Stop Doubting Your Brilliance: How to Find Your Creative Voice

Stop Doubting Your Brilliance: How to Find Your Creative Voice


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You are making beautiful work, you are booking jobs, you are executing on your bookings, but something is missing. You feel full of doubt. You're still not sure exactly who you are as a designer or how to find your aligned voice as a creative.


That is disorienting to say the least, disheartening to be sure, and not something easy to ignore. It's like you've learned how to dance, but you feel like you're only going through the motions. You haven't tapped into what you're really capable of yet, and you want to step into something more felt, more authentic, and more confident.


It is one thing to learn an art form, or to develop the skills you need to functionally create within your field, even if you are just creating your version of something made by someone else that inspired you. It is another thing to feel the confidence, fulfillment, and freedom that come with knowing who you are as an artist and creating something that feels true and authentic to you.


So if you find yourself second guessing your creative work or genuinely wishing you knew how to discover your authentic style and voice as a creative, this episode is for you. It is time to stop doubting your brilliance. Let's dive in.



In This Episode, We Cover:

  • The Desire: What We Want and Why We Want It

  • The Problem: What Exactly Gets in the Way
  • The Path: How to Discover Your Authentic Creative Voice
  • The Practice: Exercises for Building Confidence and Trust with Your Creative Gifts and Sensibilities




Episode Summary

You don’t need to doubt your brilliance or try to pin down your style in order to find your authentic creative voice—you need trust, skill, and the courage to let your work evolve. In this episode, Jen Cavender explores why creatives get stuck feeling disconnected from their authentic creative abilities and how self-trust, practice, and play can lead to greater confidence and clarity. You’ll learn practical ways to overcome self-doubt, develop your style, and keep creating even when you fear being misunderstood. Whether you’re a floral designer, artist, maker, or creative entrepreneur, this conversation will help you reconnect with the voice that’s already within you and build the confidence to bring forth what you are here to create.




Key Takeaways

    Your creative voice is built on trust.

    An authentic creative voice is more than a signature style, color palette, or technique. It comes from trusting your instincts and making choices that feel true to you.


    Skills make your creative voice visible.

    Authenticity and craftsmanship work together. Through practice, training, and repetition, you develop the ability to express your ideas with greater confidence and clarity.


    Creative blocks can signal growth.

    Feeling stuck, bored, or uncertain may mean you are outgrowing your current skills. Instead of treating these feelings as failure, use them as an invitation to learn, experiment, and evolve.


    Play is essential to originality.

    Low-pressure creative practice creates room for curiosity and experimentation. Not every session needs to produce something polished or useful.


    Self-doubt does not have to stop you.

    Doubt is often a protective response rather than an objective assessment of your ability. You can acknowledge it, examine the fear beneath it, and continue moving forward—even when your work may be misunderstood.




    Mentioned in This Episode





    Details From Sponsors:

    This episode of the Called to Bloom podcast is brought to you by Nectar & Bloom Mentorship.

    Explore a multi-day Studio Mentorship for an in-person immersion tailored to you that combines floral design, business strategy, and holistic creative entrepreneurship, or a Remote Mentorship for strategic coaching from wherever you are.

    Use code CALLEDTOBLOOM at checkout for 10% off your first Remote Mentorship session purchase.




    Resources:

    • Join the Poetry of Flowers — holistic floral artistry online courses to empower your creative practice from anywhere in the world



    Keep in Touch:


    Thank you so much for being here, and for being part of this radiant community as we step deeper into our creative callings together.

    If you enjoyed this episode:

     


     

    Episode Keywords

    authentic creative voice, finding your creative voice, creative self-doubt, overcoming, creative blocks, building creative confidence, developing your artistic style, creative growth, trusting your creative instincts, floral design creativity, creative freedom, overcoming fear of failure, creative skills development, embracing the creative process ,serious play in creativity, mood boards for creatives, creative practice exercises, inspiration for artists, personal creative style, creative mindset shifts, navigating the unknown


    Sound Bites

    08:38 — “Your unique and authentic creative voice is trust.”

    13:23 — “Build trust, gain skills, and learn when to surrender.”

    26:20 — “Trust is not abandoning yourself.” 

    27:38 — “We are not for everyone. And we can survive being misunderstood.”


    33:39 — “Instead of comparing or getting self-critical, come home to yourself and strengthen your vision.”

    35:08 — “The fun part” — seven practical exercises for building creative confidence.

    46:12 — “Be a steward of the creative work you are here to bring into the world.”

    47:15 — “You are here to create, express, and share your light.”

    48:24 — “We don't really get to see the whole map when we start out… your work is to trust, to train, and to take the next step.”



    Chapters

    0:00 — Finding Your Authentic Creative Voice

    8:06 — What We Want and Why We Want It

    13:55 — The Problem: What Gets in the Way

    21:32 — How to Discover Your Authentic Creative Voice

    26:09 — Embracing Trust and Overcoming Doubts

    28:25 — Mindset Shifts for Creative Freedom

    30:45 — Navigating Self-Doubt and the Unknown

    34:54 — Practical Exercises for Creative Growth

    45:59 — The Journey of Creative Evolution



    Full Transcript


    You are making beautiful work, you are booking jobs, you are executing on your bookings, but something is missing. You feel full of doubt. You're still not sure exactly who you are as a designer or how to find your aligned voice as a creative.

