LeAnn Phelan is a singer music industry professional based in Nashville, LeAnn offers an insight into her journey through creativity. She helps creatives be seen, heard and encouraged.
They chat about the value of travelling alone and how they love to explore, meet new people and the 'power' of independence. It opens up a whole new world of growth and possibilities.
It's interesting to hear how both Margaret and LeAnn explore as many different types of creativity as possible and how they find it freeing. They examine how to balance the need to earn and the art itself.
A lovely calming, fascinating and uplifting chat.
You can find LeAnn here:
https://leannphelan.com/
https://lpcreative.samcart.com/products/lp-creative-therapy-launch-dec-2023
Sign up to the next Creative Light Festival here:
https://creative-light.co.uk/
Sign up to my newsletter to hear first about new retreats:
Follow me on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/margaretsoraya/
Join my online Creative Haven community :
https://creative-haven.newzenler.com
LeAnn Phelan is a singer music industry professional based in Nashville, LeAnn offers an insight into her journey through creativity. She helps creatives be seen, heard and encouraged.
They chat about the value of travelling alone and how they love to explore, meet new people and the 'power' of independence. It opens up a whole new world of growth and possibilities.
It's interesting to hear how both Margaret and LeAnn explore as many different types of creativity as possible and how they find it freeing. They examine how to balance the need to earn and the art itself.
A lovely calming, fascinating and uplifting chat.
You can find LeAnn here:
https://leannphelan.com/
https://lpcreative.samcart.com/products/lp-creative-therapy-launch-dec-2023
Sign up to the next Creative Light Festival here:
https://creative-light.co.uk/
Sign up to my newsletter to hear first about new retreats:
Follow me on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/margaretsoraya/
Join my online Creative Haven community :
https://creative-haven.newzenler.com
This week I'm speaking to Leanne Phelan and she's coming all the way from America Now. I met Leanne it must have been like three years ago now on a course with Cathy Heller, so it was an online course. We've never met in person, but we've stayed in touch and it's just really nice to catch up now. So we're going to start with just hearing a little bit from you about what you do in life and what your business looks like and what your life looks like.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's so nice. I have to say before I do that I am such a big fan of your work. We were in this huge class together I think there were maybe 300 people and we were never in a pod. But I was friends with a musician that was in the class, will, and he started doing some recordings for you. So that's how I started seeing your photography, and people tell me a lot that my voice is calming, and so I really was drawn into your work and I was like, wow, there's another person with a really calming voice and she's so powerful. And it was, I don't know. I've just I've been following you since then.
Speaker 2:I actually started out as a singer and I that's all that I thought I would do, and I ended up being a background singer at the pinnacle in my career for an artist named Steve Winwood, who's kind of a legendary UK artist. That's amazing. So I got to tour the world with Steve and then I've felt the uncertainty of how to get another great background singing job and so I didn't mean to do this. But I live in Nashville and I kind of followed what I now know was my intuition and I stumbled into a publishing company where there were songwriters writing songs and I was, you know, answering the phone, making the coffee, taking the trash out, but I could hear these amazing songwriters come in every day and then I just started understanding that part of the business and that was such a great home for me. I've worked with songwriters for the last 25 years in various ways, whether it was at a record label publishing company or at one point I had a job as kind of like a preliminary judge on American Idol and I was also managing songwriters and producers. So that was pretty interesting. And then I co-headed a company called ASCAP in Nashville, the creative team. That's just where you're around all the songwriters and if they're not with ASCAP, you want them to be. So you're, you know whether they're with your company or not. You're around them, helping develop them, seeing them in the very early stages and kind of figuring out who you think will work and get to those next levels and figuring out what they need and and how to help them.
Speaker 2:And and that piece led into what happened during COVID when I met you in 2020. I had started managing artists there weren't shows to commission and I thought about that work that I did at ASCAP and I had a lot of groups and mentor groups for female artists, or I put together something called the GPS project, which was a development program for songwriters, and they ended up getting signed out of that program. So they still do that today at ASCAP. So it's it has been very successful. And just thinking about you know what do I love to do and and it was basically putting like-minded people together and helping develop them, and so that's what I started during COVID, in workshops, private sessions and courses and you know I don't know about you, margaret, I feel like you do a lot of this kind of work.
