Nimue Brown's Blog, page 26

Creative community

(Nimue)

If you want to grow as a creator, then consider looking for a community where you can share your work. This can mean overtly creative spaces set up explicitly for certain kinds of sharing – poetry groups, folk clubs, writers groups, amateur dramatics groups and so forth. It can also mean finding spaces where creative contributions are welcome. Druid rituals, bardic circles and other community spaces may have room for what you do.

Being part of something gives you accountability. Having something or someone to create for may help you focus. I found that recently on a poetry course where there were commenting that being their helped them find the focus to write. That kind of space gives feedback, support and the incentive of getting a good response. I’ve had similar experiences when attending regular poetry nights, and folk clubs. Having people to perform for helps, it’s an incentive to create, to practice, to hone skills.

Encountering other people’s creativity is a really nourishing thing. There’s so much to learn from what others do – stage skills, subject matter, technical aspects – you never know what gems and insights you might pick up just by being in the room. Being aware of what other people are working on and interested in helps keep what you’re doing relevant and protects us all from becoming too self involved or self referential.

The instant feedback of applause is a wonderful thing. How much applause is always informative. Did they laugh when you thought they would? Did they go quiet when you wanted them to? That engagement can be highly educational and can help you hone your work to get the responses you want.

It works for other forms, too. I’ve been involved with drink and draws, storytelling circles, dance classes… whatever you’re doing, the process of sharing it will help you grow. It’s also entirely wonderful seeing other people growing. Watching  someone grow in a space you’ve contributed to is a lovely feeling. Knowing that your applause, your support, you having space and time for them has been part of what’s enabled them to become more capable is a wonderful thing to get to experience.

Creativity comes fully to life when it’s shared. Art needs an audience. For me, the work is never truly finished until it lands with someone else, so finding the spaces where that’s possible is important.

Work and identity

(Nimue)

For much of human history, ‘work’ was whatever you were contributing to keep you and your community going. We know from the archaeology that prehistoric people certainly did support ill, injured and disabled members of their communities who were unable to work. Cooperation has been the essence of human civilization for most of our history. Our desire for social recognition and to make a meaningful contribution is deeply rooted in this.

Unfortunately, our current take on capitalism has a distorting effect on the idea of work, which impacts on how we view and value ourselves. The pandemic showed us that the most essential work for keeping society functioning is low paid and undervalued. Care work is underpaid and often unpaid. There are many things that need doing that are not effectively handled by profit-oriented systems. Health care and education would be two obvious cases in point.

Our scope to interact with this capitalist system can greatly inform sense of self. Doing an essential job that pays so little you can barely afford to eat must be a psychologically very difficult place to be. I’ve spent time on minimum wage jobs – which are by no means wages you can live easily on. Being economically undervalued takes a toll, as well as having huge practical implications.

Creative work can be absolutely dreadful on this score. The amount of time that goes into it means either charging far more than the market will tolerate, or earning very little as an hourly rate. This impacts particularly on visual artists and crafters, but the effects are there across the board. It doesn’t help that the current government in the UK has treated the arts sector as worthless – despite the huge sums of money the arts create within the economy. For whatever reasons, in this line of work, the economic value of the work isn’t recognised and that often translates into devaluing the people who do it.

One of the other groups of people seriously struggling with being undervalued and underpaid, are farmers. It’s hard to make a case for any other line of work being more essential to everyone, and yet we don’t value that properly either. With nurses obliged to use food banks, it’s clear we have a structure that undervalues essential work. It’s hard to see what possible justification there is for billionaires, and I do not accept that anyone’s work could be genuinely worth that much money.

What we can do around this is value each other in ways that aren’t underpinned by how much we earn. We can support those essential workers who need and deserve better pay and we can decline to celebrate the gross excess of those whose ‘earnings’ have no bearing on the true value of their contributions. The money that a person attracts is not a measure of their value, nor of the intrinsic value of what they do. We can be alert to New Age ideas about attraction and recognise that privilege attracts opportunity and that this has nothing to do with a person’s goodness. Probably the opposite. Our current systems reward those who are willing to exploit others, and who take more than they give.

