Purging darkness

As many of you may know we have been so hopeful about the promise of a new second level school in our local area, and active in our personal involvement in the campaign to make it an Educate Together school. It has been a strong flame of hope for us. Regular readers will know just how big a deal school is for me, for us as a family. And so I feel sick, angry and shocked at the announcement today that the new school will be the only one of nine in the country, awarded to a Catholic patronage.

I don’t want to defend or attack any individual Catholics or to cause hurt. It is not about you or me. Catholicism is not my path. Nor my family’s nor that of so many families in the local area. And every school in this area, bar one private school is already Catholic. And so I feel frustrated that at the time when our children, the next generation of this new world, start moving into their adult consciousness, the only places on offer to them are all not of the consciousness we choose to impart to them. The place they learn day in day out about their feelings of love, arousal, sexuality, spirituality, their paradigm and sense of self and self-worth… will all be in a place which is so dissonant with our own values.

I feel angry, angry, angry. Because we were promised that these new schools would bring diversity, would reflect parents’ and children’s needs which were not already being served by existing schools.

I am angry because of reasons that I do not want to go into here, and I am a writer who could be sued for libel, not an impervious religious body that still holds vast power. But I do not feel that they have, through numerous past actions in the local area, only recently admitted, proven themselves to be a body to which I would trust my children’s bodies or souls.

And so we are left reeling, as are hundreds of parents in the local area, wondering what we do next, where we turn, what our options are: to move 40 miles to be close to the new Educate Together school which has been approved? To commute that distance every day? To home educate? To start a home-ed co-operative or private school, to move to the UK or further afield…. None of the options hold any desire for me… And nor do the schools on offer here. And there are SO many parents that I know personally who are in the same situation.

So here I am, in the dark time of my cycle, the moon darkening in the sky and I feel full of frustration, full of anger and darkness. I am taking part at the moment in a very powerful women's e-course, and we are purging shame and guilt and darkness there too. It runs deep. So deep. It is pervasive. And it gets rooted young.

So much of it is not individual, but collective, built up generation by generation, and now, those of us that are wanting to shift it, to get to somewhere fresh, somewhere creative and vibrant and life-affirming in our own psyches, in our collective culture, we are purging the darkness, speaking shame, shining light on it, sharing, and moving beyond.

But some days it really feels like I don’t have the energy to keep purging, to keep pushing and shaking and resisting the old ways. Trying to knock down old walls, and campaign for new ways. Trying to persuade and convince, and apologise and not offend the old-wayers. How much simpler it would be just to bow my head and accept, as so many have done for generations. To be grateful for what I have. To make the best of it. To stop being so demanding, so entitled.

Or to be happy to lay down my own life, my own career and soul-work to home-ed if it’s so important to me.

Fuck it, fuck it, fuck it.

I am angry. But I know I am not alone in it. There's a lot of us. Angry. Frustrated. And finding our voices... watch out world!

PS So me being me I have gone into overdrive and in the past couple of hours have:

• Set up a petition - you can sign here 
• Contacted the regional newspapers with a press release.
• Written emails to the Minister for Education and our local Representatives
• Spread the word via social media so others can share their voices.

I don't know what can be achieved. But I know I won't go down silent or without a fight.

My Creative Fairy Godmothers

Welcome to Week Two of the month-long Carnival of Creative Mothers to celebrate the launch of The Rainbow Way: Cultivating Creativity in the Midst of Motherhood
by Lucy H. Pearce. 

Today's topic is Creative Heroines. Do read to the end of this post for a full list of carnival participants. 

Join the Carnival and be in with a chance to win a free e-copy of The Rainbow Way!
December 4th: Creative Inheritance.
December 11th: The Creative Process.

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Do you remember in Sleeping Beauty when all the fairies gathered at the baby Aurora's bedside and each gave her a blessing? In the Disney film there were just three...

But in the traditional story there were twelve.

Well that is how I feel about my creative heroines - each is a fairy godmother and has given me a blessing which has shaped me into the woman I am today.

