In 2010 the bishop of the Orthodox Church in America in Pittsburgh took me out to steak dinner to tell me that he was sending me out to California to meet one of the best icon painters alive. When I went out to meet this icon painter he had one message for me and that was that he wanted me to just start drawing. This blog is about the peeling of the layers that blocked my creativity and my conversations with my artist friend Rhoda about removing the obstacles which stand in the way of artistic expression.