Being Brave

When you have a passion, you let nothing stop you.  It takes a lot of bravery to put your art out in the world.  There are going to be a lot of people that will see your dedication.  For whatever reason, they are going to try to take it away from you.

I want to share a story with you, about a time when someone tried to take my passion away from me.  I was a very dedicated art student in high school.  I spent most of my time hanging out in the art room, helping my teacher, and most of all making art.  I knew I wasn't the most talented art student, but I figured out early on that all it took was dedication.  I succeed with my art at an early age for two reasons, I was passionate and I had an amazing teacher that saw it.

One day, I recall a friend wanting me to see a painting someone gave to her as a gift.  She was very excited about it and wanted me to see it, and I certainly wanted to see it!  It just so happened that I was at her house one afternoon.  We were in her room where this gorgeous painting was hanging.  She pointed it out to me, "This is the painting I was telling you about."  I started to admire it, it really was spectacular.  But then her attitude changed, maybe I did not have the reaction she expected, she went on, "Isn't it amazing, SHE is a good artist, SEE Nicole."  And she laughed.  Yes, she laughed at me.  I understood then what was going on.  For whatever reason, she wanted to humiliate me.  She wanted to take away my most precious possession, my passion and my greatest joy.

Sadly I don't recall too much about that painting.  I wish I had, she ruined that moment for me.  When I find art, or an artist that I admire I try to learn from them.  Most artists do, they want learn from each other's successes and failures (because we all fail at some point).  However,
I did learn a lot from this moment, but it wasn't to stop making art because someone was better than me.  I already knew that.  This was a challenge, and we all need these challenges.  This was an opportunity to see how truly passionate I was.  If I had stop making art at this point in my life, well, then maybe I didn't deserve to have that passion.

So please, be brave.  Continue sharing what you love with the rest of us.  Follow that passion.

Current work in progress, me being brave with a large canvas.