The quote that started it all:

“Leap and the net will appear” - Zen saying

I’ll never forget the day I saw this quote on a card in a gift shop. It stared at me on the rotating card display from across the store. I stared at it. It stared at me. It was a square black card with bold white lettering.

What was this card trying to tell me?

I bought it and walked home, contemplating why I couldn’t shake this quote from my mind.

Fast forward almost 3 years. I quit my job. I moved to a new state. I started working full time for myself. I dug deep into exactly what I wanted out of life; what everyone wants:

For my heart to be completely full of love for what I do each and every day.

As I’ve written before, I had to figure out my passion; what made my heart sing. In order to do this, I had to cut back my spending big time (my husband and I were getting ready to cut my salary out of our budget which was the bigger one), rely on my loving husband for financial support (which was really hard for me to do as I’ve always made my own money), work hard, and TRUST IN GOD.

I also had to do exactly what that card told me to do: Take a giant leap and have faith that a net would appear. And that metaphorical net has appeared time and time again.

When I started praying every day, keeping my thoughts positive (trust me, this is hard and self doubt sneaks it’s ugly head into my brain at least once a week), and turned to God when I needed to talk, things really got good.

Am I exactly where I want to be yet? Nope. But. I’m. Getting. Closer.

Carolyn’s Blooming Creations started over 15 years ago in a garage of my first home with my husband. I started it by making beautiful and yummy cakes. Knowing that wasn’t all I wanted to do, I branched out into doing event planning, makeup, making YouTube videos, illustrating a children’s book (and writing some of my own), and basically anything creative that I loved to do. When I finally dedicated 100% of my time to fulfilling my brand’s mission statement “A creative lifestyle brand dedicated to making the world a little happier and craftier”, life changed for the better.

Everything I do makes my heart a little happier, which I believe, helps others too. I recently had someone tell me they love watching my YouTube videos because they love to see me having fun. I loved that they told me that.

I’ve even started making some money off of everything that I’m doing, which for me, really helps keep me going. It’s not that money is the most important thing in life but having some sort of income is necessary in today’s world (we all need food, shelter AND to be charitable of our money to others in need). Find out how Carolyn’s Blooming Creations is currently making some money via the CBC Patrons page. As of 2020, I’m not contributing much money to the Braden household, but every little bit helps.

Oh, and while all this went on with me, my husband started trusting in that same Zen saying quote. He began to put in a lot of hard work and faith in God when trying to get a new job for himself. He wanted a position that paid more (he deserved it) and one that enabled him to work remotely 100% of the time. After about one year of dedicating lots of time to applying and interviewing, he scored that exact job he sought. Coincidence? I think not.

And Now For the Quotes…

I’ve always loved quotes and made a ton of cute quote graphics with my favorites using my favorite graphic program, Canva. I want to share my 101 quote creations with anyone who loves quotes too.

Scroll below to see them all. Save them to your Pinterest boards, screen shot them and save them to your phone or print out the free printable I created below and place it somewhere you can see it every day.

Sometimes we just need that little reminder to help steer us onto our path in life and stay there. I hope that I’ve been able to help be that little reminder for you today.

Sending my love and light to anyone who needs it!

Click the button below to access a PDF version of my cute printable “Do What You Love, Love What You Do” and save it to your computer, phone or print it out!

And one more…I think this would be cute on a t-shirt!