Recently a friend said something to me like, “It takes a lot of audacity for you to show up to these huge walls and just paint on them". 

I hadn’t thought of it like that before. Murals are in fact, VERY SCARY to me. I’m keenly aware of this and over the past three months I have spent so much time and energy consciously pushing aside that fear as I worked through two large mural projects. Physically moving my limbs, taking deep breaths, showing up at the paint store, driving to the site and letting my body do the work regardless of where my mind is at. Now that I’ve finished my outdoor mural season, I am thinking about that fear. And I’m thinking about naps. And I’m thinking about what keeps me from listening to my fears. 

For context, here’s what fear looks like for me...maybe not too different than most creative people. 

I’m terrified no one will like what I make. Even if they’ve liked a hundred things I’ve made before. It’s a complex form of imposter syndrome because I’ve been showing up as a creative professional for nearly two decades in different art mediums. I know I belong here, I have experience, a strong resume and yet, I never don’t have this same feeling. A feeling that says, your client is a fool to hire you. It says…you don’t know how to do this. How are you going to do this? You CAN’T do this. Frozen. Staring into a void with nothing to grasp onto. 

On top of being afraid my work won’t be liked, or that I can’t even gather myself mentally enough to even complete it, I simultaneously am afraid I’m not being brave enough in it…I’m succumbing to the pressure to please everyone. I’ve gotten too commercialized, too trendy, too palatable. One time a girl passed my booth at a market and said out loud…”God, I love basic instagram shit like this.” I know, that’s a whole different topic for another newsletter but it feeds the part of me that is worried I am missing opportunities to push boundaries and be more thoughtful or showcase more depth and meaning in my work.

One side of my fear represents the idea that I will fail to make a living, fail at my journey to be a working artist. Not able to execute well enough or even execute at all. The flip side is that I will become irrelevant to my own self, no longer able to make work I am proud of or that inspires me. Failing to truly be an exceptional artist with a strong voice.

Through all of it there is a compassionate, knowing compass inside my body and soul. It sits physically at what feels like the bottom of my lungs near my spine. It is heavy like a boulder and electric like a lightning bolt. It is grounding and propelling. It doesn’t tell me what shapes to draw or what colors to use. It doesn’t say I did good. It doesn’t say I did bad either, for that matter. It isn’t concerned with the results.

I’ve realized it’s joy. 

It’s not happiness but something more complex. Something weathered and tired, but striving. A part of me that believes so deeply in art and beauty. It is wildly and unknowingly audacious. It fights my first set of fears with a belief that people and connection and feeling are all so much more important than monetary success or productivity or being liked by strangers. It fights my second set of fears with a whole heap of no-fucks-to-give. Colored with a rosey hue of trust-in-the-process. Trust that the art I’m supposed to make will be the art I make. I can argue with it. But I almost always lose.

It is always there, pushing. Joy is quietly advocating for the ME I truly want to be. It hears my complaints, my fear, my stress, my doubts and sees through to the bigger picture. It knows discomfort isn’t a reason to quit. And it knows the fear of discomfort is an even worse reason to not start. 

I imagine anyone showing up to the table of creativity has a little bit of this audacious joy. This pulse or fever or grinding in their spirit and body that gives them the courage to say to fear…”I hear you, but I’m not letting you guide me.” 

Joy is fearless. Maybe it is as worth cultivating as technique or aesthetic. Maybe it’s the voice that inspired me to paint a giant smug loaf of bread into my Trader Joe’s mural?

I’m out on the road with my friend’s in the band Joseph running merch (including the special print I got to design for their tour). If you are at any of the following spots, come see the show and say hi!

Here’s some music I thought you would like. 🥰