From Fearful to Thriving: Healing the starving artist syndrome part one

©2011 stephey baker All rights reserved | oil paint sticks, watercolor, ink | purchase signed & no. LTD print here

"They were wrong, her eyes didn’t borrow light from the stars. They came to her, each night, drinking from her inspired spirit until intoxicated with illumination, and she, happily kept their secret, for that's what made her eyes sparkle." ~ stephey from Dream Song series


"I'll never make enough to live on as a full-time artist."
"If I create art to live, I will end up hating art, the way I hate my job."
"People will laugh at me if I try to be an artist and ask when I’m going to get a real job."

Do you say these things to yourself? What do you need to free yourself from these lies?

Before, you answer that question, place your right hand over your heart. Hear it beating? Take three deep breaths. Now, ask your spirit what you need to embrace about yourself in order to feel:

• Confident about myself
• Fulfilled in my life
• Free to be who I am
• Trust my inner whispers
• Faith to provide for myself
• Release the need for others approval
• Courage to take action on my dreams

What do you need to release in order to be who you are?

Rather than claiming you don’t know or that you need to go off and find yourself – stop. Instead of believing that finding who you are is an additive practice, consider it a subtractive process.

What you feel you need, have to have, have to get, or must find, doesn’t exist outside of your self. You are all ready who you are.



Your spirit lies within - not with out.

You do not need to find yourself – this is a journey of emergence. It is a journey of seek and discover, not get and take.

Just as the caterpillar has within it wings, so do you. You all ready contain your true essence, authentic self, and spirit, there is nothing to find but there is much to discover.

You begin the journey towards authentic living by, releasing what you are not, so who you are emerges. Traveling this path provides the insight to the above questions and instills you with unshakable confidence.


The journey towards authentic living, towards thriving as an artist is a process, a home coming to your creative spirit.

To illustrate this process, imagine dirty windows. Picture a run down house with windows covered in years of dust, grim and dirt. The dirt complies a film over the windows, which act as a barrier to sunshine, blocking the light from getting into the house.

You don’t think, I need to get windows so the light comes in; you simply discover what windows need cleaning and do just that – clean. Viola! The light comes shining in! The act of cleaning dirty windows invites the light in just as the act of releasing what we are not allows our authentic spirit to shine.
When we are conscious of our spirits’ voice, listen and follow that voice – we begin to live authentically. Living authentically as an Artist yields a Thriving Creative Life. It is the secret ingredient to experiencing your dreams come true.