Heather Martinez, Visual Practitioner

Eigg that is. Rainbows, caves and beaches...my current life on a remote island in the Inner Hebrides is beautifully full of sites and sorrow. I'm taking the time I need to grieve and explore what's around the corner.

Having spent a month now on this remote island, I am reflecting on the transformation I have experienced thus far. 

So much so, I barely recognize myself: physically, mentally, emotionally, energetically and spiritually. 

The first two weeks of the transition were about learning the ways of the island and how the people move around, including on and off of it. Weather, Ferries, shop and cafe hours were the firsts. All while putting 8+ miles in on the bike and/or hiking a day. 

By the third week I was involved in groups and projects, and in a way I would describe it as “Living fully on the front of the postcard.”  The people here are warm and care for one another. 

The last week of November, turning the corner into December was a deep plunge, a realization of what I have done: Isolated myself on a remote island. True I had made friends and was in-tune with the rhythms of the land. Yet, after a few calls with friends and family back home, I could feel the resistance to what was happening in the world I had left. A distain for the media’s impression that was impacting others but not me. Having not looked at any news and having little interaction with social media, I feel privileged to have the kind of calm nervous system we all hope for, but rarely achieve. 

I have little to no external influences, unless I go seeking them.

Which is good because this has served as a foundation for my "dark night of the soul." A moment where my grief was the threshold, and as I leaned into the darkness to feel it fully, it sucked me in. It felt as though I was being pulled through a keyhole, swept out by the tide, and pulled into an undercurrent. I experienced all of the emotions in a way only grief allows you to: to the fullest, deepest, most excruciatingly way possible. 

Landing in a torrent. The gale force winds knocked the air back into my lungs with a smack on my back. While having been ravaged, I was breathing again. 

All the while showing up to others with love and grace—my living devotion to Ray. What a forceful expectation society requires of us. Friends encouraging with words like: you are doing great, I admire your strength. Those statements make me want to hurl myself into the ocean again. Yet I find myself saying the same thing to others and shamefully put my mask so others don’t see the depth of my pain. 

A secondary loss I am now getting used to is navigating who I was before and who I am becoming. I step firmly as I hike, my boots sink into the boggy earth. I gently dance on the beach, toe prints in the sand. Each a purposeful interaction helping me stay in alignment with myself so I may continue forward with less stumbling, more eye opening experiences, and new memories made. 

With a recent loss in the community, I carry my grief alongside them. Wishing I could put my heavy load aside to help carry theirs. But I simply cannot. 

So I created this series of grief prompts as an offering. Though a first draft, perhaps you can benefit from them too. If you find them helpful, please share the link with a friend. It includes a video from my Calligraphy as Meditation presentation.

I leave you with this. 

After the Tide

Standing where the water once was,

the sand still breathing its memory.

Grief shimmers like salt left behind —

a trace of what love has carried away.

The tide will return; this is known.

It crashes, takes me down,

then cradles in the same motion.

It whispers of endings

and beginnings that sound the same.

There is mercy in its pull,

strength in the soft undoing.

It holds me —

the ebb, the ache, the quiet repair —

and in its rhythm,

What do participants in my lettering workshops have to say about how it has added value to their work? Click the image above to watch the video.

Will we letter together in the UK?

What brought me there in the first place:

It was early 2020…we were leaving the UK for Iceland and heading back home. Covid was a whisper in the air as I wrapped up a 5-week lettering tour through Europe and a retreat in Oxford, England. Within days, the whisper became a storm—and the world changed.

Five years later, that time feels like another lifetime. Looking back on everything that’s unfolded since then, I can see how each experience—joyful and painful—has shaped who I am now.

Ever since my first visit in 2019, from the plane window, the patchwork of green fields pulled at something deep inside me. That feeling has stayed — nurtured by the movies I watch, the stories I hear, and the friendships that remind me that the call of the land never fades.

After the passing of my beloved Ray, I was lost and searching for resources on grief. 

“Your grandmother was a Keener.” 

My mother shared that I’d been keening in Ray’s final days—an ancient Irish and Scottish practice that lives in my lineage. What I thought was an online class on keening turned out to be a deposit for a weeklong, in-person pilgrimage on a remote island in the Hebrides, Scotland. My tear-flooded eyes and trembling hands guided me as I signed up, unsure of what I was stepping into.

