The Intersection of Art and Self-Discovery with artist Joan Marie

What if the key to unlocking your creative potential lies at the very intersection of spirituality and art? Join us as we sit down with inspiring artist Joan Marie, who shares her incredible journey from being awestruck by Michelangelo's Sistine ceiling at age nineteen to crafting her own unique blend of da Vinci's draftsmanship and abstract expressionism. Joan's story is a testament to the transformative power of art and self-love, as she takes us through her process of creating ethereal drawings, abstract music paintings, and personal power portraits that capture the essence of the soul.

Learn more about Joan Marie at the link below:
https://joanmarieart.com/

Learn more about Jim Fortin and The Subconscious Solution at https://www.jimfortin.com/

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Transcript

Speaker 1 0:46

Joan Marie creates art with an exuberant passion for life. Her visionary art began with a profound spiritual connection to Michelangelo At age 19,. Standing in delirious awe under Michelangelo's Sistine ceiling in Rome, she said If art can be this powerful, I must be an artist. Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo continued to communicate with her and fill her soul to this day. With the completion of her MFA, her art career began with ethereal drawings, quickly achieving national and international agency representation. As a result, her work was licensed by multiple companies, selling on millions of products and purchased by hundreds of private collections around the world.

Speaker 1 1:30

Driven by a passion of music. Millions of products and purchased by hundreds of private collections around the world. Driven by a passion of music abstract music paintings intuitively transforming the energy of one's favorite song into a wild and mystical abstract painting. These high energy abstracts led her to a powerful combination of da Vinci draftsmanship and fluid abstract expressionism. Of da Vinci draftsmanship and fluid abstract expressionism. Currently, she has a waiting list to co-create your personal power portrait expressing her patron's deepest passions and unique higher selves. Reflecting on your power portrait heightens love of self in connection with your soul. According to Joan, love of self is where compassion begins. She asks that you join her, knowing that falling in love with yourself helps to make the world a better place. Welcome, joan Marie.

Speaker 2 2:22

Thank you.

Speaker 1 2:24

Good morning.

Speaker 2 2:25

Good morning.

Speaker 1 2:27

How are you doing?

Speaker 2 2:28

Fabulous, fabulous.

Speaker 1 2:30

Right on Welcome Virginia.

Speaker 3 2:32

Yes, I'm glad to be here.

Speaker 1 2:34

I'm glad to get to know.

Speaker 3 2:35

Joan, better, I'm all quiet, it's a party.

Speaker 1 2:39

Yeah, it's pretty on a Sunday morning, but it feels like a party to me, absolutely. Anyway, thank you so much for being here. I guess for our listeners I will say, uh, if you've listened into greg spelanka's episode, uh, joan is a dear friend of greg's, as am I, so we have that, we share that mutual connection and I personally think, the world of greg. So I trusted him and, uh, everything I've, you know, seen of you I've stalked you online, of course, like I do all my guests and I'm I'm feel very lucky to have you oh, thank you.

Speaker 2 3:12

I love greg. The connection is dynamite. Isn't it so exciting to expand with other human beings like that?

Speaker 1 3:20

yeah, exactly, he's been a huge, huge influence in my life and I didn't hold back on our podcast.

Speaker 2 3:26

No, it was, it was wonderful.

Speaker 1 3:28

Oh, you heard it, good yeah.

Speaker 2 3:29

Yes, of course.

Speaker 1 3:31

Well, for me, this podcast among many other right, I think Virginia, you'd agree it's serving us in a number of ways, not just our listeners and our patrons, but it's therapy for us so for me, it's just kind of renewing your faith right, as an artist, you have to remind yourself why you do what you do, but as a human being, it takes hope to get up every morning.

Speaker 1 3:51

So this podcast has been a reminder to me of you know what. There are some pretty cool people left in the world, and going back to the early 90s, which is when I met Greg, there were some characters that I don't know if I took them for granted, but they seem a little more scarce these days. And so, yeah, reconnecting with Greg just brought me back to a really pivotal time in my life, a formative time, right where your worldview is being sort of cemented, and I'm grateful for that. Where did you meet Greg?

Speaker 2 4:21

out of curiosity, Through the class Artist as a Brand. I actually my daughter lives where Greg lived and I had known about him and I anxiously went to his wife's beautiful perfume store and just sort of hung out, you know, praying that I could meet him in person.

Speaker 1 4:42

Was that in Santa Fe or when he was still in California?

Speaker 2 4:45

Thousand Oaks.

Speaker 1 4:46

Oh, okay, right, right.

Speaker 2 4:48

Yeah, where she had that beautiful perfume store on the second floor. So I hung out there and then, um, she said that he would be appearing, you know, in a few hours. So I waited and waited and I got to meet him in person. And then we talked and I, I signed up for his artist, brandon flew back to to take the class with him, one-on-one with my daughter. It was just paradise, it was just wonderful. So everything about just wonderful, so everything about it.

Speaker 1 5:11

Yeah, I'm a fan, for sure, and not to mention his work.

Speaker 2 5:15

Yes, oh, gosh as is yours.

Speaker 1 5:18

Yeah, beautiful work.

Speaker 2 5:19

Thank you.

Speaker 1 5:20

And it does seem mixed. I don't want you to give away all your secrets and we're not really here to talk about technique. I think you know the impetus behind the work and the inspiration behind the work is what we're here to talk about. But it is mixed media correct.

Speaker 2 5:35

There's a lot, yes yes, whatever, whatever it calls for spill some coffee on it, drive your truck over yeah, and that's when I did the abstracts for four years. Like if I, if you do spill coffee, you're like, ooh, this could be cool.

Speaker 1 5:52

It's called a happy accident, right? Yeah, I mean, I'm not afraid at all.

Speaker 2 5:57

I just like, oh well, that was magic or a blessing, let's see where this goes. You know, absolutely.

Speaker 1 6:03

Yeah, I love that, uh.

Speaker 1 6:05

So, yeah, I do want to talk to you, for sure, about the personal power portraits, as well as the music paintings and the ethereal drawings. But before we dive, yeah, there's a lot to follow up on and I earnestly have some questions about all three of those, because it seems like those are the major phases of your career so far. Is that fair to say? Yes, yeah, along with the licensing aspect? Yes, yeah, along with the licensing aspect. But before we do that, we're starting to ask a rote question and, based on a little dirty laundry for our listeners, we have a form, of course, that all of our guests fill out so that we can all impart what is on our radar at this moment. And so, in your form, I get it. You have a huge appreciation of story. I see how it informs your work. I look forward to hearing everything you have to say. But a real question we've been asking at the top of every episode in our new season here is what do you feel traditionally has been the role of storytelling and culture?

Speaker 2 7:04

At culture.

Speaker 2 7:05

I mean, you know, joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey has been my inspiration ever since he I mean when he first came out with it, when he was living and he was sharing that I mean I was so I was just glued to the TV watching those interviews with him and the Hero's Journey was just so.

Soulful Inspiration and Epiphanies

Speaker 2 7:22

It just seemed to help me make sense of the roller coaster of life roller coaster of life. And it made me, it got me into spaces, because my art had become expressions of the challenge, the spiritual challenges I was going through, like we all go through, and and so I would. It was express a work of art that would express whatever I had learned, you know, to whatever challenge I was facing, and it just made sense. You know to like when you're going through the ups and downs. You know to whatever challenge I was facing, and it just made sense. You know to like when you're going through the ups and downs. You know if you can create that story in your mind, that hero's journey story. It just adds such adventure and excitement to it, instead of you know wondering why, why me, or why this, or why you know like it.

Speaker 1 8:06

Just so yeah, in brief summary's, that's what has inspired me yeah, I'm a big fan of joseph campbell and the hero's journey. Uh, are you talking about the bbc series that became the masks of god? I think that was, from right, a bbc series yeah, who was interviewing him?

Speaker 2 8:25

bob? Was it bobson? Oh gosh, I can't remember. I mean, I can see his face and I can't remember.

Speaker 1 8:31

I don't remember, but I know I liked the book because it was a conversation, right, it was almost like letters to a young poet. It was an exchange and you just get to be a fly on the wall and sort of listen in yeah, fascinating.

Speaker 2 8:42

I mean I was pretty, um, I mean that was all so new that I didn't really grasp the depth of all of it, but there was a general feeling. You know that just that allowed me to soar, Because it's all about soul. I mean that's why I love the topic of your book and your top podcast, the Soul. I mean that's all. There is a soul. You know that started the whole journey.

Speaker 1 9:04

I love that. Yeah, it is a funny word, though, because people have different connotations and denotations, and the right it's easily projected on. So I jokingly hear myself say if I use the word spiritual in the wrong circles, right, or the word soul with spiritual, I just go no, no, no, no, don't be threatened. I'm talking about Oprah's spirituality, like you make it mainstream.

Speaker 1 9:31

And then with the word soul I just go well, it's anything that's not your body or your. You know. Everything that's not your body Like there is. You can't really argue with the concept that your thoughts and your feelings and your, your emotional journey, right, your emotional maturation. There is a spiritual journey and it's just a word that I think people get hung up on. Yeah, yeah, you know, and for good reason too, I think you know institutionalized religion had its day and then you know we're kind of I think there's been a backlash against it, but in my parlance you don't throw away the spiritual baby with the religious bathwater, if that makes sense.

Speaker 2 10:06

Oh gosh, completely. I mean, that's an overthinking. I just keep thinking about overthinking how we overanalyze, trying to figure it out. Well, we're never going to figure it out. We just need to follow our soul, which is our intuition, which is our, you know, if we just trust what, what our passions are, what our, what our skills are, and just you know, that's our meaning for life, you know, is, is that, is that is just following that drive that we have inside and being paying attention to what our skills are and just going with it, instead of asking so many questions over complicating this thing.

Speaker 2 10:41

Yeah, it stops you so much and causes such problems when there isn't a problem if you just do what you love, I love it.

Speaker 1 10:50

Yeah, we should all be doing that. I agree that there's a ripple effect we talk about that a lot, right, virginia where you start with the man or the woman in the mirror and you just, yeah, be true to your authentic self, but also maybe invest a little time in pondering what your calling or your ministry or your purpose is right, but then it automatically contributes to the collective. So, yes, I agree with, I love your approach. Just live it, don't you don't always have to pick it apart, but that's.

Speaker 1 11:20

You know, this is a podcast, so I do want to follow something. You just said. Um, I didn't want to put words in your mouth, but, uh, it led me down the path of that initial. Oh, you said, joseph campbell, you didn't want to put words in your mouth, but it led me down the path of that initial. Oh, you said, joseph Campbell, you didn't fully understand it in the moment, but it did have an impact on you and it brought me to your Sistine Chapel epiphany.

Speaker 2 11:41

And I have my own.

Speaker 1 11:43

I had my own that I'll probably be telling. Just heads up, I'll probably tell the story myself. But yeah, what exactly was that for you? Out of curiosity and I want to talk about the idea of muses as well, these kindred spirits that stay with you throughout your lives Could you expand on that Sistine Chapel moment a little bit?

Speaker 2 12:03

Oh, I mean, I was 19, so I was over in Italy taking college classes for the summer and, you know, one weekend we got to go to the Sistine Ceiling.

Speaker 2 12:14

So I walked in with thousands of people, as always, and you just have to move slowly through, you know, and I, just when I first entered, I had this energy, just like I just became delirious. It's like I, you know, the energy just overcame me and I, just I tried to keep pace with walking, with the slow pace we were all half to do, you know, like we're pushed through, not pushed through fast, but slow. And I just started, I, it was just a, it was, I was in the ozone, you, you know, it was just such powerful energy and I kept looking up, going, what is this? I mean, what is happening to me? And I remember looking and look, you know, trying to watch my steps, and the people, and the guy in front of me was, um, you know, had had the plaid shorts and the big camera was trying to take pictures and and I, I remember like, oh my gosh, would you just look at the ceiling, Aren't you taking it in?

