March 31, 2025
#016: The Art of Breaking Free: Amber Goodwin's Journey from Cultural Expectations to Creative Liberation
When 12-year-old Amber Goodwin discovered glass painting in Pakistan, she couldn't have known her creative journey would require breaking free from cultural expectations, an arranged marriage, and toxic artistic communities before finding her authentic voice.
Growing up in a traditional household where art was "just a hobby," Amber faced immense pressure to pursue conventional careers despite her passion for creation. Years later, after living under her parents' roof into her thirties, she made the courageous decision to claim her independence—a choice that paralleled her artistic awakening. As she gained agency in her personal life, her creative confidence flourished, revealing the profound connection between personal autonomy and artistic authenticity.
Amber's most challenging moment came when a hurtful interaction with a fellow artist silenced her creativity for three months. The turning point arrived when another artist encouraged her: "The world cannot stop seeing your art." This powerful reminder became the catalyst for Amber to develop her unique textured dot technique, setting her apart in the fluid art community and helping her build a following of thousands.
Through her story, Amber distinguishes between toxic competitive environments and supportive artistic communities that celebrate each other's successes. By consciously surrounding herself with people who share her values of respect and mutual support, she created space for her authentic expression to thrive. Her journey demonstrates that staying true to ourselves often leads to our most meaningful artistic achievements.
Whether you're facing cultural barriers, critical voices, or self-doubt in your creative practice, Amber's advice resonates with universal wisdom: don't procrastinate on your dreams. Start today, live in the present, and take immediate action toward your creative goals. Visit ambergoodwinart.com to discover her distinctive textured artwork and connect with this inspiring creative voice.
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For the Love of Creatives Community
Chapters
00:00 - Introduction to Amber Goodwin
04:54 - Childhood Art Beginnings in Pakistan
11:56 - Cultural Expectations vs. Creative Desires
17:39 - Breaking Free From Family Constraints
27:23 - Dealing With Toxicity in Art Communities
33:48 - Handling Criticism and Hate
50:20 - Rapid Fire Questions and Final Thoughts
Transcript
WEBVTT
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I'm just letting it go and I have.
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It's been like a year now.
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How can you take your power back from her?
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She took your power away with that conversation that conversation.
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Well, I think I got most of it back by starting to do art and really focus on stuff like creating this, like heavy texture dots that I do it.
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That helps me grow, I feel like this incident into creating something that none of the fluid artists or acrylic poor people have done.
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Um, it's a specific niche you know that I created, so I think that helped me.
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Hello and welcome to another edition of For the Love of Creatives podcast.
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I'm your host, dwight, I'm joined by Maddox, we're the Connections and Community Guides and today we're joined by our featured guest Amber Goodwin.
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Hi everybody, maddox and Dwight, thanks for having me.
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I'm so excited.
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I'm Amber Goodwin.
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I am a artist and my full-time job I work at Texas Health, dallas, but I love art and I love creating and I love being part of the creative community and so awesome to meet Dwight and Maddox, who share the same type of mindset as I do, so I'm super excited to be here today.
00:02:04.281 --> 00:02:06.305
We're certainly glad you're here.
00:02:06.887 --> 00:02:09.293
Also tell the audience how we met Amber.
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So we met of all places, at the Deep Ellum Arts Festival.
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That was their first year.
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They restarted the festival after the original organizer retired and I just saw Maddox and Dwight strolling around and they stopped by my booth and I was just immediately drawn to both of y'all's kindness, um, and I just felt a connection, and you actually liked my paintings too, which was awesome.
00:02:45.193 --> 00:02:45.895
So it was.
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We did and we do.
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Yeah, yeah, and I just I just had this ease of like explaining my process to both of you and just you understood what I was saying and yeah, we met there and it was like the luckiest meeting I've ever had.
00:03:05.852 --> 00:03:22.294
I mean, I talked to a lot of people at these shows, but they don't turn into friendships as this one has, and this was back in, I believe, 2023, I believe.
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I think you're right.
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Yeah Time flies.
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Yeah, and it's.
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It's been a year and we're on to our what like second year and yeah, just so, so amazing.
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I mean that was the best time.
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That was the best thing.
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I feel like that came out of the show was getting to know you both.
