Creative Healing, and Navigating Through Times of Sadness

Do you ever wish you could reach back through time, and just embrace your former self? Because you KNOW everything they're going through. I recently shared a picture of this painting on my socials, and that it was inspired from an excerpt from a journal entry I wrote when I was 20. I'm going to be vulnerable for a quick second, if that's okay. In my journal, I wrote: "I'm unhappy and lonely all the time. I'm afraid this sadness will last forever."

I wrote that in March of 2012. It was my last semester of college, and I was blessed enough to have the opportunity to spend that semester studying art in Rome, Italy. I KNOW, right?! It sounds like a dream. The experience wasnʼt quite the adventure I expected though, because a few weeks into my studies I got Bell's Palsy. If youʼve never heard of Bellʼs Palsy, itʼs a neurological condition that causes partial facial paralysis. The right side of my face became completely paralyzed: like, having to blink my eye with my fingers, food and drink dribbling out of my mouth, and slurring my speech like a gangster in a 1930ʼs movie paralyzed. My Bellʼs Palsy was also accompanied by terrible nerve pain. My face felt like it was full of hot lava, or stinging bees, all the time.

When I got Bellʼs Palsy I became self-conscious and ashamed of the way I looked and sounded. So I withdrew and, Iʼll admit it, hid from everyone. I was really sad, and really lonely.

We all go through tough stuff. I'm a firm believer that it's okay to struggle, and it's okay to be sad. Those times are often when we grow, and find out just how strong we really are.

This painting is about having your heart trapped in sadness, made of stone; and then being reawakened with new life. It's part of the new collection that I'll be exhibiting at Beggar's Table Gallery this July 3, and August 7. I'd love for you to come and see the whole collection.

Prints of "Heart of Stone" are available NOW in my online shop.

SHOP PRINTS

If you're walking through your own season of sadness, feeling like your heart is made of stone, it will not last forever. And you don't have to walk through it alone. Take care of yourself, and each other, friends.