Scott Erickson Paints an Honest Picture of an Advent Season of Hope

Jen: Everybody, welcome to the show. Hello to you. Hello to Amy. Hello. Hello, everyone. Hi. How are you today?

Amy: I’m okay. Yeah. Yeah. I saw you glance at my clothes.

Jen: What? Just your outfit. Your uniform. I should call it. 

Amy: Well, I’ve seen you a lot this week. Yeah, I’ve been wearing this exact same thing for three days.

Jen: It’s not not true. But also I don’t care.

Amy: Right. Also surprised you notice at all because it’s the same color. It’s just black from head to toe. Everything is covered in black. Yeah. I’m okay. Okay. This week, I am. You know, sometimes I’ve talked about this before. Sometimes I need to take to the bed a little bit. You know.

Jen: A flare up is so much. Yeah.

Amy: Yeah. Sometimes I choose to work in the bed.

Jen: Great. But after this, it’s a free country. That’s why you work from home?

Amy: Both jobs. But yesterday, I have a puppy, a six month old puppy. So sometimes I have to do some interventions in the backyard. And yesterday I walked across my yard.

Jen: Just, just your yard that you live in your backyard.

Amy: Yeah. Like walked up to the back. And my watch dinged and said Congratulations! Record breaking outdoor walk.

Jen: It’s like a hundred steps.

Amy: Congrats! Congrats. I’m not sure if it’s oh for the week or for the month.

Jen: It’s not great.

Amy: So now I’m okay, but maybe I should go outside more.

Jen: Oh, listen, I am so much like this. I work from home every and all my stratas, and I’m a homebody. Yeah. So I think, I mean, back when we all had, watches that did our steps. Well, you still do. But I had it when it was. What was it, the first FitBit? Fitbit? Oh my God, thank you.

Jen: Yes, I had a Fitbit. I could go a handful of days in a row and log 400 steps in a day. I’m sorry to say that.

Amy: And, it was confusing because I have driven 1 billion miles this week back and forth. Like I took a kid to get a driver’s license. Like, I’ve been in the car so much. So when my watch said that at first I was like. But I think I’ve only walked from my bed to the car I see.

Jen: So you know what? Tomorrow’s a new day.

Amy: Tomorrow is a new day.

Jen: We have such a lovely, lovely interview today. And it’s nestled in the space of Christmas and Advent. And, we have actually just finished the interview. And so oh, my gosh.

Okay, you guys, this holiday season, Amy and I’ve been super inspired. We asked for stories from the community. We need some holiday heroes. We need some good news. We need some people to rally around and celebrate. And you guys delivered. And so today, we’re super excited to spread, I guess, some of our own little holiday cheer by celebrating one of the holiday heroes that we have selected.

Jen: And we’ve got with us our new friend Carrie.

Amy: Hi Carrie!

You nominated your twin sister, Kelly, and I’m gonna read the letter you sent in. Okay. 

Kelly is my twin sister and is as deserving as all the others being nominated, I’m sure. However, I think she’s awesome, and I hope you will choose her as one deserving holiday cheer this year. My sister was in the Navy as a medic and worked with the Marines on the ground when she was injured in Iraq.

She ultimately lost her arm and shoulder and sustained other injuries. And this alone isn’t why I’m nominating her. It is her resilience and kindness that she continues to show us all every day as she perseveres through all the pain and hard moments and at times, the hard days. She shines with a beautiful smile. Whether carrying a flag on horseback with other wounded veterans in the rodeo or working security at Disney, playing wounded warrior amputee football, and even volunteering most recently in the aftermath of the Florida Hurricanes when she was out with her disabled husband and adult son, helping neighbors and friends with cleanup.

Kelly is a beacon of light in what should be the darkest of times. 

Oh, she sounds incredible!

Jen: She sounds incredible. We unfortunately don’t get to talk to Kelly today. She is sick. But who we have is Carrie here to talk about her sister Kelly.

Welcome. And we’re delighted that you wrote in and told us all about her. 

Can you tell us a little more?

Carrie: Well, thanks for having me. It’s so nice to meet you both. And. Yeah, so I, I’m excited to have nominated her and all of the things that I wrote, and she’s so humble and so kind and through all of the heartache and turmoil and hardships. So she just keeps shining. And, I think that as you all asked for, nominees, I just couldn’t help but say, let me do that. Let me nominate her and share a little bit of sunshine, possibly for her, literally and figuratively. Because she just keeps shining for others. And, I just think it’s important that we remember those who have served and continue to serve, not just in the military, but also in the military. But, you know, as they continue to be of service even through hardship.

And so, yeah, I just think so much of her and I think she’s a blessing and I’m so grateful she’s here. I’m so grateful that she has fought, and continues to fight, and continues to share and smile and and help others and in any capacity that she can.

Jen: We couldn’t agree more. And it is always, meaning for all to hear the story of someone who has suffered and lost in some way. Particularly in service, who then finds a way to just dig deep into resiliency and still turns around and serves her community and finds joy and creates joy and these are the exact sort of stories that are like, for me, rocket fuel. Like, this is why we do what we do. This is why we keep going. And, when we’ve got, like the Kellys in the world, we can look sideways at them and draw so much courage from their stories. And so we agree with you, Carrie, that Kelly is absolutely worthy of being one of our holiday heroes.

Amy: And to honor her incredible spirit, we are giving her a $500 gift card to use however she wants or needs, and then also in hopes that she treats herself a little bit and can also maybe do some of her holiday shopping. We’re going to give her another $500 to the Jen Hatmaker Gift Guide, where she can go shop and maybe…

Jen: Yeah, we expect her to get something for herself off of that. The gift guide has it all, so she is bound to find something she loves on that. And we deeply expect at least one thing to go right into her closet or wherever she wants it to go. So, we’re delighted to honor her, Carrie. And thank you so much for nominating her.

We hope that you will give her all of our love, our respect and our gratitude, and that we were so happy to select her as one of our winners and so happy to celebrate her. And you, thank you for nominating her. What a good sister you are. And so happy holidays to both of you from us.