    That is disorienting to say the least, disheartening to be sure, and not something easy to ignore. It's like you've learned how to dance, but you feel like you're only going through the motions. You haven't tapped into what you're really capable of yet, and you want to step into something more felt, more authentic, and more confident.

    It is one thing to learn an art form, or to develop the skills you need to functionally create within your field, even if you are just creating your version of something made by someone else that inspired you.

    It is another thing to feel the confidence, fulfillment, and freedom that come with knowing who you are as an artist and creating something that feels true and authentic to you.

    And honestly, this is a desire we all experience. It is human to want to be seen and known for who you are. It is just as inherent as an artist to want to create authentically and to discover, express, and share creative work that feels true and alive and aligned.

    So what gets in the way? What makes you doubt your brilliance or feel at a loss when trying to see or pinpoint or know your creative voice? What makes it hard to trust your instincts and how do you move through this into clarity and confidence?

     

    *

     

    Welcome to the Called to Bloom podcast. I'm Jen Kavender, founder of Nectar and Bloom, and your host as we explore tools and holistic methods that empower you to craft an inspired career and a fulfilling creative life.

    I am a floral artist and educator who left an academic career to build my dream floral design studio. Now I empower flower lovers, florists, and creative entrepreneurs like you to find your aligned path and to build your dream.

    Together we go deep into topics covering creative entrepreneurship, health and well-being, sustainability, personal transformation, the art and business of working with flowers.

    And practices for manifesting a life you love. If you are ready to feel inspired and empowered as you build your next aligned creative chapter, you are in the right place. Now, let's bloom.

     

    *

     

    Quite often I get asked this very interesting and also very relatable question by my mentees and my students and my listeners. How do I find my unique style or my authentic voice as an artist in this field?

    It is a question that I've asked myself along the way on my own journey too. A question that any creative can get really hung up on, feeling stifled and unsure whether or not we have anything original to offer, or whether we'll be able to tap into what we are really capable of and meant to create.

    The problem is rooted in two main places. One is relevant to your experience level, and the other is relevant to your approach. And we're going to dive into this and more in just a moment.

    So if you find yourself second guessing your creative work or genuinely wishing you knew how to discover your authentic style and voice as a creative, this episode of Called to Bloom is for you.

    We are going to explore what we actually want and why we want it when we desire to create authentically, what exactly gets in the way, how to discover your authentic creative voice, and practices and exercises for building awareness, confidence, and trust with your own creative gifts and sensibilities.

    It is time to stop doubting your brilliance. Let's dive in.


    *


    When I started out in floral design, I had no idea what I was doing. I felt like a crazy person, making a huge pivot out of an academic career that I'd been building for almost 10 years, and I could not find the kind of guidance or support that I needed anywhere.

    I was getting married that year, moving back to San Diego, and starting to feel cramped and out of alignment working in academia, which started to reveal what a huge life transition I was in through this enormous pivot that I felt called to make.

    It didn't make sense on paper in any way, but I knew that I wanted to start a floral design studio.

    I wanted to be my own boss, to create a business that allowed me to make art and connect and serve in ways that felt authentic to me. I wanted to build a legacy in a way by building a brand that would allow me to bring all the parts of myself together: the academic professor, the poet and writer, the flower and nature lover, the yoga teacher, the artist, and the person inside me who loves to mentor and coach and motivate others.

    I didn't even know at the time how this was all going to look or come together, but I just kept trying things and kept taking steps. What I wanted was a guide who could walk with me, who could teach me the ropes, and who could really listen to what I was trying to realize as I took these clunky and uncertain steps toward a vision that was revealing itself to me bit by bit in real time.

    I wanted someone who could see what I was trying to do even when I couldn't, someone who could help me collect and hold the vision as I built it.

    I tried different career counselors, business coaches, mentors, and even marketing creators along the way, mostly learning big lessons the hard way.

    But each of these experiences taught me an important lesson. I was looking for something that did not exist in the way that made sense to me or that aligned with my desires and values, which meant that I had a vision for what mentorship, coaching, and actually client-focused support and guiding could look like.

    Within two years of starting Nectar in Bloom, I felt called to start offering mentorships.

    I felt so passionate about what I was doing and I wanted to empower other floral designers, flower lovers, and fellow creatives with the tools that I had gathered, and also this genuine attentiveness and care that I realized that I can and love to provide.

    Over the years, my mentorship program has evolved into two containers: studio mentorship for a multi-day, in-person, immersive one-on-one workshop; and remote mentorship for an hourly online, one-on-one, holistic business, and life coaching experience.

    If you are building a new venture or stepping into a new chapter or project within your creative work and would like to have a passionate guide who is ready to share all the tools and techniques, someone who will help you discover and hold the vision and know how to keep taking clear intentional steps toward it. Reach out. This is what I love to do most.

