Why wait till January 2018 to set your goals, do it now!

At the beginning of October, I decided to pursue one of my passions, drawing. Since I was a little kid, I always loved to draw and paint. At the age of 10, my parents enrolled me in a  school of arts; in Spanish called  “Escuela de Bellas Artes”, but after a school year I told my parents that I didn’t want to continue because I was tired of getting out of my regular school and later continue in a second school every afternoon.

Nineteen years later, I’m like: how silly can I be? What a stupid excuse! I regret that moment so much because I wonder; what type of person would I be today if I stayed there? Plus, I was taking photography classes too.  I married a photographer so I could have helped my husband so much now a days! In college, I decided to do a bachelor’s degree in translation and a second one in photography, but I had some trouble enrolling in the second one and I thought that it was a sign. In addition, my dad told me that photography is a hobby not a steady profession. I was only 17 and sadly I believed it.

You may ask yourselves: why didn’t you go back or take classes somewhere else? Well, I decided to focus on things that would help me have a “steady salary”.  This isn’t enough though. You keep working for someone else and try to make other people “happy” specially my parents. PLEASE DON’T DO IT! You’ll feel miserable like me.

But what’s in the past stays in the past. We can’t change anything, but we can change our future. So, one day scrolling through Instagram I got inspired by the blogger Pursuing Pie. I thought to myself: “you know what? It is never too late, if she can have her own shop, be a wife, and a mother of twins, doing what she loves, I can do it too! What am I doing with my life? I don’t want to keep regretting things!

On that same day, I started to do some research about what would help me to do what I love. In Puerto Rico, arts aren’t seen as something that will make you have a decent living. You either try to sell your art or become an art teacher. While I researched with my husband (a graphic designer), who is always by my side and supports all my ideas, talked to me about lettering, which is something not found in Puerto Rico. I fell in love with it! We had the same thought: why wait till January to start? Let’s start now! So I enrolled in a couple of online classes and bought a book called The Ultimate Brush Lettering Guide by Peggy Dean. I am also drawing a lot again and hoping to do many illustrations for 2018!

I can’t wait to continue on this journey!

This is how Letters by Angelie was born.

I encourage you to STOP, THINK, and MEDITATE about your life…Ask yourself: am I doing what I really love to do? Am I doing things that I won’t regret later? Are you doing it for yourself or others?

If you’d like to get started and turn your passion into a career and get to know me better, here’s something cool for you…

<3

Melissa