The 100 day project, but make it unpredictable

In February, I decided to jump into the 100 day Project, with 100 Days of Play. My aim was simple: to approach my art with beginner’s mind and some playful experimentation. I had some unfinished projects and ideas that I wanted to complete, but, most importantly, I wanted to tap into that child-like feeling of play.

And while I did end up making a lot of art during the 100 day project, Play decided to walk off my art table and enter into almost every area of my life.

It started with a random Instagram post, which sent me down a rabbit hole exploring historical tarot games, and ended up with me designing a single-player tarot board/journaling game involving decks and dice!

I spent about a week coming up with the outline of the game, and then a few weeks and multiple game plays refining and tweaking it. Initially, I played it almost every day, adding in new ideas and refinements after almost every game play.

Once I was happy with the rules of play, I experimented with different tarot decks to see how, or if, the deck affected the feel of the game. Friends, this was one of the most exciting and creative projects I’ve undertaken in recent years, and I am absolutely thrilled with how it has turned out!

I’ve also come up with a name for the game — The Wayfinder’s Quest — and have a dedicated notebook with all the rules and notes from each game that I play.

But that wasn’t the end of it — Play went on to encourage me to gamify my life.

I had come across this idea a couple of years ago, but it felt too complicated with different XP points for different tasks, all categorized into a couple of categories, with spreadsheets and loot and...it was all too much.

But then, around mid-March, I came across Gamify Your Life: Tarot Edition on YouTube, and was intrigued enough to watch it. And this time, something clicked. I felt an immediate current of inspiration; spent 2 evenings brainstorming how I wanted to gamify my life, coming up with a rewards system, and setting everything up in my planner. No complicated XP system or excel sheets or Notion trackers involved.

It has quickly become a playful way to motivate myself and keep myself accountable, especially for the difficult tasks that I usually tend to put off.

As if all of this wasn’t enough, Play also entered into my journals! Dice and decks were involved, in addition to stickers and washi. And it has made journaling a lot more interesting! I may film a video showing my process — let me know if it’s something that would interest you?

Of course, through all of this, I’ve played at my painty table too. I made 3 small journals, including the bouncy accordion journal that I shared with you last month, turned some Amazon mailing labels stickers into collage sheets, almost finished a slow stitching project {a patchwork drawstring bag}, filled some pages in my sketchbook, and completed that bouncy accordion journal — a flipthrough will come soon!

This has been one of the most unexpected 100 Day Projects that I’ve ever done, with some ideas — like the gamified life system and evenings spent playing The Wayfinder’s Quest — that will likely remain an integral part of my life going forward.

Want to try gamification as part of your creative practice?

The next time you’re art journaling and feel stuck, why not roll a dice to decide your next move? If you don’t have any dice, you can use an online dice roller.

1: Collage

2: Color wash

3: Scribbles

4: Pattern

5: Cover up part of the page

6: Add some text

I bet you can adapt this idea for almost any creative practice.

Have fun with it, and if you do give this a whirl, tell me how it works for you?