100 Day Project 2026 Takeaways

In 2025, I participated in the #100DayProject for the first time. I was part of an online art community, and we all decided to find a very simple project we could do quickly each day. The idea was if we made it super simple, it would be easier to stay with it for 3+ months. I made it to day 70-something and lost momentum.

This year, I was determined to stick with it through all 100 days. And I did! I got really sick of what I was doing (4x4” collages) and my process (shockingly finicky) at about the same point, but I forced myself to show up and glue SOMETHING down, no matter how awful the piece looked. 

I discovered many things that I love

• Color (I mean, duh! But most days a color or a color combination became the starting point.)

• Contrast (black/white, out of focus/sharp, torn page/precise cut, organic/industrial, etc.)

• Angles and diagonals (I typically am drawn to rounder shapes instead of pointy edges, so this was a big surprise to see so many angled compositions.)

• Peek of shapes or colors at the edges of the collage

• Playing with composition (Each page of my sketchbook held 4 collages, so I would vary the composition to keep the page from feeling flat and formulaic.)

• Variations on a theme (ie, small series)

• Faces

• A small reveal of something where you’re not quite sure what it is — a sense of “what am I looking at?”

  
  

What I learned about consistent art making

• There’s a rhythm of creation that reveals itself only over time. If you show up everyday, a natural pace develops that helps keep the project's momentum going.

• There were days I didn't like what I was making or think it had any redeeming qualities, but within a few days, I’d feel connected to and more content with the process and end result again.  

• On days when I wasn’t feeling it and couldn’t find anything to create the first spark, I just made something and was OK letting it be. I learned not to judge, to allow it all to be — my mood, the lack of inspiration, creating an aesthetically unpleasant thing. I learned to shake it off and keep going.

• I’m not patient in general and I was surprised by how irritatingly finicky my process was. Eventually I learned how to achieve an end result without having to do geometry to get there, but even better was watching myself master my impatience and learn to let the art take me where it wanted to go. (Growing up! 💪🏼)

What I’m proud of

• 100 days of art, of creating, and of keeping my commitment to myself

• Sharing/posting on Substack daily and LinkedIn a couple of times, not for anyone else or because I wanted outside approval, but because I promised myself to show up and show out.

Having finished, I really am stupidly proud of myself, and the consistency of creating art daily has stuck, which makes me happy as I’ve battled with resistance regularly in the past.

Even if the most creative you get is doodling while in a meeting, I’d recommend trying the project next year — or start whenever. Playing around like this daily is a visceral reminder that when we were young, we all made things with messy paint, fingers, crayons, markers, glitter, dry pasta, and pipe cleaners and called it art.