The Day You Decide

Becoming an artist doesn’t come with a ceremony or an external sign that you’ve arrived. It begins with a decision, often a quiet one, to take yourself and your work seriously and say, “I’m going to do this. I am an artist.” Nothing around you necessarily changes in that moment, but something does change within you. That decision gives the work a different weight, because what begins as an internal conviction now has to be supported by action. Believing in your vision is only the beginning; you have to return to the painting, show up when no one is watching, work through doubt and creative blocks, and continue even when the results are uncertain.

The path rarely moves in a straight line. It unfolds gradually through paintings, experiments, failures, discoveries, and the accumulation of years of practice. Some days bring a breakthrough; others feel like nothing is happening at all, but both are part of becoming. Sales, exhibitions, publications, and recognition are milestones, not definitions of whether you are an artist. You become one when you choose the life and commit yourself to the work, and you continue to define that identity every time you return to the canvas and keep going.