That week, The Gathering of the Keeners, became a sacred turning point. It widened my heart’s capacity to hold others in their grief and to tend my own. The land held me first: the forests, the beaches, the sea that echoed my cries and soothed them with its rhythm. It left me with two embers: one of sorrow and one of hope. I’ve been tending the fire of love and grief ever since.

And the people.

The dear friends who shepherded me from plane to train to ferry. The islanders of Eigg are grounded, witty, visionary souls who live in deep rhythm with one another and the land itself. They taught me that community and individuality can coexist—that boundaries and belonging are both forms of love.

And the land.

The land!

Scotland, the land of a thousand greens. Each turn of the road, each crest of a hill, each gaze across a loch reminded me that I was walking on sacred ground. The moss embraced me, the trees hugged back, and the bramble and bracken clung to me like reminders to stay awake to life. I’ve always been a mountain girl. I didn’t know I could love the sea—until I asked it to bring me back if I was meant to return.

It seems I am.

Eigg gave me many gifts: a piece of sea glass shaped like the island, a wool sweater, a walking stick, and a new lens through which I see the world. I planted a few seeds there, and some have taken root.

What I thought would be a winter chasing 70-degree weather in my Casita has turned into something far richer. The people of Eigg helped me find a winter let, and I’ll soon be returning to the island that has the capacity to hold me through my grief. Tickets are booked, care packages are en route, and I’m curating what fits into two checked bags and a carry-on.

But enough about me — what’s in it for you?

While I’m in Scotland, I’ll be working on new creative projects, including:

✏️ A Cursive Curriculum for Blackwing

💧 Let Grief Speak — developing live online sessions and companion workbooks

🖋️ Advanced Skills in Lettering — refining my in-person class to be held in Newcastle upon Tyne in February. 

And yes, this journey marks the beginning of a new lettering tour!

Announcing…

✨ Lettering Masterclasses in Newcastle upon Tyne ✨

Hosted by Inky Thinking, Neuland reseller and graphic facilitation boutique.

Designed with the visual practitioner in mind, for those who have not taken my in person workshops, learn Core Skills here. For those who have lettered with me before, join me in the Advanced Skills workshop here. 

Lately, resilience hasn’t looked like charging forward. It’s looked like pausing to breathe between caregiving, making space for quiet grief while boxing up art supplies, and trusting that even without a clear plan, the next chapter will come into view.

I’m in a season of shifting. I’m caring for someone I love deeply. I’m running a business that still needs tending. I’m closing the door—literally and symbolically—on my beloved art studio. And I’m turning, gently and with intention, toward something new.

None of it is simple. None of it is tidy. But inside the swirl, I keep returning to a different kind of resilience—not the one that pushes through, but the one that listens.

Resilience is not about bouncing back. It’s about bouncing forward with new capacity, new insight, and new compassion.

That line sits with me. Because honestly, I don’t want to go back. I want to grow forward, even if it’s slower than I expected, even if I don’t have all the answers yet.

Living in the Ambiguity

There’s an ambiguity that comes with big transitions—especially when more than one is unfolding at once. You might be caring and grieving. Building and dismantling. Staying present and dreaming forward.

This in-between space has taught me to live in the “both/and.” I can feel heartache and joy in the same breath. I can mourn what I’m letting go of and still feel energized by what’s next. I can be uncertain and grounded in my values.

This inner navigation is “dancing with ambiguity”—a practice of staying open, curious, and kind to yourself when the path isn’t clear.

Closing With Care

The thought of shutting down my art studio has felt like saying goodbye to a chapter I loved. It was more than a space. It held years of exploration, collaboration, and making things that mattered. It’s where I taught, learned, failed, flourished.

Closing it isn’t failure. It’s honoring what it gave me—and choosing to carry that forward in a new form. It’s a ritual of making space for what’s next, even if I don’t fully know what that is.

And that’s something I’m learning about resilience: It’s not about pretending you’re fine. It’s about telling the truth about what matters, making decisions rooted in love, and letting the next shape emerge over time.

A Shift in Focus

There’s a quiet wisdom in allowing yourself to shift, especially when it’s time.