Carrie: Thank you all so much. And I know she is sorry she couldn’t be here. She’s just under the weather. Right? Laryngitis. Yeah. And so, so sorry she can’t be here, but thank you both for honoring her. And, Happy holidays. Thank you. Hopefully I can share this with her. And she’s gonna be so excited and humbled and wonder why she gets there.

Carrie: So, yeah, she’s just going to be so touched. So thank you. Thank you.

Jen: It’s our pleasure to do it. Happy holidays to both of you.

Amy: Thank you for writing letters.

Carrie: Bye bye.

Jen: We want to say to everyone who shared your nominations with us. Thank you. What a delight they were to read and to learn about your best and your favorite people. Thank you for reminding us of the power of giving and of love and of human connection. It’s been a joy. On our side of the street, to get to read through all of your nominations and by the way, you guys, everyone listening can also receive gifts. Go to https://jenhatmaker.com/gift-guide. We are doing a daily gift giveaway every single day between now and Christmas Eve, every single day. And nothing is under $100 value, so this is worth your time. Again that is https://jenhatmaker.com/gift-guide. And you can enter every single day. 

One more quick segment until we bring our friend Scott on. Let’s do a little Culture Shock.

Honestly, this answer could probably change year to year, even week to week. So let’s just say whatever it is right now or maybe you have a stalwart, forever permanent answer here. Favorite Christmas song?

Do you have just one?

Amy: I mean since this episode about advent. So that makes me think of more religious Christmas songs.

Jen: Baby Jesus.

Amy: So O Holy Night, that’s mine, honestly.

Jen: I don’t have a second place. I mean, that is my all time favorite Christmas song. When Angie sings it at church, I just can’t deal with it. I can’t deal with anything.

Amy: Yeah.

Jen: The lyrics to me are maybe some of the most, like, beautiful lyrics ever written. Like, I almost just can’t even hear the lyric, a weary world rejoices. I could cry right now.

Amy: And you know what gets me is listening to it in other languages. Oh, because it’s, you know, it’s the same story. It’s so universal. It’s the same melody. Like just. I’m undone.

Jen: Oh, gosh. Oh. I feel that in my bones.

Amy: Like it’s on. It’s the Pavarotti Christmas album that he did with, like, the boys choir when we were little. But that whole album just slays me. But yeah, that’s my top one. Yep.

Jen: Same; we’re the same on that. Okay. So speaking of, like, beautiful Christmas. Jesus. See, advent spaces, we have the most delightful guest on the show today, someone that Amy and I have both known and followed for years and years and years. And I know a ton of you have, and I’m I’m excited for those of you who haven’t, because you are about to be introduced to just an incredible artist and who leads us into some of these spaces, I think with great care and, tenderness that I’m always searching for, particularly this time of year.

Jen: So today we have the incredible Scott Erickson. You may know him by his internet and artist moniker, which is Scott, the Painter that might feel more familiar to Scott the painter. So Scott is just unique.He’s his own person in the art world. So obviously an artist, he’s also an author. Definitely a storyteller. And, he centers his work, like, as so many artists do, around honesty and truthfulness and vulnerability and, and big ideas and heart ideas and pain and joy and it’s kind of all baked into the sauce. And so it’s not just visually beautiful, which it is, but it’s meaningful. And so he has a variety of ways in which he presents his art to the world.

It’s in his paintings. It’s in his books. He has live events where you kind of watch him create his work in real time. He has small group material that you can kind of gather with a handful of friends and come around these beautiful images and ideas, and just work it out together. And he doesn’t follow conventional rules or wisdom, particularly in spiritual slash religious spaces.

He brings his own beautiful brand to a very old story and I’m absolutely drawn to him. And I have been for years. And I think you’re going to love what you hear today. He’s, I think he’s somebody that you can trust. As you know, in this show, not just in the show, but in anything that I do, I’m never going to put any kind of spiritual or faith content or leader in front of you that I don’t trust. So I just wouldn’t do it. I won’t do it. And so I want you to know that we both love and respect and admire and trust him. We trust his perspective. I find it authentic and true. I find it, his work has an uplink to what I think is the most beautiful part of believing in God and believing in Jesus. The stuff that transcends country and party and nationality and generations. And, that’s the stuff I’m looking for. The stuff that is true everywhere and at all times. And so I think that that is the essence of his work. And plus he’s funny. So get excited for that. You don’t very often get a funny artist, right?

Somehow he is both. And so he had us laughing. He had us nodding. He had us thinking. And he is helping center all of us during this particular season that can be so overrun with consumerism and hustle and bustle and busyness. I think this is the conversation I was wanting to have during advent. So having said all that, let’s welcome Scott Erikson, aka Scott the Painter to the For the Love podcast.

Jen: Delighted to see your face and so happy to have you on the show. Thank you for saying yes to being on the show today.

Amy: Welcome.

Scott: A day we need to be seen.

Jen: It’s a good day to be seen. Yeah, that’s exactly right. We’re just kind of holding each other in our little arms.

Scott: It’s going to be seen. Except when you’re jogging. Nobody wants to see themselves jog. It’s never. If you’ve seen video footage of yourself jogging, I guarantee you you haven’t been impressed.

Jen: I have not.

Scott: So we all have an idea about how we think we run. But then when you see yourself running, you’re like, oh, is that.

Jen: That’s how it is? Okay, this is such a funny thing to say. As you were saying, my brain is imagining what I actually look like at a sprint. It’s terrifying. I’m 50. Like that ship has sailed, you know? That’s just it. I think my running days. What? I never had running days. What am I saying?

Jen: Yeah. Why are we pretending with Scott that we are runners? You’re running. It’s. I mean, we’re clearly…

Scott: Jen’s running days are over, and.

Jen: That’s right. I really miss them. I really miss them. Okay, I, as we’ve told our listeners all about you for the ones that don’t already follow you, one really fun thing that we’re going to start out the gate talking to you about, which I’m trying to imagine how this would feel, and I think it probably feels cool, is because of the nature of your art.

