I recently returned from a Nia training in Portland, Oregon. There, I spent a wonderful week dancing, learning, and connecting with like-minded movers and dancers.

I also shared my oracle cards.

When my husband suggested I bring them with me, I wasn’t intending to share them. Well, maybe I would share them with my host or bring them out during a break. Maybe I would just use them for guidance in the mornings or evenings.

The cards had other ideas. One morning, as I was getting ready, I was checking in with myself: Is there anything else I need to bring? 

The answer came: Bring your oracle cards. 

I don’t have to share them, I thought. But then I pulled a card and got this:

The truth card. I had to laugh. It was the most appropriate card I could have picked. I was in the middle of the Nia Blue Belt training, which focuses on communication and intimacy. And one of the elements in the training is truth-telling, starting with telling myself the truth about myself.

I think I have to share them, I thought. And so, during our open sharing time that afternoon (about what we’ve learned that day, what has come up for us in general, anything goes), I told the story and shared this card, passing it around the circle. Several of my fellow trainees later asked to see more of the cards.

I felt incredibly vulnerable after sharing. These cards have become part of my story. They took over three years from start to finish, from the first line drawn to final printing. I initially created them as part of a personal growth program, but I finished them on my own terms.

I recognize that sharing them in a circle like that is a way of promoting them as a product, but that wasn’t my original intention. My intention was simply to share my art. My art and my creativity is part of who I am, part of my truth. I shared my art twice during the training: the first time was the vision board that I created before the training, and the second was the cards.

I did receive some orders as a result of sharing the cards, the first of which was the last set of my first printing from two years ago. So I ordered more sets. You can find them in my Etsy shop here.

I’m realizing how important sharing is in my own creative process. Yes, I share on social media and whatnot, but it’s also important I share in a variety of forums. So I’m setting an intention to share more of my cards and their stories and meanings here.

Yes, there is a vulnerability in sharing my work. But there is also this: by giving myself permission to share my own work and creativity, I also connected with other people about theirs. People came up to me afterward and shared about their art, how they hoped to get back into it. Art can be deeply personal, and it also has a universal language that can speak to the creativity within each person.