I taught, supported others through lettering and visual coaching, and hosted spaces where creativity and clarity met. My life and business are evolving. My purpose hasn’t changed, but how I express it is becoming more refined.

Because my relationship with my husband, my life partner, and my best friend is changing as we navigate this next chapter together.

One of the questions I’m sitting with is: What wants to emerge now, given all that I’ve experienced?

Not “What’s the five-year plan?” Not “What should I do?” But—What is quietly taking shape beneath the surface, and how can I support it with care?

What I’m Learning (So Far)

I don’t have a neat conclusion, but I do have some things that are helping me navigate this in-between season: • Letting go is an act of love. • Ambiguity isn’t failure—it’s fertile ground. • Care work is work. It’s emotional labor, time, and presence. It counts. • Small rituals—lighting a candle, closing a door with intention, writing a list—help me feel anchored. • Being in community with others who value meaning over momentum has made all the difference.

And maybe most importantly: Resilience doesn’t have to roar. Sometimes it whispers, Keep going. You’re doing the best you can.

An Invitation

If you’re in a similar space—caring, shifting, holding multiple realities at once—I’m so glad you’re here.

There’s nothing weak about needing rest. There’s nothing wrong with not having it all figured out.

There’s a quiet wisdom that shows up in our lives when we least expect it.

It arrives not with fanfare, but with a whisper: Pause. Tend to this. Make space here.

In seasons filled with momentum—creative projects unfolding, workshops blossoming, opportunities stacking up—it can feel counterintuitive to slow down. But recently, I’ve been reminded how deeply life asks us to honor not just our ambitions, but our relationships. The ones that tether us to love, to memory, to meaning.

It’s not always easy to step back. Especially when beautiful things are underway.

But here’s what I know to be true: Every opportunity, no matter how exciting, is enriched by our presence. And presence requires tending. To ourselves. To those we love. To the rhythms that keep us rooted.

I’m pausing my weekly Focus & Flow coworking sessions for a time—not because they aren’t valuable, but because they are. I want to ensure these gatherings are supported by tools that meet you where you are: a workbook to guide your process, reference videos to carry you through when we’re not live together.

This pause is not an ending. It’s a clearing.

A making-ready.

A trust in the long arc of connection.

Because creativity doesn’t flourish despite our relationships—it flourishes through them.

When we make time to care, to listen, to sit quietly with a cup of tea or hold space beside a loved one, we deepen our well. The well we draw from when we write, draw, facilitate, dream.

I know many of you are also navigating complex layers of responsibility, love, grief, growth.

This is a gentle reminder: It’s okay to move at the pace of what matters. It’s okay to pause, to pivot, to revise the plan. You’re not falling behind—you’re walking alongside what’s most alive in your world.

Lately, I’ve been reflecting on how easy it is to feel overwhelmed by the big things happening in the world. It’s natural to care—it shows we’re paying attention. I’ve found that when I focus on what matters most while moving lightly through life, I navigate with more grace.

It’s time to heed the call and shift focus—not by turning away, but by turning toward: toward community, toward work that feels real and good. The kind of work that strengthens our hands, steadies our hearts, and reminds us that small, steady steps create lasting impact.

The Slow Lane Is the New Fast Lane

Back in January, I shared a Head, Heart, and Hands exercise. In February, I started offering Focus & Flow coworking sessions. Why? Because 8 years ago, Venus was in the same place in her cycle and we were going through a similar change of administration.

I fled Washington, DC.

I needed to step off the fast lane and embrace the slow lane. What I quickly discovered was that the slow lane led me farther and faster toward the path I truly needed to be on.

When I arrived at my first artist residency that year, I chose to focus deeply on getting into the creative Flow state.

I immersed myself in Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s research and followed his “Experience Sampling Method” to understand how to enter and stay in Flow.

During that residency, I gathered both qualitative and quantitative data to prove my methods of productivity, equanimity, and happiness. I used the following tools:

Spire Stone to track three mental states: Focus, Stress, Calm.

Analog journal to answer Mihaly’s 7 questions.

Random alarm generator to disrupt my flow state and capture real-time data.

This experience taught me how I uniquely enter the creative Flow state quickly and effectively. What I thought would take three weeks to analyze, I completed in just three days.

After finishing a body of work, I created guided visualizations to help artists enter Flow.

