Creative Pep Talk
A Weekly Podcast Companion for Your Creative Journey Transform your creative potential into reality by making your creativity a practice. A “creative discipline” can feel like an oxymoron. Creativity is about doing something new. Discipline is about doing something consistently. The aim of this podcast is to help you strike that elusive balance. Each week, New York Times Bestselling Author Illustrator Andy J. Pizza shares everything he’s learning about building a thriving creative practice. Through solo episodes and interviews with top-tier creatives, Pizza brings you the strategies and stories that you need week in and week out to keep your inner critic at bay, bust through creative blocks and stay creatively pepped to the max!! Learn more: creativepeptalk.com Check out the host: andyjpizza.com
Episodes
August 6, 2025 • 71 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter: http://andyjpizza.substack.com
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WHOA! Loved this conversation SO MUCH! There’s so much to go at here and I could have spoke with Yowei for twice as long. Hope to have her back sometime.
Yowei Shaw is an “emotional investigative journalist” and the creator of the really really great “Proxy” podca...
Mark as Played
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
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I used to think I didn’t have ideas. I would hear other artists talk about how an idea presented to them and think “oh that never happens to me, I must not have ideas!”
But over time, I’ve come to realize that ideas present in different ways to everyone. That’s what makes them unique.
In this ...
Mark as Played
July 23, 2025 • 35 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter: andyjpizza.substack.com
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Social media has become a very difficult space for artists and lots of folks are looking for other places to share their work.
Before we all bail, there are a few things to consider. This episode identifies 3 essential needs we have been attempting to satisfy with social...
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Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter: andyjpizza.substack.com
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You know those people who are SO FREE and CREATIVE that spending time with them just opens you up and makes you want to be more authentic and creative yourself?
Eliza Kinkz is a human like that.
If you need some of that, THIS EPISODE HAS GOT YOU COVERED!
We talk:
PROC...
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July 9, 2025 • 44 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
---You know that in order to make progress you have to show up in a disciplined way or have good creative habits, but no matter how hard you try, you always end up throwing in the towel.
If that’s you, listen to this episode! Let’s talk CREATIVE DISCIPLINE!
SHOW NOTES:
Atomic Habitshttps://james...
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Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
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How does it feel to be on the path to realizing your creative potential? Zorana Ivcevic Pringle, PhD wrote the book on it and has the research to back it up!!
Listen to this episode if you:
Struggle to follow throughConstantly abandon projectsDon’t feel like your portfolio reflects your poten...
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June 25, 2025 • 34 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
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Listen to this if you are feeling overwhelmed, struggling to focus and unable to find the fuel you need to show up.
There’s a cliche that says artists are depressive types, and although this isn’t completely unfounded, this disposition creates a powerful opportunity that you may be missing!
...
Mark as Played
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
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This episode is for you if you:
1 - Struggle to be productive like a “normal” human2 - Want to make your work more YOU3 - You want to get looser and have more fun in your work4 - Are interested in storytelling / picture books
THIS WAS A PHENOMENALLY FUN AND INSIGHTFUL CHAT with picture book le...
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June 11, 2025 • 44 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
---This episode is for you if you are:
1 - A beginner trying to make a splash2 - A seasoned creative who needs to try something new3 - Stuck and uninspired and lost the love of making stuff
We are all beginners at some point and we become beginners again and again at different aspects of our creati...
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June 4, 2025 • 66 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
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How do truly embed yourself into your work?
Today on the show, we have a creative master who has done this at the highest level. In this episode, Caldecott winning author illustrator Brian Selznick joins me to discuss his new book “Run Away with Me”.
We deconstruct the elements that make thi...
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May 28, 2025 • 34 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
---Do you feel like the competition is so steep you don’t have a chance? Do you ever look around online and think “why should I even bother? I am not even close to this level of talent!” If so, this episode is for you. Stop trying to be super and tap into your true edge: your secret creative powers! ...
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May 21, 2025 • 36 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
---When times are hectic and industries freeze, it can feel like creative progress is impossible. In times like these, rather than bang your head up against the same wall over and over again, you can see this external block as a sign that it’s time to shift your focus and ways of being. In this episo...
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May 14, 2025 • 67 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter.
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This was an INCREDIBLE CHAT. I left so pepped.
If you are overwhelmed by the blank page, scared to try and fail, or feel the pressure to exist in a vacuum, this episode is for you!
In this episode, Poet Maggie Smith is back with her brilliant new book “Dear Writer: Pep Talks and Practical Advi...
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May 7, 2025 • 26 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter here: andyjpizza.substack.com
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Are you overwhelmed pretty much no matter what you do? Are you overwhelmed by long to do lists? Short ones? Complex and simple ones? In this episode I will share a recent shift that has made a big impact on me that resulted in me feeling less overwhelmed and more abl...
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April 30, 2025 • 74 mins
Feel like things have changed or are always changing?
Do you find yourself changing yourself to fit?
Where do you really want to be?
In this episode I am joined by artist and author, Morgan Harper Nichols. We discuss envisioning a future for yourself that you actually want to go towards and how to find the right creative home within all the possibilities.
https://morganharpernichols.com
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Feeling lost on the creative ...
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April 23, 2025 • 37 mins
Feeling lost on the creative journey? Download our 7 step Creative Career Path Handbooklet for FREE by signing up to our newsletter here: andyjpizza.substack.com
If you THINK more about making stuff than actually making stuff, this episode is for you! I tell a story that helped me realize that going the right way is overrated and what to do instead.
SHOW NOTES:
Co-Writing / Editing: Sophie Miller http://sophiemiller.co
Audio Edi...
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April 16, 2025 • 60 mins
How do you develop discipline as an artist?
Can you hack your behavior and form creative habits?
What tips or tricks could help you to create more often AND more confidently?
In this episode I'm joined by Eisner Award winning cartoonist Sophie Yanow. Sophie has so much insight on this topic and found great value in creating what she calls a 'Gentle Comics Habit'. We talk starting, stacking and bundling habits and what it all...
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April 9, 2025 • 52 mins
Discuss this episode, share creative wins and obstacles at our next monthly meetup! Join this month’s Creative Pep Rally by supporting the show on Substack or Patreon:
andyjpizza.substack.com
https://www.patreon.com/c/creativepeptalk
If you’re like me, you have more trouble with following through with ideas than you do coming up with new ideas. I am a serial quitter. I have ADHD and I am often working on 5 things at once. BUT. In ...
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April 2, 2025 • 42 mins
Discuss this episode, share creative wins and obstacles at our next monthly meetup! Join this month’s Creative Pep Rally by supporting the show on Substack or Patreon:
andyjpizza.substack.com
https://www.patreon.com/c/creativepeptalk
On this Ask Dr. Pizza episode we hear from 3 artists in totally different creative pitfalls and explore what action you can take to get past each of them!
This episode is for you if:
1 - You don’t have...
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March 26, 2025 • 51 mins
Join our January Virtual Pep Rally by supporting on Substack or Patreon!
andyjpizza.substack.com
https://www.patreon.com/c/creativepeptalk
Do you feel like you’ve lost your way a bit creatively? Maybe you feel lost or in a creative rut. Today on the show we chat with Artist / Actor / YouTuber Cheyenne Barton about a recent creative crisis and we find some aha moments along the way! Loved this episode!
SHOW NOTES:
Cheyenne Barton
h...
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