Make something nobody asked for. Independence starts where the assignment ends.

Most of what you make in a week already has someone else’s fingerprints on it: a rubric, a manager, a prompt, a due date. The shape of the thing was decided before you touched it. The first work that is fully yours is the work nobody was waiting for, because every choice inside it was a choice you made.

Build one small thing this week with no approval in mind. A song recorded on your phone, a drawing, a shelf, a recipe you invented. Let it be bad, because the point is that it exists at all.