For the Love of Creatives: Unlocking the Power of Community
Imagine a space where your creative spark is truly seen, a community where people get you. That’s what Maddox and Dwight bring each week on For the Love of Creatives. As your hosts and “connections and community guys,” they dive into conversations that bridge the gap from solo journeys to powerful collaborations, transforming “me” into “we.”
In each episode, explore a variety of engaging formats, from insightful dialogues between Maddox and Dwight to conversations with everyday creatives who’ve overcome challenges to reach new heights. You’ll meet fellow artists, innovators, and heart-centered creators sharing their stories, and together, we’ll discover what it means to create, collaborate, and co-elevate.
Tune in, share, and join us each week as we celebrate the magic of community-driven creativity.
For the Love of Creatives: Unlocking the Power of Community
#023: Your Life is a Masterpiece in Motion With Creative Coach, Jill Allison Bryan
Ever dismissed your natural talents because they come easily to you? That’s exactly what creativity coach Jill Allison Bryan wants you to stop doing. "When we do something well or have done it a long time, we discount it," she explains, encouraging us instead to celebrate these gifts.
Through an engaging conversation with hosts Dwight and Maddox, Jill shares her remarkable journey from Nashville advertising copywriter to Caribbean yacht stewardess to Dallas-based creativity coach. Her pivotal moment came when she asked, "If not now, when?"—selling her possessions and moving to the islands with just a guitar and a duffel bag. This philosophy of seizing creative opportunities continues to guide her work today as founder of Creative Oasis Coaching.
What sets Jill’s approach apart is her expansive definition of creativity that extends far beyond traditional arts. "We can view everything in our lives through the lens of creativity—how we fix a sandwich, how we dress, the conversations we have," she explains. This perspective grants permission to those who’ve never considered themselves "creative" to recognize their unique expressions at work in everyday life.
The conversation explores how coaching differs from therapy, with Jill noting that while therapy helped her process grief, coaching propelled her toward specific creative goals. Her proudest achievement? Producing her CD Infinite Possibilities while organizing an event featuring thirteen female artists that raised over $10,000 for Women for Women International.
Jill’s insights on creative community reveal why groups like Creative Mornings thrive: "People come for the transformation but stay for the people." As she embraces her latest creative challenge—building a YouTube channel—she models the very philosophy she teaches: "Don’t let perfect be the enemy of done."
Join the conversation and discover how embracing your creative truth can turn everyday experiences into extraordinary adventures.
Jill's Profile
Creative Oasis Coaching
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For the Love of Creatives Community
I remember I had this client longtime client and she was a writer and to her writing was natural, easy. She loved to do it. It was just like that was her truth of who she was and how she saw herself in the world. And she would say, oh, I've got to do this and this and this and this. And then there's you know, I have a bunch of writing to do, but that's easy. And I would always stop her and be like Dawn, that's awesome, that it's easy for you, and just really realize that there are a thousand other people on the planet today that need to write something, who are frozen in fear because it is not easy for them. So and I only say that, so you really. So don't discount it, celebrate it, yay.
Speaker 2:Hello and welcome to another edition of For the Love of Creatives podcast. I'm your host, dwight, I'm joined by our fabulous co-host, maddox, and today we are joined by our featured guest, jill Allison Bryan.
Speaker 1:Hey, Jill, Hi, thanks so much for having me y'all.
Speaker 2:We're so glad that you can be here. It's been a little while since we've actually known you. I believe that we actually met at a creatives event at a local artist space in Deep Ellum in July of 23.
Speaker 1:You are correct, sir.
Speaker 3:How time flies, doesn't it?
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, when you just said two years, I was like wait, what Two years? No, we just met recently.
Speaker 3:It seems that way, doesn't it? But July will make two years since that event. Crazy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, and it's interesting how, with that time flying so rapidly, I know that we've been in and out of the same events We've seen, we've been in the same places at the same time, but we've never really had a chance to sit down, so this is going to be a great opportunity for us to get to know each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we can kind of dive deep today. Yes, the quick hellos and goodbyes, yeah, yeah, love it.
Speaker 2:Well, in preparation for this, my neurodivergent tendencies just got really curious and I saw that you have quite a story to tell. I know that you did some time copywriting in Nashville. I know that you got to go and spend some time on a yacht in the Virgin Islands and let me just interject.
Speaker 1:I worked on that yacht. That sounds very luxurious the way you said it. Like I went and spent some time on my yacht for a while, but I was actually the stewardess, meaning I waited on everybody, made the beds and scrubbed the heads. So I mean there was fun, it was fun to be had. But I just want to put a reality lens on the experience.
Speaker 3:Very important Life of the rich and famous huh.
Speaker 1:No, it was more like everybody. When they find out that I worked on a sailing yacht, a cruising sailing yacht, they're like, oh, like. What's it called Under Deck? Or there's some TV show out, that's a reality show.
Speaker 3:Lower Deck.
Speaker 1:Lower Deck, yeah, and I'm like maybe, so that's probably it Closer to the truth.
Speaker 2:Well, and I and I think I don't know if the the Nashville influence had anything to do with it, but when you returned to Dallas, I know that you were also a singer songwriter- yeah, you know, what's so interesting about that is actually the singer songwriter part came before.
Speaker 1:It was kind of a thread all the way through. So loved music, singing, acting, dancing, everything from the time through. So loved music, singing, acting, dancing, everything from the time I was little and I guess it was. You know, I was in plays, I was in choir, I did all that kind of stuff in high school and I had an experience in college that I think is really familiar Maybe it will be to y'all, I don't know Certainly with a lot of the people that I have worked with and met over the years as creatives.
Speaker 1:Where I had a dream or a desire to for mine, for myself, it was to major in theater in college down, you know, my dad was like, well, that's not very practical, you can, you know, why don't you minor in theater and major in something more practical? And here's an interesting fact. So I used to tell that story and believe that story. It's so interesting, right, what we think about the stories that we've told ourselves our whole life that, yeah, I was going to do that. And then my dad said no, and so I, I didn't, and I cut my nose off to spite my own face.