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Thank you, we feel the same way, absolutely.
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And for those that are watching video, the painting to the left of my cabinet back there that has the big word authentic on it is one of Amber's paintings.
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There's a little bit of glare on it from the window.
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Yeah, resin.
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It's lovely, we love it.
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Thank you.
00:04:04.250 --> 00:04:06.206
Thank you, I'm glad it went to a good home.
00:04:08.501 --> 00:04:15.753
Well, tell us a little bit about how it was that you got started with creating art.
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So originally I started art back when I was 12.
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I was 12.
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My mom had enrolled me in this glass painting course which you know you use this paint by Pebeo called Vitrel.
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It's really stinky, by the way, so make sure if you're going to use it then wear proper protection Because, yeah, it does smell really bad.
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And yeah, it was just a lady who, I guess, used to live in London and she went to art school there and at that time I lived in Pakistan, where my family's originally from.
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I lived there for about four years, I want to say.
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I want to say, and this lady just had, you know, she made a, she bought a house and she actually made this art school in this property that she had bought and she taught glass painting, she taught silk, screen painting, um, just a lot of stuff, and it was very interesting and she was good at it too.
00:05:22.266 --> 00:05:42.134
And so I would go there every Saturday for about six hours and just paint on mirrors and glass and I learned to use this thing called relief paint, which is kind of like an outlining you do so the paint doesn't spread around.
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So I learned that and I did it for a while until we moved back to the States and those materials weren't available here, which I was kind of shocked because I thought everything would be available here, you know.
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And then I, you know, when I went to college I started doing a lot of watercolor art with watercolors and my art teachers there really pushed me to like, sketch and use watercolors.
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And I actually had my first exhibition in my sophomore year during Black History Month, during Black History Month, and I remember that a professor wanted to buy one of my floral watercolor paintings but I just, I just could not part with any of my stuff, so I was just I didn't want to sell it to her and I just said no, that's not for sale.
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And.
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I remember my dad was like oh, why?
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Didn't you sell it Like, like she, you know, just sell your stuff.
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And at that time I was just like, oh well, do I really want to sell my stuff?
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You know my art, and that was a difficult thing, which is still a little difficult sometimes, to part with art.
00:07:01.963 --> 00:07:02.362
Um, it's.
00:07:02.362 --> 00:07:04.807
It sounds like your art is really for you.
00:07:04.807 --> 00:07:08.552
Yeah, yeah, for you, yeah.
00:07:08.552 --> 00:07:18.454
I have a question when, at 12, when you started painting on glass, was that your idea or was it mom's?
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It.
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Actually it was my idea.
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And it was my idea because I saw my aunts, which are my dad's, my dad's side of the family.
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They were doing it and they have no proper training and I just it's a pretty popular thing to do in Pakistan, the glass painting.
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A pretty popular thing to do in Pakistan, the glass painting.
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But they were the first ones who I saw in my circle actually do glass painting.
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And I remember my eldest aunt she I don't know if you're familiar with those paintings of like the persian mythology where they have the very dainty looking, you know people.
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They're like kind of white, you know they're painted white and they have very intricate like designs, like persian motifs and and stuff.
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And uh, my eldest aunt would actually paint those.
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They look very like, I would say, the oriental paintings back from that time, kind of like those oriental paintings where you saw like the reds and the blues and the golds.
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So she would glass paint those and I thought, oh, that's really cool, I want to learn this and I don't know why she wouldn't like teach me, which was kind of weird.
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So I did talk to my mom and she found the school.
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I don't know how she found this lady.
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But she found this lady and I went and I made a lot of last paintings there and unfortunately we couldn't bring them since we were moving back and my brother broke a few because he was playing I don't know cricket in the house.
00:09:15.880 --> 00:09:31.712
So he smashed a few of my paintings which, um, it was horrible back then but now when I think about it it's like kind of funny that he broke them because, like, I can make them again, I guess.
00:09:32.679 --> 00:09:47.393
Um, but yeah, it started out with my aunts and then my mom saw the interest and she was like well, you know, amber needs to do a hobby, uh, outside of school.
00:09:47.393 --> 00:09:52.087
So that's how it all started and my mom would go with me.