Speaker 2:But I just had all this time to think, when I really got down to the bottom line of why did I end up doing all this and working with these writers and how is it that I help them develop? And it goes all the way back to the person that helped me when I was nine years old with encourage, and I never put those things together. I was actually in another class with a woman named Patrice Washington, just trying to learn how to be a better speaker and intro myself, and we had to think of this transformational moment and that was it like. Really quickly, I was on stage at this little vocal studio, my teacher pointed me out in front of the other kids and it was the first time I had been on the mic alone and I wasn't even a singer until that moment. And when he said I heard your part, you did a good job and and so I don't know. I think I look at songwriters and and don't count anyone out, because I could have easily been counted out.
Speaker 1:So this idea of encouraging people, then that's that's where it is. Then I think that's maybe where we're very, very similar is that we both encourage genuinely encourage people like it's come from a genuine place of wanting other people to to do well it doesn't really matter.
Speaker 1:You know, the creativity encompasses all sorts of things, doesn't it? Photography and art and music I'm particularly interested in because I think it's it's so expressive, and my two sons are musical, so they're into the music world, so I always try to understand a little bit more. But I think it's so powerful songwriting so powerful, isn't it so? Coming coming to that, I suppose the connection that we have is that idea of of encouraging other people. That's what I'm seeing, anyway.
Speaker 2:I listen to your podcast a lot and follow you on Instagram and I see that you know the other day you were talking about a young girl that just you know she had her own way of shooting. I love that you recognize that she had a different way of play you talked about. At one point she had her camera on the ground, like you know. It was just a whole different thing and you loved seeing that expression in her. And really, if okay, I think in all creativity and that includes entrepreneurship, you know, creating a product, creating a painting, a photograph, a song, a short story and newsletter, which I love, writing shorter things like that but I think there's a through line in all of it and I think when you're first learning or maybe there's some people that don't do this, but a lot of people when they're learning, they're copying, comparing, oh, this is working and I like that and I'm going to try to sing like that.
Speaker 2:I had to sing an Aretha Franklin song five times a day one summer at a theme park. I would listen to that recording. It was respect of all songs. I don't think anyone can emulate Aretha Franklin and I tried so hard and I just couldn't do it and I think that's the journey.
Speaker 2:Like you try to shoot a photograph, like Margaret, are you trying to write a song, like I'm gonna say, alan Shamblin people might not know who he is, but he co-wrote I can't make you love me with the great migraine, but you want to write a timeless song like that. And finally, after all these guests coming on, I see the pattern you get frustrated and you just say I'm like I'm gonna write what I wanted to in the first place, I'm gonna write what I liked in the first place. But what happens is by emulating all these people, you kind of learn the craft. You know you learn the craft and then you bring your voice to it. You finally get the courage to bring your voice and I think that's where most people find their version of success creatively.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it does. I'm running like a three month thing in monthly. We have a monthly thing, a three month course. Finding your voice in my membership program.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, so we're sort of halfway through it just now, and it's something that I've taught before, actually, but I think I'm always. I always wanted to explore more with other people. But what you're saying absolutely concurs with my thoughts about and it's such a big topic, isn't it? Doesn't everybody want to do that? You want to be your own, an expression of your own self, don't you? You can't, as you say. You can't be so in photographer speak, I suppose we can't be Charlie Wait or whoever you, whoever images you love, you can't be that person because you want that person. But in order to get to that place of finding your own thing, you have this learning process, don't you? So therefore, looking and observing and watching other artists is a way, is a way through, but it's not the end goal, is it? But I love the way that you said it lets you learn your craft.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, you know, one thing that's really helpful for songwriters is to like take the songs you like and physically just write down the lyric, like it. You know you get inside of it a little bit more, definitely not saying copy that, but like just figuring out as you're writing. Oh they, you know, did this inner rhyme scheme or it's just a cadence to to the song that you might not otherwise know, and it's all like pouring into you and you know. That's another thing that I talk about a lot and I'm interested if you see this for yourself as well. But I know for me, like I've done all these different things you know singing, touring and art and label publishing, writer management, artist management, all these workshops and and even with with other little things you know, taking a painting class, photography, writing class, and so now with what I'm doing currently, if I take that aerial view of all of these things, I see how all these things before affect what I do in the workshops or being able to talk to you and just really talk about creativity from all these different angles. I think my point with that is it if you're a creative person or you want to try to be more creative and maybe you're not being creative because you're scared, because you're not at the caliber of somebody you respect. It doesn't matter, you know it's not what's important to you.