I still have to pinch myself to really believe that so many of them were involved in The Rainbow Way. However, they did not know, because they had uttered their blessings through the pages that they had written, that they were my fairy godmothers, until I told them! And, to turn the story round a little, I literally was Sleeping Beauty awakening from a long creative pause - because of the magic of this book, its process and contributors

Let me share my creative fairy godmothers and each of their blessings with you:

• Jennifer Louden taught me the importance of retreat. And strong self love... especially when pregnant.
• Leonie Dawson made me believe I could write a book NOW. Her mix of self-love, humour and soulful business advice turns all my lights on.
• Julie Daley showed me what being a sensual, connected, deep speaking woman can look like.
• Pam England opened up the world of birth so fully for me through art, and passed on the labyrinth seed to me.
• Indigo Bacal shared deep feminine beauty and connection.
• Lynn Andrews showed me that there was a maternal archetype that fitted me.
• Christiane Northrup helped me to become loving and proud of my incredible female body. And offered me the words that changed me forever.
• My mother gave me life and a childhood packed full of creativity.
• My aunts and real life fairy godmother all showed me how professional creativity and motherhood can be merged.
• Becky Jaine and Paula Cleary each light my darkness with their effervescence.
• Laura Angel and Tracy Evans hold space for me strongly as I find my way and love me completely. And live their own creative lives so deeply and truly.

And others who I share in the book with whom I have never connected...

• Sylvia Plath who first shared the raw language of madness with me when I was still a teen.
• Adrienne Rich who spoke the powerful, angry truth about motherhood in a way that no one before her had dared. 
• Louise Erdrich planted the seed of a writing shed in the woods, and being a serious writer mama.

And others who are not in any way connected to the book or motherhood but are women who inspire me constantly:

• Jeanette Winterson for speaking so honestly about women's love. For weaving such magic with language that I want to submerge myself in it forever and drown in her prose. And who is a living example of a deeply intelligent, free-thinking woman who speaks her truth with power.
• Louise L Hay for being a beacon - both as a self-made woman via self publishing, but also always being right every time I go to her list of affirmations that I totally don't agree with!!!
• Darina Allen who has been the most incredible mentor to me, first through our family connections, but now professionally - to work alongside her and learn from her is such an honour. She is enthusiasm and lived-values writ large.

So... I dare you... write up a list of your heroines, your own fairy godmothers and the blessings they have given you. How is your life richer for having them? How would you like to connect with them to share your gratitude? Perhaps you can write them a letter or an email. Send them a tweet. Or a prayer. Apply for a job with them. Create a collaborative project and invite them to join you...

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ORDER YOUR SIGNED COPY of  The Rainbow Way! and grab your free extras  (first 200 orders only!): - exclusive access to a private Facebook group for creative mothers - a vibrant greetings card and book-mark of one of the author's paintings. Kindle and paperback editions from Amazon.co.uk Amazon.com Book Depository, Barnes and Noble or order it from your local bookshop!

• Carnival host and author of The Rainbow Way, Lucy at Dreaming Aloud celebrates her creative fairy godmothers, and gives thanks for the creative blessings that each has gifted her.
• And on her other site, The Happy Womb, Lucy expresses her sadness at a lack of real-life female mentors and Wise Women in her life so far.
• Becky at Soul Sunshine shares the creativity heroines-- her Saviors-- who reactivated her creative heart after a near-20-year-hiatus.
• Lucy Pierce from Soulskin Musings explores the ways in which three artists have inspired her to follow the inner wild of her own creative narrative and it's interface with the forces of nature and of Spirit.
• Kae at The Wilde Womb shares how she invokes her inner child when summoning creative juices. 
• Zoie at TouchstoneZ reflects on the women who have inspired her most. 
• Alex at The Art of Birth shares her Journey of a Creative Mama which is all about liberating the Feminine through Art.
• Laura at Authentic Parenting is grateful to those women who have inspired her.
• Who most inspires Georgie at Visual Toast? She'll tell you here!
• Please come to the dinner party, invites Nicki at Just Like Play, where we will celebrate Judy Chicago, art, womanhood, and the creative kitchen table.
• Becky at Raising Loveliness shares her creative heroines.
• Dawn Collins at The Barefoot Home honors three artistic mothers in the post:her strong willed Nona, her free spirited mother and the best solo artist ever... Mother Earth.
• Angela at Peach Coglo looks to her grandma and granny as her creative heroines when the creative going gets tough.
• Jennifer at Let Your Soul Shine wears odd socks proudly!
• Kelly at Knittingandthings shares how she turned her grief into helping others  
• Biromums remember their biggest creative heroines.
• Darcel at The Mahogany Way shares who inspires her.
• Aimée at Creativeflutters discusses which artists influence her in her creative journey. Find out how she nourishes herself as a creative mother, and finds the time to help other moms on their journeys.
• Creativity is something that's always meant the most to Jasmine at Brown Eyed Girl and she can't wait to take the journey in identifying herself and supporting other moms with it as well.
• KatyStuff has a mother who allowed her to make mud pies while she knit or embroidered near by.
• Ali Baker is a creative mama to twin girls who reignited her creative energy and sense of who she used to be by just doing it and creating whatever needs to be created in an imperfect way. 