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My mom, um, that's actually the one time we actually were able to kind of bond, because she went and did the silk painting part there, yeah, and she painted a sari.
00:10:05.932 --> 00:10:07.895
I remember I think I still have it.
00:10:07.895 --> 00:10:31.445
She dyed the fabric, you know, first, and it was like a ombre green, like a pistachio green, and then it went to like a dark green and then she painted like these really beautiful pink tiger lilies on them and we would go together and that was was like I had a lot of fun going with her.
00:10:31.445 --> 00:10:32.066
Um.
00:10:32.066 --> 00:10:45.013
So, yeah, that it brings back good memories of of my mom and I going together and being creative together, you know it sounds like your family was supportive of your creative desires.
00:10:46.414 --> 00:10:46.654
Right.
00:10:47.440 --> 00:10:56.519
Because we do, we talk, have a lot of these conversations and it's amazing how many creatives report that family was not so supportive.
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It's like, what are you doing?
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Like get a real job type, you know thing you know thing.
00:11:06.701 --> 00:11:09.966
Yeah, I think back then, like they kind of, I feel like my mom and my dad viewed it as just a hobby.
00:11:09.966 --> 00:11:13.753
Because when I went to college it kind of shifted.
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It was like, oh no, like you need to be a doctor or or a lawyer or an engineer, so, um, they were always or an engineer, so, um, they were always, um, open to the, I guess, the hobby part of it.
00:11:32.104 --> 00:11:44.350
But I don't think they've ever viewed it as being a career, which to me I wanted it to always be a career, um, and it was just kind of frowned upon.
00:11:44.350 --> 00:11:46.592
Uh, that's.
00:11:46.873 --> 00:11:48.596
That's a cultural thing, though, isn't it?
00:11:49.461 --> 00:11:56.913
Yes, it absolutely is, which is kind of sad because my youngest aunt she was a she passed away.
00:11:57.500 --> 00:12:10.143
She was a set designer for the Pakistan television um channel, which is like kind of like PBS there television um channel, which is like kind of like pbs there.
00:12:10.143 --> 00:12:34.475
And then she used to set design, um, and she actually went to art school, um, she went to this college called the national college of arts, um, which is a college that was built when the british ruled over, uh, pakistan and india, um, so they created like these colleges and that we still students go to today, uh, and they're considered pretty prestigious.
00:12:34.475 --> 00:12:41.288
So she went to this national college of arts and she got her degree from there, uh.
00:12:41.288 --> 00:12:49.263
Her daughter followed her footsteps and got a degree in textile art, uh, which is pretty popular there as as well.
00:12:49.263 --> 00:12:56.053
So, uh, they would always be like, oh look she's, she's, she struggles.
00:12:56.053 --> 00:12:58.042
You know like you'll end up like her.
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And she did struggle, but I mean, she wasn't in a good marriage and, uh, she kind of had to, you know, make ends meet on her own and I felt like she did not have the support that she needed.
00:13:14.591 --> 00:13:20.125
Um yeah and it trickled down to the generations to to come.
00:13:20.125 --> 00:13:28.783
But I have to give it to her for doing what she had always loved to do, which was her art, and she oil painted.
00:13:28.783 --> 00:13:44.828
And I felt like she was always compared to my elder aunt and everybody was like, oh yeah, she does really good art and her paintings are really good, and I felt like she was always compared.
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And my eldest aunt is like a math genius.
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Um, she, she was always into statistics and all those number things.
00:13:54.072 --> 00:13:59.462
Um, and I didn't really like that, you know, being compared.
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Uh.
00:14:00.884 --> 00:14:05.889
So yeah, I kind of think about it and she's kind of.
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My inspiration, I would say, is that she stood her ground and basically died doing what she loved to do.
00:14:18.522 --> 00:14:20.167
Couldn't want for more than that, could we?
00:14:21.409 --> 00:14:21.792
I'm sorry.
00:14:22.279 --> 00:14:23.767
Couldn't want for more than that.
00:14:24.120 --> 00:14:26.607
Yeah, yeah absolutely.
00:14:26.628 --> 00:14:29.503
I mean the heart wants what the heart wants.
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So in my life I've seen so many people sell out and give up what they love to take a job that makes money, thinking that that was the right way to go, and most of them are miserable at the end of their life.