    Mentorship is one of my absolute favorite things that I get to share with you. And it all starts with a complimentary discovery call where we can connect, where I can learn where you want to go and what is getting in the way, where you can get your questions answered, and where we together can clarify an experience and a path forward that feels thrilling and like a perfect fit for what you need.

    To learn more, visit the mentorship page on my website at NectarandBloomfloral.com. And as a thank you for being a called to bloom listener, you can get 10% off your first remote mentorship session when you use the code CALLEDTOBLOOM at checkout. That's C A L L E D T O B L O O M one word at Checkout. I want you to thrive in what you are here to do, and I want you to feel amazing.

    amazing about investing in yourself and in your vision. So reach out and let's explore these options together. I can't wait to see you step into your radiant next chapter.

    And now let's head back into our episode.


    *


    So, what even is your unique creative voice or style? What is it we want and why do we want it? Let's define that first.

    What you are really longing for when you wonder how to find your own unique creative voice is to express something authentic to you, to be seen and known for who you really are creatively, and also to contribute something to your creative field.

    It can also mean that you'd like to be known as an artist and perhaps sought after specifically for what you uniquely can do, for your unique style. So that is what we want, or what's behind the desire to find your creative voice. But what is your creative voice exactly?

    How can we find it if we don't know what it is?

    This might come as a surprise, but your authentic creative voice is not a color palette or a technique you use or a signature styling move or method or any of that. Instead, are you ready for this? Your unique and authentic creative voice is trust. Trust in yourself, in your instincts, and in your abilities. It is not just one signature style.

    It is an ability to believe in and execute what you know is true for you.

    When someone appears to have a distinct creative voice in their work, a method or a style you recognize as theirs uniquely, what you are sensing is their trust in their own instincts and their ability to execute what is true for them because they trust themselves.

    Knowing this gives us a few helpful opportunities to follow.

    The first is the need to build trust with yourself, which we will get into in a moment.

    The other is to explore and train and practice such that you are able to bring your vision or your creative instinct into being through your work.

    And there is a third opportunity I see here too, and that is the ability to allow the creative work to become what it wants to become.

    That means not holding it too tightly or trying to control the outcome too intensely, but instead being a kind of devoted steward of the creative energy or idea that is coming through you.

    This is true across all creative fields. I remember during my MFA in creative writing while I was studying the craft of poetry, one of the hardest but most important things to engage with was pursuing an idea for a poem, but not crushing it with my own vision for what I wanted it to be.

    This is a humbling lesson as a creative that it's not all up to us, and that sometimes we ourselves, the creators, can be the problem or what is getting in the way.

    This means learning to treat your art like something outside of and beyond you that has chosen you to bring it into being. If you haven't read it yet, Liz Gilbert speaks beautifully about this in her book, Big Magic, which I highly recommend all creatives read. So add that to your reading list.

    But my point here is that there is an element of the creative process where you have to learn to surrender and allow what you are creating to become what it is meant to become.

    And I want to start with this because it's really important to have that in your mind and in your body as you are pursuing this creative voice that is uniquely yours.

    This is also why you have the writing adage, kill your darlings, if you've ever heard that one. All writers know this adage. And it means that you have to be willing to let go of the thing, the element, the word, or maybe if it's floral design, the color or the flower variety, or just the expectation that you are most precious about in order to allow the art to emerge from your effort.

    So sometimes we're holding on to something that we think is the best part of what we're doing, but it's actually the only thing we need to let go in order to allow what we're creating to work, to come to life, to be what it is actually supposed to be, or to transcend what we feel stuck in when we're disappointed with or feel misaligned with what we're creating.

    If I had to describe it, I would say writing a poem is like working an emotion, into language, like a math problem made from elaborate bits of clay, crossed with a process of origami folds, all done with the images and connotations that words carry. You're only using words and you're sculpting something that invites this deep and resonant experience for the reader.

    Floral design is not all that different. From stems, shapes, colors, and gestures, we are composing emotional, atmosphere-generating, living set design, living breathing art that tells stories and invites meaning. We start with an intention, a color palette, floral ingredients, arranging in patterns and at angles and depths and levels in clusters and arcs and gestures that start to say something.

    But we have to learn to pursue the idea we have with as much devotion as willingness to allow it to become what it is meant to be without holding it too tightly.

    So you can see in these examples the need to trust yourself, the need to develop a skill level that allows you to bring your vision into being, and the need to allow your art to emerge, even if it deviates from your original intention.

    So instead of asking, what is my authentic creative voice, or how can I find it, you are now empowered with three pursuable tasks. Build trust, gain skills, and learn when to surrender.

    And we're getting into how exactly to do each of these as we get deeper into this episode.



    *


    So now that we have clarity on what it is that we want, or really the why behind this very normal desire to find and know your creative voice, let's take a look at what gets in the way.

    Having clarity about the problem is the first step to overcoming the problem. Why does it feel difficult to find our own authentic creative voice?