And also your art is so specific. I can pick it out of 1,000,001 one out of a million photos I can find yours. And so it’s got this really beautiful style to it that’s unique to you and kind of carries its own weight. So because of this, a whole bunch of you get your artwork tattooed on their physical human selves.

Scott: In the thousands I think. Yeah.

Jen: Yeah, yeah. My gosh. Okay. I would love for you to walk us through that, so much so that you have a whole thing on your website where you’re like, okay, look, I can’t answer. Here is the tattoo. Yes. Like

Scott: Yes, I made it. Yeah. It’s that I made a Frequently Asked Questions because, every week, almost twice a week, somebody will ask me, will you design my tattoo or can I get a tattoo with your design? And so I just streamline that process. I just send them to that link. I think it’s so cool.

I think it’s so cool. I think tattoos for our, you know, for our parents, it meant you were an outsider or a dirty, dirty sailor. But it’s for us. I, I’m not sure why we embrace it so much. Maybe we want to be sailors, but I think it is why I have. I have a lot of ink.

Is it that it’s visually telling the story of my life? And then a lot of people just love the art. Some people are into the pain of it, you know, we all have our kinks. But I think it’s really why we choose certain images, telling our story visually.

And, I think because this is a longer part of my story, I grew up in Protestantism and I, there’s no visual vocabulary there. And so a lot of my work has just been creating my own visual vocabulary that I needed. And I think once I release it into the world, people like, oh, that’s how that describes my life too.

And so it’s been a real honor to help give solidarity for people’s experiences and journeys and then to see it on their bodies. And it’s amazing. I will say that there’s very few, but there are some tattoos because I asked, I just say, send me a picture. I just want to see a picture. There are some tattoos that I’m like, I wish you would have talked to me before you got that.

But I don’t ever say that. I just button that up.

Jen: That when that choice could have used the second eye.

Scott: And that’s why I have those rules or guides of things to think through. Because I think that when people contact me, even friends, they’re like, I don’t know what to get. I’m like, okay, well, let’s just have a process of just kind of thinking about what story you want to tell, thinking about your body. Like, you know, my favorite one is to imagine your parents with this tattoo because it’s just the same.

Jen: That was my favorite.

Scott: Your body’s going to change over 30 years, so just realize it’ll be a different kind of body shape eventually.

Jen: That’s correct. Right. I only have a couple of spaces on my entire body that will be largely interrupted. Like. And those spaces are shrinking.

Scott: So, you know, just like after your running career ends…

Jen: Are your own personal tattoos? Is it your work? Is it yours? Yes.

Scott: It’s me doing some work. Yes. So I could, I could do let’s do it. 

Jen: Yeah. Get excited. You two.

Scott: So this is my logo from Say Yes, my book and show I did, they’re all my ideas. They’re just, I work with different artists. There’s my Trinity symbol. This is, not Thomas Merton, Saint Francis and Steve Zissou from the Wes Anderson film Life Aquatic.

So, Saint Francis of Assisi. So I combine those two, and I think that that’s.

Jen: That’s a natural pairing.

Scott: I showed this to Franciscan friar Richard Rohr, and he didn’t love it.

Jen: He didn’t love it.

Scott: And then I got this guy. I got some other stuff. So, you know. Yeah, they’re mostly mine. I do have, actually. It’s funny, I’m wearing the shirt today because I do have this juxtaposition of these two Vincent van Gogh paintings. I have it on my back as a tattoo.

Jen: Very fancy. Nice. Like, I love it. I’m. I mean, I love tattoos, I’ve always loved them. I’ve been drawn to them my whole life. I find them beautiful and interesting and an avenue for storytelling. Those are beautiful. And, like, what fun. Like to see that your work is like walking around over.

Scott: They all hurt. That’s the question. Does it hurt, like, every single time? Yeah.

Jen: Yeah, absolutely. They hurt. Yeah 

Scott: Yeah yeah. That’s part of the process. That’s where I get the kink or whatever. There is something about, you know, going through a process to get to something. That’s why I don’t and I’m not great at surfing, but I’ve surfed for 20 years and it’s you all. We all see highlight clips of people riding the wave. It’s boring to watch somebody get smashed, wave after wave after wave to get out there.

Scott: But there’s like this process of getting to it. Yeah, yeah yeah.

Jen: Yeah, yeah. I completely signed on to that.

Amy: In addition to your prints and the artwork that so many people use as tattoos, really, all your work sort of radiates connection. You bring people in, and invite them to experience it together with you, like performances and like live painting and gatherings. And you bring humor into all of that. It’s such a unique approach. What drives this and how did that start?

Amy: It’s really unique to you.

Scott: Yes, that is a great question. I mean, I’m an artist because I’m a haunted person. So things come to me every day and they’re like, make me. And I’m like, I can’t, I’m driving right now. I’ll get in an accident and they’re like, make me or will go away. And I’m like, no, don’t go away. All right?

I’m pulling over and I’m pulling out my sketchpad. So I think I’m just trying to release the haunting. That’s how I’d like to say my wife doesn’t have this haunting. My parents don’t have this. It’s like a particular invitation to a dance, a work, a conversation that has just been fostered over time. Usually things start very personal. So it is like, well, I’m a, you know, I’m a Enneagram four. I got a lot of emotions. So it starts with an emotion, a question of wondering. And then my answer for myself is always like, well, what would the picture be to understand what’s happening? And then I and then I.

Jen: That’s how your brain is.

Scott: Yeah. So I, I’m always like, what’s the image that I would need to make or find to help me with this idea to understand it. And then I’ll go through that process of transformation, of putting things together, juxtaposing it. And then, I think the artifacts of that transformation is a print artwork, a t- shirt, a couple, a show, and then it’s offering.

So I really think we’ve all experienced this with art that hasn’t been internalized first by the artist. You know, we can call it shallow or, or really just kind of untrue fake. I, I’ve come to understand, like, I’m the one who has to go through the transformational process, and then I can offer that transformational process from that.

I also like that’s, that’s kind of where it starts from my, my good friend, his name’s Royal. He’s like, you’re, you’re less of a medium-forward artist and you’re more of a meaning forward artist. And I think that’s really true. I haven’t even landed, social media has got the painter. When I have an idea, it’s, I think.

