From Blueprints to Brushes with Emily-Jane Sarroff

Finding a balance between career and creativity. 

Have you ever built a "successful" career only to realize it was draining the very creativity you intended to nurture? 

Artist Emily-Jane Sarroff spent a decade navigating the worlds of architecture and high-level business consulting before realizing that her most important work was the art she made for herself. 

Emily-Jane shares her journey of deconstructing the "societal programming" that linked her worth to her career and explains why she recently pivoted to real estate to provide her nervous system the safety it needed to create again.

In this episode, we discuss:

• The "Disappointment" Narrative: How the internal pressure to succeed led Emily-Jane away from her creative roots after high school.
• The Architecture Trap: Why a "creative" degree can sometimes feel more technical than expressive, and the brave decision to "leap" away from a career that wasn't fuelling her soul.
• Choosing Self over Scale: Why Emily-Jane closed a successful, six-figure business to stop "proving herself" and start living from a heart space.
• “Weird and Woo Woo” Art: A look into Emily-Jane’s spiritual, abstract style and why she prioritizes creating for her own healing and expression rather than for commissions.
• Practical Creativity: How to set up a permanent art space (even in a garage corner!) and the importance of scheduling “buffer zones” to transition your brain from logical work to creative flow.

You might also like:

Rediscovering the Inner Artist with Kerry Lyons

Peonies, Paint and Personal Growth with Sally Jean Fox

Society, Stereotypes and Sparkle with Jessie Elliott

Listen to Creativity Found on TrueFans by downloading the app from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store. Listen on the desktop version here.

Transcript

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Emily-Jane Sarroff: 1:02

That if I didn't go and get a certain career, then I'm going to be a disappointment to my parents, even though they never said that to me. That was the narrative that I had made up for myself within that young adult set period of my life. Yes, I could learn how to manage money and rebuild from here, but I realized I didn't want to rebuild what it was that that I had created. And the reason for that was I wasn't actually meeting my needs in terms of what I valued and what I wanted to create more of in my life, and that was my art. I truly believe that everything I paint is just an expression of me and my soul and what I'm feeling in that point in time or in that moment or what I'm needing to process or transmute, not putting these strict rules on it as well. And the biggest thing that's bringing me joy is that I'm creating my art for me.

Claire Waite Brown: 1:57

-Hi, I'm Claire. For this podcast, I chat with people who have found or refound their creativity as adults. We'll explore their childhood experiences of the arts, discuss how they came to the artistic practices they now love, and consider the barriers they may have experienced between the two. We'll also explore what it is that people value and gain from their newfound artistic pursuits and how their creative lives enrich their practical, necessary, everyday lives. This time, I'm chatting with Emily-Jane Saroff. Hello, Emily Jane. How are you?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 2:36

I am great. Thanks for having me, Claire. I'm excited for this episode.

Claire Waite Brown: 2:41

You're very welcome. Start by telling me what you are concentrating on creatively at this stage in your Life.

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 2:50

Stepping into 2026, I did set three clear focuses for myself, so health, wealth, and self for myself. That's really where the larger part of my creativity comes in, where I'm really focusing on my art and creating for me, whilst also, I guess, creating wealth for myself through a new career path and creating a more energized version of myself through my health and Muay Thai. So I'm creating in three different areas, but when we're really talking, I guess, about artistry, that would be creating art for myself.

Claire Waite Brown: 3:24

For yourself. I love that. Go back a bit when you were growing up. What was your relationship with creativity like then? And was it something that was encouraged in you internally and from external forces?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 3:40

Yeah, I always did feel like my creativity was encouraged by my environment around me. I have one really clear memory from. I don't know what age it would have been, but it would have been like three and five And I've got this memory of me sitting down with my mom in the first house that I ever lived at. We were drawing together and I remember she drew the most beautiful swan that I had ever seen. And that image has just always stuck in my mind. So, you know, from a young age I was always encouraged to be creative. Throughout my schooling journey, art was always my favorite class. So there was always space I was creating for myself to make art and would always receive that encouragement as well from my teachers to lean deeper into that. It was probably only after I finished high school that I felt like I had closed myself off from creating when I had to start to build a career by going to university and following that path. So that was really the point in my life. You know, up until the age of about 17, 18, I was an open book to creativity. And it was when I started to step into the real world that I felt like that part of myself started to close down.