Speaker 2 13:14

And I remember like passing judgment on this guy in front of me and then snapping out of that and going wait a minute, I'm you know, stay in this energy of what?

Speaker 1 13:22

you're feeling, If you were, if you were thinking that or feeling that in 19,. Imagine now right.

Speaker 3 13:27

Yeah.

Speaker 1 13:30

There are people falling off of cliffs to get that selfie now instead of just being in the moment, right, oh, that selfie I know I that, yeah, exactly, I mean that.

Speaker 2 13:39

You know that's why I'm so blessed. You know that that I didn't have the internet for so many years of my life I do. That's a whole nother topic isn't it?

Speaker 1 13:49

but we have a foundation of actual real life. How about that?

Speaker 2 13:53

yeah, real life connection, you know so. So basically that was it. And when it was done, you know, when I actually got through, I was like oh my gosh, and then I, I just my life had changed. I just felt because I didn't know that I was going to be an artist major. At that time I didn't feel like I was one of the top artists in my high school class. I was one of the top five, but I wasn't like the one of the top two and I didn't feel like it was going to be my thing. And then, oh my gosh, when it was, it just.

Speaker 2 14:26

But then, and then I went back to the college, changed my college, you know, because I was very serious, and I went to Washington U, which is one of the top 10 colleges in St Louis, and at my sophomore year a professor there said you need to not be an artist, you're not creative and you know you're going to, you're going to starve, like don't, we don't want you to starve, like the 27,000 starving artists in New York City alone. And, um, you know, I, I just I mean with tears in my eyes, off of the corner, he didn't see him. You know. I was like. I came back I was like is creativity something that you can learn or do you just have to be born with it? And he said you just have to be born with it.

Speaker 1 15:04

And I'm sorry, what I know do you think he was playing the devil's advocate to make you get your heels in more?

Speaker 2 15:11

Yeah, later on I found out that he was. You know, he's this powerful, incredible professor artist. I mean, he wasn't the greatest professor in my opinion, but he was the great artist, powerful artist, and here he had to be a professor. So he was trying to weed out people that he didn't feel had it. And you know, I just thought. But in that moment I thought you just have no idea who's inside me.

Speaker 1 15:37

Michelangelo and da.

Speaker 2 15:38

Vinci are in me because, you know, after Michelangelo, I had gone to France and I sat in front of da Vinci's at the Uppizi Gallery, in the Adoration of the Magi, and you know, I had just been introduced to these things, I really didn't know that much about them. I mean, everybody knows these names, but I just, I was by myself at the Uffizi Gallery, I sat in front of the Adoration of the Magi, which is an incomplete work, which I had no idea that it was incomplete, and I just sat there, once again, I couldn't get up for an hour or over an hour, I could not leave that painting. The energy was so powerful. And then Botticelli, and you know, just like, this energy, just like, filled me. And so when the professor insulted me, I just, you know, it was a part of me, that's like, oh my God, because I'd been putting myself down so bad all the time anyway, so that I had this little voice on one side hearing him putting me, you know, saying I wasn't good enough.

Speaker 2 16:33

And then Michelangelo is saying you are good enough, on the other side of Da Vinci, and it was a battle for so many years, you know. But I just, I was a workaholic, just like work, work, work, work, you know. And then my skill got incredibly good. But then I went wait, you know they. Then my skill got incredibly good, but then I went way. You know they're like look at what you know I, I. I won't go into the details of what I'd achieved, but you know I was insulted for my ability to draw the figure. And then I got into the master's program because of my skill for drawing the figure.

Speaker 2 17:03

I mean, that's how hard I worked and um, I. But I looked at my art and I said you know, wow, I really have achieved technical skill here. But it's not speaking to me. It's not speaking like Michelangelo and Da Vinci speak like the expansion that they were connected with, the soul expansion, the energy that came off of their work. That's what I want. You know at least a little tiny bit. You know from my stuff and it's not technical, but you know you have to reach the technical to be able to have the no limitation with your voice.

Speaker 1 17:38

you know so to execute whatever your vision is or your concept is you don't want to hit a wall with technique.

Speaker 2 17:44

Yeah, I mean when I'm in love with Michelangelo and Da Vinci and I'm not able to have the skills. It's like you know where do you go from there, you're just going to keep battling. But anyway, so that's when I moved to Sedona, sedona, arizona, and the energy there. I didn't know that the spiritual energy was so powerful. I just was one of those magical moments. I won't go into the story of how I ended up there, but I just moved there like a like a boo, like what am I doing? What am I doing?

Speaker 1 18:17

moving here. Oh, now I see it's a vortex. I didn't have any idea about any of it, and that's all I've ever heard about Sedona.

Speaker 2 18:20

It's like Santa Fe, but more powerful yeah. Yes, I lived there for two and a half years. It changed my life, and that's when my art began, the spiritual art began, you know so. So it's been quite a wonderful journey.

Speaker 1 18:34

Wow, yeah, there's so much there, but I, I, I don't like to hear, you know, those sort of bitter. It's usually an instructor, let's be honest.

Speaker 1 18:43

Like in my high school there was a failed Broadway. You know the acting coach that did all the. It's a long story. We had a real theater with the catwalk and, you know, even LA Philharmonic would rent our high school auditorium because it was a real theater space with, again, catwalks and all the lights, and so we were kind of spoiled. You know, we had access the first time Grease was done off Broadway. We had the sets, the choreographers, the vocal coaches. So you know, being next door to Hollywood, there was some serious like stage parenting going on as well. So everything came together. But yeah, unfortunately we had a pretty bitter, failed performer from Broadway and he did similar things, I guess trying to weed out the people that couldn't cut the mustard in his view. But in a way, just spiritually, do you ever get to the point where you actually see, in an unexamined way, they're playing the devil's advocate in a way, and ultimately can be seen as an angel, not an adversary, because they make you more convicting?

Speaker 1 19:41

right, you dug your heels in and said no, no, no, I'm not listening to you, I'm listening to Michelangelo, right?

Speaker 2 19:51

That's later on. I understood what a blessing it was. And later on I would ask my students if somebody insulted you, what would you do? And you know, some would say, oh my gosh, I'd tell them off. And some would say, oh, I'd totally be quiet and buckle and I would never be an artist. I mean, you know so I said that's. That tells you how strong, like you just said, how strong your conviction is, and I had been putting myself down so much that that's why he was allowed to get into my, into my spirit.

Speaker 1 20:13

You've fought harder ultimately. So that's everybody's different, but I know I became, in spite of limitations, in spite of the voices of doubt, in spite of the haters, as they say, you know, and so everybody's different, but and I think, uh, it's unexamined on their part, so I'm not letting anyone off the hook. I think they go about it in the wrong way. But yeah, sometimes they can be seen as agents in your growth, or angels.

Speaker 3 20:44

Yes, I agree, come across that myself in the writing world that. I feel like it makes me, kind of introspectively, take a step back and go. Is this my drive, is this my purpose? And if it is, I think that's when I think I dig my heels in more versus you know, kind of like what you just said, joan, where, when you've talked to your students where they're like, oh, I just grew up on a ball, I'm probably not, you know, be an artist at this point, like so how dedicated are you really?

Speaker 1 21:10

right right yeah well, I, you know, I taught for 20 years at art center. That's uh. Greg was my instructor at art center oh, wow years later I I taught there, for I founded their entertainment track. Then I taught there for 20 years and frankly. Virginia, I would never take on the responsibility of discouraging anyone to never. So. I just not how I roll. It's not in my blood, but I do think, uh, you can lead a horse.

Speaker 1 21:37

I mean, I've learned, obviously, over 20 years of teaching and I I do keep in touch with students and I see where they land and what role art plays in their life. We're not all meant to necessarily, right, have have it be our vocation. It can be our avocation and so it is interesting to watch people's artistic. You know chemin artistique, their little artistic journey and what art ends up serving in their lives. So I do know, if it's meant to be, it will happen. You can lead ores to water but you can't make them ring. So I have a nephew who I created opportunities for and I did spend much of my life writing letters of recommendation and literally getting interviews for people and going out on a limb and heartfelt recommendations and the bottom line is, if it's meant to be, it will happen and it could be the drive, the passion, like you had, joan, who knows there's so many ingredients.

Speaker 1 22:28

But I just I like the idea that it can serve different. You know, it can serve everybody differently.

Speaker 2 22:33

I mean, I used to ask my students what is the most important thing that you need for whatever it is, your drive is, if it's and I said artists, since I was teaching artists but you know what is the most important characteristic you need? And they listed, you know, creativity, skill, you know, list all kinds of things. I said the number one thing is drive. I mean, because how many students I was one of the few in my class in Washington you that continued to be a professional artist full time and you know, and same with students, I had some incredibly skilled students who had no, like you just said, no desire to be, and that's okay, you know. But just understand that drive is the number one thing to succeed.

Speaker 1 23:12

You know, right, and maybe everybody's on a different journey, so the milestones can be universal, but they're in different order. Right, we all learn things in a different order, but this podcast we tend to focus on, you know, that moment when you do connect your craft and we've talked a lot about technique, right, having that technique to back up your vision, whether that's conceptual right, or just narrative, whatever you're feeling driven to express. So technique is just one part of that equation, but I kind of like this magical moment, like you, joan, where you connect it with what you have to offer, right, what your unique soul, what combination of traits is unique to you, that you're being called upon by the universe to contribute back to the collective. Sorry if that sounds lofty but I know it's perfect.

Speaker 1 24:00

There might be somebody out there like garage bands. They never really learned technique, they might just pick up an instrument and never take a lesson, but you know what? That's exactly what they're meant like. That rawness is exactly what's needed. So, anyway, I just I think it's more about purpose than it is really any one ingredient, like technique or. But I agree, drive, right, drive, and the muses are a part of that. I have my own muses that I feel I'm kindred spirits with, you know, even if there's decades or centuries separating us, and that's what keeps me going a lot of times, feeling that kinship with people that are, you know, called upon in the same way that I've been called upon. How do Michelangelo and who's the other guy that's that visits you?

Speaker 2 24:44

Da Vinci, right, oh, just Da Vinci. Da Vinci, right, right, leonardo da Vinci, oh just da. Vinci yeah just him, so full of wonder and exploration. Well, I think. But I want to kind of touch on, I'm sorry, but the word success I said in order to succeed. You know we all have whatever success is for us and if doing you know, a Sunday artist or a few hours a month artist is what helps you feel good and find joy and peace, then that's success for you. You know, there's not. I didn't want to.

Speaker 1 25:17

No, no, I love that. Yeah, that's how I took it when you said it. Okay, you know, being a professional artist is definitely overrated. Yeah, yeah, no, but that shouldn't be your gauge of whether you've you know it's, whatever that vision is and whatever you've been called to contribute. If you touch one or two people right and I'm more into writing these days that's where I feel like I've matured the most. It's definitely not in my figurative or figural painting, although I do enjoy it. I feel like I've matured most as a writer.

Speaker 2 25:48

So do you know what?

Speaker 1 25:49

I mean If one story touches one person in Iceland. My job is.

Speaker 3 26:11

That's beautiful. Come to that universal feeling of understanding. You know what you're seeing or what you're putting out too. I mean to me, I think that's what makes art so amazing it's. You know, as the artist creating you're, you're tapping into that universal connection of the human experience and then the person who's viewing it is receiving that energy and tapping into it to perceive it.

Speaker 1 26:31

Yeah, it's like a full circle, right. Beautiful, that's when the circuit's completed is when the patron but you know we're not always there to feel that or experience the completion of the circuit. That's why I love live theater, because you actually feel the energetic exchange, you know, but you have faith, right that the patron. Well, you probably get a lot of satisfaction because you work directly with your patrons on the right, you co-create the portraits together.

