How do you recognize that you've made a turning on your path? For me, feelings of irritation are often the first sign. Things I accepted without question begin to rub me the wrong way. Sometimes it's the people I've most admired who start pushing my buttons. Generally it's nothing big, just a laundry list of petty irritations. It's not their fault. They haven't changed; I have.

Since I picked up my first sable watercolor brush in January 1975, I've been fortunate to have fine teachers come into my life at just the right time. By now, there has been a l-o-n-g line of such creative mentors. Some were painters, others sculptors. There have been potters and performance artists, dancers and singers, poets and writers, and lately, photoshop experts and photographers. Each one has added something unique to my consciousness and creativity as an artist. Sometimes they give me specific tools, other times their gift is more conceptual. But I never stay with them forever. No, there comes the time when I must move on. But always with gratitude for gifts received.

Being an artist means seeing the world in ways that it's never been seen before. Those who look at your work may not get it. To them you might be just another painter or writer or photographer. Maybe your preferred subject is one that countless others have painted or photographed. It doesn't matter. You know within yourself that your artist's eye is unique, that your camera captures images that would not exist had you not hit the shutter release button at that particular second, that the way you pull elements together for a composite or diptych is yours and yours alone. No one has ever made the choices you're making. Nor will they again.

So when it comes time to leave the comfortable path you've been traveling and strike out on your own, don't apologize to anyone. Those who have companioned you to this point must be left behind. You must follow your own inner guide wherever it leads. Look at it this way: if you don't forge your path, who will?