On Being An Artiste

I think one of the things that holds me back artistically is the idea I grew up with that "artists starve" and what an artist does isn't really "useful to society". So there has been a little voice in my head telling me that I needed to limit myself to doing something "useful" so that I wouldn't starve.

I have been working through this idea and as awareness is the first step, I'm on my journey to allowing my inner artist to live and flourish and produce art.

To quiet the voice I hear telling me that I'm not "good enough" to be an artist, I often tell myself that I'm an "artiste" or an "artisan". Today I encountered the following quote which I need to turn into a poster for in my studio.

"Every artist was first an amateur."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson