Lattes & Art

Authenticity, Fearless Creativity, and Becoming You

• James William Moore • Season 2 • Episode 4

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In this illuminating conversation, writer and creative Tiffany Smith joins host James William Moore to explore the messy, beautiful process of becoming your authentic self. From filtering our lives to fit expectations to learning how to silence inner critics, Tiffany shares her journey toward creative freedom—one rooted in vulnerability, healing, and radical self-acceptance.

Together, they discuss the courage it takes to be you, how to stop chasing perfection, and why true art often begins when we let go of control. Tiffany also opens up about her upcoming short film, her philosophy of turning the invisible into the visible, and how re-parenting ourselves as adults can unlock our most powerful creative voices.

A soulful, inspiring episode that reminds us: your story matters, your light has value, and imperfection is where real artistry begins.

Links for Tiffany Smith: https://www.instagram.com/creatiffity22/

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James:

Welcome to Lattes & Art, presented by J-Squared Atelier. This is the place where we have conversations around creativity, brewed one sip at a time. I'm your host, James William Moore, artist, curator, and a little over caffeinated this morning. Today's guest is someone whose words and wisdom cut straight through the noise. Tiffany Smith is a writer and creative whose work feels like a manifesto for authenticity, exploring what it means to create without filters, to find your voice in a world full of noise, and to make peace within perfection. In this episode, we're going to talk about learning to believe in yourself long before the world catches up. The power of vulnerability. And how to bridge the invisible with the visible through art. So grab your favorite coffee, settle in, and let's dive into conversation. That's as real and refreshing as it gets. Tiffany, thank you so much for joining us today. I'm excited to get into this conversation with you.

Tiffany:

Me as well. I've been looking forward to this. So I'm excited to see what we'll what we'll dig up in the weeds of creativity.

James:

I look forward to it. The writing that you do, it sort of feels like a manifesto for authenticity. Am I getting that right?

Tiffany:

That sounds pretty accurate. And it's something that I've been leaning towards more um since my move to New York, which has been just a little over four years now. And since then I've been kind of wanting to almost find a structure or way to communicate on an authentic level. I I kind of suffered from what a lot of people suffer from when they're first starting out. And I overly filtered myself, especially in any type of email reach out or getting into someone's DM or just reaching out in general, whether it's a platform, email, phone. And I just kind of had that habit of too much filtering and not enough, you know, this is who I am, and let's be human.

James:

Well, and you know, society has kind of brought us to this filtered concept, right? We have filters on our cameras when we take selfies and when we're on Zoom, so we look better. And so yeah, that filtering is everywhere. And do you feel society kind of pushes us to that?

Tiffany:

You know, it's interesting that you bring that up because I've kind of witnessed this interesting contrast recently. Because when you when you think about how people communicate even within uh the realm of professional emails, like we all like stare at that email for like an hour and rewrite it over and over again and try to structure it. And we know it's we know we're gonna be judged. And so there's there's this professional filtering, and then there's this filtering that takes place on this more human level within the social media platforms, and I find that the filtering that I typically see somewhere like TikTok, LinkedIn, or Instagram, for example, this filtering of the physical surface level, and maybe even the short bio is a little bit filtered. But then I see people on, you know, they they make their kind of stories in their Instagram or they'll hop on TikTok and they'll share something really authentic about themselves. So it's interesting how we're in this kind of like balancing act. It's like we're all trying to balance, we're all trying to grow up a little bit.

James:

So you mentioned moving to New York a few years ago. Was that part of what brought you to kind of reevaluating even filters you were using? Was there something that inspired you to get rid of that stuff?

