“How can I achieve clarity to succeed at my art business goals?” – Robyn Ready Voth

Jessica Craddock: Welcome back to Intuitive Art Sales. I am here with Robin Ready Voth, who was a client of mine, I don't know, three or four years ago. And she is a portrait painter who captures milestones in your life that are important to save for future generations through live events and wedding paintings. She's currently getting her master's and upgrading her business as her artwork is also upgrading and she's stretching herself and getting new levels of clarity. And one thing she said she wanted us to know about her is that she really loves connecting one on one and cares very much about other people and that's part of her brand as well.

So I have a feeling that's going to be important for this conversation as we keep going, but let's stop for a second and say, hi Robin. I'm so glad you're here. You said your hair is so long and I'm like, it is, it's been long forever, but that's how long it's been. So, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Robyn Ready Voth: Long it's been. Yes. And you were actually instrumental in the beginning of the, of this journey.

When I first met you and just, I got to tell you the thing that pulled me in, the thing that I was drawn to was you were authentic and real. And, you actually cared about who you were talking to. And that really, that resonated with me. That's where I went, I got to talk to this lady. I've got to connect with her. She's got something, and I would love to learn how to do that. So,

Jessica Craddock: And you are still doing that. You are on the journey. Like we were talking about. evolving and stretching and getting to level 12 of 452 because the levels keep going. But like, I'm proud of you. I'm seeing the evolution and I think it's really great. So besides getting your master's degree, improving your artwork, you said you just joined a program.

I already forgot the name of it. Say it again.

Robyn Ready Voth: Oh, it's just part of my master's program. it's

Jessica Craddock: It's a part of your master's. Okay.

Robyn Ready Voth: Art marketing for the affluent.

Jessica Craddock: Yes. And it's about connecting with other people, building relationships and asking for referrals, which is beautiful. I'm so excited that you're doing that.

So, in this class, I guess, is it a class? Is it a workshop seminar?

Robyn Ready Voth: It's a class. We go through, um, I believe there's nine courses and then there's the extra courses for like learning how to do it online where you're doing social media, which I need.

Jessica Craddock: You'll get there. Yeah.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah. I'm getting there. So, yeah.

Jessica Craddock: It's not all that different. You get the, the good, strong, basic stuff down and that will be flowy and nice. So, in this class, are you practicing what they're teaching you to get your art in front of people?

Robyn Ready Voth: Yes, I am actually. And the minute I started the course, I'm telling you my feet hit the ground running. So, I got through the first three courses fast and some of it is dialogue. A lot of times I need to know the exact words to use because there are phrases that are non salesy that I use because I don't want to be a salesperson.

I'm not a salesperson. I'm a people person. And I love relationships, and I love people. So, yes, the minute that I started this. I have been and still am applying and doing the homework.

Jessica Craddock: I feel like I have to do a little plug here. Okay.

Robyn Ready Voth: Okay.

Jessica Craddock: Because I have to, um, I just taught this in my Money Now Bootcamp.

It's basically the exact same thing you're learning. It's the scripts. It's asking for referrals at certain points. It's telling people what you have in a non salesy way. And I'm selling it as a digital program as well, because I'm not running the live version now. I don't know if, when I will do that again, but if you wish you were in her master's program, I have something for you.

So just got to put that to the side and let's keep going. So, in your practicing of all of the, how's it going? How does it feel? Are you getting stuck anywhere? Like what's, what's going on?

Robyn Ready Voth: Well, the wonderful part of it was I had to do my own personal deep dive. I had to get to the bottom of my emotions and the places where I had these, really like old tapes that needed to be discarded.

Literally, they needed to be disleaded and discarded. And so first, before I could connect with others, I must connect with myself. And I did that through some good meditation. And, I just started writing about specific moments in my life that were life changing and what that, what I learned from that emotionally, because I can tell you when somebody asks you what your emotions were regarding a particular event, I was, I couldn't identify what an emotion was, um, which was like weird to me. I'm like, Oh my God, I had literally had to look at what are emotions and really, we only have about seven to 10 actual emotions. Everything else are feelings. And so, I learned to identify my emotions, which then, in turn, has helped me. Then I can now identify others emotions, and then connect at that point because that's what this is all about really.

Yeah, that was the first deep dive, jump into the deep end and look at the ugly and the beautiful. It was ugly and beautiful and finding out what my emotions were with those which helps me define myself. Then that just You know, that just blooms as part of the fruit from the tree, in my work.

