Play Date with Becka Rahn 

EPISODE LINKS:

Find all the things Becka teaches on her website.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:

Annmarie: Welcome back to I Used to Be Fun and our next Play Date. Playdate is someone I've known for a long time, though it's been a far too long time since we've actually sat down and had a cup of coffee. So I am super excited she is here today. Becka and I met years ago when we both worked at Textile Center in Minneapolis, and since then she's built a wonderfully creative life around making, teaching, experimenting, and following her curiosity, which I am a big fan of. And today, what I hope we're gonna end up talking about is things like the exhausting business of maybe, our worlds can feel a little smaller than they used to, and what happens to our moods and our brain when we make something with our hands. Then finally, what it actually looks like to build a life that makes room for creativity while doing all the other things we need and want to do. So Becka Rahn, welcome to I Used to Be Fun. I'm so glad you're here

Becka: Me too. I am glad to be having another chat.

Annmarie: About you in the intro, but I would like to hear right from you, what is it that you're doing for a job, for, your life, and then what is it that you also do for fun?

Becka: Oh, yeah. Okay. Let's see. I have a whole, professional spiel that I do about how I'm a full-time teaching artist. Really that sort of, boils down into chaos mostly. I... So we met, at a nine-to-five job. I used to have one of those, and I decided that I really wanted to do something else, more for me and less for other people. And so I've invented this job where I don't do the same thing two days in a row. I mean, you're familiar with this. And I kind of follow my brain a little more. Like, what feels good today? Like, what do I need to do today that makes me happy to be doing this job? 'Cause the minute I start hating it is, why are we here? Why would I be doing that? So, it's, it's a lot of fun and a lot of balls to keep in the air.

Annmarie: And an actual artist. I shouldn't

Becka: Yep

Annmarie: Two, but you do create art, but then you

Becka: Yes

Annmarie: How to do it. You have had an Etsy store for 25 years?

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: Oh my goodness, that is a

Becka: 20 years, yep

Annmarie: Early adopter in the Etsy world.

Becka: Yeah. Yeah. Etsy opened in June of 2005, and I started my shop in August of 2005. Yeah. It didn't know what it was at that point, so

Annmarie: Doesn't, but we'll get into that later. And, talking about that, doing something that you find fun, I think that's so important when we're in self-employment because it is so much work, and if we're not working, we're not making money. It isn't a, there isn't a salary coming in the door, so you do need to find fun, but also joy. So let's slide back to January of 2026, and I remember a newsletter came out, and you said that your theme for the year was bring more joy, obviously made my ears perk up, perk up because that's pretty much our playground around here. So tell me, what made you choose that as your theme for the year? And now that we're all the way, into nearly fourth quarter, how does it... How is it showing up? I'm gonna do that again. So how is it showing

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: What does it

Becka: Okay

Annmarie: Now to be bringing more joy? And I know we're just- we don't have to talk about it, but you guys have had a hard year, so I'm sure that you've had to make a big effort to find that joy as well

Becka: Yeah. So I started, somebody's advice about running your business and all that you should sit down and you should set goals at the beginning of the year, and this is, not how I operate. It's, it... I really kind of resisted for a long time, and then I started to kind of be like, "Okay, there are things about this I don't like the way they are working, so I'm just gonna start trying stuff." And so this was one of the things I was like, "All right. I'm gonna try doing this goal-setting thing." so I made a spreadsheet, and I started. And I realized that, defining I'm going to do X number of whatever every year was really stifling for me. Like, that just, that was a horrible kind of a goal. And so instead, I kind of went with this idea of having a theme. So for a couple of years my theme was, "Use what you have, do it better." And that was, kind of just post-COVID, still trying to figure out, what my job and my life looked like now versus then,? And so that worked for me for a couple of years. That was the theme. And this year we sat down, we had a terrible winter just personally. We had a lot of losses and just a lot going on, and I looked at that, "Use what you have, do it better," and I was like, "no." I've gotta give myself, a little grace this year. Like, we're just gonna just try to keep coasting. And so I was like, "All right. What is the theme then?" and bring more joy just was the thing that kept, bubbling to the surface. And we talked a little bit, the big manifestation of that was we got a puppy. And it was, yeah, a lot of joy, a lot of chaos, a lot of distraction, which was kind of good, we needed that. But the way I look at the theme is it's not like, put it on a fancy thing and stick it on your wall kind of a theme. It's like my rubric that I look at everything that I'm doing, and I say, "Is this serving that theme or not?" and it makes it really easy when I get approached with like, "Do this collaboration, do this whatever." I go right to that theme and I'm like, "Is this going to bring more joy to me or to someone else?" and there have been a lot of things this year that I'm like, "Nope." I can... It makes it so easy to just say, "Nope, that's not gonna work for me."

