There are some experiences in my life that I will always remember. One of them is the time my mom and I took a trip to Bay St. Louis, Mississippi to meet an artist named Alice Moseley.
Miss Alice, as the locals called her, became a nationally known folk artist after she began painting in her early sixties. She first picked up a paint brush as a way to cope with the slow loss of her mother to Alzheimer's Disease. Miss Alice never had formal training as an artist. She only followed the guidance of her heart.
One of Miss Alice’s most famous paintings is entitled, “The House Is Blue But The Old Lady Ain’t!” This painting of the house she lived in includes a likeness of herself doing a little jig on the sidewalk. The image goes a long way toward capturing the essence of Miss Alice who focused on living with joy and zest.
As I sat in Miss Alice’s small, cluttered house and listened to her talk freely about her life, I was filled with deep admiration for her resilience and determination to live fully. In that moment, she became living proof for me that it is never too late to pursue a passion or a dream.
Miss Alice touched many people through her paintings, her friendliness and her down to earth nature. Her life story was recently made into a documentary which will be freely distributed to every public and private high school, every university and every public library system in Mississippi. Miss Alice’s legacy will continue to grow even though she passed away in July 2004 at the age of ninety-four.
Different people will learn different things from Miss Alice as they watch the documentary of her life. Here is what I learned from Miss Alice: It is never too late to start over, begin something new or to change the course of our lives. We get to choose how we want to be in life. We can consciously create from unlimited opportunities at every moment.
Is the “it’s too late or I’m too old” excuse preventing you from moving forward and living more fully? What is this costing you? What could you gain by taking at least one step this week toward the direction of a dream you gave up on because you thought it was too late?
As George Eliot said, It is never too late to be what you might have been.
(c) 2006 Beverly Keaton Smith
Beverly Keaton Smith, CPCC owns and operates Embrace Your Gifts and Soar! She is a certified life coach who offers individual life coaching, group coaching, workshops, classes and retreats to women who are ready to discover and embrace their unique gifts so they can live more athentically and joyfully. To learn more, see http://www.embraceyourgifts.com
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