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

J, appreciate you joining us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?

Economics of art has played a major role in my creative approach since the moment I first transitioned from art as a native catharsis to a source of income. The effects of the paradigm for ‘selling my art’ are inherently depressing because there can be no real recompense for a cathartic effort. The creating is the high, the desire, the reward, and the therapy. Money means very little to an artist until they need it and only the artist who becomes aware of a tomorrow can have the notion to provide a measure of sustainability. Many times my eyes for lifestyle didn’t match my income and my life would sort of cannibalize. It took many times of learning that, which resulted in diversifying my creative approach, and my mediums for expression. Some twenty years of being a professional artist, I can confidently tell you that you are making a full-time living from your creative work every single day that you are living with creative approach to time in full. There’s a thousand ways to get paid, and every moment is an opportunity to express yourself.

J, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Creative approach lend an olive branch to me countless times of my life that, I think, others felt comfortable identifying me as an artist long before I did. I am grateful for that sense of identify as I have seen many others struggle with their sense of purpose in the world, while mine is quite simply just to live and be and express my ideas and feelings with the universe around me. (Does that make everyone an artist?) In the twenty years that I have considered myself a professional artist I have found fascination, community, and monetary reward from these mediums: Painting, writing books, composing & producing music (@listentostop55), writing & directing short films & commercials & music videos, product design, fintech, CAD, creating & programing video games, designing and producing card games (playcentralgames.com) growing vegetables, teaching others how to express themselves with various mediums, and for a short time I made soap. Some call me a polymath but really I just want to try a little of everything and try to make the best possible representation of self expression thru iterations as possible… so maybe obsessive would be proper nomenclature.
I am at a beautiful place in the timeline of my journey where I am categorically separating my works of catharsis from my native gift of creative approach, so I may focus on the latter to polished examples of thoughtfulness and community. My two most recent projects are @Listentostop55 (My music project) and playcentralgames.com ( A card game I designed about bunnies).
I am always happy to help others through counsel and inspiration on their journey as a creative and especially as an entrepreneur, please reach out any time!

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

Say yes more often. Often when teaching, one of my lessons is about maximizing creative output by establishing limitations, because a great artist can make anything around them a medium of expression. Doing a lot with a little means doing bigger things in our short time here. The best thing society can do for creatives and is say yes to our asks and ambitions so we can build better, dream bigger, and shine the light of inspiration & innovation brighter than ever before.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

I love connecting with people. Special moments, big ideas, quick glances, and even small talk… it’s all ways to acknowledge and embrace my experience with this active universe. Most of how I grow my audience starts offline. I get out there and meet people, talk to them, listen to them, hear their stories. Everyone is important to me, they each play a role in influencing how I feel and that is shown in my art. All my social media content begins offline, then I think of creative ways to express it in a digitally engaging way for mobile audiences. When the people I meet connect with my social media, they can experience their impact on my creative legacy. It all becomes it’s own organism of art because of this. I’ve made incredible friendships with people entirely online though too, some of them I’ve never met in real life and some I’ve traveled to the farthest parts of the world just to have a tea with. I believe the people we love are the life we live for. Our connections with others are everything, it’s a mirror of the depth of our connection with our own self.

Contact Info:

• Website: jfeelgood.com
• Instagram: @artistjfeelgood
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jfeelgood
• Youtube: @listentostop55
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@listentostop55