Explorez tous les épisodes du podcast Make Your Mark

A disappointing painting does not settle the question of your talent.

In this episode, Lynn talks about the moment when a painting doesn’t turn out the way you hoped, and how quickly disappointment can become a judgment about yourself.

You’ll learn how to slow down that moment, separate what you observe from the story you tell about yourself, and make your next creative decision without waiting to feel completely certain.

Lynn also shares how she transformed large intuitive paintings from an art retreat in Idaho into small studies.

Instead of asking, “Which one do you think is best?” she practiced asking herself, “Which one do I want to explore?”

In this episode, you’ll discover:

* How to learn from a painting that disappoints you

* The difference between observing your work and judging yourself

* Why “I should be further along by now” is not a useful measure

* How to change the size of the question when a whole painting feels overwhelming

* How to ask for feedback without giving away your authority

* What to consider before buying another class or art supply

* How to make a choice without turning the result into a verdict about you

* Why trusting yourself does not mean liking every result

You can be disappointed and still be curious.

You can be unsure and still choose.

And one painting does not get to decide whether you are an artist.

Make Your Mark Before the Holidays

If you have art in drawers, sketchbooks, piles, or stacked against the wall, join Lynn for a live Zoom workshop on Sunday, October 18, at 10:00 AM Pacific.

Together, you’ll make three decisions:

* How you want to share your art

* How much you want to take on

* What needs to happen, and when, to make it possible

You might choose a piece as a gift, plan a small display, share your work online, or decide what you’d like to offer for sale.

You’ll leave with a clear, realistic plan for doing something meaningful with the art you’ve already made.

Register for Make Your Mark Before the Holidays →

A question to take to your art table

What did I notice, and what did I decide for myself today?

You don’t have to make something perfect. You can give yourself credit for the specific choice you practiced.

Originality Comes from Memory: Making Art That Feels Like You

Have you ever finished a piece and thought, “I can see everything my teachers taught me, but where am I in this?”

In this conversation, I share a discovery that changed how I approach my art: bringing my own feelings and memories into the marks I make.

It began with a painting of my mother on her honeymoon. Looking at it, I could see myself in the work. There was a personal connection behind it, and I wanted to explore how to bring that connection into my everyday practice.

I share examples of what happened when I moved from “I have to get this right” to letting a memory influence my lines, paint, and choices.

In this episode:

What a painting of my mother reminded me about my artistic voice.

A lesson from Jean Oliver about pressure, relaxation, and making marks.

The difference I noticed between working from frustration and creating from a personal connection.

How love, wonder, and memories influenced my practice pieces.

Why practice can be a place for play without needing a finished result.

You don’t have to bring up an overwhelming emotion. A small memory, a familiar smile, or a sense of affection can be a starting point.

Join me for the Feeling Art Masterclass

On September 15 at 3 PM Pacific, I’ll guide you through exploring your own marks, colors, and textures and bringing them into a finished expressive piece.

Learn more and reserve your spot

https://lynnhardin.com/the-feeling-art

Something to consider: What might change in your art if you began with a memory instead of the thought, “I need to get this right”?

In this episode of The Practice, I’m showing you what happens when you feel an instinctive mark, color, or idea and replace it with the safer choice before your brush ever touches the paper.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

* Why your brain edits your creative impulses before you consciously make a decision

* The difference between a craft edit, an audience edit, and a self-protection edit

* A simple three-step Edit Protocol to help you recognize what you removed and decide whether to put it back

* Why making the “bad” or “too much” version on purpose can help you take more creative risks

* How the choices you keep editing out may contain the clearest evidence of your artistic voice

If you believe you haven’t found your artistic voice yet, this episode offers another possibility: your voice is already present in your recurring colors, marks, subjects, and instincts.

You may simply be removing it on the way to the page.

Schedule a complimentary Life + Art Check-In and leave with greater clarity about what matters most to you and the next step you can take to begin creating it.

What if making art is not only about creating something beautiful? What if the things we make can speak back to us?

In this conversation, I’m joined by artist, teacher, and intuitive guide Stacey Vajta of The Feisty Crone. Stacey creates spirit dolls and magical creatures that hold stories, emotions, and wisdom.

Together, we explore the difference between simply producing art and feeling creatively alive. We talk about the rules artists carry, the pressure to make something “good,” and what becomes possible when we approach art with curiosity, play, and no predetermined outcome.

Stacey shares how her dolls become storytellers, teachers, and companions. I share how contour drawing and watercolor help me enter the creative flow and discover the marks, shapes, and visual language that are already mine.

We also talk about allowing grief, sadness, joy, and wonder into the making process. Art does not have to eliminate difficult emotions. It can give them somewhere to go.

In this conversation:

* The difference between little “c” creativity and big “C” creative energy

* Why you can make a lot of art and still feel creatively stuck

* How external rules and comparison disconnect us from our own expression

* Why your creative practice does not have to happen every day

* How keeping materials accessible makes it easier to follow creative energy

* What spirit dolls can reveal through imagination and story

* How art can help us experience and process grief

* Why play sometimes offers answers that seriousness cannot

* How intuition can arrive through art, nature, children, movement, or ordinary moments

* Why your style is already present, much like your handwriting

* What happens when you stop asking whether you made an insight up and begin listening to it

One of my favorite reminders from this conversation is that the pressure can come off. You do not have to make art for Instagram, create a finished masterpiece, or know where the work is going.

You can make something because the energy is there. You can follow it, play with it, and ask:

Where else could this take me?

About Stacey Vajta

Stacey is an artist, teacher, and intuitive guide who creates spirit dolls and other magical creatures. Her work explores what happens underneath the things we make, where imagination, energy, intuition, and story enter the creative process.

Find Stacey on Substack at The Feisty Crone, on Instagram, or through her website, Sacred Art and Story. She also offers dollmaking classes for anyone ready to discover the stories their hands want to tell.

Feeling Art

On September 15, I’m teaching Feeling Art, a 90-minute live masterclass about using feeling to guide the marks you make.

We will choose a feeling or quality and explore how it can influence color, line, pressure, shape, space, and movement.

We are not painting pictures of feelings.

We are allowing feeling to guide our artistic choices so the work carries more of our energy, voice, and aliveness.

Find out more here : https://lynnhardin.com/the-feeling-art

Thank you for listening. I hope this conversation encourages you to take the pressure off, follow what has energy, and let your art surprise you.

Until next time, keep making, keep listening, and trust where your creativity wants to take you.

