Creative Retirement Series 4 of 4: Can I Learn To Draw At 60?

This is Part 4 of 4 of the Creative Retirement Series and the question I am asked more than almost any other. If you have been listening from the beginning, welcome to the final part of this journey. If you are just joining us, I warmly invite you to go back and start from Part 1 of 4.

The answer is yes. Wholeheartedly, without reservation, yes.

In this final episode I want to show you exactly why age is not the barrier you think it is. Drawing is not about talent. It is not about natural ability. It is about 4 simple comparison skills you already use every single day without even realising it.

Women in their 60s, 70s and beyond have sat down with me and created artwork that made them weep with joy. Not because they were gifted. But because they were finally given the right starting point.

You deserve that starting point too.

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 📧 cindy@drawpj.com

Transcript

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Hi everyone, it's Cindy here with your creative identity transformation. Thank you for joining me. In our last episode, I led you gently into actually taking that first step. You picked up a pencil and you let it touch the paper. Something shifted in you. In that quiet moment of just being present, it was bliss and it felt complete. Now some say that it even felt like finally arriving or coming home. And now perhaps a new question has bubbled up inside of you. An even bigger one, a much bolder one. No longer are you asking just can I pick up a pencil? but can I really and truly learn to draw at 60, 65, and into my 70s? Is it really possible for someone like me? Maybe you doubt this. Maybe you could be thinking to yourself, no way, that's not possible, it's too late for me. But this is exactly what I promised in the last episode that we'd explore this today, and I want to answer in a way that I always answer this question, not just with encouraging words alone, but with real proof. Real women, real stories that will show you the answer is absolutely yes, you can learn to draw. Now let me introduce you to three women whose journeys I've had the privilege of witnessing firsthand. I won't use their names today because this episode is really about you, and I want you to learn yourself and imagine yourself in their stories. But their full journeys are on my website at drawpj.com along with many more. When she came to me, she was absolutely convinced that she couldn't draw, as though it was simply a fact about who she was. But what she did have was just a tiny glimmer of hope. She began at the very beginning. I led her through as I first of all started with a pre-instruction drawing, and that is what I ask every one of my clients to do. Begin with pre-instruction drawing so that she can see what she begins like. Now, pre-instruction drawing that she described as something that looked like a child, and that is exactly where we start as beginners. So she said, I draw, I'm drawing like a child, and it is so true because when you first begin with me, you'll be drawing the same as you left off as a child. So that was a fact that she actually said, but then she began to work through the comparison skills. Now these are the same four comparison skills that I've explained in episode two. So these are comparing angles, sizes, tones, and spaces. Remember, these are the same skills that made her an extraordinary nursing leader. The ability to assess, to observe, to notice and to judge things that she needed to do her job and do it to the best of her ability. Okay, she's got eyes that have been trained over decades to see what others have missed. And something happened. Gradually, quietly, her drawings began to change. Not because she suddenly developed some mysterious new gift, but because she was given the right guidance, the guidance to learn how to use those exact abilities that she already had, but to apply them for drawing. So the difference was she'd learned how to use those skills while holding her pencil and stroking it across a piece of paper. She needed to learn to do that in the right way so that she could finally draw. She discovered how to make that valuable connection between her mind and her hand so that what was in her mind could actually come out of the hand. And that is a gap that I love to work with. That gap in between, that why is it that you can't just get that piece of information, that thought that is in your mind and coming out onto your hand, instead you're trying so hard to make it happen, but it just ends up looking something like you didn't ever imagine. So by now she could see that at last she could create the images that were in her imagination and she could bring them out into life on the page. Today that retired director of nursing is writing and illustrating her own children's picture books. She's actually on her second book at the moment, and her first book is in the process of being published as we speak. It's a beautiful story, and the whole first children's book, the children's book that she has is set in the Irish countryside. Really gorgeous story. It's with her own imaginary characters, her own original drawings, her wonderful whimsical illustrations. I get so excited when I speak about this stuff because just remember that this is a lady who believed for decades that she just couldn't draw. She didn't believe that she was creative whatsoever. But now, through drawing as a carriage, she has been able to release all of this wonderful imagination that's within her. Her