00:14:45.043 --> 00:14:49.529
Oh, yeah, absolutely, which I have a really great example.
00:14:50.892 --> 00:15:14.229
We have friends, or my parents have friends, who are doctors, you know, and stuff, and that's the one thing they complain about is that, oh, we never wanted to be a physician, like I wanted to, like be a software engineer, I wanted to write like a program, you know.
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Or one lady wanted to be a chef from one of my dad's friend, his wife but they were always pushed and you can see like they're just not happy.
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You know, it's kind of like a robot, like, oh, they wake up, go to work.
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It's just they're just not happy and yeah, they may be stable and and stuff, but it's like, are you really happy?
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And art makes me happy.
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So that's why I do it and it would be nice to be a full-time thing and I'm working towards that and being more confident in reaching that goal, because I want people to be inspired and not think that, oh, you have to be something that your family tells you to be.
00:16:07.533 --> 00:16:14.533
I feel like it's a little bit of manipulation to me sometimes and I don't want to do that to my kids.
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I think it's definitely manipulation.
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It is.
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It's the subtle way that we're bullied, we're trained.
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It's the subtle way that we're bullied, we're trained.
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So how is it that you are able to move past that and, instead of being forced to do what you have to do to earn a living or to earn the acceptance of your family, to go toward what you want to do?
00:16:44.833 --> 00:17:14.902
Right, that took a long time for me to gain that confidence and and, as I would say, a Brown person, my parents aren't very like religious, but I mean they do follow like the traditions, like not dating and stuff that was frowned upon and uh, so that there were certain things like we couldn't go spend the night at our friend's house, uh.
00:17:14.902 --> 00:17:23.050
So I just broke away from all that and that happened when I actually met my husband.
00:17:23.050 --> 00:17:33.021
Um, I was 30, I think I was 31 or 32 and I still lived with my parents.
00:17:33.021 --> 00:17:41.983
I'd moved back in with them and I they were always trying to like arrange my marriage and and and stuff.
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And I don't know if y'all know, but I was married before.
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I had an arranged marriage.
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My dad arranged my marriage and it was to an Indian guy who we thought was on a student visa, but he was actually on a visit visa.
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I found that out when we went for our interview.
00:18:01.420 --> 00:18:18.401
It's very grueling process and he had overstayed on his visa and as soon as he got his green card he left and yeah, and that was a very hard time for me.
00:18:18.401 --> 00:18:22.886
It took me years to get over that.
00:18:22.886 --> 00:18:28.635
I feel like I still don't have closure, but you kind of have to move on.
00:18:30.980 --> 00:18:43.262
So my parents, after that whole ordeal, were still trying to look, and I would always get when they would try to arrange these meetings with these men and their family.
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When they would try to arrange these meetings, like with these, you know, men and their family, like the minute they would find out I'm not a doctor or I'm not, like you know, in a prominent field, they would just ghost my parents and I thought to myself I'm like, I'm always going to be stuck here, I'm always going to be stuck at my parents' house doing what they tell me to do and I'm 30, like I'm 31.
00:19:16.789 --> 00:19:26.393
And, um, again the whole manipulation, like oh, you live in our house, you know, um, and I kind of just I know this sounds bad I went behind their back and started dating online and that's how I met my husband.
00:19:26.393 --> 00:19:28.207
I met my husband on online.
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I know a lot of people say a lot of stuff about online dating and, trust me, I've I had a hard time but thankfully I met my husband and he was totally okay how my parents were, because any other normal guy would be like I don't want to deal with this.
00:19:46.901 --> 00:19:49.626
This is like you're a grown person, you know.
00:19:49.626 --> 00:20:00.980
But he was okay with it and he planned a camping trip and my parents wouldn't let me go and I just thought I don't want to be stuck here.
00:20:01.181 --> 00:20:10.366
I cannot be stuck here doing in in everything like whether it's dating or art or whatever decision that I make.
00:20:10.366 --> 00:20:12.289
I can't do this I.
00:20:12.289 --> 00:20:37.224
It takes a lot of courage to just walk away from your parents and because you have the fear of, oh, you're going to, you know, get rejected or they'll just not like you, just these fears, or you're going to let them down, that's the biggest one.