With love,Lynn

What if the secret to making more art is lowering your expectations and using the time you actually have?

In this episode, I talk with artist and Substack writer James O’Boyle, creator of The Doodler.

James works full time, yet he has built a consistent sketching practice by keeping his materials simple, using small pockets of time, and letting go of the need for every drawing to be perfect.

We talk about why consistency matters more than technique, how constraints can make creating easier, and why your artistic style is not something you have to find. It is already there, and it emerges as you keep making.

James also shares how a ten-second blind contour drawing changed the direction of his art, why buying a course is not the same as practicing, and how calling himself “The Doodler” helps protect the joy in his work.

In this conversation, we explore:

* How to make art when you only have five or ten minutes

* Why adjusting your expectations helps you create more

* What makes every drawing a success

* How consistency builds both skill and confidence

* The difference between taking a course and using what you learn

* Why simple tools and constraints can prevent overwhelm

* How your artistic style develops naturally through practice

* James’s upcoming nine-day hike on the Northville-Placid Trail

* Why the point of making art is to do it, not to make every piece perfect

My favorite takeaway from James:

Your style is like your handwriting. You already have it. The more you practice, the more clearly it emerges.

Connect with James:

* Substack: The Doodler

* Instagram: @jamesjohnoboyle

If you have been waiting for more time, better supplies, greater confidence, or the perfect idea, let this episode remind you that you can begin with one pen, one page, and the few minutes you have today.

If you would like to make art that resonates then join me September 15, 2026 for an online experience.

By the end of 90 minutes, you’ll have created a piece that feels more personal, expressive, and unmistakably yours.

Make the inconvenient mark — it may be the one that leads you back to yourself. Lynn, The Practice.

What happens when two artists pull out the work they usually keep hidden?

Mariel and I recently went Live on Substack to share the art we might never show anyone. The pieces that felt ugly. The ones that did not turn out the way we imagined. The experiments we abandoned and the paintings we simply never finished.

And we laughed. A lot.

Because once we brought those pieces into the light, they did not feel quite so terrible anymore.

They became evidence of curiosity, courage, learning, and being willing to make something without knowing exactly where it would lead.

Watch our conversation if you have ever hidden a piece because it was not “good enough,” felt disappointed when your art did not match the picture in your head, or believed unfinished work did not count.

You may discover that the art you are judging most harshly has something to teach you.

Meet My Co-host, Mariel

I was delighted to share this Live with Mariel Barahona , the watercolor artist and elementary school teacher behind My Watercolour Journal.

Mariel shares her art, her process, and quiet reflections on creativity, one brushstroke at a time.

During our conversation, she brought such warmth, honesty, and humor as we showed the paintings we usually keep hidden.

She helped make this conversation feel like two artist friends laughing, sharing, and reminding each other that every painting does not have to be beautiful or finished to be valuable.

If you enjoy watercolor, thoughtful reflections, and a calm place to appreciate creativity and simple beauty, you will love Mariel’s work.

Please follow Mariel on Instagram and subscribe to My Watercolour Journal on Substack. She is a lovely artist and human, and I am so grateful she joined me for this Live.

And if you are ready to loosen your grip on getting it right and make choices that feel more like you, join me for Feeling Art, a live 90-minute masterclass.

You will make one piece differently than you normally would, follow an impulse instead of immediately correcting it, and learn how to translate a feeling into color, line, movement, pressure, and space.

Learn more and save your seat for Feeling Art.

Thank you Faye Scofield, Mona Cattan, and many others for tuning into my live video with My Watercolour Journal! Join me for my next live video in the app.

What if confidence isn’t something you need before you begin?

So many of us wait until we feel confident enough to make the painting, send the email, have the conversation, apply for the job, share our work, or try something new.

But confidence may have the whole thing backwards.

In this episode of The Art Coach, I’m talking about something I learned from watching my grandson learn to walk. He didn’t need to believe he was a good walker before he took the next step. He fell. He got back up. He tried again.

He wasn’t proving anything about himself.

He was learning.

And somewhere along the way, many of us stopped doing that.

A painting we don’t like becomes Maybe I’m not a good artist.

An offer that doesn’t sell becomes Maybe nobody wants what I have to offer.

A post that gets little response becomes Maybe nobody cares what I have to say.

The event happens, and then we make the event mean something about us.

In this episode, I’ll show you another way.

Instead of asking:

How can I feel more confident?

Try asking:

Am I willing?

Am I willing to make the mark without knowing whether I’ll like it?

Am I willing to try something while feeling uncertain?

Am I willing to be seen learning?

Am I willing to find out what happens next?

I’ll also introduce you to my LEARN process:

L — LaunchDo something. Make the mark. Send the email. Take the step.

E — ExamineWhat actually happened? Not What’s wrong with me? Just: What happened?

A — AskWhat did I learn?

R — ReviseWhat do I want to change, adjust, or try differently?

N — NextTake the next step.

Because learning is very different from proving.

When you’re proving, every result feels personal.

When you’re learning, every result becomes useful.

And maybe the confidence we really want isn’t:

I know this is going to work.

Maybe it’s:

I trust myself even if it doesn’t.

I trust myself to be disappointed.

I trust myself to learn.

I trust myself to decide what comes next.

I trust myself to stay with myself.

A question to take with you

What would you try if you didn’t need to feel confident first?

Pick one thing this week.

One mark.One email.One conversation.One invitation.One decision.

And see what happens when you stop waiting for confidence and practice willingness instead.

Want some help?

If something is getting in the way of what you want for your life or your art, I’d love to help you look at it.

You can book a complimentary Life + Art Check-In with me. We’ll talk about where you are, what you want, and what may be standing between the two.

Book your complimentary Life + Art Check-In:

Thanks for listening.

Lynn HardinThe Art Coach

Make Art Be Happy | 22 minutes 37 seconds |

Episode description

A piece can be skillful. The proportions can work, the color can work, other people can admire it, and you can still look at it and feel strangely absent from it. Nothing is obviously wrong. Something is missing. This week Lynn makes the case that what is missing is not more skill. It is more of you.

She tells the story of the drawing she made the day after Belle died. She was not drawing Belle and she was not making a picture about grief. She was drawing a woman’s face in contour line. But the line slowed down, it hesitated, it pressed harder in some places and nearly disappeared in others, and she left most of the face as bare paper. The subject was a face. The grief was in the way she made it.

From there, a practical look at how feeling becomes a visual choice, and one small thing to try in your next studio session.

