DREAMS, GOALS, LEARNING + GROWING. A PEAK INTO MY PAST..
I grew up very fortunate, my parents always believed in my dreams + my goals. They encouraged learning + growing, sports, 4-H + school were a big part of my childhood. My parents always wanted us to do our best, but to enjoy what we were doing. Whatever we chose to do, we were encouraged to give our 100% with their help and support along the way. I grew up more artistic than athletic, I would rather draw pictures than kick a soccer ball. I had to really try at sports, it didn’t come easy for me. Art on the other hand, was something that I didn’t ever have to think about. I could pick up a paint brush and know exactly what to do with it. I didn’t struggle with art, because it is something I was passionate about. I spent many hours from painting to sketching to crafts to thumb art to pastels, you name it – I did it. I took art classes every Saturday with a very talented artist, I learned everything I know from him. To this day, I still value everything he taught me, all the hours I spent in the studio with many other talented teenagers.
I always had big dreams with my art, I always wanted to graduate high school and head off to Chicago and go to the university of art and design. I was going to do something great and become a famous artist…. I almost had my portfolio put together, I had many pieces to submit. I wanted to teach art classes, and have my own studio with big windows facing the mountains where I could blast music & just get lost in my art work.
But than reality hit me. I did a lot of thinking and soul searching. I found some things out about myself that I’m glad I found out before I left my friends and family and went to Chicago. I realized that if I made my art my life, depended on it for a living & had to do it everyday I would no longer enjoy it. I didn’t want that, I didn’t want something that I was so passionate about to be a “job”, I never wanted to loose that passion. I didn’t want to depend on a living from a paintbrush, because what if one day I ended up hating it? It was a scary thought for me. So I changed my dreams. I headed to college for heath care and pulled a 180. The day I came home and told my parents I applied for school, I think they thought I was crazy. Every since I was a little girl I always had a pencil in my hands and talked about being an artist, that was the girl they knew.
Four years later, here I am sitting in my art studio that my parents built for me. Looking at all the art work I have worked on over the years, the beautiful pencils I have that are just aching to be used, the paint brushes that want to get dirty and the paper that wants to be sketched on. I love this place, it is my happy place. When I sit in my art studio, I feel something I don;t normally feel. Some sort of realization, quietness & happiness comes around.
I do not regret the decisions that I have made, I am a firm believer in everything happens for a reason. If I went to Chicago, chances are I wouldn’t be head over heals in love with the amazing man I have in my life, I wouldn’t have found my passion for photography and pursued it to become more than just a weekend hobby, I wouldn’t appreciate art and the skills I have the same way I do today, I wouldn’t be sitting here writing a post about how sometimes you can be so sure of your life and 5 minutes later, some thought crosses your mind and everything changes. That’s life and thats what I love about it. You can’t have regrets, because in that moment you made that decision for a reason. And sometimes you just have to trust yourself, and what you were thinking in that instant.
Hope you enjoyed a brief tour of my art space + a little bit of me that you probably didn’t know about 🙂