Contemplating forgiveness

(Nimue)

Forgiveness is a complex consideration and very personal as well. It has to be an individual decision, and I feel strongly that it has to feel right for the person doing it. If you feel pressured into forgiving someone, you absolutely should not do it. If forgiveness feels freeing for you, if it heals you and helps you then that is your choice to make no matter what anyone else thinks about it.

I’ve struggled with forgiveness in the past. There were things that deeply hurt me, that I couldn’t let go of or put down, couldn’t move on from. I heard that my bringing those things up just felt unkind and unreasonable. The trouble was, those things continued to impact on me, and their legacy remained un-dealt with. What I needed was something restorative to help me change how I felt and to undo the harm done.

We all make mistakes, and sometimes with even the best of intentions things can go terribly wrong. I’m very much in favour of forgiving honest mistakes. However, if something impacts on me, I need that to matter. Some mistakes cannot be undone – what was said, or done, or not done cannot be taken back and easily made over. Putting the burden on the wounded person to just be ok with being hurt and move on from there is a lot to ask, I think. It was more than I could manage, at any rate.

I’m finding it’s a lot easier to forgive mistakes when there’s some exploration of what went wrong and why. It’s much easier to trust that there won’t be repeats when time and effort are invested in understanding what went wrong. I can be weirdly sensitive about some things, I have some less obvious triggers and occasionally get caught out by one I wasn’t aware of. Spending time on understanding it and figuring out how not to go there again does a lot to reassure me. Being supported in that has helped me healer older wounds, and to overcome the small setbacks that brought them to the surface.

Forgiveness is easy when the mistakes are owned and genuine care is shown. I suspect that should have been blindingly obvious. I’ve spent my adult life determined to learn from my mistakes, but was in several long term relationships with people who were not inclined to even admit that they might have got things wrong. The idea of someone else wanting to learn, change and grow in response to my needs is very new territory for me.  It’s also opening up room for self-forgiveness in a way that’s surprised me.

I was pretty convinced for a long time that the problem was me – too sensitive, too needy, too difficult and complicated… So I internalised a lot of blame around the things that were hurting me. I felt responsible, and intrinsically wrong. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t fix any of that. The work I did to accept and forgive left me feeling smaller and smaller, and less able to function.

What’s happening now is restorative. Making mistakes feels safer – we can try things, and if it doesn’t work we can regroup, think it over and try something else. I can afford to make mistakes, or not know things. I have been making a lot of mistakes because there’s a lot I don’t really know about myself and can’t figure out without exploring and taking risks. I’m also not confident enough about which boundaries I can afford to soften and which ones need holding firmly. I’m learning all the time.

Some mistakes cannot be undone. But when what follows after them is soothing and restorative, those mistakes don’t loom large. They’re easy to let go of and move on from. Mistakes that could have become huge and awful drama can gently deflate when they’re just treated as opportunities to learn and understand and do better.  The mistakes that are followed up on with kindness and care don’t become heavy burdens, or sources of ongoing distress. There may be bruising, but that fades and is forgotten in very little time. There’s so much you can’t do if you can’t risk a few bruises here and there.

How to fall in love

(Nimue)

How to fall in love is a new poetry collection. I’ve just put it up on ko-fi – https://ko-fi.com/s/a63103ffdb 57 pages exploring love in all kinds of ways and contexts. The pdf is free or pay what you like. Patreon support really helps make that feasible for me.

If you prefer paper versions, it is also on Amazon – https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Fall-Love-Nimue-Brown/dp/B0D3V9S29R

Steven C Davis said of it: “An absolutely delightful weed of a book, flourishing in hard places, surviving where others might not, with poems of wonder and delight, of love, of finding joy in the world, in little things. I would mention ‘Even knights’, ‘Haunting the twilight’, ‘No longer a monster’, ‘Considering the harvest’, but truthfully, there’s something delightful, evocative and deep in all of them.”