Speaker 1:And you know, I ended up advertising journalism major with a double minor in Spanish because I loved Spanish and business practical. What I realize now, all these years later and forgiveness to my parents, you know was that they were doing their best because they wanted me to be safe and secure, and that's what they thought that they were setting me up to. And, truth be told, if I had had the conviction and the courage and the belief like this is what I'm going to do, no matter what I would have told them to lump it, as much as I loved them and said you know I'm going to New York or whatever, whatever, like many people do.
Speaker 1:So I've kind of owned my part of that story in my older, wiser years than I used to.
Speaker 3:That's beautiful Jail, that's really an incredible like full circle thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I don't know if y'all ever had anything like like you know, I don't know. You just look back and you really realize that my whole life I've been telling myself this and it was kind of let myself off the hook.
Speaker 3:As I see it now, you know, I do have something that I, something very not not that had to do with my parents, but something I told myself for my whole lifetime that I finally freed myself of only about seven or eight years ago, something like that.
Speaker 1:Very similar. So again, with this age comes some wisdom, hopefully you know, I think we do have things like that.
Speaker 1:So but what I did do when I was in college that let me stay connected to the performing was I did perform with. I usually had a partner that would play guitar or something and that we would sing and I was usually an acoustic duo kind of situations. And it is funny and just a coincidence, that my first grown up job in you know, out of college, was at this advertising agency, which was then the biggest advertising agency in Nashville. It's defunct now but that's what had me moved to Nashville and I did have the thought in the back of my mind I'm going to Nashville and you know I'm a singer, songwriter too, so maybe I can get some of that going on. Even the late.
Speaker 1:The family that owned the advertising agency that I worked for, they were like such heavy hitters in Nashville. They were people that were involved with the Opryland, opryland Hotel, the Grand Old Opry, like they were royalty in that. And yet it's so funny, even once I got there I really kind of focused on my advertising copywriting career and only had time and energy really to dabble in music. So it's funny, it was very I was gonna say circuitous I don't know if that's the correct word or not, but like for me to have gone to Nashville, done a little bit of music, but not really too much, go all the way to the Caribbean and then come back to Dallas, and that's when I started just performing on my own as a singer, songwriter, me and a guitar.
Speaker 3:That's amazing, that's yeah, you've had some interesting adventures.
Speaker 1:Yes, and some of them I could even talk about here.
Speaker 3:Actually, you could probably talk about most of them here.
Speaker 1:Could and would are two different. You're like, okay, after this, after the camera stops rolling, we want to know what you're talking about.
Speaker 3:Exactly. Inquiring minds want to know Well.
Speaker 2:I love the way that you have really kind of framed that. You've lived a life that is definitely not the the plain boring path. For sure that's found. Our podcast would probably really love to know what your first tendencies toward creativity were, and I mean way back when when you were just a little girl.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, I was definitely singing into my hairbrush, pretending like I was Cher. My hairbrush pretending like I was Cher and really wanted to be was very jealous of Chastity at the time, who was, you know, at that time. They're on the show with them, a lot Like the Partridge family. I like these on-air musical families and with kids too, with people my age, it can happen Like I mean, I wanted that. I also was a writer. I wrote and thought I needed to have my book published. You know, I told my dad this is going to be a good book. You should publish this book. I was always in the plays.
Speaker 1:So I really honestly and this is the truth, I can't remember a time I wasn't lit up by some sort of creative process and really, like, I'm a self-described, unapologetic, very joyful, multi-passionate, creative and what that means to me is just, I like all the things and don't make me choose. I mean I think there's a difference between like, choose for a little bit so you can focus and follow through and have some things that you're focused on. So we're not trying to do all the things, spinning all the plates and all of them breaking or not having time for any of it to be done. But yeah, I just I mean it's interesting because yeah, as a kid loved all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1:As an adult, one of the things that I realized, probably when I worked with my first creativity coach that was a light bulb moment and I felt very freeing and heartening was that we don't have to pigeonhole our creative endeavors. You know which? I do think that our school system and our society, we just want to pigeonhole people. So it's easy to tell you are the athlete, you are the brainiac, you are the choir geek, like whatever right. We just get put in those little boxes real quick and it's convenient for everybody.
Speaker 1:But when I started working with my coach and I started realizing I can view everything in my life through the lens of creativity everything how I fix a sandwich, you know how I. Obviously. How I fix a sandwich, you know how I. Obviously, how I dress, how I accessorize, what my home looks like, the conversations I have, like everything can be seen either as an opportunity to express ourselves creatively or take in somebody else's creativity. We need audiences and we need community, as y'all know. So, in order to have not only creative collaborations but just like I want to soak in other people's creativity you know it's not all about what I'm producing- I agree completely.
Speaker 3:I know for me, and I've never thought of it too much until we started having these kinds of conversations with creatives. But there is a big portion of my life with creatives. But there is a big portion of my life, and it's mostly simple stuff, where my creativity shows up in me solving some sort of a problem, and some of it's just silly stuff. Like you know, the chips continue to get stale. How can I fold the chip bag down in a manner that they don't get stale? And that is truly creativity. But we don't think of it like that, of course, until we do Right.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:Until the light bulb goes off and we went oh my God, everything I do is creative. You know, whether it's flush the toilet or brush your teeth, or everything I do is creative.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and isn't it great that once you can't unring that bell like once you, once you start to see things that way, it's just like it's everywhere, it's, it's, it's and it's contagious too. I think it also really gives a lot of. I'm big on permission. I feel like we have to give ourselves permission before we will do anything, and I think some of the most heartening interactions I've had with people who didn't think of themselves as creative for probably because the way they were raised or whatever they were told, or something like that and then they're like oh, wait a minute, you're saying the way that I dress or the way that I decorate my house or plant my garden is creative too. That counts A hundred percent Because the stereotype right is can you paint, can you draw, can you play an instrument.
