About the Artist

There was a time when nothing made sense. I was losing everything that once felt like home — friends, family, community. Abandonment had always been my biggest fear, and this fear was showing up to teach me many important lessons on my journey. 

For nearly two years, I lived in solitude, stripped bare of identity and belonging wondering if the empty feeling would ever end. How could I ever love myself when the people in my life were gone, showing I was unworthy? How could I face myself knowing I had no identity, or purpose in life?

At the time, my only lifelines were snowboarding and art — the mountain became my teacher in courage and bravery. It allowed me the space and freedom to fall and know I would get back up. My art became my expression. A healthy outlet to show my inner feelings that had no words. Because feelings, in my life, never had a safe space to go, to be seen, or to be accepted, except through what I was creating. 

What I learned was that with each ride down the mountain or stroke of a brush (or pull of a screen, in this case) — I could still feel brave and vulnerable, that I could still feel alive even when things seemed hopeless.

But most importantly, what I was truly facing wasn’t abandonment at all — it was an awakening. It was alignment.

The version of me who lived for others, who shaped herself to fit expectations and quiet her truth, was no longer sustainable. I was angry, lost, and grieving the life I had built on external validation. But beneath that pain was a flicker of something divine: rebirth. It was an opportunity to look internally for the love I was seeking outwardly. It was an opportunity to learn to love in ways I never knew existed.

I learned to sit in my darkness — to face my inner child, my shame, my patterns, and my past. Through tears, mistakes, and forgiveness, I discovered that healing doesn’t happen when you find love in others — it begins when you finally love yourself. In order to walk that journey toward unconditional love, I had to feel everything. I had to allow time to be angry, sad, and frustrated in order to change my thoughts about who I am and what I thought of myself. It was through this process of accepting and expressing, that the joy and peace I always desired would come. 

It was on a snow-covered mountain out West, surfing down the side of the largest slope I’d ever faced, that the name Ridin’ Soulo came to me. This journey wasn’t about being alone — it was about coming home to myself. It was about learning to “ride or die” for me (to love myself fully), in order to feel worthy and loved. 

In that moment, Ridin’ Soulo became something bigger. It became a community — a way to express everything we have once been told to hide. It became a safe space for women like me — who were once told they were “too much”, who were learning to feel without shame, who were ready to wear their truth and their healing as armor.

Today, Ridin’ Soulo is more than a brand. It’s a movement built from the ashes of self-doubt — a living testimony that when you love yourself unconditionally, you magnetize the community, courage, and connection you were seeking all along.

Because healing isn’t the end.
It’s the beginning of truly Ridin’ Soulo.

Thank you for being a part of the Ridin' Soulo community,

Nicky Grant