Taking Up Space

I have issues about taking up space. I feel very guilty about it. I have, on the whole, gotten over my immense guilt about being alive. And am getting better at not wanting the ground to swallow me up when sharing my creative talents. But there are two areas where my space issues still show up.

My body. And my living spaces.

Being heavier than I have ever been, I have also found a sort of peace. I am allowed to take up this much room. I have my own permission to eat as much as I need to. I am allowed to take up space. As a person, as a woman. It is OK. I need not apologise for my body, my appetites, for my size. I am allowed to be big... in every are of my life, if I want.

The other issue, as I said, is with living space. It takes me years of living in a place, to feel I have the right to make it my own... to actually move in.

Instead I camp in space. Living out of bags and boxes. Not wanting to make any mark on the space... as I know I will be moving on soon enough. For most people decorating a space is something they do straight away when they move in, usually with great relish. They don't think twice about hanging a painting on the wall. Or painting the wall for that matter. For me it is such a serious move it takes a couple of years to get up the courage to give myself permission to make my mark, even in a small way.

It stems, I am sure, from a lifetime of moving between parent's homes, boarding school rooms and rented accommodation. Space of my own is always borrowed, transient and can be reclaimed at a moment's notice for someone else.

Mr Dreaming Aloud has no such bullshit in his brain - perhaps because of having had his own room in the same home for 20 years of his life. So he is happy to paint walls, put up shelves, heck even put up nails to hang paintings on.

Me, I only hang paintings where nails exist already.

And so, after three and a half years of living in our own home, I am finally getting settled in. Little by little. We have two of my paintings in our bedroom, one of which is actually hanging on a newly placed nail! My favourite books are on shelves by my bed. For me home is where my books and journals are.

And so today, emboldened by the successful launch of The Rainbow Way, I started phase one of "make my studio my own" .

Mr Dreaming Aloud helped once more - having heard me say umpteen times about wanting an armchair to curl up in brought one of ours from home up for me last week. And me...I have cleared out (most of) the boxes. I have (propped) the paintings that I want to look at. And my father gave me a little heater so that I do not freeze any more. I have cleared and tended my little creative altar. And intend to make myself a vision board above my desk, and get some lino to cover the tiled floor so I can paint without anxiety about ruining the beautiful tiles.

 Little by little I am taking up space. Making it a room of my own.

Though, I must be honest here, I have yet to put things into the cupboards - I can feel the nausea rise just at the thought of it.

Slowly, slowly I am taking up space.

Nurturing a Family Culture of Creativity

Welcome to Week One of the month-long Carnival of Creative Mothers to celebrate the launch of The Rainbow Way: Cultivating Creativity in the Midst of Motherhood
by Lucy H. Pearce. 

Today's topic is Nurturing a Culture of Creativity at Home. Do read to the end of the post for a full list of carnival participants.

Join the Carnival and be in with a chance to win a free e-copy of The Rainbow Way!
November 27th: Creative Heroines.
December 4th: Creative Inheritance.
December 11th: The Creative Process.

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One of the best bits of having children around is having the “excuse” and the materials on hand to be creative almost all the time! And what is more, we have companions who do not know the rules, who have imagination and energy by the bucket-load.

We have the chance for a second bite of the cherry of childhood. Being a parent gives us so many wonderful opportunities every day to connect with our own creativity again. It allows us to explore a huge variety of art forms that in the adult world we are cut off from because we are not “good enough” to indulge in them, which make the human spirit soar: singing, dancing, storytelling, improvisation, clowning, painting, sculpting, collage, playing percussion, dressing up, puppet shows, model making…the list is endless!

Our role as parents cultivating creativity, as I see it, is four-fold:

• First to provide a rich environment – not necessarily of expensive paints and costumes, but basic materials.
• Second, to step back and see how they intuitively choose to use them and join them in this.
• Third, to share ways that we know to use these materials, and share our skills with them.
• And fourth to model our own creative process to them – both by letting them see “behind the scenes” in our creative lives, to share how our creative process works, and allow them to see us fully absorbed in it.

