New Frontiers.. January News

Rose Sounds - 2013.. the new frontier...

Here we are looking at the blank canvas of the emerging New Year - what do you wish to paint, sculpt, draw, sing or simply be there? What does voyaging into the unknown bring up for you - exhilaration, adventure, creativity, butterflies, daring-do? What holds and supports you in the quick of life’s uncertainty and enables you to expand rather than contract from the preciousness of each moment?

For me as I reflect on the transformational year of 2012, I’m so grateful for the support and love I experience in my life and am aware that I still have new frontiers to soften so I can yield and surrender to the flow, to the dance, to the song, to the invitation to live mind, body heart and soundfully. From softness is born the strength of a lion’s heart, from delicacy comes the deliciousness of life, from subtlety the ability to savour all the flavours on offer in every moment.

Whatever you intend or resolve upon for 2013, may there be space for the spontaneity of joyful surprises and the delight of discovering new frontiers of freedom.

Looking forward to hearing, seeing and singing with you in 2013!

New Adventures for January

Love Your Voice  & Sound Therapy

"You guided me to my heart in an explosive journey and I'm forever grateful. I will never let myself down........ I feel secure within myself yet so vulnerable. Thank you!!! ♥♥♥ Jyoti X"

If you’d like to journey to the next frontier of self expression or take a sonic trip in a special one to one Love Your Voice/Sound Therapy Session, please contact me.

 

Heaven on Earth  Full Moon Party - Shake out the Old, Embrace the New

Conscious connections meets kickass clubbing!

Enjoy the vibrant songfulness of angel-voiced Katie Rose, followed by global sounds and groovy beats from the awesome Caz Coronel. The event takes places in an intimate and beautiful private residence, complete with enchanted Oriental garden! Delicious food from Bite Entertainment will be available throughout the evening. Plus connection and games, massage and healing sessions, and a few surprises along the way!!!

Saturday 26th January, 7.00-11.00pm, £12 early bird by 12 Jan, £17 thereafter.

 

The Garden of Roses - Tones of Transformation

An evening of Auspicious Sounds with Katie Rose & Friends featuring

* Michael Ormiston & Candida Valentino - present magical music from their new album Eight Auspicious Symbols - featuring the mesmerising sounds of Mongolian Khöömii Singing and truly extraordinary sacred instruments.

* Raphael Radoux-Rogier - creative & versatile fiddle player, singer & composer who combines his classical training with his love of traditional music to create unique playful & colourful soundscapes.

Inspiral Lounge, Tuesday 29th January, 7.30pm - 10.30pm, Free!

 

Monthly Singing Group in Forest Hill

Would you like to discover your voice in a very nurturing and playful space?

Super easy super chilled chanting, singing & voice stretching.

Next session:  Jan 30th, 7.30-9.30pm, £15, SE23

Please contact me for more details
 

At The Big Om with Barefoot Doctor and Tim Wheater

Sonic Soulstice Card with a little Musical Pudding

Dear Beautiful Being,

Wishing you a Wondrously Songful SoulStice
& Merry Midwinter Season!

Thank you for all the wonderful creativity, love, joy and beauty you share in the world.

Thank you for being a sparkly, songful presence in my world this year.

Here's a little musical pudding for the last dances of 2012.
 

Wishing you safe passage into the new realms of 2013.

With love and gratitude

Katie

xxx

Super Sonic Solstice Events

I'd be super delighted to sing with you over the festive season - do join me at:

* 19th December - Forest Hill Singing Group - super easy joyful singing

* 20th December-  Interactive Solstice Concert at Naked Dragon

* 21st December - 21.12.12 - Sunrise-Sunset Solstice Celebration

* 31st December - New Years Eve 5Rhythms Party - Tim Broughton, Alive! & Nikki Slade

* Love Your Voice - 121 Holistic Vocal Coaching-  TLC for your wonderful voice.