Tiffany:

Absolutely. Yeah. That there was a big kind of push. I shouldn't even say a push, it was more of this big pool that kind of came in and surfaced to move to New York City and kind of follow that path. And once I made that decision and you know that you're up against deciding the path that's least taken, the path, you know, versus the path of least resistance. You're going into the forest, walking the tightrope with the blindfold, and you don't know what's gonna happen next. So when I made that big leap and that big jump for my kind of authentic aligned path, it almost forced me to keep going. You know, it was like if you're gonna make a choice like this, then you're also gonna need to be eating the foods that feel right, or you're gonna, you know, your sleep schedule has to fit for you, or the way you speak or introduce yourself has to be you. It just kind of went into everything.

James:

Before we jump into this idea of a creative awakening, I wanna ask you. You made a statement in some of the writings that I went through that you have to believe in yourself long before the world catches up. Can you explain that?

Tiffany:

Yeah, you know, I very much came from a really, really isolated situation. I grew up kind of telling myself that my personality, quote unquote, was someone who wasn't very social and someone that didn't connect to people. And I was fully convinced of this. But what I didn't understand is that I had my vision and my creative passion. And I I believed in that myself, but I was fully surrounded by people that were either not sharing in that type of you know, path that I can relate to, but also more importantly, I wasn't really sharing it with anyone either. I was just kind of keeping it to myself. But there there are a couple kind of points to that because yes, it is important to kind of practice that self-love, love and appreciate, respect yourself, create your own sense of harmony and peace, and then you kind of bring that light into the world, right? That's kind of the idea. So, yes, absolutely believe in yourself. You don't really need the validation from other people. But at the same time, when given the opportunity to share and be authentic with other people, take advantage of that too, because you don't always know who your supporters are if you're not sharing anything. So maybe there are other people that believe in you too.

James:

Well, and how true that is, right? Like many times as artists, we find ourselves we kind of isolate away from things because we get into our headspace. But when we keep ourselves from that, we sort of miss out hearing who the fan club might be.

Tiffany:

Absolutely. Yeah, we we just assume it's not there for a long time, too.

James:

Right? I mean, it's like, oh, look, there are people that support and actually appreciate what I'm doing. And if we don't put ourselves out there, we often don't hear that.

Tiffany:

Right. And then we go into telling ourselves stories, right? You know, it's fun. Then we just are in our own heads criticizing ourselves.

James:

You say that you didn't chase inspiration, it found you. How did that happen?

Tiffany:

I've always had creative visions that have surfaced, uh, mind's eye, I guess, is a way to say it. Since I was five years old, I have always had these big visions of stories and film and creations and random flashes of design kind of pop into my head sometimes. So it all just surfaces. I don't really know where it comes from. Uh I guess it comes from somewhere, but I I don't try to make it happen. I don't really look for inspiration. I just kind of it just happens.

James:

Isn't it interesting when we don't force something? Like so many times we are locked into, I've got to create, I've got to do something.

Tiffany:

Yeah.

James:

And and when we kind of take a breath and step back, is that what you're sort of talking about? That you're not pushing it, you're not forcing it, you're it's manifesting in some of the most random ways and places.

Tiffany:

Yeah, absolutely. And I think maybe that may be something that, you know, I I maybe just have the fortune of that too, because I've never known the other side of that. I've only known um since I was little my whole life, um, random things just kind of surfacing. So, you know, and I've never practiced it. So it's it's not even something that I can say, well, here's here's the process, right? If I'm given some type of creative project or assignment, I go, you know, this is my mantra, and I go into this dark room and like I don't really have that process. But I really do just allow things to serve it's it's it's just the way that I've always been. So it's funny because I don't think I know the other side of that.

James:

Well, it's gotta feel pretty good because I've I myself and I know several artist friends that will get wrapped up in something and we miss that opportunity to find it because we've already preconceived it's supposed to be this way, and this is where creativity is gonna come from. Dang it.

Tiffany:

No, don't do that. Yeah, it's it's it's kind of like, you know, if you were gonna practice graphic design, for example, and you just wanted to play in that world, and you were just simply organizing some spheres or circles on your you know, illustrator window. You know what I mean? It's just kind of if if you're used to just playing and you're just used to creativity surfacing and being fun and coming together in a flow, I would I would recommend that as the process. I I am of course gonna recommend that people try that.

