4/ The Story of an Artist: Reconciliation and Integration
I’ve always been an artist. It’s something I feel and do. Even when I didn’t feel like an artist, I still was. Even when I didn’t do art, I was still an artist. My story as an artist has been one of discovery and limitation; longing, separation, and wholeness; expansion and exploration; and reconciliation and now integration.
This is Part 4 of 4.
RECONCILIATION
And then it all stopped. I lost inspiration. I struggled to create. Anything I made was off, fleeting, or uninteresting. It was as if my creativity decided to just leave and go someplace else. The struggle lasted over a year. I was in grief.
By contrast, Indigo Lion Handmade, my social enterprise, was taking off. It took all my energy and focus to make it financially viable. It was working, mostly.
But instead of my art healing me during that intense time, as it had in the past, it was nowhere to be found. I was on my own.
Teasing hints of inspiration started to show up again a year later when I made my first healing chime, then another, and another. I gave a few away to close friends who seemed to need them the most. I also needed them for me.
By early 2019, I desperately longed for my inspiration to return. But instead, I experienced resurfacing fears around money, self-worth, earning, and success. The decision that I had made decades ago, to separate my art from my livelihood, was getting my attention and needed to be reconciled. I had much inner work to do. I had no choice. I wanted my art back. So I listened hard, and it was hard.
INTEGRATION
As the months passed, my art and inspiration slowly came back. Or maybe, I came back to them. And then I knew what I needed to do.
I needed to integrate my art and expression into the heart of my social enterprise.
In late summer 2019 I worked with a business coach to figure out how to evolve Indigo Lion to fulfill that desire. Out of that deep work with her, a new purpose and mission for the business emerged: to connect and inspire creativity, to weave connections with Laos through discovery, expression and engagement.
I launched on Patreon in April 2020 and I have been loving it. I have a handful of wonderful supporters who cheer, encourage, and inspire me.
It’s a space where I share fiber arts, hand stitching, natural found objects, storytelling, expressive mark making, and photography, all inspired by my travels and discoveries in Laos.
It’s a space where my art, life, and practice are more integrated.
It’s a space where I take others on a journey, where we connect and inspire creativity together.
It’s a beautiful space.