Then, the sticky point now for me is where I literally have to define what my plan is. Now I'm doing a plan, and it's kind of slowed down a little bit because I really have to think about, which I shouldn't be doing. It really should just flow. But to think about the plan. I want to do it with a study partner so that the slow part is finding an actual study partner who wants to spend the time to walk through that with me, even though I'm willing to walk through that with anybody.

But just finding the right one. So that's only the sticky point because people schedules.

[00:07:38] Having an execution partner is great for holding you accountable to your action plan.

Jessica Craddock: Yeah. So is it a study partner where you're studying it together or is it an execution partner where you are holding each other accountable? Yeah. That's it. It's an execution partner. Yeah. Yeah. Great. Yeah.

What if you didn't have to have the same schedules?

What if it was just, okay, here is my, in marketing you call them KPI, but what are my measurables this week, meaning how many people do I want to, and I'm making this up. It would go along with your curriculum. But how many people do I want to tell about my art? And how many people do I just want to touch base with?

And let's say I want to do five of each. So, I'm going to define my goal to you. They can have a different goal or similar goal. Yeah. And then by Monday at 10 a. m. you have to text me and tell me how many you did. And one thing you learned.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yes.

Jessica Craddock: Like there's always a way around it. Schedules are schedules and they will always be schedules.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah, that's actually what I call an action plan. So, I check in with my action partner, you know, once a week and say what I've completed, what's on the burner, and then if I've got any frustrations going on. So, addressing the frustrations is a good thing because that kind of sets it aside as far as sets. Well, it sets it in a place where I need to get more, more skills built around that frustration so that that won't be frustration anymore.

Jessica Craddock: Right. the same time, part of the beauty of it is instead of just saying what I did, it's what am I going to do and how does that align with the class that I'm learning or my goals or my, like what is the point of choosing this particular thing that I'm going to execute. And then how many times am I going to do it, and then checking back in for accountability to say I did it or I didn't do it.

It will be much more effective if you really think about what you are measuring in terms of your goals and setting up the actions based on that. Yes, and thinking about it ahead of time before you have to go do it.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yes, I absolutely agree with you. That's exactly what I do.

Jessica Craddock: Are you saying just to clarify, are you saying you're already doing this?

So, we're, we're having a wire across somewhere. I'm confused. You said, okay, well, that's what I call the action plan. But what I need is someone to.

Robyn Ready Voth: I am looking for an action partner, so that I can make my weekly goals, and then report back with that. So, my sticking point is finding the person or persons that I can do that with.

Jessica Craddock: Got it. So, you're already doing the steps. You just want someone to do it with.

Robyn Ready Voth: Right. Yes.

Jessica Craddock: And I can say there's a lot to that. I recently joined something where we have accountability Monday through Friday. You say what you're going to do and come back the next day and say I did it or I didn't do it. And man, that's rough.

Cause if I didn't do it, I'm like, I'm just going to skip today. No, I need to, I need to go and face the music and say, I didn't do it. I can handle it, but it's very helpful to keep you moving. And the way that we do it, we set our goals at the top of our sheet where we're saying what we're doing every day. And every day we have to, this is something I've taught in the past to clients, write your goals out in your journal, do a little meditation on why you want them. Why is that important to you? Write that down. And then we get into, okay, what are we doing? So, it's consistently not just, what do I want to add to my to do list, but how are these things affecting where I'm going.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah. That's perfect. That's perfect. And, and for me, what that does is build a whole other level of confidence. Self confidence in just the fact of completing something makes me just that little ounce, a bit stronger and a little bit more, have a little bit more power back in my life so I can go out and do the work, you know?

Confidence for artists is a tough one. And if you know, I don't feel like very confident when I'm not selling my work, but that confidence building still happens when I'm doing this work, as opposed to putting paint on canvas.

That's why what I'm doing is above myself and my artwork, because one, I'm building myself, but I'm also building someone else. And that's that connection that's so vital. It's so vital to connect with other people. And, um, practicing that is really confidence and powerful.

Jessica Craddock: Yeah, I, I couldn't agree more.

[00:12:50] Doing a deep dive into who you are will make you a better artist.

Jessica Craddock: I have this saying that I forgot about that I was looking at my website yesterday on my about page. It says, better you equals better art equals better world. So, it's really what you're saying. Like it starts with digging deep in us, where our fears, what are our emotions, what do we want to say to the world.

Which in turn makes us a better artist, gives it more depth and meaning and beauty, even if it's not something that really visually comes across, still knowing these things about you and being really secure in who you are, puts, I believe, puts that into the artwork, which in turn goes out into the world and spreads it around.

Yes. It doesn't happen unless it starts inside.