Annmarie: Of the women that I've talked to are all in our second half of our lives, and we're looking at actually even having just a rubric like that. How do I make these decisions? How do I make this feel good? And I also love that you said, "Will this bring me more joy or other people more joy?" Because while we don't always have to be in service, we always have to be in service to ourselves to a certain point, but there are things that we know will make the world a little bit brighter, and sometimes we can push through for ourselves. So I love all of that. And so do you feel like now, this many months in, that's been successful?

Becka: I think so. I, it hasn't, manifested in the way I was sort of thinking of at the beginning of the year with the big sort of, theme. It's been a lot of little tiny moments, which I kind of love. Like, it's, it's little bits of things that you find yourself, laughing out loud about. And I was like, "Oh, yeah, look, that's the thing. That's the thing today." and maybe having a theme like that has made me notice that more, those little tiny things, and not looking for, whatever it is that I'm going to do or buy or find that's gonna, change my life. It's the little tiny things

Annmarie: A big piece of even my year. Like, I've really spent some time, stop thinking that you need to have this big grandiose goal, and stay in the moment, and really see those things. Because they are what make our day-to-day life better. Like, you might still want to, sell so many widgets, or you might want to, redecorate your kitchen or remodel your kitchen, but have to have those little things that make every day feel more... Well, what's the word I'm looking for? Thank goodness for editors. Well,

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: Know, make every day more enjoyable. Let's just say that. And I think feeling those, and I do think bringing attention to it is exactly what that theme was supposed to do. Yes, it helped you figure out, do I wanna apply for this show? Do I want to exhibit at that But it also helped you look and see what was already happening that was good. And in a year with a lot of loss, you need those pick-me-ups, right? I think this ties to

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: You've written some fantastic blog posts this year, by the way. And one of them was you were talking

Becka: Thank

Annmarie: Loving people who love

Becka: You

Annmarie: And so people who are completely, unabashedly, unembarrassed by their enthusiasm. And I think so many of us take what's weird about us and want to shut it down and not let the world see. So talk about why you think it's important that we let ourselves love the, what we love openly.

Becka: Ugh. I, this is one of the things I think that, for me, forever, lifelong, this has been a thing. Like, people who get excited about stuff, something about that just, lights up my brain. It, watching other people's enthusiasm, sharing a little bit of that with somebody. And I think it goes along with, I blame my dad mostly. I have like no problem with self-confidence, and this is one of the things that I know that there are people who don't like that about me. But I have never been somebody who is worried about, what other people are gonna think of me or anything else like that. And so seeing that sort of kindred spirit in somebody who's like, "I don't care if people think it's weird," like, "I totally am obsessed with whatever it is, and make my whole self about it." Or even little things like, "I dyed my hair purple and I don't care if somebody thinks that's weird." I sort of accidentally did that this year. My hairdresser, who I love, tried out a new color. She didn't know what would happen, and it turned out to be sort of the color of grape candy, and we both, got done and looked at my hair and we were like, "Oh, okay. That wasn't what we thought it was gonna be." And after I got over the initial, "Oh, that was not what I, was, anticipating," I loved it. Like, it, there was something just like, yeah, I'm gonna totally own that, and it was serendipity and that's awesome

Annmarie: Right? Like those spontaneous things that happen that we aren't expecting,

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: All of a sudden it turns out to be this great thing. I have another girlfriend who, one of my closest friends dyes her hair purple as well, and loves it, has never stopped doing it, and it's worked into part of her brand now and everything. So I do think that's so important. My thing is LEGO. You can see behind me there's LEGO on every shelf, little mini

Becka: Oh.

Annmarie: Everything like that. And people say, "Oh, you must have loved LEGO as a kid," and I said, "I never played LEGO once until I was in my 40s." and now I just can't get enough of it, and it's that feeling of almost freedom to just let yourself play and be and, wear your Sesame Street T-shirt to a Kermit exhibit. I think somebody I know did that. I love

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: Think

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: In the blog post, right? Like Sesame Street T-shirt, Kermit in the background, so that's fantastic. Let's switch gears a little bit to another blog post. I think this maybe came out in your most recent, newsletter, or recent when we're recording this. And you wrote a post about the exhausting business of maybe, and about how much of your working life as an artist and a teaching artist spent preparing for something that might happen. So applying for things, proposing, submitting grants, planning, and then you have to wait. It struck me because I think you don't have to be an artist to know that feeling. Like so many of us seem to live with one eye permanently fixed on what's next. I wanna know how you think it affects our day-to-day life when we live in that space of maybe or always looking to what's next, and if you can, if you have any lessons to how do we bring that back around and find joy back in the moment? That's a tough question

Becka: Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's been a hard thing to sort of figure out how to navigate. Like, when I decided that this was gonna be the job that I invented for myself, I... That was not a thing that was really on my radar. Like, realizing that most of what I do is, proposing things and hoping that somebody else says yes. And, having to have permission to do what I wanna do is, not the fun part at all. And so I got to a point, you work on this for a few years of this endless cycle of proposing, and asking, and applying, and writing, and all of this, that I used to get really excited about things, and I would get so, involved and emotionally sort of invested. And then you don't get it, and you are devastated. And I had that happen a few too many times, and I was like, "Okay, we can't... I can't live like this." and so

