Hello again, lovey humans,

Some reinventions are chosen. Others are forced on you in the middle of the night with no warning. This is Tracey Halvorsen’s story.

When the Canvas Goes Blank

Tracey spent twenty years building something most people only dream about. Starting her own design agency in 2000, she grew it into an award-winning, highly successful business — alongside her wife. By 2018, she had exceeded every goal she’d set for herself. She felt proud. She felt complete.

Then came the conversation while getting ready for bed.

Over the months that followed, Tracey’s marriage unraveled. Her wife wanted out — of the marriage and the business. When Tracey discovered an affair with an employee and a close friend, there was nothing left to negotiate. "Letting go was one of the hardest processes, along with wrangling that much grief wrapped in anger and fear. But the hardest part was realizing nobody needed me the way they had for 20 years. No more employees to lead, no more clients to partner with, no more business to navigate into the future."

The only path forward was through. Let go of the business. Let go of the identity. Let go of nearly everything that had defined her for two decades. "I'm not going to say I handled things perfectly, or even gracefully. Friends would say how lucky I was because who gets to completely reinvent their lives halfway through."

The One Thing That Remained

“Moving when you don’t have a map anymore,” as Tracey says, “is scary.” Grief is heavy cargo. Tracey leaned into the one thing she trusted when everything else had collapsed: her creativity.

She booked a trip to the Dolomites to paint the breathtaking landscapes. She turned her apartment into a studio. And she stood in front of blank canvas after blank canvas, letting herself play in the one space where the unknown felt safe rather than terrifying.

Knee deep in grief and anger, what she found on the canvas surprised her: beauty. It kept showing up in her work — landscapes, florals, threads that stretched all the way back to her graduate school years. She could see herself in the paintings. Not the version of herself shaped by a business and a partnership that had been held together with toothpicks and tape. A different version. A freer one.

“I saw how much of me was still there.”

Sitting in the Discomfort

Tracey is honest about what the instinct tells you to do when a life blows apart. You instinctually rush to fill the void. The world demands that you find a new relationship, a new job, a new identity to step into. She had spent twenty years being very good at being who everyone needed her to be. She was, by her own admission, very good at being impressive.

But she resisted the rush.

The real work, she discovered, wasn’t rebuilding. It was sitting still long enough to hear what was actually trying to come through. That is a lonely place to be. It is also, if you’re willing, where everything worth finding tends to live. "When a life blows apart, you have a choice. You can rush to rebuild the structure you knew, the one that made you feel safe. Or you can sit still long enough to spot the new pictures, the different colors, what it feels like when something is inevitable rather than imposed."

What the Other Side Looks Like

Seven years on, Tracey can see it clearly. She runs a different kind of creative agency now. She paints seriously. Frequently exhibiting and selling her work. She hosts a popular podcast about creativity. She’s engaged (yes, her therapist knows). And she says yes to the universe considerably more than she ever did before.

The blank canvas, it turns out, was never a problem to solve. It was proof that something new could emerge from the ashes. And, most importantly, not imposed but remembered. We are all remembering who we are.

That’s what Second Harvest looks like. Intentional and chosen.

You can follow Tracey’s painting practice and creative work on Instagram at @traceyhalvorson. Her podcast, Escape Velocity, is a personal favorite and highly recommended.

More stories like this soon.

— Richard & Devon