Creative in Process

Meg DeBrito: Reweaving 2025 - Season 2 Finale

Welcome to the season finale of season 2 (and of this podcast)–for now. Be sure to stay tuned till the end for more updates, reflections, and next steps! Our delightful guest today is: Meg DeBrito. Meg is a communication design strategist with a passion for art, craft, food, and ecology. She has led organizations in both executive and director roles with a proven track record of thought leadership, messaging, and storytelling to promote mission-driven organizations. Holding a Bachelor of Architecture from Tyler School of Art, Meg has a creative imagination for what we shape around us, focusing on the shared health between our bodies and the ecosystem we live within. Over the years, Meg has built a beautifully complex life renovating housing, biking the entire east coast of the U.S., training as a certified yogini in India, and engaging in a local community on urban farms and food access, all while working to build a catalytic voice in public policy, university research, social impact organizations, community trusts, and impact investment. Meg and I chat about what it means to reweave: and why it’s so crucial for us to reweave not just ourselves, but each other. How moments of adversity–or “crumble”--in our personal and collective lives cause us to hold onto each other more tightly, and how this is the key to not just surviving, but healing and thriving. We ask: How do we look beyond old, decaying systems and embrace a regenerative approach to climate, gender, economics…technology? How can we build a future that is truly sustainable, equitable, and aligned with our deepest values? It has been a gift to be creative humans in the process of becoming...of growing our qualities of being, together. Cheers, to you, my friends, listeners, community–from all across the world–as you close out this year and enter into 2025, remember: you are a beautiful process in the making. And that is a very good thing. You are a gift and a wonder to this ever-unfolding, unpredictable, but gorgeous process of life, itself. I can’t wait to see where I’ll see or encounter you–next.

Tina Lu: Belonging in the Tension

Today’s guest is a lovely gatherer of humans, as well as a fellow neighbor and friend: Tina Lu. Tina is a Taiwan native and transplant who has now lived in three out of four U.S. continental time zones (Eastern, Central, Pacific). Tina now finds herself mostly traversing the 4.12 square miles of Somerville on a daily basis -- shuttling kids, groceries, freebies found on sidewalks, and ideas about how to make her local community a more resilient, interconnected place. If you are ever awake at 5:30am on a breezy summer day, you just might find her walking along the bike path, admiring native plant species and making friends with baby bunnies along the way. Today, Tina and I chat about: how our hunger for belonging, community, and holding spaces for each other is birthed from our own experiences, the messiness of immigrant identity and inhabiting awkward decimals (like 1.25 or 1.5) as immigrants or children of immigrants, why belonging in tension also means doing conflict well, the search for a meaningful model for how to do conflict in community and listening and storytelling as meaningful antidotes, the relationship between agency and belonging, and many other things…including how chill spouses and pokemon-loving children are necessary (albeit challenging) counterbalances to those of us who struggle to embrace the process.

Mark Robinson: "My Language is Basketball"

Our guest today is the wonderful Mark Robinson. Mark enjoys playing basketball, coding, and serving others–among many things. His life motto is "It is what it is.” In his own words, Mark’s goal is to grow closer to God every day, follow Him shamelessly, and share about Him with everyone he meets. Today, Mark and I chat about why body language and nonverbals can speak louder than words, how team sports like basketball expedite opportunities for connection and intimacy with our fellow humans, why it’s sometimes good to lose track of the score in a game–and how things we learn on the courts translate into the larger court of life itself. You can learn more about Mark through his Instagram at @wakrson [http://@wakrson].

Jessica Gath: Re-Evolution through Art

Our guest for today is the spectacular and beloved Jessica Gath. Jessica Gath is a possibilitarian who makes artwork in paint, garments, zines, food, correspondence, community, activism, songs, dirt, plants, videos and whatever else gets the job done. For almost 30 years, the concepts behind her art practice have been to connect us (humans) in our shared humanity and to strengthen perceptions of our oneness with Earth.  Today, Jessica and I chat about: why we should see ourselves not just as creatives but as citizens, why we should get uncomfortable artistically, women's magazines and how to say no to things that drain us, how to accept that we’re beloved, why smiling first increases our quality of being, how art can disarm both the dictators and creepers in our lives, and how we can surprise ourselves even in old age. And be sure to stick around to the end of this episode to hear the answer to the question: "Why are Bostonians known to be less friendly?" You can learn more about Jessica at www.jessicagath.org [http://www.jessicagath.org] and the below websites: www.phullyrooted.com [http://www.phullyrooted.com] | @phullyrooted on Instagram. www.artistscommit.com [http://www.artistscommit.com] | @artistscommit on Instagram. www.5millionstrong.art [http://www.5millionstrong.art] | @5millionstrong on Instagram.

Krystal Ray: Creativity as a Safe Space

Welcome to the third episode of Season 2! Our guest for today is the spectacular voice behind the first seconds of this episode: Krystal Ray. Krystal is a full time lover and liver of life. She is at once Wife, Mom, Educator, Singer, Worship Leader, Entrepreneur at Mary Kay and Beautifly You, and last but not least, Jesus Follower. And Foodie. Today, Krystal and I chat about butterflies, the importance of community, how to practice self care when you’re mom-ing, life-ing, and work-ing all at once, how to create safe spaces even when we didn’t have them as kids, how to attend to family members with completely different creative needs, why cleaning and organization are intensely creative acts–and lots more. You can learn more about Krystal on Instagram at @krystalursula [https://www.instagram.com/krystalursula/] and @beautifly.blessed [https://www.instagram.com/beautifly.blessed/]. You can also contact her at krystalraymusic@gmail.com [krystalraymusic@gmail.com].