    Children don't doubt this. In play, kids just create. They make things up. They try things, invent, test it out, and they let it be silly and unserious. I watch my niece and nephew do this all the time, and it is so delightful and so inspiring. They are even willing to let it be fantastical or absurd or even a little unhinged. Kids explore without judgment, and really, when we look at it, they entertain themselves with creativity.

    Unencumbered creative energy doesn't ask questions like, is this going to be good enough? Or has everyone else already done this? Or what's the point?

    Unencumbered creative energy instead asks simple, free, and playful questions like, I wonder what would happen if, or wouldn't it be funny if I tried? Or I wonder what this would look like?

    We were all children once. There was most certainly a time when you invented and expressed from a place of total freedom, of curiosity, amusement, and innocence. You do actually know what it feels like to be free and unencumbered. You can remember it right now, I bet, as we talk about this.

    But then as adults, we step into society where we need to be professional, reliable, and understood in order to gain respect and to make a steady income and furnish ourselves with a sense of belonging.

    It's not an option to stay a child. But that's not what's called for here. When it comes to discovering your unique style or knowing your brilliant creative voice, several challenges are at play. And again, knowing what these challenges are is exactly what's going to empower us to have the shift into what we can do about it and how to move through it.

    So let's take a look at what some of these challenges are, what is actually getting in the way.

    First, we have simply become too serious. We have forgotten or misplaced how to play, or we have forgotten the value of making space to play, to iterate, to experiment, and even just be silly. This is a real thing. And as an adult, it's hard to break down the walls we build around being serious and respectable, responsible, and reliable. And these are good fortifications.

    And they're unavoidable. We need to be respectable and responsible and reliable. But we need to remember with the desire to find creative confidence and authenticity that we need to place great value again on having space for uninhibited play.

    Secondly, we are contending with self-doubt. This is something that I'm sorry to say never goes away.

    But it is something that we get more and more skilled with as we go along.

    And I'm going to guide you on how to navigate self-doubt as well as each of these challenges in just a moment.

    Thirdly, we are contending with the unknown. How can you know your unique voice or expression if you haven't felt it yet? And how do you discover it? How much more nebulous could this get? But don't worry, we will be addressing this too.

    We are also often dealing with a lack of experience. Mastery and confidence come from experience. We all need education, training, and practice in order to master a craft and gain confidence in our abilities. There is actually no way around that.

    But honestly, that's okay because getting to practice and do what we love if we're creating an alignment is a joy, is part of the entire experience of arriving to something that we feel proud of, that we feel is aligned, creating and expressing in a way that's authentic.

    Even our idea of genius, as in someone who has rare and outlandish ability in some area of life, is often just an early sign of interest and talent that has been nurtured by hours and hours and years of practice and experience, rendering a person who appears to be a genius in something because of their confidence, originality, and their ability to execute. But really, this comes from interest and talent meeting training and practice.

    In short, to get really good at something and to feel confident in your own abilities to contribute something original and worthwhile creatively, you do need to train, practice, and educate yourself in order to gain experience.

    That, although it does take time, is very doable. It is something you can control.

    And it's a big part of what we are talking about today in learning how to stop doubting your brilliance and find your creative voice.

    But what else gets in the way?

    Another part of the problem is in our approach. When you feel the doubts and fears come up that you are not good enough or that you just don't actually know how to create something unique or authentic or recognizable as you, it's easy to interpret this as a big problem. Something is wrong, and I'm in big trouble, I'm on the wrong path, I don't belong here. All of those things start to compound and escalate. This makes us freeze up even more.

    As the fears and doubts grow, we start to feel less and less confident and less and less capable. And this is the worst. This is where we really get stuck. And you find yourself not making time to create, not jumping in and taking the course, not sharing the post, and not pitching or responding to an opportunity because you've gotten all clammed up in worry and imposter syndrome, thinking things like, who am I to offer this service? Who am I to be the designer or creative of this work?

    When we approach our creative work from the doubts and fears, we undermine what we are capable of doing before we even begin. When we treat the inherent fears and doubts like a big problem, we make things even harder for ourselves.

    One other interesting challenge that gets in the way of knowing and accessing your creative voice is not actually a problem, but more of an opportunity. And that is that you are just in a period of growth. Something you used to desire to be able to do in your creative practice or workflow is now second nature. You don't really even notice it anymore because it's become something you've mastered.

    Now things that you are currently doing seem old hat or overdone or unoriginal because they're no longer exciting or difficult or empowering you to grow.

    So part of the problem of doubting your brilliance is simply that You need to try new things. You need to learn a new technique. You need a new guide.

    You need fresh inspiration and most of all, you need room to explore.

    What I'm saying here is that when you feel like you don't know what you are doing creatively, or when you feel like you are just going through the motions but not sure how to create what you know deep down you are capable of, you may just be needing some new information and some space to experiment.

    So, as a review, some of the key problems we are facing when feeling out of sync with our creative brilliance are being too serious and not valuing play, dealing with self-doubt, grappling with or avoiding the unknown, a lack of experience, and the need to learn more and grow. You may be dealing with one, two, three, or all five of these right now.