Since then, I’ve developed a framework and worksheet to help others find their way into Flow, track progress, and establish a productive creative rhythm.

Because beginning this practice then saved me. And deepening it is saving me now.

To help support you, I offer two workbooks:

Workbook with guidance and worksheets

Worksheets only (no instruction)

I also host weekly coworking sessions for those who want to put their ideas and projects in motion.

Why Is This Important?

Here are the Top 5 Benefits of being in the Flow state:

Deep Focus & Productivity – Flow minimizes distractions and enables you to fully immerse yourself in a task, making complex or time-consuming work feel effortless.

Enhanced Creativity – In flow, ideas connect more easily, problem-solving becomes more intuitive, and innovative thinking flourishes.

Greater Enjoyment & Fulfillment – Tasks that might normally feel tedious become engaging, leading to a sense of satisfaction and intrinsic motivation.

Improved Performance – Whether in art, writing, sports, or work, being in flow allows you to operate at your best, often achieving peak performance.

Reduced Stress & Increased Well-Being – Flow fosters a sense of presence and mindfulness, reducing anxiety and promoting a positive emotional state.

Get into the flow state this Tuesday. (Sessions will continue throughout the year.)

The truth is, what we nurture grows. And I want to nurture connection, creativity, and the kind of learning that helps us all feel like we are contributing to our community and to what supports our highest good.

Acrylic lettering on glass window. I love the way the words form a shadow on the wall during the winter months.

Having a gratitude practice doesn’t mean being happy all the time. Sometimes it’s hard to find gratitude when things aren’t going the way you expect. We can’t always get what we want.

Which reminds me of The Rolling Stones chorus:

You can’t always get what you want You can’t always get what you want You can’t always get what you want But if you try sometimes Well, you might find You get what you need.

If you listen to the song, you’ll hear a series of vignettes that touch on the human condition: desire, deception and acceptance.

I remind myself that I signed up for the full human experience. Which means I have the privilege of accepting the bad with the good, finding ways to navigate the obstacles in life, and learning from the lessons. Because on some level, if I don’t believe all of this is for the evolution of my soul’s purpose, then I’ll lose gratitude for all things and the practice will never be enough.

We can hold two truths at once.

As time leads us into the next season, here in North America we are faced with many dichotomies.

"Thanksgiving is a time to celebrate gratitude, community, and connection."

"We live on land taken from Indigenous peoples through violence and broken promises."

To learn more about Vent diagrams and how to use them to have the kind of conversations that need to be had, visit www.VentDiagrams.org or visit my studio at The ArtRoom.

Practicing gratitude in complex and painful contexts requires holding space for both appreciation and accountability. Here are some ways to navigate this tension:

Acknowledge the History Gratitude doesn’t mean ignoring hard truths. Begin by learning about the land’s original stewards and the ongoing impact of colonialism. Practice gratitude by supporting Indigenous voices and causes.

Resources:

https://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/5session_factsheet1.pdf

https://www.nea.org/professional-excellence/student-engagement/tools-tips/resources-teaching-about-indigenous-peoples

Focus on Interconnection Express gratitude for the resilience of those who came before, the land’s ability to heal, and the community efforts toward equity and justice. Gratitude becomes a practice of honoring connection, not erasure.

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/news/9-ways-decolonize-and-honor-native-peoples-thanksgiving

Channel Gratitude into Action Use your gratitude as motivation to act—whether that’s amplifying marginalized voices, supporting grassroots movements, or voting with compassion for systemic change. Gratitude can inspire accountability and advocacy.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lucFX65i_t8ADaXlIO0UVx9ZORuuH_HZ/view

By holding these complexities together, gratitude becomes not just an emotion, but a pathway toward deeper awareness and meaningful action.

So how do I? How do we?

I practice radical self-care and Appreciative Resilience.

In December and January, I will be offering two free sessions for those who are curious enough or are forced to sit with the discomfort long enough to discover what’s also possible.

Please join me in building resilience so we can continue on our paths of having the full human experience.

Read more and access free lettering resources from Blackwing here:

Putting your body before anything and everyone else’s.

CONTEXT In 2011, I was walking down the street in Telluride, Colorado. All of a sudden I felt like I was walking in sand, against the wind. With all my might, I couldn’t walk any faster, no matter how I tried. Then, for the next 13 years I experienced all kinds of strange symptoms. I have chased many dragons.