James:

Well, when when we came into COVID all those years ago now, and my art, I'm a photographer, I stage and manage and direct scenes, I'm not looking for that spontaneous moment really. And I ran into a situation that I couldn't be around people. We had lockdown, and and I'm sitting here going, what do I do? Where do I go? And in those moments, it's like this panic because I knew how it worked, and now it doesn't. And I think through that I experienced a level of creativity because it was suddenly popping into my head. I didn't have all that other noise going on. So it was quite exciting. It gave me a whole new avenue to go down, which now, you know, a handful of years later, I'm still doing that. And it's actually turned into one of the biggest works of my practice since I started. So it, you know, yeah, I like this idea of, you know, let's be random, let's see what happens, let's take a breath.

Tiffany:

Absolutely. And just really not caring so much about the limitations, you know. But like, who who told you that there were limitations when it came to even designing something as simple as a birthday card, for example, like just anything, like, oh, I'm planning this party for my friend. Who told you that it had to be this traditional thing? Like, what's purpose thing for you? What sounds fun? You know, it doesn't have to fit anything, it's it's just something that you're creating.

James:

Well, and you know, I teach and I tell students in my art classes, art has no rules, but I kind of forget that sometimes. It's like I have rules.

Tiffany:

Right. We live in structure, you know. I mean, I'm I'm currently developing my first short film, and it's it's specifically being created to submit to Tribeca. And I'm now going through that process where I'm kind of storyboarding right now, and I'm telling myself, you know, there are no rules, but at the same time, there is a structure here. Like, you know, you you can create the structure, you know, it can be your structure, but there does have to be a structure. So it's interesting.

James:

So now I want to jump into something that you talk about using art to bridge the invisible with the visible. What does that mean for you in your own practice? Like you're talking about this opportunity to create this film for Tribeca. How does that manifest for you?

Tiffany:

A lot of kind of connecting the invisible to the visible, a lot of it is bringing things into reality. So think about, you know, if we want to go with the term soul level or, you know, inner calling or that inner kind of compass voice, frequency, the different types of layers that we kind of move within energetically as we exist, right, in a universe. Whatever is calling to you, whatever is pulling, as that emerges and surfaces, maybe you have some of the visuals kind of come in, right? Making the invisible the visible is that entire process because it still has to come without shame. It has to come without judgment, it has to come without limitations. If something is surfacing for a film for you and you start judging it, well, what if people don't like it? Well, what if someone watches it halfway through and they have something to say about it that doesn't make me feel so great? If you start coming at it in that way, when it's still in that invisible realm, what you're gonna bring into the visible is not gonna be authentic because you've already prejudged it. So that kind of process and practice is bring the invisible into the visible, you know, bring your bring your light into the reality of the world as a something that you've but you've actually created without judging it so much.

James:

It's one of those things too, right? That we're our worst critics.

Tiffany:

Yeah, absolutely.

James:

So yeah, this idea that we are our worst critics really does stop us from experiencing what you're talking about.

Tiffany:

Yeah, you know, something that a lot of people have really touched on lately. And I I've maybe I'm just hearing it more and more. It's one of those things like you buy a red car, you see red cars everywhere. But there's this conversation revolving around reparenting yourself and rewiring your brain as an adult and understanding where those stories are coming from. So when you find yourself going through that critique and you you're constantly saying, I'm my own worst enemy, I'm always standing in my own way, and I'm always my biggest critic, where is it coming from? You know, it's like taking a pause to that and kind of looking at it, observing it, unpacking it. And then that's kind of like moving towards or leaning towards the hope of I'm gonna stop criticizing myself so much, and instead I'm gonna practice love and acceptance and you know, not shame over every idea that I have.

James:

You know, I want to touch on something and tell me if this isn't the right place for it. But, you know, you talk about um in some of your writings, your family and such, and that you owe them nothing but truth. Is this where that's coming from?