It’s a book about healing, learning and growing. My own heart journey has been particularly inspired by the work of Halo Quin, Irisanya Moon and Vishwam Gurudas – he’s why I’m at the Heart Festival this year. My love of landscape is very much part of the mix, and also the romantic love in my life that has so deeply inspired me in this last year. This is some of the most joyful and exuberant poetry I’ve ever written – the only stuff that is more so is what I’ve written since putting this collection together. These poems are an invitation to fall in love with life.

I believe in gift economy, which is why I make my work freely available. Grab a pdf, and I hope you enjoy it. If you’re in a position to buy it, that’s lovely and it helps me keep going. Take a try-before-you-buy approach if you’re just curious about my work. Have a look at my ko-fi shop and help yourself to any other books that catch your fancy – I’ve non-fiction and novels in there as well as poetry collections.

The cover is based on an original piece I created and that Keith Errington has brought his design skills to – no AI was involved in creating this book.

Hot weather Druid

(Nimue)

For some, the heat of hot summer is a time to play and celebrate. Others find it takes a bodily toll. There is of course no one right way of responding to the conditions, only the way that is right for you and the body you have.

It’s important not to make anyone else feel ashamed of their responses. If a person is honouring how their body responds to heat, that should be fine. If a person is in a situation where work or other pressures mean they are suffering because they are not allowed to meet their needs, that deserves compassion.

We’ve clearly evolved to have bodies that work in different ways. Some of us thrive in the sun, and some of us thrive in the quiet darkness. Some of us want to be up with the dawn and some of us do better going to bed then. That diversity is really powerful, and if we accepted it, we could collectively handle all sorts of things far more effectively.

Unfortunately, humans seem intent on structuring human societies in ways that ignore all of this. We demand that our teenagers get up early in the morning even though we have a ton of evidence that this is counterproductive for them. We expect people to work in unbearable heat.

I think it’s because we have been so keen to separate ourselves from nature. If humans are superior to nature and need not be ruled by it then we can do without the rest we need, ignore how our bodies react to heat and cold and so forth. It’s insane. We are animals. We have bodies, we exist in the physical world and we are not all the same. If we could just get to grips with this simple truth we could start building human habitats and societies in ways that actually relate to real human needs.

Burnout and recovery

(Nimue)

You can’t push your way through and out of burnout. You can’t work your way out of it or overcome it by trying harder. On reflection this should all have been blindingly obvious to me, but it wasn’t.

There’s a lot of wider, cultural stuff around striving, pushing and overcoming. Burnout is the consequence of doing far too much of that with far too little respite. Obviously you can’t heal from that by continuing to do the things that cause it. And yet, that deadly siren song in my head repeats the refrain that I would do better if only I tried that bit harder…

These days I can’t run for long before I falter. I can’t do much pushing hard before I get into difficulty. This suggests to me that I’ve not really dealt with the burnout legacy, and that I am going to have to ease up and learn how to be gentler with myself. If I want an option on pushing hard sometimes, I can’t do it all of the time.

We are mammals. Nature exists in our bodies. Mammals are designed to rest, and all other mammals do as much lounging about as they can. We are not supposed to be busy little bees. The life expectancy of busy bees is short. So much goes wrong for us when we try to function like machines, or to ignore our own natural limits. Honouring nature has to include honouring nature as it manifests in our own bodies, and I’ve not been good on that score. I think most of us aren’t.

I’ve been burnt out for years. I had my first massive crash something like ten years ago, exhausted and bursting into tears all the time. I don’t think I’ve ever recovered from that, and there were a lot of years when serious burnout happened every four to six weeks. I’d have a couple of days of being totally unable to function, but as soon as I got on top of it a bit I’d crawl back into action and go another round. Healing and recovery call for more time than that. Little wonder that my physical health deteriorated so much.

I’m learning about healing. Some of that involves learning about resting, and feeling safe enough to stop pushing all the time.

Hearts and poems

I’ve been asked to be poet in residence for this lovely festival. I went last year as a contributing poet, and feel deeply honoured by this opportunity to be more involved. My plan is to spend the weekend writing in situ, taking inspiration from whatever is going on around me, and whatever anyone chooses to share. At the far end there will be some sort of Heart Festival collection.

