No one wants it to take an overnight hospital stay to be the wake-up call for you to learn an important lesson.

But so be it.

This is my personal story that doesn’t veer far from my professional life. For too long I let fear and anxiety influence the way I chose to grow my Creative Business, and this is where it’s time to make a new choice.

The person who went into the hospital is not the same person who came out, and how I was running it will no longer be the way I will be running it going forward.

In today’s episode, I share with you how this health challenge inspired me to dive into my fear versus resisting it, and what has happened since.

Join the Artful Selling Waitlist here to be the first to know when we open the doors again, on August 26th

Stunned that we're still having this conversation and throwing cautionary tales out to people who may just be getting up the courage to pursue their passion as a business, I open this episode with a response to a conversation I heard with 2 well-respected Women leaders, just moments before I went LIVE for Creative Business Coaching over Coffee last week

And then one of our founding Expansive Artists members, Quilting Artist + Teacher Laura came on to get coaching help with her recent “failures”.

She bravely, and vulnerably shared what happened in her recent launch, and together we came up with a solution for her next steps. Spoiler alert: no failing actually happened….😝

Happening TODAY! Join me for LIVE Creative Business Coaching over Coffee ☕️ at 10 am PDT this morning over on Instagram @creativethursday.

You can find all things Laura Schrader on instagram

@lulusews

Turns out that when asked if social media feels both frustrating, and confusing as to who's actually following you? that answer was a resounding 100% on a recent poll I posted.

Which means, we've got some work to do!

Precisely why I'm back with another edition of Creative Business Coaching over Coffee where I get to have a conversation with EA member and Artist Jeanette Bergstrom answering her Social Media questions.

And I open this call by answering this question from Katherine about how to reach more followers, by sharing a whole lot of Social Media tips including:

1. What content performs best on Instagram right now
2. Reasons why you may not get seen on Social Media
3. How to grow organically on Social Media

You can find all things Jeanette Bergstrom on instagram

@jeanette.bergrstrom.art

Happening TODAY! Join me for LIVE Creative Business Coaching over Coffee ☕️ at 10 am PDT this morning over on Instagram @creativethursday.

It's become tradition!

A couple of years ago I started sharing a behind the scenes studio wrap up of what worked and what didn't when it came to my art practice and my creative business.

And how did it impact my personal life?

One of my best years in business thus far, a lot of progress made, and definitely more room for improvement in one area I was struggling with last year.

The question is which one will I choose to interpret my overall year?

Is there really such thing as self-sabotage?

Why would we ever consider keeping ourselves away from what we say we want?

Doing ALL the things for many years, and still not progressing in the way I envisioned, lead me to start a deep dive on learning more about the brain from science to psychology.

Oh the discoveries, wow! mind-blowing, pun intended.

Coming to understand the science behind our automatic behaviors and the choices we make is life changing and I hope this quick overview brings you some insight + understanding that you may have been seeking too.

Coming to you with a special Sunday edition of the podcast.

In 2000, I started to ask myself the question, if I truly believed I could follow my dreams and become anything I want to be in this world, would this path I'm currently on, be the one I'd choose? It was answering that question that ultimately lead me to finally acknowledging that I always wanted to become an Artist.

When I was easing my way into the belief that I could be an Artist, I found great comfort in listening to any and all stories from people who had been where I was, chose to pursue their passions and made it.

I couldn't get enough of these stories. Let's be honest I still can't get enough.

What has become my check-in, I still ask myself that question, which invites me to keep dreaming bigger. And it's listening to stories from the inspiring people out ahead of me on the journey that keeps me appreciating how far I've come and enthusiastically focused forward on all the goodness that is yet to come!

I can talk endlessly about my passion for mentoring The Expansive Artists how inspired I am by their kind + generous spirits, dedication to their dream, and their incredible progress every week, not to mention their beautiful art!

But today I invite them to share their stories, and experience as a member of The Expansive Artists to inspire you and give you more insight into what it's like to work with me and be a part of our incredible community if you're thinking about joining us this time!