Diving into Divine December

Rose Sounds - Diving into Divine December

So here it comes - the greatly anticipated Solstice of 2012 - to which I am not going to add any further interpretation - but simply ask: where am I in the wave?  

The powerful energy surges of astrological line-ups, divine downloads, festive frenzy, Christmas commercialism, family dynamics, can create a feeling that we are all at sea.
Personally, I am waving, not drowning - to reverse Stevie Smith’s poem -  in the deep currents of these times, even though I too have felt ‘much too far out all my life’. 
It feels as if this is truly is the time to let go of the fear of being ‘too far out’ and to dive, jump, dance, sing, trust and surrender full-heartedly to wherever we are in the wave - peaking, troughing, ebbing, flowing, splashing, capsizing and all! :)

For, as a lifeguard will tell you, if you surrender to the current,
it will bring you back to shore.

There is a vast array of Sonic Specials for Sound Surfers on offer this month.

For Stylish Singers seeking respite from seasonal madness I am offering 3 special Singers Salons on Saturday afternoons here in Crystal Palace - please do contact me for details.

Thanks to Liam Smith, Kate Mckenzie and all the fizzy flowers who joined us for the firework special, do join us at the Garden of Roses Christmas Tree Party at InSpiral on 4.12.12 supporting The Green Light Foundation’s amazing work in the Amazon.

The Barefoot Doctor’s Little Big Om on 12.12.12 - is sold out, but you can join a host of extraordinary lightworkers at the wonderful London One World Celebration 12.12.12

The Sonic SoulSisters (Anne Malone and I:)) are also offering a special Sonic SoulStice Celebration at Buddha on a Bicycle on 15.12.12 - for all deep sea sound divers.

I am also honoured to be offering a special Interactive Solstice Concert at Naked Dragon - on 17.12.12. There is a special Naked Dragon raffle in aid of The Dystonia Society & Macmillan where you can win two free tickets plus lots of other goodies.

On 19.12.12 I will be having a local Christmas sing with the Forest Hill Singing Group.

And... the peak of the wave...

For Solstice I will join an array of wonderful soundsters at the 21.12.12 Sunset-Sunrise Celebration

On the other side... I will singing my way into 2013 with the wonderful Tim Broughton and Alive! Musicians at the New Years 5 Rhythms at Kew.

Wherever you are in the wave, I wish you courage, strength, joy, love and much fun fluffy seafroth this Solstice and Festive Season.

I look forward to singing and soundsurfing with you

"Sail Forth - Steer for the deep waters only. Reckless O soul, exploring. I with thee and thou with me. For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared go. And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all." - Walt Whitman

November Blog - Rest & Vulnerability - The Song of Stillness

Rest and Vulnerability - The Song of Stillness
My recent learning has taken me by surprise - which is not really surprising, because to learn is to be willing to be constantly surprised- but something crept up on me that I was not aware of and it was to do with resting and, by extension, vulnerability.  

Being firmly instructed to rest by a fiercely compassionate acupuncturist has proved to highlight that Western culture is wired up to burn out, and so, unless I am mindful, am I.  Even though I checked out of the conventional crash-and-burn corporate lifestyle, I realise I have nonetheless been driving myself along without a full understanding of the importance of rest.  So I have started dismantling the engine that powers my tendency to over-work and what I am discovering is that it is the willingness to be vulnerable that is key to allowing rest.  

After listening to Brene Brown’s TED Talk The Power of Vulnerability, whilst on air with Energy Brown on Inspired Talk, Radio Verulam, I have been reminded that vulnerability is the key to creative expression and fulfilling relating, as it allows us to drop all masks, pretences or shields and let the full spectrum of our humanity - with all its imperfections - to be seen.  To be open to any transformative, loving or creative process requires being willing to be vulnerable and to enter and surrender to the still, restful, receptive place. In this space we can more fully receive the inspiration, love and abundance of life.

