How would your art look if you truly allowed yourself the freedom to create? What would happen if you embraced the title of an artist without hesitation? Join us for an inspiring dialogue with mixed media artist and instructor, Stacy Spangler, as we discuss the liberating power of giving ourselves the permission to be artists. We shed light on our personal insecurities and the influence of our childhoods on our artistic expressions.
Stacy takes us on her journey from teaching art to children to selling her own creations. She opens up about the creative freedom she found in teaching and how it has informed her personal art. She also candidly discusses the shift from childhood to adolescence and its profound impact on creativity. We also dip our toes into the power of collaborative learning and the role it plays in an artist's journey.
In our honest conversation, we tackle the subject of imposter syndrome and the different definitions of success. We reveal how we have navigated the delicate balance between work and creativity, and the importance of self-care in nurturing our creative pursuits. Stacy shares her experience and passion for guiding adults in their creative journey. This episode is an invitation to celebrate your creativity and give yourself the permission to pursue it. Tune in and allow us to inspire, empower, and guide you in your own artistic journey.
How would your art look if you truly allowed yourself the freedom to create? What would happen if you embraced the title of an artist without hesitation? Join us for an inspiring dialogue with mixed media artist and instructor, Stacy Spangler, as we discuss the liberating power of giving ourselves the permission to be artists. We shed light on our personal insecurities and the influence of our childhoods on our artistic expressions.
Stacy takes us on her journey from teaching art to children to selling her own creations. She opens up about the creative freedom she found in teaching and how it has informed her personal art. She also candidly discusses the shift from childhood to adolescence and its profound impact on creativity. We also dip our toes into the power of collaborative learning and the role it plays in an artist's journey.
In our honest conversation, we tackle the subject of imposter syndrome and the different definitions of success. We reveal how we have navigated the delicate balance between work and creativity, and the importance of self-care in nurturing our creative pursuits. Stacy shares her experience and passion for guiding adults in their creative journey. This episode is an invitation to celebrate your creativity and give yourself the permission to pursue it. Tune in and allow us to inspire, empower, and guide you in your own artistic journey.
Welcome to Mind Over Medium, a podcast for artists who want to make money doing what they love. When you tune in a twink, you will learn how to attract your ideal commissions, approach galleries for representation, have a great online launch of your work, and how to do it all with less overwhelm and confusion. You will have the opportunity to hear from amazing artists who will share how they have built their successful creative businesses. My hope is to create a space where artists and the creative curious can gather to learn about one of the most important tools creative entrepreneurs need in their toolbox their mindset. Thanks so much for tuning in to Mind Over Medium podcast. Let's get started.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Hi everyone, before we get into today's episode, I wanted to let you know that the waitlist is now open for my 12-week course Artful Decision Making how to transform your artistic journey from scattered dreams to focused success. If you feel like you are stuck on the hamster wheel and would love not only some support but practical tools to create a business that makes you feel overjoyed more than overwhelmed, you should get on the list, and I will offer special pricing for people on the waitlist, so you should definitely sign up. The link will be in my show notes and on my website. So head on over to leanslotkincom to sign up Today. I'm so excited to be chatting with Stacy Spangler. Stacy is a mixed media artist and an art instructor, and I really appreciate you being here today. Thank you so much, leanne.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Yeah, I always ask a couple questions at the beginning so the listeners can get to know you a little bit better. So I'm going to ask you these questions. The first one is a multi-step question. It's introduce yourself who are you, where do you live and what do you do?
Stacy Spangler:Okay, well, I live in Arkansas and I've lived here my whole life, so I'm a Southern girl at heart. I'm a mixed media artist. I call myself a creative and an instructor. I started out instructing first, and so that's probably my first love. I love to create and mix media and try new things. I'm constantly trying new methods and techniques, and my art kind of evolves, it seems like, about every six months. So that's kind of where who I am and where I'm from.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Nice, and then I'm going to ask you to describe a time in your life when you felt the most creative.
Stacy Spangler:I think that would be probably when I first started teaching my art classes to kids and that really gave me so much freedom. I think I saw I never thought of myself as an artist and I started teaching kids and I'm like be able to tell that in a little bit kind of how that evolved. But I think I saw how brave that kids were and how they had no fear in creating art and so that just kind of empowered me like why do I stress about creating? You know, why am I scared to put my brush on the canvas and just try it? And that really started my whole creative process and I think that was the time in my life when I was most creative. That's great.