Tiffany:

Yeah, absolutely. You know, I I definitely was brought up in a in a somewhat broken family dynamic. And it it just wasn't what I wouldn't consider it to be healthy. It it seemed more, you know, survival, like a lot of people kind of living in survival mode and just kind of becoming an adult and understanding that I'm responsible for my present and my future. And there is no blame, right? It's not they're wrong or they didn't do XYZ. They're their own people as individuals and their own experiences. And now it's my kind of responsibility to kind of rewire a little bit, uh, unpack and practice the kind of I accept that that's how I grew up, but it, you know, you don't let it follow you. So you just kind of rewire, rewire a little bit.

James:

That you're talking about does this help you then heal something that might have been from childhood that you recognize? Because you said about parenting yourself now. I I like that. That just feels so much that it's healing as a process.

Tiffany:

Absolutely. It's it's been a it's been an incredibly healing journey for me to, in, in kind of a sense, take responsibility and ownership as an adult in my life, right? And acknowledge that myself and everyone else doesn't have control over how they were brought up. We don't all have control over the the small chapter of our childhoods. And I think a lot of people tend to carry their childhood with them throughout their entire life journey. What I'm yeah, and I'm definitely trying not to do that, essentially. Basically just trying to avoid that.

James:

I think you're right that we all have that, right? There's things that happen in our childhoods, and I like to think that I had a pretty stable environment, but I know there were things about it that weren't building the best me coming up of for authenticity, at least who I am today.

Tiffany:

Yeah.

James:

So yeah, I I just think that when you can find something like that that helps you kind of process and get beyond it, that's sort of amazing.

Tiffany:

Yeah, it's it's kind of like a superpower. If you want to find you know your own little superpower internally, that's that's definitely a way to kind of go about it, where it's just kind of if I take ultimate responsibility for the way I view the world and the stories I tell myself as an adult, who is aware um, then I get to walk with that type of confidence and reassurance, right? Versus someone did something and it's someone else's fault that I that I'm bad at math, you know, I didn't learn right because of someone else, or you know.

James:

Well, and that just kind of leaps into this next one. You in your writings had this Dolly quote, have no fear of perfection, you'll never reach it.

Tiffany:

Yeah.

James:

Talk to me about this. I love this.

Tiffany:

You know what it reminds me of? The thing that really pulls me towards that quote is the fact that we remain students. We're never, we never can know and absorb everything. We can't ever, we we can't even fully create everything that we ever want to create. So there this idea of perfection, when we all remain students to the death of our life, just doesn't exist. It perfection simply doesn't exist. It just can't.

James:

Well, and how many of us, you know, me included, that we look at this isn't perfect. So I'm not gonna put it out there.

Tiffany:

Yes. Yeah, a lot of people go through something like imposter syndrome and imperfection of I'm gonna I'm gonna start posting to social media, you know, every day. Well, I'll start it next week because I don't like what I created this week. And yeah.

James:

Well, and we sit in studios and we sit in our little writing dens or, you know, wherever our creative space happens to be. And again, it gets back to what we talked earlier. If we don't ever put it out there, how's it ever going to get out there?

Tiffany:

Right. Release the rough cuts. Yeah. I mean just put it out there because we're all trying to find people that we truly authentically connect to. And it's something that we all crave. It's it's part of the human experience. We all want connection. Um, connection doesn't always exist in your home. It doesn't always exist, you know, with the neighbors you're currently surrounded by. Sometimes it's connection from another state, another city, uh, a community you've never even, you know, heard about, but they found you somewhere because you decided to share something.

James:

I like that you use this quote and it talks about no fear. And just imagine, as we as artists, if we were to actually approach those things with no fear, where could we get?

