What I’ve learned in 2023

Reflections on my creative life and business over the last year

Looking back this year, doing my annual reflect and review process has been tricky.

The year got off to a bad start with my dad being very ill and my own health being less than ideal too. We both had surgery and are both a million times better now but that heavy and exhausted start of the year has taken its toll on me, creatively. I don’t feel like I’ve caught up yet.

What I’m now realising at the end of the year is that I’ll never catch up. There is no finished with creative practice or with a freelance / consultancy business that I’m enjoying growing or with renovating a house and tending a garden. I’ve realised that’s ok. It’s a life, not a competition.

Somethings do get finished, some projects are things that I can tick off and those have been joyful this year.

I got the funding for my Cultures of Care project in January and got started in May of this year. I’ve learned that slow, gentle, care-full work is exactly what I need.

I finished a very lengthy piece of work this summer and shared it, along with other new work in my Material Evidence home studio exhibition in August. I learned that I can host small exhibitions at home and that people will visit and share the pleasure of the cosy space.

I collaborated with the brilliant Mandeep Dhadialla on a great project called Worn Stories with refugees and asylum seekers in Leicester. I learned that collaboration is my favourite way of working and that projects can be personally and creatively rewarding.

I created and shared Blossom & Thorn, a hedge histories project with local volunteers for the National Forest. I learned that other people love hedges as much as I do, and that I can create outdoor artworks.

I’ve developed artist support programmes, projects, training and events for organisations, individuals and artist groups. I’ve learned so much doing this, it’s a constant flow of ideas, problem-solving and understanding. I love it.

I’ve even had some little holidays in between, in York, in Wales and in Paris. I learned (or reminded myself) that I really needed them and I need more breaks.

And now, in the winter, I’ve had enough! I’ve learned that I can’t do so much in the winter and that I need to start hibernating in the Autumn.

From all of this I’ve learned a lot

• I’ve learned that rest is part of the work
• I’ve learned that I have to support myself as well as others
• I’ve learned that I need to have time and space to reflect on my work
• I’ve learned that my own creative development has to be more of a priority
• I’ve learned that my goal setting has worked and that I’m now only doing work that I love and that I have chosen to do
• I’ve learned that creative work is a slow, mindful ramble not a marathon let alone a sprint

I invite you to join me in Find Your Focus, my online 5 week gentle course to reflect, learn and plan with your joy, your needs and your creativity at the course. I don’t believe in targets or hard goals that set you up to fail. I believe in working out your real focus, what matters the most, what is true to your values, and figuring out ways to bring more of that into your life. The course starts on 3rd January and runs to the end of the month and costs £49 for all five workbooks, videos and a bonus online live Q&A with me half way through the process. You can read more about it in various blog posts over the last few years here.