Today, I practice radical self care. It’s absolutely necessary if I want to get anything accomplished.

How and when does it start? My Radical Self-Care List

Without an alarm clock as it’s important not to interrupt an REM sleep cycle otherwise you wake up feeling groggy and you’ve lost up to 45 minutes of good sleep. Write. Sip room temperature water with some salt or unsweetened electrolytes. Prepare morning tea or cacao. Eat 20+ grams of protein. Meditate to focus the mind and get in alignment with inner/higher self. Six-step oral hygiene. Skin brush. Shower if needed. Face the sun with eyes closed and move head around. Get productive in 22 or 45-minute sprints. Take breaks every 90 minutes when the brain switches to non-dominant hemisphere and back. Move/walk around. Eat a hearty and healthy lunch. Supplements. Get productive again. Take a nap. Go to the studio and create. For those who use your head a lot, rest by using your hands. If you work with your hands, rest your brain. Make a savory dinner. Take a walk. Do the dishes and prepare for the following day. Take a magnesium salts bath with essential oils if needed. Decompress by compressing. I use a Normatec for 30-60 minutes on my legs. Sometimes I use the hip or arms attachments if I really need it. Cover up with a weighted blanket. Rest. Listen to a guided visualization. Sleep. I’m a bi-modal sleeper so when I wake at ~4am, I do a few hours of work and go back to sleep.

Pretty radical huh? What is on your Radical Self-Care List? Is it sustainable? It takes time to build up to a repeatable, sustainable routine.

Here are some tips:

Know your purpose and why. Feel into how important it is and remind yourself frequently.

Find the anchor or cornerstone practice you do everyday and build time around it to add and enhance your self-care.

Be present with the process. Your subconscious knows when you aren’t putting in full effort. By being present, you are training yourself to be more resilient and strengthening your practice.

How long does it take?

Well, it’s taken me 13 years to get to this point. But it was the split-second decisions that changed the trajectory, the depth, and the will to MAKE each change happen. You can choose to begin anytime.

Want to learn more about the skill sets I have developed to help me?

Time-honored processes and the professionals who taught me:

Discover and Implement Your Purpose/Why Use a methodology and get a coach like the SHIFT-IT Visual process with Christina Merkley (manifestation approach) or Make It Happen Method with Coach Jennie and Meredyth (inner critic/productivity-based).

Develop Mindsets, Skill sets and Behaviors The 3T Model from the Learn Lead Lift Framework has been critical in my decision making and determining energy allocation. You can learn more from the book at https://www.learnleadlift.com by Wendy Ryan.

Leverage Visual Thinking Love a good abecedarian? I talk more about those in an upcoming email. Meanwhile, check out this one by Brandy Agerbeck. Valuable Link: https://www.loosetooth.com/a-to-z

Building Resilience with Appreciative Inquiry By Joan McArthur-Blair and Jeanie Cockell Link to an excerpt of their book: https://cockellmcarthur-blair.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/building-resilience-with-appreciative-inquiry-excerpt-1.pdf

I love to host live group sessions taking creative professionals through the ALIVE process. If you are interested in organizing one for your creative group, guild, book club, etc, please email me for group rates.

Last month, I met with Laurie from Bluebird Gardens to test plant-based dyes that could be used on fabric AND paper using Neuland’s BigOne Art markers.

Success! Yes, they wrote beautifully on both.

Do you know how long we have to wait for these plants to grow, get harvested, turn into dye, in order to be used? Sometimes just under a year, with some plants, it could take several years. And think of all the love and labor that goes into their nurturing and care.

While I am learning to be in the moment… It’s quite easy AND necessary when lettering. These plants are teaching me patience. And we all know the value of being patient. :)

Here are a few photos from a workshop in Laurie’s garden last summer.

Laurie offers workshops both at her farm near Mesa Verde and at Durango Sustainable Goods. So if you are near or visiting Southwest Colorado, please check out her offerings at https://www.bluebirddyegardens.com.

Which leads me to…

What does radical self care look like?

Click here to download my Radical Self-Care Checklist.

. . .

Did you know that we…

think faster than we can listen

listen faster than people can talk

talk faster than we can draw or write

That’s why we can sketchnote!

