"About Maggie and This Work"
I've spent 35 years as a practicing artist and 15 years as a therapist, and I've come to understand that these aren't separate vocations—they're two expressions of the same deep belief: that we heal through presence, through process, through the courage to create even when (especially when) we don't know what will emerge.
As an artist, I know intimately the voice of the inner critic, the fear of the blank page, the way perfectionism can strangle joy. I know what it's like to struggle, to start over, to make something that will never be "good enough" and to love it anyway.
As a therapist, I understand how our creative wounds form—the childhood moments when we learned our art wasn't good enough, the cultural messages that tell us creativity must be productive, the way capitalism has colonized even our joy. I know how to hold space for what's tender, what's stuck, what's trying to emerge.
I created Mindful Making because I needed it. I was tired of the relentless productivity culture that had crept even into my art practice. I wanted space to create with no agenda, surrounded by others doing the same. I wanted to practice what I preach as a therapist: that our worth isn't tied to our output, that process matters more than product, that slowing down is a radical act.
Now, I hold this space for others—not as someone who has transcended creative struggle, but as an elder who has learned how to stay with it, how to be gentle with it, how to let it teach me. I bring my artist's understanding of the creative process and my therapist's capacity to hold whatever arises without needing to fix it.
This work is my resistance. My offering. My practice.
If you're tired of the hustle, hungry for authentic connection, and ready to reclaim your creativity from the productivity machine—welcome. There's space for you here.
Mindful Making: A Creative Sanctuary
A monthly gathering for your hands, your heart, and your creative spirit
In a world that constantly asks What did you produce? What can you sell? How can you monetize that?—we're reclaiming our right to create for no reason at all.
Mindful Making is an act of quiet resistance.
This is not a class with outcomes to measure. There's no productivity metric, no finished product required, no hustle. Instead, this is a sanctuary—a radical space where your worth isn't tied to your output, where the process matters more than the product, and where making something with your hands becomes a revolutionary act of presence.
In a culture that commodifies everything, including our creativity, we're choosing differently. We're choosing connection over consumption. Slowness over speed. Being over doing.
What to Expect
Each month, we gather for 2 hours of unhurried creative time at the museum. We begin together with a guided meditation and body scan—gently stepping out of the relentless pace of daily life and into the spaciousness of creative presence. Then, you'll have just under 2 full hours to work on whatever project you bring—knitting, drawing, writing, collage, embroidery, woodcarving, anything that lets your hands remember their wisdom.
There's no instruction, no competition, no judgment. Just your work, your pace, your creative unfolding. We trust the process, not the outcome.
We'll pause midway for a brief moment of connection—because making beauty alongside others is how we weave a different kind of world. Then we return to our making. At the end, you'll have time to reflect through journaling, followed by a closing meditation to honor whatever emerged, finished or unfinished.
The Quiet Revolution
Every time you choose to create something that serves no "productive" purpose, you're pushing back against a system that wants to extract value from every moment of your life. Every stitch, every brushstroke, every word written for the simple pleasure of writing it—these are small rebellions.
And small rebellions, practiced together, change everything.
When we gather to make art that won't be sold, projects that may never be "finished," beauty that exists simply because we decided it should—we're modeling a different way of being. We're saying: My hands have worth beyond what they can produce. My time has value beyond what it can earn. My creativity belongs to me.
This is how we change the world: one person at a time, one creative act at a time, slowly rebuilding our capacity for presence, beauty, and genuine human connection.
What to Bring
Whatever creative project you're working on or want to start
Your own supplies and materials
Permission to work slowly, imperfectly, joyfully
An openness to the process, not the product
Yourself, exactly as you are—tired, curious, longing for something different
Who This Is For
Anyone exhausted by the hustle. Anyone who's forgotten what it feels like to make something just because. Anyone craving authentic connection in a world of performative productivity. Anyone who senses that the small act of sitting down to create—without rushing, without judgment, without profit motive—is actually a profound political and spiritual statement.
You don't need to be an artist. You just need to believe that beauty, slowness, and presence matter. That you matter, beyond what you produce.
Join us for Mindful Making—where creativity isn't capital, where your presence is enough, and where we practice building the world we want to live in, one mindful stitch at a time.
We can't optimize our way to a more beautiful world. But we can create it, slowly and together.
Every 4th Sunday 1-3 pm at Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture in Spokane, WA
Register here: https://sales.northwestmuseum.org/calendar.aspx?view=c&et=p+c
Coming soon: Virtual Monthly Mindful Making
"Creativity and healing aren't separate—they're the same impulse toward wholeness."