Lea Ann Slotkin :It is amazing how free children are with creating and experimenting and exploring. And then I wonder if there is I'm sure there's some sort of study, that kind of pinpoints, when we lose that or come away from that.
Stacy Spangler:There is, and I think I mean I'm not an expert on that, but I know when I was teaching I did look into that and it is that puberty when we start caring what people think about it. Yeah, and so it's between that 12 and 14 age and I really saw that because I taught all ages for a while. I've probably told about age 15, but I specifically taught fifth and sixth grade art and I saw a huge difference between the fifth graders and the sixth graders. You know, the fifth graders didn't care and they would do anything and had so much fun with it. And then you get to the sixth grade, which was they were starting middle school and they were, you know, afraid with their peers, thought, and there was a lot of judgment on themselves and they just didn't enjoy the process as much. So I really saw that transition there in my own teaching career.
Lea Ann Slotkin :That makes sense. When you say that, that makes perfect sense. Yeah, that's a bummer. That's a bummer for all this budding artist out there.
Stacy Spangler:But I always say, like back to that creative question, like I know I taught kids art, but they always say they really taught me. I learned art through teaching kids and just having to really think about the process and really at the time, not being a practicing artist myself, I learned so much just by teaching them and then they would teach me kind of the flip side of like I was trying to have the rules and the program and the project, but then I learned about the real side of art from them.
Lea Ann Slotkin :So that's really awesome. I love that. So you started out as an art instructor before you yourself started creating and selling your work. Yes, yeah, tell me about that.
Stacy Spangler:So I don't have any teaching experience or wasn't trained to be a teacher and I wasn't trained to be an artist. But I always say it was just a real God thing with me. It was kind of a point in my life I had been in the corporate world and then I was fortunate enough to be able to work from home. I say work from home because I think staying at home with your kids is harder than going to work sometimes. No joke. But I was doing that. And then we got caught up in the housing market crash and we got stuck in a house that we had built to sell and I had three kids and had just had two year old at home. Still, that was not in school and I was facing going back to work and I didn't want to go back to the corporate world. I loved being at home and loved just everything about that.
Stacy Spangler:And so one of my friends, she said why don't you teach art? Which I thought was a totally crazy idea. And I was like why would I teach art? Like I'm not an art teacher and I'm not an artist. And she was like, yeah, but you create with your kids all the time.
Stacy Spangler:And so at the time I painted furniture a lot just for friends and just kind of decorated my house with my kids art. We would just be bored and I'd be like let's paint a dog, and so we paint a dog and I'd frame it and I'd put it on my wall. And of course children's art to me is adorable, so it was always fun and colorful. And she was like well, I would have my daughter take art from you. She said I just want you to pray about it and see what happens. And I just thought this is the craziest thing I've ever heard. But I did. I prayed about it for a couple of days and I just kept thinking, yeah, this is what I'm supposed to do. And so I sent out an email. My middle daughter was in a half day kindergarten program at the time and so I sent out an email to her classmates. That finished at noon and then to the full day class and within a day I had like 16 students.
Stacy Spangler:We like wow, okay, yeah, I guess I'm teaching art Like this is crazy. I can't believe people. I mean, I didn't charge her anything because I didn't feel like I knew what I was doing. But we had a room under this house that we were wanting to sell. That was kind of unfinished, it was my husband's workshop. And so he said, well, just fix that room up. It was heated and cooled, and so we fixed that up and I could see it about eight to 10. And so I began teaching kids art and I just kind of started with like things I wanted to learn and my goal was because I had kids at the time and I, you know, and I know teachers have such limited resources and limited time and I really learned that after I taught in a classroom setting later.
Stacy Spangler:And you know, I wanted art that they could bring home and put on the wall and their parents throw it in the trash, because I was always bringing home. You know, my kids would bring home color sheets and I was like you know, I want art that can be proud of, and so that was kind of my goal. We would spend about a month on each project and we would paint on canvases and we would just I mean, they would create these beautiful art pieces and I'd have a little show at the end of the semester and they would feature like three of their favorite pieces. And so that business just really grew on its own and kind of got. I did that added in some homeschool classes and was probably teaching about five courses a week of kids.
Stacy Spangler:And then, you know, as my kids started getting older and busier with their schedules, it was hard for me to teach in the afternoon. So I kind of transitioned into doing like little the sypensie which I was doing with kids. So it wasn't a sypensie, but it was kind of like a paint workshop that we would do in a two hour timeframe at night. And then I kind of started adding in some adult classes because the moms would say oh, you want to come and do this. And so I did that for about eight years and got to where I was really just teaching, mainly summer workshops.
