Getting started sounds so easy – but for millions of aspiring artists and creatives, the uncertainty of the path forward presents a very real challenge. So, we wanted to gather some artists and creatives we admire to open up about their experience and how they think about whether they should have started sooner or waited for a better time.

Tabnie Dozier

I definitely wish I started my creative career sooner. As a TV News Journalist, I was utilizing various creative aspects daily, such as interviewing, video editing, production and more. I spent 11 years working as a Local News Anchor and Reporter on both sides of the country and if someone had dropped a line to me discussing starting an LLC, even as a Media Consultant, I would not have hesitated. Especially while still connected to a corporate paycheck. It is much harder being an entrepreneur without steady income and trying to navigate such new spaces. Read More>>

Tj Rice

I’ve always loved music. Growing up, music was always being played. From Michael Jackson, Usher, Keith Sweat, and Chris Brown, I’ve always loved singing their songs. During my younger years, I never thought music would be in my future. Sports were more on my mind. Even though I had no reason for it to be. Fast-forward to college. I attended SIU-C and started out as a kinesiology major. That did’t work out the best for me. After not knowing what I wanted to do, I decided that I wanted to go the music route. I switched to Mass Comm and enrolled in Audio Engineering program. At that time, I wasn’t focused on my personal music. I didn’t believe in myself. I didn’t have the confidence to write and sing at that time. After I graduated, everything halted. I did nothing with my degree for years. After Covid, I decided that it was now or never to start recording and singing my own music. It’s been 4 years of making music and I’ve loved every second of it. I definitely wish that I started working on my own stuff way earlier than I did. Read More>>

ITS JUST NIA

Music and singing was something I was ALWAYS passionate about. Something I always loved doing when nobody was around and in my alone time. I started taking music seriously back in 2022. At the time, I still was in a creative pursuit of being a makeup artist. Until I got into a relationship, and who I was dating at the time would record his music at my house, I was always in awe and inspired every time i would watch him record. And one day he finally encouraged me into getting in front of the mic, and “just say something”. Read More>>

Melissa (Mimi) Hartley-Garner

Sometimes I do wish I would have started cultivating my creative skills sooner but it was my experiences in life that triggered my creative awareness which led to me being an artist. I had just become a wife and a mother, I was working for a non-profit, I had settled into a life that looked like the “thing” people wanted out of life; The thing they tell you to strive for. Read More>>

Hush Bewlay

For me, it’s less about when I started my creative career, and more about what kind of creativity I was making my work. My entire professional life has been in the film and tv industry, so I’ve always been able to bring creativity to the jobs I do. But my life as a musician, Hush Bewlay as an entity, hasn’t been very long. Hush Bewlay was very much a ‘pandemic baby.’ Suddenly the world stopped and we were all at home with time on our hands. I thought my creative outlet was going to be writing. I honestly thought I was going to wake up at 7am and churn out the next great American novel. Read More>>

Michele Pariza Wacek

I definitely wish I had started sooner. But more than that, by all rights, I SHOULD have started sooner. You see, I taught myself to read when I was three years old because I wanted to write stories so badly. You would think with a start like that, I would have had hundreds if not thousands of books and stories written by now. Read More>>

Veronica Harrell

I am glad I began my creative career later in life. If I had achieved the success I enjoy now at an earlier age, I would not have valued it and likely would have squandered it. Now that I’m more mature, I appreciate the time, hard work, and sacrifices required to accomplish a goal or pursue a dream successfully. Read More>>

Jacque Gorelick

I began freelance writing after spending most of my life working in education. Even as a teenager, I worked with kids in some capacity, so the solitude of a writing life was a shift. But one that made sense. When I left teaching, which was a creative career in many respects, I knew I’d need to do something to tap into that side of myself. I’d always been a reader and journaled off and on, so I had this innate need to make sense of things through writing. In that sense, it wasn’t such a huge leap.  Read More>>

Lori Weeks

I wouldn’t change a thing about my career choices. I was painting and selling art early on in life around the age of nine, art was the only thing I wanted to do. After attending art school for graphic design, illustration, and fine art, I landed a position in print sales which led to a career in marketing/advertising agency- I learned fairly quickly that I didn’t want to hold a position with graphic design in that line of work. I held various positions within the creative department while continuing to paint at home. Read More>>