About the Artist

My path to manifesting as an artist in adulthood has been a winding one, but more of a returning home than anything. I’ve been an artist since childhood, doodling, collaging, painting, and creating in all my spare moments. I was lucky enough to have that fire stoked in me by elders with gifts of art supplies, and encouragement to play pretend with cardboard boxes and paper scraps. But as I came of age and the realities of financial responsibility in a capitalist society set in, I got clear messaging that “being a starving artist” wasn’t a realistic way to keep food on the table or a roof over my head.

In college I hung onto my artist dreams by starting a minor in art while completing an undergraduate degree in psychology. But the hustle culture in the art department of sleeping on the couch in the studio, grinding at all hours, dissuaded me from completing the minor. For me, art was a joyful and contemplative practice, which shouldn’t be tainted by workaholism.

At the beginning of my Master’s degree, I took a few months off work in the Summer to focus on creating art. I met quickly with the reality that I didn’t have the bandwidth to attend school full time while also creating, let alone support myself with art-- there was just no viable way to make ends meet. I went on to complete a master’s in Mental Health Counseling, and eventually got my license in Florida as a therapist. Several years working in a non-profit women’s intensive outpatient program for folks struggling with substance abuse and mental health was both rewarding, eye-opening, and also a path to burnout.

After leaving the non-profit, and 3 months of soul-searching and re-orienting, I opened up a therapy private practice that centered on the needs of the LGBTQIA+ community, non-traditional relationships, folks in kink/BDSM communities, and other underserved communities (www.innertrekllc.com). This was my labor of love for the next 8 years until the end of 2023.

During that time, my path crossed with a lay Buddhist teacher, Fred Eppsteiner, who was ordained in the Plum Village tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh. The encounter with the teacher and the Sangha (spiritual community) lit a flame in me-- I had found my spiritual path. I worked closely with him and a small cohort for three years of intensive Dharma transmission, and went on to take the 5 Mindfulness Trainings and the Bodhisattva Vows-- two transmissions that connect me with a lineage of Buddhas past, present, and future. The transmission of the Dharma changed me to the core, and solidified my aspiration to use my life energy to be of benefit, beginning with finding solidity and joy within myself, and then sharing that with others.

During the pandemic, my private practice in therapy shifted to a telehealth practice- both a blessing and a curse. It enabled me to move out of Florida (with its rapidly declining political climate for queer and other marginalized folks) to a safer Colorado, but also put a screen between myself and the people I worked with. Years of working primarily through a screen took a toll, bringing a sense of alienation from body, others, and the natural world.

After relocating to Colorado, at the end of 2021, I knew I needed to root myself in community to stabilize and thrive. I started the most recent iteration of Wake Up Denver, a meditation group for folks in their 20’s and 30’s in the Plum Village Tradition, with the help of the Eyes of Compassion Sangha and many others, which has been meeting 2 times a month since March 2022.

Listening deeply to myself in spiritual community, I heard again the calling of the young artist in me. They wanted space to breathe, and space to explore and reconnect with body, community, and Earth. With the support of my Sangha and friends emboldening me, I closed my private practice in December 2023, and leapt into the life of a full-time artist. Living on savings in a bus behind two dear friends’ house, with an incubating studio carved from a laundry room in their basement, 2024 has been both transformative and humbling. It has been a deep practice in faith, radical self-compassion, and reverence for the calling that has been tugging at me since I was young. 

In May of 2023 I joined the Denver Art Society, a co-op for artists of all mediums and experience levels. This group provided a soft and encouraging space for my exploration of identity as an artist. Over time, what emerged was a deep fascination of and love for all things fibrous- weaving, slow-stitching, sewing, collaging, crafting, sculpting. Fiber arts became a spiritual door, opening my eyes to the interconnectedness and relational nature of fibers to place, people, animals and plants, and the health/unhealth of Mother Earth. It also was a very personal path to slowing down and healing.

Although I am a nascent artist in terms of career, having one standing exhibit at my co-op for a little over a year, a few local markets, and several community art events under my belt, I have bold ambitions and dreams that this path can spark a revolution of reverence for each other, ourselves, and the Earth. I believe that creating spaces for artistic expression and learning in community can rekindle the lost (for many) sacred connection to self, community, place, and our child-like and wild imaginations—which we will sorely need if we are to find ways to turn our society’s momentum away from destroying the planet. I have already begun to see the edges art’s power by witnessing the transformative energy it has had in the container of my own communities, and hope to only grow this practice as the next years and/or lifetimes unfold.