We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jessica Rodriguez a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Jessica, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?
Where I Get My Resilience From
My resilience was shaped by movement, loss, and the creative act of rebuilding. Growing up between cultures with one side of my family leaving Cuba after Castro’s rise and the other rooted in the South, I learned early that life could change overnight. We moved often as a military family, and I grew used to living from a suitcase, constantly adapting to new places and people. Those years taught me how to start over, how to observe, and how to find belonging wherever I landed.
After loss entered my life and the ground shifted beneath me, resilience took on a deeper meaning. Grief became both my teacher and my mirror. Through art, I found a way to sit with the discomfort, to create when words failed, and to rediscover who I was beneath all the roles and transitions. Creating helped me piece together a new sense of identity, not one shaped by movement but by meaning.
In 2006, after so many years of packing and unpacking, I set down roots in Charlotte, North Carolina. Learning to stay in one place meant learning to face myself, my pain, my strengths, and what truly serves and does not serve me. That process was both beautiful and painful, personally and professionally. Art became my compass, guiding me through healing and toward purpose. It led me to pivot from art education to art therapy and addiction work, helping fill the care gaps I had witnessed in so many communities.
The daunting decision to become an entrepreneur through Thrive by Design LLC grew from that same resilience, a way to honor family balance and to transform my pain into purpose. Every workshop, session, and collaboration now reflects that journey and the belief that even from loss and uncertainty, something deeply whole can grow.
Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?
I am the founder of Thrive by Design LLC, where I help individuals, teams, and organizations design a life and work they love through art, wellness, and purposeful reflection. With a background in education, art therapy, and counseling, I create experiences that are both creative and healing, blending professional insight with lived experience.
After almost two decades as an educator, I realized that the art classroom is a powerful space for highlighting each student’s uniqueness. But I also saw that art educators are not art therapists, and counselors are not art therapists. Witnessing gaps in support for emotional well-being and addiction across schools and communities inspired me to become an art therapist and a registered licensed clinical addiction specialist. This combination allows me to fill those gaps, supporting both creative growth and emotional health.
What excites me most about my work is seeing people uncover strengths, build resilience, and gain clarity through creative expression. I work with schools, businesses, and individuals, offering a unique blend of workshops, art therapy, career counseling, and addiction therapy. I also teach future educators how to integrate creativity into the classroom to support brain development, emotional regulation, build emotional intelligence, and cultivate proactive self-care practices. This blend is rare and powerful, providing tools for growth and healing that are not widely available.
Recently, I participated in an event with the Charlotte Observer called The Power of Creativity, where I helped lead an interactive workshop and raised awareness about the difference between being creative and using creativity intentionally as a tool for healing, guided by art therapy practices. I love teaching people how to take creative control, advocate for themselves, and use creative processes to foster insight, growth, and self-awareness. I also enjoy raising awareness for art therapy, especially in North Carolina, and helping more people understand its transformative potential.
Through Thrive by Design, my goal is to help individuals and organizations discover what serves them, release what does not, and create more meaningful, balanced, and inspired lives — all to design a life you love.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Looking back, three qualities have been most impactful in my journey: resilience, creativity, and clarity of values. About eight years ago, I made a conscious decision to be proactive in my life. I realized I could no longer let others make the calls for me, or simply react to circumstances as best as I could. That shift was both difficult and rewarding, laying the groundwork for everything that followed.
After the death of my husband due to addiction in 2023, I found myself grieving while navigating the busyness of life. Creativity became a source of comfort, particularly in the form of weaving, but I still hadn’t fully learned how grounding myself in my values could help me feel connected, present, and aligned. That understanding came when I had to walk away from both a romantic and a professional connection. Logically, these were different situations, but in both cases, my body told me I was in the wrong place. In my job, I had voiced ethical concerns, and every part of me knew this wasn’t a healthy environment. Stepping away was terrifying, yet freeing, and fully committing to my entrepreneurial life while processing through art-making made it all click.
Authenticity, family and work-life balance, faith, and continual growth are central to my values, and I realized these were being encroached upon. Since that time, I have learned to filter decisions through these guiding principles, allowing me to approach life proactively rather than reactively. Now, I genuinely look forward to Mondays instead of dreading them. I feel like the driver of my own life, consistently aware, intentional, and grounded in my values.
A tangible reminder of this journey is the necklace my daughter made me, which I wear to every work meeting, event, workshop, or Zoom call. It is a conversation starter, and when people ask about it, I can explain why I wear it and what it represents: “Design a Life You Love.” That mantra is both my personal guiding principle and the mission of my business, helping others take creative control, advocate for themselves, and build lives and careers that align with their deepest values.
What is the number one obstacle or challenge you are currently facing and what are you doing to try to resolve or overcome this challenge?
The number one challenge I currently face is the lack of licensure for art therapy in North Carolina, combined with widespread misunderstanding of what art therapy truly is. Art therapy is often misrepresented in popular culture or common knowledge. Many people assume that coloring pages, journaling, or any creative activity that feels therapeutic qualifies as art therapy. While these activities can be helpful, mindful, and even lower cortisol levels while increasing dopamine and serotonin, they are not art therapy. True art therapy is a clinical practice led by trained art therapists who use creativity intentionally as a modality for healing. Creativity becomes a tool for processing, exploring, and transforming emotions under the guidance of a professional. Without that guidance, even profound creative work, like the paintings of Frida Kahlo, can leave pain unresolved, continually resurfacing.
As an art therapist, I use specific, purposeful approaches such as the Expressive Therapies Continuum and interventions like sublimation with clay to metaphorically deconstruct and reconstruct experiences. The supplies, the techniques, and the process are all intentional, designed to support healing and personal growth.
I try to approach speaking about this in a passionate way because I am also passionate about learning the intricacies of what others are doing in their important work such as dance therapy, music therapy, and many other expressive therapies. To address these challenges, I advocate constantly through my website, at events, in college classrooms, community groups, and one-on-one interactions. I remind myself that I cannot change everything at once, but every conversation, presentation, or article raises awareness and builds understanding. Each interaction is an opportunity to educate the public about the true nature of art therapy and its transformative potential. I believe that with licensure, art therapy will be available to more people and more communities will be able to experience its full benefits. Over time, these efforts help create a more informed community and pave the way toward proper recognition for the field in North Carolina.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.designalifeyoulove.org
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessica-rodriguez-ma-mat-atr-p-lcas-registered-807623241/?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=ios_app
- Other: Limiting my social media use is a proactive mental health choice that helps me stay grounded, focused, and present in my daily life.
Image Credits
Logo by Hanna Rogers (Daughter) with Cooper Carry [email protected]
Headshots by Jennifer Rodriguez (Sister) https://jennifercolerodriguez.com/
Necklace with tagline by Daisy Rodriguez (Daughter)
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