Truth, Love & Insight – Hope Wallace Karney
People often say that ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder,’ and I say that the most liberating thing about beauty is realizing that you are the beholder. This empowers us to find beauty in places where others have not dared to look, including inside ourselves. (Salma Hayek)
Hello my lovely friends. How's your week going? Things are rockin and rollin over here. I'be been feeling equal parts of delight and joy, with a dash of overwhelm. There's a lot of newness still with work, but I'm getting settled in.
Today’s Truth, Love & Insight interview with Hope Wallace Karney is sure to make your heart smile. Last week's TLI post featured Elise Blaha and her approach to creative living. It's a great read if you haven't had a chance to check it out yet.
I first discovered Hope through her online shop, Paper Relics. Since then, I've found lots of inspiration through following her blog, tweets and pins. Here's a little more about Hope, in her own words:
Hope Wallace Karney is known for mixing old elements with modern principles to create unique and whimsical designs. Her work has been featured in several national magazines, including Mary Engelbreit’s Home Companion and Country Living. Hope also has a love for art journaling and enjoys sharing her pages with others to inspire them to start a journal of their own.
Visit Hope’s Blog at www.besottment.com to peek into her life and art.
1. How did your blog get started?
I started blogging back in 2003 as ‘The Soul of Hope’, it was a big step for me, not knowing what type of world I was entering. I was in a dark place at the time, lacking a life of creativity and happiness, and I shared parts of myself I never imagined I would post on the internet - I put myself out there... and found support and friendship.
My blog ebbed and flowed for a bit while I worked on my company (Paper Relics) and in the spring of 2009, I found that I was in a place I was able to put my heart back into blogging seriously again, under the name Besottment, which to me is the perfect name, a version of an old fashioned word full or wonder and awe. I started the blog to chronicle my journaling - both my new found love of incorporating art into them and and my search for personal truths which I explore in my writing.
2. What motivates you to continue sharing your story with the web?
Blogging holds me accountable to myself, it keeps me journaling on a regular basis, and keeps my mind full of ideas about what I could share next. I also really am encouraged by the comments and emails I receive from people saying they are inspired by my work, and if I can inspire even just one person, I want to keep at it, because there was a time when I needed to be inspired, and when I found it through other blogs, it helped me start a new life for myself.
3. If you could go back in time, what advice would you give to yourself as a budding blogger?
Don’t be afraid to be honest and true.
4. If you could go forward in time, what is one question you would like to ask yourself? How do you imagine you might answer it?
Q: Did you live and breath with your full heart? A: Yes.
5. What are your favorite creative resources? Old type and graphics - I have a vast collection of pre-1900’s ephemera and I use imagery from pieces of it in my graphic design, greeting card line, and journals.
6. Who inspires you online? Offline?
Offline I am very lucky to have some close creative friends that can always jump start me, inspire me and push me to be the best I can be, in life and art. I am also inspired quite a bit by some of my favourite authors, from Jane Austen and Juliet Marillier (fiction) to Deepak Chopra and Mark Epstein (non-fiction).
Online I have a couple of places where I search and ‘store’ art journaling inspiration:
Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/30683806@N06/favorites/ Pinterest http://pinterest.com/besottment/inspiring-journals/
For thought inspiration, I wish I could take a class at The School of Life in London, but have to settle for following their blog. Also the Tiny Buddha blog has a lot of thought provoking articles that inspire some of my journaling prompts and pages.
7. How do you make every day extraordinary? I tend to delight in the small things, which helps make each day joyful.
Image Credits: via Hope Wallace Karney