Speaker 3:I hate it. Yeah, yeah, so many people. I have so many friends that say, oh, no, not a creative bone in my body and I'm watching them make these fabulous home-cooked meals or I'm watching them do something else, that I'm just marveling at what they're doing and they don't get it. Yeah, oh, I just do that. That's not creative. I don't do that.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, the other thing about that, I think, maddox, is when we do something well or when we've done something a long time, we discount it. So we're like, oh, that old thing, you know the story or the example that always comes to me. That's so funny.
Speaker 1:I remember I had this client, longtime client, and she was a writer and to her writing was natural, easy. She loved to do it. It was just like that was her truth of who she was and how she saw herself in the world. And she would say, oh, I've got to do this and this and this and this. And then you know, I have a bunch of writing to do, but that's easy. And I would always stop her and be like Dawn, that's awesome that it's easy for you, and just really realize that there are a thousand other people on the planet today that need to write something, who are frozen in fear because it is not easy for them. So and I only say that, so you really, so don't discount it, celebrate it. Yay, Writing is easy for me. I love to write. Writing energizes me. We've got, we'll probably have other problems to deal with, so why borrow?
Speaker 3:Absolutely, dwight. I'm realizing that we have the benefit of knowing at least a little bit about what Jill does, but our audience doesn't. So let's give you a minute Jill to just.
Speaker 1:I am a creativity coach, a master creativity coach and the founder of Creative Oasis Coaching, which I opened in 2008. So it's been a minute that I have been doing this and basically, I help creative people to get out of their own way, to take the ideas that are whirling around in their minds and, you know, move past the blocks of procrastination, perfectionism, overwhelm inner critic voices and really get clear on what it is they want to share creatively with the world, whether professionally or personally, and then help them to do that.
Speaker 3:I love that, and that begs an immediate question what was the one thing that you had to help yourself get beyond that? You know, getting you out of your own way.
Speaker 1:This is going to sound like a setup, but it's the truth. I worked with the creativity coach, but I'll I'll tell you that. I'll tell you the little like snapshot of it. So you're familiar with the artist's way. Yes, julia Cameron's, the artist's way, right? So the the joke or the, not the joke, but the like. The norm for the artist's way for so many of us, I think, is like I've meet people and be like do you, oh, the artist's way? I own it, you know like, or oh the artist's way.
Speaker 1:I read the first three chapters and I just found I just find that it's like it's a lot of you know, you really dig in the dirt and you really do a lot of work if you go through all the way through the artist's way. So, like many people, I owned a copy of the artist's way. I was super drawn to it. I felt like it had things to tell me and to teach me and I was excited to do it. But I can never make it through it by myself. And then I joined a group which is so helpful to go through it with, and it was like a I can't remember now, at least a 12, 14, 16 week program, cause we did each chapter you know week at a time program. Because we did each chapter, you know, week at a time. Interestingly, I think there were 10 of us when we first started only four finished. So again, you have to. I mean you have to want to do the work and be there.
Speaker 1:But it was after we had finished that going through the artist's way together and I had elicited like all of these next chapter ideas for myself that I was really excited about and the group was going to go on together and do another book of Julia Cameron's called Bane of Gold, and I was like that sounds good. But also, remember, this is 2007 or so. So I just started to hear about life coaches. It was like relatively new to me anyway, and I was like I think maybe I want to work with a life coach. Do you know of a life coach?
Speaker 1:I asked one of the teachers of the Artist's Way group that I was in and she said, well, not specifically, but check out this woman. She calls herself a creativity coach and I just got like chills. And then I went on to her website and I saw her. You know, do you have so many ideas but you don't know what to do? Do you suffer with procrastination and perfectionism? I was just reading and checking all the boxes and then I felt like a choir of angels was going oh, this is what you're supposed to do next. So it was Jill Bonansky. She's a creativity coach and it was.
Speaker 1:I started working with her honestly and that's how I was able to, I would say, get back to myself as a creative, because at that time I was married and I had a young child, and so I had.
Speaker 1:Really I was at one of those crossroads that we come to in life where I had looked up and was like where'd Jill go? Where did Jill, who moved to the Nashville and moved to the Caribbean and was a singer, songwriter and did all of these wonderful things you know, exciting, adventurous things and did all of these wonderful things you know, exciting, adventurous things? She'd kind of gotten lost, and so, working with Jill, I really not only found that spark in myself again, but was really able to harness it and do a thing that I hadn't done in earnest ever, which was really dial into my singer, songwriter self and start performing around town again, this time with keyboards, started writing and singing and then made a dream come true, which was to write and produce a solo CD. Now I had sung on a lot of people's CDs, I had been in a band with other people, but to do my own was a big dream, and so that was kind of my. I consider that and the CD release as my thesis, as a creativity coach.
Speaker 2:Nice. Now was that the infinite possibilities.
Speaker 1:It was you did do your homework and research, that's right. Infinite possibilities, a night of music, art and women helping women. And, oh my gosh, I'm just realizing I'm coming up this week on the 15th year anniversary of that. I mean, I realized it before, but I forgot until this moment. But yeah, so 15 years ago.
Speaker 3:Wow, we kind of had parallel stories. My first experience with the Life Coach was in 2006. It was not a creativity coach, it's a life coach. And then 2008, I got my first was in 2006. It was not a creativity coach, just a life coach. And then 2008, I got my first certification in coaching. I mean, as soon as I saw what she could do, I was like, oh my God.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, it's like you see behind the curtain and you're like, oh, I can help people do that.
Speaker 3:Well, I had been a hairdresser forever and realized that my clients were coming in and telling me all their woes and I had been standing behind the chair having these conversations with them and didn't know that that was a thing you know, didn't know that there was a name for it or that you actually could get paid for it.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, we were double dipping when we were getting our hair cut and getting coaching at the same time.
Speaker 3:Oh, yes, you know, and I love that, you know. I just to me, it was just part of the service.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:You know, I just freely gave it away along with their haircut. And I would even have clients say you know, I love the way you cut my hair, but I come for the coaching.
Speaker 1:Well, there you go, that's great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we do have a similar past, then Interesting yeah it's interesting, my first exposure to coaching actually came by way of well, it was something that I was going through as a result of grieving the loss of my partner of 20 years who passed away due to complications from advanced liver failure.