Enjoy a recording from a recent live chat.

The Doors to The Expansive Artists are OPEN! only until Tuesday, September 21 @ 11:59 pm PDT

Join us https://theexpansiveartists.com/

The Artists featured: (click on their names below to be taken to their websites)

Eliza Day-Green

Sarah Kelly

Jo. D Livingston

Marisa Montaldi

Marie -Laure Delage-Carlson

Do you sometimes wonder if you're sabotaging yourself? getting in your own way of success?

Has anyone ever called you emotional? Have you felt especially tender when exposed to certain experiences in your life. And have you ever wondered if it's just you, or are Artists really more sensitive than other people? 

If you aren't yet familiar with the work of Dr. Don Wood, you're in for a treat today, so many answers to questions that you may have been wondering about for a lifetime. 

This is an episode you'll want to save and listen to again. Find comfort in knowing that you're not alone.

Learn more about the life changing work of Dr. Wood, with a special limited offer exclusively for Creative Thursday listeners. Click here to learn more

If you caught my last email, I shared some Creative Thursday changes that are going into effect this summer. Our 4 day work weeks M- Th, are happening! And I'm podcasting and emailing you the Creative Thursday 3 every other week, instead of every week, through August. I also unintentionally took a long pause from posting to Instagram.

What I did do, is make art! I took a weekend painting workshop in Sonoma, California that lead to some pretty inspiring discoveries in my work, see the sneak peek above and more details were sent out in the Creative Thursday 3 today. Are you on the list? Join here at creativethursday.com

Letting go + stepping back, and getting more support is not my comfy place ~ I've been a do it all myself kind of girl who also prides herself on a strong work ethic (which is all fine + good unless the work rarely pauses)

I most definitely hustled my way to this place in my business (more on today's podcast episode below), and it's not how I plan to grow from this point forward. 

For the record; the choice to hustle less is not to be confused with sizing down on my BIG vision for Creative Thursday, for us! It just means that more wonderful people will be invited along for the journey to help bring that vision for uplifting our creative community into reality, while I also continue with my art.

Taking these gentle steps forward with a focus on designing a business that supports me, instead of bringing me close to burnout ~ feels pretty incredible so far.

I hope to be an example of what's possible when it comes to building + growing a thriving online business today. 

As always I intend to keep you in the loop with new discoveries, which is what today's podcast is about, inspired by a question one of our EA members Dana asked “How much do you have to hustle as an Artist?”

What's it really take to be a professional Artist?

How many hours are you supposed to work to make your dream a reality.

In this episode I share the truth of what's involved to growing an online business in today's climate and how the landscape is starting to change.

Call all high-achieving and heart-centered Artists. Want to to turn your passion into an Art career, here are the top qualities I believe it takes to thrive as an Artist, selling online today.

I know, I know ~ when I was coming up with this title High-Achieving Artist (not to be confused with over-achieving) that pairing of words sounded so unfamiliar, downright strange. 

In my desire to support Artists in building a thriving business around a practice of creating Art they love, I never connected High-Achieving with Artist before,  but in recent months it's become increasingly clear the stakes have been raised. As author, Steven Pressfield says, it's time to step into the role of the Professional. Here's how!

Ready to re-connect with your vision + plans for 2021 alongside a group of dedicated Artists (both emerging and established) next week, starting Monday June 14 to have a mid-year check-in and creative dreaming + planning session, click here to to join us for the Profitable Artist's Planning Challenge.

In this episode, life happened. Technology failed, mili-second power outages were at play, user error was in also in the mix, and my Clubhouse talk didn’t get recorded. It can be so frustrating to experience hiccups that get in the way of your best laid plans!

Though this episode did not go as expected, there’s a great lesson to be learned...

Also if you're hearing this first thing in the morning, we're back on Clubhouse today for an episode on Email Marketing for Artists @ 10:10 am PDT in the Creative Thursday Club. See you there!

Click on the link below to go directly to the room when we go live.

https://www.joinclubhouse.com/event/PrWK54Ol