Okay, what’s the best way to portray or enter into this idea? Is it a set of prints? Is it, is it just, is it a show? Is it a talk? Is it a video? And is it a book? And that’s kind of how I think through things now, because I’ve made it my vocation. I have to go.

You only have so little time. You have. You still have small children, you know, like, you have to make an income. How are these? I have these different compartments. Like what will help pay the bills. What’s worth doing? That might be profitable. What? Won’t be profitable at all, but will help you be a better artist.

And so I try to make, like, this t-shirt. You see, I made it. I wanted to make a series of, t. So if for those of you listening, it’s just like a juxtaposition of some Van Gogh paintings with some. But I wanted to. I like that there’s all these, like, band shirts out right now that have been for a while, but I was like, there’s so many, like, badass paintings from history that I was like, could you make, like, band shirts about paintings?

Like rock and roll, like Gustaf Dora’s The Death or Edvard Munch’s Self-Portrait in hell, you know? And then like, try to turn them into, like, band shirts and it was this I just gave me a lot of joy. And that’s why it gave me a lot of joy. And then I put it up on my site and people are like, that gave me joy, too.

Jen: So exactly, there’s plenty of creatives in the world and that’s how they process the earth as well. I think it’s interesting with you too, because you obviously have this incredible like visual and like skill. Your you, your, your drawings, your creations are beautiful. But also you can do language too. You do words. My intro to you, by the way, Scott was our friend Justin, who you had a project with McRoberts?

And that was when I first saw your work. When he was like, this is what I’m working on, the prayer book. And, yeah, that’s right. And I love seeing because I’m creative, too, but I, I dabble in it in words. And so what you’re able to do so often where you bring together art and language, I mean, that just cuts right through the fog.

Jen: And so you have a really special creative brain. That feels like sometimes you draw from the right and from the left.

Scott: Yeah. I love working with Justin. We and maybe you’ll, like, have us back on this podcast. We finished up our third prayer book together, which is a prayer book for depression and comes out next year. But it’s such an interesting collaboration. I mean, I can do it myself, but really to go, what would the language be?

And then what would how would the image come alongside it, and how would they work together and have and bring you into a conversation? And so, I think that’s been so fun to work with him.

Jen: And it comes out.

Scott: Yeah, yeah. And we talk in the low, and it’s, it’s really like a spiritual companion through the season of depression because both of us are. Yeah. Our grown ass man who never got rid of depression. And we don’t think it’s actually there’s something wrong with us. We just think it’s part of our being human. It’s something that’s inside of us signaling that, hey, there’s something disconnected.

And so both of us have collected helpful things: poems, images, songs, routines during those low seasons. And so we were like, why don’t we make a book of a collection of helpful things for others and, and, and also pushing against anything in a certain kind of form of Christianity that says that the goal of depression is, you know, spiritual or to stop feeling sad or whatever.

It’s like, no, this is actually both of us have experienced the fruit of going through that season, which then we’re like, oh, this is probably something that the spirit can use. I’m not saying God gives us depression, just saying, like God, the giver of our lives, it’s built into how we process the crazy and complex and paradoxical world we live in.

So how do we not bypass what’s happening and how do we, like, stay with it and see what we can? That’s and that’s what the book is to do. Yeah, right.

Jen: That’s so great. Especially coming from man.

Amy: Yes for sure.

Jen: Yeah. Really truly like women are a little bit more absolutely talking about depression and anxiety than men are. And so that is very powerful coming from that source material.

Scott: Yeah.

Amy: One thing in your, in your printed art, your drawings, that’s a hallmark of your work is this knack you have for taking complex ideas and turning it into a simple, powerful visual. It’s like Jen said, we can spot it. You know, 1 in 1,000,000 pieces of art. And you see something new every time you look at a drawing.

Amy: You understand it on a different level. Are there any particular artists or writers or just your own lived experience that has influenced you?

Scott: Yeah. I mean, those are very kind words. So thank you. I, I think I’m a, you know, I think I’m a good artist. I think I’m on my way to being a great artist. But I understand the field and the community of creators that I’m in, and so I’m like my, my offerings to me, it’s very humble.

But I love that it really resonates with people. I think that there’s, because I’m such a big fan of a giant, ornate painting, and I’m such a big fan of musicals or any kind of, you know, a one person show or a play. I have a good comedy set. Like, I’m such a fan of crafting something.

I think what I’m interested in visually is how can you put the most in the in the most condensed way, which is more of maybe a design aspiration. You know, if you’re making a logo or some kind of brand, it’s like, how do we say the most about us in the simplest way? And so that’s that’s kind of an especially growing up in like, organized religion and stuff, giving all of these like, big lofty ideas and complex and, you know, it’s like it’s the not now, but you know what?

Jen: We’re well versed, you know.

Scott: It’s like it’s just all this, like, grandiose talk. And I think there was a desire and need to go, well, how can dumb dumb like me. Yeah. Simplify that as, like, a foothold or a handhold to this larger thing. And so that to me, that’s the process of kind of starting with this big thing and then going, well, how would we summarize it or simplify it.

Scott: And then, then there’s like a process of confronting the cliche. And then what if you and then like chopping it up or messing up certain parts of it and seeing you know, how that would and that and it’s kind of like did this distilling process until really it’s kind of a gut heart soul feeling of I look at it and go, I really love it.

Scott: I think it’s really helpful. There’s nothing I can change about it. And then that’s kind of when I release it into the world. So that’s the heart, some of it’s my own self-expression, some of it’s my own wanting to make jokes. I mean, I’m secretly my secret ambition, which is my first Michael Smith quote of this podcast.

Scott: It is, that I would.

Jen: Be a.

Scott: Stand up comedian and in some ways, it’s so funny. I’m like, I’m terrified of ten minutes at a comedy club. But then I put on this 90 minute show for two or for five years, you know. Right. Which had lots of jokes, but it’s more of, well, comedy isn’t everything. I want it to be either, but this is where I get, like, I forgot where I was going.

