Creative Identity Transformation with Cindy Wider

Cindy Wider
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For 35 years, I've been encouraging and guiding women in retirement as they discover the joy of drawing and colouring, often for the very first time since childhood. I'm Cindy Wider, a multi-award-winning Australian artist, author and fine art storybook illustrator, and I believe every woman has a creative life waiting for her. Close your eyes and imagine a world you've invented with your very own hands, stroke by stroke. Little clothed characters from the Golden Age of Illustration, and childhood dreams coming to life on the page. Pour yourself a tropical tea and listen along as I welcome you into my studio under the palm fronds of Far North Queensland. On my table, Kelly Cuddlee Koala and her family have just arrived in tropical paradise, and my second picture book is coming to life in watercolour, ink and coloured pencil. Are you asking, "Who am I now?" Episode by episode, I'll share the stories behind my artworks and show you that drawing and colouring aren't just for the gifted few. They're for you too, and it's never too late to begin. Would you like to see the artworks I talk about? Watch along on YouTube at @CindyWiderArtist. Your next, and most beautiful, chapter starts right here.

Episodes

  1. Sep 26

    The Mind to Hand Gap: Why Practice Isn't Enough

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. Today I want to talk about a moment many women know well. You pick up a pencil, and what appears on the page doesn't quite match the picture in your mind. That gap has a name. I call it the mind to hand gap. In this episode I'll show you what it is, why it exists, and what closes it for good. It isn't about practising more, and it isn't about positive thinking. It's something far more fundamental that almost no one is talking about. In this episode:  🌿 Why practising more can actually make things worse  🌿 The one word at the heart of every drawing breakthrough  🌿 What you already have inside you that no one has ever told you about  🌿 Why the mind and the hand have to learn to trust each other  🌿 What becomes possible once the gap is closed Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  2. Aug 17

    The Missing Step Before Every Drawing

    Send us Fan Mail Drawing doesn't begin in the hand. It begins first in the mind, the heart and the emotions. Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. Over 35 years, I've watched so many women who could only draw stick figures go on to create a self portrait so real it takes their breath away, in just 12 weeks. In this episode, I'll show you how that begins, long before the pencil ever touches the paper. It begins with wonder, the curiosity that was set aside because there was never time for it. In this episode:  🌿 The step almost every beginner skips, and why it matters more than technique  🌿 My approach, and why it looks nothing like an ordinary art class  🌿 What happens in the garden long before you hold a pencil  🌿 One simple thing you can do today that's already the beginning of an original artwork Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  3. Jul 27

    Learning to Draw in Retirement: From a Tiny Ember to a Creative Life

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. Today I'm sharing what it really takes to learn to draw in retirement, something most people never discover. In this episode I want to talk about the ember, about hope, and about how a tiny glimmer of wondering can grow into a full, glowing creative life. There are some very specific things that help a woman genuinely learn to draw, and most of them are rarely talked about. In this episode:  🌿 Why hope carries us when belief isn't strong enough yet  🌿 What the Four Comparison Skills are, and why you're already using them  🌿 The fundamental principles handed down from the great masters  🌿 Why specific, kind and personal guidance changes everything  🌿 How it all comes together to help you draw faster than you ever thought possible Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  4. Jul 20

    Never Wonder What to Draw Again: The Washing Line Method

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. What does a washing line have to do with creativity? Everything! Imagine if every drawing you made was part of one beautiful, meaningful story. In this episode I want to share something that changes the way you think about drawing and creating art. It's what takes you from practising, following tutorials and copying photographs, to truly living a creative life. I call it the washing line. It has nothing to do with laundry, and everything to do with the one thread that holds all of your creative work together. Your deeper reason for creating. Your story. The theme that gives every drawing a home and a purpose beyond the making of it. When a woman finds her washing line, something remarkable happens. She stops wondering what to draw. Ideas arrive while she's walking, journalling and daydreaming. Art becomes the language she's been missing, a way of expressing herself that nothing else in her life has quite matched. I'll share my own washing lines, the themes that have held together 25 years of exhibitions, awards and books, and walk you through finding yours today with a simple, gentle activity. This episode is for you if you've followed plenty of tutorials and you're ready to create something that is completely and irreplaceably yours. In this episode:  🌿 What the washing line is, and why it transforms everything  🌿 How one theme can fill a whole creative life with ideas  🌿 The questions that help you find your own washing line  🌿 Why your most meaningful art is still waiting to be made Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  5. Jul 20