Stacy Spangler:I would do summer camps, and that's kind of what I did as my kids got older and then, right, I guess in about 2014, I was asked to teach at my kids private school. They were trying to start their art program and they said will you teach fifth and sixth grade art? And I was like, well, yeah, I mean I don't have a degree. And they were like well, as long as you have a degree, you can teach in a private school. And so I was in charge of developing that curriculum for two grades and teaching it was like four classes in each grade and it was totally chaos.
Stacy Spangler:I didn't know what I was doing. I mean, that's where I really got my appreciation for teachers and, like man, they work so hard and they're so smart and they don't have credit or get paid what they deserve. But that year really burnt me out and so we moved the next year and so when we moved, I was like, you know, I want to take a break and just start focusing on my art, because then I could kind of get to the point to where I could say OK, I love creating too, and I want to paint some. I want to have time to paint.
Lea Ann Slotkin :So yeah Well, when you were going through that process for yourself, I'm sure it brought back memories or you know, seeing all these kids and young, you know, not young adults they're not, they were not young adults, but these kids essentially learning, and it probably just freed you to just be a beginner, like have that beginner mindset, because you were surrounded by that. So much Did that factor in for you.
Stacy Spangler:I mean, I think it has definitely influenced my art. Now, for a while I wouldn't show my art to anyone because I said it looked like a kid did it which I love children's art but I had this mindset that like people wouldn't like my art, they wouldn't want to hang it on their walls because it was too whimsical and too playful and look like a kid did it. And I had taken years before I had taken some oil painting lessons and kind of went down that path because I've always loved creativity and quit painting oils because it was no fun. You know, I was trying to reproduce a photograph and I could do it if I really tried, but it wasn't fun. It was.
Stacy Spangler:I can have a very perfectionistic mindset and so for me it was almost just like you know, I would drive myself crazy because I couldn't get it to look exactly like I wanted to. And so I think once I started creating with kids, I was, like you know, art's supposed to be about expression and having fun, and so that's really what I learned from the kids that I learned to incorporate into my own art, and once I kind of gave myself permission to just enjoy that and not be so critical of my own art. Then I was more free to start creating expressively and on my own.
Lea Ann Slotkin :So, yeah, I think that the key phrase you said like gave yourself permission and that really is probably one of the most important things as artists that we need to do is, like you have to give yourself permission to start. You have to give yourself permission to call yourself an artist. You have to give yourself permission to show people your work, all these things like you. If you're waiting for people to give you that permission, you might never get it going, which which is sad, because if you have that calling, you really should listen to that and give yourself permission to start.
Stacy Spangler:Right, and now we have all these podcasts and online where we learn these things. But I mean, I taught art from probably 2007 until 2014. And I couldn't call myself an artist. I mean, I would not call myself an artist. I'd say, well, I teach art but I'm not trained and I would you know over explain, yeah. And people would be like you're an artist and I was like, no, I'm not, because I don't sell my work and I really don't know what I'm doing. And you know, that was so silly. You know, I just that, but I just didn't know.
Lea Ann Slotkin :So, yeah, yeah, you know it is a process. Do you remember? Well, one it's very normal, I mean, because I think in our minds, you know, you know you can't do that. We think that there are certain things that need to happen before we can call ourselves this, that or the other, and really it's just a decision that we get to make. Do you remember when you became comfortable calling yourself? Was there like a certain moment, like okay, I had, I sold a piece, or I've sold X amount of dollars, or did you just kind of ease into it, like what was that process like calling yourself an artist?
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, thinking back, probably two defining moments. I remember sitting in a restaurant with one of my really good friends, and it was a restaurant that displayed local artists, and there was a piece of art in there that was really similar to some of the stuff that I did. It was whimsical and fun and colorful. And she was like, why don't you show your art anywhere? Like you could have your art in here. And I was like, oh no, you know, I'm not really an artist. And she was like, if you don't go ask them right now about showing your art in here, I'm going to do it for you. And so I just I went up and the manager was there and I asked her and she said, well, do you have some pictures? And I showed her and she was like, I love your art. And she said, of course, we'll put it in here. And like it was so easy and so it was so, I was just like, oh wow.
