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

Shari, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. 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?

I’m 22. I’m fresh out of college with a Fine Arts degree. I’ve been called in for an interview for a web design job.

He says, “We pay $15/hour here. But since you’re so new, I’ll pay you by the project instead. I pay really well, so I’ll pay you $800 to design a brochure for me.”

I’m overjoyed and excited for this job. I show up everyday to this office, and work on this brochure. He asks for round and after round of revision. He’s abhorred by my lack of design skills, and reminds me constantly how grateful I should be for this opportunity. Several months of full time in office work go by and he has paid me a total of $1500 on two projects.

I realize that I could make more at McDonalds and notify him one day that I’ve decided to leave.

He said to me, “You can’t afford to lose this job. Where will you go?”

He then convinced a coworker to call me and personally tell me that I was making a big mistake.

He then called me again to say that if I didn’t take down my negative glassdoor review, that he’d tell my future potential employers that I was a terrible choice to hire (I was in tears at this point, since I tried explaining to him that I wasn’t the one who left the review and therefore couldn’t take it down. He didn’t believe me.)

After harassing me for weeks, I blocked his number. I was devastated.

This was one of the lowest points in my life, and I’m so grateful that it happened to me early in my career.

I realized that money isn’t just a thing to buy cute shoes. Money can also be used as a safety net, it can increase your ability to take new opportunities, and it can shape the choices you have in life. And I made a determination at that point that I would never again allow someone to use money as a way to control me.

It fueled my resolve to build a strong savings net, to invest in retirement, to grow my income to six figures, and to thrive in a creative career.

Shari, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I own Botanie Press, a design brand that features minimalist, elegant collections. In addition to Botanie Press, I also work with clients to help bring their designs to life.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

Michelangelo is revered as one of the greatest fine artists of all time (and I agree!). What almost never gets talked about, though, is how much he struggled financially during different points in his life. And that his greatest works were basically commercial projects. In fact, the majority of his works were commissioned, and he focused almost all of his time on paid projects. (At one point, he even tried to create a fake replica of a famous statue of his time in order to make ends meet).

My point is not about his success story despite his fraudulent activities (which I don’t condone). My point is that nobody ever called Michelangelo a sellout for being an artist who took on paid projects to support his family. And nobody ever said to Michelangelo, “you love painting, so it doesn’t really matter if you get paid for this.” And I’ve never heard Michelangelo quoted for saying, “I just want to focus on my art, so I’m not going to think about money.”

I think one of the things I’ve had to unlearn the most as a creative is shame around money and art. And once I finally embraced that you can make incredible art for others and thrive when getting paid well, it made a big impact in my career. Getting paid well means that I can produce better designs, afford better equipment to create even high quality designs, take on more opportunities, and support my family.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

When I studied art in college, I was convinced that selling my artwork to a museum someday would be the pinnacle of success. One day, after finding out that one of my professors recently got his piece into the Museum of Modern Art, I excitedly ran to him and asked, “How does it feel to have your work acquired by them?”.

He responded quietly, “You know, while it is exciting that my artwork is in the museum’s collection, it also means that now that piece sits in a basement somewhere and nobody gets to see it.”

Looking back, this moment made me realize that a key part of my process is being able to create work that is seen and enjoyed by others everyday in their homes and in the world.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://botaniepress.com/