Tiffany:

Yeah, you would, you know, you would get the essence of of you, essentially, right? You would get the the no shame, the no judgment, the no heavy critiquing perfectionism. Does this fit in the industry? Is this competitive to the standards of XYZ? Who are my competitors? What are they doing? You take all that away, that noise. You you get you. You you're basically birthing on some level a creation of yourself.

James:

Well, and that just popped into my head, this self. How many of us actually don't know who we are?

Tiffany:

Yeah.

James:

Right?

Tiffany:

We've got yeah.

James:

Filters, striving for perfection. We've got imposture syndrome. You know, we we've talked these things, but it still gets back to if we don't know who we are, how do we, you know, we got to push through this. We need to figure that out. That's kind of a key piece so that we can be not only authentic to the world, but to our own selves.

Tiffany:

Absolutely, because there's something that just, you know, we carry a lot of moments throughout our lives that just quote unquote don't feel right. And we don't always take the time to unpack why something just doesn't feel right. And that process is kind of what you're speaking to, knowing yourself, figuring out who you are. You have to be able to have that kind of bravery and courage to approach those moments and those, because sometimes it's just something small. You go to someone's, you know, dinner party and they serve something and it's something just doesn't feel right. You don't want to eat something or you don't want to be around, you don't want to sit next to someone for whatever reason. It's kind of just like paying attention to those little pieces to figure out, you know, what's really going on.

James:

So, Tiffany, what is it that you hope then for all of us to gather from this?

Tiffany:

What I would advocate for the most, and the thing that I've been kind of leaning towards as I've had these types of conversations, is the simplicity of be you. Because as simple as that is, the be you tackling it is massive. The amount of work to put in to truly be you takes a lot of courage. It takes a lot of fighting shame and old stories, and I'm not good enough, and this isn't perfect, and that places on this social level, and I'm on this other social level, and all of those judgments and every way we tear ourselves down, it's taking away from who you are essentially. So if you can just practice the be you, you can maybe start the journey, which in itself is a healing process, but it's also an un unraveling and a and a reveal at the end of it of you know your true nature and your true you.

James:

I was out, of course, doing some research and digging around. And is this where your creativity comes from? I saw you your Instagram, I saw that you have this creativity.

Tiffany:

Yeah.

James:

Is that the impetus for this?

Tiffany:

You know what? It's it's almost like I came up with that when I was in college. It was through the assignment of creating my own brand identity. So part of the assignment was create your own logo, think of some type of label or name that you can kind of market. Um so that kind of tied into that. And as a student, I definitely was leaning towards self-discovery. I mean, I was also attending an art school, you know, majoring in creative spaces. So it wasn't too far away from what I was surrounded by, I would say, to come up with something that felt authentic, like connecting my name to the word creative. But yeah, I think, you know, that was definitely maybe like a seed, you know, one of the seeds planted um early on for sure.

James:

Nice. You talk about protecting your vision sometimes from your own self. What are we protecting it from?

Tiffany:

That really comes from vulnerability. So when my vision includes telling my story and that story is vulnerable, it's really easy for me to kind of, well, how can I make this so abstract that people don't know that I'm in there? You know? So it's it's kind of like, well, what was your original vision? Because if your original vision was to share the vulnerable and to be honest and truthful, and you make it too abstract where you don't actually exist within the piece at all, then you, you know, you kind of have to. You didn't really fully go there.

James:

What advice could you give someone who might be standing at this sort of moment in their practice and their creativity, in their work life, even. And they're torn between the practical and being authentic.

Tiffany:

I would say if you find yourself kind of looking in the mirror, I think even Steve Jobs made a quote like this. You look at your, you find yourself looking in the mirror too many days in a row and you don't like what's going on, you need to change it. I think that's that's a really great way to kind of put that. It's it's very much, you know, it ties into everything. It ties into your relationships, your work, the your chosen career, the education you've taken on, the house you live in, uh, your diet, your everything, the type of workout you, you, you're involved with. It taps into everything. So in order to find your authentic you, in order to be you, you have to really fight those battles. And it comes with a lot of feeling alone sometimes because not everyone's going to support the transformation of you becoming you. There may be some people that feel it's very impractical, that you're being too risky, that you're throwing money away. Why would you go study in France when you have a perfectly great job here? Well, because that's what I want to do, and that's what I feel called to do, and I want to go do that. Really, really practicing that kind of ear towards yourself and your own inner voice and really understanding what the noise is versus who you are.