Speaker 2:I had been seeing a, I'd been seeing a psychologist and we were we were able to make progress as, as could be the best that could be expected, with how unpredictable grief can be, with the things that trigger it. That helped me to find a path to explore who I really was and what I really needed, because, after being in an intense caregiving situation for a couple of years, I had completely gotten lost and it was an affirming and healing thing for me. An affirming and healing thing for me I could see progress that was being made almost on a daily basis, like it was like this opening up. That was incredible and, uh, I went from being in a state that it was kind of like death for me to uh, to kind of turning the page and being open to possibilities and actually wanting to embrace what was coming next.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's huge. Oh, I'm so grateful that you found the person and the methods to help you with that.
Speaker 3:You know, I've come to believe that that's a rite of passage for humans, I think. I think we have to go through a period where we get lost so we can find ourselves. I don't know very many people that, if they're going to be honest, wouldn't say yes at least once, and maybe multiple times. I've been completely lost in my life.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, I agree if they're being honest, because otherwise the path is too much like the path that we're supposed to be on, that somebody else wants us to be on or we seem to be on. But, yeah, I think you're right, maddox. And so you were saying, dwight, then that really for you, that healing and that being able to come out the other side and embrace life again and see what was waiting for you, came from working with a coach.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I think. Actually I think coaching and therapy work beautifully together, like I think they can, you know, lift each other up. They're not, they don't have to be mutually exclusive and they're doing two different things a lot of time. But I have had people say to me longtime clients say that they got, they feel like they had more actual movement in the direction they wanted to be with coaching. Now, again, that depends, right.
Speaker 3:That's been my experience.
Speaker 1:Mine as well.
Speaker 3:Years of therapy earlier in my life, up until maybe about seven or eight years ago, and then coaching from 2006, until I still from time to time check in with a coach or have a coach for a very. You know I've had multiple because they all serve different purposes, but it moved the needle way more than therapy for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Now, coaching isn't designed to deal with trauma. No, no trauma recovery.
Speaker 1:There are trauma coaches, but that's yeah, but I'd want to make sure that you were really coaches, but that's yeah, but that they I'd want to make sure that you were really that was your speciality and you really knew what you were.
Speaker 3:A lot of times those are therapists that have crossed over into coaching.
Speaker 1:Lately. Yeah, I've met also medical doctors, a lot of people. I think people are seeing the value. I mean, honestly, if I had the magic wand that we're all that, we all kind of wish we had to help the world in all the ways, like if everybody could have a coach. The other thing about coaching right is like such a different relationship than even a very, very well-meaning friend or family member. Right, there's just they know you in a different way and even if they're an open-hearted person that wants the best for you, they can't have that same nonjudgmental kind of perspective that that a coach can have. And even even that difference between coaching and therapy I think is like the dogma is not there more, tuning you back into yourself, introducing you to questions in ways that you can trust yourself and your own answers and how you want to be in the world.
Speaker 3:Coaching always feels like more of a two-way street to me than therapy.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah especially the therapy where nobody's talking except for you.
Speaker 3:I didn't know anything about the therapist Right. They knew all about me. I didn't know anything about the therapist, you know, they knew all about me. I didn't know anything about them. And I have a tendency when I'm coaching to share deeply personal stories if it's relevant to something that they're going through, and that's where that two way.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:I mean I've anybody that I coach, I get close to to the degree at some point in our relationship. I'm telling them that I love them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:You know, of course I did that with my hair clients as well. You know it. Just they become.
Speaker 1:I can see that.
Speaker 3:They become family. You know, they really do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, not surprising. Well, I'm really curious as to what of young, young Jill for having the inclination and then having the courage to do it, because I guess the idea was really sparked First my dad. At that point in time my dad had a little sailboat, like a sunfishy kind of sailboat that he did some, you know, around in Arlington and then he found these those bare boat, bare boat charter kind of situation so you can go down and get if you have a captain's license and you can sail the boat around the Caribbean. So he had done that a couple of times with friends and really loved it. And so I went down with my brother and my mom and dad and a boyfriend I was dating at the time and that was my first introduction to really big sailing, like open water sailing like that and the Caribbean, and I was like this is amazing, this is beautiful, how fun. Came home to Nashville where I was copywriting and there was this beautiful four color print ad campaign that came out for the US Virgin Islands and I remember there was a double spread of St John's, just like a palm tree in the sandy beach, and I stuck it up on my bulletin board in my office and I just kind of moon over it every day, like, oh, that was so great, that's wonderful.
Speaker 1:And then you know, I just I can't remember exactly what put the thought in my head Well, you could move there. What? What if I think I had gone through a breakup and I just kind of was thinking to myself well, you've done all the things you're supposed to do. You graduated from high school, then you graduated from college, then you went and got a job in your degree. That was your, your, you know, your practical degree. That wasn't theater, so you showed, you did that and you know you're doing pretty well here. But you don't have any other real time like now's the time right? Like if you want to do something. Pulling up stakes, as you say, isn't that hard when you're 20, something you didn't have, I, basically.
Speaker 1:So I I moved in with a friend of mine, roger, who was amazing. He let me live with him for he bought my piano. We lived together for like three months while I sold everything I owned and saved extra money, and then I just got a duffel bag in my guitar and I went down there and the funny thing was was that ended up being a situation that I never would have thought. I didn't even know I was going to work on a boat. I just was moving to the Caribbean, y'all. I was just like I'll figure it out, I can wait tables or bartend for sure. And that's what I did for like the first three weeks or four weeks.
Speaker 1:And then all my friends I started meeting down there that had money, they were working on the charter boats. I was like, oh, hold on. Since I didn't have any experience, I just wrote a funny kind of rhyming pretend resume, almost basically saying I'll sing for my supper, I'll, you know, I'll make the beds whatever. And I put them in all the captain's boxes and I got an interview and I got hired and then I went to move on. I lived on the boat. So what ended up happening was I sent money home, I saved money. It was so weird because I had no bills. My food was paid for, my lodging was paid for, we were paid pretty darn well when we had charters, and so I got to see all this part of the Caribbean that I thought at the time and I was correct I would never see as much of again, because we went all the way from the US Virgin Islands to the British Virgin Islands, st Martin, st Kitts, all the way down to Antigua many times back and forth.