Creating together is not just about today’s painting or model, but about setting the tone and feeling for your child’s experience of creativity for the rest of their lives. When we can see it as a privilege to engage creatively with our children, our time together becomes richer and more rewarding for us and them.

Nurturing a culture of creativity allows your child to regularly experience autotelic experiences (those which enable a flow state). Csikszentmihaly’s research into flow states found that: "early childhood influences are also very likely factors in determining whether a person will or will not easily experience flow."

So in creating a culture of creativity, not only are you passing on valuable skills, confidence in their own creative ideas and abilities, but you are helping to wire their brains to more easily experience optimal experiences for the rest of their lives.

A culture of creativity honors and requires:

• Space for silence to bloom: for concentrated work, and contemplation.
• Space for sharing our voices, visions, experiences and dreams.
• Appreciation and enjoyment of the process, not judgment of works in progress.
• Courage and respect for trying new things. Being allowed to like them…or not.
• A need for responsibility.
• A time for mess!
• A respect of basic safety guidelines and rules.
• Prioritizing fun.
• Support for developing abilities.
• The understanding that creativity has an intrinsic value, beyond its extrinsic practical worth.
• Self-reliance.
• Dreams, possibility and the fully-fledged imagination.
• Celebration – of big festivals and small mysteries, and knowing how to mourn the losses and failures too.

When we choose to nurture a culture of creativity, we commit to giving our children the support and appreciation necessary for the breathtaking unfolding of their unbounded intellectual, aesthetic, collaborative and imaginative capacities.

We show them that we are responsible for creating our own lives and that we can have a direct impact on every area of them. Our creativity can be used to create our living spaces, the food we eat, the clothes we wear, the gifts we give to each other. But most of all we share directly with them that life is good, and that joy, celebration and beauty are to be nurtured and treasured – that life is not all work, hardship, suffering, nor should it be dominated by practicality and money-making. 

Through nurturing creativity we give our children the practical and emotional skills to be productive, engaged authors of their own destinies. 

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ORDER YOUR SIGNED COPY of  The Rainbow Way! and grab your free extras  (first 200 orders only!): - exclusive access to a private Facebook group for creative mothers - a vibrant greetings card and book-mark of one of the author's paintings. Kindle and paperback editions from Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.com Book Depository, Barnes and Noble or order it from your local bookshop!

• Carnival host and author of The Rainbow Way, Lucy at Dreaming Aloud shares an extract from the chapter Nurturing a Family Culture of Creativity.
• Lilly Higgins is a passionate food writer. Now a mother of two boys, she's discovered a new calling: to instil in them a love of food and creativity in the kitchen.
• DeAnna L'am shares how visioning the New Year with your child is an invitation to be inspired: use creativity and resolutions to create a fun road map for the year ahead.
• Molly at Talk Birth on Releasing Our Butterflies - balancing motherhood with creativity.
• Laura shares some of the creativity happening at Nestled Under Rainbows and a few thoughts about creativity.
• Georgie at Visual Toast celebrates her own unique culture of creativity at home.
• Esther at Nurtureworkshop spreads the love of the ordinary, the delights of everyday things that can be an adventure of the imagination.
• For Dawn at The Barefoot Home creativity is always a free form expression to be shared by all in a supportive environment where anything can be an art material.
• Naomi at Poetic Aperture is a mother, artist and photographer who tries to keep her daughter away from the expensive pens and paints.
• Aimee at Creativeflutters writes about keeping your sanity and creativity intact with small kids in the house in her post: Mother + Creativity - They Must Coexist.
• Amelia at My Grandest Adventure embarks on a 30 Days of Creativity challenge...you can too!
• Becky at Raising Loveliness explores creating with her smaller family members.
• Jennifer at Let Your Soul Shine reveals how children help us connect to our souls, through music and movement.
• Mary at The Turquoise Paintbrush shares her experiences of creating with kids.
• Joanna at Musings of a Hostage Mother explains why creativity at home is important to her in her post "I nurture a creative culture."
• It took until Amy at Mama Dynamite was pregnant aged 35 to discover her dormant creative streak - she has found lovely ways of tuning into it every since.
• Emily at The Nest explores how creativity runs through her family's life together.
• Jennifer at OurMuddyBoots sees that encouraging creativity in children is as simple as appreciating them for who they are: it just means overriding everything we know!
• Lisa from Mama.ie has discovered that a combination of writing and traditional crafts can provide a creative outlet during those busy early years of new motherhood.
• Anna at Biromums shares what nurturing a culture of creativity means to her.
• Zoie at TouchstoneZ argues that the less they are interfered with, the more creative children become as they grow up.
• Darcel at The Mahogany Way celebrates creating with her kids.
• Sally (aka The Ginger Ninja) of The Ginger Chronicles is continually inspired by her own mum and grandmother.
• Just being creative is enough, says Nicki at Just Like Play, as she ponders her journey of nurturing a creative family.
• Allurynn shares her creative family's musings in her post "Creativity... at the Heart of it" on Moonlight Muse.
• Laura at Authentic Parenting explores how being creative saves her sanity.
• Mama is Inspired talks about how she puts an emphasis on the handmade in her home, especially in the holiday season.
• Kirstin at Listen to the Squeak Inside shares with you several easy ways for busy mamas and dads to encourage their children to be creative every day.
• Mila at Art Play Day always lived in her dreams, sleepwalking through life ... now she is finding out what creativity is all about.... her inner child!
• Sadhbh at Where Wishes Come From describes how picture books can nurture creativity in young children.
• On womansart blog this week - nurturing a creative culture at home.

