Don’t Forget the Parts of Yourself You Promised You’d Come Back For

A note from Jules on creativity, connection, and the moments that bring us back to ourselves.

When she was two, she used to hand me scribbles like they were masterpieces. No hesitation. No fear of getting it wrong. Just color, movement, and the kind of joy adults forget how to access.

I didn’t know then that one day we’d build a place where "grown‑ups" could feel that again.

But this weekend, a man walked into our studio to celebrate his wife’s 65th birthday. After the paint, after the chaos, after the walls got what they deserved, he came up to us glowing.

“I feel like I’m ten years old again.”

And suddenly, with a warm smile, I found myself looking at him like the kid he was… like my little girl in this photo… just thinking about how many versions of ourselves we abandon on the way to becoming “adults.”

Later, while they ate cake, we learned every person in that room was an artist in some way. Some professionally. Some quietly. Some simply because creating makes them feel more like themselves.

Then Michael Jackson came on the speaker.

I said my first concert was the Bad Tour in ’89.

He said his was the Jackson 5 in the 1970s.

Two strangers, decades apart, connected by the same spark.

And earlier this month, we met Tom Furness, the grandfather of VR, and joined his Light School community. Through that circle, we met Jesús Daniel Hernández, he told us all about his life and this one chapter on how The Alchemist shaped his life. It shaped mine too. 

Another spark.

And when he sang, his voice filled the room in a way that made everyone go still. The kind of sound that feels like it’s coming from somewhere older than the person singing it.

Listening to him felt like stepping into a page of the book; the part where a stranger appears on your path and somehow you already know you were meant to meet them.

This whole year has felt like that.

Like the universe tapping us on the shoulder saying, “Pay attention. This is one of the good parts.”

And maybe that’s the real thread running through all of it:

The child you used to be is still in there, waiting for you to remember them. Waiting for you to play again. Waiting for you to say yes to the things that make you feel alive.

That’s what I’m learning as we build this thing together...me and the little girl in this photo, now grown, now beside me, still creating.

Some days the paint is the point. Some days the people are.

But every day, the reminder is the same:

Don’t forget the parts of yourself you promised you’d come back for.

Jules McVey

Wicked Rae’s

(Image: Jules McVey and Oakley Rae laying on the floor laughing approximately 17 years ago)

Oakley Rae and Jules McVey, 2008