Stacy Spangler:So I kind of started selling my art, you know, and I wasn't get. I didn't have a whole lot of time to paint at that point, so I would paint a few pieces and put it in there and they would sell. So that was real encouraging. And then when I moved up here, when I moved up to Northwest Arkansas from Central Arkansas and really started focusing on my own art, and you know, I think one of the things I've learned being older and wiser is like I have this fear of regret now, you know, because I think back and I'm like why didn't I do that? You just kind of learn to just and I love what you say, lingie, and I was listening to one of your podcasts the other day and you said we're either learning or we're winning. I think is what you said, and I love that because we never really fail. We're either in the learning process or it's going to be a win for us, and so.
Stacy Spangler:But I applied for this juried art show up here it's like one of the larger art shows in this area and I've never been in an art show before and I just sent my application in, sent a couple of pictures, didn't even really think about it. And they called me and they said we've chosen your art for to be the featured artists and you're going to be on all the posters and you're accepted into the art show. And I was like, oh, wow, what, like what does that mean? I don't have any art, you know? Like now what? But I think that was just a real validation for me to like okay, it's okay to pursue this, and there's some people that love your art, and so that was really good.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Yeah, yeah, that's a lovely story and going back to what you referenced about the learning, or winning, I think it's important to point out we get to define what winning means to us. Like winning could mean something different for you than it does to me, and I think we have this idea. Like winning is having X amount of followers on Instagram or making this amount of money or whatever the thing the external thing is, but it can also be an internal thing. It can be like making the time in your schedule to create. It can be finally calling yourself an artist. Like. So we get to choose, I guess, is my follow up to that.
Stacy Spangler:Even trying a new style of art. I try to challenge myself every year to take an art course that I say I can't do, that, you know, and that's always a huge learning and win, because I learned something new. I learned and I learned if I like to do it or I don't, or I can incorporate it into my toolkit or something. Maybe that was just a fun experience, but but yeah, I love that that you said that I thought that was a. I think I do that. I just didn't think of it that way. So that was a great spin on things, thanks.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Now you continue to teach Correct yes.
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, so I well I started, I guess in about 2015. I really started focusing on my own R and I would teach every once in a while, Because I wasn't at the time really teaching adults, and so it was kind of that same mindset again, like well, I've taught kids for a long time but I'm not really qualified to teach adults and and so I just kind of focused on my art. I would teach every once in a while, just kind of the you know, we're going to do a painting in two hours type thing, and really didn't enjoy that. I really found that I loved working with the people that were kind of a step behind me in the journey of like oh, I want to make time for our or I love art, I just don't know how to get started. And so I really loved working with that type of person, and so I really just kind of focused on my art and selling my art and doing art shows and like kind of growing my online business until the pandemic hit and I kind of been thinking about and praying about getting into the online space to teach.
Stacy Spangler:But I like I'm a really introverted, like shy person and especially being in front of camera I that was so hard for me and I would try to record myself and just be like, oh, this is miserable. And so I just kind of him hard and drug my feet. And then the pandemic hit and I was like, okay, like I've got to do this, and so I started creating. I started just a little Facebook group, first going live on there, and then started creating some courses during the pandemic and then started teaching it some retreats right off of you know, coming out of the pandemic, yeah, and have really enjoyed that. So you know, kind of back to teaching. I don't teach on a regular basis or I teach weekly lessons or anything like that, but I love teaching at workshops, especially in collaborations with other artists, to come in somewhere and kind of combine our creative energy, and that's always so much fun.
Lea Ann Slotkin :That's great. How would you suggest someone who is not really try creating or, like you said, is at the very beginning or just like just getting into it? How do you coach them into next steps, not feeling overwhelmed? Because, honestly, just figuring out what supplies you need if you've not done it before can be very overwhelming.
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, especially in today's market because there's so many choices. You know, I always say art journaling is a great place to start and that's really where I started, because when I was teaching I didn't have a whole lot of time to create myself. I would just create small format in my journals and I did the index card a day, which I talk about that a lot. And now I've been doing the deck of dreams with Kelly, when the small formats, I think, are stress free and there, if you don't have a lot of space or a lot of time, like you can complete something, even if it's just learning a technique or experimenting. I think that's a great place to start.
Stacy Spangler:And then I always recommend to people, you know, especially even people that take lessons from me and they've taken a ton of my classes. I'm like go take from another artist, like take from as many people. If you love their work, take a class with them, because you're going to learn bits and pieces that you can incorporate in and that helps you develop your own style. And we're like well, I like this little piece from this artist and I love this that I learned from her. And so I think you know this would be my two recommendations and as far as supplies and stuff go like, so use what you have. If you have an art, some art supplies. If you don't start with the basics, depending on what your you know if you like acrylics or watercolors, or take from an artist and kind of start out with those basics and then go from there.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Yeah, I think we tend to over complicate things when it's new, especially and, like you said, we have. There's so many options available to us now, and Even more so. So I like simplifying, like what you just said. Simplifying, keeping it as easy as possible, and that's something I try to remind myself now and anything that I do, especially something I'm Learning, like how can I keep this as simple as possible?