00:20:37.224 --> 00:20:44.305
And so I got the courage to move out and I moved.
00:20:44.305 --> 00:21:14.512
I moved out and my parents were very hurt by that, and but I feel like that is the best decision that I made for myself to do my art and to think that this can be something that can be done full time if you have the right tools and the right strategy, the right planning to do so.
00:21:16.178 --> 00:21:25.949
I was like I cannot deal with people saying that, oh, you can't make anything off of it, and why do you always have to make everything off of something that you love?
00:21:25.949 --> 00:21:34.054
Just share what you're doing, share your creativity, and to me that stuff will come, you know, um.
00:21:34.054 --> 00:21:55.367
So just taking that step of moving out has really helped me in a lot of stuff, especially the art as as well, because it's given me the confidence that you don't always have to listen, you don't always have to have someone in your ear telling you that, oh, this isn't going to work out Like you have to.
00:21:55.367 --> 00:22:00.222
If you, if you fail, you have to fail and learn from that.
00:22:00.222 --> 00:22:03.588
Um, I hope I'm making sense here.
00:22:04.130 --> 00:22:05.772
Oh, it's perfect sense.
00:22:05.834 --> 00:22:06.454
Perfect sense.
00:22:06.454 --> 00:22:21.814
I just want to acknowledge that you took a bold and brave move and you know I want to champion you for making the decision to have agency in your own life.
00:22:21.814 --> 00:22:24.140
Yeah, absolutely.
00:22:24.140 --> 00:22:29.525
I got to ask have you fully acknowledged yourself for that?
00:22:29.525 --> 00:22:34.374
I mean in really really fully acknowledged yourself for that?
00:22:34.374 --> 00:22:35.160
That's huge.
00:22:35.980 --> 00:23:15.282
Um, I haven't, but I should, um, and I think the thing that holds me back is, uh, and maybe I want some assurance from, like, my husband, you know, because he's always talking about powerful women in his life, like his granny, who's like 102, and then his mom, but I don't get anything from him like, oh, like you, because it's a big deal in our culture for a female to move out and to marry someone who's a non-muslim.
00:23:15.282 --> 00:23:27.830
By the way, like my husband didn't convert, I didn't ask to convert, um, so I guess I'm wanting some words of affirmation from him to kind of seal that deal.
00:23:29.233 --> 00:23:45.468
uh, but I can, I give you a little clue sure you probably won't get that from him until you can give it to you ah, that's a good one.
00:23:46.189 --> 00:23:58.521
Yeah, that's true you mean you can't expect him to celebrate something about you that you haven't been willing to celebrate about you?
00:23:58.521 --> 00:24:09.820
You just talked about what a big deal it was in your culture to make that decision to move out to marry a non-Muslim.
00:24:09.820 --> 00:24:30.337
And it is huge to marry a non-Muslim and it is huge and you're in a tiny percentage of women that would have made the choice to be that courageous Right and you're not getting the acknowledgement because you haven't been willing to give you your own acknowledgement.
00:24:31.239 --> 00:24:35.327
Right, right, I mean, you just get this strength, like it's so hard to explain.
00:24:35.327 --> 00:25:07.675
I have friends who, like will ask me who are in, like I guess, the same type of you know boat, who have someone who they love, but like they're not from the same culture or like they're not from the same profession that their parents want them to be, they're not from the same profession that their parents want them to be, and I I feel like it's something that you can't just like tell someone, like they have to put a foot down, and it's just the strength that comes to you, you know, to walk, to walk away.
00:25:07.675 --> 00:25:13.086
It's just this unimaginable, undescribable like thing.
00:25:13.086 --> 00:25:38.202
But but yeah, like you, you do need to, like a person does need to go and, you know, kind of go in into their heart and be like, yeah, I did achieve something and acknowledge themselves, like you're saying, whether it's like life stuff or art stuff, like I totally agree with you on that.
00:25:44.769 --> 00:25:47.045
Well, basically what we're talking about here is you just owning the badass that you are.
00:25:48.313 --> 00:25:48.535
That's cool.
00:25:48.535 --> 00:26:01.851
I can tell the ways that you're reliving the hurt and you've.