Claire Waite Brown: 4:55

Okay, so this is quite interesting because it's been so encouraged up until this point. And I'm wondering where this then new thinking that career had to be different from that came from. So once again, was that you or was that external and then, and then how did you carry on exploring what you were going to do in a career?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 5:21

Yeah, I think if I was to pinpoint it, I would say, you know, around that age of like grade 10 to 12, where you're really starting to think about careers. The careers that were coming up for me were things like lawyer, architect, which, you know, I ended up going and getting my degree in architecture. But these were like the careers that were really being thrown around for me. There was never this idea or this suggestion that art could be a career. And so I don't think that was anything intentional. But you know, there's the societal programming of we need to get a certain type of job if we want to be successful. My parents always encouraging to go to university, yes, you could go to university for art. But I guess I didn't really think of that. And you know, as I've done some self development over the last 12 months as well, I've realized that a big reason or a big, a big driver that has really kept me away from creating as much as I could have been over the last 10 years was this need to not be seen as a disappointment or a failure. And I made up the story at some point between grade 10 and grade 12 that if I didn't go and get a certain career, then I'm going to be a disappointment to My parents, even though they never said that to me, that, you know, you have to do this, otherwise you're going to be a disappointment to us. That was the narrative that I had made up for myself within that young adult set period of my life. And so that's what I've seen play out over the last 10 years. 10 years as I've shifted between careers from an architect graduate to a business owner, to now having closed down my business and stepping into the real estate space. That's what I've really seen was the driving factor up until this point. Right. So with this career change that I've made, it's not been to avoid being a disappointment, it's actually been to feed into this bigger picture vision that I do have for myself, which we could talk about more soon. That would really be that driving thread there.

Claire Waite Brown: 7:25

Oh, that's lovely. The second bit, not the first bit. The first bit is, is something that I have heard before from guests and like you say, you don't necessarily know where it comes from. And then they go looking for their careers advisor or someone and they don't ever get the kind of advice that could lead them a different way that they might have preferred or, you know, felt more in line with. So you said you did architecture, you went to university. How was that experience, how was the actual topic of architecture for you?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 8:05

Yeah, well, I guess the reason why I picked architecture, and it's funny, I can laugh about it in the irony of it, I picked architecture because it was a quote, unquote, creative career path that also fit the bracket of what a successful career path might look like. And then I obviously went into the industry, I got the degree, I worked two years as an architect and I ended up quitting because it just wasn't fueling me creatively how I thought it would. It turns out for anyone who's considering architecture, architecture is a lot more technical than it is creative. There are these big, big, big books of standards that are put in place by governments that you have to fit inside the lines of which they say you can create. So architecture, yes, there is a level of creativity and creative problem solving involved, but it's not the type of creative expression that I thought it was going to be. You know, like as a designer, as an artist of buildings in a way. So that's why I really stepped away, because I found myself growing, reaching this, like, point, the same sort of point that I reached within my business as well, where I just didn't feel like my soul was being lit up by what I was doing that. Fulfillment wasn't there. And it was also taking away from other things that I loved, like creating art. You know, because the degree was so intensive, I actually completely stopped creating. So for the four, almost five years of that timeline, I had maybe created or started one piece of art, if that. And so that was, again, a big piece for me to step away because I wanted more time to creatively express myself and feel less trapped in what it was that I was doing.

