A Miracle in Tubes of Paint

The universe is funny at times, the one art medium I would never try is the medium I painted my first official painting in, and this was oil paint. I remember telling someone that I was wary of oil painting, because I heard it was difficult to work with and toxic. I remember telling her that oil painting was only for the professionals and was too advanced for me. I don’t remember where I got these ideas from, but it couldn't be further from the truth when you use the right supplies and have the willingness to learn and be mentored by others who know more than you. In fact, with the right supplies, oil painting is less toxic than watercolor, which has the reputation of being the most non toxic painting medium.  

I was never visually artistic growing up. In fact, I could barely draw stick figures. I was terrible! No one was lining up at my table in art class looking in awe of my creations. The only time I ever had remote success was when I was five years old, I picked up a paint brush, and painted my first painting, which would be my last until I turned 30 years old. My mom still has the painting framed in her bedroom to this day. It was very abstract but not half bad for a 5 year old. I was however, very artistic in music and the performing arts up until middle school. After middle school, I dropped all things artistic because I was led to believe there was no future in them. I was led down the path of being realistic and being practical in my career approach at the mercy of the education system. I was taught in school that university was the only answer. My parents did encourage me to continue with music, but instead I spent my high school years working my butt off for A’s, earning scholarships to Gonzaga University and Whitworth, pretty prestigious schools in my area.

I never did attend school, at least not until I was 26 years old, which at the time I earned my Associates in Business. I hated accounting, in fact I strongly disliked all of the business courses. I felt like I was being raked over the coals, but I did it anyway, ignoring the small voice that I was on the wrong path. I never did feel settled, it never felt right. I put myself in respectable jobs, such as working at a bank and a credit union, but this was terrible too. I was a bird trying to race a cheetah on foot, nothing ever worked. Everything I tried was a failure. I partially blame the system in which I grew up in, but I’m only just now at the age of 30 realizing my place, and it's not tripping over rocks in a field racing a cheetah, but flying in the vast skies of art and the art community.  

When I stumbled upon Milan Art, I was scrolling my Instagram feed feeling a little down about my jewelry shop on Etsy. I was feeling discouraged, because the only sales I made were from my family, and the Etsy world is filled with many other jewelry brands and creations that overshadow mine. I remember stopping my scroll, as I watched this girl who looked like me, painting beautiful colors on a canvas and creating magic through her paint brush. I had always wanted to try painting and graphic design, in fact I even bought technology powerful enough to run all of the Adobe software 2 years earlier, but the idea of me having the ability to paint on real canvas felt like a fairytale dream, and an unrealistic expectation of myself. I believed that being good at the visual arts was an innate trait, and people were just born with it. I watched as my cousin painted and drew the most beautiful and exquisite paintings growing up. I felt like I would never be able to do that myself. I clicked on the link, and watched my first Masterclass called “How to Create an Abstract Floral Painting”, which cost me $25. 

This Masterclass through Milan Art helped me with my first mixed media painting that spoke so much to an art collector she contacted me encouraging me to keep going. She saw the emotion in my paint strokes, and knew exactly what I was feeling and the story behind the piece, even before I realized it myself. 

I was now hooked on painting, and I wanted to keep going.

I was deciding between continuing on in acrylics or trying oils, or if I even could continue on at all since I was struggling financially. Oil painting felt overwhelming to me, acrylics seemed easier and I had already been somewhat successful with them. I was debating in my head and I even recorded my thoughtful debate to myself on my phone as I was driving to get gas one day. This particular day I was having a very rough mental health day, and I was struggling a lot. I eventually had a panic attack in my car at the gas station, and bawled my eyes out for 20 minutes, feeling hopeless and at a loss at where my life was at. People walked by me and stared, what I thought were judgements going through their minds, making things worse. This past year alone, I had just gone through a break up with a man I moved across the country for, was fired from my part time job that I had successfully landed after the break up because I had a panic attack at work, I was broke being called constantly by debt collectors, I also had just been diagnosed with PTSD from past trauma as a veteran, and I was recovering from a concussion and a week long hospital visit that forced me out of university. I had been trying to go back to school for my bachelors degree (again). I was feeling the pressure on all sides, mentally, emotionally, physically, and financially. I decided at that moment at the gas station to drive myself to my local art thrift store. I felt this weird pull to go there. 

As I walked through the art thrift stores doors, I had tears streaming down my face with makeup all over. The gal smiled at me as I made my way to the bathroom where I cleaned myself up. I then made my way over to the paint section. I had been to this store before and the girl recognized me as we had a good conversation a couple weeks beforehand. This was where I had grabbed my acrylics for my mixed media painting I did. As I was rummaging through the acrylic section, the girl who had smiled at me approached me and asked if I would like to take a look at all of the oil paints that they had just received. She said someone had passed away, and they were given an extremely large donation of professional grade oil paints. 

I told her I would love to look at them. As she brought out the big box of oil paints, I told her that I was in the middle of deciding between doing acrylics or oils and I thought it was rather funny that they just so happen to have a huge donation of oil paints on the same day that I was deciding. She looked at me and grinned, “Well, I guess this is your sign.”

I decided to pull up one of the courses from Milan Art and see what kind of paints I would need to finish one of the courses for an oil painting session. As I looked through the paints that were donated, I would come to find that every single paint I needed was donated and then some. Each paint was only five dollars each, and I would find that some of the paints normally went from $12-$30 each. I decided that oil painting was the way for me to go at this moment, unaware that both acrylic and oil can be used together. Ecstatically, I bought all of the paints I needed for the Milan Art course and a few extras. I felt like a miracle had just happened, and in my moment of my deepest desperation and feelings of hopelessness, I found hope again. This time it was with simple tubes of paint that I would then use to create more art, freeing my mind and heart from the traumas of the past.

Overly excited by my miracle, the only breakthrough I had in years it felt like, I drove home and signed up for Milan Art’s “Oil Painting Made Easy” workshop. Let me tell you it wasn’t easy. It might be easy for somebody that has been doing it for 30 years but for me this is a brand new challenge and I had no idea how it would go. While it wasn’t easy, it was fulfilling. Peacefulness overwhelmed my body and the painting brought me joy and I found it was just the challenge that I needed. My mind found solace and hope in every paint stroke, and every pigment that was spread across the canvas. That day I spent six hours painting, my first oil painting. This painting is one of the ocean as ships are coming ashore and there are storms in the background as the sun is setting. 

This painting felt like I was going on a new adventure, that this was the beginning of something good, and that the storms of my life were now behind me and a new day was dawning. Painting brought me a new sign of hope and joy and confidence that I had the ability to do the things that I loved, even if I wasn’t an acclaimed art prodigy. It made me feel like where I was right now was good enough, and yet there was still room for growth. This is what oil painting felt like. Like the paint knew where I was in my journey to a fulfilling life and was willing to work with me on my journey, making each brush stroke special and full of soul.