    Either way, we still want to move through and out of this stuck feeling of doubt and uncertainty and into confidence and authenticity. It's time to stop doubting this brilliance of yours and these creative abilities of yours and to discover how to find and trust your creative voice.

    And that is exactly where we are headed next.


    *


    So now I want to take you into how you actually discover your authentic creative voice or style. So far, we've established that there are three helpful and empowering opportunities you can take:

    build trust, gain skills, and learn to allow.

    When it comes to gaining skills, we'll go with the second one first. This means giving yourself the gifts of time, space, and training tools so that you can learn and grow. You can watch a YouTube video.

    Get flowers for yourself at a local market to use for experimentation and practice, buy and take an online course like the holistic floral design courses I have inside Poetry of Flowers, or seek out one-on-one mentorship, just to name a few options that will help support you in learning, expanding, and growing.

    The key is connecting your desire for confidence and clarity with your experience level.

    As your experience expands, your confidence grows. Your skills and techniques grow too, which also builds more confidence. As you gain skills and confidence, you start to trust yourself, your capabilities, and your instincts more and more.

    So you see how, in the same way, fears and doubts can compound and spiral you out,

    taking steps into educating yourself, experimenting, practicing, learning also compounds in the opposite direction in a positive way, where your experience level builds more confidence, builds more skills, and that builds the trust with yourself that allows you to know that creative brilliance that is trying to come through you.

    Then, when it comes to learning to allow the third one of those three opportunities that I just mentioned that we spoke about earlier, this means you consciously decide to remember that when you create anything, whether it's a paid project or you're in studio practice, that you make space to let it become what it wants to become. You bring the intention and you bring the training and the skills

    And also the openness and curiosity. You create in service of the idea or the vision you have, as though you are helping manifest a gift that is being given to you and to the world through you. Remember to not hold anything too tightly.

    Whenever we think everything is up to us, we are putting so much pressure on ourselves, which makes it hard to feel good or confident or to perform well. And we are also incidentally being quite arrogant, completely unintentionally. There is no way that it is all up to you or me.

    From the moment you were born, creation happened without your choice or your effort. Our very existence is the first act of creative surrender. So no matter what your spiritual beliefs are, explore how it feels to create with an awareness that something greater, whether that's God or love or source or universal consciousness, something greater is calling you to create and is creating with you.

    Practice grace and have the humility as you create to allow what you are helping to create to emerge. Try it out and see how it feels. See how different you operate and move through your creative work when you feel like everything is up to you and you're all alone in this world, or when you feel like you are co-creating with a greater force that's driven by love that is asking you to bring something into this world. See how they feel and make your choice based on your experience.

    But what about the first one when it comes to trusting yourself? The first opportunity we talked about was building trust.

    How do you build trust with yourself, your ideas, your process, your instincts, and your abilities?

    The simple answer is that you set the intention to practice trusting yourself. Even just this softer and simpler solution has profound effects when practiced.

    The more practical answer is you show up, you explore, you seek education and guidance, you practice and you train.

    This, as we spoke about just now, builds confidence, which builds trust.

    Trust is really big. It's like a muscle that you need to strengthen. When you trust yourself, you believe in your abilities and you don't undermine yourself.

    Trusting your creative voice is very much like having the courage to say something you believe in a room full of people with ease and gentle certainty. You don't always have to speak up, and you don't have to shout or prove anything or keep quiet to appease anyone. When you trust yourself, you are in sync with your instincts, and you know when you have something to say and when to say it.

    And you don't hold back because you know what is true for you.

    Trust is not allowing normal inherent doubts to stop you. Trust, is not abandoning yourself. You can learn trust through listening to your body.

    It's also really interesting and helpful, actually, when you feel fears and doubts and inhibitions come up to ask yourself, what is it I'm afraid could happen? Really? And if it did happen, would I be okay? What would I do if that happened? And wouldn't I figure it out and carry on? Every time I've tried this, I end up realizing that even the worst case scenario or the thing that I'm scared of, even if that happened,

    I would be fine and I could think of a plan to move forward, which really kind of pops the bubble and alleviates the power of those fears when we know there isn't an actual real danger.

    That reminds me recently I was journaling and exploring the fear of being seen and the fear of not being good enough or being too much, which I still struggle with and still continue to lovingly work on and heal within myself, and as I was journaling, I came across a thought that gave me this sense of immediate relief. And that was, I can survive being misunderstood.

    This is a phrase that embodies a certain resilience.

    I find it really freeing because it actually names and reframes what is really going on.

    Instead of fearing that we are not good enough or that what we have to say might not land well for everyone or with everyone, it is wonderfully freeing to realize that A, we are not for everyone. And B, we can survive being misunderstood.

    Use these as affirmations. I am not for everyone. How alleviating is that? And I can survive being misunderstood. How helpful is that? Someone misunderstanding is much less detrimental than someone else proving that you have no reason to be here or that you shouldn't be creating what you're called to create. Reframing that to understand that someone might misunderstand what you intended.

