“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.” -Rumi

 

It is true, there are many things in the world that could use changing. And yet the thing over which we have the most power but is often ignored is the way we ourselves engage with the world around us. Creating large-scale change takes years of coordinated effort and comes with varied results. We must be the key to creating the world we want to live in, not by setting out to change the course of humanity or the flow of nature, but by committing to change those things in ourselves. This is the first step, recognizing what it is in each of us that contributes to the world we want to live in.

 

Kimberly Brooks is a painter who has been making art since childhood. Brought up in a family of doctors, the expectation was that Brooks would take up medicine. She enrolled in a pre-med program in college but her dorm was situated next to an art store. At first, she was timid to try any of the supplies until one day an art student introduced her to a tube of cadmium red paint. Brooks bought the paint and carried it around for years before she had the courage to try it – once she did, she knew that painting was to be the focus of her life. To hear more about Brooks’ life in the arts, as well as a discussion about her father Leonard Shlain, a doctor who became the author of a book later in life, listen to the complete interview.

 

Christine Suarez spoke to us from Santa Monica, California. A choreographer and dance educator, Suarez has been fortunate to receive grants from an arts program in Santa Monica. She received one just before the pandemic began and, moved by the race-based violence and calls for social justice of the summer of 2020, Suarez used her grant to amplify other artists. She commissioned three artists to make short films about the histories of native black and Latinx people in Santa Monica. To hear more about this project as well as Suarez’s other pursuits, listen to the complete interview.