I got such ideas. I just like my desire. Oh, a lot of my I think there’s, I mean, I’m, it’s I have landscape paintings over here that I’m working on, but I think there’s a part of my work that’s like, I want to help distill complex ideas into something that we can really use for our own, a flourishing and then there’s like, I just also want to make some beautiful things as well.

So it’s kind of yeah.

Jen: That can translate that idea of, of distilling and condensing and finding a summary that still somehow feels complete enough to carry the weight of the meaning that that can translate to all these different places. I’m about to ask you about honesty. Yeah. Because this is advent season when this comes out and we’re just thinking, this is this year’s just been a lot.

And, certainly for me, I am craving some sort of spiritual nurture that feels true. That feels true for everyone. Not just some of us feel that feels honest. And it’s out of the realm of cliche. It’s out of the realm of talking points. It’s out of the realm of, Christian nationalism or whatever all gets bound up.

And so before I talk to you about Honest Advent, I think this is a I know this about you, and Amy does, but I want to make sure that our listeners do, too. I wonder if just in whatever way you see fit, can you talk a little bit about your personal kind of spiritual arc? And because, you know, when we put spiritual content in front of me, the creator of that content matters.

And are we coming from the same place? Do we have the same values like our spiritual ideologies, like anywhere near each other, or is this going to be, yet again, disruptive? Disorienting? Confusing? Yeah. And that is not how we find your work. And so I wonder if you could just for a second, let’s discuss a little bit about your personal spiritual arc and where kind of where you come from as you create these really spiritual experiences.

Scott: Yeah. You know, I, I think what gets mixed in the concrete really young, once it hardens, it’s really hard to get out and, I can’t tell if it’s, you know, Christianity, was the framework in which I was introduced to look at the world. And as I’ve departed from so much of it, is like the American version that’s aligned a lot with really sick power.

There’s still things that really, are helpful in that scaffolding for me, which, I like, I like to say, because a friend of mine, we were having beers a year ago, and he was like, I still can’t believe you’re a Christian. I was like, I know it’s you. I said it was for two reasons. One is that a Christo centric worldview really hasn’t failed me.

I’ve had to become really broad on what Christ means. But the idea of something invisible becoming visible makes sense. It’s helpful in describing a lot of things that are mysterious or aspects that, you know, the interesting parts of life are very material and yet also just magical at the same time. So like there’s this hiddenness that becomes unhidden and it fills us with wonder.

So that’s helpful. And then two is the paradox of being alive, which is, and the best way I can describe it is like I grew up in an institution, and that gave me a lot of really beautiful things, wonderful celebrations and festivals and community and, and yet has also been proven to be a harbor for racists and misogynists and swindlers and the snake oil salesman and, like my general feeling for the last few years is just really heartbroken, heartbroken at the kind of hypocrisy of it all.

But then, paradoxically, on the other side of that, people keep telling me their mystical stories. I mean, I’ve had some of my experiences, but people keep telling me about these mystical experiences, these encounters with something larger that we would try to call God and love and, something’s happening. So I need, I need, in that paradox of it is like, oh, everything that we make to try to control and contain the thing is always going to be imbued with human selfishness and fragility and abuse.

But something is still happening, and I want to make a space in a practice in my life for that. So, if that describes the arc like I, I grew up in a tradition and then I’ve, I’ve been trained as a spiritual director. You know, I, nobody’s forcing me to do the work I do.

It’s really from an earnest search for a seeking place. But that is mixed in, like, heartbreak and our failures and, but also, like, something’s still happening, and I don’t want to give up. I don’t want to let bitterness overtake my eyes to see that something is still happening.

Jen: I love that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I really do. I love that answer that draws me to you and makes me feel safe to bring my people to you. And to that end, I want to talk about Honest Advent. This season is so many things but it it can just eclipse anything holy or tender or divine the whole time.

Jen: We just skid into it. Maybe on Christmas morning and hope to, like, grab it by its tail. But for the most part, it can just be absolutely engulfed with the hustle, the bustle. So I love, I love this I love that you have taken this time of the year and, and brought it down to something that is truthful and honest and frankly, raw and, really, really inviting.

Jen: And so I think I’d love to hear you talk first of all about why you did this, what drew you to this? And, how did you feel? This is what I want this to look like. This is what I want it to feel like. Here’s the kind of experience I am hoping to sort of inspire in the people that take.

Scott: There’s like two. So it was, I started working on this in 2016, so not so different to today. It was a divisive election cycle. There was the Zika virus. There were the Syrian refugees. There was just a lot of war sickness, division. And then I walked into CVS in November and they had Christmas decorations up. And I was like, oh yeah, it’s Christmas. And as an artist, I love the brand of Christmas red and green. You know, they’re like complementary colors. I love the music, the soundtrack. I love all of it. But it just was like, oh, is this a distraction from life or is it a hopeful message for the reality we live in? So it was kind of like that. And then my wife was pregnant with our third child, and this is where I’m like adjacent to the mystery of birth.

Because I’ve witnessed three pregnancies and three births, you know, next to but not having embodied it. And, and for me, I was like, wow, you know, we there’s a lot of, these Christ is born and advent and stuff. I’m like, yeah, pregnancy is amazing. It’s also painful and uncomfortable. And there’s a lot of fluid lines.

And I was like, yet this imagery that we’ve all we’ve sanitized it all. And then I get it. Nobody really wants like, you know, fluid, I don’t know. You know, you’ve seen those paintings. Do they try to make it real? You’re like, not my favorite. So I get it, I get it. So I was like.

Jen: It’s a lot.

Scott: It was a lot. So I was just bearing witness to my wife’s journey as a mother and. And me as a father, too, and just going, wow, we. So I guess that the larger question was like we said, God is with us. That’s the name of Jesus is God is with us. Yeah. And it’s just like, well, where is God in the midst of this world I live in?

And, I was like, maybe, maybe God is in the place where God came into the world, which is through human vulnerability and so I had to look. I started looking at incarnational vulnerability. A lot of people who come out of a tradition, they don’t ever use incarnation except to describe Jesus’s birth, but Jesus didn’t have, like, an unusual birth.

