Artist
Awakening the Spirit Within
Artist is thoughtful in suggesting ways to uplift one’s creative spirit.
Acting coach Jocelyn Jones’s career guide Artist shares advice for tapping into one’s creativity and living a fulfilling life.
Part memoir, part creative guidebook, Artist emphasizes the law of attraction and the importance of harnessing higher energy to achieve one’s desires. Stories are woven into the book’s training exercises and practices, which include meditation, journaling, and spending time in nature. There’s also practical guidance for exploring one’s dreams and setting progressive goals. The scattered prompts encourage thinking about how to process one’s emotions and react to situations; they draw parallels between how actors create their characters and how people create their lives.
Indeed, several of the exercises and anecdotes are geared toward actors, though they also proffer general lessons for taking control of one’s thoughts and emotions. Thus, the book draws a connection between the skills needed to be a good actor and those required to live a good life: active attention to details is beneficial, it says, regardless of one’s vocation. Jones expresses conviction that the most important educators are nature and the self.
The topical chapters cover the differences between thinking one knows something and knowing that one knows it, learning to notice what is without feelings attached, and living in the moment. Jones’s personal stories of growing up among artists, rebelling against the strictures of school, finding wisdom and connection in trees, and building her own life as an acting coach and creative consultant are mixed in with wider observations, such as that people are energetic beings who are more powerful than the stories, fears, egos, and personalities that they tend to label themselves with.
Much is left to the audience, with Jones empowering people to make discoveries on their own. Her book suggests activities that might be helpful for discernment and understanding one’s motivations and desires, but many of its encouragements focus on general well being, like understanding the physical, mental, and spiritual aspects of life, spending time in nature, and cultivating an ideal home environment. As the book goes on, it places increasing focus on Jones’s own stories about her work and the deaths of her parents; these are presented as lessons about the brevity of life and the importance of making memories and collecting more stories to tell.
Geared toward those with an interest in the creative arts, the self-help text Artist is thoughtful in suggesting ways to uplift one’s creative spirit.
Reviewed by
Sarah White
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
