Six months ago, at the spring equinox, I closed down my email newsletter. It was a decision I’d been thinking about for a while and felt aligned with where I was personally (against the backdrop of ongoing polycrises) and professionally (within the wider context of figuring out my role outside of my craft work). It was actually quite a relief to know that I wasn’t going to be forcing myself to show up each month in that way, to allow new things to grow. I felt proud of myself for listening to the inner voice which was telling me that this aspect of my work no longer fit me and wasn’t feeling comfortable anymore. Looking back over the announcement I still feel the same way, those things haven’t changed. But, other things have rearranged themselves around me and that initial decision, while made in good faith, has also turned out to be not quite the right thing.

At the time, I pointed you all in the direction of a new substack, which I sincerely thought was going to be the perfect alternative to the newsletter (and also in some ways this blog). I was feeling energised to write more freely about a wider range of topics, for it not to have to align with ‘work’. But six months on I’ve only published two things there. The motivation just hasn’t happened and I’m feeling ok about that. I can see how the state of the world, and then a summer of long-covid flare ups, has diminished a lot of my creative energy.

However, where my personal creativity has entered a bit of a fallow period, my work energy seems to have shifted and become more focused. I am clearer on what it is I offer and what I don’t. I have been streamlining things and turning down offers of teaching or collaborations which might have been at home in my practice 5 or 6 years ago, but now are things I no longer do. I have mentoring clients I love and am eager to find more whose approach to their creative work aligns with my values. I am working on redesigning my website and figuring out how to articulate where this mentoring practice is headed. It’s all been feeling quite positive.

The only problem is – how do I let people know about these changes? How do I branch out into new audiences and find the people I most want to connect with? Instagram? Here on the website/blog? I know from the analytics that I’m not reaching people. On IG only a small proportion of my followers see my stories and posts (this reach has been severely impacted by my continued posting about Palestine). I don’t think things are going to change there, I don’t think we can rely on that platform to truly connect us, to help us build communities. I won’t stop using it as a tool for gathering information and staying aware of what is happening in the world, but I have to admit that having a separate, non-algorithm dominated method of staying connected is vital.

Which brings me full circle. I have a new email list; I want to be able to let people know about my work and to feel connected in a slower way, I want to be able to reach people directly and know that they are likely to see the things I’m sharing, I want to start building new relationships. And emails are the perfect way to do this. What I’m going to do is start over; learning from my experience of the previous newsletter, responding to the things I enjoyed/didn’t enjoy, I know it needs a light touch.

I enjoy a bit of structure, so it will hinge on the shifting seasons and how these marker points offer such intuitive and natural moments for reflecting. At the heart of my practice is the belief that questioning and reflecting on your creative practice, at any time, is a fundamentally worthwhile endeavour. Fostering deeper self-knowledge and awareness of how you as a human fit into your practice and how your practice can respond to you and your shifting needs/priorities. So the new emails will focus on reflection prompts that can help you reconnect to yourself and your practice within the shifting context of your life and the wider world.

There will be less emphasis on me, and my inner process, in the new emails. (If you enjoy that kind of thing then please do join me over on substack or keep an eye out here on the blog.) Instead I hope to offer ways to ‘live the questions’ that centre on your own experience, and allow you space for a greater connection to your inner knowing.

And, in rare moments, there will be emails that highlight any new offerings I may have, or opportunities for us to work together. My mentoring practice feels like it has really started to put down roots in the last few years and it’s not something that is easy to express in Instagram posts.

In my work I am committed to prioritising the experience and the needs of the humans at the centre of creative practices. I take a trauma-informed, holistic, person-centred approach to my mentoring practice. This is underpinned by a commitment to social and climate justice, informed by ongoing engagement with, and exploration of, intersectional feminism*, decolonial shadow work, radical imagination and post-capitalist futures. This work is conducted with an awareness of how everything we do with our creative practices is situated within the wider context of our lives and the world. I help people develop creative practices with care at the foundation, that are in service to you and the life you want to lead, responsive to your needs, adaptable to your existing priorities and which acknowledge your responsibilities to other people and the planet.

If this sounds like your cup of tea do sign up and stay connected with me beyond the little squares – I’m looking forward to building a new relationship with you!

*“I feel embarrassed when I say feminism and people do not think revolution in service of every living thing” – Lola Olufemi