It might feel like everything is going so fast as we sketchnote, but actually, our bodies function naturally to support the practice AND it pushes us to do it better and faster each time.

That’s why our minds wander when people talk. That’s okay! Even better when we focus and apply our listening to create sketchnotes. That space between:

Thinking/Listening » Drawing/Writing

» That’s where we are synthesizing, distilling, and deciding where to put things on the page.

Have you ever noticed how some people are "ah-mazed" by what we do and often say they can’t do it? It’s because they haven’t exercised or used that function as frequently as we do!

CONTEXT: In 2009, I suffered a head injury. Shortly after, I found sketchnoting and it helped me build up the neuro pathways in my brain. I went from being super forgetful and anxiety-ridden to having what I thought was a super brain! I truly believe that sketchnoting helped me heal.

The first time I took a big leap to change careers, it was scary exciting. The result: I over 10x'd my investment and more than doubled my salary.

I’m not trying to sell you anything here. You have everything you need inside of you. Sometimes it just takes a nudge to help see it.

In all the years I have been in business, I’ve only had one bad coach. It’s because they came at a time in my life that I was so desperate, I believed their program promise. Not only did it not deliver, it put me in a much worse place financially and physically than I had ever been in my life. I was so heavily invested in their ability, that I didn’t trust my own. It was a yearlong process that took me down. Luckily, it was during the Pandemic and no one really noticed.

While I no longer trust that coach, their colleagues, nor the oppressive system they feed into, I haven’t stopped believing and investing in myself.

It took a long time to heal from the place that coach abandoned me. And over the past two years, I went in a completely different direction and found success and happiness for myself.

And that was one, only one, in a long list of dozens of great to spectacular coaches who have helped me along the way. Each with their unique approach I needed at that time.

Why am I sharing this?

Because perhaps you have: 1) Invested in yourself and failed. But was it failure? Or was what you invested in NOT really an investment in YOU? Or 2) You have not invested in yourself because you are afraid.

Regardless, one thing is true. You are here. Picture yourself just a few years from now. It’s likely you have changed and grown. How much depends on how much time and energy you invest in yourself today.

Like most artists, I flutter from idea to idea.

But when it comes to offering classes at Let’s Letter Together! I have a very different approach. I have been planning, setting intentions, harvesting, and sharing the abundance on an annual cyclical basis.

By Winter Solstice of each year, I plant my seeds of intention for the coming year. I let the fertile ground of my intentions help my ideas grow.

By Summer Solstice, my ideas are fully formed and ready to share.

This year I delivered: • Lettering with Pencils • Finding Your Signature Style

Then the real fun begins: Lammas/Harvest allows me to see and share with abundance. This year delivered a bumper crop. As I was planning to announce:

Dancing in the Dark with Sharon Zeugin

When The BigOne! Blowout happened:

BigOne Duet with Brandy Agerbeck

Let’s go BIG Together! (a free class on Neuland markers)

BIG Fun! with the BigOne! With Mike Gold

Not to eclipse my efforts with Sharon, these BigOne sessions have come together quite easily—inspired by a retrograding Venus transiting over my natal sun in Leo and the Venus Cazimi. While Dancing in the Dark has been in slow development for over a year—with good purpose.

Starting on the Fall Equinox when the light and dark are equal, we will begin Dancing with the Dark with Roman Capitals on black paper. Together we will dance with Sharon through a series of prompts and end our time together at Samhain, at a time when the veil is the thinnest, and we will be equipped to let go of what no longer serves us in order to step into the selves we need to become next.

From Sharon... "Let's use this time to emphasize connecting the lettering with personal feeling and one’s own words—a meaningful mantra or something fun to write. This is an opportunity for experimenting with improvisation in terms of writing words and designing as you go.   We’ll start simply and grow from there, always rooted in the knowledge and experience of the forms—and variations on their rhythm, spacing, and proportions."

This launching of ideas and completing them by November 1 aligns perfectly with the Deer Walks I am doing with Cassandra Leoncini (http://www.twoeaglesastrology.com). This is the restart after a 7-year cycle since my first Deer Walks when I lived in DC and needed an integrated Vision Quest in order to leave so I may return to the Southwest.