Robyn Ready Voth: That's right. That's, that's spot on. Yep. And then globally in our world, it makes our world a better place so that our generations after us have a better place to, to grow up in and, and be strong and powerful. But yeah, because artists were the ones who changed the world.

Right. You look at and being an art history major, art has changed everything in every single generation. And as artists, we really have a responsibility to the world and to the future. And don't let anybody stop you.

Jessica Craddock: I don't hear that very often, but I couldn't agree more.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah, especially now at a time and I'm, you know, I'm at the forefront.

I'm there in the master's program with everything that's happening now. We are at a point where things are changing. There's an evolution happening. We're evolving spiritually and socially. And we really are the, we're the cornerstone and the foundation of that. And our, our work in that field is going to be what will be in the next generation, in the next 25 years, in the next 50 years.

Because everything has just changed. We've just gone through evolution. And we artists are we have a responsibility to not only in our home, in our cities, but also to the big wide world.

Jessica Craddock: I want to bring this back to your accountability partner.

Okay. Because when you're writing down something, I have to do this and maybe I don't really want to, or maybe I want to, but it's really hard or whatever that is. Having that why on there, you can steal my phrase if you want to make it short, better you, better art, better world. You can say we have a responsibility.

You can say, uh, we are going to affect how the world looks in the next generation. And if I don't do this, I'm not doing my duty. Like those are some powerful statements to make, especially when it's right captioned for Instagram posts that I've been putting off for three weeks or whatever it is. Like you look at that and you're like, Oh, I should probably do that.

It feels like, cause when it's in this to do list aspect, it's just. This little thing and it feels like it's not going to have that big of an impact, but all these little things Create this bigger thing.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah,

Jessica Craddock: So, you also said I guess we're getting into motivation today.

Robyn Ready Voth: That's good. Motivation is good.

[00:16:38] Connecting with people is caring about people.

Jessica Craddock: I want to well, I'm paraphrasing. I want to capture milestones of their life that are important to say for generations, but you almost are a record keeper You also said that connecting one on one and caring about other people's really at the cornerstone of what you do.

So, if I'm not connecting, I'm not caring. If I don't do this thing, am I really caring about the other person? You just need to write down a big, long list every morning.

Robyn Ready Voth: No kidding.

Jessica Craddock: What I used to teach my clients. Let's see if I still have it was to write down your elevator speech, more or less, that has your deeper meaning in it, and then your Y underneath that, or Y's, and then any of your next goals, whether they're small or big, sometimes they're small and big. So, I want to buy my own house, and I also want to sell one piece of work by the end of April. So, we've got our who we are, why we're doing it, and then our goals, and then we write down what we are doing? What are our measurables?

Robyn Ready Voth: measurable, yes,

Jessica Craddock: things are we doing today or this week? So how are you going to, because we've just, I feel like made this great plan to keep you accountable and move you forward and motivated. Also, you said the more that you do, the more confidence you have, which I also find to be a hundred percent true.

So, to keep growing that confidence, to keep making sure we are serving our purpose in the world, how are we going to find somebody to work with, to be our person who's going to say, dude, why didn't you do what you said you were gonna do?

Robyn Ready Voth: That's a great question. How do you find them?

Jessica Craddock: Um, I'm guessing it's probably someone in your class is the easiest starting point.

Is that true? Right?

Robyn Ready Voth: Because we're working in a similar, you know, we're on the same track. So yeah, that would be good. Also, gosh, my poof, it just gets bigger and bigger. All of a sudden, I start thinking of all my friends and the people that I spend time with and fellow students. I'm also part of different programs.

There are groups out there that, um, I'm a member of, say, the African Violet, group.

Jessica Craddock: Right. So,

Robyn Ready Voth: So, finding people, and I'm going to go back to what I said at the beginning, was is that when the students ready, the teacher appears.

[00:19:36] Letting go of self-defeating beliefs changes not only your habits but everything in life.

Robyn Ready Voth: So, when, my when my energy is and my, my centered in ground is where it's supposed to be, I'm telling you, vibration changes everything. When I let go of some old habits or old self-defeating beliefs that I didn't even know were there, all of a sudden, the people around me started changing. I'm like, wow, that really works. I mean, and it wasn't anything I did, but take care of myself.

We take care of ourselves. The other people are going to pick up on that and they show up. I'm telling you could be in a grocery store and somebody would show up and that's the person for the day. That's my teacher or my students, because we're also teachers. Everything that we do, we pass on information.

 For for now, right now, it's with the group that I'm at. And there's a couple people that I just have to reach out to. And it's my part of getting into action. I have to get into action, which is really the best way to break up any kind of artist block or connection block.

