Spend regular time in the studio!
You cannot call yourself a serious artist if you do not spend regular time in the studio!
It is not your education, nor your success rate that makes you a serious artist.
Not even the quality of your art /craft/ writing - those are arguably fabulous or mediocre, depending on who you ask.
A woman I know, introduces herself as an artist, but the last time she painted was almost twenty years ago.
My New Year resolution is to spend as much time in the studio as I can.
Life has its rhythms and for everything there is a season.
A time to accumulate experiences (for me it is through traveling) and a time to express them (in the form of art in the studio).
Even though I always carry with me a small pocket size sketchbook, a charcoal pencil and a pencil sharpener, it is not the same as being in the studio and working with my medium.
Today I spent the whole day in the studio and beside preparing and priming some canvases, I managed to finish another painting and to start a new one.
I will post images as soon as I can.