And it’s after that time that I take all of the ideas I have gathered during this harvest season for 2024 and let them reveal their true selves.

Will I be collaborating more with master calligraphers to give our shared audiences what they need, want, and desire?

Will I both: return to the basics by offering more handwriting classes all WHILE helping visual practitioners Level Up so the important work they are doing is supported?

Will there be another European Lettering Tour? Since 2018 I have taught hundreds of VPs in over 10 different countries in-person. With so many more entering the field, do they need me in-person or will virtual learning continue to grow?

I read a quote on Instagram the other day that said:

“Set goals so high that they demand an entirely different version of you.”

I know where I want to put my focus in 2024:

Appreciative Inquiry,

Lettering,

Tech hosting and building curriculums to support trauma-informed communities

But will the stars align?

Only time will tell. As will my health and well-being in support of these efforts. Both my willingness to grow and the external forces outside of my control will determine what version of me will come next.

What's a mashup? Simply put, it's two or more ideas combined to inspire something new. One of my favorite games (that I rarely play because I can't find anyone to play with) is Disruptus. It offers up 3 types of cards: illustrations, photos, and flat graphics (icons). There is a sand timer and a die you can roll to determine how you will mash up your ideas.

After hanging out with a fabulous group of art pals who also happen to have a love/hate relationship with their Cricuts, I came up with this idea.

A hand-drawn graphic of a seed sprouting up out of the ground with the words: Plant Seeds of Intention.

Made to hang in a window by a piece of jute string.

Cut from a LaCroix box - way to upcycle!

Presented with a handmade paper backing that is embedded with wildflower seeds.

This idea didn't just come to me. It was inspired by Carol DuBosch's Monkey Bar Caps class, Mike Gold's Letters and Scissors and Paste, Oh My! class, Earth Day, the local Durango Sustainable Goods shop AND Helen Hiebert's A Paper Year class.

I had a great time drawing it on my iPad, learning how to use my Cricut, and resourcing the paper. I'm happy to announce that I found a local handmade paper maker who is willing to create seeded paper for this project. For someone just starting out, Sarah Lemcke makes beautiful paper. Click here to see her work on Instagram.

Helen Hiebert featured my idea in a recent blogpost: https://helenhiebertstudio.com/the-fractured-giant/

And I couldn't be more pleased that Durango Sustainable Goods carries my cards and will continue to carry them at their new location.

Appreciative Resilience

Pairing visual facilitation with Appreciative Resilience is a powerful experience when determining personal and professional needs. If you would like to learn how to use Appreciative Inquiry and visuals in your meetings, you can learn more here.

I’m sharing my story, but if you prefer to skip to the good parts, you can learn about Appreciative Resilience here:

AI vs. AI blogpost

Building Resilience with Appreciative Inquiry: A Leadership Journey of Hope, Despair, and Forgiveness

Come ALIVE and Build Resilience in this free session

When I stepped into Jeanie and Joan’s virtual classroom: Resilience Reset last fall, my goal was to find the strength and gain the tools to forgive a family member so I could move on in my life. I was being by stifled in so many ways by my own hang ups and was having a hard time letting go of past trauma.

A few months later, after taking their Appreciative Resilience Facilitator Training, I met my goal, and was changed forever. I learned how to:

Forgive, even from a point of despair.

Find Hope, through a regular Resilience practice.

Come ALIVE by writing the next chapter of my life.

Further develop my mission: Facilitate the creative express of others through online and in-person Resilience sessions.

And now that I have my certification in Appreciative Resilience, I’m turning my lived experience into a shared experience for others.

Why is it important to build and practice Resilience in your work?

… as an artist?

… as a visual practitioner?

… as a person?

As a human in our current society, we are bombarded everyday with news, images, demands from others, complex circumstances we find ourselves in—often outside of our control. It can be devastating, crippling, of not simply overwhelming. And certainly never-ending. And we all share this.

I have found the ALIVE model to be:

Investigative

Enlightening

Empowering

And I’ve been taking small groups through the model so they may learn from themselves and each other how to build resilience to manage the everyday, AND when life hits us with something new.

I wrote this blog for The Center of Appreciative Inquiry. You can read through the questions. I encourage you to journal about them or share them with a friend or accountability buddy as a way to deepen your own understanding.