In this episode

• Why a piece can be skillful, admired, and still leave you feeling absent from it

• The drawing Lynn made the day after Belle died, and what changed in her hand without her deciding it

• How a feeling enters the work through pressure, speed, space, repetition, and what you leave unfinished

• Why the subject is almost never the feeling

• Three artists, one pear, and what makes the three pieces different

• A better question than what color is sadness

• Why your voice is not hidden somewhere waiting to be found

• What changes when you stop asking does this look right and start asking does this feel true

• How to let feeling into the work without turning your studio into therapy or your art into a confession

Timeline

0:00 Looks right versus feels true

0:49 Nothing is wrong, but something is missing

1:04 The day after Belle

3:06 The studio looked the same, the room felt different

4:05 The line moved differently that day

4:58 The watercolor, and what she left unpainted

5:32 The subject is not the feeling

6:56 What we are taught to do first

8:29 A feeling is a visual choice

9:33 Three artists, one pear

11:12 Sadness does not have to be blue

12:11 A better question than what color is the feeling

13:21 Your voice is not hiding from you

14:23 Does this look right, or does this feel true

15:30 The drawing did not have to be a confession

16:18 You are not required to expose yourself

17:39 The line knew before I had the words

19:02 Joy has a visual language too

19:49 The practice for this week

22:02 The closing question

The practice for this week

• Choose your subject the way you normally would. A face, a flower, a pear, a landscape.

• Before you start, ask what you want this to feel like. Quiet, warmth, energy, distance, tenderness, strength. Keep it simple.

• Ask how that feeling moves. Does it push or pull. Does it need room. Does it repeat, fade, interrupt, expand. Is it heavy or fragile. Fast or slow.

• Make one visual choice from your answer. Just one. Heavier pressure. More space. A repeated mark. Less color. A larger subject. An edge you let disappear.

• When you finish, do not decide whether it is good. Ask where you are in it, and where the feeling changed the way you worked.

There is no correct picture of quiet. There is no official line for grief. There is no perfect color for joy. There is only you and your response.

The closing question

When you look at the last piece you made, what feeling is showing, even if you did not put it there on purpose?

Comment on the episode, send a text, or send a DM.

Lynn reads them all.

Your voice isn't a finished destination, it's the ongoing conversation between you and the work.

In this episode I tell the story of one honest mark on a napkin and what it revealed about an artist who, beneath sixty years of beautiful work, was still waiting for permission.

It's about the difference between making something beautiful and making something honest, and the mark you almost make but talk yourself out of.

The newest round of The Practice is now open if you want to build an art practice that actually feels like you.

Timeline

00:00 — Cold open: your voice, and the work, is never a finished destination. It’s an ongoing conversation between you and the practice.

01:30 — The napkin story. One strange, ugly, honest mark made over dinner. Sixty years of beautiful work, and beneath all of it she was still there. Her hand hadn’t forgotten. It was waiting for permission.

04:00 — Who this is for. Maybe you’ve stopped making art altogether, or you’re still making it but the work no longer feels alive.

05:30 — The important clarification: this isn’t about throwing out what sells or what makes your living. What you’re pointing to lives inside the practice, where only you see it.

07:00 — Beautiful versus honest. You know how to make something beautiful. You’ve gotten so good at knowing what works that you’ve forgotten how to be surprised.

08:30 — This week’s homework: notice the mark you almost make. Instead of talking yourself out of it, give it somewhere to live. It doesn’t need to be good. It only needs to be yours.

10:00 — The invitation. If having a practice matters to you but your art no longer feels like you, this is what The Practice is for. A practice you actually live, not one you keep promising to return to someday.

11:30 — Close: make the inconvenient mark, the one that feels a little too honest. It may be the one that leads you back to yourself.

Show Notes

The Inconvenient Mark

Your voice isn’t a finished destination. It’s the ongoing conversation between you and the work, and sometimes it comes back through one strange, honest mark nobody asked for.

In this episode I tell the story of a mark made on a napkin over dinner, and what it revealed about an artist with sixty years of beautiful work behind her: that beneath the style, beneath the discipline, her hand hadn’t forgotten. It was waiting for permission.

This one is for you if you’ve stopped making art altogether, or if you’re still making it but the work no longer feels alive. It’s not about throwing out what sells or how you make your living. It’s about what happens inside your consistent practice, the part only you see, there for you to do with as you wish.

We get into the difference between making something beautiful and making something honest, and why getting so good at knowing what works can quietly cost you the ability to be surprised.

This week’s homework: Notice the mark you almost make. Instead of talking yourself out of it, give it somewhere to live. It doesn’t need to be good. It doesn’t need to belong in the finished piece. It only needs to be yours.

The newest round of The Practice is now open. If having an art practice matters to you but your art no longer feels like you, I’d love to help you build one that does: loose and purposeful, consistent, spacious, honest, surprising. A practice you actually live, not one you only think about.

Make the inconvenient mark, the one that feels a little too honest. It may be the mark that leads you back to yourself.

Lynn, Make Art Be Happy

You keep your word to everyone. Your kids, your husband, your friends, the people at church who somehow got your number. But that painting you stopped doing, the walk you keep meaning to take, the book with the bookmark stuck on page 12 since spring?

This episode is about the promises you only ever make to yourself, and why those became the ones it feels safe to drop.

This isn’t about guilt, and it isn’t about discipline. If you follow through for everyone else, you have plenty of discipline.

You’ve just spent every last drop of it on other people.

What’s really underneath the broken promises is something quieter and a good bit older, and once you see it, the whole thing changes.

Timeline

00:00 — A careful hello, and why this one is easy to hear wrong00:40 — The promises you keep for everyone else vs. the quiet ones to yourself01:15 — The pause. “Oh, that one. Yeah, that’s been on the list a while.”01:55 — A woman I worked with: reliable for everyone, sure something was wrong with her02:50 — The list — the painting, the morning walk, the bookmark that never moved03:30 — “I just need more discipline,” and why that isn’t true04:20 — Look at your actual life: you keep the promises that cost you something05:05 — The tank is empty by the time you get to your own list05:45 — “When you were small, what got you loved around here?”06:30 — Good, easy, not needing anything — and how that once kept her safe07:20 — The turn: you’re the one person you decided it’s safe to disappoint08:15 — A different perspective: follow-through isn’t productivity, it’s loyalty09:05 — Putting your own name on the list of people you won’t break your word to09:45 — You don’t get there by blowing up your life on Monday10:20 — One small promise, almost embarrassingly small — and keeping it11:00 — How she started (the walk came first, the painting came later)11:35 — You count. Lower down in your body where it’s true.12:00 — If you’re ready for the deeper work, and how to set up a consult

This week’s practice

Make one promise to yourself. Make it so small you cannot wriggle out of it.

