At school, my concentration span is extraordinarily short. I struggle to comprehend the junk that is being taught to me by teachers who give the impression they’d rather be elsewhere. Eventually, my mind drifts someplace else, until their words are blissfully mute. Here, in this sweet spot, the words literally go in one ear and out the other.

Sun spills into the window of my tiny kitchen as I sip chai slowly, trying to wake up. From his high chair, my six-month old son throws much of his breakfast onto the patchy linoleum that is as old as me, possibly older. The state of my house is cringeworthy + the state of my head is an emergency.

As the freight train of twenty-twenty gains steady momentum towards the finale of what can only be described as a spectacular fiasco, it would be almost rude not to give a standing ovation. It has been a hell of a show.

"The goal of life is to make your heartbeat match the beat of the universe, to match your nature with Nature.” ― Joseph Campbell

Civilization is only a series of victories against nature ~ William Harvey

If we allow it, a civilized life will swallow us whole. Our precious minutes will be engulfed by society’s tenacious tendrils, with any further minutes absorbed by thinking, planning + worrying

Twenty-twenty you ruthless, fiery shrew.

Some days we see the gifts of the rug being pulled out from underneath us, and other days it is as if we sit in a room, abrasively + awkwardly sharing space with all of our bad decisions, bad hair days, and bad dates….

Welcome to the guts of the tornado. It’s unusually quiet in here. On any other April, this town is inundated with tourists, travellers + musos. But the streets + beaches + forests are empty havens. For introverts like me who dream of a world without crowds, it’s almost paradisal.

When everything falls apart, I run.

I run, fast + far, with no intent on returning. I had meticulously orchestrated every facet of a “grown-up” life and had the tax returns + shoe collection to prove it.

As we catapult into a new year + decade, it is seemingly a whole new ball game altogether. The rules, as if overnight, appear to have ruthlessly changed - the consequences to our fuck-ups more dire + foul than ever. While many partied into the new year, it is safe to say that this year, many did not.

The Storyteller draws us in, captivating us until the noise of the outside world is but a faint murmur. With every word, inflection and plot twist, we find our hairs standing on end, hearts expanded ... breath held.

I recently facilitated my first ever art therapy workshop. The class was centred around unblocking & unleashing creativity and for someone who spends a lot of her time exploring the concept of creative freedom, it felt like the most natural and exhilarating thing to finally be sharing it.

There is a quote and it goes something like “being an artist means forever healing your own wounds whilst at the same time endlessly exposing them”. Loosely translated, Artists dance feverishly on the fringe of social norms in an attempt to self-process

At fourteen I am a handful. Even I know it.

I feel like some kind of undetonated dynamite that gets thrown from person to person, each one hoping that I wont explode on them.

When we think of a hermit archetypically, we usually imagine a cave dweller living alone, isolated from society and people. Words like “loner” and “recluse” can come to mind. In ancient stories, hermits were seen as guides - imparting wisdom & direction to travellers in need.

She is the source of all life. We all had one. From conception until birth, she was our home. Our relationship with our mother ranges from idolisation to contempt and everything in between. It is in her ability to be intimately known - yet enigmatic that makes her a living contradiction.

From the time I discovered the concept of ‘archetypes’ some years ago, I was fascinated. I immediately identified with so many of the archetypal folklore and mythology characters. In some way throughout my life, I had been The Trickster, The Prostitute, The Child, The Rebel, The Victim, The Saboteur, The Mother, The Artist, The Addict and The Explorer to name only a few.

My son likes to create his own animal totems. I guess this could potentially be considered cultural appropriation .. but he is 6 years old and to him its just a kind of game that he’s created. Each animal has some kind of message to relay to him. For instance, he has this turtle necklace and he tells me “turtle says never give up”.

Ladies, have you ever visited your womb? What was happening in there? Was it nurturing a child? Was it nurturing you as a baby? Perhaps it was bleeding? Was it fecund, fertile with earthworm rich soil, ripe with ovulation? Was it dark & barren or filled with light? Perhaps it had sticky ancestral fingers all over it….

I don’t have any preconceived notions of what to expect as I drive to Terania Creek. As usual it is chaos to even leave the house. The ambivalence of itching to break free from the daily grind, but being pulled to stay by the familiar sloppy kisses and cute smiles.