Claire Waite Brown: 9:50

You're still quite young, so it's quite a mature realization and a bit of a brave one as well, to turn away from the architecture. What did you do physically, logistically, and how was your mindset in doing that? Because, like I say, it sounds brave. It sounds like something a bit scary to do. Did you find that was the case?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 10:12

Oh, yeah, it was definitely. Look, I didn't take the easy or the slow path. Like, I left. When I stepped away from architecture, I left away from architecture. And what I mean by that is I quit my degree, I quit my job, and I jumped into starting a business that I had zero experience in the industry I was jumping into. But I decided to just go all in and focus on building a business that was completely on a different wavelength to what that career was and what I had been studying. So I ended up starting a life coaching business where I was actually mindset coaching people how to set goals, how to overcome fear. And the reason why I started coaching that was because I was embodying that in that moment. And so I had been building an Instagram community, sharing my journey and sharing the personal development journey I was going on that led me up to that point of wanting to quit my degree. And because I was building a brand around that, I thought, well, why not try to see if I can monetize this brand and actually build a business around that? So I had quit the job, quit the degree, started the business, and just doubled down on building that and put all of my time, my energy, my money into growing that business, which did pay off because I ended up hitting my first six figures in just eight months. And I was 22 years old at that time as well. But I do want to also frame and share that. There was a level of, I guess, a safety net I created for myself in the sense of, you know, I was 22 years old, I was still living at home. I didn't have a mortgage, I didn't have kids, I didn't have, you know, a car loan or any of these big financial commitments that would have required me to stay in a job. So someone's sitting there and they're like, oh, but I can't just quit my job and go cold turkey like she has. That's okay. Like, you can still take steps in your own way. But for me, like, being at that point in time, I figured, what's the harm? Now's the time to risk it. Now's the time to jump in with both feet and just see where this new idea, this new venture could take me.

Claire Waite Brown: 12:21

Yeah, and it's a. It's a lot. It's obviously successful. I mean, how did you know what to do to build a business?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 12:32

I didn't really know what to do, but I was resourceful, that's for sure. I was listening to podcasts every day. I was reading books. I was tuning in to people who had already built businesses and was basically doing whatever research I could to figure it out. And I was also just willing to take messy action. And, you know, I had been building my Instagram community just for the fun of it. So there was experience I had there when it came to creating content. In that first month of going all in on my business as well, I did actually invest in a business coach. So the gaps that were within what I could find out myself were then bridged by someone who already had those answers for me. So it was this combination of getting resourceful, as resourceful as I can to find the answers, and when I couldn't find the answers beyond that, I then invested in someone who could give me those answers.

Claire Waite Brown: 13:29

Yeah, I see. And I know that you don't do that now. How long were you in that business? And what was a reason, if there was one, for winding that up?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 13:43

Yeah, well, I was five years. It's funny, because I was five years into my architecture degree, and then I was five years into my business when I again made that same pivot. So it's been a very clean 10 years of, like, five years working to one thing, having this breaking point where I'm like, okay, it's time for change. And then five years working towards another thing, and then reaching that breaking point again and realizing that I'm ready for change. So it was five years that I was building my business. Across that five years, my business had evolved from mindset coaching into branding and marketing consulting, because that's what I found really became my strong point as a business person. Then I had clients coming to me asking for that as well. So it was this transition from life coach to branding and marketing consultant. And it was middle of 2025 when I realized I didn't want to have that business anymore. And whilst it had been very successful, I had had my biggest financial year ever in 2025. But there were areas where I had let myself down in the sense of money management has always been a weak point for me. I can admit without shame that I made $200,000 in a financial year and had $0 left at the end of it. Not even any money assigned for tax. And that right there was the real breaking point. Where it was like, wow, all of this hard work and all of this effort and then, you know, yes, I could learn how to manage money and rebuild from here, but I realized I didn't want to rebuild what it was that I had created. And the reason for that was I wasn't actually meeting my needs in terms of what I valued and what I wanted to create more of in my life. And that was my art. Right? Because again, during those five years of my university degree, I neglected my art. I quit my degree and I started painting again. But then I started my business and I neglected my art once more. And so here I AM at this 10 year point, like, damn, what was the last thing that you actually created, Emily? And that's where I recognized that the business I had built required too much of me and also placed too much stress on me that then I wasn't able to actually show up for myself outside of the business in the areas that I really valued. So when I decided to take a step back from my business last year, I just decided to lean into creating more art. And that's where like all of these art pieces behind me, like all of them were created last year. There's many, many, many more that I have on my shelf and, you know, in other rooms as well. But that was all created through telling myself it's okay to step away from this business, to just focus on pursuing things that bring me joy without this need to prove myself and prove my worth. And I guess to summarize that neatly, the core of the business that I had built was to just prove that I am good enough to prove that I am worthy, to prove that I'm not a disappointment. And so that is why I decided to not rebuild my business. Because that entire business was built upon proving myself. It wasn't built from this, like, heart space or like this abundant energy. It was built from this need to not be seen as a disappointment. And in my mind I said, okay, well, I'm not going to be a disappointment if I'm this successful business Owner. So I wanted to step away from that and I wanted to create space for myself, to just be me, to just create art without the need to prove. And that's why I've transitioned into the real estate space. Because real estate for me is just a vehicle. It's just a vehicle to meet my needs financially, to meet my needs in this society, and then to allow me to work towards having the luxuries I want in life or having the home I want in life without taking away the time that I value putting into my art. So for me right now I'm just channeling all the skills and the, I guess the skillset I've gained over business into an industry where it's directly applicable so that then I can just focus more time on creating outside of that.