Annmarie: Good for

Becka: I don't anymore, which in a, in a way is really... It's, it's less fun. I wanna get excited about stuff. I wanna be invested in it. I wanna dream big about how this is gonna be a really cool thing. And I kinda set that boundary with myself and like, "Nope, we're gonna get the application in, and then I'm gonna try to just forget about it. Just let it go and be what it is." and, I don't love that. I don't love that I have to sort of stifle that enthusiasm. But sort of for my mental health, it's a lot healthier. It's a lot... I can keep going with my day and go on to the next things. Kind of on the flip side of that, one sort of positive thing that comes out of that is I, because I'm not like totally personally invested in it, I'll apply for things that I don't really feel like I have a chance of getting at all. I'm a little bit fearless because I'm like, "What? They're gonna tell me no." Like, most of them tell me no anyway, so the, it has become like a no big deal sort of thing. So like I, when I wrote that blog post, I had just finished up, I think I applied to two different grants, and I had sent a bunch of things into various juries for art and for, selling some work and whatever. I've heard back from zero of them at this point. But a bunch of those, the grants that, one of the grants that popped up, it literally like on a random afternoon, I was like, "I'm not doing anything this afternoon. Maybe I'll apply for this one." Like, it was not part of a big, grand scheme. I was just like, "What's the worst that can happen?" You know? I, maybe I'll get it. I don't know

Annmarie: Really like both your honesty about the fact that you would love to sink into the enthusiasm a little bit more, and I get that in putting out books, right? There's so many authors who build up to this launch day of a book, and maybe that launch day doesn't look like you want it to, or maybe the book of your heart isn't the one that resonates with readers, and it is really hard to divorce yourself from that. And you do need a little bit of enthusiasm to keep you pushing. But it sounds like what you found on the other side is this fearlessness, and that is something that can also push too, because I am one of those people that I'm not afraid of no. I don't like people to be rude, I don't like people to be disrespectful, but no is not a big deal. The less invested I am in it, the easier the no is, so I totally understand that. Like, you're pitching to agents, or you're pitching to publishers or whatever it may be in my world, and I have to sit back and say, "Well, no is just not right now," or, "This is not a right fit," or, "It has nothing to do with my proposal or the quality of something," but it is hard to live in there. So we're gonna, we're gonna sit with that. Fearlessness is absolutely wonderful. Being afraid of no a great thing, not being afraid of no. And also, we can mourn a little bit of that enthusiasm, because it does... It is hard to have both, But then I suppose when it comes in, if you do get it, you get chosen for that juried show or the grant, then the enthusiasm is there and available to you, so. Also in that blog post, before I move on to the next thing, was something that I can relate to so deeply, which is you said your solution was just throw more Becka at it. I think anybody, any woman, I think first of all, but particularly if you've been self-employed or been an artist, is you just think, "Oh, I just need to do more. I need to hustle more. I need to try harder." And so have you learned to recognize the difference before I can between I can stretch a little here and there simply is no more Becka available? More

Becka: No.

Annmarie: I love it

Becka: I think writing that blog post was one of those moments for me where I was like, "Yeah, I really can't do this." Like, I rarely say that. And I was like, "Yeah, this is a point where I have to do something else." I feel like as women and as competent women and women who like to have your own business, do your own thing, whatever, we get sort of, used to thinking of ourselves as like, an endless resource. There's always more of me. So like, there's no bottom to that well. And I, this year, I think it's been very recent, I kind of hit that, no, this one I can't fix just me.

Annmarie: It always

Becka: And it was something silly. Like, it was, it was the little tiny thing that just toppled the whole week of one little tiny thing. And yeah, it had the absolute simplest solution, which was I just emailed somebody and asked for help, and like the problem went away.

Annmarie: Because

Becka: But

Annmarie: With that. No, she's shaking her head no

Becka: No.

Annmarie: I'm not either. And, I

Becka: Absolutely not.

Annmarie: "Where is that coming from?" Because I deeply believe in other people's expertise. So if I'm gonna do, create a new website, I'm gonna reach out to people that I know that are fantastic graphic designers, that are, back-end web designers, those types of things. I will, but it also feels like I just bring everything in and think, "Oh, I'm gonna just, I'm gonna beat this. I'm gonna win." And then I get to that point where you do have to step

Becka: Mm-hmm.

