Letting the light in
Where does the light get in? Where in your busy daily life do you let in time for you to grow and thrive and bloom? Are you planning some summer time space for you to find your creative flow and lean in to life’s joys?
It has been a slow spring and a very wet one but at time of writing the sun is out and the sandals are on! It feels like time to kick back a little and get off the task driven hamster wheel and set aside the to-do list, at least sometimes!
(Tough Mary’s Bakehouse - Nottingham)
I like having the opportunity to meander in the summer and be open to new things. I try not to have a plan so that the light can get in, so that the new can inspire me. This can start off with a wander around an art gallery or a bookshop or a conversation. I make a connection, join the dots and then the next thing there’s a series of ideas and I have gone down the rabbit hole and become OBSESSED with something new. Opening my mind to this process means that the same can occur with my creativity - taking stepping stones until I can see the links and then jump in and get totally absorbed.
My current rabbit hole is all things Danish! A trip to the Danish Homestore in Nottingham reminded me that there’s a book called ‘My Year of Living Danishly’ by Helen Russell. I bought it and spent a very content weekend diving in to her experience of living in Denmark; arts, food, social and political policy. I read about ‘hygge’ and put some candles out despite it being summer! I found her insights into community and social cohesion and support really hopeful (especially as we approach a general election here in the UK).
Once sparked I seemed to see inspiration from Denmark everywhere - I noticed Scandi lighting and fabric and my eyes pricked at seeing some foraged food presented beautifully in the NOMA style. I picked up a magazine and discovered an article about the Skagen Painters of Jutland, I had never heard of this artist colony and may well have flicked past if I hadn’t been having a Danish festival. These artists living on a remote island wanted:
“to return to nature, to the naive, the original, the uncomplicated”.
That seems the perfect manifesto for my summer.
Where will this lead me? Who knows but I feel invigorated, and of course would love to go to Copenhagan but if all I do is get myself to a fancy bakery for a Danish pastry I will be out there waiting for synchronicity to strike and living with my eyes wide open - and that is the way to let in the light.