Stacy Spangler:Like I have that, like I say that to myself a lot, I write in my journal because I want to over complicate things Especially, yeah, and yeah, and I do think I mean that's one of the things I say is like limit your supplies and limit. When you're creating, I Always pull out like a little basket of my papers and I'll pull out a few colors and you know, a couple of marking tools and when you limit yourself, I think you tend to be so much more creative with what you have. Then when you pull everything out and you're overwhelmed and you don't even know where to start. So, yeah, I think limiting your supplies even, or having limited supplies, you can be most creative in that mindset.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Yeah, I really agree with you on that, and it encourages you to push your creative Thoughts or processes because you're like, okay, I want this, but I only have this. How do I Really just like creative troubleshoot? I guess about yeah to Exactly things going. Yeah, now you will seem to be. I've not known you long, but in the time I've known you that you're a very natural and amazing encourager. Have you always been that way, or is it something that came to you later?
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, you know that's so funny because I actually just wrote about that in my newsletter. I was thinking back on it. Yeah, I mean I think that's one of my gifts, but I had posted something. I was a little known fact. I was a plum girl for the University of Arkansas in my college days. I, and you know, I went back this year. We had an alum Celebration and we got to actually go out on the the field and cheer Mm-hmm, and you know it's so much fun. It's kind of like when you say, oh, I go back for just one day.
Stacy Spangler:And so I did that and it's something fun that I said I'd never do it until I turn 50. And so a few years ago, when I turned 50, my friends that she or they held me to it. They were like, okay, you're 50, now you have to do this. So I've been doing it for the last years and it's so fun. But it just like really dawned on me.
Stacy Spangler:I had a student from I have a course right now that's called paint to product. It's a master course and she had sent me an email yesterday and she was like I just finished my calendar and I'm so excited and she sent me a picture of it and I was just like you know, it's like your child, you're so proud and I wanted to just help her. I'm like, okay, do this and call this person and you need to. You could call this store and you know I'm like trying to help her sell her calendar and I thought you know that is like part of just who I am. I love to encourage and I love to see. Almost would rather see somebody else succeed than myself, which is sometimes, you know, I need to cheer myself on more, but it is so fun to help somebody.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Reach out. Yeah, yeah. Well, it does seem like it comes very natural to you and it feels very genuine. So yeah, now your faith plays a big part in your art, and did it start out that way, did that kind of uncover as you were finding your style? Can you speak to that?
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, no, I definitely. Just like I said, I really think that I think God Uses our trials to sometimes push us into things where we're not brave enough, and I really saw that. I Mean, I used to joke when I was in corporate America and I was an ad PR major, so I was in a creative field, but I had a friend that I worked with and her mother was a really prominent oil painter and she painted these beautiful thick oil and Pasto flowers and I you are pasto I don't know how you say that I'm southern so I probably pronounce it wrong but I used to joke with her and say when I grow up, I'm gonna be an artist because I loved her mother's art and she was like. You know, my mother didn't become an artist until we were all Graduated with college and we were out of the house, and so I always kind of had that in the back of my mind.
Stacy Spangler:But I don't think I would have ever pursued art in any capacity other than just maybe taken some classes. But because of that kind of crisis financial crisis we found ourselves in, you know, I really had to evaluate and that's just kind of a provision that I feel like God put in my path and I've just seen him open so many doors along the way that, like I said, I sometimes I haven't even really tried, it's just happened and so I just kind of keep going along like trying to see where God is gonna use me with my gifts and I know they're definitely.
Stacy Spangler:I mean, I know, I believe, you know the Bible says that we're all created in his image. And you just got to go outside and look at the butterflies on one flower, bush, to see, you know, the beautiful and just amazing creation. And so I always tell people that, like when people say I don't have a creative bone in my body, and I'm like, oh yes, you are so creative, like you know, maybe you can't draw, I can't draw either, but you are creative, we were made that way. And so I think when we are, you know, and where he wants us to be, we all have some sort of creativity we can share with the world, and so that definitely is a big part of my faith and a big part of my art.
