How to Practice Hand Lettering With No Time: 5 Practical Ideas

Hand lettering is an amazing skill that takes a lot of practice. How to practice hand lettering with no time can be really tricky. One of the biggest struggles I hear from my followers trying to learn lettering is that they don’t have time to practice. Have you ever felt that? I totally get it. You know that in order to get better at lettering, you just need to practice. But we don’t have all day every day to just sit and do what we want. There are a lot of demands on our time. There are busier seasons than others. You will have to assess what is realistically possible in this season of your life. In this post, I give you 5 practical ideas of how to make time to practice even in a busy season.

5 Ideas of How to Practice Hand Lettering with No Time

1. Make Practicing Hand Lettering a Priority

It’s all about our priorities. I’m not saying that you need to spend hours lettering instead of making and eating dinner. Be smart about your priorities, of course. If you really want to get better at lettering, you need to decide that you are going to make time. Even in your busy schedule. That can be even just 10 minutes a day. Wake up 10 minutes earlier or go to bed 10 minutes later. You may not be able to letter for hours every day, but 10 minutes isn’t too much to ask. Especially for something that you really want. Start with committing to just 10 minutes a day. Then maybe you’ll have one day a week that is a little less busy that you could spend 30 minutes or an hour lettering. These small moments really add up as opposed to not practicing at all.

2. Let Hand Lettering Become a Habit

If you do something enough, it will start to become a habit. Choose when you are going to practice hand lettering for 10 minutes. Then get in the habit of setting aside the same time every day. Maybe you’ll be in the habit of lettering for 10 minutes right before bed. That could even help you calm down after a long day. It might feel hard at first, but soon it may become second nature.

3. Know the Brush Pen You Love to Practice With

It can be hard at first when you feel like you don’t know what to practice. It seems like it’s going to take forever to get out all of the right tools. Yes, it is true that it can take a lot of time to get out all of your lettering supplies. There is definitely a time for exploring new tools, but this takes extra time that you don’t have every day. Have at least one brush pen you love and want to use every day, and make that pen easily accessible. If you know beforehand what pen you’ll be using, you can spend 10 minutes practicing lettering instead of 10 minutes deciding what pens to use. There are certain pens I always carry with me in my purse. You can see my 3 Best Brush Pens for Beginners in this post. This brings me to the next idea.

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4. Practice Hand Lettering Anywhere

I always carry brush pens and a little notebook in my purse so I can letter on the go. How often do you find yourself waiting somewhere? Waiting at the doctor’s office, waiting in traffic, waiting to pick up your kids from school, etc. You don’t have to try to fit in hand lettering in every possible free moment and feel really crazy about it. If it makes you feel crazy, don’t do it. Hand lettering should be relaxing.

However, there may be more free moments than you realize that you could enjoy hand lettering instead of scrolling on your phone. As much as we want it to, scrolling on our phones won’t make us better at lettering. Also, how much Netflix do we watch? You don’t have to give up your favorite show, but there could be hours of practicing hand lettering if we did it while binging shows. You could keep a brush pen and notebook near the couch always to make it as easy as possible. It’s little moments like these that can really add up.

5. Make a Plan of What You Will Practice

A common struggle I hear when it comes to practicing hand lettering is, “But there is so much to practice, I don’t even know where to start.” Do you ever feel like that? It’s very valid! If you only have 10 minutes a day, what are you even supposed to fit into that time? I have a few ideas for you. First, you could find a lettering challenge that you are excited about. That way you know what quote you will be lettering every day. This is what helped me when I started lettering. I found a lettering challenge on Instagram and stuck with it for a month. It helped me feel excited to get to the end of my day and letter the quote.

Next, you could purchase lettering worksheets or a lettering workbook and work your way through it 10 minutes at a time. I have several worksheets and workbooks in my Etsy shop that may be a good fit for you. Plan ahead so you don’t spend all of your free time deciding what to practice.

The Confident Lettering Practice

I know that not having enough time to practice hand lettering and not knowing what to practice can be such a struggle. I also know that the only way to start feeling confident in your lettering is through practice. This is why I’m creating something to help you. It’s called The Confident Lettering Practice. It’s a guided practice to help you go from being a beginner and just knowing the basics, to feeling really confident in your lettering and life.

I will give you exactly what to practice each day for 6 weeks so you can stop feeling overwhelmed by all there is to practice. You will get video lessons and a workbook to follow along with. The goal is for you to take control of your lettering to bring more confidence to your unique style and life. The Confident Lettering Practice is currently closed, but the best way to here about when it will be open again is by signing up for the Insider Scoop.

Have you done any of these ideas to practice hand lettering? How else do you do to practice when you are really busy? I would love to hear your ideas!