Speaker 3:I love that area, all of that. I've been to multiple locations over my lifetime and I love every ounce of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, I miss it. I haven't been in a long time. I say I miss it. I haven't been in a long time and it's been through, you know, a hurricane or two since I've been down there. But yeah, I just, you know, I think I had that wiser than my years. You know, I didn't realize really at the time, I just had the thought now, if not now, then when? And I think, but without the pressure, if not now, then when? And I think, but without the pressure, you know, because I was 25, so I was invincible at that point in some ways.
Speaker 3:But yeah, I was glad that I did that and had that experience. Yeah, I think that one thought is the real wisdom. You know, if not now, when? Oh?
Speaker 1:and that's true. Now, right, I think that's true at every crossroads we come to, and maybe not pressure-y, but especially now, like I think it becomes more clear with every passing year that you know I've got less time on that end than that end, and rather than let that be a fear-inducing kind of energy for me.
Speaker 3:I want it to be a Motivating and spiraling.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's go yeah, and if not now, when really? And the truth of the matter is, you know, we never know. I think the one it didn't turn out the way I kept hoping that COVID would be the thing that everybody would walk away from going. Oh yeah, now I get it. Like tomorrow's not promised for real, like it can, the whole world can shut down in a month's time, you know, and nobody was expecting that.
Speaker 1:Think that, if we can, if we can tap into that or remember that without it being totally fueled by fear, but more, just like this is it. We've got this go around, at least in this particular suit, I don't know. And and let's, let's go for it. Trust has a lot to do with it, I think, like trusting ourselves, trusting that it's going to be okay, and then, of course, that you know what, what your life was up until the point you're making. That decision has a great bearing on on that trust, right, whether or not you're able to trust that. Have you been in situations in the past where you could trust and that kind of thing? So?
Speaker 2:yeah, I, I think it's fabulous that you had the wisdom to, to go and seize that moment. And just hearing all of the wonderful things, the wonderful adventures that you have taken part in it begs the, the question, you know, and it's really it's harder to uh appreciate the, the masterpiece that is your life, when you're so close to it. But what is it that you are most proud of? What is your, your crowning achievement?
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness. Um also, I just want to write down what you just said the masterpiece that is your life. I'm like that's a lovely, lovely way to look at it and it really does. I mean, I will say it goes back to what I was saying before. I think I do think of my life as my canvas. I like masterpiece even better. If it's going to be a canvas, let's make it a masterpiece.
Speaker 3:If you don't walk away with anything else, you got that today right.
Speaker 1:That's it. Yeah, I've upgraded my life canvas to masterpiece in motion. So, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, I mean, I guess I mean truthfully, as far as just creation my daughter is definitely my, you know, number one kind of creation, right, I think about it in that way very often, but yeah, that's still kind of mind-blowing to me that's really pulling some meaning up right now and I can feel it, yeah, yeah, just, that you uh literally create another human being.
Speaker 1:I mean, like, I know people do it every day. It's like la, la, people do it, that's how we propagate the earth, whatever. But still, and then there's, you know, I mean familial and friendship bonds are just you know, it's a different level. But so so my daughter, um, because I would feel remiss if I put anything else of her then, if we're talking like practical in the practical world, probably my CD and CD release, because the CD release itself happened after I did have my, I'd earned my certification and started creative, the early, early baby stages of creative oasis coaching. But I already, you know, as a creativity coach. My thought was well, jill, you can't just go to some bar, smoky bar and deep bellum and hawk your CDs and play, you know, like you can. What else can you do? Like, let's think bigger, let's make it more creative and let's also y'all will understand this let's not make it just about you. How can we find a way to make this CD release which is ostensibly about you and your CD, not just about you? And what I came up with was I do have a lot of talented artist friends. Even back then I had a lot of talented artists, friends and female. So I had just found Women for Women International. Are you familiar with that organization that helps women in war-torn countries via education, medical. It's a wonderful sponsorship program. It's just super vibrant and huge now I'm sure. But anyway, I had just started sponsoring women through that and I thought, well, if I can tie it to that some way, that would be great.
Speaker 1:And then there were 13 songs on the CD. So I invited 13 female artists to each make something inspired by one of the 13 songs and contribute that for a silent art auction. I put I got sponsors. I mean, it was a big, like six to nine month project to get this CD release going. I had a lot of help. I had a lot of people raise their hand to say this sounds great. How can I help the artists who contributed?
Speaker 1:We made videos of each of the artists talking about their piece and how they did it, because also, some of these artists at that time they weren't thinking of them. So they knew they could paint, they knew where they were artists, but they wouldn't have said that in the world necessarily. And here was a video. Here was a video that was going on a website telling the world oh no, but you are, because look here, here you are and you are talking about this art that you've made for this. So so we had the silent art auction. I performed the entirety of the 13 songs with the band. We had a raffle and the sponsorship and a really wonderful evening in the design district at a cool, cool place that doesn't exist anymore. It was a little bit like the best I can describe. It was like Alice in Wonderland on acid.
Speaker 1:It had really oversized furniture that was painted kind of whimsically and a little bit Mad Hattery, so that was awesome. And then, after all was said and done, it was a heck of a party and we ended up raising, after everything was paid for, so profit, over $10,000 for women for Women International and awareness, because I talked about it a lot as well. So the artists got their bravas and their, you know, being shared with the world as well as Women for Women International, and that's how I got my CD out, you know, and it felt I was more energized and I think y'all understand that to do it in that way, because it wasn't all about me and the cd but geez, pretty dang creative you know, I mean really, really thinking way over here, out of the box.
Speaker 1:I love it yeah, that, and like I say, I feel like that was my, I think it came right about the time, right like that was what happened right after I'd earned my certification, and I always think of it as like if my certification was a master's program, that would have been my thesis, that infinite possibilities event, that's wonderful.