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, and I kind of started out with some of the larger paintings I did. They just started as prayers. You know, I would just be what I was praying, what would visually come to my mind. I would put it on a painting and I would actually I have one right there, kind of. You know, I hear probably the same way, but I'm just a visual person, so I Would just have an image in my head that would go with a certain verse I was praying and I would just put it on canvas.
Lea Ann Slotkin :So yeah, that's great, that's really great. Yeah, what do you do? Well, first let me ask it Do you ever feel overwhelmed with what we're doing as creative entrepreneurs? And if you do, how do you move through it?
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, I do, and I'm struggling with that right now. Tell me about it. Well, I think as an mature woman now we have lots of changes. I used to be a very organized, energetic, could juggle, you know, multiple balls at many times and I thrived in that capacity. And then you know I don't know if it was part of the pandemic, and then also menopause, maybe TMI, but I've had to learn how to slow down and in order to nurture my creative self, I can't be juggling all the things anymore.
Stacy Spangler:So I really have been over the last year Really evaluating where my business is and kind of how to pivot to. I'll never stop doing art and I'll never probably retire from it, but to quit the hustle mindset, it's just, yeah, it exhausts me now and it's so I'm trying to just set up more. What do you say? Passive streams have been come, which has been working itself. Yeah, it's starting. I'm kind of starting to see the fruits of that and where I don't have to feel like I'm always working all the time. I'm trying to sell or promote or it's more. You know, I can focus more on the creativity and helping others part.
Lea Ann Slotkin :So yeah, well, so it sounds like you are good at recognizing when what that feeling comes up, like overwhelm, and then Do you journal about it, do you Like? How do you move through it, like practically speaking?
Stacy Spangler:I mean journaling and prayer, which to me I do both of those Together as a process. I journal my prayers and so a lot of times that's revealed just kind of Okay, this is where I'm stuck and this is obviously why, and so that. And then also just taking a break I mean I've had to take several breaks this year I just kind of step away, take a break from social media. I mean I'll always be posting and it's funny because people say, oh, you've been creating a lot that I see in person. And I'm like, well, no, not really, I just program it all in. And yeah, I mean so I want to remind people that what you see on Social media is never a reality.
Stacy Spangler:I mean I don't create every day. I don't work on my business every day anymore. I used to in some capacity. But once you kind of learn how to work the systems and to set it up to where you can, you know, still run your business and then have time to yourself, you can make it look like you're doing that all the time. But Mm-hmm, definitely yeah. So I've had to learn to take breaks and step back and just create for myself and not always be creating for a lesson, or for a course, or for, yeah, to post on social media, mm-hmm so yeah, that can be a fine line to walk at times.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Yeah for sure. Yeah, well, my guess is you have a lot of ideas, because I know I have a lot of ideas. What do you do? How do you decide which ones to pursue or follow through on?
Stacy Spangler:I try to every year just kind of set my focus for the year, like, is it gonna be I'm collaborating this year or am I gonna teach? You know, focus on teaching this year. So I usually try to plan this time of the year. I'm kind of behind this year on it because I had money for a baby, so I've been focusing on that. But yeah, I saw, usually kind of try to focus on, you know, plan out my year, especially by quarters, and kind of say, like this is what I'm doing, this is what I wanna, and that can always change. But I do try to have a plan.
Stacy Spangler:And I started off with I had a really good friend here that she's a watercolor artist and we used to meet weekly and just say, like, just go through the questions of like, what are you working on? And just to keep each other focused and keep each other on task and then share best practices. And then that kind of evolved into a group of us that we would meet once a week and wouldn't meet every week, but whoever could show up, we would do a local restaurant here that features artists and we would share best practices and all that. And so I think that helps is having some accountability people and now I'm in our group, which I'm really enjoying, so I think, having people to keep you accountable and then setting your intentions ahead of time and knowing your why and why you're doing something.
Stacy Spangler:And that keeps you on track for sure. Yeah because as an artist and you're probably the same way you get lots of great offers and opportunities and I've been saying no now to showing my art and that's hard when somebody asks you to show at an exhibit or an art show and you feel bad kind of turning them down. But then you're like, okay, that's not where I am at this season and it's only gonna cause more stress in my life. So you have to kind of remember those things.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Yeah, I do feel like that is kind of a common struggle that people that I talk to have, because I think there's a little bit of scarcity mindset that can creep in and be like, well, if I don't do it, it's like it'll all go away. What if I'm never asked again? So it sounds like you have a really good internal compass for knowing what your limits are and your boundaries, which is great. I mean, that's what we all need, because there's always gonna be another opportunity, something will always come up. But I think that can be a hard thing.
