Prosperity
“the condition of being successful or thriving”
Today’s MotD encourages us to embrace the prosperity mindset…which may or may not have anything to do with money. It’s about building upon and growing one success after another. Of course the key here is to establish what we mean by success. That’s going to be different for each one of us.
I grew up in an environment where money was the only measure of success. If what we were doing wasn’t going to provide a regular, steady income/living, then we weren’t being successful. My oldest brother and I wanted to become artists (musicians and as well as visual). My father, who grew up during the Depression, questioned us as to how we were going to make a living doing that…and basically discouraged us from pursuing said career paths. I understand and understood that he was trying to protect us from being poor. I get it. I admit at the time (my 20s and 30s) I wasn’t strong enough to go up against my father’s wishes…so I and my brother conceded and pursued “regular, good-paying day jobs”.
When I officially became an artist 25 years ago, it was tough for me because I was constantly up against his questioning of my chosen path. I struggled because I too was buying into the money=success belief system. I started to doubt myself as an artist. Thoughts like “I mustn’t be a good artist because no one is buying my art” or “I mustn’t be good enough because I’m not able to make a living at it”.
Only in the last couple of years have I transitioned into creating art for the art’s sake versus creating art to make money or a living. Thankfully because I did make a living for decades with my day job, I’m blessed now to be in a situation where I don’t have to make a living at it.
Essentially, I’ve changed my definition of prosperity/success. Over the last 25 years, I’ve painted close to 2,000 mandalas, created over 500 mandala designs for coloring, and have been doing intuitive readings for over 10 years.
And I’m not done yet…I plan to continue thriving and growing as a mandala artist and intuitive reader. If I do end up making a lot of money from my art, it’ll be icing on the cake, the cherry on top, the feather in my cap.
How about you? Is prosperity a core value for you?
BTW…here’s what it looked like before…
joyfully,
Maureen
The Mandala Lady
inspiring and encouraging creativity, curiosity, and play through the art of mandalas
About the 2024 Mandalas of the Day
Each day I will create and post a mandala inspired by one of 366 “value” words chosen randomly. The objective being to discover for myself which ones would best represent my core values…and by doing so, I hope it inspires you to determine your own.
Mandala of the Day 