With you, I felt - exhaled.

Morning,

I am so delighted to be back with you all this week. First of all, I have a couple of podcast episodes to share with you. I recently read ‘You had me at Bonjour’ by Dufflyn Lammers. Dufflyn has been an actress and a performance poet and is now ‘The American love coach in Paris’. She looks at relationships through the lens of attachment theory and I found her book really refreshing. So much of what we see online about relationships seems to bat people off into divisive categories as phrases such as ‘toxic masculinity’ or ‘trad wife’ are thrown around.

What Dufflyn’s book deftly describes is how we can be in relationship human to human. When we get out of the weeds of labels and get curious about why someone is behaving the way they are whilst trusting ourselves to hold the necessary boundaries, then real transformation can happen.

It may not fit into the conventional ideals, but that is exactly why I love her book. For we are complex human beings with our human tricky things and there is not a cookie cutter way of being in a healthy relationship. Yet, curiosity, intention, accountability and personal reflection are all prerequisites to create the opportunity for healthier relationships to flourish.

We spoke a lot about relationships, but also about what it means to live a creative life:

Listen to the full episode

I have since recorded a solo episode after speaking at the Wellness in the Wild Festival. This was such a gorgeous festival. A really mellow vibe, lots of opportunity to do yoga, meditation and other peace-enhancing activities. I did my usual ‘doh’ move of not really clearly describing what I was doing in my ‘Words in the Wilderness talk. However, I still had a good crowd and was delighted to sell copies of my poetry collection ‘Stop the world I want to get off’.

One of the writing exercises that I encouraged people to do during the talk was to engage in ‘mark making’. This is great for when you cannot put actual words to your experience, but you still need to feel witnessed. I recorded this episode based on what I share within the talk. You can listen to the full episode here:

Listen here

This last week I attended the funeral of my dear dear aunt. She was 92 when she passed away and was such a source of comfort and support in my life for many years. I couldn’t attend in person as we were away on holiday in Norway. My surroundings provided the most perfect pathetic fallacy for how I felt…

After the funeral I wrote this:

I did not come to your funeral.

Some things, death cannot solve.

I watched through a live stream.

Your life packaged into 60 minutes of hymns, a poem you didn’t mind too much, and a eulogy.

Just for the record, I want you to know:

With you, I felt - exhaled.

Like, there was no other shoe to drop.

You told me once that you thought I was more intelligent than my brother.

I carried that belief in my pocket, like a talisman.

Brought it out when self doubt was loud.

Daily, then.

It’s raining where I am today, even though there is a heatwave.

I’m glad for it, this integrity.

You were a magician.

Beauty fell from you like fawning petals.

Everything you touched took on an air of cared for.

I want to list all my memories so that they don’t slip from existence, but it’s like trying to pin butterflies.

Some things should not be captured.

Instead, your way of witnessing, that feeling should be savoured for every sense of settled it brings.

And, ah!

Our last meeting.

I do not regret it.

But it is not something I savour.

Some things, death cannot solve.

Thank you for reading and supporting the work I do.

Here is a prompt for you today: