Hi, I'm George cow and I'm here today with creativity coach Cheryl tapes She is one of my clients. I'm grateful to be able to work with her and she we're gonna have a conversation today about Creativity the process of creativity How that relates to entrepreneurship? I think you're gonna enjoy this conversation and hi Cheryl. Great to have you here Hi, George. Thanks for having me. It's a it's a real honor to be able to talk to you and and to your Audience, yeah, yeah experience what it's like to be seen Yes, yes, yeah, we'll definitely talk about how that because I know a lot of those watching can you know are starting out with their content and Getting this experience of what it's like to share Authentically vulnerably being themselves. So but before we go on I want to make sure people have a sense of your background So let me just read your bio out and sure and then we can start the conversation here So Cheryl tapes is a visual artist and creativity coach Who's passionate about helping artists to strengthen their create their creative resiliency? so that they can deepen their connection to their work and produce the most authentic and Personal art and I'm gonna be sure to link The page for your both your creativity coaching, but also your your art if that's okay Wonderful for people to see your art because you're actually in the work So finishing your bio here Cheryl's coaching focuses on the creative process and how to navigate the challenges and manage the Emotional labor that often accompanies the making of art Through her business insight creative She offers one-to-one coaching as well as a 12 week online group coaching program. I'm excited about that It's called the artist's mindset and it's going to be available actually in the next month or two So really cool. I will make sure that there's Links to your website and Facebook pages. You can get a free copy those watching if you go to Her website and sign up for her email newsletter You'll get a free copy of the PDF of how to make a creativity journal. So Cheryl great to have you here. Thank you George Let's let's have this let's start talking about this here sir this Feeling of when we well, you know as I talk to the audience a lot about is the importance of authentic content And of course one of the most important or one of the most authentic ways of creating content is being on video especially on Video that isn't edited just like this one never on so Tell tell me about how you tell us about how you feel about that and you are just getting into the video part of things Yes, I love for you to share and then come come to it from a from a creativity coach point of view as well Absolutely. Thank you. Well, I think one of the biggest Noticings that I have right now For myself is I'm I'm uncomfortable, you know, this isn't natural for me And I know you and I've talked a lot about this because you've had a lot of experience Can you expressed how you were uncomfortable in the beginning, you know hearing yourself seeing yourself and also just being seen You know being out there in the in the world and in social media and having that exposure So it's it goes against a lot of my natural instincts, which you know from a very early age I was a shy child quite introverted most of my life I've been able to kind of be a behind-the-scenes supporter type person and as an introvert I love one-to-one relationships So in a way, this is really cool because I feel like I'm just talking to you Right, so that's what I do in my mind. I go. I'm just talking to George. I talked to George all the time This is what I'm doing so One of the things that I do with my clients as we talk about Mindset is to recognize, you know be that observer of what's happening the internal dialogue that's going on and when the discomfort arises you know to really just Allow that to be to not force it away or reject it or judge it or condemn it But to recognize it's just a natural occurrence, you know as we're traveling into that Unknown place into the things that we haven't experienced before Which is very much like making art and the creative process I want to talk a little bit more about that connection down the road here, but so in this moment. I'm just having to really Notice the thoughts that are coming and then reframe them Recontextualize them for myself and even just speaking about it like I'm doing with you right now helps me to be honest and authentic and say You know, I'm a little uncomfortable. I'm uncomfortable having you know being on camera But if I can diffuse that and and have a different kind of energy meet it with a different kind of energy more gentleness authenticity then it becomes More manageable for me and then I can actually step more fully into my potential instead of You know holding myself back from what I can do And it's been a limiting, you know, it's been something that's limited me for a long time in my life I'll be honest and so in the last five years As I've been working as a creativity coach I've been really growing more fully into that and recognizing it started very early on with my art making I Was having a lot of challenges with my inner critic I was feeling a lot of Creative blocks I wasn't able to really, you know Show up authentically in my work as I was really thinking all the time about what how it was going to be perceived What whether I was going to get into the next show with this piece whether the teacher I was showing the work to you know when I was in school was going to like it It was so much about the external and so disconnected from the internal and that's where creativity comes from is from our Internal connection, you know to our self and to source and so I really had to get An awareness around that and get a handle on that and that's where this whole journey began for me was through my own process of trying to Understand what was going on and I read about this a little bit in some blog posts But I had these really you know these two conflicting places within myself like I really wanted to create this art It was like I dreamed of it my whole life like this is this is my passion And yet I was so Stuck and challenged and you know, how could those two things coexist and that was really the big question That I was trying to unpack and understand what was going on for me You know that I would be want this on one hand so passionately and on the other hand I was so terrified Yeah, yeah and and you were able to work through that I mean you've got yeah Extraordinary art so talk about that. What's the what's yeah, well, I think the for me It was a journey inwards it was like really about Connecting to myself a lot through journal writing and creating a sketchbook creativity journal Which is one of the offerings that I have for my clients Because it was deepening the relationship to myself to really understanding Who I was what my fears were And then questioning those fears, you