Conversations with Leeanne Brennan

Today we’d like to introduce you to Leeanne Brennan.

Hi Leeanne, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I grew up in a family of artists and continued my passion for drawing at Rhode Island School of Design where I majored in Film, Animation, & Video. From there, I went on to work in the video game industry and then switched gears to work as a storyteller for the innovation consultancy world.

When I had my first child, I decided to quit my job and become a stay-at-home mom, and this is where the story of Epic Bones really begins. With this sudden change, I felt a loss of identity not working and became very depressed. I wanted to create personal artwork, but it seemed like such an overwhelming task while caring for my young daughter. Years went by with my creative soul on pause.

I ended up getting back into freelance work, but there was a burning desire to create personal art again that I couldn’t quite seem to find a way to do. When it came time to have my second child, I knew I had to have a personal creative practice in place before he arrived or I would slip into the same depression that I did with my first during those long first years of late nights nursing, changing diapers and all the other things that come with caring for a small child.

So, I set up a project for myself and gave myself some rules and parameters to work within. At the time I was learning a lot about mindset and manifestation so I set out to create a drawing a day about that topic when my newborn son was about 6 months old. The rules were, that the drawings would be digital on my iPad in procreating so that I didn’t have to worry about the mess with a young baby, the drawings would be of 1 character and they would be black and white.

As I marched along showing up daily for these drawings, I felt an enormous amount of fulfillment and excitement. I started to share them on Instagram and people were finding me and following my art. As the days rolled on, I set a goal to complete a drawing a day for 100 days – and thus my program, 100 Epic Days was born.

Everyone started reaching out saying how inspiring it was to watch me show up amidst the chaos of my crazy life as a mom to do my drawings and they loved the empowering messages of hope and overcoming self-doubt to chase my dreams and manifest a new life for myself.

The 100 days ended and I celebrated but felt a longing to keep going, so I set up a group program to share my philosophy on how to lower the stakes, make rules, and create a sustainable creative practice that could be done in 20 min a day. I now run this program, 100 Epic Days yearly. I’ve had creatives join from all walks of life.

Some are musicians who chose to compose music every day, some are artists who chose to paint daily, one woman wrote a children’s book, another worked on her email marketing every day, one woman in this round is creating a digital journal, I created my affirmation deck in the last round and this round I’m doing a short animation every day.

It’s so inspiring to be a part of a group of other people who have busy lives just like me, but were all there to support each other to get our creative goals in each day!

So, I transformed from a depressed stay-at-home mom to now offering my mindset and manifestation art in the form of art prints and an affirmation deck, I run a group program helping others get unstuck and into the flow and I do 1-on-1 coaching too!

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle-free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
It has not been smooth, but it has been consistent. I have made a point to work on my business every single day, even if it’s just for 5 minutes of journaling about who I’d like to become. The biggest struggle has been figuring out the technology part of how to share my message.

I started a podcast and had to figure that out, I had to figure out the whole email marketing thing and how to make a signup form, how to build my website – I’m doing everything myself, so it’s a lot go googling and watching YouTube tutorials.

Also, I’ve created this entire business while caring for 2 young children with the help of my husband.

I started my business when my 2nd child was 6 months old (my son) and I was also managing my daughter in virtual kindergarten at the time all during Covid, so it has been a rocky start, but systems are starting to get in place now and I’m excited about the future!

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I’m an illustrator, animator, and mindset & accountability coach for creatives. I specialize in mindset and manifestation art and I help busy creatives get back into their personal practice or complete a personal project amidst the chaos of their hectic lives.

I’m most proud of the fact that I’ve helped other creatives embrace the season of life that they’re in and figure out a way to do their personal creative work in a way that they didn’t otherwise think was possible. I’m able to inspire others to lower the stakes and let it be easy.

I believe in gentle achievement and that all paths will get us to where we need to go.

If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?
I’m the youngest of 3 girls, all very close in age. I was the loud, bossy one always trying to get attention. Many might not see me that way as I come across as very laid back, but I’ve always been trying to lead from a very young age.

Pricing:

• $20 art prints.
• $42 affirmation deck.

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Website: www.epicbones.com
• Instagram: http://instagram.com/epic_bones
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/epicbones
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCaLwXp1SA0fLwxcruwE8eaA