Speaker 1 26:59

Oh, it's a total high. Yes, well, we'll get into those in a second. I truly. But I, I think, virginia, you hinted at something that's a good transition here. You seem pretty into the visceral aspect that's my word, you know like if intellect is overrated and we're talking this thing into the ground.

Speaker 1 27:14

I agree, it's experiential in a lot of ways, right, your process is just that, it's a process that's serving you, but we don't always. You know, there's all kinds of art out there there's conceptual, there's narrative, right, there's process art, there's, yeah, experiential. So I really thought the music paintings were largely about the visceral level. And just as a way into this topic, I'll say, as a filmmaker, you know, my favorite part of the process is working with the composer and because it is nonlinear, right, and it's nothing that can really be bottled, and I'll use just one silly example, I did know on one of my films that I wanted.

Speaker 1 27:55

You know, my favorite films are those in which they're actually very light on dialogue and truly, almost like theater dell'arte, it's the facial expressions and the gestures that touch you, despite language. That's right, virginia, that's the name of our podcast, language of the Soul. But there is a whole other visceral level and those are the films I like best. So I had this approach on this one film and I thought, well, I kind of want to get them in the gut first. And I do love films where you're reacting and you don't know why.

Speaker 1 28:31

They're despicable characters even, but you don't know why there's something in their humanity that you relate to and you're invested in, and then you're moved, despite yourself, and usually I walk away going. Well, I guess I was moved because I'm a human. There's something about loss. You know films about loss, for example. You can't pinpoint it, but your humanity is the very reason you're moved, anyway. So that sounds pretty lofty, but my goal was let's get them in the gut first, then maybe, maybe, maybe not maybe two days later.

Speaker 1 29:03

I love films that sit with you for a while, right, but maybe you feel it in the gut, and if there's a takeaway that's intellectual, it's kind of delayed, it's a little bit later. So I was thinking about that the whole time. I even wrote up art direction you know paragraphs and my composer, without communicating that to him, it was so magic. He would have the deep cello vibrating in your gut, you know, and at just the right moment, and then it would break and you'd hear these ethereal strings that literally vibrated in your sinus cavities. So he followed my approach, without even communicating it to him, anyway, and I feel like your music paintings might be experiential, if that makes sense. How did those come about, and is there anything that you can put your thumb on, or was it a completely nonlinear, if that makes sense.

Speaker 2 29:49

Visceral experience for you well, I, I have to just say, in response to what you were just sharing about your, what you're creating is, um, that that experience of all the levels of being human, along with the incredible soul. You know that, you know so that even just the title of this podcast is such a beautiful combination of, you know, appreciating loving human experience, along with, you know, the expansion of soul, because soul is all there is. But we are so blessed to be human, so to to experience all this, and so I don't know the abstracts for me, I was writing my book and I was just dedicated and focusing on that, so I wasn't able to do my art for a while and I found, like my daughter when she was seven, she goes Mommy, when you don't do your art, you're not happy.

Speaker 1 30:45

You needed her to tell you that I love that and I, you know, I was like boy.

Speaker 2 30:48

Are you insightful, like?

Speaker 2 30:50

that's so true you know, and um. So anyway, I had to do some art while I was um, writing the book, because I just, but I couldn't get it. I couldn't get back to these ethereal drawings that took so very tedious, very time consuming, you know, like I was so passionate about one at a time, which took a long time, and I couldn't start one of those while I was writing a book. So I went to the studio and just threw some paint around, just because I needed to just be a kid and play and just get my hand in some paint. And I just did it and I was like whoa, that's pretty cool. And then I was playing music, you know, because I love music, and I started, I all of a sudden, this painting that I did.

Speaker 2 31:36

It was like my gosh, I just captured the essence of this song oh, you didn't even consciously notice no, it was morning is broken by and I found myself grabbing, you know I I said, oh, I want a new canvas, and it was kind of big. I mean, you know, I just had access. By then I had just kind of accumulated stuff and materials and I just picked the colors intuitively and I just played the song over and over and because I loved it oh, my God, I love Pat Stevens. And I just played the song over and over and because I loved it, not because I thought I was not, because not because I thought I was going to paint, to paint it. But when I was done I was like my gosh, look what I have done.

Exploring Personal Power Portraits

Speaker 2 32:19

So then I consciously started putting it out there that I can capture your song, because I thought it would be a real, you know, expansion for me, because that was something I related to as those songs, you know, like that connected to my energy. But if you pick a song that I'm like, oh gosh, I don't even like that song but I'm committed to doing it because you know you want me to use, I've put that out there that I will do that and it would stretch me to see if I could, you know, connect to the energy of a song that I wasn't like all high about you know, and I and I did it.

Speaker 2 32:54

You know, like every, every customer I had or collector I had, they were like Whoa, this is really cool, it looks just like I feel it. And it was a real, real expansion, you know, for freedom. I mean talk about life expansion because here had been doing these tedious you know drawings and and they were feeling soulful but but I wasn't, but this freedom.

Speaker 1 33:16

I was going to say it sounds. Sounds very freeing.

Speaker 1 33:18

I've, I've said, you know, if somebody came along tomorrow, and I'm very trained, I took my first oil painting class at seven and you know, I know the, I know the Atelier approach and you know old masters approach versus the alla prima. I spent my whole life doing that and but you know what, every time I do a painting that's like in the old master's technique, I get halfway through. I'm like, and why am I doing this again? It is not. I mean, there's something meditative about right being methodical. You do lose yourself, you get your meditation in, you get those gamma waves flowing, I guess, but it is tedious and I just end up going tearing my hair out Like, and why am I doing this? So I've joked like if somebody came along tomorrow and said I want to put you up, I'll take a percentage of your first show. You're now a fine artist. Go, it would be completely abstract. I don't want to pull out my bag of tricks, if that makes sense. Yeah, I have no pride, nothing to prove. You know, like I probably would do 100% abstract.

Speaker 2 34:40

Well, it built my trust in life, you know, because I built so much trust in my skills, because you know you take so many classes, so I didn't know that I had retained. And I went to grab like a certain material or tip or dip or throw or do whatever and I was like where did that idea come from? Like how did I even think to grab that tool or do it? But then I went, oh my gosh, I read about that or saw that or stood there one on one and looked at a painting. You know, in the museum, you know all this, you retain all this. So it gives you so much trust in the magic of life and the retention of life and you know, just like in your daily life, you start trusting how things flow and I don't know there's just a big, it was just, it was wonderful.

Speaker 1 35:14

It's beautiful. It's almost like the psalm is greater than the whole of its parts. You know like it all comes into play in some unexamined ways. I do have a question, though Do you still do the music paintings, or is that a thing of the past?

Speaker 2 35:29

That is a thing of the past.

Speaker 1 35:30

But did you ever nail? I mean, I'm guessing, all the time? Did your patrons ever say oh? That is the perfect embodiment of what I experienced when I hear that song.

Speaker 2 35:41

Well, they said they loved it, they bought it, you know. No, but I just wonder, because I did have kind of an agreement if you don't connect or relate Like I don't want this pressure.

Speaker 2 35:50

I don't want this pressure, although you know galleries don't like that, but you know, so I worked on my own more. So you get a refund if you're completely yeah, you know, like you know, they say no. You, you sign a commission, you're committed, you have to pay. And I was like I don't want that pressure on me, I want freedom to just do and if you like it, get it.

Speaker 1 36:08

but um, no, I the reason I ask is uh, I again quick story I had some former students that didn't really land, you know, right away at a studio. Their goals happened to have been, you know, working in the entertainment industry and they just didn't land. So they started meeting, which I thought was beautiful, and just creating. They say don't wait around to be loved, just keep creating. So it was actually the funnest thing I've ever done, uh or no, you know, on a volunteer basis, and we would, uh, just meet and slowly try to develop concepts that nobody had ownership in. But it was really just, you know, exercising, keeping those muscles primed, you know.

Speaker 1 36:45

And one of the things we did is just turn on a piece of music, and it was usually non lyrical and we all would just sort of tune in and, I guess, tune out right.

Speaker 2 36:56

Yeah, tune in and zone out totally and just start sketching what came to mind.

Speaker 1 37:01

Yeah, and it was fascinating how we all would gravitate toward the same themes in our little doodles and then we actually would write a paragraph of any narrative that occurred in your mind's eye, always, always variations on a theme, because we're in the same room and literally it's vibrational at that point yeah fascinating.

Speaker 1 37:22

So yeah, I just kind of wondered if you know you received the same. You know vision that they or maybe sometimes people don't know it till they see it right, I feel like maybe non-artists don't sometimes know until they see it yeah, I don't think that they.

Speaker 2 37:39

I don't feel like they had a vision ahead of time because they weren't artists, but I mean not that they don't have a vision if you're not an artist, um I don't know the feeling, though right, every song right takes you on a journey and there's a feeling attached to it anyway.

Awakening Through Spiritual Artistry

Speaker 1 37:54

So how did the personal portraits? It seems like a sort of extension of the music paintings. In a way you're capturing their favorite song, which I would. I think aesthetics are largely soul related, if that makes sense, like that is your unique thumbprint in a way. Is your sense of aesthetics to talk a lot about the personal power portraits? Because I do think that when we surround ourselves with reminders of our core essence, you know, reminders of our essential selves, it's empowering.

Speaker 1 38:27

And I don't mean to put words in your mouth, but that's my understanding of these personal power portraits. I know my space is very important to me. I don't like clutter. I, like you, know I've never explored feng shui, I don't know anything it, but I know I love to feel tranquil and at peace by virtue of the space, right, what I'm surrounded by. So I can't imagine having a reminder of my central self, my soul, as a constant reminder. Can you tell us a little bit more about how those evolved, those personal power portraits, and how you interact with the client? What kind of conversations go into that?

Speaker 2 39:04

Well, to start with, like so many, I was plagued with putting myself down all the time. You're not good enough. Because you know, I look at my work and say, well, it's not Michelangelo or Givenchy. I was always comparing, anyway, I was just always putting myself down. So I'm always seeking, and I realized that spiritual growth is the only way to reach love of self.

Speaker 2 39:39

Artist, you know, in the business of art, trying to understand how to run the business of art and put, you know just all that conflict, you know how do you run the business and I'm not good enough to do that, and you know all that voice, and so I don't know. There was many other stages that happened in there, cause I, I went from um abstracts to combining animals with abstracts, and then um, and then I started doing fantasy, because I, I love fantasy, you know, like dragons, unicorns, and, and I was pulled to go to comic-con and I did a comic-con show and it was very, you know, I was very popular there and and I thought that was my key and in the meantime I had signed up for a class.

Speaker 2 40:18

a jim fort have you ever heard of?

Speaker 1 40:20

Jim Fortin, I have, I have.

Speaker 2 40:21

F-O-R-T-I-N.

Speaker 1 40:22

Oh, maybe on your website, I yeah.

Speaker 2 40:24

Read about it, yes.

Speaker 1 40:26

Yeah, so the name is in my brain already, but then I didn't read about him on your website a little bit.

Speaker 2 40:31

Well, he has a wonderful podcast, jim Fortin podcast, and I had signed up for his class and just to spiritually grow, because I knew that the conflict I was experiencing could only be solved through the soul, through the spiritual growth and he was into, you know, subliminal, you know, shifting your inner voice. You know that subliminal, that the subconscious, and so I signed up for the class. The subconscious, and so I'd signed up for the class and anyway, to make a long story short, after going through his class, I made these realizations about my identity and my values and I mean I just cried. It was like it was just a release of this is who I really, the clarification of who I want to, who I know I am, inside my identity, really getting in touch with my values and um, and then living them. And so I get. I wanted to do a thank you. Uh, I wanted to give him one of my abstracts as a thank you, you know, for having such a wonderful cause. I signed up for his class called, and that's the class I had taken.

Speaker 1 41:43

Can you?

