Teaching and creating art, I hear so many women say, “But I am not an artist.”

We have forgotten that we don’t have to sell or paint a masterpiece to be an artist.

We put so much pressure on ourselves and what art really means. It isn’t something outside of us; it isn’t something solely meant for galleries where we are told to look but not touch. We get to play and create, we get to design our own gallery.

I think we have forgotten that, in so many ways, our capacity for creation thrives in our everyday lives. Sometimes, I would argue most times, that is where we create the most meaningful art. Complex and unique and completely beautiful.

I am lucky to know so many women who inspire me just by the way they live. To every woman I have ever or never yet met: You are an artist.

The way you make your lover laugh is an art form.

The way you touch your fingers to their collarbone at night and tangle souls is art.

The way you press your lips to the temple of your sleeping child is art, and the way you hold their body when they weep.

The way your fingers arrange sliced pears on a wooden cutting board and reverently feed the mouths of those you love is art.

The way you work with oils, the way you wear perfume.

The way you lay down your yoga mat and teach others to come home to their body is art.

The way you have faced down illness and death with palms open is art.

The way you share your story and hang onto life with both hands, laughing until your belly hurts, is art.

The whisper of your fingers turning book pages by the fireplace is art, your complicated mind dreaming up new worlds.

The way your long fingers dig in the earth, blooming red tomatoes you offer to young hands every summer is art.

The way you hold your best friend’s head in your hands as she wails is art.

The way you see the world from behind a lens and capture new perspectives is art.

The way you give food, blankets, energy, time to a world you will always believe is worth saving is art.

The way you put lipstick on your tired smile and walk bravely into new degrees and new choices when it feels like a gamble is art.

The way your feet hit the gray pavement and your breath frosts the air as you run is art.

The way you raise your voice and sing in the car is art.

The way your hips dance in the kitchen reminding us our bones are not rigid after all but capable of creation and expanding to hold a universe is art.

The way you hold a pen or paintbrush and share fractured pieces of your soul on display is art.

The way you stare bravely down the unknown and trust your wild heartbeat to lead you where you need to go—all this is art. You are art. We are artists.

Keep creating. Keep living.

The world needs our breath, our hands, our contributions, and our evolution.

Creating as only you can—uniquely, powerfully you.

I love you.