Paint Your Day

I’m often asked – How do you keep your head above water when the tide keeps rising? When the world outside your door feels like a collapsing star, sucking in light, reason, and every last ounce of hope?

Simple.

I paint my day.

Before the headlines bleed their dread, the politicians crawl from under their rocks with fresh venom, and the talking heads spoon-feed us outrage with our morning coffee—I step outside. I touch the earth. I listen for the quiet hum beneath the noise, the rhythm of life that keeps playing, no matter how loud the chaos roars.

I’ve learned to see each day as a blank canvas, mine alone to colour. No one hands me the brush. Not the news anchors. Not the brokers of doom. Not the peddlers of division who would love nothing more than to smear my canvas with their palette of grey.

No—this canvas is mine.

And I choose the colours.

I can wake up, look out that window, and let the shadows creep in, or catch the light before it disappears behind cynicism. I think of those whose mornings are filled with nothing but struggle, waking to hunger, fear, and indifference. The least I can do is honour the day I've been given. Fill it with empathy, colour, and life.

Politics, you see, loves to paint in black and white. Loves to keep you in the margins, scribbled over with anger and dread. But your life? It’s not meant to be a monochrome sketch of someone else’s narrative. It’s a mural—bold, expansive, messy in the best way.

Stop mid-stride. Check your canvas.

What colours have you used so far? Are they bleeding together into a muddy blur of frustration? Or do they sing? Do they reflect your hopes, convictions, and stubborn refusal to let anyone else define your day?

The garden is always there waiting. Life didn’t begin in a boardroom or a war room—it bloomed in colour. In wild, unruly, unapologetic colour.

Keep that garden close.

Dip your brush. Paint your day.