Speaker 2 41:43

tell us what that acronym stands for. Oh gosh, transformational it's shifting your subconscious. Oh my gosh, don't worry.

Speaker 1 41:50

No, no, no, no pressure, we'll Google it, we'll Google it.

Speaker 2 41:55

Jim Fortin TCP. It'll come up everywhere. He's got a huge podcast, he's popular, but his class is awesome. And then there's another inner circle that follows that His brother-in-law is a shaman, like his sister, is married to a real shaman. That was a shaman from age six years old, you know, born into the family, I mean a real shaman. That was buried in the desert, you know, neck from neck down for days, you know, when he was eight, nine years old. All that, oh my God. So the powers of this shaman has in the, and he's just so. Jim speaks for him because real shamans don't get on the Internet and share, like not real shamans, you know so he, he, he is the shaman's voice and and he passes all this wisdom.

Speaker 2 42:44

You know this, this effort, you know this, um, ancient wisdom that is just so profound and I it just it rang. So it just rang so true, so deep and I just, oh, it was such release to finally connect to letting go of. I want to be successful and all this kind of ego stuff, not kind of, but total ego stuff. Like what is success? Is it a certain amount of money? Is it a certain level? You know it's none of that, you know, so like getting that clarification and simplifying, you know, simplifying the direction of my life was so profound. So I wanted to give him a thank you and I had many abstracts in my studio that I was just going to send him and he said, you know, I love the generosity but it's really just not my style and and so I was like, oh gosh, I I just feel like I've got to do art for him. So he had mentioned the double-headed eagle in one of his talks and he just mentioned it, had mentioned the double-headed eagle in one of his talks and he just mentioned it and it just like, oh, it just got, you know, just got it stuck with me.

Speaker 2 43:44

So I found myself one day just like being, you know, just like whoosh, you know, like those artist moments that you're just like, oh, thank you, god. You know, I was totally inspired to do this huge it was five foot wide and um, double-headed eagle, with all the symbols and you know things, things that I had felt inspired from and connected with him for him, and I sent it to him as a gift and because it was done with such purity and gift and no money involved and nothing, it was such a pure energy place. Then, when I was done with it, I was like, oh my gosh, I have captured his higher self, because the double headed eagle is a leader and there's so many other symbols in there that represent things that you know that are him. And he was so blown away by it and he said do you realize how powerful you are? And I was like, well, you know, there's this power. That's been just like the pounding in my heart. I mean I still remember so many, I mean almost every day. I just had this hyper power energy just driving me forward all the time, but this conflict of I'm not good enough and what's a success, and trying so hard, you know, to stop it. And so, like I felt like I had this powerful, you know, message that was in me, that was our purpose or whatever you define it. You know my Dharma was in me, getting me there. And so, you know, I was like you're wow, you know, like that, this is it, you know. So then I started offering that for people. You know that's when I defined oh my gosh, my two passions are to study spirituality and and um, the higher self, what it is, and and and art, you know, creating creative art.

Speaker 2 45:26

So when I interviewed I so now I interviewed the person for 90 minutes and I ask them a whole series of questions and um, and I connect to their energy and I record it and then I, you know, meditate. You know, after the recording I play the recording again, but I relax and meditate and I just feel the energy of pulling it all together. One of the first questions I ask, which seems to be popular these days but how many people really ask themselves if you had two weeks to live and you had all the money and perfect health that you needed, what would you do for those two weeks? And it's amazing how many as popular as that is now in songs and everything people don't really stop and really ask themselves seriously, because almost I can't remember one person who wasn't like oh, oh, what would I do? You know?

Speaker 1 46:17

Well, there's the bucket list idea. That's pretty popular right.

Speaker 2 46:21

Yeah, but that's not a two week thing you know you can't do your bucket list in two weeks, you know so that's almost.

Speaker 1 46:26

That's almost like what's. What meal would you like before we execute you?

Speaker 2 46:31

Oh gosh.

Speaker 1 46:34

Anyway, so that's the first question you ask.

Speaker 2 46:36

That's one. And then I asked him a bunch of other things that they're like wow, you know it. Just it gets some thinking. You know like what, what turned you on as a child and what turns you on as an adult? And it's just you know what is your Scott, what turns you on in the sky and what you know what is your favorite? Just all these questions and it. Just pulling it all together, they get high. I high, I mean. 95% of the time they're like wow, this is like a therapy session. This is like I feel like I understand myself more. I'm excited. This is, you know, I think I'm pretty cool. Now, you know, they're in touch with themselves again because they've lost it, because everybody gets so busy with their nine to five world that you know you just lose touch, and so that's basically that, basically what I do.

Speaker 1 47:20

Yeah, it's beautiful because you're offering more than just the painting. Right, you're offering spiritual growth, maybe not an epiphany, but that's as it should be. The patron, right you get something out of it and they get something out of it.

Speaker 2 47:33

Yeah, and power animals and spirit animals, of course, is a huge thing.

Speaker 1 47:36

You know like many times, many times I I had sorry to interrupt you um, one of the questions I had was and sorry for my ignorance, but the double-headed eagle. Is that from a specific tradition, or did he mention it as kind of a metaphor in his talk? What was the you?

Speaker 2 47:52

know, I don't remember when you know, because it was just mentioned and and then later on he said it's interesting how nobody asked me about that that's funny.

Speaker 1 48:06

Well, it probably landed enough as a metaphor, however he was using it. So but I will say, uh, the closest experience. I have, a friend, dave, that's kind of doing similar work, although maybe not to the extent. He's a pretty cool dude and he's pretty spiritual. So he does talk a lot with his clients when doing a portrait and of course he tries to capture them in some way. But he probably would express it very differently than the way you have.

Embracing Humanity Through Spiritual Growth

Speaker 1 48:31

But I would say you know the therapeutic function of that exchange you have with your patrons. We, some of us, have been in therapy or are in therapy and that definitely serves its purpose. But there's something different when it's got a spiritual slant to it. So there's a little place in my neighborhood called the Philosophical Research Center on Los Feliz. Do you know that, virginia, by chance? Yeah, it's awesome. I go there just to look in the bookstore and there's events from time to time.

Speaker 1 48:59

So I just popped my head into an intuition workshop and, yeah, one of those days where you're just following synchronicity, right, you happen to be free enough to do that and the universe just kind of reveals itself.

Speaker 1 49:12

I feel like when you're not on the clock right and you're not on a schedule. That's when you notice the synchronicities and you just ride the wave. So I went in there and it's just one of those days and yeah, they had us, you know, hook up with a partner that you didn't even know and it's pretty intimate, you know, and I don't remember a whole lot, but, um, you kind of try to picture the other person as an animal, right, somebody you just met, and I was told I'm a lion, but I just, every time I go to Kabbalah you know what I mean or even just a little workshop like that, it serves you in a very different way than therapy, and maybe that speaks to what we were saying earlier. Like words are overrated and just the experiential level or the visceral level can be more cathartic than I don't know hashing out the intellectual side of things, yeah, overthinking kills you Well.

Speaker 1 50:04

I think, sorry, we're human and so I think our egos serve a purpose for survival. But, yeah, definitely overrated. Sorry, virginia, go ahead.

Speaker 3 50:12

Oh, I was gonna say it just reminds me of how powerful it is for us to see ourselves through those different lenses. It's kind of like you know, I know, uh, Nick and I have talked before like when I used to teach my beginning writers class, I'd always tell the writers and day one in classes they need to go home before the next class and throughout that week constantly look in the mirror and really take a hard look and like stare into their eyes and and see what gets reflected back, because that the reflection that we see through those different lenses can be so transformative into understanding our deeper selves. And I think we don't take the time to do that because we're just, you know, like you're saying, john, you know we're just in that nine to five kind of getting things done. That we don't. You know, people don't stop and ask themselves those philosophical questions anymore.

Speaker 1 51:02

Well, and I think they need permission to do that too. So, like going to that workshop, it gave people permission to do that. Or, you know, taking the step to have a portrait done and meeting with you, it's permission. So yeah To experience the energy.

Speaker 2 51:16

You know, if you do that in a workshop or if you do it like with the one on one, with the portrait, you know it's, you experience the energy and then you start craving more, like that's a higher, that I feel a different, higher energy.

Speaker 2 51:29

I mean, if you want to call it it is higher, expansive energy, that it just fills a need, and that's the kind of energy that you know, like the really getting in touch with how we all are one is. And you know, like you said, the ego serves a purpose. But you know we have to get jump past that to expand, you know, to this oneness, and to get to that place is just starts with loving yourself. You know, so that you can start looking in the other person's eyes without um judgment. Because if you're still judging yourself so harsh and you're looking at them with judgment instead of seeing them as a reflection of you, you know, like you, and it doesn't mean you stop judgment, because I think as long as you're a human, you're going to judge. But you have I like the word discernment- there you go.

Speaker 1 52:17

You're allowed to diagnose and discern there.

Speaker 1 52:20

There you go, but now I get you 100%, I mean, I think, the only answer. You know you were hinting at again my words, but inner peace, tranquility, well being, it's always available, right, and those of us who meditate, no, it might take a while, but you can get there and limit the mental chatter and in the midst of chaos, chaos, that inner peace is there. But how many of us take the time to do that? Then go out into the world and the rest is the ripple effect. So we're not gonna like change the world overnight or create inner peace, but I promise, right, each of us doing our inner work. That's the answer on the macro scale, you know. So, if we can all, because the humanity is part of you know, seeing it's all sounds so corny, right, but if you go about your day seeing through the eyes of love, because you've taken the time to align and center, you're going to see somebody holding the door open at Starbucks instead of the you know asshole honking in the parking lot.

Speaker 2 53:17

There you go, there you go. I mean, it's all about redirecting that chatter inside and it's you know, that's Jim Fortin helps a lot with all the different ways you can go about it. You know, I mean, there's so many ways of of shifting, and you know, and it's very simple, it can be very simple throughout the day, where I mean because, like the shaman says, meditation is um 24 hours a day. Well, how do you do that? Well, you're obviously sitting and meditating all day, but you're, you're, you're shifting your, your, your vision, you know your thoughts, you, you're what, you're paying more attention to what you're actually thinking and shifting that to to another. You know, whatever, if it's just as simple as, oh, I'll just be grateful or thankful instead of whatever you know, putting whatever negative thing if you, but I would.

Speaker 1 54:03

I guess for me the answer would be having a practice and prioritizing that practice because, yes, the more you meditate, the more you're centered as you go about your day. It has a kind of cumulative effect. Yes, we still go in and out of alignment, but I tell me, if you feel similarly, I have this premise that artists or anyone, we're all creative. I would say that it's. It's to be human, is to be creative. Some of us are, have not yet found a way to uh, I don't know, connect that with a sense of purpose or to contribute it back to the collective. But we're all being creative in our own ways, all day, every day. But I think people with a discipline or a craft actually have the gift of those gamma waves. So when you're in the middle of a painting and you're in the zone, as they say, there is no mental chatter, right?

Speaker 1 54:49

You're connected with your divinity.

Speaker 2 54:50

Totally.

Speaker 1 54:51

So the creative process.

Speaker 2 54:52

That's why your daughter says mom from the mouths of babes right Mom you're happier when you create but it's that simple.

Speaker 1 55:01

I think if we found an outlet for creativity or self-expressed on a regular basis, we probably would get in the zone at some point in our creative process. And it does have cumulative effects. I know I plein air paint a lot and there is no linear thought. When you're you know what know.

Speaker 1 55:18

I mean kind of looking back and forth and interpreting those colors in nature, it's just in the zone, and I was so lucky to have a mentor speaking of our muses and mentors. On lion king, my first film, I just adored it was great to have a boss that you worship. It's never happened again trust me, you know, he's 21, straight out of school and I adored my boss and to this day he's kind of just an example to me of a gentleman Right and a spiritual being and anyway, like Greg, had a huge influence on me.

