When I was young I took an empty paper towel roll and made a telescope as a gift for my step-dad’s 40th birthday… I have always loved making gifts for others, but you see I didn’t have any money being 11 years old. However, I sure did have an imagination and I saw such potential in that gorgeous paper roll. I could see the magic in so many things that others would often discard.

I ended up giving him a whole themed gift that year of things that I had repurposed and made by hand. Yet, that gift that I was so excited about…well…I could tell it was not received the way I anticipated. Although he engaged with the gifts for the photos my mom was taking, I could sense that he did not care for it. Let’s just say he wasn’t going to be using it to look at the stars that evening.

I was crushed.

That was the moment I began to stop believing in my creativity and perhaps even on a deeper level, my own confidence and self worth.

It might seem extreme, but surely I’m not the only one whose life was impacted by someone else’s words or actions.

Can you relate?

That was a pivotal moment for me. My creative paper towel roll telescope world was broken.

Now, don’t get me wrong. While I do think these life experiences can crush or dull the creativity in us, it can’t ever be fully extinguished. I never stopped seeing the beauty in disregarded things. You may see me picking up random “trash” in the streets, frequenting thrift stores buying the next awesome thing that I may one day use for this art/photography project that has still yet to be born…I see the potential, it’s my magical super power.

But here is the clincher, since that gift giving moment I had a really hard time believing that what I created was something that others would like, much less want.

Creating to create, just for the sake or the fun of it, became debilitating. As much as my soul wanted to express itself, I would often be frozen (also known to some as perfectionism). And yet, despite my fears, I still ended up pursuing photography as a career. You know the “creative career”… It started with the love to shoot just to shoot. The things that I gravitated to most of all to photograph were old abandoned and disregarded places and things. Often what people would overlook was what I most treasured. Seeing a pattern here?

I photographed these things and they would light me up! I felt alive and connected to my creative nature. It was like I was a kid again making my paper towel roll telescope. And that’s why I do the work I do…

I help my clients tap into their most creative selves, their confidence and self-worth, in other words - their unique beauty! Through art, photography, teaching, coaching, and creative exploration, I pair my love for forgotten things with people who at some level have felt forgotten or overlooked too. I found that through this process, the magic happens, healing takes place, creativity flourishes, with me AND my clients. They see, sometimes hesitantly, but they see their unique beauty! And holy hell, it is FANTASTIC MAGIC!

I’m not going to lie and say that my confidence was fully restored the moment I first picked up a camera or jumped back into art. It was a process of many years, but my experience has taught me that it CAN be done, and that with a little support (from someone like me who’s been there, done that), regaining and reclaiming your creativity and confidence is FUN, empowering, liberating, and deeply healing.

Are you ready to unleash your creativity and all the beauty that comes with it? Because regardless if you feel you can barely draw a stick figure, I promise that if you take a closer look, you’ll find that YOU ARE CREATIVE (or as I like to spell it - URCRE8V 😄)