Tiffany Joy

My First Trip To Africa

by tiffanyGod Shows Up February 23, 2020January 28, 2020No Comments

In 2016 I had a grand adventure with God. I went on my first over seas mission trip. It was to South Africa. It was a big and scary trip for me, but I was excited. I had dreamed about taking a trip to Africa for awhile. Now I was able to take my first trip to Africa.

I learned and grew a lot even before I left the country.

The first thing came months before the actual trip. Did you know it takes a lot to plan for a mission trip? We had meetings and homework in order to plan the lessons and activities. This was on top of planning and organizing the basics of travel. Yes, we had a wonderful leader who did a lot, but we were responsible to get the needed shots, our own packing, work related stuff, and fundraising for the trip’s expenses.

Automobile Issues with God’s help

Once everything was planned I thought things would be easy sailing for me. However, a week before the trip my car broke down in rush hour traffic on a curvy mountain highway. I had just enough momentum to get over a lane and pull over on the tiny shoulder.

God showed up by sending the highway partol tow truck out pretty quickly. He was able to tow it to a turn off, so that I would be safe.

The next issue was finding a tow truck who would bring me all the way back to my home area and to the mechanic I regularly saw. After a few calls and what felt like a long wait a truck finally came to tow my car to my mechanic.

I had to leave it outside their building over night on the street. God showed up that night, because there was no damage to my car. On another visit to my mechanic I did hear about a stranger’s car getting looted.

The car was fixed within a day or two. I had it before I left for my big trip. Yes, in the end everything worked out. However, the whole situation was stressful. It caused stress and anxiety. It was not a fun experience, but God was present in it.

My first trip to South Africa also had many God moments. Each time God showed up could fill up another blog post, which I do plan on writing.

Want More?

For more blog posts in this series you can visit my God Shows Up page. I also have a YouTube series that goes hand in hand with this written series.

Tiff’s Tips: Define Success for yourself

by tiffanyTiff's Tips February 18, 2020June 4, 2020No Comments

Success is defined as the accomplishment of an aim or purpose. It is the attainment of popularity or profit. Success is based on achievements and accomplishments. What you aim for and strive to accomplish will be unique to who you are.

You need to define what a successful life looks like to you. Who do you want to be? How do you want your life and art to look? What accomplishments and achievements mean most to you?

No one can define success for your life, except for you. A successful life for me will look very different than your successful life. We are all unique with different passions, personalities, and life styles.

Let Me Share My Definition

In my life success is defined as living a life I’m proud of, where I am allowed to be fully me. This definition will allow me to grow, but also allow contentment as I grow.

I live a successful life by keeping a journal for self-exploration, so that I can keep in touch with who I am at my core.

One reason why I pray and read the Bible daily is so that I can learn more about my spirit/ soul and grow closer to God who made.

Living a successful life for me also means being creative often and sharing my creativity with others.

Notice, I have defined a successful life with things that I can control. I can decide to journal or not. I can focus on building healthy habits or I can ignore those habits. It is up to me.

I learned through goal setting and striving to be a better version of my self that the focus has to be with you. You cannot focus on the achievements, but that what you do to get to the achievements.

This means that it if you want to get to point B, don’t focus on point B. Focus on walking to point B and the steps. You’ll get there, but if you focus on the end goal and achievement it becomes easier and easier to see that you’re not at point B. This is especially true if point B is far far away.

Focus on your habits and what you can control and you’ll get to your successful life.

This is part of Tiff’s Tips a blog series. I have also done a goal setting video series on YouTube.

The Road (A Poem)

by tiffanyPoetry February 12, 2020June 4, 2020No Comments

The road is long.
The path is hard,
and I keep thinking
I haven't gone far yet.

Maybe I'm good,
but need to be great.
Perhaps I'm struggling in vain
and being an artist is not my fate.

I could run.
I could hide,
but then there'd be
a deadly gnawing inside.

So I'll stay my course
and walk my path.
Perhaps one day I'll look back,
see my struggles, and laugh.

I do have more poetry in the poetry section of my site and poetry readings on YouTube.

Introduction: Love Nerd

by tiffanyLove Nerd February 4, 2020January 21, 2020No Comments

I am a Christian, a sister, and a friend. I’m an avid learner and artist. Also, I am a huge fan of love and a romantic. You can say I am a love nerd. Oh and another thing you should know is that I am single.