So what prevents us from being more open and vulnerable? Ultimately fear and shame.

It is our fears, and ultimately the fear of death, that keep many of us running around at break-neck pace.  Deep within there is a fear of being obliterated by the stillness of rest, the stillness of death.  Yet, as the powerful celebration by the 5 Rhythms community of dear, beautiful Gabrielle Roth’s recent death demonstrated, Stillness can be understood and embraced simply as a natural, deep and rich rhythm in life.

Shame is the fear that we are not enough - that at core we are inadequate and that we cannot be seen for our real selves - which may lead us to attempt to fill up the ‘not-enough’ place with externals - “I feel not enough unless my diary is full, unless I have 5 billion friends on Facebook, unless I have the latest iPhone, unless I am constantly earning and achieving, unless I have saved the world and helped all my sick friends and gone shopping and cleaned the house this afternoon...” which basically boils down to “I am not enough unless I am a good girl/boy according to whatever belief system I am judging myself/being judged by.”

Shame arises from competition and comparison - we tell ourselves or have been told we are not good enough according to a measuring stick. Take the measuring stick away and there is no shame  - which means to say “I Measure Up As I Am” - ie - “I am inherently good and my inherent goodness cannot be measured, commodified or pressurised into conformity to any systems or structure - and that all these cultural tape-measures, grading systems and numbering processes are only helpful to me for very practical things like buying apples.”  

One reason we buy into the measuring stick game is because it gives us a sense of self and way of simplifying reality into what is good or bad.  So there can be fear when we consider letting go of the measuring sticks that we might suddenly become amoral or monstrous in our behaviour.  I hear clients with cancer talk about the difficulty of saying No to friends and family whilst having treatment, because they feel guilty.  Yet actually when we slow down and listen for the truth of who we really are and what we really need, we naturally begin to act with more integrity - which means ‘wholeness’ - acting in alignment with the truth of all levels of our being - which in turn makes us more truthful with others.  

Vulnerability has its roots in the word ‘wound’ and shame is often a covering we develop to cover our wounds.  It is however, only a sticking plaster.  Our wounds often contain the seeds of our brilliance and when we allow another trusted soul to witness us at the core place - where it hurts, where it matters, where it’s scaldingly painful and searingly ecstatic at the same time - there and then magic happens.   For just the process of allowing it to be seen is transformational. The witness takes on the role of the wizard - the reflection of our own wisdom - and whizz! - the wound becomes a site of learning, creativity, insight, development.   

In rest and in meditation, we become our own witness.  We are able to embrace the wounded child or battered lover inside that is bleeding and heartbroken and to say “yes I see you, I am coming for you. I will no longer leave you here alone, I will gather you up in my arms and hold you while the tears flow, I will sing to you, I will bathe you, I will take care of you. Tell me what you need.”

Rest allows us to become creative - in stillness ideas, insights and daydreams emerge. Some will evolve into breakthroughs if given space, for vision is just the empowered bigger sister of daydreaming.  Others may need to be discarded or upgraded - for rest gives us the resources to be brave and let go. I may discover that the project/ job/ relationship I once cherished has now fulfilled its purpose and can be lovingly released.  Rest allows me to step away from that which no longer fits and to find my own inner fit with myself.

As we dive in our own deep waters, we become aware of archetypal swells within collective tides. As Jeff Foster discusses in his description of Depression as an invitation to Deep Rest - we become able to put aside the exhausting false story of our life and to become aware that we are in truth a home for the waves of the ocean of existence.  

Originally the root of the word rest comes from Proto Germanic ‘rasto’ - meaning ‘a measure of miles’ - so rest is actually not a diversion from the journey but an integral part of it. The rest we take is moving us forward. In the stillness we are dancing. In the silence we are singing. 