Speaker 3:So Jill in your coaching with clients. What is the thing, the aspect of it that you just love the most, your favorite part of it?
Speaker 1:Them. I mean, you know, just seeing people, I mean, I think what I'm here I heard a little bit of this from y'all as well. The desire to become a coach was because of our wonderful experience as coachees, as being coached right Like you're like when you see what's possible, you want that for other people, you don't want to sit on it.
Speaker 1:You want everyone yeah Like you have a cure for something and you're like, no, but really this is, this is great. I mean, if it's aligned right, if they want it and you can't. It's just like you can't tell somebody they need to go to AA or they need to go to Weight Watchers or something like that. They have to want it. You don't tell people they need coaching, but when somebody really wants it and they're there for it and you have the empathy of knowing what it's like to want a thing, to want to create a thing or share, put a thing in the world and keep stopping yourself for one fear or something and you don't even know what it is sometimes and to be able to help them see what it is, get clear especially for the multi-passionates who have a million ideas to get clear on what they want to do next and then focus and follow through and make it happen and have that satisfaction. Wonderful to see other people experiencing that and knowing how great it feels. You know and and what like it wasn't lost.
Speaker 3:It could have just known you had a role in it. All right, they had a big breakthrough and and you had a role in it I feel like.
Speaker 1:I mean, I do feel like the word call, like I feel like this is what I'm supposed to be doing, like I have no, there's no like, hmm, but I wonder. I mean, there's still other creative projects that I may or may not get to do in my time left on the earth. But this right, the, the coaching, this is definitely what I'm meant to do, and and, and I think we'll do it. It obviously lights you up and I think we'll do it obviously lights you up.
Speaker 1:It does energize me. I also have to say part of one of the things I love about it is I coach both one-on-one and small groups, but I offer these sessions three times a week that everybody gets to come to one-on-one clients and the group, so everybody gets a chance to be in community, even if they're preferred to be coached one-on-one and usually they love that most love that as well. And it's just this. You know, the cliche is true for a reason, but a rising tide lifts all boats. So seeing people learning from each other, having aha moment, or somebody stumbling and being supported, somebody winning and being supported, it's just. It's so much easier than doing things in a vacuum, right, when we've got other people. And sometimes it's easier to see the lesson when somebody else does it. Like you said, it's hard to see ourselves. Sometimes you know like, oh, that thing that you're doing I can now I see how I'm doing it too, and oh, and your course correcting, beautifully, I think I'll do what you're doing, you know. So, yeah, I love that part of it.
Speaker 3:I love the rising boats quote. I think the first time I ever heard that was perhaps one, I don't remember which one now one of the board members for the Dallas Galleries for Advocacy. Yes, and it had an impact on both Dwight and I. We were together when we heard it and now we say it all the time. I put it in some of my writing. It's on webpages of ours because, you know, it just says it in a way that I can't think of a better way to say it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, agreed, yeah. Some of those cliches are around and used all the time for a reason that's right Our brain gets it really quickly. I mean also I think it's true, you know putting the oxygen mask on yourself first. I know that one is used a lot, but it you're like get it so quickly? Yeah, and people tend not to so yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, you got a chance to really go out there with your your thesis project. It was an exercise in bringing together creative community creatively and you have been engaged with with Creative Mornings. You were actually our introduction to Creative Mornings. I love that.
Speaker 3:And I don't know if you know this, but you know that my first time was when you spoke, but I haven't missed a single meeting since then.
Speaker 1:I do know that I love that too. It's amazing.
Speaker 3:I've been there every and I invite.
Speaker 1:And you've brought people and yeah.
Speaker 3:This past Friday I had invited 10 people. I think one came, but I invited 10.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we are believers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know We've all sipped of the Kool-Aid and are very much in the yeah for sure, I love creative mornings and creative community is very much what we are all about.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'm I'm really curious about how, with all of the ways that you have been involved, all of the creative communities that you've seen in and around the town, what patterns have you noticed in how successful creative communities operate?
Speaker 1:Well, I think I mean there's a real spirit of giving right. Like so Creative Mornings. I had already been going to the in-person live once a month meetings for a couple years before, a few years before COVID, and even that I was like wow, like this is a pretty amazing thing to offer every month, month after month, a beautiful space, a speaker, delicious breakfast and coffee and cool people. Like wow, you know, that's very generous, very expansive. And then when the lockdown happened and they started offering virtual field trips as a way to again anything like connect people, offer some hope, offer something to do while you're at home, that kind of thing, and I raised my hand immediately and I think I was one of the first 10 or 12 people to do a field trip. And now I've done dozens.
Speaker 1:But again, there's this they're free. I mean we have sponsors and everything. Obviously it's like it's running in some. It's not magic. I mean it's also sponsors at this point that care about it, but a lot of volunteers amazing volunteers as well but just that feeling of yeah, like do you want to learn about this, do you want to learn about that? And you could be in a room a virtual room, but a virtual room with people from all around the world, all around the world and learning about the same thing or having the same experience or trying a new technique or fun thing together, and I just I love that piece of it, that kind of Supportiveness. And I don't know if you all are familiar with the Creative Arts Center of Dallas. I don't know if y'all are familiar with the Creative Arts Center of Dallas.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, so I teach a handful of. I've like four to six workshops there a year three to four, just depends on the year, but I have for again over a decade and I think a place like that at its best are when people are supporting each other, right, or when we open. They just opened their doors and had their first art market. That was open. It wasn't just teachers and students, I think. They opened tables up for other vendors to come in and sell their creative goods.
Speaker 1:And that's not what the CAC does normally. It's normally all about classes and workshops. But, you know, giving creatives a place to be and connect and show their stuff. I mean, the Creative Arts Center is in a cool wrong pointing over there, a cool old building that was like a 50s elementary school building or something and they did a little renovation a couple years ago. So there's this small but nice little gallery space and they've been hosting openings and gallery um shows for artists that may not may not get to have them at other places. So I think, opportunity like opportunity for people to say this is what I'm doing, you know, as a creative in the world and and um, you know in person or online.
