Dea Jenkins
9 min read ⭑
“Our deepest creative dreams are actually God’s dreams for us. Whatever divine-inspired dream that we crave to see enacted in the world is actually a possibility beckoning us into a future that longs to become a reality.”
QUESTION #1: ACQUAINT
There’s much more to food than palate and preference. How does a go-to meal at your favorite hometown restaurant reveal the true you behind the web bio?
Home is an idea I find myself mulling over a lot lately. After over two decades of moving from state to state every few years, I’m now in the process of determining where I would like to settle down. What would it look like to put down firm roots, the kind that only grow after you’ve been somewhere for a while? Are roots only formed in place? Experience informs me that they’re also grounded in relationships.
Growing up, I used to define home as wherever my family happened to be at any given moment. It was less about which city or neighborhood we were moving to and more about who we were moving with. My parents and younger brother became the centering force, the gravitational pull, that anchored me amid swiftly changing landscapes. From Texas to Michigan to Kentucky to Virginia — we were each other’s constants.
The one place that always brought us back to each other despite the variances in our respective offices or schools was the dinner table. During my adolescence, our dinners were always at our kitchen table. As the years progressed and our schedules grew busier, we often found ourselves at our favorite American steakhouses. My father and brother would order steak; my mother would have whatever grilled fish was on the menu; I would order a hamburger or pasta. And this was our ritual. Although our surroundings changed often, the familiar rhythms of each person’s quirks and tastes drew us together.
Jose De Queiroz; Unsplash
QUESTION #2: REVEAL
We’ve all got quirky proclivities and out-of-the-way interests. So what are yours? What so-called “nonspiritual” activities do you love and help you find spiritual renewal?
I may forever find myself chasing the feeling I had in 2016 when I got to ride on the back of a “moto” through the Tuscany mountains. My first art residency abroad was coming to an end, and one of the residency directors asked if I finally wanted to take that ride with him on his moto (motorcycle). He was a kind man in his 60s. While a gentle soul, he also had an undying taste for adventure. My bubbling enthusiasm matched his own, and after he made sure I had on the proper safety gear, we set out.
Although he drove slowly through the small town that housed the residency, we took paths down tiny streets that only the locals knew about. Soon, we were out of the town and deep into the winding, mountainous roads — and I could not believe the beauty unfolding before me. The slim roads and steep cliffs only served to boost my adrenaline. Every twist and turn revealed a new vista of gorgeous greenery, and it was like all of the deepest parts of my heart were filled in that one incredible moment.
QUESTION #3: CONFESS
Every superhero has a weakness. Every human, too. We’re just good at faking it. But who are we kidding? We’re broken and in this thing together. So what’s your kryptonite and how do you hide it?
Moving around as frequently as my family and I did meant that my brother and I grew up learning how to adapt to new environments very quickly. This skill has served me well, allowing me to connect with people from all walks of life. While I am grateful for this aspect of my upbringing, it has also cultivated a sense of restlessness that I often wrestle with. Where do I belong if I belong nowhere and everywhere at the same time? I feel as though each place that I am in pulls out another corner of my personality. What I long for is to finally see the full mosaic.
Feeling grounded within myself has often been a struggle. Even when I feel grounded in my faith and in my relationships, it is the relationship with myself that I have fought the hardest to cultivate. What would it look like for me to truly know and trust myself? How would this trust open up new levels of intimacy in my closest relationships? What would become possible for me if I could learn to settle into myself?
QUESTION #4: FIRE UP
Tell us about your toil. How are you investing your professional time right now? What’s your obsession? And why should it be ours?
I am head over heels for textiles at the moment. I’ve loved fiber art for many years, but I’m currently deep-diving into the ecological and social repercussions of the contemporary textile industry. The notion of creating a circular economy has me hooked, and I am asking where I fit best within the chain. As a maker, I am a champion for handmade products. As we travel deeper into the era of AI, I believe that handmade art and objects are going to become even more intrinsically and socially valuable. Our ancient crafts are our oldest technologies, and as we learn the creative languages of our ancestors, we gain tools that can help us care for our struggling ecological and social systems.
My work tends to take on many forms (visual and performing arts, music and so on), but there are always the same essential staples present. Ultimately, I’m interested in cultivating social healing through interactive creative mediums. The largest problems that we face in our communities, within our nation and even on our planet will require systemic solutions. My work begins with my individual creative practice, but I’m always interested in crafting spaces for communities to discover their own capacities to generate collective healing.
QUESTION #5: BOOST
Cashiers, CEOs, contractors or customer service reps, we all need grace flowing into us and back out into the world. How does the Holy Spirit invigorate your work? And how do you know it’s God when it happens?
There was a season of my life when creating was the most challenging, gut-wrenching endeavor. Fresh out of film school in 2012, I was trying to write a script, but I simply could not seem to find the words. Finally, out of frustration and desperation, I asked God to help me write. I had never really thought about asking God to help me create before then, but something inspired me to at least see what God had to say on the matter. Shortly after this period, I randomly came across a book called “The Artist’s Way” written by Julia Cameron. This book changed the course of my creative journey, and I credit it as the tool God used to lead me to creative freedom.
