did a great job of pointing out the self-destructive habits I have that get in the way of living the life I want to live.

There are more than a hundred of these little guys, but I want to share the ones that really yanked me by the earlobes and said, “Hey! I’m talkin’ to you!” They’re listed here in the same order they appear in the book:

• Make your first project really big.
• Compare your work to the masterworks of the great masters.
• Be in a big hurry.
• Assume that your dream will be much too expensive and beyond your reach.
• Slide into despair rather than take one small exploratory action.
• Talk about it so you don’t have to do it.
• Consider the odds against whatever you make ever selling.
• Demand that what you do be absolutely original, totally brilliant, and ever done before.
• Demand 15 hours of free time to create, so you can ignore the 15 minutes you’ve got.
• Help others to formulate a step-by-step approach for manifesting their dreams.
• The minute you have an idea, ask yourself: How much cold, hard cash is it worth?
• Focus on how much is left, not on how much is done.
• Under no circumstances make any art just for fun.
• Focus on your future as a homeless person, caused by your pursuing your dream.
• Tell yourself you need to relax instead of create. Tell yourself you’ll write later.
• Get your main sense of self worth helping others instead of facing the blank page.
• Tell yourself you need your family’s approval.
• Tell yourself your work isn’t good enough to finish or frame. Explain to everyone that you’re not “really” an artist.
• Tell yourself if you have free time, you should do something productive.
• Rather than make art, read about art.
• Let the fear of freelance health care costs drive you back to corporate life.
• Decide to learn everything about critical theory regarding your art form of choice.
• Think about your art instead of doing it.
• Hide from the crazymakers in your life instead of setting boundaries. Hiding makes it hard to do your art.