Speaker 3:But I have a mentor that said to us at one point people come for the transformation but they stay for the people.
Speaker 1:Yep, yep, and I think that's true. Yeah, mean, and you never. I mean for sure. When I go to to a creative mornings meeting now I'm gonna get the clint again, y'all. What's happening? Hormonal? Um, when I go to a creative mornings meeting on any given friday, I don't know who all's well, I know y'all are going to be there.
Speaker 3:You're pretty, pretty, pretty good site that we're going to be there.
Speaker 1:Y'all are going to be there, but I don't know exactly who's going to be there and I don't know what the topic's going to be about. Or even if I kind of think I know I don't usually really know, and it does, I always look forward to it. It doesn't matter. I know I'm going to learn something. I know I'm going to meet somebody or get to reconnect with somebody who's just simpatico, who's just cool or maybe who will challenge me. But just like people, I want to be around, you know, and I think that's just so. It's huge, there's just you know.
Speaker 3:We have met some phenomenal people. It's huge. We have met some phenomenal people, and then those people introduce us to other people that may not even be involved in Creative Mornings At this point. We've just got this network thing that is happening, a network of people it's happening, where we're spending quite a bit of time now in social aspects that we're creating, mostly aside from the business and the events that we do, but just little gatherings of people here in the house that are well during the pandemic. One of the things I said was, when this is over, I'm going to go back out into the streets and I'm going to do whatever it takes to create an epic social life for myself, and I want my house to be a social hub, and it is. We have arrived.
Speaker 3:We have an epic social life and there is people coming to the house you know frequently for gatherings and it's got to be maybe one of the most fulfilling things I've done in my entire life.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, that's great.
Speaker 3:In fact, whether it's an event for the love of creatives or it's a little gathering here at the house that we curate, I'm usually so pumped afterwards that I lose an entire night of sleep. We had friends here on Saturday night. There were eight of us, including Dwight and I, so it was very small, very intimate, and everybody split between nine and 930. And I laid awake until two o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 1:You sound like after a gig. Like after a gig I'd be like I can't go to bed now. It's like Like I remember like after a gig I'd be like I can't go to bed now. It's like I got all this adrenaline.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I. I just. It's like yeah, it's a social life that I paid dearly for through the loss of sleep.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. Our saving grace with that gathering was that it was all adults and everyone really enjoyed getting to bed at a decent hour.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like going to shows now and you're like wait what? You're not going on until nine o'clock. I don't know if I can. I love the adult. Start time Starts at seven o'clock. You'll be in bed by 930.
Speaker 3:Yes, this gathering we started at six. No-transcript.
Speaker 1:There you go, that's a good iteration.
Speaker 2:Well, this has been a fabulous hangout. I'm so glad that we got a chance to do this. Thanks for the invitation. I appreciate it. Well, we can't let you go without getting into a round of rapid fire questions for some rapid fire answers.
Speaker 1:So my brain works for the rapid fire and it's not like deer in headlights.
Speaker 3:It'll be entertaining either way.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's right, I'll think of it that way. Thanks for that reframe, maddox. Thanks for that reframe. Maddox.
Speaker 2:So rapid fire. Question number one yes. What form of creativity do you engage in to relax?
Speaker 1:Ah, easy. Visual journaling meaning collage, mixed media, yeah.
Speaker 2:Nice, all right. Next question what creative challenges will you next overcome?
Speaker 1:I am dedicated to my. My focus right now is it's new for me, so there's a learning curve, so there's a little bit of that kind of factor Like I don't already know how to do the thing, which, at my age, is like wait what? You know how to do all the things you need to do so far. So I'm learning a new way to share my work in the world and yeah, so there's going to be a lot of growth around that and I'm excited about that. Like I don't want to get stayed, I don't want to just be like you know, I know how to do this. I'm going to keep doing it in the same old way, but yeah, so I guess it doesn't matter if I say it.
Speaker 3:I'm saying it again You're describing a little bit of a pivot.
Speaker 1:Well, no, it's not really a pivot to like. The coaching is the same. It's like how I'm going to put myself out there. So it's like really doubling down and focusing on my YouTube channel and sharing things like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So I mean, I've kind of toyed with podcast vlog this, that, the other, for a while and again, as a multi-passionate, sometimes I'll just are you familiar with human design at all?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Taking us off in another direction, but manifesting generator anyway. So I respond well, like this. So I. This has been perfect for me. You say something, you ask me a question, I respond like I'm a responder.
Speaker 1:And so some class that I took, or maybe one of my coaches, said something about you don't have to be on all the platforms all the time at the same level, like what's the one that lights you up or you think would light you up. And I'm like same level, like what's the one that lights you up or you think would light you up. And I'm like I'm super comfortable on on video. I love to make videos and yet I'm not really utilizing that. And then I just started going down the rabbit hole of what about a YouTube channel? And I was like I think that's the, my next thing I'm going to try. No, so it's not trying. A new field of work Like the, the creative voices. Coaching stays the same, but it's like how I'm getting it out into the world in front of new people is going to be YouTube. So we shall see.
Speaker 2:Love that. I'm looking forward to it. Thank you, we'll definitely make sure to include some links.
Speaker 1:Oh, thanks, I appreciate that and it's also like I'm very in beginner's mind and I'm very I need. I am taking my own advice of good enough, like don't let perfect be the enemy of the the done, because otherwise no videos are going out.
Speaker 3:Yeah, letting go of that perfectionism is like one of the I. I carried that for years. And now just to let go of and let things be what they are to, to be able to say you know, we're going to record this podcast episode and it's just going to be put up the way it is. That's right, you know, and that there was so much freedom in that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, I bet yeah Because, and honestly, if I'm being truthful, like probably one of the main reasons I never did start a podcast was not this part.
Speaker 2:I love this part.
Speaker 1:Right, I can do this all day, but they're like, oh, and then I'm going to have to edit it and this, that and the other. It was just like although I'm doing some of that on YouTube too, but it's just like, yeah, you have a choice, it doesn't have to be perfect, it's going to be fine. I actually heard somebody say something that's really cool that if you look back on your early whatever podcast episodes, videos, songs, poetry, artwork, whatever it is and you think, oh, cringy, yeah, great, because that's you've grown that's right, that's all that means.
