I’m no longer afraid of Motherhood!

Hey creators! This is Aramis Hamer. And you are listening to the A.O. Blogcast. Okay, let's talk about it! I sent out the email. Shout out to the E-fam for hitting reply and chatting with ya girl. Y'all, I am no longer afraid of motherhood. This is so exciting! Okay, it has truly been a long time coming. First of all, let me get some disclaimers out the way. Okay?

One: I am NOT pregnant.

Two: I'm not getting pregnant any time super soon.

But I'm glad y'all are excited. I'm glad y'all are excited for me. It just makes me so happy to think that when I do make that announcement, and I do publicly share that private moment in my life. There's so many people behind the scenes, rooting for me and cheering me on in the process. So thank you. Thank you so much. And this has been a long time coming, y'all I shared a lot more in the email talking about how Andy has always wanted kids. I really wasn't sure if I want it kids. It's just like, mothers are amazing.

Oh my God, my mom is truly incredible. You probably saw some of the little fun moments that we had in Jamaica. Shout out to my mom, y'all. We just recently got back from Jamaica on January 17. She had a wedding, we were celebrating her love. And I vlogged the entire thing. So if you missed that video, head on over to YouTube to check out the Jamaica vlog. I really really enjoyed making that YouTube video.

What you can expect with the new shop.

One of the things that I was doing in that video is wearing the satin robes. Okay, so this brings me to the new shop that's gonna be launching. Are y'all ready? Like, omg, hold on! Let me know in the comments if you ready. Okay, here's what you can expect with the new shop. It’s gonna be one word: STREAMLINE. Really streamline and easy for you to find all the different things that you want and that you're looking for and really creating a structure so that you can even know what to decide. I know sometimes for me, when I'm looking for something, I can get overwhelmed. Okay, just overwhelmed. There's so many options, there's so much art, there's so many products, you know, so really, this has been a tool where now I can group all of the products, all the works of art that I've been creating over this time period and making that available to you all. And I'm gonna tell you all this, it is a lot of inventory. It made me look back I was like wow, you girl has been creating!

How the 30s are different than the 20s.

Can we take a minute and talk about how the 30s is lit?! I mean, like, literally, okay. If somebody would have told me that when you enter your 30s you just feel so much more confident, so much more free. You give so many less f*cks. If somebody would have told me I would have been excited for this time, versus the world making women feel like oh, your biological clock is ticking. Like our whole obsession with youth. First of all, I still feel young. Okay, but I know I'm in a completely different mindset than I was in my 20s. Especially my early 20s. Like, oh, my god, boo. If you are younger than 27 right now, I send you all my love. I send you all my light right now, because I know there’s a lot of confusion. You're trying to figure out who you want to be, what you want to do. There's so much pressure, there's so many options. This is what I want you to do: inhale…exhale…It’s gone be alright. Okay, it's gonna be alright. The clarity is gonna come with time. The clarity is also going to come with action as well. What I've learned is that you start gaining clarity in the doing.

Now, what I want somebody to know is that it's okay for it to ebb and flow. It's gonna ebb and flow. Because if y'all watched the vlogs, then, you know, one minute she feels crystal clear. The next minute, she's like, what are we doing here? What's the game plan because I'm completely lost!

How the Artist Residency in Motherhood reframed my mind

So I talked about this in the newsletter, the Artists Residency in Motherhood, which is a super dope movement that was founded by Lenka Clayton. She's an artist, she's a mother, she is truly- I feel - a mother's advocate. She just reframed the entire process for me, where I felt like I didn't have to abandon my art in order to have a family. And also I didn't have to abandon my idea of wanting a family, for the sake of my art, you know? I can really have both at the same time. And so as I'm thinking about what the future will look like with a family and having a newborn. I'm like: Okay, I'm probably not going to be in the studio. I'm going to be chillin on a couch in a robe, breastfeeding, you know? How do I create a space where I can still share and that's okay, and that's still also in the context of my art? Now granted, I’m not gonna be a mommy vlogger or anything like that, not at all. I'm still gonna be creative and making my art but I feel like that's just another part of my creative process is letting people know that you aren't alone on the journey. And what better way than to let mothers know that they aren't alone on their journey of motherhood, trying to balance life, time, being a mother, being an artist and being an entrepreneur.

