How to Do The Bare Minimum Artist’s Way
For the ADHD creatives who always give up on Week 3
If you’d like to listen to the podcast, you can listen below or on Apple Podcasts
If there’s one thing about The Artist’s Way, it’s that almost no one finishes it.
We asked our community about their experience with the book, and 74% of people said they’ve started The Artist’s Way but never made it through. And honestly? We get it.
Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way is a 12-week course in creative recovery, designed to help us reconnect with our creative energy. It’s transformational—but also a bit overwhelming. The structure is intense, the exercises are extensive, and the book itself can feel like a college curriculum.
And yet the process of going through the book always seems to magically lead to new opportunities, deeper self-awareness, and a huge creative breakthroughs. And we’re itching for some of those.
So, we’re revisiting The Artist’s Way with a twist: lower the bar way down and do a bare minimum Artist’s Way.
Not because we don’t respect the book. But, because we know that doing it imperfectly feels better than abandoning it completely by week 5.
Why The Artist’s Way Is So Hard to Finish
Most of us start The Artist’s Way with the best intentions. The first couple of weeks feel fresh and exciting. We’re writing morning pages, feeling introspective, and noticing small creative sparks.
But then, life gets in the way.
By Week 4 or 5, the exercises feel like a lot. The commitment starts to feel like a second job. And before we know it, we’ve missed a few days, fallen behind on morning pages, skipped an artist date, and the book starts collecting dust on our bedside tables.
This is the exact moment where most people stop.
It’s not that The Artist’s Way isn’t valuable—it’s that it asks for a level of commitment that can be hard to sustain for most people, especially if you have ADHD. But what if we didn’t have to do it the way it’s designed in order to get something out of it?
The Bare Minimum Version of The Artist’s Way
Our philosophy is simple: What is the least amount of effort we can put in while still getting something substantial out of it?
Here’s how to do a Bare Minimum Artist’s Way:
1. Just read the book!
Our main priority with the BMAW is just reading the book! You can also listen to the audiobook if that’s better for you. We’ve both listened to the audio gotten a lot out of just doing that.
2. Morning Pages? Not really.
Julia Cameron is dogmatic insistent that you hand write three full pages of stream-of-consciousness journaling every single morning… which tbh is absolutely ridiculous and out of reach for most people. Instead, we’re just writing in our journals whatever comes up for us as we read the text — which might just be a few sentences. Hell, just jot your reflections in the margins! Who cares!!! Live a little!!!
3. Artist Dates? If you want to!
The other practice that you’re “supposed” to do during the Artist’s Way is called an artist date, which is a weekly solo outing meant to inspire your creativity. The book encourages full-on excursions: museums, hikes, long walks through antique stores.
That’s great in theory, even the smallest artist dates— going to the local library, watching a movie you wouldn’t normally pick, or taking your book to the coffee shop should do the trick.
4. Forget the Exercises (Mostly).
Each chapter has multiple writing exercises, reflections, and tasks. Some of them are powerful, but you don’t need to do them. On our weekly podcast episodes, you’ll hear us pick 1-2 and do them together, so you can use our episodes for this part if you want. Or just don’t do them! You have free will, don’t you?
5. Zero Shame Policy
Our final guideline for BMAW is a Zero Shame Policy. Creative recovery isn’t about rigid discipline, which is one of the primary reasons why no one ever finished this course. There is no effort too small, and our podcast episodes are designed so that you can pop us in your earbuds for ~60 mins a week and get the same effect as reading the text if that’s all you do.
Why the Bare Minimum Approach Works
Slow and steady consistency beats intensity every time, but unfortunately so much of the self-development world is wrapped up in black-and-white thinking and all-or-nothing mentalities.
By allowing ourselves to do less with this practice, we can stayed engaged longer, and actually get to the good stuff in this book instead of abandoning it a few chapters in like we usually do.
A lot of us think that The Artist’s Way is about unlocking some kind of creative genius. That if we do it right, we’ll suddenly be prolific, inspired, and wildly successful.
But that’s not really the point. The real gift of The Artist’s Way is that it teaches us how to stay with ourselves. How to listen to our own creative voice, even when it’s quiet and reconnect with our imagination without pressure or expectation.
If you’ve started The Artist’s Way but never finished, consider this:
What if you tried again, but let it be easier?
Want to follow along with us?
New podcast episodes & Substack articles every Tuesday!
👉 Subscribe to the Internet People podcast on Spotify or Apple Podcasts
👉 Subscribe for free on Substack to get the weekly articles:
Read the companion article for Week 1:
Love you ladies. There is so much shame for ADHD and not being able to finish books. We can approach so many things like this in new light. Looking forward to it
Really like this approach - will be following along! I started and ran out of steam with AW but actually really enjoyed it so knew that I needed to find a way to make it work for me (parent of 3, small biz owner, etc etc)
So I’ve decided to give myself a month for each chapter 😜