00:26:01.851 --> 00:26:02.873
You've come out of it.
00:26:02.873 --> 00:26:11.388
So that's something that's happened in your past and it's something that uh it.
00:26:11.388 --> 00:26:21.040
It hurt at the time, but you need time for it to develop a bit of a scar so that you're strengthened by it.
00:26:21.040 --> 00:26:22.849
You're not forever wounded by it.
00:26:23.451 --> 00:26:23.732
Right.
00:26:23.732 --> 00:26:25.865
Right, Because you know what.
00:26:25.865 --> 00:26:45.592
I have a daughter, and I mean even though she's only four, but I want her to be strong and confident and I want her to, you know, be comfortable coming to me and not being told like, oh no, this is how it's done, you know.
00:26:45.592 --> 00:26:51.896
So I get that I'm doing this for my daughter too.
00:26:51.896 --> 00:27:06.824
Well, it's a pretty big piece of incentive I think yeah yeah, she's already very sassy, so I I think she'll be fine, but like, yeah, she, she, yeah you.
00:27:06.904 --> 00:27:09.432
You are probably her number one role model.
00:27:09.432 --> 00:27:14.666
I mean your your husband is but he, but you probably are with her more than he is perhaps.
00:27:15.127 --> 00:27:18.153
Yes, oh, it's always mommy, mommy.
00:27:18.535 --> 00:27:18.976
Right.
00:27:18.976 --> 00:27:36.219
So you're in the number one place role model and she is going to follow your lead and your cue, I mean, which is kind of incentive in and of itself to to really show her the her, the badass that you are, so she can follow in your footsteps.
00:27:36.219 --> 00:27:42.198
You know there's something important about owning who we are, and we do that on multiple levels.
00:27:42.198 --> 00:27:50.900
You can own that you're a badass for moving out from your parents and doing something that was totally unacceptable to your culture.
00:27:50.900 --> 00:27:54.011
You can own that you're an artist.
00:27:54.011 --> 00:28:03.548
I'm amazed at how many people we talk to that won't own that they're an artist, or own that they're a writer, or own that they're even creative.
00:28:03.607 --> 00:28:06.532
Right.
00:28:06.813 --> 00:28:11.586
And there's something really powerful about owning whatever it is, you know.
00:28:11.586 --> 00:28:19.471
I mean we could probably go down all kinds of rabbit holes and look at the things that you could own if you were willing to make that choice.
00:28:20.605 --> 00:28:50.590
Right, right, no, you're right, because, as I'm, you know, finding myself as an artist, finding things that I gravitate to and learning from it, it's like, yes, this is what I want to be, this is, even though it's starting out late, this is something that I want and have always wanted.
00:28:50.590 --> 00:28:55.997
I think for a lot of creatives, it's they.
00:28:55.997 --> 00:29:08.909
They get scared or I know, for, like the art that I do and the posting that I do, like on YouTube and stuff, I don't consider myself a YouTube artist.
00:29:08.909 --> 00:29:14.259
I think the main thing is to figure out what you want to do with your art.
00:29:14.259 --> 00:29:19.912
Like, are you like a content creator or an artist?
00:29:20.192 --> 00:29:40.037
And I think in the acrylic, poor, fluid art world, a lot of people they're just like okay, I'll post stuff and I'll get monetized and it'll just be a fast deal, but I want to stay true to the art and what I create.
00:29:40.037 --> 00:29:54.916
I just don't want something fast, and I'm not saying they're doing stuff fast, but it's like I want to be true to the stuff that I create and I want it to be original, Like I just don't want to.
00:29:55.785 --> 00:30:00.355
You know I'm inspired by people, but I also want to be inspired by myself.
00:30:00.355 --> 00:30:13.277
Um and Dwight and I have talked about this in the past that sometimes you have to be your own inspiration and be confident enough to to say, yes, I am that person.
00:30:13.277 --> 00:30:21.239
And even if you're an asshole, like say, I am an asshole, yes, I act like an asshole.
00:30:22.287 --> 00:30:23.853
I think you're completely right.
00:30:23.853 --> 00:30:30.577
I think that sometimes we have to own it in order to manifest it.
00:30:30.577 --> 00:30:35.121
You know, I started, probably a year ago.