The Wait is Over... It's Here!!!!!

THE WAIT IS OVER!

I know, it feels like forever... but it's finally here!

THE RAINBOW WAY!!!!! My book baby. The biggest book I've ever written - over 2 1/2 times the pages and almost 4 times the words of Moon Time. The Rainbow Way is 335 pages of life-changing glorious words, ideas, exercises, reflections and support which are about to be let loose on the world and I am so excited I can barely contain myself. I keep reminding myself it's "just" a book. 

But who I am kidding? 

It is SO much more! It's massive in every way! It is pure creative energy, insight and inspiration in page form. It's the book that changed my life in the writing of it. Totally transformed me, from depressed stay at home mama to the rainbow coloured creative entrepreneur you see glowing before you.

I am SO excited that you can finally ORDER YOUR VERY OWN COPY NOW! And then tell me what YOU think about it, and how it's transforming YOUR life. Do leave reviews on Amazon or email them to me! It's available from Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk too! W

ant to know what glory stuff is packed into it? Check out the list of contents and extracts.

"Is this is the creative rainbow mama book?" people keep asking me - yes, yes, yes it is!

It's the very first book I started writing... and the most recent book I have written. It's been two and a half FULL years. This book has carried me from aspiring writer through self-published to now published author. 

This is the book that when I am skating on the edge of burn out refer myself back too. Or when I am feeling uninspired and all dried up, or frustrated with the creative process. It is my go-to guide... even though I wrote it! How mad is that - to read your own book? 

But don't just take my word for it. Read what some of my biggest creative heroines have said about it - their words of praise for it leave me truly breathless.

Wow, look a nice, shiny BUY NOW button. I dare you to press it... butterflies will fly out of your computer screen... 

Wow! Magic! ... Well not now... but when you open its pages. So say the women who've already gotten their hands on a copy.

Buy one for yourself, for your sister, your best friend, your grown up daughter, put it on your Christmas wishlist!

The first 200 copies are signed and include:

• an inspiring book-mark
• a vibrant greetings card of one of my paintings (you can even put in a request for your favourite!!)
• exclusive access to private Facebook group for creative mothers. 

But even more exciting there is a SPECIAL BONUS GIFT!!!!!!!!!!!! Remember when I was designing covers for it? Well 10 4 lucky customers will receive an original labyrinth mono-print that I made (7x5 inches). Each picture is totally unique, and naturally quite rainbow-ish. (*Orders number 1,12, 25,38, 52, 71, 84 and 99 and the first 2 orders of 2+ copies will all receive a print!)

I'll see you over in our secret hang out on Facebook - there are already nearly 50 women there: it is a supportive place to network, meet other creative mamas, find resources and get inspired. After the busyness of the launch I will be doing some group projects in there too!

And don't forget to join us for the online launch - 4 glorious weeks of creative mothers around the world writing about nurturing creativity, creative heroines, creative inheritance and the creative process, linking up in blog land... starting tomorrow!!! We have over 70 women from around the world signed up already! You can find out more and JOIN US here!

PS. Kindle and paperbacks editions are available from Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com too - I just don't make much of a living from them. (Please do leave me a review!)

Paperback editions are also stocked by Book Depository, Barnes and Noble...or order it from your local bookshop!

ISBN: 978-1-78279-028-0
ebook ISBN: 978-1-78279-027-3

The Biggest Lie

I realise that I have been believing the biggest lie.