The 10-minute walk, the one page, the paints left out on the table whether or not you touch them. Then keep it.

Not because it will change your life by Friday, but because you’re finally someone worth keeping a promise to.

Work with Lynn

If this is the work you know you need, the real version where we go find where you first learned to go last, that’s what I help women do.

It starts with a consult call, just a conversation to see if it’s right for you.

Thank you for listening.

xo Lynn

There is a kind of stuck that does not look like stuck.

It looks like competence.

You are making, you are finishing things, the proportions are right and the color is handled, and anyone looking would say it is pretty good.

And then you stand in front of it and feel almost nothing, because you know something they do not.

It is correct and empty.

It looks like art, and it does not feel like yours.

This episode is about that flatness, why it is not a skill problem, and the five-minute practice that brings the aliveness back.

On purpose.

Badly.

Here are the show notes for the “bad but lively” flatness episode, matched to that format and drawn from the actual transcript.

In This Episode

* Why work that is technically “fine” can leave you feeling nothing.

* The kind of stuck that looks like competence, not stuckness.

* How years of skill can quietly become a trap.

* Why safe choices add up to work with no heartbeat.

* Where the aliveness actually hides: in the moves you trained yourself to skip.

* Why you cannot think your way back to feeling.

* The five-minute practice of making something allowed to be bad.

* Why five minutes, and not thirty, keeps the inner manager from taking the wheel.

Memorable Quotes

“It’s correct and empty. It looks like art, and it doesn’t feel like yours.”

“I could finish this in my sleep and it would be good, and I would still feel nothing.”

“I’d gotten so good at avoiding the bad, I sanded out the alive.”

“You cannot think your way back to that. Thinking is what flattened it in the first place.”

“I wasn’t practicing skill. I was practicing letting go of the wheel.”

“The skill comes back the moment you want it. The aliveness only comes back if you stop managing it out.”

“The flatness is not a sign you’re done. It’s a sign you’ve been too careful for too long. And carefulness is curable.”

Episode Chapters

00:00 Welcome and the stuck almost nobody names.

01:30 The day I caught it in myself, days into a watercolor.

03:00 The thought that gave it away.

04:00 Why every safe choice added up to no heartbeat.

05:15 The practice: five minutes, make something allowed to be bad.

06:30 Why five minutes, and not thirty.

07:30 The ugly wash, and the flicker I met again.

08:30 Your questions: doesn’t bad work just train bad work?

09:45 What if I feel nothing, no flicker?

10:30 You did not lose the gift. Carefulness is curable.

(Times are approximate.)

Your Five Minute Bad-On-Purpose Practice

When the work is correct but empty...

* Set a timer for five minutes. Not thirty. Not a real piece. Just five.

* Make something allowed to be really bad. A mark. A color you know is wrong. One line that goes nowhere. Not a painting. Not even a study.

* If you catch yourself making it nice, make it worse. Let the wrong move stand. The accident. The ugly color. The risky line. You are not practicing skill. You are letting go of the wheel.

Reflection Questions

* Where have I been managing the work from the very first mark?

* What wrong moves have I been correcting before they even happen?

* Have I gotten so good at avoiding the bad that I sanded out the alive?

* What would I make if it only had to be alive, and not good?

* What small, ugly, five-minute thing could I let stand today?

This Week’s Gentle Challenge

Practice it one time. Set a timer for five minutes. Make one small thing that is allowed to be bad. When you catch yourself smoothing it out, let it stand. Notice what happens, a flicker, or maybe nothing yet. Both count. It’s a door, and the door gets lighter every time you open it.

Then ask yourself: What would I make if it only had to be alive, and not good?

Free Resource

Download Lynn’s printable Your Bad-On-Purpose Practice guide and keep it inside your sketchbook for the days you need a gentle way back to your creativity.

If this episode found you, share it with a creative friend whose work has gotten quietly correct, and who misses the alive.

Remember, you did not lose the gift. You only buried it under competence.

Make Art. Be Happy.

Lynn

What if your exhaustion isn’t coming from doing too much, but from giving yourself away before your day even begins?

In this episode, Lynn explores a different way of thinking about creative energy. She challenges the belief that we simply need more sleep, better routines, or more discipline. Instead, she reveals why so many creative women feel empty before they ever sit down to paint, write, or make something that belongs to them.

Then she shares a simple practice she calls The Five Minute Bridge, a gentle way to return to your creativity without pressure, perfection, or the need for a full tank.

If you’ve been waiting until you feel more energized, more inspired, or less overwhelmed, this episode offers another path.

“You don’t need more before you begin. You need a bridge back to yourself.”

In This Episode

• Why the tiredness that sleep doesn’t touch is often not a sleep problem.

• The hidden ways we spend our creative energy before the day even starts.

• Why more time isn’t usually the answer.

• How bracing for everyone else’s needs quietly drains us.

• The surprising reason rest alone doesn’t restore creativity.

• The simple three-step Five Minute Bridge practice.

• Why stopping after five minutes is actually the most important part.

• How keeping one small promise to yourself rebuilds creative trust.

Memorable Quotes

“The problem is not how much you start with. The problem is where it goes before it ever reaches you.”

“You cannot fill a cup that is tipped over.”

“The five minutes is not the warm up for the real thing. The five minutes is the real thing.”

“Making does not require a full tank.”

“You are allowed to stop on purpose.”

“The studio is not going to drain you anymore.”

“Keeping faith with yourself is what we’re actually starving for.”

Episode Chapters

00:00 Welcome and today’s conversation about creative energy.

02:15 The myth that energy is simply something we run out of.

05:00 Where your energy actually goes before your day begins.

09:00 Why more rest doesn’t solve the real problem.

11:15 Introducing The Five Minute Bridge.

13:00 The three simple steps.

16:30 Why stopping after five minutes matters most.

20:30 Teaching your nervous system that creativity is safe.

24:00 A personal story from a difficult Tuesday.

30:00 The lesson learned from keeping one tiny promise.

34:00 Your invitation for this week’s practice.

(Times are approximate.)

Your Five Minute Bridge

When you feel like you have nothing left...

1. Set a timer for five minutes.

Not twenty.Not an hour.Just five.

2. Do one true piece of your work.

One brushstroke.

One line.

Mix one color.

Open your sketchbook.

That’s enough.