00:30:35.121 --> 00:30:39.095
I started telling people that I am a community leader.
00:30:39.095 --> 00:30:43.775
Now, do I officially have a community that I lead?
00:30:43.775 --> 00:30:46.271
No, not yet.
00:30:47.744 --> 00:31:08.699
I mean, we're working on it, we have a following, we've got a bunch of creative people on our mailing list, we host events, we just launched this podcast recently and but do we have a like a community that quote, unquote, I or we lead?
00:31:08.699 --> 00:31:22.978
No, but I'm owning that, I'm a community leader and I think that it will come to pass, because owning is what manifests owning and believing and acting as if.
00:31:23.644 --> 00:31:24.628
Yeah, and we're.
00:31:24.628 --> 00:31:25.873
We're doing the grunt work too.
00:31:27.404 --> 00:31:42.914
Yeah, and and that goes to your point Like, if you have in your mind that this is what I want to be, I feel like the good vibes and the good energy comes that way as well and you're successful.
00:31:42.914 --> 00:31:46.394
And this goes back to like the art community.
00:31:46.394 --> 00:31:51.125
I mean, I wouldn't say like I'm not part of the community.
00:31:51.125 --> 00:32:06.059
I'm cordial with everyone, but, um, it's always like just fast, fast, fast, and they just want to be better than the other person.
00:32:06.059 --> 00:32:11.699
Um, and they're not true, not being true to their selves.
00:32:11.699 --> 00:32:20.275
So I would just recommend people to be true to themselves and yeah, and then create.
00:32:20.275 --> 00:32:27.894
That way you will achieve so much, even if you make mistakes, like you'll find yourself in that process.
00:32:27.974 --> 00:32:44.230
I feel like you know, a lot of what you're describing sounds rather toxic to me, and you know there was a time in my own process where I often felt like I didn't fit in, I don't fit in, I don't belong here, I don't belong here.
00:32:44.230 --> 00:33:02.076
And then there was this day when it all shifted and I realized that I had been seeing it completely wrong, that it wasn't that I didn't belong, it was that I chose not to belong because that group or that group or that group weren't my people.
00:33:02.076 --> 00:33:19.049
You're describing a group of artists that they're highly competitive, everything's fast and they're very quick to be judgmental of each other's work.
00:33:19.069 --> 00:33:25.606
That's not a community I would want to be part of right I totally agree with that and that is why I kind of just do my own thing.
00:33:25.606 --> 00:34:27.268
I post when I want to post, um, uh, and it's because it's about the art at the end of the day, it's about creating and creating something meaningful, because I I can just do whatever, you know, the trend is, but but I want to be original to myself and and that does weigh sometimes people who are starting out, it does weigh them down, uh, because it kind of becomes like a popularity contest or like you know who follows you more, who likes you more, and I think that's very detrimental to a, you know, to an artist, to to create, like the goal should always be, in my opinion, to create your art and share because you want people to see it, not more of a numbers game, you know, that's, that's the deal and amber.
00:34:27.467 --> 00:34:29.469
may I share a different perspective.
00:34:29.469 --> 00:34:37.617
Sure, You're talking about the art community and all the competition and the.
00:34:37.617 --> 00:34:42.282
You know all of that and how you find distasteful, so you pulled away and you're doing your own thing.
00:34:42.282 --> 00:34:54.298
I want to suggest that you be mindful of that not being about community or art.
00:34:54.298 --> 00:34:54.925
That's about those people.
00:34:56.327 --> 00:34:57.532
Right, I agree.
00:34:58.405 --> 00:35:05.614
You know you have to really zero in on what it is, and if you make it about community, then you're going to be isolated.
00:35:05.614 --> 00:35:19.092
But if you make it about those people and you disassociate yourself with them because they're just not your people and you look elsewhere for community and other artists, you will find them.
00:35:19.092 --> 00:35:23.458
You will find people that will celebrate every piece of work you do.
00:35:23.717 --> 00:35:43.284
You will find people that will be right there cheering you on, you will find people that will believe in you in those moments when you can't believe in yourself, right?
00:35:43.284 --> 00:35:43.965
Oh yeah, absolutely.
00:35:43.965 --> 00:35:45.909
I remember which this goes back to.
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