From Mess to Muse - And so it Began

It all began with burnout and mild insanity. Is that not how great artists are born?

There was a time in my life, not too long ago, when I was just a mom of five kids trying very hard not to completely lose myself somewhere between snack requests, laundry piles, and chauffeuring small humans . My house was loud, chaotic, and permanently covered in crumbs. Every single day I would walk into the bathroom and see toothpaste smeared all over the counter like my children were tiny abstract expressionists working exclusively in Crest Whitening.

But one day, while staring at those toothpaste globs with the rage of a woman who had already cleaned the same counter fifteen times that day, I had a sudden thought: “This actually reminds me of the minimalist texture art I see online.” (You know, the kind you make by slopping some joint compound on a canvas and dragging your fingers through it.)

And honestly? That passing thought changed my life.

It was the first moment I realized that the things driving me absolutely insane could actually be something beautiful to be thankful for instead.

So for the next two and a half years, I filled scraps of paper with ideas, frustrations, and moments from everyday life that most people try very hard to mitigate. Things out of place. Anger. Messy counters. Anxiety. People whining. All with the idea in mind that these moments and the meanings behind them could be preserved through art.

And after so many months of toying with that artistic concept, the event that put it all into full-blown operation struck…

The feeling of dirty floors under my feet after I had just cleaned them! That gritty feeling would instantly become the last straw sending me into a spiraling rage. I was on the warpath. I furiously ran the vacuum while mentally drafting a lecture for my fellow inhabitants which would have been delivered with all the grace of a firing cannon …when a voice inside whispered, “YOU HAVE TO STOP.”

I put away the vacuum and sat in silence, finally surrendering to that still small voice I had heard many times before. I was ready to let go of the pursuit of perfection. Ready to see that every circumstance holds beauty. I was ready to choose thankfulness. To find joy on purpose.

That was the moment I finally started this journey.

I created my first piece for me, “Precious Grit,” inspired by the very thing that had been irritating me for years: the dirt and crumbs under my feet. But instead of creating from anger, I wanted to create from redemption. I wanted to train myself to see joy, beauty, humor, and meaning in the imperfect parts of life. And even more than that, I wanted to create art that could help other people do the same.

Now, strangely enough, I almost look forward to the moments I used to hate. The messes, frustrations, sorrows, and little interruptions of life have become a challenge to find inspiration. And even when they don’t inspire a new piece of art, they do remind me to pause and look for joy anyway.

Because, somewhere along the way, I stopped seeing these moments as evidence that life was miserable and started seeing them as evidence that life was full.