***

If you are seeking respite and a creative space amidst the seasonal madness please do join me at the following events:
* Singers Salon- 1st, 8th, 15th December - flap free singing in Crystal Palace - 2-4pm
* Forest Hill Singing Group - Nov 21st & Dec 19th, 7.30-9.30pm
* Garden of Roses Christmas Tree Party - Dec 6th, InSpiral Lounge
* The Big Om - 12.12.12 - Zu Studios, Lewes - tickets going fast!
* Sonic SoulStice Celebration, Buddha on a Bicycle - 7-9pm
* Naked Dragon Interactive Solstice Concert, 7.30-10.30pm, Chertsey
All info available on my Events Page
 

November Sparkles - Go with Your Glow!

Rose Sounds - November Sparkles - Go With Your Glow!

So here come the dark days with the challenge to maintain an inner glow when the nights draw in. Our presence is what glows, even we feel cloudy or foggy headed,
there is still a place of inner shine.

The process of staying connected to our inner sparkle sometimes involves shedding a few skins/ letting go of life luggage so we can dance more freely. Sometimes it involves acknowledging and nurturing our treasures, talents and gifts so that they can really shine. Sometimes it involves taking a long luxuriating soulsoak in a song, book, poem, artwork, walk, landscape, meditation or other connection practice.

*** Wherever you glow, there go! ***

I’d love to sparkle with you this month - here’s the latest sonic offerings:

There will be plenty of sparkle at The Barefoot Doctor’s Little Om on November 11th - a special day of Love and Art to celebrate peace - a prelude to the Little Big Om on 12.12.12 - a smaller version of the Wembley event which will happen next year.

Thanks to Amy & Paolo and Buddenath for filling InSpiral full of heartfelt chants - there will be a wonderful fizzy fireworks song session in the Garden of Roses this month with myself and Liam Smith.

I had a wonderful Halloween sing with my fabulous Forest Hill Singing Group - if you’re looking for a super safe space to come and sing playfully do come along.

Following a wonderful adventure in Austria, celebrating the 7th Anniversary of Best of Spirits, I am now launching a special service for clients near and far.

Personal Transformation Sessions on Skype

Personally tailored Holistic Coaching/Tarot sessions to support you to love and transform your life. So if you’re feeling ready to take your sparkle to a new level, please be in touch!

I look forward to singing and sparkling with you very soon!

Voicing the Boob

Voicing the Boob

As a woman, I have been turned off mainstream media for a very long time but three recent stories have engaged my attention.  The first is the No More Page 3 Campaign launched by Lucy Ann Holmes, which has received much support across the media and now has 44K signatures, the second is the photographing of Kate Middleton on holiday and the third is the Lady Gaga’s stand against media snickering about her weight gain.  At the centre of these stories is the female form, particularly the boob which has been objectified, airbrushed, mutilated, implanted, scrutunised and salivated over ad infinitum by the media - no change there - but what’s new is that the form is speaking out - the Boob has a voice!

Since cave dwellers started drawing on walls, people have always want to make images of their bodies.  The wonderful vehicles that carry us through life are indeed often fascinating, beautiful, juicy, delicious things to behold - and are as such absolutely deserving of artistry and admiration.  They are also universal - everyone, regardless of shape or size, has got one - which also makes them pretty ordinary, everyday and unexciting.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with celebrating the beauty of the human form in images, there’s also nothing new about it.

Yes, boobs are beautiful and powerful, but are they news? No, to be honest we’ve all been suckling on them since way back when.  And yet, in our infantile tabloids, catching sneaky peeks at boobs is the source of immense titillation.  Millions of women sunbathe topless, yet because she’s a royal, Kate Middleton’s knockers are in another realm of excitement according to the handful of wealthy men who run the media. Photos of Kate’s very ordinary activity sold for very extraordinary amounts of cash and was distributed for all to see.  