Those of you who know me well know that yoga isn’t for me. It isn’t a good choice for hypermobile people. I have done a little, but only with someone I really trusted. It is not a coincidence that he’s at the heart of the Heart festival. I’m there for the sacred arts side and looking forward to seeing how this develops.

I haven’t camped in a lot of years. I used to do it for Druid Camp and found it hugely physically challenging. I’d end up sleep deprived, stiff and sore. However, I think it’s feasible to have another go. I sleep a lot better these days. The role of poet invites wafting around gently and being able to take things at my own pace. I’m hopeful that I’ll be able to do it.

I used to love going to festivals, camping, and being in that kind of immediate and intense community space for short bursts. I’m hoping I can have that back, and that maybe folk festivals can be back on the agenda for next year, too. I’m enjoying exploring more events. Keith’s support makes it so much more feasible to go to things, so if you’re interested in booking me for music, as a speaker, or to do workshops, I’m much more open to that than I’ve been in previous years.

I really enjoyed my time at last year’s Heart Festival. It’s a lovely space, and a welcoming one. I was impressed by last year by the strong sense of community given that the festival had not run before. It’s a cooperative, collaborative, supportive space and I look forward to seeing how it develops. It’s not huge, so it’s not overwhelming, the location is lovely and the site infrastructure is very good. Do consider coming along!

Working collaboratively

(Nimue)

To be creative is to be collaborative. Ideas about the ‘lone genius’ are misleading at best, and not accurate about how anything gets done. Some of the first forays into rampant individualism were written by chaps who had conveniently forgotten that their mums were doing their laundry and cooking them Sunday lunch….

We all depend on each other. We depend on the people whose work (paid or unpaid) makes out work possible. A lot of creators depend on partners or family for financial support and that’s always been true, and why its a lot easier to become (apparently) successful if you come from an affluent background in the first place.

We depend on each other for inspiration. Genres are a collective project. We all need reviewers and people willing to talk about what we do if that isn’t to be purely for our own amusement.

Every piece of creativity is an interaction between whoever has made it and whoever experiences it. For me, it means that the final form of the piece can exist in many different ways when it lands with someone else. What the person experiencing the creation does with it will be informed by who they are and what they know and think. Every kind of art only really exists in that point of connection, I think.

We can’t always see the collaborations that go into creativity. As an animist I’m also inclined to think about how we collaborate with physical materials, with time, space, the air around us. We’re held by the Earth. Our creativity depends on ecosystems.

It’s good to be alert to all of this, and to talk about the collaborations intrinsic to whatever we’re doing. I think its healthier and more honest to understand ourselves in terms of both the ecological and cultural webs that we are all dependent on and supported by. The idea of the lone genius supports ideas of human supremacy. What is a writer without paper? What is paint without earth pigments?

New adventures in fiction

(Nimue)

It’s all rather full on this week – I’m talking at the Pagan Tribal Gathering on Friday, and have been running round like an overheated and headless chicken. So, rather than blogging today I’d like to direct you over to this post from lovely Mark Hayes. It’s about a project I’m involved with…

Folly and Madness

Books for Druids

(Nimue)

At some point this year I’ll bring out my book on pilgrimage. It’s finished aside from the formatting and releasing issues. Currently on Patreon I’m working on a book about spirits of place. I already have books out exploring Druidry and the Darkness, and Druidry and the Future. Those are free as pdfs or pay what you like. You can find print versions on Amazon.

Over at Moon Books I have books about prayer, meditation, ancestry and dreaming. https://www.collectiveinkbooks.com/moon-books/authors/nimue-brown

At this point I’m being deliberately slow when it comes to writing non-fiction. Every book takes at least a year and explores a topic I’ve spent considerable time with. I won’t be starting the next book for some months, but I would like to settle on the theme for the next project and devote some time to pondering it well ahead of jumping in.

If there’s anything you’d particularly like me to write about, do please comment.

I’m considering the idea of doing an everyday Druidry book, focusing on small, everyday actions, and ways to integrate Druidry into the rest of life.

The prayer and meditation books are very much about those topics. I have wondered about doing a book of meditations or a book of prayers at some point. I’m also very much open to suggestion!