Speaker 2:I have a photograph right here that I took on my iPhone, that I framed because it means something very dear to me. It's actually a photograph I took in West Tennessee. My mother passed away a year ago and it was at 2.50 am in the morning and as the sun was coming up, I just drove in my hometown and there was this field and this little bit of mist coming through and I pulled over and took pictures. And so to me, that is success for me as a photographer, and I don't shoot every day. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:I just saw an article about Taylor Swift. She's going to do a billion dollars on her tour. This one thinks that it could probably be more, you know. And then it talked about the money that she's made for other people just by showing up, like, if that's your goal, you might end up frustrated. You know that is the top of the peak. But if you're creating because it makes you happy, you know that's a great reason to create. That's why I would come to your workshop. You know it's not for me to have a gallery show. It's for me to be outside and be around amazing people and see the landscape in a different way and hopefully go swimming. It's just to make me happy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that idea. I suppose that idea of success is different, isn't it, to everybody. I think I feel at the moment, currently, where I am, I feel extremely successful because I'm living this life. That's really in tune with who I am and it's very authentic and it's just me and it goes against a lot of the traditional ways that we see success. So, you know, going on to not that I would be singing on to, but maybe going on, yeah, something like that, that's very high profile. You know it's so far we've moved from that, but for me, success, success is living like this and being creative.
Speaker 1:Living a creative life is probably at the top of my list of what success means, but also living, being outdoors all the time and being in nature and finding that real happiness. So maybe that's what you're saying there. I think that's what I'm getting from. That is that you know we need to reframe that. But why we're doing things, why we're creating, is it because we want to have these enormous shows that tour around the world, or is it because we simply want to find that contentment and that space of you?
Speaker 1:Know what you were saying about the photograph that you took. That's hugely important to release those emotions or to put those emotions somewhere in creativity. It's an outlet, isn't it? So I totally agree with you on that. I think that's a really, really valuable point for a lot of people, and it runs through into this idea of when people come to do photography. I'm a great believer that you don't need a camera, even under your phone, if you know that's what you want to do. The phone is a great tool. It's a fantastic tool for taking photographs, and we don't need to be seen to have this amazing kit to be great photographers, because the iPhone is just as good. So I'm sure some people would disagree with that.
Speaker 2:It's. You know, I've had my camera out and I only have two lenses and you know I'll see something, and then I don't know the equipment well, so I'm like, oh, maybe I should change to this. You know all the settings, so it's just easier and quicker with the iPhone. But I, I so appreciate a beautiful photograph and you know, I think I emailed you about this you took some photographs with you. In the photograph and you were in this really beautiful dress and you're kind of in the water and for some reason well, I know what the reason is, but I've gravitated towards pictures of just really independent, free women, like I had this old photograph of this woman. I don't even know where I got it, but it's black and white, it's got to be from like 1920 or something and it just looks like she's traveling alone. And that's something that I do frequently and love it.
Speaker 2:And I have so many people say oh, you went there by yourself, were you scared or were you? And when I visited the Kailin place, I was traveling alone. I met so many incredible people and I'm always kind of shocked that people some people, don't even like to have a meal by themselves. You know, I just think you know, anytime you add another person, it's just like with you and I talking. If we had another person here, we would have a great conversation, but it would be different. And so traveling alone, I think it really forces me to be extremely present, because you're, you know, you are having to figure out everything, and it just seems like when I'm doing that, if I do need something, whoever I ask is the right person Like the first time, like, oh, excuse me, do you know where it's? Oh, it's you know, it's it. I love that, that flow of like really being in the moment, and there's no better time to do that than when you're traveling alone and exploring like that.