Stacy Spangler:Yeah well and I think I mean Leigh Ann I will say I've learned to do that because I've been where I say yes to everything and I was like that as younger not even just in my art with my kids and I gotta be the homerun mom and the teen mom, and so I've learned from my past mistakes and over commitments and what that does to me physically and mentally. And now to my creative side when I'm stressed like that, there's no creativity that can really come out of me. So I think I've just learned with experience.
Lea Ann Slotkin :So yeah, yeah, experience is pretty great actually.
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, one good thing about getting older.
Lea Ann Slotkin :I wanted to learn those hard learned lessons are yeah, you don't forget those, that's for sure. When you were talking, it made me think about something I have found and I would be curious to hear your thoughts about this. Like the creative community is really amazing. Like I don't think I've had anything but positive experiences, either in person, meeting people on Instagram or in a mastermind. Like it's the most supportive, collaborative, encouraging community. What do you think about that?
Stacy Spangler:I agree, yeah, and I do think I love Instagram.
Stacy Spangler:I mean, I have some of my which I would say they're my best friends, best connections, that I've made through Instagram and I've gotten to meet them in person and teach with them and spend weekends with them on retreats, and so I would agree, I don't think I always saw that.
Stacy Spangler:I know, when I first kind of started out in the art world and maybe it was more my mentality than it may have been more of things, my self-consciousness of not being accepted I used to feel like I wasn't accepted into the art community because I didn't do fine art and there maybe used to be more of a stigma around that, or maybe it was the community I was in.
Stacy Spangler:It was, you know, because I was pursuing like the oil painting and more serious fine art, and then kind of, when I just stepped into the more whimsical fun realm and started doing my own thing, I didn't feel like those venues were, you know, they weren't going to show my art or really even. You know, I did a lot of the community art leagues and stuff like that and I would submit my art and of course it would never win or never get. You know, people would just kind of say, oh, it's so cute, you know, and I just feel like, oh, that's cute, which I didn't take as a compliment. But I feel like when you change your whole attitude, then the way people receive you changes too. So that was partly my own fault probably.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Well, I think it's just again just like learning, like finding your people essentially Exactly. Yeah, that's true, that's true. Yeah, do you ever deal with imposter syndrome?
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, yeah, I mean not as much as I used to now, I think, just because I'm pretty comfortable with what I'm doing and I love, I have fun when I create, and so that's. But definitely in teaching. But I still am humble because I just know I have so much to learn still. So it's kind of depending on who I'm around, probably, of like I would never try to act like I knew something that I didn't, but sometimes people just assume and then you're like, oh well, I really you know, I'm really not that. So maybe in that way I do, but it definitely doesn't bother me as much as it used to.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Yeah yeah, I can tell for me usually if I've taken too long of a break from painting. That's kind of when my imposter syndrome stuff starts getting triggered. I'm like oh, and then I'm like well, that's it, I've used up all my creativity. There's no more.
Stacy Spangler:there's no left.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Right.
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, it's funny Because, amy, you do have to keep it in practice. Yeah, it's a practice for sure. And so yeah, you can start feeling like, oh, I forgot how to do this, or I forgot how to paint or yeah, I'm thinking after you haven't painted for a while and it's really ugly in your life.
Lea Ann Slotkin :It's like awesome. Yeah, what am I doing? Yes, yes, I get mentally irregular when I don't create long time. Yeah, it really affects my mood, definitely. How do you define success for yourself?
Stacy Spangler:Oh, that's a good question. I think really it's doing what I'm supposed to be doing at the time. Definitely, for me, success is seeing whatever I'm doing and impact someone else, whether it's like they buy a piece of my art and makes them really happy and they say, oh, I love it Every time I see it. Or I took your course and it really changed the way I paint and I love creating now. Or just like the girl the other day that had created her calendar from my course. She was so excited that she had an additional product she could sell. That's definitely probably success. I think just growing as an artist that is a success in itself. See my next goals. I'm a pretty goal oriented person. I always have been. My goals may not be somebody else's definition of success, but if I reach them then I've succeeded.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Yeah, yeah, I think that's the best way. Honestly, if you could go back to when you started on this creative journey, would you do anything different?