Besides, if you know, it was for sure, it just. If we all were incarnated, we would all like again. We were all nowhere and then we were here somewhere in what is that hidden journey and how can we find it? So I take these like very few passages of Jesus’s birth, some prophetic stuff and then kind of like using it as like an invitation to meditate on our own vulnerabilities and incarnate.

And maybe that’s where we’d find God in our midst now. So it was like watching my wife and watching the process of birth. But then also there was this image. I was at my friend’s house in Atlanta in the bathroom. They had this image of sister Grace Remington having done this portrait of Mary and Eve, and Eve is like holding Mary’s belly, and Mary is like holding her face. And it’s this interesting, you know, and I’ll meet a lot of people who are like, oh, the theology of it and stuff. But when I saw it, I was like, oh, here are two moms that lost their kids too early. That’s my first response. Because, you know, as you get older and you become an adult, like, babies die, kids die.

You know, things don’t work out the way you thought they would. And I was like, it’s a big risk to love. It is a big risk to bring something into the world and to have your hands open to whatever is going to happen. And so I think it was so I was like, I need to again, this goes back, I need to all the imagery of Christmas doesn’t work.

So I need to kind of make my own illustrations. And I wanted to make something that didn’t look like Christmas at all, to just take it out of that store, you know, take it out of the North American winter snow. Yep. And I lived in Austin when it snowed, you know, like I was there for that.

And I’ll never.

Jen: Forget.

Scott: You know, so that’s that. So, that was kind of my invitation into that. And then I posted it on Instagram, then I think I did 3 or 4 illustrations that first year and just had an overwhelming response from people. Yeah, and mostly women just saying this is the first thing I’ve seen that actually honors my experience.

And that is such a tremendous compliment. As you know, and a journalist, you know, like an observer. I remember when we were pitching this book to a publisher who would comment, we got backwards. Was this straight white guy trying to talk? Oh, for.

Jen: Sure, I.

Scott: Talk about birth. Right? I was like, it’s an insert. Yeah. I for sure am a visitor to this incarnating. I can’t grow a baby inside of me. But I am an observer and I want to bear witness to what I see is amazing. And if a bunch of, like, white European men made a bunch of paintings back in the day that dismiss all this, I want to offer something different in the same vein of white men trying to do something.

No, you know what I’m saying? It’s just like, this is my experience, and I’d like to count that. Yeah. Give something. Yeah, that. It’s probably the best. It’s so far, the best thing I’ve ever written, for sure.

Jen: Maybe. I don’t.

Scott: Know. Amy. Have you written? Are you an author?  Sorry? I don’t know if you’re an author or not. I know, okay, and I wonder if you have this experience. Like when I read this book, I’m like, who wrote this book? Not me. If you know, I’m not saying.

Jen: Like.

Scott: I never wrote it, but no, it just is like I’m still moved by what was written, which is such a weird experience, because when you’re close to your own work, eventually you’re like, I don’t need to see it anymore. But I still read this book every year. I wrote it. Yeah.

That’s I love you. I love hearing you say that.

Amy: People can experience this material online, in a book, and, like, walk through exhibits, and a lot of different ways. What do you think has resonated the most with people, and were you surprised by what it was by the feedback?

Scott: Yeah. One of my favorite reviews on Amazon is like a, a female, pastor. What I have to say, female. But, you know, she’s a priest and she’s like, she’s like, I’ve been doing advent for like 20 years. And this book is talking about things that I’ve never seen in the story. And I think that is a tremendous compliment.

I love when people just feel it’s like, oh, this. I feel like the seasons come alive in a way that I haven’t experienced in a long time. And that might just be, because of the massive culture of, the, you know, money and economy that comes along with Christmas and stuff. But I think it’s in my own look, I just want to I want to I want to know if I should just give up on my beliefs, you know, like, if it doesn’t, if it doesn’t, if God’s not in the world and this isn’t the story that’s happening, I just want to move on, you know?

You know what I’m saying? But we are celebrating this thing, and it is happening. I just like, is this happening? And that’s what my invitation is. And so, I think by going through those things and thinking through and praying through and, and, and then creating out of it the fact that it becomes then like a path for others to walk is that’s the greatest gift, I think, in making art or making something is that it can offer that to people and it can excavate their own story.

They’ll find their own story in it and stuff like that. So that’s, that’s.

Jen: Do you have a favorite? Because just like Amy said, you have made this available to people in a variety of ways. It can be in a group setting. It can be an art installation. It can be in a live setting, it can be individually, it can be in a small group. So there’s a lot of ways to experience your art here.

Do you have a favorite like or even a specific favorite where you went, oh, this one girl or this one church was this one place did this with it. And I didn’t see that coming. And it was really, like, beautiful or surprising.

Scott: Yeah. It was only last year that I put the artwork up as posters that you could download, because churches are always asking your communities. I also want to help Protestant or, you know, churches that don’t have any art to have art. And, so I’ve been trying to figure out ways to affordably print out shows and then put them up, so those are always great.

Specific story. I know you guys asked me this questions. I don’t know.

Jen: I threw that in. I didn’t prepare.

Scott: Like, I think it’s just it’s always amazing to see, and look, I mean, now my, my studio is pretty big, but I like to say I just make stuff in a room by myself. So. So to receive images of, like, communities walking through the art. Yeah. Just to receive this, one woman sent me, like, her book club and a picture of her whole book club with my book and reading it, and you’re like, I mean, maybe you’ve had this experience when you.

When I was doing shows, when I was touring, people would come and they’ll bring your book and it’s like a tabbed.

Jen: Yeah. Oh, it’s best when it’s dark. Just my heart just renders.

Scott: That is because you know that you work so hard. Yeah. Alone on something. You know, in that cave of creativity that you have to, I mean, I know, I mean, I know things can be generative with other people, and so but there’s it always comes down to just like you kind of like wrestling that thing and trying to bring it forth.

And then when somebody left their house, got in their car, drove, found the parking, walked in the rain, came inside and showed you their tabbed book. Thanks. Thanks to me. Yeah, yeah.