Claire Waite Brown: 17:53

Brilliant. We'll talk about time and also space. I want to talk about in a moment. What does the real estate thing actually involve then? That's allowing you to get a bit more of a. A good balance between work and art.

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 18:08

Honestly, the biggest piece out of anything is. It just calms my nervous system. It really just takes this pressure off my nervous system. You know, like when I was in business, there was this constant stress of I have to really provide for myself right now, I have to source my leads, I have to make sure this is running, otherwise I'm not going to have a livelihood. But for me right now and where I am at this point in my career, it's a breath of fresh air, having a base wage that I'm earning and, you know, there's potential for commissions and income growth on top of that. But right now it really is just taking that weight off my shoulders so I can breathe for a minute and not have to stress about the tax man and keeping myself afloat financially month to month. Like purely stepping into this career has just been to take a break from that stress of being self employed, to let my nervous system rest and therefore allow me to pour more on myself in other areas. Because for the last five years of my business journey, I've been almost in that like flight or fight mode within my nervous system where I haven't been able to rest and therefore I haven't been able to create. Because when we're in that survival state, you can't actually tap into your creativity.

Claire Waite Brown: 19:22

Yeah, I'll put a clip up so that everybody can see what's behind you where we're recording right now. So tell me two things about your art and your themes and your inspiration, but also the practical side, because I've certainly heard this from guests before, that they've said, you know, I work big, but it's really difficult because I have to get all my stuff out. So do you have a situation where you. Your stuff's already out, you've got a space, so you can just go and do it when the mood takes you. So sorry. I always ask two questions at once. It's about your inspiration and your style, but also about the practicalities of how you get to do it.

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 20:01

Well, talk into the practicalities first because that'll be the quicker answer. But yes, I realized the reason why I wasn't creating as much art was because I never had a space to create art and buy a space to create art. You don't need to have a studio. I've just turned what used to be my work from home office into my little art space. But prior to that, I actually set up a corner of the garage where I could just permanently have a easel set up and my paints out and my canvas there so that when I decided I wanted to create, I could just walk there and I'm ready to go. So I removed that hurdle of needing to always have to set something up. When something is packed up, it's out of mind, Right. So out of sight, out of mind where you're not thinking about creating. So now I always have my little canvas set up on the easel in the corner so that I'm always actually looking at what I'm in the process of creating. So I always know, well, let's go pick this up again. Let's go start that. And oh, yeah, I haven't worked on that in two weeks. Let me do a bit more on that. Right. So it helps to have your art space, like a corner or a little table and chair that just permanently has your supplies set up so you can just quickly go there and get started. And that's been like the biggest game changer for me, even now and then. In terms of scale, I have been experimenting with different scale. Previously, I had never done larger scale, but I've just been buying different canvas sizes to just have fun and play around. But what I find works for me is the bigger kind of pieces. They're like bigger projects. Right. So mentally it's a bigger commitment. So I actually started buying smaller little canvases. I could do a painting in a day. Maybe it takes two days. So I've been playing around with smaller canvases at the moment just to improve my technique and to get through a piece quicker so I can start working on volume and refine my skill set quicker than if I was working on one large piece. But I am due to work on a bigger piece soon because I do think that they're, like, really magical when you do put the time and the energy into creating something bigger. So that answers that first question. Was there any sub questions on that before we go into the second part?