Speaker 1:It's wonderful, I think it's a really, really good point that, because it would be nice to encourage other women to travel alone, because I think it's something that maybe not everybody does. I think more and more people will be doing it now, but it allows this sort of openness, doesn't it? You're open to meeting new people, but also, I think, to do it you have to sort of sit very comfortably with yourself, so you have this self awareness and this knowledge that you can face yourself.
Speaker 1:almost it's like that, that thing of that. One of the most uncomfortable things that we can do these days is to sit in silence for 30 minutes and, amazingly enough, so many people can't do that Now. I love doing that, I think. I need quite a lot of time. I need a lot of downtime. I need a lot of time alone, and traveling alone is one of those things. I don't know. It just makes you feel powerful.
Speaker 2:I was going to say that there's a power in it. That is exactly the word. You know, and I don't think maybe a lot of people and you can speak to this. I don't have children. I have a lot of nieces and an FU, but I'm used to kind of doing what I want. You know, I think a lot of people aren't used to that, but that's one of the most fun things about just going, like whatever you want to do, you know you can sit and watch the sunset or whatever story you want to see, whatever rock you want to climb, you know. It's just, it does feel free and powerful and maybe that is why I like those pictures that represent, you know, women traveling independently, doing things independently.
Speaker 1:I think it could be and I think you right now, that I think back to them. I did it as like a little series for those of us, a little project, but then I carried on doing it when I was, when I was in Harris, because I felt like that felt more like home. I'm glad you brought that up because I think I might carry that on, because it did feel very strong and I felt I really, really enjoyed to enjoy doing them. There was something about the connection with the landscape and also something a lot of people shy away from photographing themselves because, well, they don't like.
Speaker 1:They don't like the look of themselves or whatever it's you know not many people. I photograph a lot of portraits and whatnot, and not many people come to me and say I love getting photographed. You know, most people have things about themselves that like oh, please, you know, I'm a bit worried about this.
Speaker 1:So, to put, yourself in front of the camera. It's quite, it's quite a good thing to do, and I think what's running through my head here is that all the things you're talking about you're doing, all the things that allow growth and they allow creativity to come through, definitely because I can see you when you're saying I'm going to go and travel alone and I'm going to go to this place, and when you were, you were wanting to come to one of the retreats but, to do that, to do that and to come on a retreat by yourself.
Speaker 1:It opens up this world of possibilities because the other people there, usually other women that traveling alone, are so full of these, beautiful, usually creative and and powerful, and then you bring them together in this space and then these friendships are made and that is just a great thing, and in so much so that I do that you know, I tend to do one once a year. I'll take something where I'm alone, but I'll meet other people, because, as much as I like being alone, I think that the power of connection with the right type of people and the right type of people go on retreats for me.
Speaker 1:It's just incredible and it opens up a whole new world.
Speaker 2:It really does May 2022. And I'm laughing because this was such a fluke that I was even there because I was on this email list for Sherry Salada and this, this email, you know mass email came out go to Tuscany with Sherry and I was just like scrolling through my email and I was like I'm in. I wrote back to the email, I'm in. So I ended up going on that trip, traveled alone there, and then I met 18 or 20 women Again, like you say, like the same, like like mind, different not from from all different parts of the world, but just with that same energy of seeking and, you know, wanting to go deeper. And and this retreat was part workshop, part experiencing beautiful things in Tuscany and it was amazing and I did make some lifelong friends there and actually different parts of that group. We've already done two other trips together. We went to New York doing Thanksgiving last year and we went to Punta Cana in May and it's just been, you know, beautiful friendships, beautiful things to get together and talk about and everybody you know is so supportive and not not holding yourself back to try something creative.
Speaker 2:Early on, when I was doing private sessions on zoom, I think it actually was a woman from our, from our class in 2020. And she very hesitantly booked a session with me and she wrote poems and she you know, we just talked about her process and everything and so she read me. One of the points that she wrote in this particular one was for her daughter, who had been through a divorce. And as this woman was reading the poem, she actually choked up in the middle of it, you know, and got emotional. And so it's the same. The same thing happens in songs, like if there's something real in there. I think that is the reason that they connect, and you may not know exactly what it is or what happened, but there's a emotion there that can be universal. So when she did that and she doesn't see herself, you know that's part of what you and I do, like we're showing people what we see, and so I wanted her to see how powerful her poem was. So I asked her to wait and I went in another room.
