Keep Going book review

I made this, and I made this. Oh, and I made this. Oh my goodness, I forgot about this one. Continue reading to discover why I stopped crocheting. 

Hey, it's Kyla Denanyoh. Today is all about crocheting, not really about arts and crafts, but all about how you can keep going with whatever fires you up. Today, we're discussing the book "Keep Going." The author of the book is Austin Kleon. The book's genre is non-fiction. The book's theme is self-help.

If you're thinking, 'Oh, this book looks familiar,' this book is a follow-up to Steal Like an Artist. People are obsessed with Steal Like an Artist. Oh my God, Steal Like an Artist, Steal Like an Artist, Artist Still Have Time, Steal Like an Artist. I read it. I enjoyed it. This one blew my socks off. 

Because I've been podcasting for three years. How do you keep going? I am launching podcasts for other people. How do they keep going? I was crocheting. I stopped. So yeah, let me read about how to keep going.

So, for starters, there's an entire chapter called Make Gifts. This blessed me so much. It just soothed my little soul because Austin talks about making gifts for people. One of the highest compliments you can give to someone in this decade is, 'Oh my god, you're so good at making a pie.' You should run a bakery. Oh my god, you're so good at podcasting. You should teach other people; oh my goodness, you're so good at crocheting scarves that you should sell them, and people tell me that. 

I learned how to crochet right before I went to law school in 2012. I started making scarves when I was in Baton Rouge because we had a sudden cold freeze. You couldn't go to the local store and buy scarves because it was Louisiana. They don't typically stock scarves. And I started selling them for $25 a pop. And people bought them. And I thought, 'Oh, I can earn money from things I make?' And then, I started making baby gifts, such as baby blankets. And I would give them away as gifts to people. And then I did start to sell them. I created an Instagram page. I made an Etsy store called 19 Knits. I had this whole thing. 

And then I stopped crocheting because everything I do, all of my art, does not have to be monetized. And so Austin writes about how everything you do does not have to be monetized. Leave the low-hanging fruit. You enjoy crocheting. You can crochet a blanket in a whole day. You don't have to sell it. If it brings you joy, you don't have to monetize it. You don't have to monetize everything. 

And there's this list that he has a checklist for artists. He's like, ' Leave money on the table. ' Could I make money selling the blankets? Yes. Do I not want to use my labor and my hands to crochet all day, and then now I've lost the passion for it? Yeah. I have definitely stopped crocheting, even though I still have all the yarn. I absolutely love doing it while I listen to audiobooks. However, I haven't done it in a long time, as I tried to monetize it, and then I lost all the excitement about it. 

And that's not going to be the case with everything. I absolutely love podcasting, and I enjoy helping others. While I cannot make them love podcasting, for me, the whole point was that I wanted more podcasts in the world, so I needed to start launching and editing podcasts for other people, allowing them to share their stories without feeling stressed. That ties into my love of organizing things as well. 

However, that shows you that you can enjoy something and learn how to turn it into a business, or you can simply enjoy it for its own sake. How to keep going. Kyla, how to keep crocheting is to do it for fun. Absolutely beautiful stuff. It got me through half of the stress of law school. I wouldn't be here if I kept going because that's the way things work, but I'm definitely picking it up again.

There's something else here, which is called Your Real Work is Playing. It's an entire subsection. It starts on page 68. Austin writes about how when he tries to work and gets flustered, he runs out of ideas; his brain is fried. He takes a break and plays with his kids. He has two boys. Sometimes, he'll draw. Sometimes, he'll sketch. Sometimes, he'll lie on the floor and talk to them. 

When you see kids play, they are so intense. They got to stack the blocks. They got to roll out the Play-Doh. They got to do, they got to do. They are focused. And when we can take a break, and we can play like a child, when we can completely zone out and get into what we are doing, when we can create for the sake of building, it'll help you keep going because you will have so many ideas spinning you will have so many new thoughts and stuff bubbling up when you are just focused on having fun with the play-doh right. 

I really enjoyed that. How do you keep going? Even as an artist, you can start something, but how do you keep doing it? This book is small but very, very good. 

Until the next book review, Kyla