One of my main takeaways from the book is that our deepest creative dreams are actually God’s dreams for us. Whatever divine-inspired dream that we crave to see enacted in the world is actually a possibility beckoning us into a future that longs to become a reality. I truly believe that some ideas, products, relationships and so on simply won’t exist if we do not follow our dreams. Sure, someone else may create something similar, but it will never be an exact replica of what you can create. And what will the world, your family, friends, and colleagues miss out on if you don’t allow what’s inside of you to find its way to the surface?
This is how I’ve framed my life for the past decade. Even with its many challenges and complexities, living out a creative life with God has led me down a path of delightful discovery and beauty that I never could’ve previously imagined.
QUESTION #6: inspire
Scripture and tradition beckon us into the rich and varied actions that open our hearts to the presence of God. So spill it — which spiritual practice is workin’ best for you right now?
Lately, I’ve been getting into a rhythm of walking for about 15 minutes each day while listening to the daily Scripture reading on the Pray As You Go app. This is a new practice for me, but I like that I’m engaging my body in different ways while thinking about each day’s Scripture reading. My senses are activated when I walk down different streets in whichever neighborhood I find myself in that day.
I haven’t had any major revelations that correlate what I see on these walks with what I listen to, but this practice still offers a chance to interrupt my typical daily rhythm. I’m no stranger to grind culture, and intentionally pausing in the middle of my day (I walk right after eating lunch) reminds me that life is much larger than what I’m working on, stressing over or ruminating on.
As an artist, I spend a lot of time nurturing my inner world. However, the world becomes grander and more vibrant when I come out of myself. Reconnecting with the larger world brings perspective, and I always return from these walks energized and grateful.
QUESTION #7: FOCUS
Our email subscribers get free ebooks featuring our favorite resources — lots of things that have truly impacted our faith lives. But you know about some really great stuff, too. What are three resources that have impacted you?
As I think about resources that have shaped my life, the transitional characteristic of this moment I’m in becomes that much clearer. The past 10 to 15 years of my life have been about deepening my faith in God. During this time, my job was to get to know God’s voice and to trust what I was hearing. I was learning to trust that God would lead me somewhere good and beautiful. The resources that helped me to do this were often about young dream-chasers facing challenging battles. Paulo Coelho’s “The Alchemist” was at the top of the list. That book spoke to the spiritual undercurrents fueling my dreams. I always viewed my creative interests and pursuits as more than career aspirations. I felt called to pursue a life filled with courageous creativity.
Now, it’s clear to me that I’m entering a new era. While I would’ve loved to cling to the previous season, I sense that God is leading me into a phase of building. I imagine that this period of time will be about setting firm foundations and generating sustainable structures. Some of the resources that are fueling my growth during this period are Emergence Magazine, a digital periodical dedicated to educating readers on matters of ecology and spirituality, and the “Weaving Voices” podcast, a platform that explores the intersections of ecology and economic philosophy as they relate to the textile industry. Both of these resources proffer questions that challenge how I employ my artistic creations and businesses in service of deep spirituality and care for our environments.
QUESTION #8: dream
God is continually stirring new things in each of us. So give us the scoop! What’s beginning to stir in you but not yet fully awakened? What can we expect from you in the future?
One of the main endeavors that I’m excited about is Inbreak. Inbreak began as a virtual artist residency in 2020, and it’s on its way to becoming a full-fledged organization. Inbreak gathers creatives working at the intersections of art, social identity and faith. We help artists translate their creative processes into community-centered practices that can stimulate communal healing.
Although I’m excited about leading Inbreak and designing its new programs, the timeline for this work is unclear. Given this, my current focus is on centering myself before fully diving into occupational leadership. I’m in a season of transition, and it can be difficult to guide others when you are also trying to clear your own vision. The primary call of this moment is to lean on all the years that God has spent cultivating my trust in our relationship. When we are presented with unexpected turns and switchbacks, how do we continue to trust that God is leading us down a path that will ultimately usher us into whatever God originally promised us?
I hope to discover that I’m more prepared for the moment than I thought I would be. This preparation may not be in the form of precise vision-casting or strategizing. Rather, preparation may reveal itself in the quality of the relationship that God and I have built with one another over the past several years.
Do you ever feel disconnected from the world around you, have a hard time focusing, or get easily overwhelmed by life circumstances? You’re not the only one. In this culture of ours, life moves at breakneck speed, and as a result, many of us lack the peace and confidence we so desperately crave and don’t “feel grounded” as Dea phrased it earlier in our interview.
But could it be that this isn’t a new struggle? Perhaps that’s why Paul regularly admonished believers to be securely grounded in Jesus:
“Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving” (Colossians 2:6-7, ESV).
“And I pray that you [are] rooted and established in love …” (Ephesians 3:17b, NIV).
Today, our prayer is that you find peace by being firmly rooted in Jesus and his truth. That’s the kind of peace this busy world can’t take away.
Dea Jenkins is an interdisciplinary creative, independent curator, director of Inbreak, and founder of Dea Studios. She began her journey with the arts after high school when she discovered the world of painting, drawing and graphic design. With a bachelor’s degree in filmmaking and a dual master’s degree in theology and intercultural studies, Dea seeks to connect her creative endeavors with theology and create spaces for individual and collective healing. She’s currently engaging questions on spirituality, collective consciousness and social healing through multiple mediums.
