I am mesmerized by the old me. I am often tempted to think she was better. I worry that “Today's Me” is lesser than "Old Me." I try to understand myself in the “Right Now,” but I lack perspective. It’s easier to see your former self with wide open eyes. Painting is my process for sorting myself out. I am on a journey, and it’s not always easy to understand who I am, where I have been, or where I am going. Painting on a canvas helps me understand myself and my journey with more clarity.

I paint the “old me.” I paint things from the past. I draw a bee because, for me, it’s a theme for many things: fear, finality, mortality, and God’s presence in the most unexpected places. I almost died from a bee sting. This was recent. My throat swelled, and my lungs tightened as I rode the ambulance. I didn’t see a vision or have a spiritual experience as my heart raced and my breathing labored. I just sensed that this life changing event was actually very simple. It’s not time yet. God has more for me to do. Today is not my day to be done. Maybe "Today’s Me” is more than I give her credit for. My creative process helps me reach this understanding. My journey would be less rich without my canvas, my paints, and my paintbrush.

How do you use creativity to better understand your journey? Art has the power to reveal so much about who you are, where you have been, and what might be next for you. What can you create that can open your eyes and let you see a little bit more about God’s plans and purposes for you? Explore your journey on a canvas, inside a coloring book, with yarn and a knitting needle, or while you create a family scrapbook. Let the process help you understand your journey. Tell your spiritual autobiography, or spiritual memoir, through the lens of an art maker. Share your journey here, or elsewhere. Let your creative process give your journey a voice, and then let it speak.