Yesterday was my first day in my kind of kindergarten. Hooray! I learned how to use a pencil, and how to color. I was told that I can color outside the lines, but also learned that there are tricks to coloring inside the lines.
Seriously! I do feel that I'm just starting to learn and expand in a fantastic world that I only recently became aware of. Yesterday I took a class on the wonderful Skillshare platform. It’s a site that has an abundance of classes for just about anything creative that you’re interested in learning. For me it is digital art.
About two years ago, I created a series of sketches that I recently hand painted onto a set of plates to give as a gift to someone who is beyond dear to me. I would love to be able to create a set for myself as well as be able to gift it to others. However, I knew that I was not ready to spend the days and hours required to hand paint each set over and over.
This realization led me to explore the schools of digital art with the goal of learning how to transfer and/or recreate my sketches in a digital format so that I can submit them to companies who print on demand. Meaning, they take your design and apply it to your choice of the products that they already carry, such as a mug, plate, t-shirt and so on. This way, I would not only have the option of gifting, but also have the opportunity to sell my designs on multiple products, if I chose to do so. How cool is that?!
I wasn’t sure where to begin. However as often happens when we get extremely set on an intention, our Creator send the right people our way and lights our path ahead.
A quick scroll on social media one day brought an ad my way. It was for CPS, the Creative Powerhouse Studio, a membership site that opens only twice a year, run by the same artist who is the talented owner of the online shop Gingiber.com. The timing was such that I had only a few days to decide before registration window shut. I was a bit skeptical, never having heard of it before, however when I noticed the founder’s name I got the chills.
Months ago I had chosen the name “Bloomfield Designs” for my collective designs of floral sketches, the ones I created as well as others I hope to add to the collection. (The inspiration for the name came from a drive I used to often take past a town named Bloomfield, in New Jersey.)
So, when I read that the CPS founder’s name was Stacie Bloomfield, I could hardly believe my eyes! I took it as a loving push from Above and immediately signed up. It was one of those intuitive moments not based purely on logic. I knew there was something greater at play here. I felt as if I was in a river being propelled forward by the strong flow of energy within the water. I looked up in pure trust and mouthed the words Thank You.
The membership site is exactly what I was hoping for and more. I feel as if I’m in in a school of likeminded creative students. Many are in “higher grades” than I am, successfully running their own businesses in this field. I have admiration for all these wonderful women going after their dreams. Tips and feedback are shared generously with one other. This is how I found out about Skillshare, from a comment shared by fellow CPS member Danielle Welke in response to a helpful question by Sharia Greenwood Morton. Thank you both!! It is on this platform that I literally just took up learning how to use Procreate, a digital illustration platform.
Which brings me back to the start of this post. Here I am on day two on Skillshare, learning how to get comfortable drawing with my iPencil on the first iPad I ever owned. Having painted murals for years did not prepare me for this electronic pencil. I am learning how to draw in a completely new way, using tools that were foreign to me, until just yesterday. I get a kick out of imagining that Michelangelo might have been a bit befuddled by it at first, as well ;)
Though I was a bit nervous at first, and slightly overwhelmed by the choices of “schools” out there (Adobe Illustrator, Affinity, Procreate...), once I made a decision to start, I began to find “kindergarten” to be fun and exciting - and I’m loving Procreate (it’s so cool!!) and all the new friends I am making at CPS.
I joined a peer support group that meets once a month so we can support each other on our personal paths to success. We each bring our personal experiences, curiosity, willingness to learn, work and play - all keys to success in anything we want to take on and learn in life, no matter what stage, no matter what age!
If you’re are intrigued by anything mentioned here, are thinking about exploring a new creative path or otherwise, please do share. Know that if you are drawn towards mastering something new, even though you are so far from owning it yet, there is a reason for that pull inside you. Perhaps it is part of your purpose, as well as joy our Creator wants you to embrace in your life.
Be courageous enough to start kindergarten again. The gold stars your heart will earn will make your soul sing and dance.
With gratitude to Stacie Bloomfield and all the wonderful educators and creators out there, working to bring more light and joy into the lives of many.
LL
PS. If you are interested in any of the above mentioned for your own personal journey, do reach out. I love to share :)
PS. For those of you wondering how this fits with my coaching, and currently advanced coach training with Positive Intelligence, I will share that for me that balance is crucial. Art is a part of my heart.
With that said, I admit that I felt a bit overwhelmed at first, with all I took on for myself. I had to quickly readjust my perspective and schedule, so that I kept my art as a form of play; as a “want to” and not a “have to.” That has made all the difference for me, in so many areas of my life. Letting it go and letting it flow.