For a while now I’ve been wanting to write about non-photography related things. Spirituality, energy, consciousness, psychic phenomenon, psychology and all things soul related. I thought about starting an entirely separate website but being creative is linked to many of these areas for me, so I decided to simply make a new section here instead called Soul & Spirit.

I’ve been on a spiritual quest since I was a child. My Dad was an atheist but my Mum was Christian and my early years were spent attending Church services and Sunday school every weekend. There was such peace to be found in Church and I loved the traditional hymns, moral guidance and sense of belonging to a shared community.

By the time I was a teenager I was toying very strongly with the idea of becoming a Nun. I wanted to do charitable work in the community and, coming from a chaotic home, was attracted to the routine and order of monastic life.

However, I took Theology as one of my A levels and it changed everything. My teacher made me question religion. We took a deep dive into the Bible and other religious scriptures, and when I looked at them objectively the dogma didn’t sit well with me. They are, without exception, patriarchal, often contain horrendous sexism and misogyny and I found the concepts regarding the origin of life on earth, not to mention Heaven, Hell and Sin bizarre. The violence in texts like the Qur’an and Old Testament are abhorrent to me.

In my 20s I was drawn to Buddhism, which fit more with my love for animals and introduced the idea of re-incarnation and meditation. To this day it’s probably the religion I align with most though the emphasis on ‘suffering’ and the idea of negative karma and endless Samsara leaves me cold. It is also still inherently misogynistic.

Pagan traditions draw me, with their emphasis on the natural world, nature, the seasons, divine energy and both the male God and the female Goddess though it’s so diverse and scattered that it doesn’t hold enough central principles for me personally.

In my 50s I’ve learned a lot about who I authentically am and have now decided to just follow my own path, creating a spiritual life which aligns with my core values and principles and is grounded in divine energy rather than dogma. I’ve also discovered huge parts of the puzzle which make me who I am, like being a Highly Sensitive Person and having mirror-pain synaesthesia, and find psychology fascinating so will delve more into that here. I’m simply sharing my thoughts and experiences and I hope you find something which resonates 🙏🏻

I am going to keep my Photography blog and my Soul & Spirit blog separate but I’m still trying to work out how to create a separate ‘Subscribe’ button for the new blog. Haven’t had a reply from my website admin as yet, so for now if you subscribe to my photography blog you will also be alerted to new Soul & Spirit blog posts – feel free to ignore these if they’re not your cup of tea. As both blogs are separate I’ve had to change the url for my Photography blog, so if you have that book marked please refresh.