For most of my life, I’ve been the one who holds it all together.

The doer.
The fixer.
The one who organizes holidays, makes the appointments, gets the job done, makes it all look effortless—even when I’m unraveling inside. I’ve been the steady one. The strong one. The one others lean on.

And I wore that identity like armor.
Useful. Capable. Necessary.

“I just have more capacity than others.”

But lately, amongst the quiet, empty hours that have become my life, something in me is cracking open.
Something ancient. Something tender.
Something wildly creative.

It started quietly, almost embarrassingly.
A sudden urge to be creative. To paint, even though I didn’t know how.
An afternoon spent shaping clay into a corn on the cob.
Hours lost behind the lens of a camera, chasing the way light hits the grass or how shadows stretch across my daughter’s face when she’s sleeping.

It’s like I’ve been starving, and only just now am allowing myself to eat; now that everyone else has gotten what they need.

Let me be clear:
I am not technically skilled. At all.
My sculptures are wonky. My paintings are awkward.
I sometimes cry over a photograph that no one else would even glance at.
But I am hungry. And something in me—something long buried—is waking up with a roar.

This isn’t about becoming an artist. It’s about becoming me.

For years, I lived in a constant state of overfunctioning. I was the one who carried the weight of everyone else’s world, often at the cost of my own. I’ve made a life out of showing up for others, putting out fires, sacrificing sleep, and swallowing my own needs because someone else’s felt more urgent.

But here’s what I’ve finally realized:

At my core, I am not just a mother, a wife, a friend.
Not just a planner, a problem-solver, or a provider.
I am a deep-feeling, fiercely intelligent woman who has lived for far too long in the roles she was handed.

Underneath the layers of duty and identity is someone raw, soulful, and curious.
Someone who sees beauty in cracks and softness in shadows.
Someone who doesn’t just want to survive—she wants to feel, to create, to express, to exist without justification.

And art?
Art is how she’s clawing her way back to the surface.

It’s messy and vulnerable and wildly imperfect, but it feels more honest than anything I’ve done in years.

Because here’s the thing I didn’t understand until recently:
Creativity isn’t frivolous. It’s a lifeline.
It’s the body’s way of releasing what the heart has held for too long.
It’s how we say the things we’re too scared to speak aloud.
It’s how we stitch ourselves back together after years of quiet unraveling.

I used to think art was for other people. For the naturally talented. For the trained. For those who had the luxury of free time or the audacity to believe they were good enough.

But I don’t believe that anymore.

I believe art is for anyone who’s ever silenced themselves to keep the peace.
For anyone who’s ever felt invisible in their own life.
For anyone who’s ever thought, “Who am I, to do this?”

Because here’s the truth:
I’m not creating to impress.
I’m creating to remember.

To remember who I was before the world told me who to be.
To remember what joy feels like without permission.
To remember that I am allowed to make ugly things, emotional things, confusing things—and that they are worthy simply because they are mine.

If you’re feeling the same pull—toward painting, writing, sculpting, dancing, gardening, photography, or just making something that didn’t exist before—follow it. Even if your hands tremble. Even if you don’t know what you’re doing. Even if your inner critic shouts that it’s a waste of time.

It’s not a waste. It’s a return.

A return to play.
To presence.
To truth.

I’m not creating because I finally have the time.
I’m creating because my nervous system is finally healed enough to allow me to find flow.

And in doing so, I’m learning that this isn’t a detour—it’s the way home.

Recently, I painted my first piece that actually looked like what I intended it to. It was a portrait of my dog, Bruno.

Not perfect. Not gallery-worthy. But unmistakably him—his goofy charm, his soulful eyes, the essence of his presence captured in a way that felt both technical and emotional. I stepped back from the painting and felt… something shift.

I didn’t just like what I had made.
I also needed people to see it.

At first, I brushed that feeling off. But it lingered. Gnawed at me.
Why was it so important that my family see this?

After sitting with it (and while writing this blog), it hit me:
It wasn’t about the painting.
It was about me.
I wanted them to see me.

Not the version of me they’ve always known—the capable one, the strong one, the one who figures it out and holds it down.
I wanted them to see the real me. The one that’s finally stepping into the light.

The playful me. The imaginative me. The curious, joy-chasing, inner-child version of me that was hidden away for so long under layers of performance, protection, and practicality.

That painting of Bruno was more than art—it was an introduction.

A way of saying, “Hey… this is me. This is who I’ve always been, underneath it all.”
And I realized, in a moment of full vulnerability, that I love who I am at my core.

I just haven’t let many people see her.

Not because I was intentionally hiding her, but because I’ve been in survival mode for so long. I didn’t realize it was finally safe to let her come forward. That I could be joyful and still be taken seriously. That I could be playful and still be worthy. That I didn’t have to choose between being strong or soft.

So maybe this chapter of my life isn’t just about rediscovering art.
Maybe it’s about introducing my truth—to others, yes, but most of all, to myself.

And maybe that’s what this creative pull is really about:
An invitation to be seen—not as who I’ve been for everyone else, but as who I’ve always been underneath it all.

So I’ll keep painting.
Keep sculpting and throwing clay.
Keep photographing whatever speaks to me.
Not to be praised.
But to be known.
By others, sure.
But mostly, finally… by me.

All of this—this creative pull, this rediscovery of self, this quiet blooming—has been happening during one of the hardest seasons of my life.

I’ve been living in another city, away from home, caring for my daughter Grace as she undergoes treatment for cancer. It’s been brutal and beautiful and everything in between. There have been moments where I’ve felt completely hollowed out—physically exhausted, emotionally scraped raw, spiritually stretched beyond what I thought I could bear.

And yet… in the midst of all of that, art found me.

Or maybe, more truthfully, I finally stopped long enough to let it in.

I didn’t plan this awakening. I wasn’t searching for it. But when your whole life gets stripped down to its bones, when you’re sitting in hospital rooms and parking garages and waiting rooms, you start to ask yourself some deeply clarifying questions:

Who am I, really, when everything else is stripped away?
What parts of me have I silenced to survive?
What if creation could live alongside the grief?

For me, that answer came in color and clay and shadow and shape. It came in letting my hands lead. It came in remembering joy—even in the middle of sorrow. Especially in the middle of sorrow.

And so I’ll leave you with this:

When was the last time you created something just for yourself—without a goal, without a timeline, without needing it to be good?

What would happen if you gave yourself permission to follow the creative impulse that’s tugging at your sleeve?

What version of you might you meet in the process?

Maybe you don’t need to be more productive.
Maybe you just need to be seen—by yourself, first.

And maybe, just maybe, the thing you think you’re not good enough to do…
is the very thing that will bring you home to yourself.