What happens when the career you've dedicated your life to no longer feels sustainable?

Carey Renee Sharpe details how she went from burnout to Broadway on The Art of Kindness podcast. The creator and star of the Off-Broadway musical Blood Love: A Vampire Opera joins Robert Peterpaul for a moving conversation on how reinvention can help you find your way back to yourself.

Before writing musicals, Carey spent years as a pediatric ICU nurse and nurse practitioner caring for critically ill children. When the emotional weight of the work became too much to carry, she made the difficult decision to leave the profession that had defined her for years. What followed was unexpected: restoring a historic theater, writing music during the pandemic, and ultimately creating Blood Love, an original Off-Broadway musical rooted in love, friendship, and the search for light.

In this podcast podcast episode, you'll hear:

• Why Carey left a successful career in pediatric critical care
• How she pivoted from the ICU to Off-Broadway, creating Blood Love from deeply personal experiences
• Building a rehearsal room centered on love instead of competition
• Balancing motherhood, leadership, and creative ambition
• Why "art is the best form of rebellion" in difficult times, plus more.

Together, Robert and Carey discuss the courage to change directions, leading creative teams with vulnerability, motherhood, sustainable theater culture, and why making art can be one of the most powerful acts of hope in a complicated world. Because sometimes kindness means caring for others. And sometimes it means finally caring for yourself.

CAREY RENEE SHARPE made her Off-Broadway debut as Valerie in her own original production BLOOD/LOVE, a lifelong dream realized. Carey spent her childhood steeped in music, with formal violin training beginning at age three, but chose to pursue a career as a critical care pediatric nurse practitioner inspired by her personal history of congenital heart disease. In 2018 she stepped away from healthcare and restored a historic theater in her hometown, reigniting her love of music. She has spent the past 6 years writing, developing & performing in BLOOD/LOVE.

Follow Carey:

⁠⁠@careyreneemusic

Follow us:

⁠⁠@artofkindnesspod⁠⁠ / ⁠⁠@robpeterpaul⁠⁠

Support the show!

(⁠⁠https://www.buymeacoffee.com/theaok⁠⁠)

Music:

"Awake" by Ricky Alvarez & "Sunshine" by Lemon Music Studio.

We are supported by the Broadway Podcast Network.