Claire Waite Brown: 22:14

Not on that, no. That's perfect.

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 22:17

And so the second question was like to just talk about my style and what inspires that.

Claire Waite Brown: 22:22

Exactly. Yeah.

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 22:23

Well, my artistic style has always been weird. I call it weird and woo woo is what I would classify it. Or other people might call it surrealism, but I call it weird and woo woo. And the reason for that is because I like drawing abstract things. I like painting abstract things, slightly mystical and magical pieces as well. And I truly believe that everything I paint is just an expression of me and my soul and what I'm feeling in that point in time or in that moment, or what I'm needing to process or transmute. It's about creating a expression of something that I'm feeling in that moment. So a lot of the pieces that you can see behind me were either processing some heavy emotions I experienced or was a way for me to start to embody and shift into a different frequency that I really wanted to be experiencing. So for me, the inspiration of my artwork is, I consider it deeply spiritual because it really is like an extension of myself, an extension of usually an emotion that I'm feeling in a certain point in time.

Claire Waite Brown: 23:35

Yeah, perfect. This leads me onto something else, actually, because a lot of times when people start making art or pots or music or films or whatever it may be, they are then not necessarily pressured. But this is the same for podcasters as well. People are saying, do you make any money from it? It's my art. I don't need to make money from it. But artists are often feel that when somebody says to them, oh, that's really good, you should think about selling it, that it takes them to another place. And for you, I'm thinking often people will take on commissions. Now, your work is not commissioned work. Your work is coming from you. So my question is, are you aware of that? Maybe getting into your mindset and that might upset the apple cart? Are you selling your art anyway? Are you purely creating for yourself? Tell me a bit about how you maybe guard against a future where your art isn't as creative and it gets turned into something else.

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 24:42

And I completely understand that. I think anyone who creates anything can resonate with that for Me a big reason, like, cause a lot of people would say to me when I decide to quit my business, they were like, oh, you should go all in on starting a business around your art. And whilst I do see that as a future for me at a later stage, right now, it's not what I want because I don't want to jump from one business that was causing me stress to then jump into creating stress around my art, when right now my art is actually something I'm using to relieve stress for myself. In saying that, though I'm not closed off to selling artwork, a lot of my originals, though I'm holding onto them, I'm not selling those because right now, at this point in my journey, I want to have them, I want to hold them. It's been so long since I actually never in my life have I been this committed to creating art consistently that I don't want to let go of those pieces. I want to allow myself to experience them, to hang them in my spaces, to be inspired by them at this point in my life. But I have done some commissions when they've been requested. I've created commissioned pieces and I'm happy to let those go because I'm not creating them for me, I'm creating them for someone else. And I've dabbled in selling prints of these original pieces that I've been creating as well. So in my mind, I don't tell myself that being paid for my art is going to take the joy away from my art. I am opening myself up to receive in that sense, without it also needing to be something that consumes the way I create. So I'm trying to just really experiment with a balance at the moment. Of course, there are some threads within myself that, you know, needs to shift some beliefs around how much money I could make from my art. But right now, I'm first and foremost creating for me. And then if anyone wants to purchase prints or pieces that I decide to let go and support me in that sense, I'm open to that. If people want commissions, I'm open to that. I'm just allowing myself to really just go with the flow with this. This moment that I'm in around it all.

Claire Waite Brown: 26:51

You can see from my face that you're giving me a very joyful attitude that I'm really enjoying hearing. That's fabulous. I love it.