Speaker 2:I have a poem framed that this guy on the street in Asheville, north Carolina, just had a little sign up, like you know, you could pay him whatever and he would write a poem for you. So I gave him the topic of red birds. He wrote this gorgeous poem. I framed it. It's right outside of my bedroom. So I got the poem and held it up in this beautiful frame and I said this is what your work means to somebody. You could just write poems to particular people and that could be such a success. Like that's so meaningful. I spent $100 putting this up where I could see it every day. You know this happened three years ago, but I just posted about it saying you know, those poems you write, keep writing them because sometimes we frame them and when I look at them every day, you know be important to me.
Speaker 1:And I think some people don't always see how the amazing work that they are doing, or they don't give themselves credit for it or they go oh, I've just done this and it's like incredible. So it's nice to have somebody to point out how good they are to them and that if that's us, then so be it. You know, but that that comes back to that power of encouragement, doesn't it? Because otherwise they might have just put it away and God, I'm not done anything with it, whereas it's nice for people to understand when they're doing some, some great work creatively.
Speaker 2:Well, even David Lynch said if you're just doing a sketch after after your work day and you work on it and you sit back and you like it, and that makes you a happier person and you can go into your job the next day, just having done something fun the night before that you enjoyed, I mean, I think almost gets, you know, gets over into the mental wellness space, like what? What helps you feel better, you know, and definitely for you, being outside, being creative outside, you know, wow, you know, soaking in the vitamins from the sun and just feeling the water and it's just, it's so nourishing in so many ways.
Speaker 1:It leads you there, doesn't it? A lot of people have been coming to visit lately and they've said, oh wow, you've got such a suntan. Where have you been? And actually I did get to Italy in June, but it wasn't. It wasn't sunny, and sometimes come from from being out every single day that's been sunny. So I made a little vow to myself we don't get as much sun as maybe you do. If it's sunny, I'm going to be outside and I'm not going to be at the computer this summer. And I've done it. So literally being outside every time is sunny and it's been amazing because it's just good for me.
Speaker 1:You know, and knowing what's good for you is it's really important and that that sort of wellness overlaps the creativity, because I've also known that being creative, whatever form, it, is good for me. So I wanted to actually just bring up something that you said earlier because you might have a little insight into this, because it's something I'm exploring at the moment and it's that idea of being creative in different forms. So I think you said it. You turn around and you realize that it's been the structure it's built up the the past to where we are now. I understand what you're saying there and I sort of feel that about my photography.
Speaker 1:My photography has been such a big part of my life for 20, 25 years, maybe longer. I'm now exploring. I'm not going to stop photography, I'm always going to be a photographer, but I'm exploring painting and I'm exploring writing. Writing is a different thing altogether. That's proving difficult, but the painting, the painting is like. It's almost like. All those years of the photography has gifted me the ability to just sort of go in and know what I'm doing, not the craft still got to learn the craft but everything behind it and all the stories and the reasons and everything. I'm now going into painting and it's wonderful to expand that where maybe sometimes people feel that they're just moving from thing to thing, but I don't. I think it's great to do everything.
Speaker 2:I 1000% think it's great, and just hearing you talk, I mean think about one of the best books that I actually listened to it on Audible and I recommend listening to it because Bono is the narrator of his own book and it is so beautiful. His writing is so beautiful and some people may think writing songs and writing a book are like, oh, everybody could do it. No, I don't think that you could, but I think his book is amazing. So that's a different form of art, you know for him, and I think there are a lot of people that like to just express their creativity in a lot of different ways. I too, I love to write and that's the most challenging thing for me. I think that's why I will write you know, my newsletters or blogs and try to like form, a complete idea. I overwrite and I think it's hard to edit yourself in those situations. I think painting is a little more freeing Because, now that you're saying that, I did see a painting that you posted on your Instagram that was kind of more of an abstract and that feels very free to me. You know, I've gotten into oil painting as well. When I paint, I have no idea what I'm doing, even when you know if there's like a steel thing, if I'm in a class and you're supposed to do this exact thing, I've done an okay job of it, and then I'm like I don't know how I even did that. You know, it's still the solucive thing, but it's just any form of being creative is interesting to me. You know, I would try just about anything. I would try to sew if I had an opportunity. You know, I think it could just enhance you.