3. Stop when the timer ends.

Even if you’re just getting started.

Especially if you’re just getting started.

This teaches your nervous system that creating doesn’t require exhaustion.

Reflection Questions

* Where am I giving away my energy before the day even begins?

* What thoughts am I carrying that haven’t even happened yet?

* What if my problem isn’t lack of time, but constant bracing?

* What would change if I trusted five minutes?

* What promise could I keep to myself today?

This Week’s Gentle Challenge

Practice the Five Minute Bridge one time.

Set a timer.

Make one honest mark.

Stop when the timer ends.

Notice what happens, not to your artwork, but to your relationship with yourself.

Then ask yourself:

What would I make today if it only had to last five minutes?

Free Resource

Download Lynn’s printable Five Minute Bridge guide and keep it inside your sketchbook for the days you need a gentle way back to your creativity.

If this episode encouraged you, share it with a creative friend who has been waiting for the “right time” to begin again.

Remember, you don’t need a full tank.

You only need a bridge.

Make Art. Be Happy.

Lynn

MAKE ART BE HAPPY · SHOW NOTES

The Chair You Won’t Sit In

Self-Worth · why you can’t rest, and the belief underneath it.

Episode description

You sit down, and within a minute you’re up again. You finally have the time, and you still can’t take it. If that’s you, this episode is about why, and it isn’t what you think.

Rest that won’t come is not a discipline problem. It’s a belief. Somewhere a long time ago you learned that your turn came last, that stopping wasn’t allowed until everyone else was handled. In this episode I tell the truth about my own version of it, the years I put my art last, the three shapes the belief took, and why my own art is on a break right now. Then I give you a way through, including two free downloads to do the work yourself.

What we get into

• Why “just rest more” never worked, and what’s actually running underneath.

• The three shapes of “I have to earn it”: a worth thing, a time thing, and a purpose thing.

• Why courses and workshops felt safe, and the free afternoon that never came.

• The honest part: why I separated my art from my business, and let it take a break.

• Hand-me-down thoughts, the ones you wear until you spot they don’t fit.

• You can’t control the first thought. You’re responsible for the second and the third.

• Your real listener questions, answered.

Chapter markers

0:00 The chair you keep standing up from

2:00 Why this is a meaning problem, not a discipline one

4:30 My going-last years, and the art table I walked past

8:00 The three shapes: worth, time, purpose

11:30 The honest part: why my own art is on a break

14:00 Hand-me-down thoughts, and the first vs. second thought

16:30 Your questions, answered

20:00 The practice, and where to start

(Adjust times to your final cut.)

Free downloads from this episode

The Hand Me Down. A thought download that helps you sort what’s running through your head: fact or fiction, and handed to you or bought new. The first step to taking off a belief that was never yours.

→ Download The Hand Me Down

The Five-Minute Rest. A short practice for the exact moment you sit down and want to bolt. Keep it where you can see it.

→ Download The Five-Minute Rest

A line to sit with

You didn’t lose yourself. You just learned to go last.

Keep going

New essays and the weekly letter live on Substack. If you’d like to do this work with someone beside you, I take a small number of women one to one inside The Studio. Links below.

Subscribe: Substack link

Work with me: Book a Call

Thank you for listening.

Lynn

You can decide what everyone else needs in a heartbeat. The dinner, the gift, the hard conversation, the right thing for your kid, your friend, your mother. You’re good at it. People count on it.

So why does it go quiet the moment the decision is for you?

The studio time. The price. The no. The yes that isn’t useful to anyone but you. Suddenly you need more information. You want to talk it through one more time. You’re waiting for a sign, a green light, someone to tell you it’s okay.

You’re not indecisive. You already know. You’ve just learned to wait for someone else to say it first.

In this episode we look at where that waiting actually comes from, why it feels safer than choosing, and what changes when you stop asking the room for permission and start trusting the thing you already know.

Nothing has gone wrong here. You’re not behind. You’re one decision away from a different week.

Listen wherever you get your podcasts, or right here.

So before you close this out and let the day swallow the idea, I want to give you somewhere to put it.

I made a little tool. It lives on my website, and it is four questions. They will not talk you into making art. They are there so you can hear your own thinking clearly enough to decide on purpose, the same way we just worked through. And here is the part I love: when you get to the end, it hands the decision straight to your calendar, so the thing you chose actually shows up on the day instead of staying an idea.

It takes about three minutes.

You will find it at lynnhardin.com. Go decide. Then go make something.

I need to share with you what happened this year.

Not because I have it all figured out.

But because I’ve been walking around asking myself how does that happen and I think I finally know.

Fourteen months ago I had a mastectomy.

A small, dark time.

Scary in ways I won’t minimize.

And yet, lying there before surgery, I had this belief.

Not a wish.

A belief.

That I was going to beat this.

That I was going to love my new body.

That I was going to get a tummy tuck out of the deal, go to Paris, go to Scotland, attend art retreats in Idaho, and celebrate turning 70 in the most beautiful way I could imagine.

I just got back from Scotland.

I beat breast cancer.

And I leave for Paris on Wednesday.

How does that happen?

Here’s what I believe: I set my expectations big.

Really big.

Expansive capacity.

I let myself want what I actually wanted, not a smaller, safer version of it.

And then I matched my energy to that belief.

I think when most of us are about to try something new, something scary, something that matters we instinctively set our expectations low.

We do it to protect ourselves from disappointment.

From failure.

And I get it.

That makes complete sense.

But here’s what happens when we match your energy to those low expectations.

And maybe we don’t fail.

Maybe we don’t get hurt.

But we also don’t get the thing you actually wanted.

That big, beautiful, best thing?

We never even give it a real chance.

I’m not special.

Not in any way that makes me immune to hard things.

This year had obstacles.

In January, after I was declared cancer-free, I bled on the table during reconstruction and had to be transfused.

I got an infection.

I’m scheduled for my fifth revision surgery when I get home from Paris.

There were hard days.

There were scared days.

But I never gave up on the big belief. Beat breast cancer. Live another 30 years. Draw on the streets of Paris.

I kept coming back to it. Again and again.

What’s the belief you’ve been keeping small?

I’m not asking so you’ll share it with me, though you can.

I’m asking because I want you to feel the difference between a belief that protects you from disappointment and a belief that actually has room for what you want.

Your creative practice.

Your art.

The work you keep circling.

What would it look like to believe in it — really believe in it — and match your energy to that?

Don’t shrink what you want so you don’t have to feel the disappointment of not getting it.

Expand.

