Creative Spirit Blog August 15, 2026 The Importance of Being Who We Are

Earth and Spirit Collage

"Be yourself; everyone else is already taken." — Oscar Wilde

Individuality is the total sum of our traits, choices, beliefs, and experiences.  This is what makes one person distinct from all others. Its' true meaning goes beyond superficial differences or rebellion; it is the authentic alignment between who we are on the inside and how we live, think, and act in the world.

Our individuality is the most valuable thing we have. Our focus as artists should be about what we feel, think, and how we see things, rather than just mastering a technique, being a perfect draftsman, or doing what we feel will sell. We need to make choices that fit our own heart.

When we embrace what makes us different, we share our true self with the world. This adds value to our art by bringing fresh ideas and varied feelings to our work. 

There are two components to a true artist’s work: our style and our technique.  And both should be as unique as our signature.  Whether we choose to express ourselves in a representational, abstract, or nonobjective way, it needs to reflect who we are.  We can appreciate all styles, but what we are best at doing as artists, needs to be unique to us. How we see things, filter them, and move them from our mind and soul, through our hands and into a work of art, should reflect who we are. If they do not, we are not standing in our power. 

This is not an easy thing to do when we are starting out. Sometimes it takes years to accomplish. Frequently we learn by coping, sometimes we are so unsure of ourselves we don’t trust the decisions we make and need someone to tell us what to do. So, to not be dependent on these things we need to “play around". Play is important!

When we are starting out or want to go in a new direction we need to experiment with various mediums, styles, and techniques. Find materials we enjoy working with, then try various techniques using them.  We start to move from copying to analytical study, building a foundation of things we enjoy.  But, most importantly we must have something we love that we want to make our art about.

As we develop our self-confidence and start to unlock our own creative ideas, we feel much happier with who you are. We take ownership of all that we do. 

We learn to find our ideas in daily life and our surroundings.  We use our imagination, skill, and tools to shape new works in our visual art, and this holds true of all the arts; writing, music, or performance. When we are on this path it blends our inner ideas with skills we have learned, so we can share our unique voice with the world.

It is all about taking what is inside us, our thoughts, our emotions, our experiences, and shaping them into something tangible and real that others can see, hear, or experience.  We share our unique vision, our individuality.

“Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom”.                                                                          Albert Einstein