Have you found your nitch?

Through out my life, I have read about finding yourself, finding that thing that brings you joy.  In the 58 years that I have been here, alot of that time was spent raising my children, would not take anything for the time I had with them, but while they were at school and after all my work was done I wanted / needed some thing to fill up this void I had, I wanted to create something.  At first I took up embroidery, and loved every minute of it, learned every stitch and was good at it.  I moved on to crewel embroidery on linen, did several big projects, most of the things on my walls were things that I had made.  Just about everyone in my family got one or more of my pieces of work.  I moved on to creating things out of old jeans, would get comments from people wanting to know where I got what I had on.  When macrame first came out, I did as I have always done, got a book of directions and learned how to do just about every knot there was to do, and created so many things.  Even had a job making these purses for a shop in the town where I lived.  Then I started making quilts, my favorite part was making the top, I got to work with color that way, my most favorite kind of quilt to make was the amish.  I loved to work with the solid colors with the black as the main color.  I took a tole painting class at one point when it was so big and oh how I wanted to be able to do this type of work.  To be honest I was so afraid of failure that I did not really try.  I completed the class but felt that the instructor did more of the work than I did.  So I kinda said I was going to have to give up that dream of ever being able to express myself with any type of paint and paper.  Along came cross stitch and I loved it! I loved to create samplers, the older looking the better, the smaller the linen the better as well.  I have them in my home today and I'm still proud of that work. I learned to stencil, did floor cloths, and stenciled just about every room in my home at one point.  Even did rooms for my friends on their birthdays as a way of letting them know how much them meant to me. Taught myself how to knit and crochet, smocked dresses for my daughter that she hated. Needle point, easy to do esp while riding in the car.  If it is done with a needle, I have done it. 
In 2006 my daughter (my baby) got married, and few months later, my Momma passed.  I found myself with this huge empty place.  Two of my most favorite people in the world did not need me as before and I did not know what to do with myself.  I deal with depression and at this point in my life I felt as if each day was a battle. 
Then my Dad passed, my aunt passed, my grandmother passed, my Dad's brother passed!  It was unreal, I was also a bit estranged from my oldest son.  How can you be a bit estranged? Well, he might call once a year, or twice if I was lucky.  This in and of itself was heartbreaking for me,
Around the end of 2006 I started scrapping and loved it but did not feel that I was very good at it.  I loved to work on a layout with pics of my children, mostly of my daughter.  I found that I only wanted to work on picture that was current, the ones of the children when they were younger seemed to really get me down, also if I worked on a layout with a pic of my Momma, I would be depressed for a couple of days.  I have scrapped for over 5 years and I would not take anything for the layouts I have.
Then one day I came upon a blog about art journals, I have kept a journal since I was in my 30's with only the writing never any type of art work, I can't do art!  I found that I kept going back to this blog (Julie Balzer) just about every day and then I would look for more, until I could spend my day just reading all these blogs about art journals. I'm not sure what possessed me to order a watercolor journal but I did, and when it got here and I took a look at it, all these white pages, I was scared to death!  What was I thinking? But I took the next step and put color to the paper and omg it was so much fun!  I would watch videos and I would hear Julie say there is no wrong way to do this, and I started to believe her!  I told myself I had to try new techniques, to think out of the box, not to be afraid of the way things turned out.  As long as I was pleased I was doing it right.  That was about 10 weeks ago and I go to bed thinking/creating this and I get up and can't wait to get into my room to do more and more.  I'm taking 3 classes right now and I'm so excited about the things I am learning about this type of art and about myself.
I have learned that for most of my life I have be afraid of failure, of not doing the right thing at the right time. That I would disappoint someone.  That I would not try to do things for that fear, it has held me back in so many ways.  I have always feared that others would find out how afraid I was and think even less of me.  I have always had abandonment issues, I'm sure this fear fed this even more.  This art journal thing has made me feel joy, a joy that I have created, it did not come for any one else, I did it for me.  Whether what I create is good, that really is not the point of what I'm doing, this is freeing me from some of that fear that I have had since I was a child and it feels good.  It feels good to express myself on paper doing something other than writing.  No I can't draw, I'm not creating masterpieces, but I'm having a ball, using water colors, brushes, I'm getting my fingers stained and colored which I love!!!! 
My daughter is a runner by choice, she has done a 1/2 Iron Man and is training now for a full Iron Man next November.  She has this passion for doing this, it is not a chore, it is a way of life for her.  It is her nitch, it's what makes her....her.  It is always on her mind, the next run, the next workout, the next bike ride.  Some people don't get it, but I do, I totally get it, I have wanted to create for most of my life, I have done a lot of things with my hands, now I'm doing it with my heart.