creativity. Her creativity is just absolutely flourishing. She's on her second book. She looks at what she's created and she just asks herself, did I really do this? Yes, she absolutely did. And in her 70s as well. So that leads me to the second woman who learned to draw in her 70s. She's a retired veterinarian from California. She ran her own veterinary hospital for 37 years. She had to be precise and analytical, someone who needed to understand the why behind everything. She told me her early attempts at drawing from a very young age, long before she met me, looked something like a six-year-old might have done. So she gave up drawing and didn't even try it again until she came to me. She'd carried that story with her for decades. She came to me in her 70s, just like the previous lady I told you about. I asked her, as I ask every student, to create her pre-instruction drawing before we begin. So creating that initial pre-instruction drawing is a wonderful record for her to come back to so that she can compare her progress so that she can really see how much she's learned and developed her skills over time. And she did. She developed her skills. She created that pre-instruction drawing, and then as she began to learn using my original drawing system, she took those four comparison skills that she'd been using every single day in her career, in her extraordinary career that used her very special veterinary eye. It was the eye that was needed to assess and measure and observe, and she used that exact eye, those refined skills, to apply them to her drawings. And now she was doing it on paper. One day she drew a self-portrait in charcoal. When she finished and looked at what she'd created, she told me years later, I was blown away. When I finished that portrait, the picture really looked like me. That was a point that I knew I could draw. Today that woman is a multi-award-winning artist. Her work has won best of show, it's received international recognition. She's in her mid-70s and she is still growing and still learning and still asking how good she can get even more as she continues forward. So the learning journey never ends, but she has released that beautiful creativity that she never knew she had. Now the third woman that I'd love to share with you today, to tell you about today, is a retired telecommunications professional. She spent 31 years with a major telephone company working her way up from operator to management, then into technology, installing and maintaining computer systems. So she's an IT professional. But when she came to me, she was retired and she felt that familiar pull towards creativity. She tried Bob Ross classes, and you know the guy with the big fuzzy ball of hair, the amazing man who's inspired so many people to paint. She also tried other online courses, but nothing clicked for her. Nothing gave her what she was actually searching for. She has an analytical mind, you see. She needs to fulfill that analytical mind and drawing, really learning to draw using my system, helps her to fulfill that analytical mind and access those skills that she's developed over all those years. They can't just sit dormant, we can't expect that. We've developed all these skills, you know, these women, they've developed all these very finely, acutely developed skills that are perfect for drawing. So then she found the right process in what I offer, and finally everything changed. So today she's a professional pet portrait artist and takes commissions, she creates drawings of people's beloved animals and with so much heart and so much soul and warmth. She has a genuine skill and people love it. They hang these artworks on their walls and they cherish them. Often it brings them to tears, tears of joy when they see their beloved pet kept and replicated in a drawing. Actually, she recently drew a portrait of a dog, and when the owner brought it home and set it on the floor, the dog came over and sat down in front of it as if she knew that that was her. Now that's the power of what drawing can do. That's what drawing becomes for you. It moves us. Drawing changes lives. Three women retired from three completely different careers, three women who believed they could not draw, all in their 70s when they first came to me. A nursing leader, a veterinarian, a technology professional, all of them discovered that they'd been wrong about themselves for decades, believing they just weren't creative and were analytical types instead. All of them discovered this truth about drawing, not by being told so, but by discovering it for themselves with their own hands. Now let me answer the question directly. Can you learn to draw at 60, 65, and into your 70s? Yes, you absolutely can, and here's why. You already have the four comparison skills that drawing requires comparing angles, sizes, tones, and spaces. We established this in episode two of my podcast series. This is the final episode in our short series, and I want to say something to you before we close. You came into this series carrying a question. Maybe it was is it too late? Maybe it was, am I even creative? Maybe it was simply a quiet, unnamed longing that didn't quite have words yet. Whatever it was, I hope that something has shifted. Not because I told you to shift, but because you heard the truth and recognized it as something you already knew. You were always creative, you always had what it takes, and it is never ever too late to awaken that hidden natural ability inside of you. See you in the next podcast episode for some brand new content. Let's keep that creative spark alive.