Speaker 2:There was an artist that had kind of you know, burnt out, was just taking a break stepping back from it, and what I remember of the story is his kid had a bike and she wanted a different color bike or something. So he painted it and kind of decorated it or whatever. So she had this really cool, unique bike. And then so a couple other kids came up and they were like, hey, can you paint my bike? And so he ended up like just painting all these bikes for these kids. That I'm so sorry. I don't remember where I heard that, but I thought that was so cool.
Speaker 2:And there's another lesson in that you never know what's going to open up for you in your creativity, and so I think you know for me. That's what I'm following right now. I'm just kind of going down this workshop path and little speaking and a little, this little that, like I know deep down that these are the things I'm supposed to be doing, and part of part of life is uncertainty. Definitely part of being a creative is uncertainty. This, this is a conversation that nobody talks about, and I wonder what you think about this. Inevitably we can be creative and do all of these fun things, but we do have to, you know, maybe buy a new computer and we have to keep the lights on. You know there is a commerce aspect to this and I think that trips a lot of people up. You know, elizabeth Gilbert said in her books and seminars she's not saying go quit your job and do this. She's she's kind of more of like integrate this into your life and make it work for you. How do you reconcile the commerce of your creative essence?
Speaker 1:It's something that not many people talk about. I spoke to Eric Hemion and he is a musician. It was a conversation around a little bit of touching on this how do you balance that the need to earn and the art? So it's something that's probably the first time I've spoken to anybody about that, but I, I'm all, I'm all for like reality. You know, life is real, isn't it? And sometimes when we hear a lot of these creative conversations, it's it's very much avoiding that, that side of things. But there's a massive gap in that, isn't there? But people don't want to speak about that, but I'm quite happy to.
Speaker 1:So my photography was born. The business was born out the need to earn. So I mean it sustained us whilst the kids were growing up. I had two boys and I was supporting them myself. So I was supporting these, these children who ate a lot over the years and with lots of shoes. I supported them, for you know well they've gone now, so I supported them through the photography for so many years. That it is. It's always a balance.
Speaker 1:I've got a deep love for photography and creativity and it started to become a bit more and needed to have more of that creative side. The weddings were the supporting parts, they were the day job almost, and that's what wore me down. After, you know, after 15 years of that, it started to wear down and I needed more outlet. So I went into landscape photography and this is where my landscape business grew from, actually from a deep love of wanting to photograph the landscape. And all the while I was doing it just for myself. And then I thought, well, okay, I'll create a business from it. And people would say, actually, if you create a business from it, you're not going to love it so much. And that's nonsense, because people say, a lot of things don't know and a lot of things you just got to. You just got to go with your intuition, you've got to go with your gut. And it's like, well, actually I'm going to do this.
Speaker 1:I do think that now I'm needing more and I wonder, I wonder whether it's my nature, because I'm noticing this about myself I kind of master something and then I need to learn something else and I'll carry on doing the thing that I've mastered because I love it, but I have this need, this sort of urge to, yeah, to learn a new craft, to keep fresh and to keep creative. So I'm just, you know, thinking through this idea of this, the balance at the moment now is that I've continued and obviously my business is a massive part. That's really important and I've got all these things going on. The workshops and the retreats are forming and evolving now, and then I created the festival, which was a new thing, because that was a challenge. It was like that's a challenge, I can do that, and then I go on to the next thing and I'll keep those things going and I'll just build and build. So it's interesting. I don't know whether that answered a question.
Speaker 2:It did. I think you know I have friends that are really talented at things, and it's not for everybody to try to make a living from their creativity. And some people do think, oh, this is my hobby, I don't want to turn it into something I have to do. I don't know where that came from either, because I think that sounds like a beautiful life to me. You know, turn your hobby into your main thing and make a living from it.
