Patience for humility

Less than a year ago I was trying to add more workshops to the studio. Things were starting to pick up and I wanted to make sure at least 2 were available each month. Keep in mind I was also working full time and cramming a 32+ hours into 3 days on top of maintaining open studio hours Thursdays though Saturday and teaching every other Sunday.

I’m not sure how my misstep happened. I look at my calendar every fucking day. I knew my parents were visiting from Ohio, there was a workshop for oil infused jewelry on that Saturday, I knew it was my Grandfather’s birthday, and I knew I had scheduled a cabochon workshop for that Sunday. It was a busy weekend and for some reason a month ago I thought “yeah, I can totally do everything”.

It ended up being a huge wrong that to this day I still get the sweats about but have changed so much of my life for the better because of it.

It was a Sunday morning where snow was just coming down, relentlessly, in a sloppy, thick, frozen mess that coated everything in a blanket of awful. However, it was beautiful in my oblivious state of having an ominous slow morning with my mom before going to my Grandfather’s party. Ya know…because I forgot I was teaching a class. That people signed up for.

It’s the worst feeling in the world completely forgetting something incredibly important that people were depending on you for. What made it extra hard for me was knowing that one of the women had driven from over 2 hours away, in TERRIBLE weather, just to take the class.

Needless to say I had a difficult conversation with her over email, profusely apologizing, immediate full refund, and offering a free class down the road. I wasn’t expecting to be forgiven but she is an incredible human and a saint for granting me more acceptance than what I deserved. It’s a miserable feeling and I had to have an even more difficult conversation with myself about what led me to this circumstance.

Luckily, this is where shame and humiliation can do some good.

I re-evaluated my time and realized I was trying to make everything happen by doing all the things all the time and struggling to say no to anything that might slow down progress. I was tired, overworked, stressed, and forgetful. It would have crashed eventually, i’m just grateful it was with the most understanding of people possible.

Because let’s be honest, I’m good at learning lessons, self evaluating, knowing I fucked up, and coming to my own resolutions about change but having people bring further punishment to justify their anger just doesn’t bode well with me when learning a lesson I already know…

But lesson is: I needed to set clear and steadfast boundaries with all my dedications. More time to the studio was an absolute must and delegating workshops to other artists is a necessary work in progress. This involved clear dates to have mental space for my full time job Monday through Wednesday and adequate time/space to blow off steam on those evenings after work.

I had to make dedicated time solely for studio stuff. No answering e-mails on off days. Don’t schedule appointments on Thursday or Friday mornings. Don’t clear a schedule for things that aren’t important. Coffee dates can wait…

Workshop days are only on Sundays (at least until more teachers come in).

And always schedule in at least one weekend to yourself a month.

I remember within the week of my defeat, I set a mental date to quit my full time job that July regardless of what I had saved up. It was a struggle learning to say no and to schedule things within my boundaries. It definitely helped being clear and intentional. The swift humiliating kick in the ass definitely helped too.

Which leads me to my next thoughts on how the most incredible people who who don’t deserve to accept your flaws or shortcomings are the most gracious and helpful when it comes to personal growth. Since then I’ve had people get furious with me for FAR less and for things not entirely within my control. And for that, I find this to be the absolute best quote:

“Those who matter don’t mind, and those who mind don’t matter.”

Not sure who said it, but it’s a beautiful quick phrase to help brush off the bullshit while keeping in mind that as long as we are constantly striving to be better versions of ourselves and work through our humiliations, it’s the good and understanding people in our circles that help give us the space to grow.

Photography by Elise Kutt of Mod Bettie