There's so many of y'all who's listening to this, who are mothers, who are artists and entrepreneurs. We can be on this journey together. And I feel like, I can share some tools that's been helping me, y'all can share some tools that's been helping you as well. And we can really even just foster a deeper community over here. So I'm like, let me create grace for myself, because I already know, I'm gonna be a little frustrated. It just is what it is. And I'm not even afraid of that, any more, I'm just embracing it. And I'm also knowing that it doesn't have to be frustrating. What would your life look like if you were a mom where you’re breastfeeding every two hours, you know? I'm like, okay, cool, I can batch my content, I can turn my website into a way where it's doing dropship and where I'm not manually shipping out orders as much. And I'm also fostering a community of patrons who really want to see an artist thrive, while still taking care of herself, taking care of her family, and also taking care of her community.

A patron is different than a customer.

Now, can they be both? Absolutely. But when I think about the customer, that's somebody who wants the item, right? Like, they want the robe or the print or the clutch bag, and then they get the item and then they carry on their way. But a patron is somebody who is doing a long term investment into what this artist is doing. They see that creator and they’re like: I see you going somewhere and I want to be apart of the movement with you, and I want to contribute to your expansion. And you are worthy of that and I want to contribute to what you're doing. So I'm just super grateful for my patrons and they continue to affirm me every day, on this journey when it can feel heavy, y'all. It can feel real heavy. I talked about it in one of my YouTube videos where I was saying that my art business is draining my creativity.

Building the structural foundation for a stress-less life.

In building that structural foundation, it's made me less afraid of motherhood. I'm like: Okay, Aramis. You can do this. This is possible for you and you can do it, beautifully with a little less stress. Of course, nothing's gonna be stress free. We're not even here to live a completely stress free life. But how I said in my TED Talk, “maybe we could live a stress-less life”. And actually, this gives me a moment to say that the TED talk is available on YouTube. So if anybody wants to check out the replay of that it is now available - the individual TED Talk. Now, I know the entire live stream was available on YouTube, but that replay was like a five hour video, and you gotta scrub through it to find where my talk is. Now they have the individual videos of the TED Talk. So I definitely encourage you to go check that out if you missed it.

Thank you, boo. I appreciate you for being here. But if you do want to go the next step, stay tuned for the shop that's going to launch on February 3. That’s where you can get anything, all of that stuff directly supports my work and directly supports this vision and goal of what I'm trying to do. And if you really want to go a step deeper and support my journey on a long term basis, you can definitely join the movement over there on Patreon. Y'all that is where the Empire is, okay? I feel like that's where the entourage, gang-gang, where they like: Girl we are here with you, we rockin with you! What I realized is that all I need is 1000 true fans, and they are over there on Patreon. And I'm just super duper grateful for that community.

And just a reminder, if you are a part of the Patreon community, Hey, boo! Hey, co creators! Just a reminder: SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 12 AT 2P.M, is our next create date where we’re hanging out via ZOOM. We're going to chop it up. Let's talk honey. Let's talk about this motherhood. Let's talk about it on the Zoom call.

And also, if you aren't apart of our Patreon community, that's all right. You know, we love sharing the love around so you can join me for the YouTube livestream. That's going to be Monday, February 6. I'm actually talking about my YouTube journey over there. And I'm going to be shouting out some of the other artists and creators who are over there supporting me on Patreon. So mark your calendars for those two dates.

Thank you all so much for listening to me rant and rave and I hope you all are excited. Let me know in the comments below. Are you a mom? Are you an artist? Are you an entrepreneur? Let me know about your journey. Maybe some of your fears about motherhood and maybe some advice if you are a mom and you feel like you got some advice to share. I would love to hear it. Thank you once again and I will talk to you all next time. Peace!