Being single is an identifier in my life’s current stage. It is also my blessing and my struggle. It is my freedom and my curse. Singleness has caused me to cry and caused me to dance with joy. Yeah, it’s a bit of an oxymoron, but both sides are true.

Being single has even taught me a lesson or two. It has showed me who I am and given me confidence in being the person I am made to be.

I am grateful that this is the struggle I’ve been given and the life issue that is closest to my life. My health, job situation, or family relations could be a lot worst. I could have actual real struggles, but I don’t.

Of course sometimes not having a partner feels like the end of the world and worst thing possible. During those dark moments I imagine bargaining away my health, a limb, or one of my senses, just to have a partner in life.

If you have been single for any major length of time you know the yearning for a partner comes in waves. Like any emotional thing in life relationships or lack there of are emotional roller coasters. As for right now I’m at the part of the roller coaster where I am at peace with the pain of being alone. It’s not that I’m numb to the loneliness. I’m just use to it.

My Singleness

I have been single for 10 years now. I have only kissed 1 guy in those 10 years and that was about 8 years ago. You can trust me when I say I know the single life.

I am truly chronically single. That does not mean I do not love or that I have not learned lessons about love. It is at the center of everything that is important to me. I just haven’t personally experienced romantic love in a very long time.

I also love learning about love and sharing my thoughts on love.

What are the different definitions of love? What comes first the action of love or the feelings of love? What does it truly mean to love?

I hope to answer these questions and more in this series. I also will share my journey to accepting my life stage with you and how I became a love nerd.

Want to learn or read more?

This blog series stems from my book “To Love” which I until February 13,2020 I have a kickstarter for. I will also be posting more in this series on the Love Nerd page of this site.

God Showed Up While I Was Moving

by tiffanyGod Shows Up January 26, 2020February 12, 2020No Comments

Sometimes it’s clear when God shows up. He does something huge that is undeniably Him. You hear these types of stories from time to time. Stories about miraculous healing or people being saved from certain death. Most of the time He whispers. The ordinary or simple encounters are easy to miss or dismiss as coincidence, luck, or chance. When you don’t, when you see God’s hand in the ordinary, you realize how extraordinary He is.

God has never helped me smuggle Bibles into Chine or given me superhuman strength to save a child who was crushed under a car. However, He has given me a part-time job almost as soon as I decided to follow Him.

More recently He took away my living situation in order to give me a cheaper one and help me realize the status quo of my life wasn’t working.

One way I know God Showed up in the moving transition was that within a week I found a cheaper room for rent.

I was about to leave a party and the only guests that were still there typically don’t hang out with my main friend group. They rent out a home and hold me that they may have an extra room. I set up a time with another tenant to look at the space and it was perfect for me.

The reasons I know it was God

There are 2 reasons I know this was God. The first is because it typically takes months to find a new place to rent where I live. Plus most of the time you have to be flexible with your budget and pay more than I actually could. It’s really unheard of to pay my rent.

The home I moved into is great and is in a wonderful neighborhood. In addition has beautiful waking paths around it that I can walk.

I could easily mistake this for luck or coincidence, but I know God’s hand when He shows up. This is Him taking care of me. I am confident that God showed up while I was moving.

Want to read more?

For more blog posts in this series you can visit my God Shows Up page. I also have a YouTube series that goes hand in hand with this written series.

Kickstarter for To Love

by tiffanyTo Love Updates January 23, 2020January 29, 2020No Comments

I have been working on my book “To Love” for over 3 years. My book is in the end stages of being ready to be published, which is very exciting for me. I am realizing I need to fully focus so that the world can get a chance to read it. That is why I decided to create a Kickstarter for “To Love.“

What is Kickstarter?

Kickstarter is a crowdfunding platform that allows creative folk an opportunity to raise funds to get their projects produced. There are many different projects being funded with Kickstarter.

How it works is that first a creative person launches a project on the site and sets up rewards. Some rewards are pre-ordering the finished product, while other rewards are special bundles, especially for the Kickstarter bundles.

Once the project is live friends, family, fans, and other people can find the project and back it. You can either back it without a reward or you can pick from the reward tier that best suits you. Then as a backer, you pledge that amount.

Once enough people pledge enough money the project gets funded, then all those who pledged will get charged. That is when the creative person will get to work putting together the reward packages and finishing the project.

