Art Making / Privilege and Courage
Self-portrait “Holding Others”
It has taken me most of my life to claim and dedicate myself to what brings me the deepest joy—making art.
Growing up, I was acutely aware of the financial stress my family endured. We were grateful for the roof over our heads and food on the table, but our family of six lived on very little. I was very aware of this from a young age, which influenced how I saw my life moving forward. My focus was on survival, not big dreams. I remember when people would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I would say, “A painter—like a house painter.” I think I got that idea from Pete’s Dragon, a 70s Disney movie where the character Pete paints a lighthouse. It’s curious that “painter” was the word that stuck, even though I never imagined I could afford art school or have a career as an artist.
I’m grateful for my upbringing, which taught me to appreciate what many take for granted. I’m also thankful for the lessons of independence and self-reliance from working my way through college. But there's a sadness in knowing I didn’t allow myself to dream bigger, to lift my gaze toward a broader horizon.
As a creative person, however, I did pursue creative endeavors. I was a florist for ten years, then as a nutritionist, and eventually became a personal chef for the past decade. The healing arts, which I’ve practiced since 2017, are also creative by nature. But throughout all this, I continued making art and I’ve always had an artist community and friends. Still, I never thought it was in the cards for me to go to art school and be an artist.
There’s a mindset to claiming the title of “artist” I know this because I spent most of my life not claiming it, and I was acutely aware of that. There is a privilege (and sometimes an earned one) and a kind of courage in this claim. The truth is, I spent much of my life in survival mode. From traumas, I experienced at a young age to simply growing up in the public school system with prejudice and cruelty woven into the culture. My mom worked days, and my dad worked nights when I was a young child, each member of my family was facing difficult challenges as we integrated into a new town and life. I was a highly sensitive, empathic child, and the survival mechanisms I developed then helped me get through, but as I grew older, they started to hold me back.
I developed a habit of seeking safety through invisibility—by putting others first and holding space for them. This became my comfort zone, my escape from being seen and vulnerable. But that can only last for so long. It leads to tremendous loneliness and a feeling of unfulfillment. This serves no one—neither me nor my relationships. With trauma comes wounding, and it has kept me small. Acknowledging that is painful, but it’s a necessary step in healing. It takes great patience to walk myself into the light, regaining the trust of the inner child I abandoned many times. I hold this with tenderness, honoring the complexity of stepping out, being seen, and allowing vulnerability. I am stepping into the light with a courage that is holy.
I was recently watching a video of artist David Choe, who, in the middle of painting, paused to let his emotions surface. He sobbed on camera, and I couldn’t help but join him in tears. It was touching and also comforting to witness another artist confront their pain in the process of creation. As I’ve said, it takes courage to feel what art-making brings to the surface. To be authentic in your process, you have to take risks, and it’s how we treat ourselves while taking those risks that counts. Do we allow ourselves to make mistakes through our learning, curiosity, and discovery? Do we allow something to be imperfect while we stumble and grow? Can we be resilient when the doubt comes up? Can we trust the great unknown while we sit in the uncertainty? Can we have fun in the process and the mess of it? All of this is a miniprocess of life itself. A life of choice and empowerment.
I deeply respect and am inspired by those who dedicate themselves to making art. To make art, you must take responsibility to claim your joy, curiosity, and play. To quiet the conditioning that holds you back and give yourself the space to create must be done consciously. For me, art is the greatest gift I can give myself—it’s a form of self-love and self-care, a practice that fuels my courage to heal.
Being an artist—especially as a woman—is inherently radical. For women, it requires being your own fearless advocate and cheerleader. To believe in wild ideas and dreams when others doubt your claim. You must be brave enough to be uniquely yourself and stand in that truth with conviction. In a society that looks to keep women disempowered, this is a sure way to stand in your power. To not agree with the way our culture wants women to behave, look, and be, but to listen to your intuition and engage in the untamed nature of creativity.
I believe we all have a place in our hearts that holds joy and freedom. When we experience these feelings, they can either grow or be buried, but they carry their own momentum—the inherent power of creativity. It’s our choice whether to create a garden for them to grow, with self-love and respect to give space for what might emerge. Or we can deny ourselves that opportunity. But if you have a calling, it will keep calling until you answer the call.
It’s a privilege to be empowered enough to dream, and it’s something only we can claim for ourselves, no one can do that for another. The foundation of our world all started as different ideas that the collective started to agree to; it‘s the world we inherited. So what would happen if we let ourselves go into that space of dreaming? Opening up to the void, see what wonderful ideas and expressions want to come through. If we are holding on tightly to outdated systems, we’ll calcify with them. And that is not the world I want to live in.
If you know me, you know I’ll be rooting for you to claim what brings you joy and freedom. I’ve always been a revolutionary at heart, and I believe this is the way forward—for all of us—to move toward the simple things that make us giddy and bring pleasure into our lives. I’ve said it before, but I’ll repeat it: Let my claiming be a permission slip for you to claim yours. It may not be perfect. I may slip back into my comfort zone; I may not always head into the studio or the great void. But what’s important is that I remain loving and patient with myself as I heal and grow. And it’s my honor to hold you in that same place. For I honor this sacred dance with the great mystery, it is what makes life beautiful and worth living.