Speaker 1 55:50

But I promise you, and he was a Zen Buddhist at the time, as evidenced by his little tail. He didn't talk about it.

Speaker 3 55:58

Right, he didn't talk about it.

Speaker 1 55:58

Right, he didn't talk about it at work, but anyway, you just knew like so much time on the right half of his brain that all day, every day, he was just complete, like he just chilled in his presence because he was there, if that makes sense. Yeah, so we all should all aspire to be a dug ball. There's a a shout out Doug ball. Now he's in Hawaii actually just painting, doing gallery paintings.

Speaker 2 56:23

He's in.

Speaker 1 56:23

Tahiti and Hawaii, and that's the life I want.

Speaker 2 56:29

Well, I've also gained a bigger appreciation and awe about being human, you know like rather than trying to escape, Cause I have to say when I first moved to Sedona I think I was with too many circles of people who were trying to, you know, raised away from being human, you know, just to be in this exalted spiritual place, you know, because kind of escaping being human, and now it's like to be able to fully embrace the honor of being human.

Speaker 1 57:03

I was going to say I think we compartmentalalize I'm so sorry if I interrupted you. No, that's, I said because it's come up a couple times, this theme of like is our humanity at odds with our spirituality? I don't know more and more. I'm impressed by people like my sister, whom I mentioned in the pre-interview, Renée Marie who can apply her spiritual principles in the trenches.

Speaker 1 57:23

You know, Mother Teresa said I lost my religion, as they say, for 20 years, but I still did the work. She literally has said I saw no evidence of God for 20 years but, I still did the work.

Speaker 1 57:37

So I just not that there's any right way to go about life, but I tend to respect people who, again, I think maybe that's why I mentioned that ego has its place, because we can't demonize all of our survival instincts. They're here for a reason, so that we can have those glimpses of our spirituality and try and live in that space as much as possible. Right, but I think it's our humanity, and when I use the word humanity I'm talking about, I am talking about compassion, you know, seeing what we share, seeing the universal.

Navigating Spirituality in a Changing World

Speaker 1 58:11

So anyway I just maybe our humanity is a path to our spirituality, or they're. They're not mutually exclusive. Any thoughts on that guys?

Speaker 2 58:18

Well, the you know, like Viktor Frankl I don't know if I have the exact words, but the meaning of life is what you make it, and what you make it is following your passions, your skills, your talents. You came into this world with uniqueness. Uniqueness, you know, and, and when you follow, when you discover your uniqueness and your individual talents, or whatever your values, and follow that, that's your meaning and it's different for everybody, and that's being, that's expanding the humanness, but it's also grabbing onto the soul's purpose, because that's your dharma, or, you know, like that's um, then it connects the two, in my opinion.

Speaker 1 58:59

well, you, I think, the reason I went into that is you hint like that's um, then it connects the two, in my opinion. Well, you, I think the reason I went into that is you hinted that early on maybe some of the people in sedona were escaping their humanity by taking refuge in their spirituality. Anyway, I heard a little something in there and I in my youth I did write about that a lot how you know, when you have your head in the clouds, it's a great way to escape your actual issues, you know.

Speaker 1 59:20

And so I think we're all on a journey and we're all trying to have our feet on the ground and our head in the clouds at the same time, if that makes sense. I guess I'm also hinting at, you know, the Thomas More idea. We're into Joseph Campbell, but Thomas More, I think, is also a comparative religion expert and he talks a lot about embracing the shadow, you know, and Jungian psychology talks about embracing the shadow side of humanity, and I mean day of the dead's coming up, right. That's an example of embracing the light in the shadow and the yin and the yang and all of that.

Speaker 2 59:53

So I just do find.

Speaker 1 59:54

You know, under the guise of spirituality, sometimes we want to ignore the shadow side and we're quick to label things as good, bad, pleasurable, right, suffering, painful, it's like. How about it just is?

Speaker 2 1:00:08

I know, I know and I think that's why the hero's journey helped me when I was trying to define, like, when you go through the shadow moments of those really dark moments of life and you can't make sense of it. You know, like, suddenly, the hero's journey like, whoa, this is part of this, this is moments of life and you can't make sense of it. You know, like, suddenly, the hero's journey like, whoa, this is part of this, this is part of the journey, like, yes, I'll get through this. Yay, there's a, there's a, there's exciting, you know chapter to come.

Speaker 1 1:00:29

you know, because you understand the cycles.

Speaker 2 1:00:32

Yeah, exactly, and you understand it is a cycle and then you can like the world. Right now, I mean, we're about to enter a pretty challenging time and if we can just like, know that we're, I mean the more spiritually connected we can be, the more we're going to just glide through this and help this be the most wonderful growth you know challenging time.

Speaker 1 1:00:54

That's exactly what we're being called upon to do, right I?

Speaker 2 1:00:57

know it's. So it's exciting to me that we're here because obviously we chose. Well, I mean, yeah, I think, because I've gone through enough of those downsides, those dark sides of moments where I've come through and it's like gosh, I don't, you know, it just feels so good to be able to get through those, with fully being able to cry and accept and release and talk and be in those moments, fully experience them. But then let it pass and then just embrace it. And once again, about embrace, being human, but, and the change that's inevitable with life, I mean, what do they say? The world, if the humans weren't here, the earth would be doing these crazy things on its own, you know. So we as humans need to just kind of go, start flowing and adding or helping, and it's just an exciting time for us to, to, to be our to, to be what we came here to be, you know.

Speaker 1 1:01:54

I do think it takes. I use the word faith a moment ago just because to recognize that. I used the word faith a moment ago just because to recognize that, yeah, all strife signals change. And in the beginning of my book that became this podcast, I talk about the year I was born, which is 1968. And yeah, the world was on fire just like right now.

Speaker 1 1:02:11

Yeah, so many you know all the assassinations that happened that year and the National Convention and just so many low points like in police brutality and the civil rights movement and but also, you know, I'm not even going to say high points, just pretty much low points, yeah, but you saw people's passion and then 69, you had woodstock, right, the quintessence of our interconnectivity. You saw the uh moon landing, which has been framed as our capacity and potential, our human capacity. So that to me is like a back-to-back example of, yeah, strife signals change on the horizon, but I don't know. I think it takes faith because I think the stakes feel higher right now. Again, you have been around a little longer. Do the stakes seem higher right now, I don't know, like the end of democracy or maybe fascism on the horizon, or is this one of many, many changes you've seen?

Speaker 1 1:03:06

you know, I assumed we're talking about the divisiveness and the I don't know upcoming yeah, I mean it's choice, you know.

Speaker 2 1:03:13

I mean I don't want to choose to believe it's the worst or whatever, because then you just get all tense and analyzing and you know, fearful and all those words, yeah and. But you know, um, facing what is there and being prepared I I'm kind of excited about I have I was just going to sign up for this Um, uh, greg Braden has a class called um, a five-year guide to your future discoveries that will supercharge the way you think he'll love and live, and it's a. It's an eight week masterclass. He's. He's just kind of listing I mean I haven't signed up for it as hasn't started.

Speaker 2 1:03:52

I don't, I don't know what starts a minute you pay or whatever, but it's like only $29 a month or 300,. A minute you pay or whatever, but it's like only $29 a month or $299 for a year to catch you up on what's going on and how it can be solved and to approach it in a really positive way. So I feel like I need a little guidance, you know. So I'm kind of looking to this as to help me shift my, you know, because I tend to be in la-la land, you know, like I don't understand and so I just can't. But I don't want to be in la-la land. I want to be aware. It's a balance. Yeah, I want to be aware to do what I can do and say what I can say, and even if my art can express and help face you know what, what is really happening, but but face it with a real positive.

Speaker 1 1:04:43

I don't know, positive is the word but how do you be the change, like we said earlier, how?

Speaker 2 1:04:48

do you?

Speaker 1 1:04:48

change you wish to see in the world, without identifying with right, the talking heads on the news and the doom speaking and the catastrophizing it is really tough to turn on the TV at all.

Speaker 2 1:05:02

Yeah Well, I, I just don't, you know so I'm one of those I'm one of those people who people are all excited to share some news, negative news, with me, because I haven't heard it, you haven't heard, and I said no, tell me. I know, I know you can't wait to tell me that's a very real thing, though.

Speaker 1 1:05:18

Like how do you let the real world and that's in quotes, by the way, right, the big bad world? How much do you let in? We all know how to be spiritually content, and we're all here for a different reason, right? We're not all going to be activists, we're not all going to buy into socialization and the status quo and all that. Thank God for politicians or public servants is the way I'll put it. Thank God for them, thank God for our military. That ain't me and that ain't you, joan.

Speaker 2 1:05:46

No Right.

Speaker 1 1:05:47

We're here to do it through our gifts, through our community. But I do think I say amen to all of it. I really do.

Speaker 1 1:05:53

But we get to choose how much and it's not even negativity, but how much of the messaging virginia in the spirit of our podcast, right, there's so much messaging from all sides all the time, and that's what you're saying about overthinking things. You turn on the news and you can buy into the fear very quickly, uh. So, yeah, I think we're all tasked with, like, maintaining our center, right, finding our authentic self and our peace and our well-being, then going out into the world and being I'm being really a lot of issuing a lot of platitudes here, right, but then going out and being the change we wish to see in the world, right, this is what I aspire to, uh yeah we all fail every day, right, but, um, I don't know, that's kind of what I see and that's what you're doing, right, I think you were saying you, your tendency is to be in la la land, but you want to find a way, right, of acknowledging, maybe, what's going on in the big bad world.

Speaker 1 1:06:47

But then, don uh DX, that he, um, that he shares the wisdom from like he, he is very he's preparing us, you know, for things.

Speaker 2 1:07:07

So, like the wisdom he shares somewhat on the podcast and um and in the classes, you know that that helps me a lot too, because it's it's uh, it's just such, it's something you believe in, you know, like it's just such a deep, expansive soul connection that is faced in reality, you know. But when the shaman has this ability to shift energy and to shapeshift and these things, you know he has a connection and a communication with the earth that is so profound and it's just so you just tune into those people that you just feel like have another connection that you want to expand to and then that becomes yours.

Speaker 1 1:07:46

Yeah, virginia, I think you've said on here be in the world, but not of it.

Speaker 3 1:07:51

Yeah, to live in the world. Yeah, live in the world, but not be of the world.

Speaker 1 1:07:57

So to define that. That's what I meant by not identifying with.

Radiating Energy Through Color and Art

Speaker 3 1:08:01

Yeah, basically, for me's, it's finding that that balance of of purpose and and aligning my, my perception and narrative to what I want to radiate out versus what I'm taking in, and then just basically perpetuating the negativity.

Speaker 1 1:08:22

Right, I love it. You said radiate I love that word. Or emanate we get to emanate, right, the change we wish to see. Yeah, you're getting pretty good at it too.

Speaker 2 1:08:33

You know, it blows me away. I wear bright colors.

Speaker 1 1:08:37

I've seen that.

Speaker 2 1:08:38

I saw that on your website you away.

Speaker 2 1:08:43

I wear bright colors and I saw that on your website and um, I it's just a natural thing that I think. Ever since I did the abstracts, um, I just start wearing. I got rid of all my neutrals in my closet and like there's no. When would I not want to wear a color that enlivens me? And I find it amazing how many people just look and I mean I have a subtle smile or smile on my face at all time Like I'm a big believer in just lifting the corners of your mouth. I even taught my students, you know, don't go into a big grin. You know, like, cause that's? You could be mostly as fake usually, but just as lifting your corners. But so it's just keeping your energy in this up spirit, so that my energy is radiating, and I also am very aware that I'm wearing these colors. But I can't but, like just yesterday again, like people stop and want to take a picture. You know, like you need to walk around with a cup.