    And that you can survive that is very freeing.

    These kinds of mindset shifts can feel so wonderful. And they can also feel kind of obvious once you realize them and make you say to yourself, of course. But they are just the easy, logical, and grounding thing that is needed to help reprogram the old subconscious beliefs.

    The subconscious is an emotional, felt place, not a cognitive logical thinking place. So we need clear, sensible, helpful tools and mindset shifts to give the subconscious something else to feel and therefore believe.

    Keep this one in your back pocket. I can survive being misunderstood. Let it free you when you find yourself holding back or when you know something aligned that you are called to create is asking you to make and share it.

    So now we've clarified and put action behind our three opportunities of gaining skills, learning to allow, and building trust.

    Then we also identified some key obstacles that get in the way of knowing our creative voice, including being too serious and not valuing play, dealing with self doubt, grappling with or avoiding the unknown, lack of experience, and the need to learn and grow.

    Again, the great thing about identifying the actual problem is that it points to the solution. The most difficult problems are the ones that are not yet clear.

    Clear or identified, those nebulous worries and concerns that haven't yet been given words or clarity or what is actually going on. So let's turn the problems that we identified into their own solutions.

    First, the problem of being too serious and not valuing play points to a need to release seriousness and prioritize play. If you're tightening up or being too hard on yourself, or expecting perfection or something above your current skill level, notice, breathe, and make space to support yourself with expectation-free creative time and opportunities to learn and explore.

    Take a tip from the children, which we once were ourselves. And remember that that freedom to experiment, explore, and play without seriousness is essential to freeing up that creative energy and discovering more of what you're capable of.

    Then the problem of dealing with self-doubt points to learning how to better navigate self-doubt. As mentioned, self-doubt is just part of it. I thought for years that at some point I would overcome it. But what I gained instead is a humble awareness that self-doubt is just part of a courageous creative life. Having the courage to live with it and to keep going, to trust in your own instincts is really the journey.

    You learn to hear and feel that self-doubt without letting it take over or stop you. You see it for what it is with compassion, a protective instinct trying to keep you safe, but an energy that does not belong in the driver's seat. If you haven't already, have a listen to Called to Bloom episode 13, by the way, the sweet spot between serving others and self-care, where I share with you a term I created to help guide the mind out of and beyond self-doubt and into a state of being what I call self-steady.

    And in short, take self doubt for what it is, embrace it as part of everything, and keep going.

    Next, the problem of grappling with or sometimes avoiding the unknown points to a solution of exploring the unknown.

    Shift your attitude toward what you do not yet know, away from a fear of what could be, and toward a curiosity about what is there to learn and gain. Remind yourself that this is all a beautiful game we get to play in this life: trying, making mistakes, learning, and growing.

    A useful tool for this process is to remember that growth most often happens in a process of two steps forward, one step back. So you will likely find moments of backslide throughout your overall growth. And being prepared for that, knowing that that's normal and part of normal growth helps not get hung up on it.

    So remember two steps forward, one step back. You're still making progress. Trust in that process.

    And lastly, the problem of needing to learn and grow, as in, you've hit a plateau or you feel limited in your creativity because you've just grown too familiar with what was once a reach for you, what you used to think you really wanted to do.

    This problem points to a solution of giving yourself permission and support to train and gain experience. Let yourself grow. When you find yourself spiraling off into being self-critical or comparing your work with someone else's, just notice. Again, noticing is the key to any change.

    That's why it's such a big part of any mindfulness practice. Then, once you've noticed this discontent and this misaligned energy, you can kindly and lovingly wrangle together your mind. Bring all those parts together. Mind is like a bunch of wild horses. Let's wrangle them together so you can shift your focus from what's out there to what's in here.

    Shift your focus from the external, what everyone else is doing, how everyone's responding to what you're doing, and bring it in, what is true for you.

    Instead of comparing or getting self-critical, come home to yourself and strengthen your vision.

    Put the energy that's been out there wanting approval from others into building and clarifying and fortifying your vision. What is it that would feel exciting or fulfilling to be able to do or create next?

    What education, experience, experimentation, materials, resources, or guidance do you need to help you get there? What is one first step in that direction that you can take today or this week?

    Any one of these shifts, clarities, and actions will start building more trust, confidence, and knowing inside you regarding your authentic creative voice. Each is a path to explore and expand.

    So go back and re-listen or just choose one that sticks with you to start to use now and then see how you shift more and more, even if little by little, from doubt, disconnect, and holding back into clarity, courage, and capability.


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    Alright, great job. That was the real mindset work. That is the heavier lift as we shift things around and free up more space through understanding to feel and operate differently and with more ease and confidence. And now is the fun part. I want to round out this episode with you by giving you some of my favorite exercises and practices

    to help you build confidence, gain clarity, and expand your trust in your creative voice and in your inherent brilliance.


