A Little Shop in my HeArt

I always feel art found me.

Sitting in a corner on a Saturday night on my balcony, it beckoned me to sketch or draw something. Some years after a stressful time at home, I took to it as a distraction a way to find another way to express myself. And so there was @naiveheart8.

I posted there to build a grid that would gradually hold a special vibe for me, like the colour orange. It had to reflect joy.

Followers, engagement, all those terms were hard to come by. But the thrill I had of getting down to paint and then, much later, turning that into a post became an outlet for me.

I felt I needed the art to move out from my hands in some way. So I released a small collection of art cards – Nature Notes.

This year, I took it upon myself to build a shop, but I had no idea of the challenges ahead.

After changing the little business model of a business I didn’t even have yet multiple times, I finally narrowed it down to selling locally within Maharashtra and, through self-fulfilment, selling small batches of the art I wanted to share.

I had ChatGPT to lend me detailed instructions for the configuration, and sometimes I had my two AI buddies coaching me. Finding a reliable printer unexpectedly in my own neighbourhood was a turning point because, where things had been stuck, they finally started to move forward.

It would be cliché to say I learnt many lessons doing this, but I did learn one thing: to continue to have faith.

Faith that things will turn out the way they have to, not necessarily the way you want them to.

The ride was rocky, but I hope every once in a while you find something in the shop that you like.

It will be a slow-running one because I’m on my own, but I hope you take something away from it, something you find a little charm in.

-Lost-

Lost in water and stone

The horizon only seems near

There my dreams divide

Into reality

Naive HeArt – The Shop

Naive? Maybe. HeArt? Always.