19/06/2026
If I was starting my healing journey through art from scratch, I wouldn’t waste so much time believing I needed to be creative, talented or “good enough” before I began. The truth is, I didn’t pick up a paintbrush because I wanted to become an artist. I picked it up because grief, trauma, anxiety and years of carrying everyone else’s s**t had become too heavy. I was standing at a crossroads in my life, desperate for something that could help me process what I was feeling without numbing myself or falling back into old ways of coping.
What I know now is that healing doesn’t ask for perfection. It doesn’t care whether your dots are straight, whether your colours match, or whether anyone else thinks what you’ve created is beautiful. Art became the place where I could put everything I didn’t have words for. The grief of losing my brothers. The heartbreak, trauma & stories I’d carried for years. Every dot, every brushstroke, every painting became a conversation with the parts of myself that had been waiting to be seen, heard & acknowledged.
If I could tell that younger version of me one thing, it would be this: stop waiting. Stop waiting until you’re confident. Stop waiting until you’re healed enough, talented enough or ready enough. Healing happens in the doing. It happens in the messy middle. It happens when you choose yourself one small step at a time because sometimes the thing that changes your life isn’t a grand plan or a breakthrough moment. Sometimes it’s simply having the courage to place one dot down and just being willing to begin.