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, I probably would have started creating sooner for myself. I think of all those years that I didn't create at all. What did I do? Watch TV all the time? We waste so much time because we're fearful or we're afraid we're going to fail, or I'm like I guess if I could go back to my younger self, and maybe not before I started my journey of when I started teaching, but just when I started taking oil painting lessons, I wish I would have continued that instead of. I mean, I got pregnant with my daughter my first daughter and I gave all my oil paints away because I was like I can't do this, it's frustrating. And now I'm pregnant so I can't paint with oils. Anyway, I quit painting for a long time because I just didn't think I was good enough. I think I would have gone back and just kept creating in some capacity.
Lea Ann Slotkin :I hope you can see how courageous and brave you've been in just starting new things and figuring things out. You talk about it as if it's. I don't think you come across as it was easy, but you're started teaching. You've never done that before you figured it out. You started creating. You've never done that before you figured it out. You have a real capacity for that. That's great, that's amazing. Thank you.
Stacy Spangler:I think it's like you say you just do the next thing, just the next thing that's on your path, and you give it a try. I love the challenge of just trying something new. Now Used to. That would scare me, but as I've gotten older and wiser, it's fun to start new things and just see what happens Exactly.
Lea Ann Slotkin :It's a big experiment. Well, speaking of trying new things, what all do you have going on now, I know? Remind me of what courses you have currently going on courses.
Stacy Spangler:I do have a library of courses that kind of touch on most of the techniques that I use in my mixed media practice. I use a lot of texture, so I have a texture course. I do a lot of small format painting. I do have a mini florals course. I have an art and worship course. I have some different classes that and really those have just been created out of requests from my customers. They'd be like oh, you need to teach us how to do this.
Stacy Spangler:I did do a membership last year so that was a lot of my energy last year. I loved it. I loved my membership gals they were amazing but it was more work than I could have imagined. I did that for a year and I just closed down my membership. So I'm kind of pivoting my business and refocusing. But I do have a course that I rolled out last year and I've kind of revamped some things, but it's called Paint to Product and it just shows the process that I've used, which has been huge in keeping my creative business where I can actually make money off of it and pay for my supplies and be profitable. It's just taking the things that I've already painted and sold and putting them on products and selling them with a retail partner or online, and so I just take people through the process of actually photographing their work and editing their work and show them all the resources and systems that I used to do that. And I do it on a really tight budget, so I mean, I don't know how to use Illustrator or Photoshop or anything like that. I do it all through my Mac and through free applications, and so that's a program that I offer twice a year.
Stacy Spangler:I'm going to be offering twice a year, so we just just rolled that out and launched that again in the fall and I'll be doing it again in the spring, and then, other than that, I'm going to be just creating. I'm kind of getting back to the basics after the first of the year. I'm going to be creating more on YouTube and kind of just I'm really going to be saying back to the basics for me, because I need to go back to the bones of getting creative again and going through just my art journaling and I do have a art journaling process, for I have a lot of people ask me like, how do you know what to paint, you know, how do you get inspiration? And I have kind of a free course right now that I created during COVID. That was called creating during stressful times and I kind of touch on my process there. But I'm going to, I'm creating a free course right now that'll be free to anyone. That just kind of goes through my creative process for my journaling and my inspiration journal. So I'm going to be working on that and rolling that out.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Nice.
Stacy Spangler:Just kind of trying to set some time aside, at least twice a week to create and document it so that other people can see.
Lea Ann Slotkin :That's great. And where can people find all this wonderful information and find you?
Stacy Spangler:Yeah, so everything is under Stacy Spangler R and it's Stacy with no E, so but I hang out most on Instagram. I love Instagram. To me it's like a visual magazine, so I try to post there daily. And then I also am on Facebook, on YouTube, and I have a website and from my website you can pretty much find like my courses and all that. So I have all my courses on the Podia platform. I pronounce that right or not? Maybe my Southern pronunciation.
Stacy Spangler:No I think it was great. You can find all that for my website at wwwstacysfanglerartcom.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Nice. Yeah, this has been a pleasure. Thank you for sharing and spending time here with me, and I know people will find it really helpful and interesting. Well, thank you, thank you for letting me be there. Yeah, how was it your first podcast? It was okay.
Stacy Spangler:I love talking to somebody one-on-one I know.
Lea Ann Slotkin :Thank you so much for listening to Mind Over Medium podcast today. If you found the episode inspiring, please share it with a friend or post it on social media and tag me on Instagram at lianslotkin, or head to my website, wwwlianslotkincom. To book a discovery call to find out more about working with me one-on-one. You can also head to my website to get a great tool I've created for you to use when planning your own online launch of your artwork. It's an exercise I've taken many of my coaching clients through and it's been very helpful. It's my way of saying thank you and keep creating.