know, is that is that a real fear? Is that some narrative and some story that somehow developed? You know in my life through some experience or some message that I may have received and was it really true and It it's it was so so questioning was the big part of it questioning and exploring and and recognizing that Curiosity was really important. I had to be very curious and I had to always be willing to Explore that curiosity even further so in art making that's that's a really essential piece In order for us to kind of grow in our work and to have Freshness and aliveness in our work and even emotional content in our work We have to be willing to step off that ledge into something that we have no idea We have to be willing to risk greatly and sacrifice everything in our work For the betterment of the whole work and so much of the time I found myself invested in results outcome The need for I need that you know that piece back for what I was putting in I don't know if that makes sense what I'm saying, but Yeah, so so there was a lot of that, you know Coming to understand and recognize what was going on and then you know to be honest I needed a push I needed some help So I ended up, you know, I was working with an artist many of you probably know Nicholas Wilton who was a mentor for me and Through my connection with him. He really reflected back to me how much I wasn't willing to be seen And at the time I remember I had a Pinterest page Where I was collecting work that inspired me a lot of us use Pinterest for that And I wasn't even using it to show my own work or under my own name Because I didn't even want people to know what I was interested in that's how deep it went, you know the sort of Feeling of just not wanting people to have any idea of who I was and so he asked me about that He was really curious about that, you know and and really brought that into my awareness And so it was a really powerful understanding and I guess the you know one of the things that That also arose was that I really had a desire to serve others I had some counseling experience.  I had the benefits of counseling it really actually Transformed my life. And so I wanted to give that back to others I really had a passion for helping other people So I trained as a counselor and I volunteered 13 hours or sorry 300 hours at a center Where I live and spent a lot of time working in that area and I thought it was an avenue that I would You know go in but then there was the arts. So these two things were both calling me But what I recognized is that the coaching, you know became a wonderful marriage of those two interests and That I could be of service and that everything that I do can be of service to others And it took it away from it being about me It took it away from my self-consciousness and that feeling of well This is about me look at what I've done look at my marketing look at my art look at me And it was more about you know, I want to have my art play a service role in the world I want others to feel An experience with it and to have it bring quality to their life. You know, it was a whole reframe a Whole different way of thinking that helped me to kind of step out of that. You know feeling if it's all about me Yeah, and and so working with Nick you eventually became one of the coaches there, right? like you started helping other artists with their creativity process and You became known in that community as Someone who can help people get unstuck in in those ways and then and then now you're you're seeing that it's time for you To bring that work out to to a larger audience. So yeah, and this is a fairly recent Transition and I think you know that life kind of goes like that we sort of transition and layers and when we're ready and But yeah, Nick Started an online program teaching his wonderful program the creative visionary program and he needed some support some some of his mentorship students to come in and help because it was a lot of he was very successful with his first launch so he had a lot of sign-ups and He's been done doing workshops for years. So he's really well recognized So we a few of us jumped on board to help teach the material and we quickly recognized that there was a huge need for Coaching, you know, there wasn't just about the techniques of learning art that was really important But there was a huge emotional content piece for people that was coming up right away It was really clear and Nick teaches about this as well, but it came up very early in the process It was a really important piece to start working with was people's fears limiting beliefs The the the limits they put on their desires for themselves All the challenges that they faced as they were, you know Wanting so much to bring the best quality of their art and find their authentic voice You know find that connection to themselves and really make their art their own Well, they would say well, who am I you know who I don't even know who I am or I don't know that I can or you know, they'd have all these reasons why it wouldn't work So our job was to really be there and help them to understand about limiting beliefs and about, you know, the way that we can work with those and shift those and Just to spend some time kind of unpacking the creative process You know what comes up as you start to create and one of the things I realized quite quickly In that work is that fear and resistance is a big part of the creative process self-doubt is a big part and for some of us It's more intense than others, you know, so my Coaching really focuses on that particular aspect of the mindset And so if you're a person that experiences that kind of thing and that was me that is me You know, I'm still working with it that ends up, you know Having a fear-based mindset kind of get in the way of what it is that you're wanting to create for yourself Well, that's something that can be changed, you know, that's something you can work with and it doesn't have to be a limitation And that was a really powerful understanding for a lot of people and normalizing it and contextualizing it and recognizing That it is part of the process and to expect that it might not be there ever is Something that is actually even scarier because then it's like you're you're having I don't know if this makes sense, but you're having just You're having to make a Decision that maybe fear will never be there for you and if that if that's not true then what what does that say about you? Right and so that's that was another piece for me in the sense that I had to Acknowledge that fear and resistance and self doubt were there But I didn't have to give it meaning didn't have to mean that I wasn't good enough or that I had More challenges than others or you know that I was going to fail at everything. I did it I just had to shift the way I engaged with it And recognize that it's a normal part of the process and when it