Annmarie: And say, "Hey, listen, somebody else's genius is over here. Let them do it." But I haven't figured it out yet either, quite frankly. We'll just leave that one

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: Okay,

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: Still have things to learn. Our time on planet Earth is not done, still things to learn. So speaking of time on planet Earth, in our email correspondence, we were talking... Well, you were mentioning that... I think you've already mentioned it today, too, about life looking a little different before COVID, where you traveled around the country teaching at different workshops and residencies, now you're finding it a lot harder to get to step outside that existing circle and get invited to new rooms or maybe even applying for new rooms. And I think so many women, I've talked to so many people, that feel like their life is a little bit smaller after COVID without even consciously choosing it. Have you really thought about, what it's gonna take to start reaching out again, or maybe you don't want to anymore?

Becka: It's, I think that's been probably, if I'm gonna step into my, Becka's business kind of, shoes, that's been the thing I've struggled with this year so far, has been like my biggest, hurdle or whatever it is I used to, the whole world was different, pre-pandemic. I used to do a lot of, teaching with guilds and groups and all kinds of things where I was interacting with groups of people. And a lot of, those organizations don't exist anymore, or they've gone to a different format, or whatever economically is going on, they don't bring in teachers anymore or whatever like this. And I miss doing those things, and I know that other people miss, participating in those things. And the, it's been a thing I've thought about a lot and tried to like brainstorm and come up with ways to sort of combat it a lot, which is I wanna figure out how to make those connections again, and they're not gonna look the same. Like I think one of the best things I could have possibly done, in the middle of COVID, because there was a period of like two years where I felt like my artistic practice, my business was going exactly where I wanted it to, and it felt amazing, and I was like on a train going down the tracks. Like, it felt awesome. And it hit like a certain point, and every single thing I had lined up for

Annmarie: That

Becka: Solid years got canceled. Every one. And it was, it was devastating. I would just sit at the same table in my studio and just like stare out the window and watch people walk by. I was like, "I don't know what to do." everything that I've built up just crashed. And I did all kinds of like weird little projects that I would never have taken time to do just kind of in desperation to have something to occupy my brain. And so I sort of embraced the whole idea of Zoom and teaching on Zoom, and I was like, "I'm just gonna figure it out. I have nothing else going on. I have nothing occupying my time." So I set up camera equipment, and I did all kind- like every experiment, hours' worth of video recorded and thrown away because I was like, "Oh, that's not gonna work." I think it was probably the best sort of haphazard choice I could have made, because there are a lot of opportunities now that I have sort of the skills and tools to be able to make a hybrid thing and do a whatever with the Zoom or something else that I think a lot of artists especially didn't. It was a direction they didn't go in. And so I'm hoping I can leverage that, into something. But I tell you what, the first few classes I taught that way in this new kind of Zoom whatever, I would... I felt like I crumpled in a pile on the floor after class, because you're teaching now to a computer screen of little black squares. And the energy level and the, attention you have to pay when you don't have people in front of you to talk to, is, it, no kidding. Like it is a whole different thing.

Annmarie: So hard to

Becka: And so that's a

Annmarie: I'm

Becka: Big learning curve.

Annmarie: The talking to a computer screen thing, and I look at so many of you that are good at it, and I think what a skill to have, which is exactly what I was thinking when you were talking about everything crashing. And then you're always been tech savvy. You're not afraid of technology. And to, it might not have felt at, it at the time, but you pivoted to something now you can see that's a, took one of your zone of geniuses and brought it into the love of textile and fabric and the things you could share with people, and it will give you an advantage, and especially if you've also figured out how to teach to little Black, little heads on the screen, right? Right? So

Becka: Little black squares, yeah

Annmarie: On or whatever, it, that... I feed off of feedback in a room. I know you do, too. And so learning how to get that feedback online is a whole nother thing. But to your point to where you started that is nothing does look the same, and at post-pandemic,

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: It sounds like, you've made the pivot, and now you're figuring out, how much of it do I love? Where do I wanna go? Which is kind of our choices in second half of our life, too, is like, do I love this? Do I not? Does this bring me joy? Does this not? And how am I gonna integrate all of that? And nobody understands that falling into a pile of mush at the end. I put out five books between 2020 and 2023, and so there were no reader events. There were no book shows. There were no conferences. And so by the time I did my first reader event, I was practically done with my series, and I think I'd forgotten how to talk to people. So, I'm like, "Oh, yes, book. Book here," you know? So it's taken, it's taken me a long time, too, to get back in that flow, and now I'm trying to do the same thing you're doing is like, "Okay, how much of this do I wanna do online?" Not so much the reader events, obviously, but my business. And how much of it do I wanna try and bring a little bit more of that analog piece back into it? And I think it's a fair question for us to keep asking. So you

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: Mentioned teaching a whole lot here, this came up kind of as a side note in something else that you mentioned. One of the things I just mentioned as well is that there's nothing better than witnessing somebody's aha moment. So in your case, it's probably like, "Oh, I can do this. I can sew. I can make a book." I know you've been doing a lot of work with paper of lately. So tell me why that matters so much to you. I mean, it makes me ridiculously happy to see somebody's light bulb go on. Why does it matter to you?

