Learning to Listen to Your Gut

Certainty. Does this even exist outside of science? I’m not sure. The last four years have been an exercise in living through constant change and uncertainty even before COVID-19 hit.

Four years ago, my husband and I left Los Angeles. We had made a plan in 2013 to get married and move out of the city. We got married a month later, but the move took us another three years, as moves do.

We used this time to remodel our house in preparation to sell it. We made some beautiful changes to our beloved home and thought it would really improve the sales price. During the re-model process we got an unexpected opportunity to move to Santa Barbara!

This was an offer that was completely out of the blue and would definitely change our plans. We saw it as a way to possibly move us down our desired path to opening a gallery quite a bit sooner. It also meant that we wouldn’t need to sell our home just yet. We weighed the options and decided to do it. (Although if we’re honest, both my husband and I felt a bit nervous about the decision to dramatically change course.)

Our house in Los Angeles post remodel.

We created a solid plan to rent out our house and embark on a new journey in Santa Barbara. I spent the summer in SB while my husband was finishing up work. I moved into my new studio space, which was smaller than my home studio in LA. I gave it a fresh coat of paint and hyper organized my space to allow for expansion in my creative work.

In the first half of the year I was working through a business program with Tiffany Han and Michelle Ward. I rebranded my creative business under my name and started painting regularly. I was finally on a path to sell my art and I was so determined and excited.

 My husband finished work and joined me at the end of September. We were organizing a huge six week-long gallery pop-up in downtown Santa Barbara for the holidays. We got to work and a couple weeks later our path that seemed so clear hit a massive roadblock.

We got some big news that changed everything and our plans to stay in Santa Barbara were upended. Knowing that we would be moving again after the first of the year became this unexpected weight on our shoulders. We had renters in our home and didn’t want to go back to Los Angeles anyway.

We had to sit with ourselves and really think about how we ended up in this spot and what we were going to do next. After some really tough conversations we decided to take a leap. We bought a truck and a trailer and hit the road full time.

My studio space suddenly got condensed into about 12 square feet. Life felt both exciting and incredibly frustrating at the same time. Our path started winding every which way over the next couple years. One day we’d be hiking an incredible trail in the middle of the desert and the next I was battling the 110 degree heat in a Los Angeles RV park while James picked up editing work.

We were “living the dream” in many people’s eyes but it was a life that required constant recalibration. I struggled to find structure and purpose with life on the road. Spotty internet made it difficult to run a business and I found myself longing for a home base.

We lived out our four different residences (including the RV) for three years. Moving in and out every couple of months, staying with family and friends, it wasn’t conducive to building a stable studio practice.

It felt like I was letting myself down. I hadn’t listened to my gut and it felt like I wasn’t in control of my own life. It’s not a good feeling to have.

While all this was going on, I had been wanting to sell our house in Los Angeles so we could settle into a new community and focus on our businesses. We had been lucky with fairly respectful renters until the summer of 2018. Enter the nightmare renters that did about $20,000 of damage to our home in 1 month! (This is a whole other story for another time.) That was the last straw. We were done… it was time to sell. If only I’d listened to my gut sooner!

All the choices we had made felt reactive rather than sticking to the original plan we’d had for our life. Life through us a giant curveball and we scrambled to get our feet underneath us. My art practice was suffering through all of it.

I made a choice when we settled in Oregon last year to prioritize my art career. Yes, we opened a gallery which took up a lot of my time. Yes, I took on outside work to help pay the bills. Yes, the pandemic has taken over all our lives and changed them. Yes, our gallery is struggling, and we don’t know what the future holds… but I’m still here prioritizing my art career.

I’m showing up, creating work and making things happen for myself in big ways.

I’m telling you this story because I think it’s important for you to know that even if life throws you curve balls or you make choices along the way that cause you to stray from your path, you can always come back to it. It’s always there waiting for you. You can find a way if I did.

P.S. Those curveballs took us to some gorgeous parts of the U.S. and I’m so glad to have spent that time with my husband and our dog. There are moments in there that I wouldn’t trade for anything.