Creative Resilience: Your SUPERPOWER
This message helped me climb out of a recent spiral around a creative business "failure." May it be of benefit!
Inspiration is constantly communicating with us. Yet, learning how to listen to its guidance is a skill and artform in and of itself- one that requires discernment (gained through actually getting out there and having experiences) —and one that seems to grow and evolve right alongside us.
I know all too well how challenging it can be to listen, to stay tethered to a sense of inner direction, when you’re met with failure and caught in spirals of despair or frustration—
—and that’s why I’m sharing this article- as a reminder to self, and an offering to the part of you who sees yourself within this part of me- the part who isn’t immune to the very thing I have so much passion around teaching: RESILIENCE.
What might emerge when “failures” are recognized as somehow, some way, in support of our dreams?
(Untitled - Oil on Canvas - 2007)
Descansos, inspired by Women Who Run With the Wolves, Handmade journal paper on Found Map, Red Thread, 2025
A few weeks ago, this video helped me find my way out of a gnarly spiral around a recent creative business “failure.”
Featuring Jerry Colona from reboot.io, the video was shared with me through a conversation I had shared seven years earlier with Rob Yaffee, an inspiring entrepreneur who left a legacy of impact in the PVD community, pioneering food as medicine in the 70’s, who departed his physical body in late 2024.
I once asked Rob how he managed to stay so grounded as a CEO of multiple successful restaurants with so many spinning plates. As a long-time meditator, our conversation planted seeds of my own inward journey - and this video is one of the practical resources he shared with me.
Re-listening to it got me thinking about what it means to keep walking the talk of one of the topics I get so fired up around sharing with others.
It also got me thinking about how resilience is a superpower of Artists, and how cultivating resilience is an art as unique as the artist themselves.
Here are a few thoughts on cultivating creative resilience, some inspired through the video- I’d love to hear yours in the comments!
DEPERSONALIZE
Listening to this talk knocked me off my pedestal in remembering that while the journey is unique to the individual, there’s nothing special about the pain points of failure. Anyone who dares to truly live is going to be met with their own flavors of “failure” - and yet, how we relate TO failure, and the self-sabotaging narratives, can essentially be portals to reclaiming and embodying more of our power and creative essence.
It humbled me to realize how much the “specialness” I’d subconsciously assigned to my failures was the very thing keeping me stuck!
YOUR HEART IS THE COMPASS/YOUR BODY IS THE MAP
In the age of technology, it’s easier than ever before to hide away behind screens, swiping, and endless sources of disembodied “knowledge” - losing touch with our body’s felt sense of inner knowing.
Embodiment doesn’t live in textbooks or on screens- it emerges through the courage it takes to wholeheartedly show up, FEEL, LIVE, MOVE, and accept that along the path of growth, “mistakes” are an inevitable part of the journey. There’s no substitute for direct experience- and, as one of my teachers Tom Gilette often shared with the Eyes of the World community, what you practice gets stronger.
KEEP WALKING THE WALK
Even when it feels like all you can do is crawl.
Just because I teach resiliency strategies, does NOT make me immune to self sabotaging patterns!!
“If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.”
―Gospel of Thomas
I first heard this quote 11 years ago when I was introduced to Steve Cope’s The Great Work of Your Life: A Guide for the Journey to Your True Calling and the words moved me deeply. Hearing them again in this video was a fan to the flame.
During one of my darkest periods, artmaking seemed to further inflame and perpetuate the physical & mental violence I was inflicting upon myself. The patterns have haunted me even in recent years with art business failures.
Yet, discovering yoga during art school in 2005 catalyzed my life’s work- it initiated my journey of dismantling patterns of internalized oppression and quite literally painting a more empowered self-image into being.
It’s these intentions that make the Emergence deck, which spans more than 12 years of inward journeying via artistic expression, resonate in the way that it does for people.
OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH FAILURE DETERMINES THE DIRECTION OF OUR LIVES
…& it’s never too late to chart a new course
There truly is no other substitute for getting out there and LIVING and trying things out- and even the smallest steps we muster in service of living, in cultivating our life force while we’re alive- are to be celebrated.
5. CELEBRATE THE SMALL WINS
If your inner critic is anything like mine, it can be all too easy to overlook the small wins. We’re neurologically wired to bypass the small ways we’re growing - meaning the opportunities to acknowledge and bring intention to our day to day actions are more important than ever before!
Making a daily habit of acknowledging the smallest wins and forgiving ourselves takes EFFORT- AND, it can change your entire life- and nervous system!
While many artists may consider themselves to be may be highly sensitive, I don't think we give ourselves enough credit for how strong we are in how we keep showing up and facing, and most especially, feeling- what's in front of us - when it’s all too easy to look away.
With my own tendency towards self-criticism and rumination, I want to know what our world would be like if more artists, and people in general, took regular inventory of all the ways they have been showing up- especially when times feel so tough and the world feels overwhelmingly heartbreaking- especially when it's painful to look.
Inspiration is constantly communicating with us. And yet, when we’re inside of a shame spiral or blinded by overwhelm, it can be so hard to feel grounded, let alone, to listen to that inner guidance.
How do you come back to center? How do you stay grounded? What helps you remember to be gentle with yourself within?
What helps breathe life back into your creative flame when it feels dulled down to an ember?
What if you could begin again with this next breath?