Set the belief so big that your energy has no choice but to rise to meet it.

And when obstacles come and they will come you walk through them.

You face them.

You don’t give up on the belief.

I’ll be in Paris later this week, drawing in the streets.

I’ll keep sharing from there.

Because these beliefs create things.

I’ve seen it.

I’m living it.

And so can you.

With love,

Lynn

This week I read a story about myself.

Halfway through, I realized I didn’t recognize the woman in it.

The article was written after an interview about my reconstruction journey at Hoag Hospital, after not getting the results I had hoped for at another prestigious health center.

I felt grateful they wanted to tell the story.

So I sat down with coffee and began reading.

She sounded broken.

Wounded.

Like someone life had simply happened to.

And I remember pausing and thinking, that’s not quite how it felt.

Because what I remember most is kindness.

Great nurses.

A hug when I walked into the room.

A surgeon looking at me and saying, “I’m going to take care of this. I’m going to take care of you.”

Care everywhere, actually.

Nothing in the article was wrong.

But something in it belonged to an older story my brain knows how to tell.

Years ago, when I was a principal, I often felt unseen. I worked hard. I carried a lot. Somewhere along the way my mind learned a familiar shape for things.

Endure.Push through.Handle it yourself.

Apparently that voice took the interview call.

I didn’t notice at the time.

So I rewrote the article.

Not to fix it.

Just to come back to what felt true.

Because life is rarely this or that.

It’s this and that.

I have known suffering.And I have been deeply cared for.

Both live in me.

But I still get to choose which one leads.

Sometimes nothing changes except the story we decide to live inside.

I was out for a walk today.Same pond.

Same path.

Different body.

Different life.

Almost exactly one year ago, I was here too.

But then, I was walking with a walker after a bilateral mastectomy. One breast removed.

One rebuilt using a flap surgery where they take fat from your belly and rebuild the breast.

I had no idea what I was getting into.

I only knew one thing.My health mattered more than anything else.

This time last year, like so many of us, I was thinking about goals and wishes.

New year energy.

Fresh starts.

But, when your health is shaky, you don’t have a long list of wishes.

There’s an old proverb that says:When you have your health, you have a thousand wishes.When you don’t, you have one.

I had one.

I wanted my health back.

At the time, my thinking wasn’t lofty or poetic.

It was survival thinking.

I just wanted to get better.

I wanted to feel like myself again.

And honestly, there were moments when I lost hope.

People would sometimes say things like, “Don’t get your hopes up.”

I remember thinking, Are you kidding me?I want my hopes all the way up.

Hope was the thing that kept me moving.

I thought it would be one surgery and done.

It wasn’t.

It was a process.

A long one.

A humbling one.

One that asked more from me than I expected.

But inside that wish to get my health back were real actions.

Not affirmations.

Not pretty intentions.

Actual steps that came from managing my mind.

Walking.Changing how I ate.Losing thirty pounds.Managing stress. Writing down my thoughts each morningShowing up to every appointment.Paying attention to my body in a new way.

My driving thought or goal was I am going to beat this.

At the moment I like the word wish more than goal.

When you’re a child and you make a wish, you believe it can come true.

Goals have always felt trickier to me.

Like something I might fail at.

And I know I’m not alone in that.

So many women avoid goals because they don’t want to disappoint themselves again.

A wish feels different.A wish comes from the heart.

And mine came true.

Today, I am in the best health of my life.My relationships are richer.My life feels bigger.My work feels more meaningful.

I’m deeply grateful.

So this year, my wish has changed.

My wish for 2026 is to fulfill my purpose.To have a bigger impact on women who are trying to come back to themselves.To come back to their art.And to stay.

One thing last year taught me is thisHope matters.Gratitude matters.And action matters.

Wishes don’t come true by accident.

They come true because we keep showing up, even when it’s hard, even when we’re scared, even when the path isn’t clear yet.

If you’re holding a wish in your heart today, especially one that feels tender or big or slightly impossible, I want you to know this.

I’m walking proof that wishes can grow into real lives.

Thank you for being part of mine.

With love,Lynn

If this speaks to you

If you’re ready to stop circling your art and actually come back to it, The Practice waitlist is open. It’s a guided space to return to your creativity and learn how to stay. You’re welcome to join us here.

Become a paid subscriber to get the full experience, in-depth guides, printable art practices, behind-the-scenes studio lessons, access to live workshops, and member-only gatherings that nurture consistency, confidence, and joy in your art.

Thank you for being part of this circle. Whether you’re reading for free or supporting as a paid subscriber you help make Make Art Be Happy possible.

SHARE THE WEALTH: Have a friend who does not think they are an artist or fellow artist struggling with a consistent art practice? Gift them a month of paid access with this special link:

I just got back from my grandson’s transitional kindergarten classroom.

There was art.There was relationship.There was that soft, steady feeling that happens when people are making something together.

And it stirred up a memory I haven’t shared in a long time.

My art practice began in 1989.

I was married with a newborn. Elizabeth was just a couple of months old. My oldest son was four. My husband was a hospital administrator in Los Angeles. One afternoon he called and told me he’d had a deep needle stick from a dialysis needle. Because of insurance, he had to be tested.

He tested positive for HIV.

My world went dark.

This was long before rapid tests. It took six months to get results back. Six months of waiting. Imagining. Spiraling. At that time, HIV felt like a death sentence.

People were dying.

We all thought we would.

We didn’t all die. He passed away in 1992.

God was not done with me.

But during that stretch of time, something kept me going.

I didn’t have an art practice yet. I came from crafts and projects, but nothing steady.

I was also in a program for people whose lives were deeply impacted by alcoholism. It was a beautiful program focused on relationships, and relationships have always mattered deeply to me.

There was a woman there, about the age I am now, who said something simple that changed everything:

While you’re going through this, you need something you enjoy. Something that’s just yours.

She told me how ice skating had carried her through her own grief.

That’s when I decided to take up art.

There was a local woman in Costa Mesa who taught watercolor out of her home on Tuesday nights.

What she taught wasn’t just technique. It was body and soul work. It was mindset. It was relationship.

Looking back, it’s strikingly similar to what I teach now.

At night, when everyone was asleep, I would lay big sheets of watercolor paper on the kitchen floor and paint. Completely abstract. Nothing that looked like anything. I wasn’t trying to make art. I was painting feelings. Turning my head off. Letting my hands move when my mind couldn’t.

That was my art practice.

It saved my life then.And it has saved my life many times since.

This is why I care so deeply about art practice now.