If the project doesn’t get fully funded no one is charged and the creative person can’t produce the product. In my case, I would have to slow down on finishing editing, pause on the visual artwork, and not do as much promotional work right now. Without the Kickstarter project for “To Love” succeeding I won’t be able to as much as I need to do in order for it to be a success.

What is “To Love?”

“To Love” is my memoir about my views and relationship with love and how it has changed over my life. It is formatted as a long love letter to my future husband. “To Love” also has my creative writings mixed in as examples of my views towards love.

It is truly an outpouring of love that I hope to one day give to my future husband, whoever he may be. And what does the world need more of in today’s society than the outpouring of love and joy? I hope each person who reads this book will feel connected to it or me and feel the love I have for all.

Here is a YouTube Playlist telling you a little more about “To Love”

My 2019 In Review

by tiffanyLife, other updates January 21, 2020January 14, 2020No Comments

There has been a lot of changes to my art business in 2019 and more to come in 2020. To make sure you are up to date with what those changes are here is my 2019 year in review.

I first retired my blog series Dreamward Bound. Although I am still heading towards my dreams the focus of my writing time has changed. I started the series God Shows Up and have been posting more poems. Plus I have been working hard on my book To Love.

I also started to do poetry readings on YouTube and working on some other promotional videos.

Poetry readings and promotional videos were not the videos I published in 2019. Earlier in the year I did some vlogs and in September I recorded 2 videos about how I am going to focus on my art business more.

In addition to writings and posting on youtube I started my Patreon page and got my first two patrons on there.

My RedBubble and Society6 stores are also growing with more digital art.

My two favorite digital art pieces from 2019 are “I’m Possible,” and “Nerdy Unicorn.”

Finally I started to look for writing work through Fiverr. I currently have 4 writing gigs available. They are script writing, a custom poem, short story writing, and writing an article.

I hope you enjoyed my 2019 in review. If you have any comments, questions, or feedback please let me know.

Depart Oh Darkness (A Poem)

by tiffanyPoetry January 15, 2020June 4, 2020No Comments

Depart oh darkness.
You are not welcomed here.
Storm I will not surrender to thee.
You can let me be.

I am not a flower.
I am a tree.
Though you may try
I will not bend, break, or die.
 
I am here to stay,
so depart oh darkness.
You are not welcomed here.
Storm I will not surrender to thee.
You can let me be.

I do have more poetry in the poetry section of my site and poetry readings on YouTube.

Tiff’s Tips

by tiffanyTiff's Tips January 7, 2020January 3, 2020No Comments

We all know things other do not. It’s a fact of living. You’re not going to have the same knowledge base or experiences as someone else. No matter where you are on your journey you can help other people. I have been on my creative journey for a few years now and I have been learning things every step of the way. That is why I’m sharing things I know with this blog series, Tiff’s Tips.

My experiences and my life have taught me things that you may not know. What I have to say may help someone just by the facts I share, or who I am may explain it in a different way, with a different light that makes the tip click into their mind.

Yes, some of these things may seem common place or obvious to you, but others may not realize or know those tips.

I hope you enjoy this series and I hope you learn from it. Please allow it to help your mind grow and your thinking to shift, so that you can achieve your goals. Hopefully by the end you will see your art and goals in a new light.

I will leave you now with the first ten tips of this series. In the coming months I will explain and expand on each of them.

Define Success for yourself
Decide If You Are A Hobbyist or Artist
Have an Ideal Life
Start where you are
Assess and Have Goals
Do Not Give Up
Have Creative Friends
Try Different Things
Do Not Be Afraid To Change
Regularly Reflect On Your Journey

Side note: I did do a video project about goals years ago. Check out the playlist if you’re interested.

Ending note

This is part of Tiff’s Tips a blog series. I have also done a goal setting video series on YouTube.

Without You (A Poem)

by tiffanyPoetry December 5, 2019June 4, 2020No Comments

A tiger can be caged.
A bird can live without flight,
and I can live without you.

He can hold his breath.
She can close her eyes,
and I can live without you.

Life will go on.
I will see the storms and sunshine,
and I can live without you.

But something inside longs to thrive.
Something inside longs to be free
and can only be when I live with you.

This was written on August 1, 2019.

I do have more poetry in the poetry section of my site and poetry readings on YouTube.