Jessica Craddock: yeah.

Robyn Ready Voth: I'm an extreme introvert, extreme,

Jessica Craddock: You are, and it's so funny, I've come across more introverts lately who are like, I love connecting with people. Most people think introverts just want to be by themselves. That's not true. It's just how you're filled up. So, you're talking in terms of energy. Are you familiar with the terms masculine and feminine?

I mean, in terms of energy, not just in terms of gender.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yes, but explain to me what you're thinking.

Jessica Craddock: Okay. So, the masculine energy is where you are getting into action. You are doing.

Robyn Ready Voth: Oh, okay. Okay.

Jessica Craddock: The feminine energy is where you are, what did you just say, working on yourself. Shifting your beliefs, changing your vibrations, probably by just being, going for walks, journaling, those kinds of things.

So, you said, I said, how are you going to find this new person? You said, one of the things I've done is just change my vibration and they show up. When I'm working with people who like energy work type stuff, I like to encourage going both ways. So, you said, I'm going to get into action. Great. Let's start there.

And then we'll talk about the other thing. How many people are you going to talk to? And how are you going to open the conversation? Let's get really specific.

Robyn Ready Voth: I have three people in mind. Right. And I will Facebook them, you know, private message, just ask them if they're open to doing, are you available to do some study partnering? That's the question. That's realistic. But basically it'll be, are you open to, since we're already in the class, anyway. I'll just ask, are you open to doing some study partnering? Cause I've been around enough people to find out who I resonate with.

Jessica Craddock: Yeah. Yeah.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah. So,

Jessica Craddock: Okay. So, you've got three people in mind, you're connected on Facebook messenger. You're going to open with, are you interested in being a study partner? And then I would also add, I have a couple of ideas of how we could do it in a way that fits both of our schedules. Let me know what you think.

And then if they say yes, no, whatever it is, I love voice messages because it's just so much easier to talk. If you don't have time to meet for coffee, send them a voice message. Here's what I'm thinking. We could list out our goals. And then every day, once a week, whatever the timeframe is, by 10 a. m. we message each other and say we did it or we didn't do it. And then we berate each other if we didn't, and we cheer each other if we did. Like, just explain the idea to them so that they have an idea what they're getting into before they agree to it. Because I don't want to agree to something if I don't know what it is.

Robyn Ready Voth: Well, yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So clarity and specific. Yes.

Jessica Craddock: So that's your masculine three of those by what day?

Robyn Ready Voth: I would say by if I was speaking to them, drink, I'd say by Friday.

Jessica Craddock: Okay.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah. All you have

Jessica Craddock: to do was even just little bitty step. I have to message them, are you interested in hearing more or talking about it, by Friday?

Robyn Ready Voth: Friday. Yeah.

Jessica Craddock: And then you can make a new one that explain it to them by Tuesday.

Okay.

Robyn Ready Voth: There we go. And explain it by Tuesday. Yes.

Jessica Craddock: Yeah. I mean, we don't know that yet. Let's, let's get to Friday and then we'll set our next one.

Robyn Ready Voth: That's a good one. Yeah.

[00:24:34] Commit to time spent in introspection for clarity and focus on improvement.

Jessica Craddock: So, we've got our action. What are we going to do on the side? The feminine, the working on ourselves, being in our, our happy place, our inspired, like those kinds of things.

What are we going to do to help us change our vibration so that the teacher can feel that and show up. If it's not one of those people.

Robyn Ready Voth: Well, sort of rinse and repeat. So, I would, I would again, cause sometimes, we're all forgetful, you know, we forget things. it's before me and it's in front of my face, then I'm on it.

Life gets busy, distractions happen. So, I have to keep revisiting those places just to kind of reignite that, that love that has happened prior to that and that vibrational change. And then it's just reinstated. So, I get to continue to move forward.

And I love doing introspection. It's my foundation. It makes my roots deeper and, and so that I can absorb more of the nutrients and the water from the earth. And then, then more fruit is produced, you know. That's actually, that's what I do. I take notes, uh, for sure. I write, and so I take notes. And so I just go back and I mark certain places, flip back to that page, and I read it again and go, oh, yeah, man, that was cool.

And then it starts all over again. You know, it's just, it's another, re-establishment of what I've already established, but to reestablish. And then you just, it's just hyperspace, you know, just go faster. So, and, um, and plus it's just, it's better.

It's just practice. It's good practice to do the basics so that you've still got when the next level happens, your foundation is solid.

Jessica Craddock: Okay, I'm going to take what you said and I'm going to make it a little bit more specific so you know exactly what it is that you are doing.