Speaker 2:You made a business out of something that you love to do and then that need to maybe express yourself a little bit different way, without the confines of that. You know, you're just a truly creative person and that's kind of what you did. But it is interesting to me that when you did it for yourself, it opened up in a new way and I'm kind of seeing that too, like I would say I've created a business for myself with something that I really enjoyed, which is, you know, I looked at my career and thought, oh, all these groups that I worked with and ask have been helping people in this way, something that I really loved. And I had a desire to do a creative retreat. My mother actually reminded me of that. Like, what about that idea? But I thought I had to buy land and build these little cabins and have a thing. So it was just a far off dream because that would take a lot of money. But during COVID I could just do that on Zoom and meet people from around the world. I'm still loving that, but that is changing and morphing and growing into more. So I think you know, I think when you do start, you know planting the flag like okay, I'm doing this thing and this is what it's worth. And that's that's the hard part, I think, for a lot of people charging for, for something that you've always loved to do or that you, you know, when it's one on one, like, okay, you pay me for, you know, an hour session, but then you forget, like, oh, I've had my entire life in the field of music and I've had, you know, I have all these different perspectives that can help you, I think, if you can get past that and start in in a way that makes sense and then be open to the pivot of that, my friend Patrice Washington.
Speaker 2:Then I took that class from this. She says purpose evolves and I would love that so much. And then when I apply that to my world, my passion has evolved. You know, my passion was for singing, then it was for being a publisher and helping songwriters and now it's like being this workshop leader and speaking and doing, like doing a podcast with you.
Speaker 2:So it's almost like a full circle thing, because I was in front of the camera, that I was way behind the camera, like when you're a manager and you're all this like you, or I basically felt like a ninja, like I would dress in black and just kind of be, try to be out of sight on a red carpet with an artist or something, while there, you know, focus is all on someone else's career. And then now it's kind of coming full circle where you're kind of back with, you know, some of the talents and desires you might have had starting out. Oh, that's kind of interesting. You know, think about who were you in the beginning. What did you like when you were six years old? You know who were you. Who were you at six, margaret?
Speaker 1:Who was I at six? Oh yeah, well, I know, because I've done a lot of exploration on this and I think it's really, really important for people to do this, to go back to that, that that child, and to go. What did you love doing? And the thing for me was the beaches in Holland where I was on holiday every year, to these Dutch beaches where my gran lived. My gran lived on the coast, and that freedom, that freedom, that happiness being by the waves and sea, that just informed my whole life. The whole life has come from that, that's amazing, isn't it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it took me a while to realize that when I was 45. I was like, how did it take me so long to find that connection? But if you can find that connection and then everything slots into place, and then coming back to live here now where I am in Harris by the sea, that's the sort of whole circle for me. That's why I feel so content and successful, I suppose yeah, which is interesting.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, I love that. That sounds like a movie. You know, being six years old on the beaches of Holland, I had this epiphany during COVID, because I was one of the people that, like I loved being here in my house and I was not bored at all Like we were doing that club. I was doing all this creative stuff. And so I think back as a kid I had brothers but I could play by myself, I journaled, I, you know, practiced singing with just a little tape recorder in the basement. I didn't realize what an introvert I was. Yeah, it's just this full circle. It's not as romantic and dreamy as the beaches of Holland. I don't want to be back in a dark basement with a tape recorder. It's the feeling the creative, like you know being inside my own head, like trying to express myself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so important to know yourself like that, though, as you've said, I can just picture that what everything you said about yourself? There you're doing it now, aren't you? You're living that, and actually you can almost go back to that time and go a little bit deeper. This is quite interesting. I've just come up with this. I'll tell you what I'm thinking. If you were back to that time, what else were you doing? What were the other things that you were doing? And then I because I was thinking there, the beaches of Holland, yeah, but also when I got back at night, I'd sit drawing and painting, and that's what I'd be doing all the time. So maybe, if you could, you know the other things. It doesn't have to be one thing, does it, it can be all of those things. When you set those points for yourself, you could. I wonder if you could go back and then you go well, that's it, that's what's going to fit. Easy way of doing it, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and another thing that I did as a kid. It's like I would just see something that I wanted to do and I would just hit the mark. You know what I mean? I just, I just just made it happen. So that's kind of you.