    Number one, the monthly creative practice. The one practice I recommend to all of my mentees and student designers, and it's a ritual that I adhere to myself religiously, is what I call the monthly creative practice. You can call it the MCP if you want, but keep in mind the monthly creative practice is simply a date with yourself, once a month where you get yourself the materials you need to do your art.

    If you're a floral designer, you get flowers and you block off dedicated time just to create and explore with them. There is no pressure, there is no expectation. This is purely time for you as a creative to immerse yourself in and reconnect with your creative spirit on a regular basis.

    The monthly creative practice benefits you in multiple ways. On the one hand, it gives you a dedicated session each month to practice your techniques, which builds more confidence in your design work and your ability to make something different as you practice.

    On the other hand, this practice gives you dedicated space to explore and play, which helps you expand.

    Repetition builds confidence. Exploration builds expansion. Having a regular, pressure-free, and playfulness forward practice will directly help you discover and hone your own creative style by building your confidence and encouraging you to explore and expand.


    Number two of our practices and exercises for finding your creative voice is the mood board exercise.

    Another approach to discovering and developing confidence in your own creative voice is to practice creating mood boards in styles and color palettes and feelings that you love.

    Jump on Pinterest and set an intention for a mood board or a concept you want to explore and collect. Bring together images that are not just your art form necessarily. Maybe they're not just flowers, but images that mix flowers with fashion or architecture, culture, textiles, landscape, other art forms. Begin with an emotion that you want to evoke, or a color or a palette that you are drawn to lately.

    Over time, make multiple boards in different registers and styles, each one as though you were planning an event that you will flower based on this mood, or each one as a project that you want to create one day. The point is to get yourself used to collecting together a visual story that you create, which builds confidence in your creative intuition and direction.

    Think about the story you want to tell with your colors, shapes, textures, and gestures, just as you would do when you work with flower ingredients in your floral designs.

    Treat this exercise as an act of composition to practice your ability to translate a feeling or a thought or a story or an intention into a visual and creative experience through images.


    Number three in our exercises and practices is to train with your heroes, as I call it.

    So here's how to train with your heroes. Collect specific images of work that you admire. Maybe this is floral work if you are a floral artist. Maybe it's photography or fashion or any other creative realm that you are a part of. Collect work that inspires you, that's created by other people.

    Put these images together and do two things.

    First, observe and make a list of what it is specifically that you like about each design.

    For example, you like its opulence, its clusters, its branchiness, minimalism, particular flowers, color palettes, design shapes, layering, textures, etc. This will become a great list to guide your next flower selections or color palette or creative exploration of any kind in your monthly creative practice.

    Secondly, assign yourself one of your favorite images to intentionally imitate in your next monthly creative practice.

    Try to loosely replicate it, not to copy or become like the designer who created it, but to learn from their moves.

    And bonus, Allow yourself to discover something and let it become as you do that imitation and see what happens.

    As a note, if you share online what you create from an imitation, especially if it retains a lot of the design that inspired it, just be sure to mention the designer or the person who inspired you and thank them for the inspiration in your caption. Imitation is a huge compliment when credit is given or appreciation for the inspiration is shown.


    Number four, draw inspiration from all things you know and love.

    So as our fourth exercise and practice, you can draw inspiration for your creative work from anything. Seasons, characters in books or movies, countries, cultures, colors, words, music, neuroscience, anything that intrigues you.

    Also, I talk more about this in episode 10, my favorite trick to unlock your creative potential, where we talk about translating inspiration from anything into your creative design work, so give that one a listen as well if you haven't already.

    Practice designing with flowers or creating in your medium using one of these areas or elements as your inspiration. This is another way to explore and discover more about your own creative preferences and authentic style.

    You can pull from dance, cooking, the weather, really anything, the sky is the limit. Maybe even looking back in your past career chapters. What are things that you have been an expert in? What are things that are your passions that you have made time to study? What are things that you can't keep yourself from reading about or researching? What do you screenshot? What do you save? What do you pin? Anything like that can become inspiration for your creative work.

    It's really a lot of fun. It will really unlock things for you as you play.


    Number five in our exercises and practices, let yourself evolve.

    While you are on this creative self-discovery journey, know that your design voice and style will also change over time.

    You might be into something for a while or curious about something for a time, and you will get very good at it, maybe even become known for it. And that very thing will also inevitably lead you to something else. This is normal and totally wonderful.

    And the main point here is that as you explore and seek out your creative style and voice, remember that it is not a fixed thing. Everything in nature continues to evolve just as you do. Allow yourself to be where you are and to grow into and out of how you do things creatively as you go along.


    Number six, look to your personal style.

    One of the best ways to gain more awareness of and confidence in your authentic design style is to take an objective look at your own personal style.

    What are you drawn to in clothing, home goods, interior design, and travel? You already know right now things that just immediately feel like, yes, that's me.

    Draw from this awareness of your personal style and preferences as you play with finding your voice as a creative or as a floral artist. Build trust with yourself based on this innate knowing of what you like and what feels aligned for you.

    How could you bring that into your design work? What does it feel like? What does it look like? How is it made up? How could that inspire and inform what you create?