Speaker 2 1:09:32

Yeah right, they pass me and just smile real big, you know.

Speaker 1 1:09:36

And and then I and my mom virginia, have you ever you've seen pictures of my mom right?

Speaker 1 1:09:40

oh yeah just everyone notices her smile but, like you said, even if it's not a full smile she got. I don't know, I don't even know if it was conscious, but she always had a little upturned impish. Yeah, the corners were always upturned, and then the eyes. She never looked old she just died in january but she never looked old because she kept her red hair magically. But then there's a twinkle in her eye and it's the smile in your eye. Yeah, it makes you exude youth. Yeah.

Speaker 1 1:10:10

So do people say it, or do they just bask in it? Do they comment on your clothes?

Speaker 2 1:10:15

Different people do different things, you know. I mean the people that actually say something about whatever color I'm wearing. I say isn't color a powerful thing If I'm wearing pink? Isn't pink a happy color? I try to make reference to the energy of color and then they go yeah, it's kind of like you're right.

Speaker 1 1:10:38

It's funny In my artwork you start to trust yourself more and get bolder with color. I think that's the general arc, right once you really feel safe, I think.

Speaker 1 1:10:47

I mean, there's a metaphor here, right? So in teaching oil painting you might say you know, start out monochromatic, that's quote-unquote, safe, right. And then you start doing complementary and then maybe get into a split complement, but then hopefully eventually you can just find the right color accents to fully saturate without assaulting the rods and cones of the eye Right. And so I look in my own space. Like I said, my space is very important to me. I just fully decided no more neutrals, no more earth tones. I'm going to do splashes of color Do you know what I mean? But you find the right relationship on the color wheel to saturate and it's still harmonious but of course it says something about true spiritual journey.

Speaker 1 1:11:28

Uh, yeah, it was very clear when I started and I might have gone overboard having color accents in my house. Do you guys relate to that at all? Yep, oh, yeah, yeah I might have gone too far. I I went with like a. What do they call it? Like a? You know the. What do you call the bold blue and white stripes? Is that bay, something or other? It's like an east coast blue and white stripes yeah, it's provincetown rhode island.

Speaker 3 1:12:01

Yeah, and I can't think of what you're talking. I know what you're talking about, though, so I extended my curtains all the way to the ceiling.

Speaker 1 1:12:06

So there's these bold, you know blue stripes. And then I found accents. Actually I did it to a painting of john watkins painting. I modeled my whole living room after the painting. But then you feel like, oh, am I assaulting my guests?

Expression of Authentic Self Through Art

Speaker 3 1:12:18

not that I have okay, I felt that your place was very serene when I walked in. I felt very balanced. I did not feel attacked. Since I have been there, I can I can say that no, I actually.

Speaker 1 1:12:31

It was a bold statement though I I, but it was important stuff for me sounds inspiring, and I'm a dude too right, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 1:12:40

Yeah, that's awesome yeah.

Speaker 3 1:12:42

And, by the way, your house. When I brought my daughter to come visit you, Nick, she has been slowly transforming her room and using some of those schemes. Oh no, I don't want to be responsible for that.

Speaker 1 1:12:56

Anyway, but actually my painting. Do you notice the John Watkiss painting? That's the one after which I modeled it. Strangely, that is my prized possession. You know, um, it's, it's my. And you know other pieces people have given me. Of course, craig hasn't as much as I beg, he's never given me any artwork but yeah it's that it means something to me, but uh, yeah, yeah, that could, and so maybe, yeah, a personal portrait down the line.

Speaker 3 1:13:26

Sorry, go ahead I was gonna say I love that joan brought up. You know color, though, and how you've gotten rid of. You know your neutral color schemes and more brighter colors, because I think sometimes we forget that. Um, you know what we surround ourselves with sets our mood and our tone and energy throughout the day.

Speaker 1 1:13:44

That explains your fingernails.

Speaker 3 1:13:46

Yes, yes, my very decorative fingernails, because I for me, I mean, and coming from a fashion background, I've noticed that it also says, I think it also speaks I don't want to say like self confidence in the fact that you know, you're just a super confident person, but I feel like when you're willing to introduce colors or patterns or whatever it is that you tend to shy away from, and just small tidbits of it, you start to build that internal confidence and power within yourself and I feel like you know that's basically you know a lot of what you've been saying, Joan. You know, like what you've done with, you know your personal power portraits, the fact that you've added the color. It's, it's learning to let that authentic self that's inside of us actually show, because we're so afraid to let people get close to us.

Speaker 1 1:14:38

Right? Or we want to blend in and not draw attention to ourselves, right I? We want to blend in and not draw attention to ourselves, right? I think women might learn that one Do you know what I mean Pretty early on. I love seeing how people express themselves. I have a niece whose hair is magenta one week and blue the next.

Speaker 2 1:14:52

I love it. Yeah, hair color is fun these days, isn't it?

Speaker 1 1:14:55

Yeah, well, I kind of grew up with that and that's what I was referring to. Like I love that teenagers do have an image, I, I had no category for image.

Speaker 1 1:15:04

You know I what I I credited myself with well, I'm secure, I don't need to. I have this premise too, like if you, um, are I don't know secure, you don't need to put much attention on your image. So, even though I'm a free thinker, right, and I've always thought outside the box and I kind of identified with or prided myself on never buying socialization to begin with, I'm an artist, I'm a rebel, and yet I never felt the need. It would have taken more effort to go out and find funky clothes on Melrose than to just wear a T-shirt and jeans.

Speaker 2 1:15:38

So do you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 1:15:44

I don't immediately look like a free-thinking artist, because, but the thing that makes me free-thinking is that I don't take the time to go to Melrose and and stand out. I don't know, but I'm over that now I I if anything, I tried to be. James Dean, right, virginia that was my one image in high school, james oh that's, that's cool. There's worse things, right.

Speaker 2 1:16:00

There's worse things. I had a student once that you know, when I was teaching school, I wore a black shirt that had like a colorful kind of things in the center. But she said, miss Marie, why are you wearing black? And I was like, well, it has like a colorful. She said, miss Marie, we depend on you. I was like, oh my gosh, and I still get that. If there's a day that the color I'm wearing is more pastel or white or something, people that know me, you know, whatever, even salespeople go, where's your color, or whatever. I was like, whoa, it's amazing, what an impact. Yeah, because it added energy to them. They can't do it themselves at that age, apparently, you know, so they have to, isn't it interesting?

Speaker 1 1:16:46

they get a vicarious yeah yeah.

Speaker 2 1:16:49

So then I start feeling responsible. You know, you're allowed to have a goth.

Speaker 1 1:16:55

You can be have a goth day here yeah, yeah there.

Speaker 2 1:16:58

There are those days that you just kind of want to be a little more quiet. You know well, g Greg was right, you definitely exude positive energy.

Speaker 1 1:17:05

I am going to use the word you didn't allow yourself to, but it seems inspiring. How about that Inspiring?

Speaker 2 1:17:10

energy. I love it. Thank you Well.

Speaker 1 1:17:12

I've said that too, a lot of times that some of us have a craft, some of us don't. I don't like to hear people that say I'm not creative, I of us don't. I don't like to hear people that say I'm not creative. I'm the one that's going to go.

Speaker 2 1:17:25

Okay, but you just hosted a dinner and you you made all that food exactly so so I don't like that but I I get that some people don't identify as an artist because we save that label right for people that send rockets into space, or so, but I do think we're all creative in our own ways. Yes.

Speaker 1 1:17:40

At a point, hold on.

Speaker 2 1:17:45

We all express ourselves in different ways, I guess, and you don't need the label of artist to be a creative being. No, just embrace your uniqueness. That's my goal, you know. Just to discover your uniqueness and be it and love it.

Speaker 3 1:18:00

It doesn't matter and you don't have to be this big thing either.

Speaker 2 1:18:03

You know, like you don't have to be this big name or big success or whatever.

Speaker 1 1:18:07

Quote unquote, success it, you know, just enjoying your simple life is huge, you know that's what I was headed toward in my little, in my babbling, was I've said for years, I have a friend who, yes, she's a dancer, so she has a craft, but truly just breathing, she's an inspiration to be around because, yeah, that makes sense, like every movement, totally, the way she moves her body, it's art to the rest of us. So I love that too. You can just, yeah, emanate or exude or radiate something into the world and that is your artistic expression. In a way, my niece is expressing herself with her hair color, you know, and you're creating performance art for everybody else beautiful so keep it up, joan, you're doing good work.

Speaker 1 1:18:56

You're doing good work in the world.

Speaker 2 1:18:58

Like I said, I believe life is supposed to be fun, you know. So you just really have to, you know, define it for yourself, what fun is for you, and um, and do it because, because nothing else matters, like money doesn't go with you when you die. You know no, and all that matters is is who you've made happy and and how you know how you feel. You know just the energy that you're feeling. That's what you take with you, is the expansion of your soul, and and how you know how you feel. You know just the energy that you're feeling. That's what you take with you, is the expansion of your soul, and and how much you've helped other people. You know whether it's one or two or thousands. You know, like, just have you helped a few people? Like that's all that really matters? And get down to that basic, basic feeling, instead of all this other stuff that's in the way of trying to be like somebody else and not good enough, and competition, and oh my gosh, get rid of it all you know, it's so frustrating.

Speaker 2 1:19:50

It makes life so like why what is life? And no one knows what life is other than just follow your heart.

Speaker 1 1:19:58

You know, like the heart math go to heart math and all these people, I think a lot of people buy into a lot of, you know, like we said, socialization and societal expectations, even parental expectations, and a lot of artists have to quiet those voices, to embrace their calling Right.

Speaker 1 1:20:17

But I think too, you know it's. It's normal to think about legacy, you know, and that could take the form of quote, unquote success, as we said or got to make my living as an artist, or I failed. I've, I've, I've talked to many of my students, former students, who feel that they're not a real artist and like, unless they're making their living at it. But, yeah, your legacy is never what you think it is Right. Yeah, it's probably the people you touched and not any of your accomplishments or accolades. So, anyway, we all step into that at some point, I think.

Speaker 2 1:20:49

Because, it's ego right, Everything else is ego, like the career, yeah, like the challenges that we're, because I had this meditation, okay, I want to be, I want to grow spiritually as high as I can. So what you know what? What will you know? Just throw it at me or whatever. I don't know how I worded it, but you know I'm, I'm open, you know, and I mean, oh my gosh, was I thrown challenges Careful, what you asked for? Oh, my Lord, I mean not, I guess this is a whole nother topic. But you know, I was, I was, um, diagnosed with leukemia and you know like now I've, I've healed that naturally, without the chemo, and, you know, just in the process of healing all that. And there's much more to the story which we won't go into, but, um, the, the in the process of studying, you know all that, the power of the mind and the power of joy and the power of laughter. You know, that's where it is, you know just staying in medicine.

Speaker 2 1:21:50

Oh my gosh, not getting stressed. I mean, stress is what caused it, you know. I mean I got to the bottom of it and I was like, oh my gosh, putting myself down and having, you know, anger towards it. Whatever, we won't go into that, but stress.

Speaker 1 1:22:06

I'm going to jump in though, because I think we would agree emotional stress equals inflammation.

Speaker 2 1:22:13

Oh, totally.

Speaker 1 1:22:14

Inflammation equals disease Totally. People resist that at every turn.

Speaker 2 1:22:18

It's a fact.

Speaker 1 1:22:19

They don't want to take responsibility, of course it's a fact that at every turn it's a fact. Take responsibility, of course, but I think too, what we don't do is we don't recognize that what is meant by stress, you know what it's? Also emotional stress, it's those feelings you were carrying around.