Becka: Yeah. I had, I had a class, what, a week ago, teaching embroidered monograms, cute little making retro style handkerchiefs, sweet little class, so much fun, the loveliest group of humans in that room. But one of the students, we got two-thirds of the way through class and she was like, "I didn't cry.

Annmarie: Oh

Becka: I was sure I was gonna come in here and cry, and I didn't cry. I'm totally signing up for another class with you." You know? Like it made my entire week. And the whole room, the whole group laughed and everybody smiled and it like, it was a bring more joy moment for everybody. And that, I mean, there's nothing better. Nothing better

Annmarie: A keynote or teaching something, if somebody cries in the room, I'm like, "It's a win. I made somebody cry." and what that just means is somebody sat and got in touch with who they are and felt strongly with what was being talked about and, 'cause I'm not a, I'm not a terrible person. I don't wanna just make people cry. But I think it's, it's fun to see just the opposite. You're like, "I didn't cry. Oh, I did make somebody cry." So, this is really a piece about creativity and sharing that. Do you... Talk a little bit about what that's like to be in a room with people who are, all sharing that level of creativity, and then I'm wondering if, know, how do you view your teaching now? Is it part of your creative practice? Does it feel separate from your own personal creative practice? How does that all work together?

Becka: Well, I feel like it's all completely interconnected. A lot... I never set out wanting to be an artist that had a agent and was represented in a gallery. That's like, that's just not the kind of art I make. A lot of when I started to figure out, hey, I think I like this, making art kinda thing, a lot of the projects I was doing were community art projects. Get a whole huge group of people in the room and make some stuff together, because it went along with the teaching. Like, I have a degree in education. And before that, I started my degree in theater, so like, I had a whole creative kind of journey getting there. So teaching is really, what I do, and a lot of, art that I make is I'm thinking about how I can share it with somebody. Like, art is all about the story and the conversation and whatever. Mm-hmm. And sometimes it's the piece of art and people getting to see and interact and whatever with it, and sometimes it's I'm making something so I can figure out how to show somebody else so that they can have that journey through. It's funny that I always kind of think, the path that kind of propelled me... Like, my degree's in elementary ed, and I was gonna go be a middle school, math teacher or something. That was my, 18-year-old self, my grown-up plan. And student teaching, I was placed in a fifth-grade classroom. The kids were doing animal reports. Pick an animal, draw a picture of it on the top of the paper, and then write your animal, report, whatever, on the bottom of the paper. And I remember this little boy done his on a snow leopard, and he'd written down their habitat and where they, what they ate and all of that stuff, had his whole thing written out, and he'd drawn the snow leopard. And he was, he was pretty great. He'd looked at a photo, and he was very meticulous, and he'd drawn it very detailed, and it was very cool, colored it all in. And he brought it over to the supervising teacher, not me, I was just, standing back being the student teacher. And she looked at it, and she says, "Well, you're not finished. You haven't put in his habitat yet. You need to put in the habitat of this picture." Hands it back to him, so he goes back and he works on this. Well- His brain, the snow leopard was the important part of the picture, and the habitat was boring. And so he'd drawn it on a branch, whatever, and he grabbed a, blue colored pencil or whatever and just colored in the background like it was blue sky. And he was like, "Well, it's up in the, in the trees, so that's what the habitat looks like." And he brought it back to this teacher, and she looked at him and said, "You colored in the sky going up and down. Everyone knows that the sky goes back and forth." And she crumpled up his paper in a wad and threw it in the trash can. And, I can feel my heart racing right now talking about this. I had to leave the room. And I called my mom. My mom is a, is a retired teacher, after this, and I was like, "I don't even... I don't know what I could have done. I don't know what happened. I did..." Like, she just killed that kid's creativity right in front of me. It was like watching violence happen, and I didn't know what to do. And I think that absolutely, changed the direction of my brain. And I was like, "I will never be that teacher in that room, ever." like, my entire, practice and way that I interact with people is basically making sure that I am never that, and as far the opposite of that as I can get

Annmarie: Teacher in fifth or sixth grade, and so that's why I probably gasped because it just, it changed who I am. But not making this about me all the time. The piece that we talk about a lot on this show is like what did you love to do as a child or what influenced you as a child? And you weren't a child anymore at 18, 19, 20 years old when you were student teaching. But that still to that day is what drives you to create an atmosphere where somebody's like, "I didn't cry," right? And so what a gift. Like, sometimes when we're searching for those things, whether it's in the second half of our life or whenever, of what we want to do to bring more joy back, some of those things can be excavated and brought back and thought, "Okay, this is what I can bring. This is what I can provide for other people." speaking of that then, with the, with saying that with the person who's like, "I didn't cry," you think adults give themselves enough opportunities to be beginners?

