Hey Reader
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So I did a thing recently. I signed up for an art class at my local community college.
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I walked in with a whole vision in my head 🌌🧙‍♂️💜🔮 Swirling galaxies. Glowing purples. Something vaguely wizardy that looked like it had been painted by moonlight at 3am. You know, magical-looking stuff.
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The teacher had other plans.
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Within about four minutes I realised he was a Process Man. Techniques first. Fundamentals first. You earn the right to paint galaxies, apparently, and the way you earn it is by painting…
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​A carrot.​
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He had me draw and then paint a realistic carrot. For the entire hour.
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Now, I have nothing against carrots. Great in a soup. Excellent source of vitamin A. But somewhere around minute forty, while I was carefully (angrily) shading its little orange ridges, a voice inside me piped up.
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​Respectfully, Sir. Do you *not* know I am a magical, cosmic, alien wizard?​
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So I did what any emotionally mature adult would do. I thanked him, packed up my brushes, and politely never went back.
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Then I went home and painted the thing I'd actually come there to paint 👇
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Honestly? It's one of my favourite things I've made in ages. I'm going to do a whole mixed media thing with it.
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👉 But here's what I keep coming back to since The Carrot Incident.​
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That teacher isn't wrong. For plenty of people, learning the techniques first is exactly what lights them up. Someone else's structure makes them feel safe and capable, and the carrot is a lovely little stepping stone. I hope they paint a thousand carrots and adore every one.
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I'm simply not wired that way. I learn by diving into the deep end, getting paint absolutely everywhere, and picking up the technique along the way because I'm excited enough to want it.
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And that's kind of the whole point.
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​You came here with your own soul blueprint, too. Your own chart, your own design, your own particular way of taking in the world and making something from it.
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So of course the "proper" order of things, the one everyone else seems to follow, might feel like wearing someone else's shoes. They fit somebody. Maybe just not you.
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We get handed so many of these pre-packaged processes. The seven-step launch plan. The morning routine that promises to fix your whole life. The one correct way to meditate, heal, start a business, or learn to paint. And a lot of us quietly assume that if a process feels wrong, the problem must be us.
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What if it isn't?
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​What if that resistance is a soul nudge, gently tapping you on the shoulder and saying, "Yoooo! This one's not ours"?​
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So consider this your permission slip...
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​You get to skip the carrot. You get to start in the middle, leave the room, and go make the purple sparkly thing you actually came for.
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I'm curious: where in your life are you currently painting a carrot?
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Hit reply and tell me.
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With love and zero painted carrots,
Claire xx

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