Alex Casey delves into the enduring success of The Artist\u2019s Way, a self-help book beloved by everyone from retirees to famous rappers.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Summer read \u2013 originally published April 19 2025.<\/p>\n
On the video call, my mum is gesticulating so wildly while recounting all her recent creative endeavours that she knocks her cup of tea over a work-in-progress jigsaw puzzle. She\u2019s been painting gnomes, baking macarons, writing children\u2019s books and collaging. She\u2019s been to see \u201cweird, weird, weird\u201d contemporary art installations, visited the dump \u201cjust for a poke around\u201d and has even been to see a \u201cterrible\u201d live hypnotist show. She\u2019s nearly at the end of The Artist\u2019s Way, and is positively bubbling over with excitement and ideas.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mum is far from the only person fizzing at the bung over The Artist\u2019s Way right now. Written in 1992 by screenwriter Julia Cameron, the book details a \u201cspiritual path to higher creativity\u201d over 12 weeks. Participants are given tasks to \u201cdiscover and recover\u201d their creative selves, always anchored by the two main tools of the course \u2013 the morning pages and the artist\u2019s date. The former is a commitment to write three longhand free association pages every morning, the latter is to take yourself, alone, on a creative date once a week (hence the hypnotist).\u00a0<\/p>\n
Three decades since publication, The Artist\u2019s Way has sold over five million copies around the world, and continues to be a steady backlist title here in Aotearoa. Scorpio Books in \u014ctautahi reports \u201castoundingly regular\u201d sales across generations and demographics, with Unity Books in P\u014dneke noting a \u201cmarked increase\u201d more recently. Library statistics also support its unwavering popularity: in T\u0101maki Makaurau 731 people have borrowed The Artist\u2019s Way since 2021, and down south in \u014ctautahi the book has been loaned out 536 times since 2017. And that\u2019s before we even get to the spinoff books.\u00a0<\/p>\n
TikTok loves The Artist\u2019s Way<\/p>\n
Personally, I have returned to The Artist\u2019s Way whenever I have felt myself Animorphing into that monstrous 3D modelled remote worker<\/a>, swollen eyes locked on the laptop all day and the phone all night, dreams plagued by anxiety and analytics. A wonderful writer friend sent me their copy in 2022, and since then I\u2019ve completed a Saturday creative writing class, read a poem (wtf) to a room of strangers, collaged greeting cards<\/a>, learned to sew, and all manner of other imaginative undertakings that would have elicited a manic pixie dream hurl just a few short years ago.\u00a0<\/p>\n Anecdata suggests that The Artist\u2019s Way is primarily spread by this sort of contagion. All it takes is one person in your contacts to start frothing at the mouth about being \u201cunblocked\u201d and soon you are rollerblading around your garage trying to connect with your inner child (also did this). And if a recommendation doesn\u2019t come from someone you know, it might come from a celebrity. In 2021, model Bella Hadid was spotted carrying the book<\/a> through New York City, and recently TikTok has gone crazy<\/a> for rapper Doechii\u2019s YouTube vlogs<\/a> about working through the course.\u00a0<\/p>\n It was through this social media hype that Jason Parker, an Auckland-based pop musician, felt the pull to return to The Artist\u2019s Way after attempting it a few years prior. \u201cOn TikTok, every second video was someone filming their progress with The Artist\u2019s Way,\u201d he laughs. \u201cAnd then a friend started doing it and posting some really amazing findings for himself. I literally ordered the book later that day.\u201d He\u2019s now halfway through the course, and has found \u201ca real community\u201d in the Artist\u2019s Way Reddit and following \u201cjust regular people\u201d working through it on TikTok.\u00a0<\/p>\n Actor and theatre-maker Ella Hope-Higginson has also found a sense of connection while working through the course with a large group chat of local multi-disciplinary artists. She first attempted it after the lockdowns, but found the high volume of tasks (which can include writing letters to your past and future selves and collaging your ideal life) and regular morning pages an initial struggle. \u201cNow it feels like some of the stuff is more ingrained the second time around, like the morning pages don\u2019t feel like a hell hole,\u201d she says. \u201cNow I actually really love writing them.