Becka: No. No. I, people are so hard on themselves. I think, I wish, culture wasn't, the way that if you make any sort of little, stumble or mistake or anything like that, people are like, "Oh, that was really funny, ha." and give you a hard time about it, and that's supposed to be a joke. And I, ugh, I, it's just mean. It's it is just so cruel and unkind that basically, you're always hypervigilant of, "I don't wanna trip on the sidewalk because somebody's gonna laugh at me, poke fun at me, and tease." I used to give my husband a really hard time. He had a group of friends that were sort of like high school friends, and they were awful to each other. And it was all this, "Well, that they love you because they, give you a hard time, and call you names," and all of this. And I think that kind of culture, that atmosphere, that you get so used to that just being the way things are, that then when you go to be a beginner in anything, your first knitting project or whatever it is, the first time you make a mistake or something that you don't understand, you're just waiting for somebody to jump on you. Like it's this, I don't know, it's vigilance. It's, it's gonna happen.

Annmarie: Way that it isn't okay

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: A novice or a beginner or, if it's something we're really invested in, it's one thing. But even, going to a paint and sip night, I don't care what you put on your canvas, just go and have fun with your friends. And I want more people to experience that. And I think it's an excellent thing you brought up, because if you're afraid to go and do something like that, if it feels uncomfortable, ask yourself why. Like, did you get some of that messaging? Did you, did you have an art teacher who crumpled up your paper? Like, that story's gonna stick with me, Becka. Oh, my goodness. But where did it come

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: Is there a way that you can find to release it? Because here's the deal. There are teachers like Becka out there that aren't gonna crumple up your paper, that are not gonna make you cry in embroidery class. So go and do it. Yeah. That I'll take it off my soapbox now that. But And since we're talking about, doing things with our hands, I have another friend, who we both do the same style of quilting, and so we talk a lot about the good stuff that comes from the physical act of making something. So your work is all very tactile, sewing, embroidery, weaving, paper, book arts. Like, the list goes on, people. She's a talented woman. What do you think happens to our brains, and I would argue our mood, when our hands are occupied with the kind of activities that you teach and share with people?

Becka: Oh, absolutely. I mean, I, to like, go totally in a non-art direction, married to a scientist, there's science behind it, and I totally, completely believe that it does things to your brain, those repetitive motions, that affect all kinds of things about your mood and about your, sort of letting your brain disengage from one thing because, the repetitive motion of knitting or of just hand sewing, lets your brain focus on that, which lets another part of your brain do something else restful. And I'm not one of those, oh, art is, woo, touchy feely, whatever like that. Like, it for me is very physical. Like, the sort of competency of making something with your hands. We're big consumers of things. You sit and sort of let the thing come at you. You watch the TV show, you whatever, and like turning that completely around and doing something where like you're driving everything about it, is... For some people, never happens. And so when it does, it's like a whole new, lighting up new neurons in your brain and that kind of experience. For me, I start to feel prickly is the way that I always put it. Where if I've, if I've sat too long without doing something with my hands, my brain starts to give me a little bit of feedback like, "Hey, you need to do something different." I'm terrible at sitting and listening lectures or anything like that. I was telling you I'm not much of a podcast listener because my brain just doesn't stay focused on that, because I need that

Annmarie: Have to

Becka: Doing something.

Annmarie: Of podcasts, you might not be surprised to hear, but I often have to do something while I'm doing it, and it's the same way that if you would've looked back at my notebooks from college or high school, the doodling is You would think I wasn't paying any attention, but that's the way I did pay attention. Now, there might be a little neurodivergence thing in there, but I do think that there's something so deeply, the piece where you're talking about like the physical nature of it and not the more spiritual nature of it. I'm watching TV and I need to rest, so I ended up on the couch because I needed to rest, that's not enough sometimes to get me to calm down. So, if I sit down and hand stitch

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: I even color, pulling out colored pencils and a coloring book, and it isn't, I've had people ask me, "Oh, do you need all that stimulus?" But actually, it's just a way to stop whatever's spinning in my brain, to just finally relax, and having the nature If I'm just watching the movie, my brain is gonna drift. If I'm stitching and watching the movie, I can actually tell you what the plot of the movie was. So, I think there's so much power in that, in just having something tactile, particularly as you mentioned, in this world we live in now where everything is coming at us, or, we don't even hardly think about anything before, we're losing anticipation is what they've talked about, 'cause we just go and look something up on Google on our phone. So, having something more analog like that sitting in front of you, I really do think Well, it certainly, we know by science it lights up different neural pathways in your brain and gives you a different kind of situation. But if nothing else, it My husband says, "You're less cranky. When you're doing that, you're less cranky." I'm like, "Oh, that's a win. That's a win for everybody."

