I think I just need some space...

No, I’m not breaking up with you guys.

But it does feel like I’ve been on permanent hiatus from creating anything while my brain tries to unravel itself slowly.

After a very difficult period over 2023/4, my brain decided to quash all motivation to do anything. Eat well. Hydrate. Wash my hair. I went into full on survival mode. So it was an inevitability that my “creative practice” suddenly seemed like a luxury that did not have place in my life anymore. But what I’ve come to realise, is that my creativity needed space and time to reignite again.

In a desperate bid to hold onto any shred of something, I tried to force a flame of inspiration. Put myself into the studio with a full band. Locked myself away in my flat for an entire week with no plans so I could spend my time writing, uninterrupted. But my heart and mind were still deeply entrenched in the anger, fear and sadness of what I’d just been through. And what came out was exactly that. Anger, fear and sadness.

Girl… what she really needed was a break.

It’s a hard thing to admit when you have to take a break, a breath, a brief stop in your journey. You look at how far you’ve come, the momentum you’re in, and you feel it all slowly getting further and further away from you. It quite frankly all feels like a waste of time. And the idea of starting again feels like a weight that is just too heavy to lift.

What I didn’t realise is that, with all weightlifting, you do just need time to rest between sets.

Granted, I’ve needed more time than I’d maybe like to admit. But to try and force your own hand, when deep down you know it’s not ready, will only have you creating work that doesn’t feel authentic.

So what does that rest and space actually look like? For me, it’s been a lot of pushing through the busy days. I am getting married, I’ve changed jobs, I’ve gone from not performing at all, to working at a publishers, to singing on tour, to singing on cruise ships, to freelancing in editorial. I’ve moved house. I’ve still got Juno giving me extra snuggles. But there’s been so much upheaval and shift, that I needed to let the waters still. I’ve been waiting for the ripples in the pond to finally settle. And it feels like it’s finally happened.

Because now I’ll get bursts of ideas. Melodies to record on voice memos. A line or two to hurriedly write down in my notebook. I’m reading more often. I’m listening to different music. I’m feeling actively motivated to want to create again, without that voice inside me telling me that it’s not worth it. I’ll not be ashamed to admit that I’m genuinely a little envious when I see other artists making exceptional work. Because I know I want to be to. When before, I felt numb to anything I wanted to say. I’m taking that little green ember of jealousy as a sign that maybe this is something that I want.

So now I’ll have to tend to that creative garden, cultivate creative space for the ideas to really come to form. I think for me that’s going to be taking up meditation again, trying to get back into my journalling practice, scheduling time to sit down and write some music, finding themes and stories that resonate and might inspire me, heading to a gallery once in a while, seeing more movies in the cinema, walking outside in nature now it’s finally sunny. It’s all the simple joys that should make us feel really human. Because that’s where the inspiration really lies, in knowing that the small occurrences of our every day lives are the things that can spark the greatest flames of inspiration.

I don’t know what will come of this. But I do hope that if I can get back into sharing this process here with you all, that I just might stick to it.

Let’s just wait and see ✨