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The Artist's Story
Art has always been a part of my life, though my participation in it has ebbed and flowed. It would be lovely to say that I figured out I wanted to be an artist, buckled down, and that’s been my passion and profession for decades, but I don’t like to lie.
Art flowed when I was a brooding teenager, locked in my room listening to goth music and drawing cool girls from magazines and then ebbed as I became a mom at 20.
It flowed again a few years later, studying Graphic Design and Illustration at Palomar College in San Marcos, CA only to ebb again when I chose paying rent and getting a reliable car instead.
The next flow wasn’t until my kids became adults and I felt the unmistakable urge to create. I simply tried again. I felt such relief and joy; it was like I had come closer to who I really was.
And yet, I was still deeply unsettled. Something was off, and I couldn’t put my finger on it. I felt like I was living a half-life – part of me knowing I was doing what I came here to do, but there was something missing, something I couldn’t access.
In 2023 I took Martha Beck’s Wayfinder Life Coach training to find that missing piece. Not only did I discover that my natural tendency is to coach, but it’s how I show up in the world. I also discovered that I had been hiding significant parts of me. It’s like I stuffed these parts in a cardboard box – my values, beliefs, absolute love of humanity – and shoved them in a dank basement, along with some very painful truths.
In November of 2023, I gathered courage and spoke those truths. The result was complete upheaval and the destruction of my life as I had known it.
By the following January I moved from Spokane, WA to the Crystal Coast area of North Carolina and began to piece my life back together again – this time, unpacking and honoring all parts of me.
Eventually this led back to art, but through a broader lens. I see now that I create not just to produce a painting, but to find what the process wants to teach me. Lessons about who I am, what blind spots I should be looking at, how can I show up fully and unapologetically me right now, today.
I’m on a journey to live in alignment my essential self, and it’s the most important work I’ve ever done.
My paintings are visual representations of this journey, the lens in which I see through.
My desire is that what I create – be it a piece of artwork or what I have to say about it – rings true to someone else. That it provides a spark of inspiration or a sense of empowerment, giving permission to unpack their own box in the basement.
Because I promise you, practicing living in congruency with your essential self is not only a gift to you, but also a gift to all who encounter you.