Welcome back to The Inspired Artist.
Each Friday, we explore identity, creativity, and the way who you are influences what you create. Then you'll receive a new mixed-media printable to spark your creativity.
What Happens When You Let Yourself Play?
When was the last time you sat down with your art supplies without deciding what you were going to make?
There is something incredibly valuable about giving yourself time to experiment. You reach for a material simply because you're curious about what it will do. One idea leads somewhere unexpected, and somewhere in that process you discover something about the artist you are.
This is how we develop creatively.
Your artistic identity grows through experience. You discover the colors that continually capture your attention and the materials you love working with. As you experiment, you begin recognizing the choices that feel like you. Eventually, those choices become part of the visual language you bring to your work.
Play gives you access to that discovery.
Yet the moment we sit down to create, something else can enter the conversation. Suddenly we're thinking about whether the paper is too beautiful to use or whether we should save an expensive supply for a project worthy of it. Before we've given ourselves a chance to explore, we're already concerned with whether what we create will be good enough.
That's where something deeper is happening.
When the finished piece becomes evidence of whether you're a good artist, creating becomes a test of your identity. The old suspicion that you somehow aren't good enough suddenly has an opportunity to prove itself again.
Think about how much power that gives one piece of art.
A page in your journal was always meant to be a place where you could explore. A canvas gives you somewhere to follow an idea and discover where it leads. Your supplies are there so you can use them.
The more you create, the more you learn about yourself as an artist. Experience teaches you what captures your attention and gives you the confidence to trust your own creative decisions. That knowledge becomes part of your artistic identity in a way that thinking about creating never could.
Give yourself permission to use the good paper. Open the supplies you've been saving and see what happens when you follow your curiosity.
You aren't wasting them.
You're discovering the artist you are becoming.
The Story Behind Cloaked in Strength
I created Cloaked in Strength around an idea I come back to often in my work: we discover so much about ourselves through the things we actually allow ourselves to experience.
The winged figure at the center of this piece is surrounded by vintage papers, botanicals, and layers of texture. There is a gentleness to her, yet the words Cloaked in Strength change the way I see her. Her strength feels deeply connected to knowing who she is.
I think creativity asks us to develop that same trust in ourselves. Each time we follow an idea, we learn something about our instincts. Creating gives us the experience of making our own decisions and seeing where they lead, which becomes incredibly valuable as we develop our identity as artists.
That meaning felt especially fitting for a journal. A blank page gives you a place to explore whatever is asking for your attention, whether you're writing about your life or sketching an idea for your next piece of art. Over time, those pages become a record of your own thoughts and discoveries.
Cloaked in Strength was created as a reminder of the strength already within you and the possibilities that appear when you trust yourself enough to explore them. The journal below was created so you can carry this with you and be reminded who you are. Grab it using the link below.