James:

Do you actually offer help to people? Because you know, you've you have these amazing life lessons that we've talked about today. And so many times we miss out on that. Like, is this a service you do?

Tiffany:

Wow, that's well, that's thank you. That's very flattering. I don't. I yeah, I don't, I don't do any coaching or anything. It was something that I had thought about at one point, and then I just started to create film instead.

James:

Well, I'm really excited to see the film that you bring forth from all of this. I, you know, I'm definitely gonna follow you and see where that heads because I love the idea of an independent movie. I love all of those sorts of things and seeing the creativity that gets brought to the table through that.

Tiffany:

Yeah, absolutely. I'm I'm excited for this process. I kind of see it as a win win situation because at the end of the day, even if the people of power of Tribeca do not, you know, maybe they view a few seconds of what I submit. You know, I know it's a big process and it's it's a heavy lifting for that team for sure. There are thousands of submissions, but it's it's it's a win. Win, right? Because I'm still going through the process of creating the film. So it's that journey.

James:

Well, and there's something to be said about just being on the journey.

Tiffany:

Absolutely.

James:

Right? It reminds us we're alive.

Tiffany:

Right. And then, you know, in the moment of even just something as simple as I'm gonna take on some storyboarding, you know, today, and then you get locked on something and you start judging yourself, and you go through maybe I need to sit in the bath for a little while, or maybe I need to go take a walk or take a nap. And you know, we we we still go through the the journey of emotions, and you know our our humanity and old stories still like to, you know, be triggered and talk back when they feel like they need to be a brat and throw a tantrum sometimes.

James:

Tiffany, as we start to wrap this up, is there anything that you want to leave us with as some final thoughts?

Tiffany:

I definitely grew up feeling I had, you know, I had my vision and I had my creativity and I had my ambitions with that, and that's the biggest thing that has driven me throughout my entire life. But I definitely experienced feeling like, you know, why would I share my story or why would I go to that group of people and join into their conversation, or you know, that community is already set, they don't need me to be involved. And I definitely felt like I was in the way a lot growing up. And I would definitely tell everybody that is not true. You definitely deserve space. The world absolutely values you and loves you, and there is community here for everybody, and there's a place for everyone, and everyone's voice matters, and your perspective is still you, and it's still special, and it's the value is you. If you can find a way to be you, you're sharing a big light in the world.

James:

That is an amazingly beautiful thought. Thank you for that, Tiffany. Thank you so much for being with us today and opening up and talking to us about this creativity and not pushing it and authenticity of yourself. I've really enjoyed our time.

Tiffany:

Likewise, this was amazing. I had such a fun conversation with you. This was great. I feel like I I had I was able to kind of release some some stuff too. Like I was able to kind of, you know, it was it was nice to share. It was nice to just kind of be in this really beautiful conversation.

James:

Oh, that's great. That's what I want to hear. That's what this is about. So thank you again, Tiffany. I look forward to seeing where you go. Tiffany Smith's reminder to just be you really hits home. Because sometimes the most radical act of creativity is authenticity itself. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to follow and subscribe to Lattes & Art wherever you get your podcast. And while you're there, leave us a five-star rating and a quick review. It really helps more listeners discover these creative conversations. You can also catch our sister show, Art Happens:, the divine mess of art history, where we dig into the chaos, beauty, and wild stories behind the world's masterpieces. Shows begin December 1st. Until next time, keep creating, keep questioning, and most importantly, keep being you.

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James William Moore

Host
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Tiffany Smith

Guest