Here is part two of my short interview with Pepi Valderrama of www.Depepi.com .. She is a great oracle card creator and I hope to emulate her success at some point. I started with asking her some questions about her courses and then moved on here to some questions about her workload. This was all conducted through email and was something that I had wanted to do for this blog here as well as to see what her answers would be for my own deck creations.
Check out her store and her cards.. 
4) On a scale of 1-10, 1 being lounging around doing nothing and 10 being so busy you can’t have a moment to yourself, how busy are you when making one of your decks?
That also depends on you. Are you creating the deck for fun? Then odds that you are going to be relatively quick, have loads of fun and not taking care about how much time you need to create just a card. You go out, hang out with friends, and create awesome art. Are you doing it in a rush? Odds are you are bound to disaster: your art will be messy, you will feel dragged of energy because you will spend too many hours on it, your mood will be more and more negative, and all the things you do, projects you try and life in general will seem grey and gloomy. Negativity will be all around you just because you want to rush it, you are doing it not in the way you like it to do, or are obsessed with just the results.
Creative endeavours, decks or other projects, need balancing. You need to have fun creating them, and leave the door open for more creative mojo. This means that you cannot be painting 15 hours a day and finish your deck in a week. I like a lot a motto that says “mens sana in corpore sano”. It means “healthy mind in a healthy body”. To create something you need to have your mind open and clean, and your body healthy. If you stress yourself too much, you will feel miserable, and end up with something you don’t really like. This means that you need to feed your brain with different stuff, not just your deck. Want to go to the movies? Go. Want to take a cuppa with friends? Do it. Need some lazy day? Do it.
Okay. You may argue that it might be difficult if you are working somewhere else and you are creating your art during weekends. You want to leave your job because your boss is the evil, and you are putting all your dreams on your project. The worse thing you can do is to get desperate. Good things will come to you if you open the door. And you open the door when you are persistent. Have fun, be persistent, and find your equilibrium, whatever that is. It does not matter if you are going at snail speed, as long as you keep on going.
5) How many oracle or tarot decks do you tend to work on at any one time?
I have created 6 oracle decks so far. And I can’t say I did just one at a time, except for the first two ones. I like creating them, but if I feel “fed up” with one, I just start another project (it does not need to be a deck). It is a way to let fresh air in. So it means that I can have two projects on the works simultaneously. It is funny because sometimes they kind of “overlap”, and it looks like as if I have been doing things in a blink of an eye. I have not. It takes me lots of time to do things, write posts, create e.courses, draw cards, draw on my journal, etc.
This is the way it works for me. But maybe, you will find this way not suited to you. It is just a question to try which way you like the most, till you find your own way.
6) I find it difficult sometimes when working on my own card decks to know where to put my time and what to focus on. What would you say is something that gets things in a place where you know what to work on OR can you give my readers an idea of some of the difficulties facing a blogging artist/card creator?
Difficulties aren’t such when you love what you do. When you love what you do, you don’t see walls, or problems, or difficulties. You are just creating and having fun along the way. And if you do feel one, you will find the way. Because there is always a way.
The best thing to do is to create a list of cards that you’d like to draw, and draw the ones you like first. And follow enjoying the ride. Don’t think about anything else when you are doing that. Just get fun. Things will fall into place along the way.
And for the focus: create a goals lists. Goals can be as small as “clean your brushes”, or “travel to Paris”. The key is to order them in groups. So, “clean your brushes” will be a small goal into a bigger one called “stardust goddess”. This means that you have to create a little bit of planning before you start. You can do it once a week, since goals change. Or you can do the mammoth goals lists when the year begins. It’s up to you.
I want to do something specifically for your magazine. Is there a certain theme or topic of interest that your next issue will be focusing on, or what topic would you like worked into this?
Rules are up there :) http://www.depepi.com/2014/02/10/depepi-magazine-submissions-open-we-got-a-sponsor/
Thank you Pepi.. It has been an enlightening experience and I wish you much continued success with your work..
That is all I have with Pepi for now. Be sure to check out her site and see what she is up to.
Tim.