Speaker 1:now I wonder if everybody who's listening can can sort of do that. You know it's not an easy thing to do, but I think that most people can. You know you can look back and you'll find something that informs the way that you're living to this day and hopefully because I know it isn't always as easy or as happy as we've just outlined it but hopefully there'll be some joy that you had when you were you was more some interest that you had or something that you always did. It doesn't have to be happiness, but it could be like, I don't know, maybe you had an interest in tractors and now you you want to become an engineer.
Speaker 1:That's just just. For example, there's usually something that you you have an interest when you're a child and it comes or it wants to come out when you're a lot older. I mean, I'm not a psychologist or qualified in any way. This is just observation of the years of teaching people.
Speaker 2:Well, okay, can I add one more thing? It it might be something that you got dismissed, you know. Maybe you attempted that and you were made fun of or something like that and so you just dropped it. That happened to me with painting. It was something I thought I could do and my mom painted and I got got into her paints and I thought I'm just going to drop. You know, paint a flower and the stem of the flower just started expanding and expanding and it looked more like a tree trunk and it was not good.
Speaker 2:And I had a friend come in that the painting was still up there and the friend came over and I said I painted that and at the time I was like maybe 20. And and he said, how old were you? And it was so embarrassing to me that I never painted again until a few years ago, for for my birthday, I thought I do want to paint, I'm going to take a class, I want to paint another class and I got in this class and I did get encouraged and then now you know I have tons of paintings and I enjoy that. So so if you are listening and you're thinking back, maybe there was a thing that you attempted that you wanted to do that.
Speaker 2:Somebody said that's terrible, but if that desire was, was there and it's still intrigued you, I would encourage you to pick it up again because you could get a lot of joy out of it. You know, and for me, like paintings not something that I, you know selling, or so I'm sold one painting and it cost me more to ship it than it, you know. Then I got paid for it and so you know, it's not for that reason, it's just I really enjoy it and it may lead you to something else If you, if you try that thing that you are interested in.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:I think that those two things, just to link those two things together, I think that you're absolutely right. There's often a time where we've got this intuitive, this instinct when we're children that this is what we love, I'm just gonna love, and we're gonna do this and I love doing it and actually that's all I want to do. And this instinct in us is beating out of us at some point, and that's usually by I don't like to say teachers, because teachers can be wonderful, it can go either way, but peers or teachers or parents, it could be. It could be just a slight comment that just really hurts us. But or it could be just like society's norms, that kind of you know, as we get older, it's not what you do and it doesn't fit in anymore. It gets beaten out of us and then usually when we get to round about 35, we start to go hang on a minute. No, actually, actually I didn't need to be listening to all of this and you managed to to override it somehow. Hopefully you do, because otherwise it's just, it's just a shame it lives there. It's just a little bit of a shock, but, you know, kind of repressed.
Speaker 1:But I think that I remember somebody saying that they've realized that spent the life on learning their intuition. So that's quite interesting, isn't it? So those two things go hand in hand and same for me. The same thing happened for me with painting, same thing happened with me for photography. So I had a good 10 gap in photography. I've had quite a lot more years not going to count them gap in art, in painting, so I'm only just coming back to it now and I'm nearly 50 now. So I think it's really good to consider those things, for people to think about those things, think about those things that they feel like intuitively want to do. Think about things why they're not and, yeah, work through it and then realize actually, just just do it. If you want to do it and it feels right, just do it.
Speaker 2:People now can, can find role models so easily online and we didn't have that as much, you know, growing up pre Internet. And then, thank goodness, we came into our lives, you know, relatively early, but not, not, not as a kid. You know, and I think that's why I'm there are more kids and that you know, want to be musicians and songwriters, and you know because, because they can see all that on YouTube. But you know, it's funny, while we were talking, I have all these journals and stuff around me and I always have a security blanket of a journal, like in case I need to write something down. But this kind of works for a conversation. This, this just says quit waiting for permission. So that's kind of you know, put a little bookend on that topic quit, quit waiting for permission, just go do it.
Speaker 1:I love it. That's brilliant. Oh well, end the conversation. It's just been lovely to catch up with you and I'm sure we'll catch up again. That's the point, but thank you. Thank you for joining me.
Speaker 2:I would love that so much, and this has been just incredible. Thank you.