arrives I recognize it really quickly. I bring my mindfulness to it and then I let it just drift away You know, I just let it move away and it will get activated at different times It's getting quite activated right now as I'm beginning to build this business and start working on content So I'm going through this whole same process with this business as I went through as I go through with my art So it's really been fascinating for me to kind of see that. Yeah I would love for you to talk about the the program the artist mindset your online 12 week program that you worry people step through the process of Well meeting with the fear and resistance what to do about that and then coming through to the other side with their creativity So tell us about the program Well, thank you for the opportunity to talk about it. Um, it's a 12 week program that I Um Based it on my work with my individual clients So I have been working as a creativity coach just alongside with Nick's programs I was doing my own coaching one-on-one but not didn't have a lot of space for clients But I developed a 12 week program that I would work with them taking them through a process of self-discovery and Understanding so I had a series of exercises. I would give them each week that were developed to sort of provoke What needs to come up? And so they could experience in a safe environment You know with someone that is there to guide in a system What comes forward in that process? So they're not alone isolated in their studio. They're there, you know So the online program is just a way for me to do the same thing But with a larger audience but also to build community so that they can Experience the fact that there is other people other artists other creatives that are going through the same challenges And they can self support and offer You know their own insights and wisdom to each other because I learned so much from the people that I coach because everybody has their own unique Way of engaging with their creative process, right? We all have a creative cycle We have different areas where we get stuck certain things will trigger me But they don't trigger another creative for artists. So that shared learning enriches it I think so much more than even just the one-on-one work that I do But I plan to be you know very involved in the 12 week program and you know Doing some live calls and some live coaching so that people can get the benefit of The key kind of questions that we can ask that are going to help you Really access the deeper truths, you know that are underneath And then just to go through the motions of trying, you know stepping out of your comfort zone Proving to yourself that you can you know and that it's going to be okay and learning about you know How to let go of attachment how to recognize when you're getting too invested too soon You know, there's a lot of things as artists that we have to be aware of So that we can make our best work and so that we can really take Risks and discover and play and create and bring that really alive energy into our art making which is what we want to do Yeah, I love that. I love that you're creating community around this because I can imagine Artists usually often as you know painters like yourself. I mean you're working in your own studio by yourself and it's um, it's hard to Yeah, it's It's like those fears and those that inner voices. You think that's it. That's that's that's the truth, right? It's inside your head But then if you get in community with others who are also creating art and meeting their their resistance and you know Come in coming through the other side. It's really powerful to see to see that other people are doing it and so can you Absolutely. Yeah to share your success, etc. So I love this idea. I hope people will check it out if you're an artist or Creative you're doing some kind of creative project Check out Cheryl's program The artist's mindset. I'll put a link in notes of the video. I know it's the It's just going to be launched actually as of this recording. It's still in process of being launched So people put your website they join your email newsletter. They get your pdf the creative How to create your creativity journal and then they'll get access to to the program when it's ready That's right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah Great and anything else you want to say before we Close the call. Well, I just wanted to say that you know Just to speak to you george because one of the reasons And this is another big piece of this is that I you know the idea of marketing myself putting myself out there Being on camera And I hope I've done an okay job today because I'm already like I can hear the self-doubt voices going off in my head So, you know paying attention to that, but it's it was really, you know, finding you Online on facebook and hearing you speak About authentic marketing really resonated with me and I really needed to find a way to do this that felt Aligned with my values and and my belief system. And so that was really a gift You know like to come across you because there's a lot of information out there And I've certainly been exposed to a lot of it and part of that was I wasn't feeling it wasn't feeling like a yes for me It was feeling like oh god do I have that how I have to do it, you know so You know your approach was so inspiring and it really has been great to work with you to get To get clear on about that content delivery piece being again about service, you know to others And just to be able to share that and feel that it's coming from that heart-centered place You know that's been really powerful for me and has really helped me to move along And and and to do what's uncomfortable because I have that way So thank you for that and and you know working with you is And listening to all of the the information that you provide all the content that you provide Free, you know available to us online. It's been so helpful. I'm sure for so many people So I just wanted to thank you for that and acknowledge, you know, what a great help it's been for me Moving myself along To appreciate that. Appreciate that. Well, I hope that this Interview of this video is encouraging to everyone who is watching this A lot of creatives out there watching this. So thank you uh, Cheryl for your work and for those who are watching if you you know Felt connected to uh to what Cheryl was saying reach out to her check out her website She has some wonderful writings on facebook actually for insight creative, which again the link will be in That talks about this process of creativity and the artist mindset. So Thank you, Cheryl for your work. Thank you, George more to come. I'm just getting started So lots more and lots more to come for these people that might be interested So thank you for the support and for giving me this opportunity to share really appreciate it Thank you. You're welcome