Speaker 1:That's right, and you started, you didn't let the cringy keep you from just starting and trying.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think it was 2021 or two that I did 55 or 53 Facebook Lives, one every week for 53 weeks, and the first few the first one in particular was horrible. It was so bad. And then I started to get a little bit of a groove, you know, and then I took a little class that helped me learn some tips and techniques. I had a formula to work with and by the time it all ended, I was like light years beyond where I was when I had started. And the same with the podcast. This is my second podcast. I did a podcast in 21 and 22 or 22 and 23, something like that. It was 80 episodes and there was just this progression from really starched and uncomfortable and not sure what to say to just relaxing in. And that's why I say, you know, to every guest just pretend that we're sitting over a cup of coffee in a coffee shop having a conversation, because that was the visualization that helped me get to the point where I could drop all of the weirdness and just be me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, whatever that looked like it's funny that you would say that, because I remember when I was first learning to engage on video, like I my, my tendency, my default, is actually to be very, very flat, very much focusing on the intelligence of the words themselves and not really leaning into all the other cues.
Speaker 3:You should do a brief demonstration for us, Dwight.
Speaker 2:No, I would not subject anyone to that because it's horrifying. It can be actually a little off-putting, but the first time that I really saw Maddox lean into what he had to do in order for being able to convey the range of emotion on video, he looked crazy to me. It was just Well give her a little overview. It was just.
Speaker 3:Well, give her a little overview. So he comes in and I'm recording a video and I'm talking, I'm doing the whole thing, and he thinks oh my God, that is so weird, you can't, there's no way, that's going to work, you know. And then I ended the video and I played it back and he stood here and he watched the video of what he had just seen live doing and he said that's not the same video. I said it is because no, it couldn't be, cause I just saw you just like doing really weird stuff, and you're not doing any of that weird stuff on the video.
Speaker 1:And I said that's the way it works.
Speaker 3:You have to be way more animated on video for it to look normal when it's played back.
Speaker 2:Well, and in my experience in life, I actually have to go through something that is akin to that filter that you're doing for video. I really have to be mindful of what it is, what the cues are that I'm sending, and, as a result, I've become more sensitive to the cues that people are putting out. So it's it's been helpful.
Speaker 1:Good, yeah, and it's such. I think this is a very cool concept with y'all doing it together and yeah, and I love the laid back.
Speaker 3:Wow, we, we love the tag, the team tag thing or tag team. However, you say that.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:It took a little bit in the beginning for us to kind of get a little bit of a flow. We kind of tripped over each other a little bit for the first few episodes, and we still do every once in a while.
Speaker 2:And the nice thing is, things don't have to be super rigid, like the plan was to ask three rapid fire questions and we went down a rabbit hole.
Speaker 1:but sorry about that.
Speaker 2:No, no, but it's good. It's good. I think this is going to be quite fun for for anyone that happens to watch or hear it. Oh yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 3:No doubt.
Speaker 2:So the the last of the rapid fire questions is what character from popular fiction do you most identify with, and why?
Speaker 1:Oh, now there's the one. Those other two were so easy. Oh my gosh. This is the part my brain is popular fiction. I'll tell you who I want, who I love. Okay, that work. I'll tell you who I wish my fairy godmothers were Frankie and Grace Lily and Jane.
Speaker 1:Fonda. Actually, I love them as their characters and as their real selves. As their characters and as their real selves, and if I could just like live in the beach house with them and their wacky shenanigans and all that, I would just. I don't know that I'd want to be either one of either one of them, but I would love to have them for my like mentors or, you know, gal pals.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a pretty amazing show.
Speaker 1:I I haven't seen all of it and he's only seen a little bit of it, but, um, it is pretty remarkable yeah, I don't think they want to be them either yeah, it's, yeah, I like, I like, I guess her attitude, their attitudes of like, the more you watch the show they do kind of like, if not now, when they just do all kinds of things you know.
Speaker 3:Oh, they do. They totally have. I have no more fucks to give attitude throughout that whole.
Speaker 1:Well, that and I do think that that's again that's one of the benefits of getting you know past 50 and up in our, because it's like it becomes true.
Speaker 3:Well, for a lot of people it does maybe not for everybody, but I like that part. I like that part a lot, when you really discover the beauty of just being you, without all of the social mask and the pretense and thinking that you've got to be a certain way for people to like you. Oh my gosh, talk about an exhale.
Speaker 1:Did you see that we all just took an exhale? Yes, it made me want to take a breath Like, oh, that sounds exhausting, just remembering or hearing you talk. You know talking about it.
Speaker 3:Been there, done that, no more of that please.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, good stuff.
Speaker 3:This has been amazing, jill, thank you so much. I mean, I think this definitely makes me experience like a connection to you that I didn't have, because we just hadn't had the opportunity to do this, yes, so thank you so much for this.
Speaker 1:Thank you for the invitation. I trusted you both implicitly because I was like, I'm just going to do this, yes, so thank you so much for this. Thank you for the invitation.
Speaker 3:I trusted you both implicitly because I was like I'm just going.
Speaker 1:We've got no script, we've got no questions pre-planned, just going to have a convo.
Speaker 3:You've never been on a show where there was no plan, huh.
Speaker 1:Zero plan? Probably not. Probably, at least, like we're going to ask you a little something about this, that or the other.
Speaker 3:So yeah, Well, we just want to acknowledge you for taking that leap of faith.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Also there's a bit of trust, like I didn't think you guys were going to do anything Like now's the point, except for the rapid fire, and I didn't see that coming. But that's okay, that's okay, I had my first answer came so quickly and I'm like great, these are going to be a piece of cake, well.
Speaker 3:I think you nailed them all. You hesitated with the third one, but that just shows you we're putting a little bit of thought into it.
Speaker 1:There you go.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Thanks y'all.
Speaker 2:This has been wonderful, thank you.