Robyn Ready Voth: Well, okay, so I don't want to interrupt you, but what I was the first time that we met and we did that mind Meister. I visit that periodically. It's saved. It's saved in my phone. And if I get off track, and I start thinking, what the heck? I feel like I'm a little bit off, a little bit stuck. I'll go revisit that whole graph that we did.

And I go, oh yeah, okay, okay, do this. So, it really gets me unstuck so that I can do the whatever footwork that needs to be done so I can do the action steps, the internal to the external. Yeah.

Jessica Craddock: Okay. So that still works. What I was going to say was, we're going to set aside, this doesn't sound like very long, but I want to make sure that you do it.

So, we're going to start with baby steps, put 10, 10 minutes in your calendar every morning. The first five we're introspecting, going back through our journal, going back through graphs or mind maps or whatever it is that has provided us insight in the past. And the next five minutes we're recording for future Robyn, five more minutes of maybe insights, maybe crap, but we're just having a five-minute free writing so that we continue to grow our library of introspection.

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah.

Jessica Craddock: That's all feels very actionable, right?

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah. And manageable. Yeah.

Jessica Craddock: Right.

Robyn Ready Voth: Set the timer, so I had keep my timeframe. Set my five minutes, set my next five minutes. And then that way, if I have to go run off and do something or there's some fire I got to put out, I've completed something.

So there's my confidence. I've done so I can go down and tackle the world.

Jessica Craddock: Exactly. And if you have no fires and nothing that you have to do and you want to keep going, keep going.

Robyn Ready Voth: Exactly. Yep. Yep. That's the best part.

Jessica Craddock: Beautiful. Okay. So, will you send me a message as soon as you have an accountability partner?

Robyn Ready Voth: Okay.

Jessica Craddock: I imagine it will take you eight days or less. We'll see.

Robyn Ready Voth: Okay.

Jessica Craddock: So you have what you're going to do with them. You have how to get them. Did we miss anything? Are we good?

Robyn Ready Voth: Yeah. And message you through your, through email.

Jessica Craddock: Whatever. Okay. Email, Instagram. I used to tell people not to email me, but I have somebody checking my inbox now.

Robyn Ready Voth: Oh my gosh. I know emails was like, no, no, no. I'm like, you know, emails are a good thing actually. But yeah, somebody's checking the emails. Yeah.

Jessica Craddock: Okay. So, Robyn if they want to talk to you about accountability partner. If they want to say, Ooh, do you have any room in your group? If they want to look at your artwork. If they want to just talk to you about anything interesting you brought up today, where should the person who's listening go?

Robyn Ready Voth: My Instagram account is the best way to get ahold of me.

So, DM me on my Instagram. You can also go in through that door. You also have the option of going to my website. But the first place to go to be Instagram and that's robinready.rr. And then there's a link there that'll take you to my website and you can email me through that. Yeah.

That's the best way to get ahold of me. And I would, Oh my God. Are you kidding? I would love to talk to somebody. I would love to talk to you. Oh my God. And artists. Oh my God. I would love to talk to you.

Jessica Craddock: By the time this episode comes out, you're going to have like a 20-person accountability group

Robyn Ready Voth: I would love that. Oh my gosh. Cause for me that's so fulfilling for me because it's one on one. Or it's a small group and that's my gig. That's my gig. I can stand in front of an audience, but I really want the, this, I want the connection because that's, that’s rock solid and it's accountable and it's measurable and it's, um, and it's confidence building and getting out of those, Oh my God, the artist blocks.

Just recently I did a gallery showing and it was disappointing actually. There are many reasons for that. But what it did was though, it kicked me hard to define specifically what I'm going to be doing instead of doing a bunch of little things all over the place. Because we artists can get so distracted with the art world is huge.

There are so many facets, but now I'm like the beam, the beam light is like, I know where I'm going. I know what I'm doing. And that's when the class came up. That was when the class came up.

Jessica Craddock: I'm so glad you're taking that class. It seems so perfect for you.

Robyn Ready Voth: Thank you. It is. I agree.

Jessica Craddock: I'm excited to see how, where it goes.

Robyn Ready Voth: Me too. So, as I just keep getting the courses done and suiting up and showing up.

Jessica Craddock: Good job. I'm so proud of you. All right. Well, I'm going to go work on my accountability list, so I can show up tomorrow and say I did it.

Awesome. All right. I'll talk to you soon. Robin.

Robyn Ready Voth: You have a great day.

Good to see you. Yes.

Jessica Craddock: Bye.

Robyn Ready Voth: Bye.