We tend to think art is about technique. Taking classes. Learning skills. Watching someone else do it “right.”

And then we wonder why we stop.

Why we hit obstacles. Why we don’t finish. Why we feel disconnected or dissatisfied.

Often, it isn’t the technique that’s missing.

It’s the relationship.

An art practice isn’t just about making something beautiful. It’s about having a place to land when life gets heavy.

A way to stay connected to yourself when your world feels uncertain.

A rhythm that holds you when everything else feels unsteady.

Every time I’ve had an art practice in place, creativity has stayed with me.Every time I haven’t, it has quietly slipped away.

That’s not an accident.

This is why I believe so deeply that art is not a luxury.

It’s a relationship. And when you tend to it, it tends to you right back.

If you’ve drifted away, you’re not broken.You don’t need more discipline.You don’t need more talent.

You just need a way back.

If you are desiring to...

• return to your art consistently

• stop starting and stopping

• create without pressure, guilt, or self judgment

• build a relationship with your art that lasts

I created The Practice for you (and me too)!

If your heart is quietly whispering, “Yes, I’m ready to come back to my art, but I want to do it gently,” then you are warmly invited into the circle of The Practice which begins this Saturday.

If you know of another women who would benefit from having an art practice pass this information on to her.

Love youLynn

P.S.. Whenever You’re Ready

Become a paid subscriber to get the full experience, in-depth guides, printable art practices, behind-the-scenes studio lessons, access to live workshops, and member-only gatherings that nurture consistency, confidence, and joy in your art.

Thank you for being part of this circle. Whether you’re reading for free or supporting as a paid subscriber you help make Make Art Be Happy possible.

SHARE THE WEALTH: Have a friend who does not think they are an artist or fellow artist struggling with a consistent art practice? Gift them a month of paid access with this special link:

Let’s talk about something almost every creative woman has done at least once.

We buy the course.We feel hopeful.We feel excited.We feel like “THIS is the one.”

And then…

We don’t start.Or we start and disappear.Or we finish… and still don’t implement.

And we quietly wonder what’s wrong with us.

Why we buy courses in the first place

Most of the time we’re not buying information.

We’re buying relief.

We’re buying a feeling.

We’re buying the moment our nervous system whispers,“Okay… maybe I’m not stuck forever.”

We buy courses because we want:

A fresh startA new version of ourselvesA promise that this time will be differentA shortcut out of confusionA path that feels safe

Sometimes we buy the course because we miss who we were when we used to create.And buying the course feels like buying our way back.

Why we don’t start (or don’t finish)

Starting is vulnerable.

Starting means we have to meet ourselves again.Not the fantasy version of us who is motivated and organized and calm.

And when we open the course, all kinds of stuff shows up:

PerfectionismOverwhelmFear of doing it wrongComparisonDecision fatigueThe pressure to “do it right” since we paid for itThat familiar voice that says, “If I can’t do it well, I shouldn’t do it at all.”

Plus, real life is loud.

Kids.Work.Health.Family.Appointments.Dinners.Laundry.Text messages.News.A body that wants a nap.

Why finishing still doesn’t mean implementing

This one is sneaky.

Because finishing feels like it should equal change.

But finishing a course and implementing a course are two different muscles.

Sometimes we finish because we’re responsible women.We finish because we’re good students.We finish because we don’t quit.

But implementing requires something else.

It requires repetition.Messy reps.Practice in real life.Awkward early attempts.Discomfort.

Courses are not the problem.

Pressure is the problem.

You don’t need more self discipline.

You need a way back to yourself that feels safe.

A way to practice without performing.A way to return without punishment.A way to do it in small, real life steps.

If this is you

Come spend 90 days with me as you become the woman who makes art through the challenging times in life.

Your mind will become quiet through confusion of when and how to make art and you will feel that joy again of being in the moment.

You will have pride in yourself as you show up for yourself and your art.

The relationship you and your art have will become like visiting an old friend.

After 90 days, your art practice has changed for good, because you finally have the right roadmap.

You will become someone who has the tools to work through any resistance.

You cannot wait to get into the studio or sit at the table and make art.

A steady practice becomes natural.

When you look down at what you made, it feels like coming home.

Your art practice is as daily as brushing your teeth.

If you want to start this year differently, and you want to come back to your art, this is for you.

The practice is now open at the early registration price.

This price is only available for one more week and there are limited spaces.

If this is not you and yet it reminds you of someone else please share this information with them.

With love,

Lynn

Most women who are drawn to art carry a quiet belief.

I am not an artist.Art belongs to other people.I missed my chance.

It often feels like a fact.Something settled long ago.

But that belief did not appear out of nowhere.

It was shaped by childhood moments.A comment in school.A comparison that stung.A paper that did not look right.A teacher who moved on.A feeling of being behind.

So you learned to hesitate.To hold back.To apologize for your work before it even exists.

That does not mean you lack creativity.

It means you learned to leave yourself when things felt uncomfortable.

Most women do not struggle with art because they are untalented.

They struggle because art stopped feeling safe.

Safe to begin badly.Safe to make something small.Safe to stop and return.Safe to stay when doubt or shame shows up.

So the answer is not more motivation.It is not discipline.It is not waiting until you feel confident.

The answer is safety.

Safety to take five minutes instead of an hour.Safety to make one mark instead of a masterpiece.Safety to notice your breath instead of judging the page.

When the stakes are low enough, something soft happens.

Your shoulders drop.Your breath slows.The voice that says you do not belong gets quieter.

Not because the art suddenly looks better.But because you stop asking it to prove anything.

If you think you are not an artist, you are not alone.

And you are not late.

Art does not come back through pressure.

It comes back through permission.

One small honest mark at a time.

Love ya,

Lynn

Thanks for reading Make Art~Be Happy/ Art! This post is public so feel free to share it.

Thank you to everyone who tuned into my live video!

Join me for my next live video in the app.

Most creative women think they need to feel motivated, calm, confident, or inspired before they sit down to make something.

So when they feel tired, anxious, sad, flat, or overwhelmed, they wait.

They scroll.They clean.They overthink.

And the art table stays empty.

What I shared in today’s video is simple and important.

You do not need the right mood to create.You need permission to bring your feelings with you.

DOWNLOAD PRACTICE PAGE

Your art table is a safe place for all of it.Grief.Joy.Anger.Numbness.Hope.

Five minutes is enough.

In the video, I guide you through a gentle feelings check in and a tiny art practice that helps you move emotion through your hands instead of carrying it alone in your body.