    Finding Purpose in Retirement: The Retirement Gap, Where Creativity Awakens

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. In this episode, I'll share what I call the retirement gap, and why it might change the way you think about creativity for the rest of your life. Around two years into retirement, something quiet starts to happen. The holidays are over. The sleep ins have lost their novelty. The freedom you dreamed of is real and wonderful, and yet somehow not quite enough. In that open, quiet, finally yours place, a question appears. What is this place actually for? This is the retirement gap, and at its heart it's a creative identity gap. The accomplished, capable woman you were for decades is still here, but the structure that held her in place is gone. And in that place, something unexpected stirs, a longing for expression, for meaning, for something entirely and beautifully hers. This gap is one of the most significant and beautiful moments of your life, because it's precisely here, in this unhurried place, that creativity begins to awaken. I'll walk beside you through that gap and show you what's waiting inside it. We'll talk about the quiet hesitation many women meet when they first think about drawing, why it happens, why it makes complete sense, and the one simple, joyful thing that transforms it. In this episode:  🌿 Why the retirement gap is an opening, not an ending  🌿 Why hesitation around drawing isn't a weakness, but a sign that something meaningful is beginning  🌿 The one thing I ask every woman I work with to do before she picks up a pencil  🌿 Why your creative life begins not with a masterpiece, but with a mark Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  6. Jul 20

    Creative Retirement Series 4 of 4: Can I Learn To Draw At 60?

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. Can you really learn to draw at 60, 65 or into your 70s? After 35 years of working with thousands of women, I can answer with absolute certainty. Yes. In this episode I'll share three real women whose stories may surprise you. A retired Director of Nursing who came to me certain she couldn't draw, and is now writing and illustrating her own children's picture books, currently on her second. A retired veterinarian who picked up a pencil in her 70s as a complete beginner, and is now a multi-award-winning artist with international recognition, still learning and still asking how good she can become. A retired telecommunications professional who tried Bob Ross classes and other online courses where nothing clicked, and is now a professional pet portrait artist whose drawings move people to tears and hang cherished on their walls. Three women. Three completely different careers. All of them in their 70s when they first came to me, and all of them with a story about themselves that simply wasn't true. In this episode:  🌿 Why age isn't a barrier to drawing, but your greatest advantage  🌿 Why the analytical skills from your career are exactly what drawing requires  🌿 Why those finely developed abilities deserve a new purpose in retirement  🌿 Why the only thing between you and drawing is a belief that was never truly yours Read the full stories of these three women here:  📖 drawpj.com/retired-beginner-to-author-and-illustrator-mary  📖 drawpj.com/lynn-nelson-from-beginner-to-award-winner-in-her-70s  📖 drawpj.com/linda-elliott-beginner-to-professional-pet-portrait-artist Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  7. Jul 20

    Creative Retirement Series 3 of 4: What Does Drawing Give To You?