Becka: I, yeah, for everybody. Yeah. I love that you said coloring books. My dad, my dad is a retired architect. I mean, he's an art guy. He does stuff with his hands, whatever. He loves coloring books. That's his thing, that he'll listen to some TV thing in the background, but, he'll sit and do like digital ones on his iPad

Annmarie: Adobe

Becka: And

Annmarie: And I've been drawing on it as something to do while I'm listening to other things. And all of a sudden the coloring pages popped up, and I thought, "Huh, will I like this?" So I got out my little Apple Pencil, and I started to do it, and I'm like, "I can pick whatever color I want. It's like a never-ending Crayola box. I don't need to sharpen any crayons." And I actually really like it. So I'm with your dad on that. And yes, it's on an electronic device, but it does feel different because there's a physical motion to it. Me and your dad.

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: We'll, we'll s-

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: Color on our So as we're getting closer to wrapping up here today, I wanna talk a little bit about where we started. So as I mentioned, we met both working at the Textile Center, and you spent, I think, about a decade or so there in an arts administration. And I'm really interested, and I think a lot of people listening will be interested in your decision to leave that. You mentioned you wanted to create something just for yourself, but I think sometimes it's really hard to leave something that's perfectly fine go off on an adventure of something else. So if you wanna talk about that a little bit, what did you feel like you had to lined up or figure out about yourself, all of that, before you're willing to leave something that was basically working but just not exactly what you wanted anymore? Does that make sense?

Becka: Yeah. It was, it was probably one of the, scariest days.

Annmarie: Okay

Becka: Did not plan it. I did not... I loved what I did there.

Annmarie: Good at it

Becka: I was good at it and, I loved doing it, and I probably dedicated way too much of myself to it. Like, looking back now, I was too invested. But that was part of what made me love it. Like, I really did, and it was just a kind of random thing. They'd had some change of leadership, and there were some other things going on, and I had a meeting with somebody who was one of the higher-ups, and the phrase that I think will just always stick with me is, was they were talking about reorganiza- reorganization and divvying some things up and sort of changing how, departments work together and stuff like this, and I was like, "Oh, this sounds really cool. Like, I'm, I'm on board for trying new things. Where is my... Like, where's my role in this new organization?" And she sort of paused for a minute and she said, "Well, we don't like to put names on things." And I was like, "What does that mean?" and we had a little more conversation, and basically she was telling me that they didn't see a place for me in that organization, and I was gonna have to, fight for whatever it was that I wanted to do. And I went home that night, and I looked at my husband and I said, "I think I have to go resign tomorrow." And he was like, "Okay." I mean, I was like, "I don't, I don't I don't wanna fight for it." I don't... Like, I loved what I was doing, but, there was nothing for me in it. Like, it was a job, and I was going and doing my job. And I felt like I was pouring myself so much into it, and I wasn't getting anything back. And they basically just told me I wasn't going to get anything back. Like, they didn't, didn't have a place for me. And I, and I did. I wrote a letter of resignation and walked in and handed it to them that next day. And then I went and walked around the neighborhood and sobbed for a little while, and then came back to work and did the rest of my job. I had no plan. I had no idea what I was gonna do after that, but I was like, "I just know that I've been given a sign that I need to do something else."

Annmarie: That this show is not scripted, because I was working part-time at the same place, and I didn't know that story, right? I didn't know that's the way it came about, and so I'm

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: That because no one ever wants to go through something like that, to say, "Here's 10 years of your service, and by the way,

Becka: No

Annmarie: Door," type of thing. Which isn't exactly what they said. But I can also see now that retrospect this many years later, and it has been quite a while now, but that was a

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: Little

Becka: Yeah

Annmarie: From the universe saying, "It's time for you to do what's next in your life." It isn't the kind of nudge any of us want, but sometimes we do get a little two by four to the head when we, when we need it

Becka: Well, and I, and I feel like I could have taken that nudge totally the other way and been like, "Okay, well then I need to double down and be like, this is where I'm gonna be, and this is what I'm gonna do for you." And

Annmarie: Becka at

Becka: Could have gone that route. Throw more Rebecca at it. Absolutely. And that, yeah, it took me years to even talk about it. I basically just refused to talk about it. Yeah, because I just didn't, I didn't have a way to process it, and it wasn't, like it wasn't a failure of any particular, anything. Just they made some decisions and decided to live with them, and so did I, and I'm, I'm glad it worked out that way, it ends up. But,

Annmarie: To get there.

Becka: Yeah. Yeah. Like, I worked for another, month or so after I resigned because, we were right in the middle of doing summer camps, and I felt like leaving at that point was cruel and unusual. So I finished out the summer, and then, turned in my keys, and there was nobody there. Like, everybody had gone home for the day and whatever. I left them on the desk and walked out and, yeah, cried in my car for a little while before I drove home. I... It was not something I wanted to do, at all. And, okay. It worked out.

Annmarie: You

Becka: I'm happier now.

Annmarie: Hindsight, right? It just gives us so many more things to look at, but it's still immensely

Becka: Yeah.