What is the difference between female and male nudity?  Prince Harry was just caught with his pants down, but generally we don’t see shots of David Beckham and the England Team running around without their shorts on.  It’s illegal to display an erect phallus.  There are two reasons for this within a hetero-normative patriarchy - homophobia and misogyny.   Mainstream media directs male attention towards the female as object and away from owning his naked reflection and his relationship with other men.  It conditions women to seek out and acquiesce to male attention in order to be perceived as beautiful, desirable, bedable and wedable.

The photographed nude female is silent - ‘our girls’ as the Sun calls them do not have a voice. They are all obliging smiles and frilly knickers. Kate Middleton will continue her silent smiling royal duties, her views expressed via the collective royal PR machine which announces that the couple are ‘saddened’ by the shots. I’d love to hear the real, uncensored version of her feelings about having her privacy continuously invaded by penis extension camera lenses. The desirable and desired woman is conditioned into silence in order to preserve her position within patriarchy.  She is placed in competition with other women for male attention under the roving eye of the camera lens  - who is wearing the best designer dress on the red carpet? who lost the most weight on her latest crash course diet? who has secret cellulite on her thighs? who has just been jilted by her high profile lover for a younger woman? and of course  - who has the best boobs? The woman who speaks out and expresses angry feelings or protests against this treatment is quickly diminished and belittled - Clare Short was portrayed as an ugly crone, jealous of the Page 3 Babes when she criticised the Sun.  

With the current prevalence of Breast Cancer, it feels urgent for women to ‘get off their chest’ that which social niceties forbids them to say.  It is urgent for women to reclaim the voice of the boob - the voice of their heart centre. It is urgent for women to release the codependent role of carers which patriarchy has doled out to them, whilst still remaining connected to the immense power of their love.  It is urgent that women are seen not as walking boobs - the sucklers of humanity, feeding male desire - but honoured for the complex, whole beings that they are.  It is urgent that women heal their conditioned insecurity about their bodies and start nourishing themselves more fully. It is urgent that women reclaim the power of menopause and embrace rather than botox the aging process. It is urgent that women reclaim themselves from conditioned responses to change, save, imitate or seek attention from men and follow their hearts.  And it is urgent that we follow the example of Lady Gaga and speak out for a more healthy, balanced portrayal of women and the female form in the media.

As any nutritionist will affirm, if you feed people junk they will become accustomed to it and grow to crave it, even if it makes them sick and will have withdrawal symptoms when it is taken away.  The media has been pumping junk sex at men for way too long.  I personally do not believe that Page 3 exists because ‘that’s what men want’. Some do, maybe, others not - the responses to the petition reveal that many men feel uncomfortable with Page 3. It cannot be healthy for heterosexual men to have their arousal chain yanked vicariously by the media in order to persuade them to buy a tacky newspaper full of tittle-tattle and numerous other useless commodities.  Offering a man a quick wank over a Page 3 girl is no substitute for real intimacy and relating. But its quick, convenient and the woman isn’t real. She’s plastic, compliant and always smiles and the sex is way less complex than real life.

It really is time to turn the camera lens round to focus on the people driving the tabloids for truly they are the ones with the pants down, publicly exposing their fetishes for crotch and boob shots while many of us wince at the tackiness of it all.  For too long the camera and the media have been given a ridiculous amount of power and have reflected back to us only the most dysfunctional aspects of social behaviour - yes misogyny still exists, but many of us have actually grown out of it.

Lucy Ann Holmes is giving a voice to silenced women and men.  For me the outcome of her campaign is not as important as the voices that are being raised, the questions that are being asked, the debate that has started.  That this voice is complex and non-uniform is to be welcomed.  Some women say they don’t care, some women say they do, some men say Page 3 is a homage to the boob, others say it’s out of date and gives the wrong message to their daughters.   What’s great is that instead of silently acquiescing in what is presented to them, people are questioning and debating.  The Boob has a Voice and She is Speaking Out.

Don't Sweat the Heavy Stuff

Don’t Sweat the Heavy Stuff

What happens when we have a ‘big cause’ and want to tell people about it without frightening or emotionally downloading on them?  How do we gracefully invite others into social activism/ charity work/ social causes?

