I am a big proponent of facing your past vices and wrongdoings, weaknesses and mental illnesses, and using them as propellants to move forward.
Here are some embroidery threads that I spent months collecting, obsessing over, and re-arranging in boxes until I finally lost interest and stowed them away in storage for several years. They are just part of the collections of supplies I hoarded without finding a use for them — a manifestation of a compulsive, overwhelming shopping addiction that took years to claw my way out of —finally coming into their own in my studio.
They are beautiful and I am lucky to have them.
They remind me of mistakes not to make again, but also of the promise of things that are borne of self-forgiveness and hard work.