We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Elaine Grohman a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Elaine, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

I have been an artist most of my Life, with calligraphy and design my primary focus for well over 45 years. Yes, I could draw and paint, but never felt particularly accomplished in realism. So, I focused on my strengths. That is until one year ago when all of that changed.

A Treasured Friend repeatedly asked, “Why aren’t you painting?” Over several months he persisted in his questioning, and I continued to resist. That is until one day, while on a phone call with my daughter, my Granddaughter’s voice was heard in the background. “Mama, can you ask Nana if she will paint a horse for me?” Her sweet request opened a world that had been patiently waiting for my attention and action.

Never before that request had I ever painted an Animal. And now, exactly one year ago, I have painted over 30 paintings of Animals and our Natural World.

Each painting has deepened my appreciation for other Beings who share Life on Earth, and whose Lives are dependent upon Humanity’s actions – and that we must be conscious, deliberate, and intelligent in caring for our Living World. We are all dependent upon Earth and Life for our existence. We are surrounded by Life, and by taking the time to paint Animals, and include my writing and calligraphy in some of the paintings, I have gained a greater appreciation of our Human capabilities, a greater understanding of how we limit ourselves when we remain closed to new possibilities, and most especially, a deeper Love and Respect for our Beautiful Earth.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Creating has been a life-long experience for me. I am grateful to say that I have a very diverse creative Life – as an artist, an intuitive, an Energy Healer and educator, an author of 2 books, a radio and podcast host and an expert guest on television.

I am originally the 7th of 9 children, born into a family full of love and inclusion. Each of us was taught how important we were, and that each of us had something to contribute to both our family and to Life. Our mother was an extraordinary Teacher, and she demonstrated, each and every day, everything she wanted us to know. She lived by example. As a young girl, I was encouraged to draw and paint. My focus, and my understanding of my place in the world abruptly changed when I was 12 & 13 years old when one of my brothers died from Duchene Muscular Dystrophy at the age of 15. Our world was shaken to the core, or so I thought. Just 14 months later, the week I started high school, our mother died unexpectedly. For a time, creativity took a back seat to my numbing grief. I had to build my confidence in myself, while attempting to be positive. When I was 16, our father remarried a woman with 7 children of her own. Finding my voice and remaining true to who I am was more important than ever.

I started working when I was 15, and my 2nd job happened to be in an Art store, which afforded me the chance to “play” with various media – from pen and ink, to pastels, to paints of all kinds. I fell in love with art even more. After high school I attended a community college, and it was there that my art instructor suggested that I put together a portfolio to apply for the Center for Creative Studies in Detroit. I was ultimately accepted into what was then called Advertising Design. I worked for a time at a design studio but found advertising to be very cut-throat, and grossly underpaid.

Fast forward several years and I was invited to teach Calligraphy, Lettering and Design at two prestigious locations. Around the same time, I started by first business, Grohman’s Studio, specializing in calligraphy, design and I even dabbled in photo-retouching (back when it was done with airbrush and paint – all by hand) which afforded me the opportunity to be a freelance artist and a stay-at-home mother of two young children.

For nearly 20 years I freelanced and created fine art which was displayed in exhibitions, galleries and even an international exhibition in 1990, sponsored by ITC (International Typeface Corporation) entitled USA/USSR Calligraphia – which traveled nationally and internationally before the fall of the USSR (the former Soviet Union/Russia).

In 1997 my life took another dramatic turn when I began working in hospice (care of the dying) all while studying Energy Medicine at the same time. I worked every day with the dying, and a whole other dynamic opened within me which brought me into writing, working with medical schools, nursing, and hospice programs, and beginning a second career as an Energy Healer and Intuitive. I have been an Energy Healer/ Educator/ and guest lecturer ever since. But my desire to create Art, and to continue to write inspirational and thought provoking works has never gone away.

For me, all these diverse experiences are enormously creative, and have offered me in-depth investigations and experiences in discovering our human capabilities.

As mentioned earlier in this interview, I began painting again just one year ago, and the depth of appreciation I have experienced for all that surrounds and supports our Lives is ever unfolding.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

We need genuine creativity right now… perhaps more than ever. Society is comprised of an enormous diversity of people, but unfortunately, we are greatly divided. We ARE Society, not an entity separate from ourselves, since Society is the human beings living today, yet we are divided by anger, ideologies, and broken systems that do everything in their power to control rather than repair. Define rather than develop. Choice is what makes Human’s distinctly different from other living beings on the planet, and our innate Creativity is required if we are to change our world for the better.

Creativity opens the Mind to new, and unimagined possibilities. Creativity requires an open-mindedness that can truly witness and examine existing challenges and begin to envision a new and better way to work with Life instead of against Life. Creativity opens us to an honesty that has no agenda, to help us all begin to appreciate what Life has to offer. Creative individuals can, and in my opinion should, help others to see their own greater potentials so that together we can work towards solving the problems facing our world today. Creativity allows us to step away from what we know – to imagine what might be – better, healthier, more inclusive, less violent, more open and engaging in ways we have yet to witness. Without creativity, nothing new can be imagined.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

If I have a goal, it would be to use my Life wisely. To be open to explore the depths of human relationships, with our Selves and the Planet. To be open to experience greater depths of understanding of our diversity and our commonality, and to explore the intimate relationship we all have with the Living Earth so that we can begin to respect our Lives more fully and collaboratively.

I hesitate to use the word “mission” since, as one who studies the meaning of words, a “mission” by definition, is a very specific agenda, often driven by religious or political motives that can easily create separation and evangelizing. We need less of that, not more of that.

I hope to Live my Life in such a way that my Life can offer some joy, inclusion, inspiration, insight, wisdom, and peace, that can in turn may help other do the same. When and if we relinquish our anger, we just might see something extraordinary.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.elainegrohman.com
• Facebook: Elaine M. Grohman, Elaine Grohman, and InLight, LLC
• Linkedin: Elaine Grohman

Image Credits
Elaine Grohman’s photo by Kelly Harper of Harper Photography