Many of us want to make a difference and to draw attention to important social issues and causes. There are many urgent and potentially catastrophic issues facing us as a species which need to be seen, heard and acted upon.  How do we communicate about these in a graceful, enlightening way which can be received by people and which is not overwhelming?

Lynn Serafinn has outlined an amazing way of creating graceful, ethical business practice in her book The 7 Graces of Marketing.  Following our conversation about these questions, she asked me to write this blog.

I have been incredibly inspired by the work of WaterAid and particularly by the project founded by composer Helen Chadwick, Sing for Water, which I want to describe as an incredible successful model of graceful contribution.  Helen initiated Sing for Water at the Mayor’s Thames Festival eleven years ago.  Every year a choir of 800 singers gather together to sing songs about water and raise funds for WaterAid.  The event is a high energy experience for everyone involved and draws choirs from across the UK and beyond.  Helen describes it as having a magic formula - people have a wonderful experience doing what they love, whilst making a difference in the world.  Their friends, families and communities are touched and engaged by sponsoring the singers.  It is a cause whose serious intent is communicated gracefully, creatively, passionately by people who love singing.  The contagious enthusiasm generated by the Thames Festival event has lead many other Sing for Water events - including Sing & Swim ! - across the UK and Europe.  In the last ten years this project has raised over half a million pounds for WaterAid - this year funds will go to life-saving projects in Ghana.

The facts about water are grim for those in some parts of the world. Water scarcity and pollution causes more deaths than any other cause and has a vast array of devastating effects in deprived communities. 1 child dies every second from water related issues.  Many girls and women walk miles every day to collect and carry heavy containers of water for their family risking rape, attack and damage to their bodies whilst missing out on school and other vital community activities.  Lack of adequate sanitation also creates massive issues as communities unwittingly pollute their own precious water sources. WaterAid are active in these communities, working alongside local people to help them build facilities that give them access to clean water (taps, wells etc) and create safe hygiene practices.

Encountering some of these facts brings me to tears and I was so inspired by Sing for Water, touching as it did on my own commitment to raising awareness about water issues, that I ran a concert this year in London featuring 180 singers which raised over £3,300.  I learned so much - mainly about how to ask gracefully - ask for support, donations, resources, performers, venues, ideas, contributions, publicity.  Sometimes of course I made mistakes - but I’ve learned that if you ask one way and it does not work, another question will open another door.  What works is passionate, unswerving commitment to the cause.  What also works is friendliness, fun, playfulness, laughter, creativity and beauty.  

We need not be afraid to apply lighter ways of communicating about so called ‘heavy issues’. For example I created a song with some beautiful WaterAid images on YouTube - which was foremostly an audio-visual experience - offered like any other - to bring pleasure to the eyes and ears as well as conveying the key information about the event.  WaterAid have also run incredibly fun and funky awareness raising campaigns such as wrapping up politicians in toliet roll, delivering 18,314 signed toliet rolls to Downing Street as part of the Make Poverty History and forming a toliet queue outside the G8 summit. Details of these and current campaigns can be found www.wateraid.org

This is why Sing for Water  has captured so many people’s imagination - because it is ultimately aesthetically and sensorily pleasurable on many levels whilst also being socially committed. The power of singing with 800 people, whilst knowing it is having a ripple effect across the world is indescribable. This is just one example of how much creative power we have when we join in shared intent.  We need not apologise for having fun while we do it!

Wishing you passionate and playful communications
Katie Rose
Sept 6th 2012

Sing for Water takes place this weekend at the Mayor’s Thames Festival -
3pm, 9th September, The Scoop, open air amphitheatre outside City Hall, The Queen's Walk, London. SE1 2AA.
Further events take place throughout the year.