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Hope-Higginson is not alone in her love for the daily journaling practice. A social media callout saw all manner of poets, musicians, comedians, actors and writers mention the morning pages as the most impactful part of The Artist\u2019s Way process, with many returning to it as a crucial tool whenever they feel creatively blocked. \u201cIt\u2019s about being honest with yourself and your thought patterns and beliefs,\u201d Hope-Higginson says. \u201cIt\u2019s not therapy, but I think that the pages can do some really good work as a placeholder for just noticing how you are going.\u201d<\/p>\n Within the repetitive pages and weekly tasks, which can be as simple as pressing flowers or as confronting as writing about your nemesis, some people have made earth-shattering realisations. \u014ctautahi performer Naomi van den Broek says The Artist\u2019s Way was a huge factor in motivating her to end a toxic and abusive relationship when she first read the book in 2007. \u201cIt was a big massive life explosion,\u201d she says. \u201cThere was a lot of denial from me to stay in that relationship, but the chapter on \u2018crazymakers\u2019 in combination with the morning pages made me go \u2018oh, fuck \u2013 I need to leave my marriage\u2019.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n While there are plenty more positive stories of people chalking up The Artist\u2019s Way to helping them through massive life and career changes, the book is not entirely free from criticism. \u201cThe hardest part for me was that the word \u2018God\u2019 is used a lot throughout,\u201d says Parker. \u201cI\u2019m not a religious person and I\u2019m queer, so I do have my issues with organised religion.\u201d Sometimes, the emphasis on the spiritual can tip even the most open-minded folk into cynicism. \u201cWhen she\u2019s like \u2018go pick up five rocks and carry them around in your pocket\u2019, I was like, \u2018absolutely not\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n The chapter about money also grates in this economy, inviting people to log every cent because \u201cit will teach you what you value\u201d. Particularly galling when a block of butter costs $10, and even more so when you consider the enormous riches amassed through Cameron\u2019s own companion book empire, which includes The Artist\u2019s Way for Retirement, The Complete Artist\u2019s Way, Living the Artist\u2019s Way: An Intuitive Path to Creativity, Vein of Gold: A Journey to Your Creative Heart, Write for Life: A Toolkit for Writers, or Seeking Wisdom: A Spiritual Path to Creative Connection.<\/p>\n Where the current moment helps The Artist\u2019s Way is that the book makes absolutely no mention of social media or the internet, which subtly filters it out of your own thinking. One challenge calls for a week of \u2018reading deprivation\u2019 of all media entirely, which Parker says made a huge impact on his relationship with his phone. \u201cI would get home from work, go on a massive walk, colour in and go to sleep,\u201d he laughs. \u201cI\u2019ve now taken a huge break from posting on social media, turned off my notifications, and use Do Not Disturb mode way more often.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The screen-free nature of the tasks also hugely appealed to Hope-Higginson. \u201cWhen I\u2019m doing my exercises, I\u2019ll have a little candle lit at the table and I\u2019m not doing anything on my laptop or my phone. It\u2019s all in notebooks, all pen and paper, and it\u2019s beautiful.\u201d Van den Broek agrees. \u201cInstead of doom scrolling, this is so much nicer and kinder to yourself,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s an extremely analog approach to creativity, which I think really resonates in an age where nothing feels analog anymore, and more people are wanting to opt out of that capitalist attention cycle.\u201d <\/p>\n As Parker puts it, doing The Artist\u2019s Way in 2025 mostly serves as \u201ca reminder that life isn\u2019t supposed to feel like a fucking slog.\u201d While it will test some people\u2019s capacity for woo-woo, it also centres creativity into daily life in a way that doesn\u2019t tie it to output, money, or accolades. For my dear old Mum, who longed to paint all her life but was forced to study science and maths, it\u2019s allowed her to fulfill a lifelong dream to make art every day. Recently at the \u201cweird, weird, weird\u201d exhibition, she was asked what she did for work, and said something she\u2019s never said out loud before.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m an artist.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\nJason Parker got back into The Artist\u2019s Way through TikTok. Image: Jennifer de Koning<\/p>\n
Ella Hope-Higginson, morning pages fan. Image: Maeve O\u2019Connell<\/p>\n
Naomi van den Broek says The Artist\u2019s Way caused a \u2018massive life explosion\u2019 for the better. Image: Supplied<\/p>\n
Welcome to the Julia Cameron creativity-verse<\/p>\n