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. What if picking up a pencil could give you something you didn't know was missing? In this episode I want to take you somewhere very specific, to the moment the pencil touches the paper. Not the idea of drawing, but the experience of it. What it feels like, what it gives you, and what it quietly and profoundly changes. After 34 years of working with thousands of accomplished women, I can tell you that what drawing gives you in retirement goes far deeper than most women expect. It gives you presence. Peace. Creative release after decades of giving everything to everyone else. And something even more precious than all of that. It gives you yourself back. This episode is for you if you listened to Episode 2 and you're ready to move from thinking about drawing to experiencing it. Have your pencil and paper ready. We're doing this together. Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  8. Jul 20

    Creative Retirement Series 2 of 4: I'm Not Creative — It's A Myth

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. Have you been telling yourself your whole life that you're just not the creative type? You're not alone. It's the most common belief I hear from accomplished women after decades in nursing, teaching, healthcare and leadership. After 34 years of working with thousands of women, I can tell you this with absolute certainty. It's a myth. And in this episode, I'll show you why. Not with encouragement or opinion, but with real evidence from your own everyday life, evidence that has been there all along, hiding in plain sight. Your creativity never disappeared. It has been with you every single day, simply waiting to be recognised for what it is. Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  9. Jul 20

    Creative Retirement Series 1 of 4: Is It Too Late To Be Creative?

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a cup of tea and come into my studio under the palm fronds. Is it too late to be creative? Have you been asking yourself that question lately? Maybe not out loud, but quietly, in the back of your mind, like a whisper of curiosity. After 34 years of working with thousands of accomplished women from nursing, teaching, healthcare and leadership, I want to tell you something that perhaps nobody else has told you. And if they have, perhaps it's time to believe it. It's not too late. It was never too late. And you were never without it. This episode is for you if you've retired or are approaching retirement, and creating something with your own hands keeps coming to mind. If you once loved making things and somewhere along the way simply stopped. If you've been wondering whether that part of you, the one who used to draw and create, is still there. She is. She never left. In this episode:  🌿 What creativity actually looks like in everyday life  🌿 Why the creative part of you went quiet, and why it was never your fault  🌿 Why this moment in your life is the perfect invitation to come home to yourself What did you love to create when you were younger? I'd love to hear from you at Your story might help another woman to remember too. Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  10. Season 1 Trailer

    Welcome to Your Creative Identity Transformation

    Send us Fan Mail Pour yourself a tropical tea and settle in. The cicadas are singing their ancient song, and you've just stepped into my studio under the palm fronds of Far North Queensland. For 35 years I've walked beside accomplished women from caring and analytical professions as they awaken their creative identity in retirement. And here on my table, little Kelly Cuddlee Koala is coming to life in my second picture book, in watercolour, ink and coloured pencil. This podcast is for you if you've spent decades caring for everyone else and now find yourself asking, "Who am I now?" Like the turning pages of a storybook, each episode brings you a little closer to the answer, through the whimsical world of illustration and the stories behind my artworks. Creativity in retirement isn't a luxury. It's the bridge between who you were and who you're becoming. Follow the show so you never miss the next chapter. Would you like to keep going? My book '12 Colored Pencil Techniques' is a lovely place to start, one small step at a time. https://amzn.asia/d/0dzA80Tl Follow the show so you never miss an episode. 📧 cindy@drawpj.com 🌐 CindyWider.com | DrawPJ.com Let's keep that creative ember glowing.

  • 1 Trailer
    9 Episodes

Trailer

About

For 35 years, I've been encouraging and guiding women in retirement as they discover the joy of drawing and colouring, often for the very first time since childhood. I'm Cindy Wider, a multi-award-winning Australian artist, author and fine art storybook illustrator, and I believe every woman has a creative life waiting for her. Close your eyes and imagine a world you've invented with your very own hands, stroke by stroke. Little clothed characters from the Golden Age of Illustration, and childhood dreams coming to life on the page. Pour yourself a tropical tea and listen along as I welcome you into my studio under the palm fronds of Far North Queensland. On my table, Kelly Cuddlee Koala and her family have just arrived in tropical paradise, and my second picture book is coming to life in watercolour, ink and coloured pencil. Are you asking, "Who am I now?" Episode by episode, I'll share the stories behind my artworks and show you that drawing and colouring aren't just for the gifted few. They're for you too, and it's never too late to begin. Would you like to see the artworks I talk about? Watch along on YouTube at @CindyWiderArtist. Your next, and most beautiful, chapter starts right here.

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