I didn’t plan to ever paint. Nor did I think I’d ever start painting and then perhaps want to write about the process.

And I don’t really know where this will all take me. Will I keep painting? Or will I only be interested for awhile and then stop?

I’m thinking I may keep going for at least a little while as now I keep seeing images for ideas of things I want to try and paint!

This has been the most curious unfolding on many levels.

One being that I’ve realized that when I’m painting my mind becomes very quiet.

This is so unusual (but welcoming) since I’m one who is always thinking otherwise (sometimes it can drive me crazy!) — and I think mostly around what I’m going to write about in the book I’m working on right now, future ideas, or what I’m going to write for my blog or weekly newsletter– along with all the many other thoughts that goes through one’s head in any given day.

But when I get out the paints and the brush hits the canvas, it’s like I melt into this silent world.

I painted for a few hours this morning but then the warm sunshine was too hard to ignore and I had to get outside and walk.

And guess who was on my walk with me?  Yup, my tree goddess.

I’ve been so intrigued lately by the goddess archetype and am learning to embrace and honor the goddess in me.

I love that I am more grounded now in my 50s, than when I was in my 20s and 30s. I enjoy that I consciously choose to live in more awareness especially with how nature, when out in it, is such a profound healer.

Like my tree goddess in progress, I too, am a goddess in progress. I’m learning to awaken on new levels each and every day and decade of my life.

I want to be that old oak goddess tree someday that stands strong with the test of time filled with much wisdom.

So I never thought I’d paint. But I’m not going to spend much time wondering why, but just enjoy the process.

I still have much to do on this tree goddess, but it’s fun watching her come to life. And I plan to do four of these which will hang side-by-side on the very long wall in my Joyful Pause Studio (nothing like jumping right in with four 24″x 48″paintings right away!).

But now I’m so curious to see what else this goddess and the other tree goddesses will reveal to me as I continue.