Embracing Self-Love and Authenticity

Speaker 1 1:22:31

Yeah, so you know our vibration. I used to be that guy, like we talked about embracing the shadow, thomas moore, not putting value judgments on things, they just are. Well, I went too far with that to where most of my life I thought, well, most people operate on pleasure principle. I see the value in melancholy, I see the value in depression, and you know, I talked myself into that. But you know what the bottom line is. You know, when feelings are toxic in your body, it could be feelings of, like, lack of self-worth or, you know not, not loving yourself. All of those things constitute emotional stress, right, totally, anyway. So I've been on a similar journey where I just had to learn from the inside out that self-love is very real. It's not just a platitude, you know, and that health depends on it A hundred percent.

Speaker 1 1:23:20

I was going to say that both of you have touched on you know, and that health depends on it.

Speaker 3 1:23:22

100 I was gonna say that both of you um have touched on. You know, something that I had said back when we did our um story in politics and when I talked about the individualistic and the collective um personas that we have out there and in ideologies. And I think you know, when you talk about individually, you know understanding our self, love and finding the joy and purpose in our life, but it's when we get to that part of the stepping stone of the individualistic ideology then we have to go into the collective ideology of you know where does be as an individual then fit in the collective that brings the wholeness to all, in that human, you know, experiment.

Speaker 1 1:24:06

Well, let me ask if this is what you're hinting at. I think when we talk about, you know, manifestation, well, it's selfish to align, you know. There is that mentality like if you take the time to, you know, have a practice, as we said, or whether that's meditation or prayer, or chanting, or Kabbalah, I've done them all right. But if you prioritize that, oh, that's selfish because you're not providing for your family in the ways that they need you to right. Well, the bottom line is you have more to offer, a relationship, a family, if you align right, correct, Correct. I don't know if that was related at all.

Speaker 3 1:24:43

Yes, no, that's exactly what it is. Yeah, and that's.

Speaker 1 1:24:46

Oh, but also, okay, then I'm going to go on. Yeah, because I've always said, you know, self-love gets a bad rap too, because people hear confidence. You know what I mean. Like, confidence is overrated to me, um, because it's usually maybe an ego-driven concept, right, whereas true self-love, or intrinsic value that's the words I use to embrace your intrinsic value, is actually not confidence, it's self-love and, yeah, the benefit, like the ripple effect, like you're saying, um, that is selfless, not self-ish, because, right, the world is depending on you to be your most authentic self and to find your gifts, whether it's within a craft or just in life.

Speaker 3 1:25:33

Find those gifts. That does make me really think about that in so many ways, because and like we just said, you know, I think people think they're being selfish and so they see that negative connotation to it. And it's not as long as you're doing it for the right reasons and and and doing it in a selfless way where you're not expecting a payout at the end. You're just doing it because you know that there's a benefit, no matter my sister's ted talk.

Speaker 1 1:26:02

You, you met renee twice now my sister's ted talk is about exactly that. So we've said today you need to quiet a lot of voices of doubt to embrace a calling as an artist, but one of them is that it's selfish there and women have it the worst. By the way, she screened a film called who. Who does she think she is? And I would say women got written out of the art history books for a million reasons and they're all wrong the wrong reasons.

Speaker 1 1:26:30

But and I don't know if I buy the premise of this documentary a hundred percent but it's like yeah, I'm sorry. You're supposed to be a wife and a mother and be all things to all people. You don't get to express yourself.

Navigating Emotional Crises and Self-Regulation

Speaker 1 1:26:40

You know so I do think women get the shit end of the stick on that one and that, uh. So renee's ted talk is entirely about how the word and I've heard so many definitions of the word, um art, but you know, one of them being artifice, which I don't buy. But she was saying you, there's a huge history of it meaning to fit. So you're finding your puzzle piece in. Now I'm going to mix metaphors. How about this? You're finding that puzzle piece in the tapestry that is humanity. You're finding your thread right In this tapestry, or your tile in the collage. And so, yeah, you got to get rid of the shame right Surrounding this trope of expressing yourself being selfish. The universe. I mean literally on a biological level. We're being called upon by epigenetics to be right, to fulfill our own potential and therefore evolve humanity in our own one right, little authentic way right it's biological to me.

Speaker 1 1:27:41

I agree 100 I said that twice today. I'm gonna shut up now. We're trying to make the podcast more of a conversation lately, because sometimes people come on and they plug their wearers and we highlight them beautifully and their brand, but, um, I think the magic lies in the conversation. So thanks for indulging me, joan. I do think some great stuff has come up. You don't even know you'll listen back and go, wow, that's going to be value. We always do, it's it. I think there's some good stuff for our listeners. But maybe, to start to bring it toward a close, did we get to everything? Is there anything you're really motivated this week, this moment?

Speaker 1 1:28:19

to impart to our listeners. We're going to put some links, by the way, in the episode description. You mentioned at least one workshop. Would you want us to put that link in the description?

Speaker 2 1:28:31

Well, I'd love a link to Jim Fortin's podcast or TCP. That's important for me, and the other link, I don't. Yeah, I could send it if you're interested. It's something brand new for me. But, uh, and the other link, I don't. Yeah, I could send it if you're interested. Something brand new. I just was exposed to greg braden and bruce lipton and all those people that are you know?

Speaker 1 1:28:48

yeah, I just read biology of beliefs. Have you read that?

Speaker 2 1:28:52

yes, and and jim fortin interviewed there. But you know uh, bruce lipton on on the uh on his podcast as well.

Speaker 1 1:29:01

Okay, we want that link for sure.

Speaker 2 1:29:04

Yeah, it's wonderful and his classes are wonderful. But, yeah, the biggest thing that I'm just so excited about because I've released a lot of, I've been through a lot of heavy negativity where, just like a couple months ago, I spent a whole day wishing I were not here anymore and I was like what is that all about? You know, like happy me, you know like always positive, always bouncing back, like what? So I had to really dig deep and you know when it's all about love of self, so that you can love others and feeling one, getting rid of that not getting rid of the ego, but, like you said, using the ego for the positive things but to feel one with the world, with the plants, the animals and feeling.

Speaker 2 1:29:51

You know just that interconnectedness is so huge and that's the only way the world's going to heal through this traumatic time that we're going. You know I mean not traumatic the big changes that are about to evolve Once we feel one and get dig deeper to our soul connection and not depend on the you know on what on the outer world, feeling you know being the solution. If the outer world is not the solution and the inner world is solid, then we can make new, we can handle new changes and and make and be okay with changes. We we're so resistant to change and, um, you know. So I'm just really big on that right now to really get connected, and I think my art is going to take a shift um to to express that more I don't know where, where it's going to go.

Speaker 1 1:30:35

That's all brand new but as long as you're meditating on interconnectivity, it's happening already, right yeah?

Speaker 2 1:30:42

absolutely, absolutely, and it happens with each portrait, and I will always do the portraits because they're such a high for me, and so I feel like it's a real service and it's just a high.

Speaker 1 1:30:54

Just to go back to something you said, I do think we're looking for our governments to solve problems for us, you know, and, yeah, we're being called upon to self-regulate, and anyway, you said some a lot of beautiful things there and I don't want to beat a dead horse, but maybe but I just wanted to throw that out there that we, you know Marianne Williamson talks a lot about how, yeah, we're looking for daddy, you know, or maybe, finally, mommy, and maybe that is the paradigm that's shifting in government too is fascism is on the horizon, but do we really want that?

Speaker 1 1:31:35

Are we capable of self-regulating and governing ourselves, or do we need our government regulating and governing ourselves, or do we need our government? You know, I mean, it goes back to Aristotle and the tripartite state that you know this idea that we're not capable of governing ourselves, that there's a whole ruling class because we, you know, that's what we're being asked to face Are we, do we want to become a North Korea right, or Russia, or do we want to self effing regulate? Sorry, is that related to this idea of solving our own problems and not looking to the outside world for solutions?

Speaker 2 1:32:08

It starts with us. It's energy, energy, energy, that's all there is, you know. So I mean we're not going to see, you know, the good change that really can happen if we don't start with, you know, feeling our own energy and then sending it out and feeling connected. And I've been tested big time with some personal things, that and that I've, that I've conquered, you know, not conquered, but I've made come full circle, you know well, how did you get out of that?

Speaker 1 1:32:37

the other you said you had recently, you had a dark day. How did you pull out of?

Speaker 2 1:32:40

that Listening to Jim Fortin. Exactly that's what I do I listen to my muses? Yes, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 1:32:48

Not gurus, but I listen to the stuff that lifts me up and Virginia knows I had that day yesterday. Yeah, I was going to throw in the towel, and it does come out of the blue. You think I've been doing so good. And then yesterday, I swear to god, I was ready to go live in the la wash with my dog and just expire yeah, it's done fighting right? Oh yeah, I guess we're never out of the woods, right?

Speaker 2 1:33:14

yeah, and then it's back to the roller coaster. I mean, I, I have a set of oracle cards that I put together and on the back, you know, that's the first line is life is a roller coaster and you never arrive. Yeah, and so scream, laugh and twirl with the twists you know. So, like you know, just have it's all good, it's all life, and embrace being human.

Speaker 1 1:33:38

you know I would say well, it's going to take a while for me to laugh about yesterday Like.

Speaker 2 1:33:45

I'm not going to have a sense of humor about it for a while, but eventually I will. Yeah, well, it was kind of a snap, I think. You know, sometimes it just takes a period of time where you just kind of have to go through the feeling bad about it, for you know, and that takes wisdom, though, because they say, this too will pass.

Speaker 1 1:33:58

yeah, it takes wisdom to know you know what tomorrow's another day. I do joke like a full belly helps coffee helps it does. And even Scarlett O'Hara said tomorrow is another day, right. But, to have enough life experience to know that's true, this too will pass, and that, yeah, faith comes back to faith.

Speaker 2 1:34:21

Anyway.

Speaker 1 1:34:22

I've said it a couple times and when it doesn't happen right away.

Speaker 2 1:34:26

You just know. Sometimes it, just like I said, it just takes a little period of time, but know that it will, because your goal is for it to shift. You know, like, if you really, if you're really giving up, it lasts more than a day, you know. And then it's a deeper issue where you might have to have hypnosis or really truly give it up.

Speaker 1 1:34:43

I don't know, or yeah, I think everybody virginia on the psychology end of things, right, there's a cry for help, there's a whole process if you really are not going to snap out of your depression.

Speaker 1 1:34:53

I mean, you can chime in on that in one second, but you know, marianne williamson talks true, it is about embracing the shadow, because we are so quick to medicate in this society and just make the bad stuff go away. And, yes, actually we're meant to sit with right, sit with the dark or the shadow, sometimes in order to have that, or the crucible, however you want to put it, in order to have that transformation and come out the other end. I think society has been trained to think, oh, I just treat this with the pharmaceutical, I don't. And trained to think, oh, I just treat this with a pharmaceutical, I don't, you know. And we quickly label things depression. How about that? Let's use the word melancholy from the turn of the century, where, oh, it's part of life. This is how I grow and transform and I'm going to live with the melancholy, knowing, yes, knowing tomorrow's another day Virginia go.

Speaker 3 1:35:40

So ironically it's known as the crisis state is what it is, and I know when people hear that they automatically think like well, that means you had to have like really big events, like when we had 9-11.

Speaker 1 1:35:51

An existential crisis, one of the crises.

Speaker 3 1:35:55

Yeah, so basically, you have your situational crisis and then you have um, your personal, um, emotional crisis. So we have them daily in our lives. The real big thing is is where we're at resiliency wise. So, like you're saying, I mean, unfortunately, here in the U? S, we like to medicate, we like we love our pharmaceuticals, we love pharmacology, um, and so what's really important is when we hit that is having that support network around us, um, so, like you're saying, you know having your muses, your, you know shamans, your ministers, whatever it is around you that can identify that you're in that crisis state.