Jen: It’s the alchemy of what happens when you hand it over and then it becomes something new in the hands of your readers and the people that are experiencing it, and they bring a story to it that you couldn’t even fathom. You’ve done your part. You did the creation part. You did your part of stewarding your gift, putting it out there to the absolute best of your ability.

And then they take it and it becomes something more. It is bananas. I’ll never get over that exchange, between creator and whoever is wonderful enough to consume what we’re doing in our labs. My daughter said one time, she was with me, and somebody came up with the tabbed book, and everything’s marked and it’s she brings her story and overlays it on top of it.

So it’s taken on a whole slightly bigger meaning. And my daughter said she was with me, and this person said the whole thing and showed the whole thing and walked away. And Sidney’s like, mom, it’s so weird that you can just have had that experience because I watched you just sit with your dirty hair in the corner of the couch and just pick that thing out, like in the same clothes you were in yesterday.

Like your third coffee. I’m like, I know, it’s just it’s a crazy exchange of art.

Scott: Talking about Johnny May and Micah May, because I got this book deal in March of 2020. And then we moved to Austin boy. And Mike, had a little shop in Braker Woods, and because we were moving. Yeah, she let me write about that. And so there’s this street in Breckenridge because I still live there. So these people don’t know where I would be because I write and then I go, I need to go walk.

And I would just walk this street for like a long time. And so anytime I go back to Austin and I’m there, I’m like, this is where I wrote on this. Then this is like, we’re on this street. It’s like this.

Jen: Street.

Scott: Is that the place where I wrote this book?

Jen: Yeah. That’s good, that’s good.

Amy: You talking about taking a walk? Reminds me, I think one of my favorite things I’ve seen is someone interacting with your art. The on his advent specifically. It must have been last year. I don’t know if it was on your page or someone tagged you. But a lot of people intentionally go see it at church or get together with their friends.

Amy: You know, people who are like minded. But it was a picture of, I guess, a church that was installing your art, on the outside of the walls, like some brick walls, like along the sidewalk. And just.

Scott: Like, and they we take centered.

Amy: On a pedestrian, a pedestrian walking by, just stopping and taking a minute to look at it. And I.

Jen: Love that. So yeah, nominal and strict.

Scott: Because.

Jen: You can’t invent that. People take what you do and then they add something to it. It just becomes something so precious and usable in a way that you probably didn’t even have.

Scott: I love the I mean, I love the pasting or putting art on the outside, partly because it’s and this is with stations on the street that I have this project, but it was more of like churches don’t need to be creepy and be like, come on.

Jen: In, come inside and your yard.

Scott: And have a popsicle. You know, I was like, why don’t just tell it to you, you know, put it on the outside and let them have it, because I know I don’t think that I’m not trying to do anything to grow a team. Do you know what I’m saying? I think one of the things I hate and sorry for the publishers that I’ve worked with, and it’s just like, I don’t think I need to be in the Christian book section.

I’m just trying to write about what it feels like to be me and be a human, and then how these old stories really help with that. And I don’t need you to sign up for my team. I just like if there’s good fruit from this meditation, then great. And I get the industry and categorizing and stuff like that.

But for me, it’s just like a human offering. And so when people see it and they go, I don’t maybe believe in these ideas, but I can see that that is a true representation of some kind of way of being human in the world. And that’s the goal for me.

Jen: Yeah. Let’s do a little rapid fire as we wrap it up here. So just whatever, whatever comes to mind,

Amy: Right now, what is your favorite color to paint with?

Scott: Pink. Oh, it’s not in. It’s barely in anything, but I really just love that. No, I mean, pink is bright red. Yeah.

Jen: What is the current either song or album or channel? Whichever. Pick on repeat.

Scott: Songs I today there’s two can I. Okay, okay. I’ve been revisiting, great Canadian rock band Matthew. Good band. I don’t know them. They have a couple great songs. Apparition and Strange Days. Strange days. It’s when you listen to, you’re like, oh, this is 90s rock, but it’s Canadian. And I don’t know, there’s a song called Strange Days that I love so much.

Okay. It feels really appropriate for this moment. And then, there’s this great, British artist named Holly Humberstone, and I’ve been really into her, and she did a cover of Prince’s I Would Die for you, and it’s. Oh, it’s so good.

Jen: Oh, well, we’re going to.

Scott: Have to leave.

Jen: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s the same. Yeah.

Amy: Okay. What is your most unexpected inspiration? And just recently.

Scott: Unexpected inspiration. Oh, I recently made friends with the older woman in my neighborhood named Donna, and she’s a quilter, and I’ve been going over to her house because I’m learning how to sew, and she showed me all these, like, quilting books, and I. There’s, like, a whole world of artists like my age, younger than me, doing amazing stuff with quilting and stuff like that.

And so I’ve really been. And then Maggie’s the next door neighbor, and she’s a big seller too. So I’ve been like, I want to make clothes and I’ve been working on like, yes, quilting and making things and working with hand sewing. 

Amy: Yeah. Thank goodness.

Jen: Donna’s probably like, just sit down, young man. You know, I love people older than us who call us like honey and like.

Scott: Yes, my daughter. So my friend Royal and his daughter and our, our daughters are friends were like I texted Donna, I was like, would you do a class for us to like two, two.

Jen: Dads and two daughters.

Scott: To learn how.

Jen: To sew? Amazing. Oh my gosh, I’m obsessed. Last, I honestly don’t know what this answer is going to be. Well, okay, I’m just going to say you can’t say stand up comedian, but you already said this, so I’m going to put that as tier one. But if there’s a tier two, if you weren’t an artist, what you’re an artist, your bone marrow.

Jen: But if you weren’t what would you be doing?

Scott: I was at, oh, kind of tropical. The bar is kind of tropical in Austin with some friends and a new guy I met. I was asking them, like, what he does for work. He’s like, well, I do this half time. And then he’s like, I work for a company. Or basically put on a game show for corporate events.