Annmarie: The situation, and I think so many people find themselves at those crossroads, particularly at different phases of our life. And you did have a choice, to your point. It was either double down or make this decision, and somewhere inside, your gut knew which way to go with that, even though it was deeply painful. Because there's nothing like giving your time and energy and so much of yourself to something and then almost feeling like they're saying, "It's not worth it," right? And how you start to reframe that. It's a little bit like the enthusiasm or figuring out how to handle the no's, right? Like, we're, we're called to these kind of questions all the time. And there, Oprah did a special years ago where she said, I'm not particularly relig- religious person, but she said she woke up one morning and that she'd had a hard day, and she looked up at the sky and she said, "Jesus, I don't need any lessons today. Let's, no lessons today." And that's a little bit, right, of what we feel. And then as it goes on, we're like, "Okay, that was for the best." But the little person inside of us that always says, "Did it have to be so hard?" yeah. Anyway.

Becka: Yeah. Right. Right

Annmarie: Last question for you that I'm curious about is you've been doing this for a long time. You've built this creative life. Do you feel like you can do other things that are creative outside of your job? Is there more space for that of your job, and what does that look like?

Becka: Yeah. I try to be really, careful to think of my job like anybody else would, that I work regular hours and I'm not on call 24/7, and I don't teach a lot of weekends because I like spending weekends with my family. And, so I try to be, not let it creep into the rest of my life. It's hard for me to do anything

Annmarie: Hmm.

Becka: Art related, and call it not work because I do so many different art things that it, that it always kind of wraps right back around. But we do a lot of other kind of, art related things. My husband plays in a couple of music groups. I go listen. I, no need to make music. That's not one of my talents. But, we do that. We play a lot of board games, that's a very favorite thing. And I feel like those are very different than what I do, that are still creative in a lot of ways. I learned how to play D&D a couple years ago, had never done that before, so now we have a regular D&D group,

Annmarie: Right?

Becka: Absolutely fun and creative and nothing at all like what I do as a,

Annmarie: That

Becka: A job.

Annmarie: Newsletter comes out, she does this amazing job of talking about her classes and her art pieces, but she also does whole bunch of links to things that are really fun and really different. But you're usually also including a new board game or a card game or something like that. I've often said to my husband, "Can you imagine Becka and Andy's game Like, where do they store all of these games?"

Becka: Oh. We had shelves made upstairs when we remodeled that are game box sized. Yeah.

Annmarie: It for the long haul, when you remodel and you measure how, what size game box are gonna fit in. I love that. And I think I'm gonna leave it there, but I want people to be able to find out more about you and some of the classes that you do, because here's the thing about a lot of Becka's classes. They are so accessible, both, because some of them are virtual, but they're also accessible because they're not master classes. They are ways to do that tactile analog fun stuff we're talking about. So tell me what you're making, teaching, what you're excited about right now, and then where people wanna where people can go if they want to either find your classes or see some of your work

Becka: Yeah. Let's see. Making, right now I'm doing a series about things which are very precious that get tucked away in a special drawer and you never look at them until they show up at the thrift store when somebody dies and it's got a 50 cent price tag on it. It's those applications that are out there in the world. I hope a bunch of pieces will be out there soon. I don't know yet.

Annmarie: Okay

Becka: But that's the series I'm working on. I'm teaching, all over the place, and the absolute easiest place to find all of that is just my website, which is beckarahn.com. It's just my name. But I have- Yep. I have links there to, classes I teach in person. I'm at art centers kinda all over the Twin Cities area. I do virtual ones both, through Skillshare and through my own website and, through Dakota County Libraries, who've been amazing to work with. So they're kind of everywhere. I pop up all over. But you can always find all of those things on my website,

Annmarie: Easy

Becka: So-

Annmarie: To navigate. It isn't... You're not gonna get lost looking for all this stuff. Well, we're

Becka: I try.

Annmarie: Kept you for the requisite hour it seems to be when I do these things, and I wanna say thanks again for doing this. This has been really fun, and I learned a lot of new things as well, and maybe brought up something that I shouldn't have. But hey, that's what happens when you're just sitting and having a conversation, right? All right. Talk soon. Have a

Becka: Right

Annmarie: Weekend. I don't even know what day of the week it is now. Right? This is the sad

Becka: Yeah, me neither.

Annmarie: People. You never know what day of the week it is. All right. Thank you

Becka: Take care

Annmarie: I hope you enjoyed this Play Date with Becka, and maybe it gave you a little nudge to notice what's bringing you joy lately, or to be a little less embarrassed about the things that you love, or even to go make something with your hands just because it sounds fun. And if you enjoy these conversations and want to help me keep making them, you can support I Used to Be Fun by buying me a coffee.

Whether it's one cup or enough to keep me happily caffeinated for the month, every bit helps me keep the show going. You'll find the link in the show notes. So until next time, I hope you keep uncovering a little more beauty, a little more creativity, and yes, a little more fun.

I Used to Be Fun is hosted by Annmarie Boyle. New episodes drop weekly.

Music from Uppbeat (https://uppbeat.io/t/soundroll/to-the-top), License code BC9SEN3G6PMABOA