Speaker 3 1:36:35

So you get that immediate, you know, basically, they come in, um, bringing up the ego, so they basically become your um, oh gosh, I'm going to get it wrong. I can't think of it right now. There's a term it's not just ego, it's ego is something else anyways where they basically bring you back to the reality and and keep you in reality while you, you know, do that why? So? So you are more receptive to seeing that light at the end of the tunnel versus the doom and gloom, and then your inhibitions get lower because you're just constantly in that state of stress and heightened hyperactive state of situational awareness. So, yeah, unfortunately, To bring Bruce Lipton back into this.

Speaker 1 1:37:17

By the way, bruce Lipton talks about growth or protection responses, right? So recently I've thought about the culture medium, right, if blood is a culture medium and too much like an allergen comes into that culture medium, the protective response is too much antihistamine, I mean too too much histamine, right, but everything can be thought of that way. Where there's a growth or protection response, and so maybe that's what's meant by crucible when you have that challenge thrown in your spiritual path, you can avoid it, like Medicaid, and completely avoid it, and that's the chemical response. So he would also say chemical, sorry.

Speaker 1 1:38:02

Energetic responses prompt chemical responses, right, so we try to treat everything in Western medicine with a Newtonian approach, right, kill a bunch of cells, you know, in hopes of targeting the right ones, and that's chemical. But energetic is actually where the growth response lies, actually where the growth response lies. So that's a parable or I guess, sorry, a metaphor for your thoughts and feelings. Are that non local energetic response? Shift your thoughts and feelings and most of that inflammation, meaning disease, will resolve. Correct? Yeah, I figured it all out here. Yeah, we always do, and I just really wanted to bring Bruce Lipton back into the conversation.

Speaker 3 1:38:38

No, and that's, that's exactly. That's exactly. It figured it all out here.

Speaker 1 1:38:40

Yeah, we always do, and I just really wanted to bring bruce lipton back into the conversation.

Speaker 3 1:38:43

No, and that's that's exactly.

Speaker 1 1:38:45

That's exactly it, and yeah, and, but it takes time too right, we want, we want quick fixes, we want quick fixes. I don't think this anymore, but I used to say I'm a, I'm all for pharmaceuticals if it gets you up off the couch to go to therapy and maybe find productive ways of you know kind of balancing your brain chemistry. Thank God for Western medicine. It's the only reason I'm alive actually. So I'm not anti pharmaceuticals, but I do think sometimes there's a journey, however long it takes, I'm going to balance my brain chemistry.

Speaker 3 1:39:17

Yeah, no, no, you're right, and I think what? And I think what? You're what, which is what exactly? What you're saying, Nick, is pharmaceuticals are important, but they're they're short, they're a bandaid fix. They're not a long term fix and unfortunately we've gotten into that long term fix mentality and we need to get back to it's a bandaid, to where we have to understand there's going to change, is always uncomfortable.

Speaker 1 1:39:40

It just is and sorry go.

Speaker 3 1:39:43

No, I think you're gonna probably say this and that's the thing we've gotten to, where we don't like being in that discomfort right and we've got to move past that societally right.

Speaker 1 1:39:52

Uh, we want the quick fix and actually sometimes things are just what they are like we said it doesn't need to be fixed. But bruce lipton again would point out that again, I know I'm sounding anti, I'm sounding anti antidepressant I'm not, but it's. He would say, the history of medicine is the history of the placebo effect. Something like don't quote me, but go to the biology of belief, Bruce Lipton, if you want, and fact check me. I think it was something like 90% of whether it's you know whichever antidepressant you want to talk about, but across the board 90% is the placebo effect.

Speaker 3 1:40:32

No, you're correct.

Embracing Change and Personal Growth

Speaker 1 1:40:32

Because societally okay, yeah Well, we'll bring that up on another episode once we fact check it. But I think the idea is it's not just the individual believes it's going to work and thank God for the placebo effect, it's faith. There's faith healers that have a lot of value, but it's that societally. We bought into all the commercials about antidepressants, right, so it's like we bought into the status quo, so we we therefore believe it's going to work. Nothing wrong with that. But I just think sometimes we want the quick fix instead of going. I'm meant to live with this depression, at least for a few days, or this existential crisis, whatever it is, because there's spiritual growth at the end of it yeah, and that's my just preaching now?

Speaker 3 1:41:17

no, you're not preaching, I think sometimes. No, no, you're not. I just, I, like you said, I think we forget those things and I, you know there's.

Speaker 2 1:41:24

There's good and bad to to everything, and I gotta throw in the word magic here, because when, because you know, like, when I was going through that, it was like you know, you, you're, you're guided to the right book, like if it's you know, bruce lipton's book, or like I, locally there was a place called the Chakra, the Chakra Healing Room, where two ladies run and they do Reiki sessions and all kinds of things, and I didn't know about this and I was just like it landed for me to, you know, to do a session with them and I, I cried and I, you know, we shared an integration session, that where I talked about things and I am not a crier, I'm kind of stoic and I released, because the physical one on one, you know, like how I ended up meeting them and how I ended up meeting another lady after that and had this conversation and this experience and like, to me that's magic, it's like, you know, I didn't, I didn't sit and say, okay, where can I get help?

Speaker 2 1:42:22

You know, it just magically flowed. If you know, when, when you're seeking quietly and asking for direction, that's I call it magic. You know, just things just come to you and it's just so exciting because that's how life is.

Speaker 1 1:42:39

It's beautiful, beautiful and again things appear like you were hinting at. The right book appears when you need it right. The universe provides what you need. So just this week I was thinking, not magic, but I was thinking again. Marianne williamson talks about grace. No, she talks about miracle. A miracle is the shift from fear to love. But that is by the grace of god. You can't plan that shit like for you to suddenly have that shift and see through again the eyes of love instead of fear. That is a miracle. Or the word grace has been used like you know. You're in a an argument with your spouse, for example, and you suddenly know if I say that, I can't take it back to have the right to have the forethought and the patience to not say that very damaging thing.

Speaker 1 1:43:27

That is grace and that's magic. I'm just agreeing with you. That seems like magic to me. You can't force a spiritual epiphany or you can't force growth.

Speaker 2 1:43:35

Yeah.

Speaker 1 1:43:36

Back to trust Comes from the universe. Yeah, all right. Well Trusting the flow as I say earlier, you talked about not over, intellectualizing things, and I think we've done enough of that. So, virginia, is there anything else you'd like to add, or should we give her a moment to think about her final words of wisdom? What do you anything else to add, virginia?

Speaker 3 1:43:59

I, I don't, I. I think we've we've covered it all and I'm just waiting for the world peace.

Speaker 1 1:44:04

I was going to say did we create world peace? Maybe next week After the elections Got it. We have so many episodes lined up but part of me is like am I going to be on an island after November 4th? Or it seems weird to plan anything right now. Am I being a doom speaker or a?

Speaker 2 1:44:25

that's fear. That's fear, I know, I know I'd be a little facetious.

Speaker 1 1:44:29

It did feel weird to plan that far ahead, though, like it's gonna be hard not to talk about the elections, no matter what happens it will be a new season for us to learn.

Speaker 3 1:44:38

I love that.

Speaker 2 1:44:40

Just plan with things that you can cancel. You know like, if it has to be, you know it doesn't matter. Just kind of leave it open and be be fine. That's just it. We make plans but we have to be open to let it go. That's the. You know that whole method. Yeah, don't be attached.

Speaker 1 1:44:57

I actually read once, even in relationships, or I wrote this into the seeker actually this idea that how do you trust your partner. It came up in my story. It just happened, but I heard this school of thought and I just heard my character reply I don't have to trust my partner, I trust myself, that I'll survive whatever you know, come what may.

Speaker 2 1:45:17

Yeah, there you go, it's all back to you.

Speaker 1 1:45:24

It's all back to you. It's all back to you so we can go to hell in a handbasket and or? You know, there is faith too. There's this popular sentiment that if we continue to destroy the planet and we don't find a way out of this climate change as you hinted at earlier, joan you know the earth will go on, yeah, and then somebody in our podcast actually said, yeah, but we have a great relationship with this rock. You know, the elon Musks of the world want to just skip town and find another rock to live on. That may not be the answer. It's kind of a cop out to go. Ah, earth will be fine without us.

Speaker 2 1:45:51

So I like that idea too.

Speaker 1 1:45:53

You know, let's not give up on a good thing just yet.

Speaker 2 1:45:58

You know love what is. You know that's like love what is and just let it flow like if it, if it ends tomorrow, we're all in and we just move to another phase. Whatever that is, you know like what, does it really matter?

Speaker 1 1:46:12

all the things come to an end, yeah, yeah and, yeah, we all die anyway at some point.

Speaker 2 1:46:17

But you know, just enjoy every moment. You now and even the dark side, see the see, understand what the dark side is all about, or feel I don't know. We've talked about it. We've kind of said I just, I just love that I'm just finally released of embracing the dark side and embracing the joy and and just still believing that life is meant to be fun and we're all so unique, love yourself. It starts with that and the love spreads and then whatever is is, but stay in the moment. You know, we just ponder too much about future stuff and and and beat ourselves up about past and all that is such a waste of energy well, now we're in eckhart, tolle right yeah well, I'm big on that, Absolutely.

Speaker 2 1:47:02

It's huge, huge, huge.

Speaker 1 1:47:04

At 19,. I wrote a story and I don't know how or why because I didn't have the life experience or perspective, but clearly it was on my radar. But I wrote a little story called the Train Station and this little old lady. I wouldn't say those words now, but right at the time this little old lady was uh, I forget going back to her hometown and she thought she was going to see her first love. And yeah, she was going back for a high school reunion.

Speaker 1 1:47:30

And then the guy she meets in this abandoned train station. They don't realize it's abandoned because there ain't no train coming. That was all symbolism, right. But they start talking in this uh, dilapidated train station that they later learn is abandoned, there's no train coming, or the reader learns that and he's, um, you know, going to a job interview and he's gonna change, you know, he's gonna suddenly everything's gonna be worthwhile and he'll finally be happy because he's got this opportunity. So she's dwelling on the past or perseverating on it, and he thinks contentment lies in the future. But they kind of miss the train station itself, which is the metaphor of the moment. So I talked about the dapples of light on the floorboards that they're not even noticing anyway oh, that's cool.

Speaker 2 1:48:11

I was a smart kid man. I was a wise kid. Well, that's a sign of who you are, you know, like the depth was right there.

Speaker 1 1:48:19

That's cool well I, it wasn't on my radar again until suddenly I thought about that the other day. Uh, I, there is no time, right? So would you guys feel like your sense of aesthetics has remained the same over your lives or the things that are on your radar, or do they evolve?

Speaker 3 1:48:35

they evolve yeah, evolve definitely I.

Speaker 1 1:48:39

I think the common threads are because that is your soul too Like the things. I think of the little kid. There were things that have not changed, and that, to me, is my core essence. Anyway, joan, you said some really beautiful things and we should have probably ended it there. I love everything you said.

Speaker 2 1:48:56

Well, the shaman said your job every year is to grow your you know. Know, grow your personal power a little more every year, you know. Just expand your connection to the world, you know, and it's, uh, it's just a, it just makes it nice to just let it grow as it grows and be good with it okay, I'm done.

Speaker 1 1:49:16

Okay, thank you so much. Really, there's some good stuff in there, so good to to have you on. Maybe you'll come back in the future. I hope so. Oh, it'd be awesome. All right, and thank you so much.

Speaker 2 1:49:27

Thank you for having me. This is very fun, thank you, thank you.

Speaker 1 1:49:31

I'm glad. All right, virginia, we'll see you next time, unless you have any final words.

Speaker 3 1:49:37

Nope, I'm going to leave it there.

Speaker 1 1:49:38

Yeah, we'll put our post roll where we beg for support. That'll be our post roll. Okay, and to our listeners, remember life is story. Yes, we can get our hands in the clay. Individually and collectively we can write a new story, See you next time.

Speaker 3 1:49:55

Bye guys, bye, bye.