It turns my guts to water. My stomach into a migration of butterflies and my legs to jelly.

Still. Despite everything I have done. And know. And written about. Still, I believe it deeply.

"What cunning lie can this be that can bamboozle a maiden as fine and fair as thou?" you enquire.

Well forsooth, I believed that there was a right answer.

To everything.

To... I don't know, let's just, for the sake of arguments say interviews. Or paintings.

That there was the possibility of getting it wrong.

And therefore that I could muck up. I could ruin it.

And therefore I needed to be scared. To hold back. To worry. To be careful. To plan. A lot. In my head. Until I felt I might explode.

This is the lie - that there is a right way. A right answer. A perfect Platonic form, hanging in the ether. And if we do not fulfil this invisible blue print, then shame, failure, doom, oblivion, blood, death, and lots of hairy legged spiders which will eat you alive as you sleep.

But it's a lie. Truly.

I can't. You can't ever get it wrong. It is simply impossible. Because there is no right. Only what you do, what you say.

This is not annoying post-modern relativism. It is truth.

What should be the most freeing part of creativity - the wide open ocean of infinite potential and possibility which stands wet and waiting for us - tends to scare us shitless. And we shake, and cry and shut down and run away, or define what success looks like in black and white rather than the myriad rainbow of colours available to us.

Blockages come always, always when you believe your own bullshit. When you believe that you are the source and that you can dry up, or fail. That you need to know all the answers. That people are expecting you to be an expert, to be perfect.

You are not. And you know it.

So just turn up, and open up.

And then watch as the magic unfolds, as even though you don't know what to say or how to express something.

Just turn up, and open up.

Stop being clever, being in control, having the answers. Be humble and play follow the leader with creativity/ flow/ consciousness/ spirit/ your unconscious/ higher self/ god, whatever you want to call it...

But show up and start.

So you see, as I just did, after I had gotten my knickers in a knot and thought I didn't have anything of value to say. And that I'd forgotten to paint... again. There is no right. Or wrong. It's like a spiritual alkaseltzer. My stomach has settled and the shaking has stopped. It can only be. So you might as well show up!

I am shaking... but it is OK

My body is shaking. It has been aware that this all feels like the biggest thing it's ever done for a month or more now.

It responds to feelings of bigness with anxiety and physical shaking.

But my mind is reasonably calm. For me. All things considered.

I have learnt a lot this past couple of years.

I have learnt that when my thoughts start to whirl or I wake in the middle of the night and cannot go back to sleep, that if I can only focus outside of my head on something else, I will notice that the noise and racing are only in my own head, they are not "reality". So I bring my attention to the tips of my fingers, my toes, and really feel them. And then listen to the outside world, it is calm and still. My mind whirls round, and I listen, as intently as I can to the sound of stillness outside of me.

Then I bring myself back into my body and feel it, bit by bit from the inside. Approaching it with curiosity rather than panic or accusation. Feeling rather than reacting. I feel the whirling in my solar plexus and I realise that I am not here, I am scattered everywhere, in every interview, and upcoming interview, and launch work and email, I have sent little pieces of my energy body out around the world. Of course I am feeling shaky and ungrounded.

And I realise to that this is a feeling of breaking through old limitations, old shells of reality that have cradled and cocooned me over the years, old cases of comfort that are breaking open, allowing me to expand my reach, my visions of myself, my abilities... but like the new butterfly coming out of its cocoon I am still soaking in the juices of transformation, my new belly is soft and vulnerable, it will take a little time for me to dry my wings and feel myself in this new form.

I now know that the shaking, though whilst accompanied by feelings of nausea and light anxiety, is not actually fear, nor something to be scared of. It is the shaking of a body in the transition stages of birth. Between contractions and pushing. And it is OK.

I now know the reason that this book has taken the time it did to come together and be birthed into the world is because of the power it holds. It is big, powerful stuff I have channelled through me and onto its pages, and in order to handle this energy, and deliver it in the way that shares it with as many people as possible I needed to be strong enough, I needed to be experienced enough in all the aspects of it: writing, publishing, marketing, creativity, energetically. And my children needed to be big enough to let me have the space and time to give myself so fully to its birth.

So here I am, standing on the threshold. The impetus growing by the day. All the hard, hard work I have done unseen for months, years, is coming to fruition. Harvest time is approaching. The final ecstatic pushes.

I am shaking. But it is OK. It is powerful stuff.