Nothing fancy.Nothing performative.Just honest marks on a page.

If your art has felt far away lately, this is your invitation back.

No pressure ever.

Warmly,

Lynn

Most creative women think they are the problem.

Not consistent enough.Too scattered.Too late.

What if the problem is not you but the way it has been named?

Low quality creative problems sound likeI am behindI am lazyI never finish anything

They create shame and very little art.

High quality creative problems sound kinder and more useful.

I want a gentle practice that fits my real lifeI want to rebuild trust with myselfI want to pay attention to what lights me up

One shuts you down.The other opens a door.

I made a short video for you today to help you reframe the creative problem you are actually working on.

No pressure.No fixing.Just a way back.

Download the Practice Page here

Five minutes counts.Returning counts.

You are right on time.Lynn

Thanks for reading Make Art~Be Happy/ Art! This post is public so feel free to share it.

2025 was the hardest year of my life.

Breast cancer.Surgery.Infection.Family layoffs.Illness.

It felt like wave after wave after wave.

There were days I was scared.

Days I was exhausted down to my bones.

And for a while, my art practice slipped away.

But then something quiet happened.

I found my brush again.

Not from motivation.Not from discipline.Just from a gentle pull inside me that said come home.

And when I painted, it didn’t feel like pressure anymore.

It felt like refuge.

So in 2026, I’m laying down the old, torn up brush that tried to prove somethingand picking up the brush that helps me breathe.

Yes, there will still be obstacles.But I’m stronger now. Softer, too.And my art feels like home again.

If your year was heavy, I’m right here beside you.

Here’s to beginning again lightly.

love ya,

Lynn

Make Art~Be Happy/ Art is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

I return shopping carts. Not because I am especially good.But because if I do not, a small voice wakes up.

You are careless. You leave things for others. You are doing it wrong.

That voice is shame. It does not shout. It whispers in ordinary places.Parking lots.Unfinished paintings.Messy tables.

Art hears this voice too.

You should be further along.This should look better by now.If you were really an artist, this would feel easier.

But art is not saying that.Shame is borrowing its voice.

Art is not a report card. It is a place to process what has not been felt yet.

When my art feels heavy or stalled, it is rarely because I am doing it wrong.It is because something in me needs attention.

So sometimes I return the cart.And sometimes I just notice why I feel I have to.

Flow doesn’t arrive fully formed.

It shows up after we begin.

For me, it comes through writing.

I start without knowing where I’m going.

That’s when the words begin to move on their own.m and I clear out what blocks me from my creative rhythm.

I see the same thing with someone I coach, though her doorway is different.

She finds flow through meditation.

The effort softens.

The practice opens.

She isn’t trying to get anywhere else. That’s her rhythm.

Flow isn’t one thing.

It’s personal.

Some of us write. Some of us sit in stillness. Some draw, walk, cook, or listen.

Flow comes when we stop forcing and start staying.

Once you find how you enter it, returning becomes easier.

I’m dying to know what you have found works for you that gets you into your creative rhythm? Leave in the comments below!

Thanks for reading Make Art~Be Happy/ Art! This post is public so feel free to share it.

Sometimes life just feels heavy.

You’re frustrated. You’re tired. You want to cry.

And you don’t feel good in your body or your heart.

In this live, I talk about how to let those emotions move through you without getting stuck in them and how to stop pulling meaning from the past and instead let the future guide your next step.

Thank you to everyone who tuned into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app.

This morning I was walking around our pond.Foggy. Christmas lights still up. The sun trying to break through.

Yesterday my doctor said I could start moving again.After a year of breast cancer.Four surgeries.A body that needed rest more than discipline.

When I was 58, I ran a marathon.I will never do that again.But I am still a runner.

Once you run a marathon, that truth doesn’t disappear just because you pause.

And the same is true with art.

This year my art practice hasn’t looked like it used to.Not consistent.Not scheduled.Not what I wanted.

And I beat myself up for that.I told myself shame filled stories.Catastrophic ones.

Until I stopped.Sat with it.And realized this.

I don’t have to recreate my old practice to begin again.I don’t need perfection.Or discipline.Or a plan.

I can start where I am.

Right now that looks like touching my supplies.Making contact.Letting joy come back before structure.

If life pulled you away.If your body needed your attention.If shame is telling you you lost something.

You didn’t.

You are still an artist.Just like I am still a runner.

You can begin again today.Right where you are.

Thank you to everyone who tuned into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app.

I just posted the first session of Start Where You Are, my five part series for creative women who want to return to their art with more ease and confidence.

Today we talked about creative problems. Not the dramatic ones, but the quiet thoughts that keep us from starting or finishing.

I show you how to turn a low quality problem that shrinks you into a high quality creative problem that grows you.

If you want a tiny homework practiceWrite down your main creative problemRewrite it in a kinder, more interesting wayTake one tiny action that supports it

No pressure. No art police. Just small beautiful shifts that change everything over time.

You are not behind.

You are right on time.

If you need more help reach out to me via DM or smoke signals!

I was in second grade, walking home with a pickle, when the news broke: President Kennedy had been assassinated.

Before that moment, the world felt safe. After that moment—it didn’t. Then came Bobby. Then Martin. A generation was shaken awake, and because of it, women like me could open a credit card without a husband’s signature.

I believe we’re at that line again. Hate is loud. Violence is excused. Even online. But here’s the truth: violence is never justified. Not in politics, not on the playground, not anywhere.

This moment has woken me up as an artist. I will paint. I will write. I will create. And I will say it plain: It is not OK.

Making art is not always easy. It looks like it should be. Children in kindergarten and certainly my grandsons make art with ease whether with a brush, marker, crayon or even a stick out in the yard.

All we must do is grab a brush, press play on that course, make a little something while dinner is in the crockpot.

But the moment we try being creative, something deeper starts stirring.

It’s not just about paint or paper. It’s about us.

It touches all the soft spots—our emotions, our self-worth, our stories.When we try being creative all the old rules about what’s allowed and what’s not come to the forefront of our minds.

And if you’ve been wondering, “Why is this so hard for me?” There’s a good reason. You’re likely carrying a lot.

Maybe a lifetime of putting other people first.(You’ve probably become so good at it that you don’t even realize you’re doing it.) Guilt that bubbles up when you finally sit down to take time for yourself. Fear—real, gut-deep fear—of being judged.

Or worse, that you’ll finally try and realize you’re “not good enough.” (Even though no one ever says what “good enough” actually means.)

Listen and watch the video to learn more!

Make Art~Be Happy is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.