If you would like to thrown some cash in my virtual bucket and sponsor me as a singer at this event, please visit my Just Giving Page  
I am offering any one who donates over £15 (the amount it costs to give one person access to clean water for life in Ghana) a complimentary copy of my album Shiva’s Rain

July Blog - Self Employment - Singing Your Own Song

I was asked recently to write a blog on self-employment. Which, as I am about to explain is somewhat ironic, considering that my life has been more of a sort of somewhat mad and magic carpet ride, however as this person felt that I had something which might be of encouragement to others, I will do my best.

The word employment comes from the Old French emploier - ‘attach, entangle, make use of, appLy, devote’ which in turn derives from from the Latin implicare meaning to  ‘enfold, connect to, involve, be part of.’  It was not until the 1590s that this gained the meaning ‘to hire, engage or make use of.’  So employment involves connecting and devoting our time to some aim, cause, activity, person or organisation.  The awareness of which, means that for me, how and with whom I employ my time needs to be aligned with my own values and purpose in the world.

In this disconnected world, it is easy to be seduced into selling our time for organisations, causes, jobs etc which do not resonate with us.  In Western so-called civilisations we are groomed to be employed and to follow a sensible career path - to get a ‘good education and a proper job’ which usually involves selling 35 hours a week plus overtime to an organisation which has profit making as one of its main objectives.  We do this so we can ‘earn a living’ and have a good answer to the ‘what do you do’ question.  Which is somewhat back to front because we are actually both living and being before any sort of earning or doing or getting busy with stuff kicks off.

Business, interestingly, comes from the Old Northumbrian word bisignes - meaning ‘care, anxiety, occupation’ - which goes someway to explaining why I have always instinctively felt uncomfortable with being considered a ‘business owner’.  I have of course had to create business plans, deal with financial and tax institutions, most of which can be anxiety-inducing, so I continually endeavour to simplify and essentialise my goings-on and to make ethical choices - e.g. banking with the Co-Op etc.

An ‘entrepreneur’ was originally a french term for someone who ‘undertakes or manages’ and was often applied to theatre managers.   My favourite example of entrepreneurship is what I witness on the streets in Istanbul, where when it rains, bread sellers suddenly within minutes become umbrella sellers. I absolutely love this theatrical opportunism. I cannot match it, for I am a far slower and inward creature whose creations are mostly homebrewed and quietly so, often with years of marination. I have, however, been managing events of various types since I started studying theatre at school, which has involved encouraging chaotic groups of artists to agree to some sort of structure that enabled them all to turn up at the right place at the right time wearing the right outfits with the right bells, bows and whistles.  I think that this madness is probably a hangup derived from being the eldest child and so far it has probably cost me more than I’ve ever earned from it in commercial terms.  It has however, given me enormous insight into human behaviour, enabled me to create experiences which were of benefit to my community, (eg co-ordinating a big fundraising concert for WaterAid this year) and taught me how to be incredibly resourceful with shoestrings and gaffa tape.

Which leads me on to the true meaning of richness.  Richness for me is being able to offer something to the world which has value and makes a difference to me and other beings.  Richness is also having time to be able to meditate, dance, hang out with my loved ones, make music, do some haphazard gardening, write, fall asleep whilst attempting to read a book about the science of water and spend time in nature.  I realised many moons ago that I valued my time more than I valued paper and coins and that I was not prepared to sell my time to anyone other than those I felt an alignment of values and purpose with.  Which ruled out pretty much most of the commercial world. So I began serving individuals and organisations who I resonated with instead.

For many years the majority of that service was devoted to those with ‘Special Needs’, which I consider to be a heritage or family dharma.  My grandmother lost her hearing when she was a child and my grandfather was a hearing child of deaf parents who became a parson for the deaf.  I grew up surrounded by people with different abilities and started volunteering in SEN schools in my teens and have worked in various support roles ever since, including my current role giving holistic therapy sessions to adults in residential care.  I often feel that I am being healed by my interaction with incredible beings who experience more challenges every day than many of us might do in a lifetime and yet still smile.  I know one lady who is always laughing.  She cannot see or speak and her family abandoned her years ago, yet she laughs more than anyone else I know.  In this strange world, where people pay to go on laughter workshops, I am paid to spend time with her.  I am grateful for this anomaly.