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 26:59

That's a part. The joy, I think as well, is not putting these strict rules on it as well. And the biggest thing that's bringing me joy is that I'm Creating my art for me above anyone else. When I stopped doing my business, I said my purpose is me. What does that then mean for me? Well, it means I want to create art for me and what do I need to shift within my environment to create space for that? And so I'm just leading with myself when it comes to this journey I'm on with my art.

Claire Waite Brown: 27:27

Yeah, it's a very strong, inbuilt mindset for you. I and lots of other people am quite susceptible to influences from outside. And to hear you talking so very confidently about your aims and what your life is at the moment is really refreshing. And yeah, so thank you for that. It's very insightful. Speaking of insight, if you. I'm not a big fan of giving advice to other people. Well, I am a fan of there being advice and people can take it or leave it, take what's good to them. But I'm going to ask the question anyway. If you were to give some advice, if anybody asked you for advice for like how they might reignite their own creativity after a hiatus, have you got any words of advice you would give to other people?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 28:22

If the situation is you want to reignite your creativity after being disconnected from it so long, the best advice I could give you is what I embodied for myself. After almost 10 years of not creating time for art, I actually started scheduling time for art. You know, I kept on telling to myself, I want to be more creative, I want to paint more. But then I never created space in my calendar for it. So it was earlier last year when I actually started blocking out days. I would block out like a full Wednesday in my calendar while I was running my business to just sit and paint. Now it's about blocking out the weekend, blocking out Sundays or at least half a day on a Sunday for me to sit down and paint. So if you want to get more creative after not being in your creativity for so long, literally schedule in time for creativity. And you do have to be strategic about where you schedule it. An example of that, a 9 to 5 job. You're not going to try to schedule schedule creative time for before work because you're not actually going to give yourself enough space to get into that creative zone. Same thing. You're not going to schedule your creative hour to be from 5 till 6 if you finish work at 5pm because it's going to take you some time to actually shift out of work mode and into your creative mode. So think about where are you going to schedule your creative time and can you put a Little bit of a buffer between whatever you were doing before and when you start your creative time, because that buffer becomes a transition window for you. It's like, I don't know if anyone can relate to this, but when my partner comes home from work after being in construction all day, he might sit in the car for five minutes before he comes inside, which is his buffer zone as he transitions from the workday to now, coming and being here, present with me. Right, so you need to create that little buffer for yourself to actually shift out of one mode and into the next mode. Because being creative is literally shifting the part of your brain that you're using. And if you've been using your logical side of your brain all day and you're going straight into creative mode, you're not going to be making that transition unless you're practiced at making that transition quickly. So create time in your schedule, create a little buffer period before that time in your schedule, and then you'll actually be able to start to leverage that more.

Claire Waite Brown: 30:46

That's brilliant. Lovely. Lovely bit of absolutely practical. I can see the strategist in you and then the artist in you in that one piece of advice. I think it's brilliant. Thank you so much for chatting with me today, Emily. Tell me, how can listeners connect with you?

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 31:05

Yeah, well, the best way to connect with me is on my Instagram @empowerwithem. I've completely transformed that Instagram to just be fully focused on my art. So if you want to take a look at some of my work or even just send me a message and let me know you listened to this episode, you can do so at empowerwithem. And if you really want to, I do still have my podcast, even though I'm not creating episodes on it at the moment. I started the Empower with Em podcast back when I was 22, when I was at that first transition of quitting architecture and starting a business. So if it interests you, you can go through that and you can listen to different points in my journey and just. Yeah, here's some of the wisdom that I had at each of those stages.

Claire Waite Brown: 31:46

Thank you so much for that, Emily. I've had a really lovely time.

Emily-Jane Sarroff: 31:50

Thank you. I've enjoyed this, too.

Claire Waite Brown: 31:53

I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you did, perhaps you'd like to financially contribute to Future episodes at buymeacoffee.com/creativityfound There's a link in the show notes. If you are listening on a value for value enabled app such as Fountain, TrueFans or Podcast Guru, feel free to send a few sats my way. And if you have no idea of what I'm talking about, you can find out more by listening to my sister podcast called Podcasting 2.0 in Practice.