Because as we get inundated by the world around us, including the demand of learning about AI and our relationship to it, we need to take as many opportunities to connect with ourselves in deep and meaningful ways so we can:

Focus our time and energy wisely

Make better decisions

Live a fulfilling life

I’m not going to tell you the WHAT (that’s within you), but I am offering some tools on the HOW.

If you want to go deeper, I will be offering a free online session where we can explore this model in community and so you may experience the power of building resilience by parallel processing in a group setting.

Come ALIVE and Build Resilience

Monday, July 10, 10am MDT

>>> Click here to register for free

This interactive session will not be recorded. You will be given a worksheet prior to the call to reflect on or simply show up on time as who you are.

Because when our paths cross, I want to check in and see how I can support you, as a whole person. And I would like to be witnessed as the same.

And leave just a little more resilient than when we stepped into one another’s space.

With great appreciation,

Heather

Lately I’ve been wondering what it might be like to embrace my quirky handwriting.

And I love a good prompt to get me thinking, creating and writing.

When you look at your handwriting, notice:

❓What do you love ❤️ about how it looks?

❓What do you enjoy 😊 about making it in your own unique way?

❓What attributes would you keep?

❓What would you change to help you feel more confident?

I practice the foundational calligraphy scripts: Roman Hand, Palatino, and Italic to keep it legible and readable.

And I play with Brushlettering, Architect, and Sign Painter because they are fast and satisfying.

But what I really enjoy is making non-traditional letters work for practical applications.

Last week I made a poster that showed Copperplate written with a pencil. I had more people ask me to teach that. I had to laugh. I’ve been studying Copperplate since 2016 and I’m in no position to teach it, nor do I want to. It’s just not my aesthetic or enjoyable to me. But knowing the rules, challenging myself to get the form right, knowing that I can do it is enough for me.

What lettering styles do you practice and enjoy? Are they different or the same?

Image Description: Watercolor painting of a glass of purple drink with 3 ice cubes. The handwritten text in the right reads: “I love to drink grape-flavored electrolytes in a narrow pint glass because it makes me feel RESILIENT.”

With touchscreens and keyboards charging the way, pencils still have a place in our everyday lives.

The humble pencil has a rich history that dates back to the 1600’s. But it was March 30, 1858 when Hymen Lipman added the eraser to the modern pencil.

“Many great ideas have started with a pencil in hand.” Having started as a sketchnoter and now a strategic visioning facilitator, I often deliver my work with a pencil in hand, or behind my ear.

Like many people who were not born with technology in their hands, I started my early scribbling life with a pencil and the occasional crayon.

Drawing, doodling, and taking notes by hand is especially important to the developing brain and is a powerful foundation for the life-long learner.*

Remember how the pencil sharpener in grade school was equivalent to the water cooler at the office? Ah, the smell of fresh cut cedar and a smudge of graphite dust on the floor.

From spelling tests to art class, the pencil was always there and at the ready. I can hear the orchestrated “thunk” of the wood and the “ting” of the metal ferrule as we quickly placed our pencils in the grooves in our desks as the bell rings before a classroom full of kids charge out for recess and head the playground.

Later in college, all of my sculptures first started as a drawing, graphite on canvas to layout the painting, notes taken in the darkroom—the pencil is the most loyal creative companion.

Decades later and even after advancing as an online trainer and virtual facilitator, I still use the pencil everyday to capture my ideas, process and refine them. And at the end of the workday, I grab my bag of pencils and head for the studio.

The pencil still has a place on my desk, in my creative process, and in my heart.

Heather Leavitt Martinez has been writing with the iconic Blackwing pencil since it’s reintroduction to the market in 2011 and is an avid pencil collector, lettering designer, and inventor. She has been known to hold pencil sharpening meetups and will be giving away pencils at her in-person, hands-on demo, Thursday, March 30, 3:00–4:00 pm in her studio at The ArtRoom at the Smiley Building.

You can learn more about Blackwing pencils here.

For more information, visit: http://tinyurl.com/pencilday23

*Other interesting reads:

How Writing Improves Your Brain and Helps You Heal

7 Reasons Why Writing Benefits the Brain

5 Reasons Writing By Hand Is Good For The Brain And For Well-Being

Pictured above: pressure and release graphite technique in the round using the Blackwing Audition Pack.