Along my ‘career path’ there have been many experiences from the sublime to the ridiculous including giving onsite massage in posh offices, washing and massaging the mud off festival feet, interpreting aura photos, reading tarot cards at pissed up parties, giving mass sound baths, performing music at all sorts of weird and wonderful events and supporting people to sing, scream, cry, yell and express themselves in their own unique way.   It could be possibly be described as a ‘practice’ - because, to be sure, there is never any end to the practice of learning about human behaviour. Anything can and does happen. What it actually feels like is hanging out with people in inner space, whilst connecting with energies and techniques from outer space that catalyse some sort of transformative experience for everyone involved.

It would not be honest of me to suggest that this wonderful technicolour journey has been without challenge.  To choose to be self-employed is to step outside much of our cultural conditioning, which is liberating and can also at times be scary and isolating.  Three things have been key for me: 1) maintaining a daily practice and taking responsibility for my own personal process - ‘working on my stuff' 2) cultivating a strong support network of like-minded explorers 3) developing a strong set of personal boundaries and ethics and a sense of humour to match.  

So, of course there have been storms along the way - to be self employed is to face all our fears and resistance which can come in many forms including financial instability which is what scares most people away from taking the step of self-employment.  In a creative lifestyle, money really is a river which has an ebb and a flow and a tide that matches our own inner currents.  The key to healing our fear around money is ultimately to separate our sense of self-worth from the numbers on the bank statement.  Sometimes I have been paid silly sums of money and sometimes none whatsoever.  Which just affirms to me that our current economic system is bonkers and often has no relation to real human values whatsoever.  It is too simplistic to say that we are not attracting money because we have low self esteem - sometimes we are not attracting money because the current economic system is not intelligent enough to include us. 

Society conditions us to feel that we have failed if we are not competing and producing like good little workers in the machine. When we confront this illusion and realise that actually we are still lovable people regardless of our finances, we become more empowered around money and can then see what intelligence and teaching it has for us.  Money has taught me many a time to acknowledge that there is a bigger game plan than my daily consciousness can comprehend  - which means that when I need to rest and am not acknowledging it, work will drop off and then reappear when I am stronger. A massive miscalculated tax bill meant I had to move house one year, which turned out to be a life changing experience - and of course the tax office gave me a rebate the following year.  All of these experiences have strengthened me immensely and taught me to trust in the innate intelligence of everything that happens in my life, regardless of how bizarre it may appear.

So for me self-employment is the choice to connect and devote my energies and my time to that which richly inspires, challenges and stretches me. For then, life really is singing my own song and allowing myself to be transported and transformed by the experience of it.  That’s for now, anyway, for the song is always changing, so I am just listening for the next harmony on the breeze.

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I am looking forward to a summer of sonic adventures - my magic carpet takes me to the following places - please do come and bring your magic and sparkle with us!

Garden of Roses - Super Sparkly Birthday Party - 24th July at InSpiral

Tribal Earth - 16th-19th August

Strummer of Love - 17th-19th August

Naked Dragon Alchemy of Sound Retreat - 30th August-2nd Sept

Sing For Water

I will be singing as part of a choir of 800 singers at the Thames Festival on 9th September.

This event raises funds for WaterAid’s life-saving projects in Ghana.

It only costs £15 to give one person access to clean water for life.

EVERY DONATION OF £15 + RECEIVES A FREE COPY OF MY ALBUM SHIVA’S RAIN

Please CLICK HERE to make a donation

Thank you so much for listening and singing with me!

Wishing you a super sonic summer

Love and rose blossoms