    And also ground you in the awareness that you do know what you like, you do know what you're attracted to, and you do have a creative voice already that we're just trying to uncover. We're not inventing who you are as a creative. We're just unblocking and uncovering your creative voice that's wanting to come out and shine and be expressed and be known.

    And my last practice and exercise for you, number seven, is shake it up and get quote unquote serious. This is not the same serious we were talking about, so I'll explain. There is an old TED talk from the early 2000s given by the iconic graphic designer Paula Scherer, in which she talks about the concept of what she calls serious play. In this talk, she describes how being creatively serious, which is actually playful, inventive, daring, exploratory, and engaged is different from and preferable to being creatively solemn.

    So she's contrasting this feeling of being serious, where you're really engaged and you're really playing and you're really connected with this creativity, versus being solemn, which is what happens when we get too familiar, when things become rote, and when we feel kind of stuck in a certain approach to our creative work.

    I always think of Paula Scher and this idea of serious play when I'm teaching about finding your creative style, as it is freeing and a good reminder

    that when we get too confident, too certain, too comfortable, the work can start to become solemn, less fulfilling, less exciting, less authentic. When it does, we need to shake things up. We need to try something weird or different and get seriously playful in order to reinvigorate our creativity.

    I love this word play because it takes the idea of being serious and makes it more of being committed and engaged when it's connected to play. So serious play is where we really start messing around and discovering things.

    Whereas solemn play is where we're trying to create, but it's kind of lost its energy, it's lost its sparkle. We need to break free and learn or try something new.

    Paula Scher concludes her talk by saying that once your work becomes too familiar or solemn, quote, all that is left for you is to go back and find out what the next thing is that you can push, that you can invent, that you can be ignorant about, that you can be arrogant about, that you can fail with, and that you can be a fool with, because in the end, that's how you grow and that's all that matters. Such a good quote. I want to memorize that one day.

    So no matter where you are in your floristry career or in your creative work, remember that while these cycles of serious play and discovery come along with stable times and plateaus of solemnness, you also have an endless wellspring of creative growth available to you if you continue to push the envelope or play or try something new and let yourself be a beginner again.

    That's where huge creative leaps forward can happen, right around the corner of the next experiment or exploration of what if I try this?


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    So, as we wrap up for today, remember to build trust with yourself. Gather skills through training and practice. And allow what you are creating to transcend your control or expectations. Be a steward of the creative work you are here to bring into the world. Let yourself explore and play and push the envelope and try something weird.

    Also remember that you can turn any problem or roadblock into a solution and an actionable step by getting clear about what is actually in the way and using that clarity to create your solution. Release seriousness, or maybe we should call it solemnness, and prioritize play.

    Learn how to navigate self-doubt through acceptance and the courage to continue. Explore the unknown with curiosity, and let yourself grow and evolve along the way.

    Try the exercises and practices too to help you tangibly get in touch with your creative voice and to really get to know yourself better or learn how to see yourself more clearly through using them.

    And as a final thought, one fundamental truth that I want you to take away from this episode is a deep and unshakable knowledge that you are here to create, express, and share your light.

    There is not a doubt in my mind about the truth of that.

    At no stage of your journey or growth into who you are always meant to become, are you meant to hide or feel unworthy. Your journey is fascinating, and you are the only one who can go on it. Plus, when you own and share your journey, you empower others to do the same. And when you embrace your own journey, you embrace the steps it takes and the exploration and practice it requires to get where you want to go and to discover where you are meant to head next.

    When I was in the thick of my years in grad school studying poetry, I never in a million years would have guessed that pursuing my love of poetry and writing would lead to and feed into my future work as a floral artist and educator. I had no idea when I did my yoga teacher training that at some point I would be weaving the lessons of yoga and healing and self-discovery into my work and services with my future clients.

    I had no idea when I started in Floristry doing floral design for weddings and events a decade ago that the boutique studio that I started would become the creative, well being lifestyle brand that it has become today.

    My point is that we don't really get to see the whole map when we start out. But we are given the calling or the clarity, even if it doesn't make sense, or even if it's scary, for what we know we need to do next.

    So your work is to trust, to train, and to take the next step. You are building something beautiful with this life. Keep going.


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    Beautifully done. You just completed another episode of Called to Bloom, another step forward on your creative journey. Finishing any resource that nourishes your being and helps you learn and expand is one of the most empowering things you can do for your business and creative calling.

    Now to expand your experience, hit follow so you never miss an episode, and also head over to calledtobloompodcast.com to find show notes, discount codes, and details from our sponsors.

    If you're ready to deepen your practice with classes and immersive experiences in flowers and well-being, head over to Nectarandbloomfloral.com and explore my workshops, one-on-one mentorships, poetry of flowers, online courses, well-being experiences, and my original Tarot of Flowers deck.

    You can also find me on Instagram @nectar_and_bloom for more inspiration, tools, creativity, and like-minded community.

    For now, keep blooming. The world needs what you are here to create.


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    Cover image by Sposto Photography.

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