I was like, what? What do you mean? He goes, well, we’ll set up at a corporate event. We’ll set up a whole game show, and then I’m the host. And I said, you just described a job that I, I’ve never had said out loud, but I’ve always wanted to do so. So I’m kind of like game show. Also, I title the other job that I’ve had the longest is being a waiter, and I loved waiting tables because it felt like having a show a little bit.

And so I think there’s a bit of like, I would run a restaurant that became very fun at times or just, you know, created a sense of relief and fun and service, hospitality, that something in hospitality of that kind.

Jen: Yeah, I like this. Just a quick ancillary question because I absolutely yeah, one game shows 100%. I mean, well, if you had to watch what’s on your face, what’s your go to your favorite game?

Scott: You don’t know this about me. I should always start every conversation. Yes. I didn’t in 1999 I with some friends to The Price Is Right was Bob Barker. I got called up on stage. I lost the car, but I went to spin the wheel. I beat everybody else out spinning the wheel. I went to the Showcase Showdown where I.

Jen: Know you did.

Scott: It was for $8,000 and I thought I lost. But then John, the LA firefighter overbid and I won the show. I’m a show king showdown winning crisis. Right? I’ve lived all your games.

Jen: I was not ready for that. I was not ready for that story. What did you win in your showcase?

Scott: I won a grandfather clock, a couch, and then three trips to Rio de Janeiro, Casablanca, and Washington, DC. Actually.

Jen: This is the best. So the best thing ever happened.

Amy: I own. And did you know.

Scott: My parents still have the grandfather clock. I sold the couch to pay for taxes, and I only took the trip to Rio de Janeiro where I took my best friend and it was amazing. We almost got robbed. We saw a dead body. It was crazy. Yeah, sure.

Jen: Yes. Oh my God, that delivered. I just want to say that story delivered in just a way I wasn’t expecting.

Amy: I want to see art. I want to see an art installation of that.

Jen: Yeah. Just distill it down. Yeah. This is my Price Is Right.

Scott: I’m surprised I don’t have a Price Is Right tattoo. Now that I’m thinking about it. Just to have.

Jen: Frankly, it’s not too late.

Scott: It’s not when I donate my body to, like, doctors in training, and they’re cutting up the cadaver, and they’re like, look at this Price Is Right now to wonder what this guy.

Jen: What do you think this grandfather clock means?

Scott: I knew to get that from my parents and put it in this space. Like, I just be like, it’s really. Yeah.

Jen: It’s fantastic. Okay. Can you please. Okay, I have two things. I’m going to have you end with these two things. The first thing is, again, I’m asking you to do your distillation gift. And for the people listening, if you could just say I am, I’m kind of condensing my advent like art and work into this one.

Hope for what? I would love you to be able to hang on to and believe and draw comfort and hope from during this advent season. And then secondly, can you tell everybody this is where you can find more, this is where you can get it. This is where to go. This is where to follow me. This is where.

Because they’re it’s it’s actually a really broad offering, that you have for people. And so I know they’re going to see more.

Scott: I think the last meditation, which is supposed to be read on Christmas Day, is saying that and the history of angels appearing to people, they’re always like, don’t freak out, so don’t be afraid, even though everything’s going to change for you. And, because I think, I think the cost of revelation, which we’re all like, I’d like a revelation and like something different, is that everything has to change.

And specifically what’s going to change who you think you are, what you think you’re capable of doing, and what you think, how you think your life’s going to turn out. And, I think Merry Christmas is another way of saying be not afraid. Like, because I’m with you. And so whatever our lives are going to be going through or are in right now, there’s a promise of presence and a promise of intimacy that I think is the invitation for advent.

And so Merry Christmas can be not afraid. Yeah, yeah.

Jen: Beautiful. I love it. And for people who would like to know more and find it and, and bring this into their advent.

Scott: Yeah. The website on this advent.com has, you know, links to books, links to art, small group studies, even some preacher notes because like so and but yeah, the book can be found where all books are sold and, it’s, it’s their short meditation. Not that short. They’re like a thousand words each meditation, but they’re also pictures.

So it’s like a picture and a meditation and it’s just meant to be. The best compliment I got from my friend Hilary McBride was like, this isn’t really a book about Christmas. It’s just a book about being human that is using the Christmas story as the magnifying glass. And I was like, that’s exactly what it is.

Jen: So that’s beautiful.

Scott: So you don’t have to buy in on the perfect tinsel in there at the. Yeah, cookies. Although those are both very fantastic things.

Jen: Thank you for being with us. Thank you for being you.

Scott: Thank you. Thank you for having me. And this has been a really good conversation in a week where we need examinations.

Jen: Same. I’m so happy for all the people listening that are getting to know you for the first time. They’re going to be delighted. So we promise to flood your space with plenty of middle aged white ladies. Okay. You’re welcome. You’re welcome.

Scott: I got to say, that’s one of my favorite, categories,

Jen: Demographics, Yeah, yeah, yeah. We’re here, we’re here. Okay. Thank you.

Amy: Good to see you.

Jen: We barely scratched the surface with Scott. You really need to take your eyeballs and go look at his work to make more sense of this conversation, and you just listen to it. And so to that end, if you go over to Jen hatmaker.com under the podcast tab, we’ll have everything this episode encompasses. We’ll have the show notes, I’ll have links to all of Scott’s websites to honest advent, to his work, to his socials, and then you’ll really get a feel for what he does.

Jen: You really just have to see it. To experience it in the way that it’s meant to be experienced. And so, and this, this episode was useful to you anyway. Share it. Like, thank you for doing that. And thank you for subscribing. And, to the show. We love having you in our listening community, and we are thinking about you all the time during the season and hoping that every single episode that we drop into your little ears each week is meaningful to you in some way, and this one’s no exception.

Jen: All right, you guys, thanks for being here. See you next week.

 

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

 

FitBit

Scott’s Tattoo FAQ

Say Yes: Discover the Surprising Life beyond the Death of a Dream

Scott Erickson’s Shows

The Enneagram Institute Personality Types

Honest Advent: Awakening to the Wonder of God-with-Us Then, Here, and Now