New year, new you. Big goals. Fast starts. Immediate momentum.

And yet, when I look out the window, the world tells a different story. The trees are bare. The air is cold. The light returns slowly, almost shyly. Nothing in nature is rushing.

Energetically, this matters.

We mark 1 January as a beginning, but astrologically and seasonally, it’s more of a threshold than a starting gun. Winter is still doing its quiet work. The nervous system is still recalibrating. The body is still asking for rest, slowness, and consolidation.

If you’ve felt resistant to “bursting into action” this month, you’re not behind.

You’re aligned.

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The year hasn’t fully turned yet

January was never meant to be a moment to leap into fast-paced change. We’re not supposed to be switching gears right now and running out to the gym to start a “New Year, New You” training plan. That’s what’s been sold to us by corporations to ensure we keep consuming and buying, even in months when we naturally might not want to.

In nature and also in Eastern astrology, the year doesn’t suddenly change on January 1st. We’re still moving through the Year of the Snake energy until February, when the Year of the Fire Horse begins. As with nature’s cycles, we’re in the final shedding. We’re in a reflective period, looking at what has been, how we’ve changed and yes, what we’d like to come. But it’s a reflective, gentle, looking forward energy, not a sprint start towards lofty goals.

Snake energy is inward, strategic, shedding, and deeply reflective. Horse energy is expansive, forward-moving, expressive, and action-oriented.

Trying to live in Horse energy before it arrives is like trying to run on icy, frozen ground. We’re gonna feel like Bambi on ice, and we’re going to struggle to manage our momentum and our footing.

There’s wisdom in letting the cycle complete.

This in-between space from January into February is not a void. It’s a composting phase. A time when insights integrate beneath the surface, where clarity forms quietly rather than through force.

Winter is for listening, not launching

Astrologically, early 2026 continues to emphasise inner recalibration over external acceleration. Many of the key transits in the first quarter support reflection, review, and long-range visioning rather than rapid execution.

That makes the period from January 1st to the Spring Equinox especially potent, not for doing more, but for listening, realigning and preparing for the year ahead.

This is the season for:

• Pausing & reflecting on the year gone by

• Integrating the year by celebrating and acknowledging all we’ve been through and what we’ve learnt

• Meditating, journaling and spending time in quiet contemplation away from the busy-ness of life to allow our intuition and internal guidance to speak

• Imagining what wants to come next

Intentions planted now need to be aligned and rooted in a strong sense of authentically knowing who we are and what we need. For many of us, that’s probably not a new year gym exercise plan that the internet says we need. It’s probably something, way more gentle and nourishing for our souls.

Think of this time as the moment you choose what kind of garden you’re tending, not the moment you start digging frantically.

The Spring Equinox: when life actually rises

The Spring Equinox is when the natural world begins its visible return to life. Light and dark balance. We start to see fresh shoots emerging from the ground. Momentum naturally starts to emerge; the new year now starts to unfold.

This is when action starts to feel supported.

When we wait for this threshold, energetically, emotionally, and creatively, our efforts tend to be more sustainable. We’re not forcing ourselves to go against nature or our own internal rhythms, so we experience less burnout and less self-betrayal. We experience greater alignment between inner capacity and outer movement. We honour ourselves and our energy, and that’s a form of self-trust.

We don’t need to run out of the gate at the speed of light to be “on track.” We need to honour our rhythms, trust the process and allow all that is to come to arrive as and when we’re most supported to receive it.

Using this season well

If you’re wondering what to do with this quieter time, here’s a gentler reframe:

• Clarify your values before setting goals

• Let vision come before strategy, and feel into your body to check if that strategy feels good and aligned

• Allow desire to form without immediately monetising or optimising it

• Notice what you’re no longer willing to carry into the next cycle

If you’d like a gentle guided step into this season, I’ve created a short workbook, Your Creative Compass. It’s a free values and vision workbook designed specifically for this liminal space. It’s not about productivity. It’s about orientation. About remembering what actually matters before the year asks anything of you. It helps keep you anchored in your truth and your needs before all the noise decides what those are for you.

Your Creative Compass FREE download

I’d also like to share with you a free 2026 key astrological & moon dates download. It summarises all the major astrological transits and moon cycles month by month, so you can work with the year rather than against it.

Your FREE 2026 Astology Download

Both are gentle invitations. I hope they help you arrive gently into the New Year feeling grounded, embodied and aligned with your own True North.

Some final journal prompts if they feel good for you…

1. Knowing what you know now about 2025, what advice would you go back and give yourself 12 months ago? Might it be something you could carry into 2026, too?

2. When you think about looking back on 2026 in a years time, how do you want to feel about it? Not accomplish or change, but how do you want to feel?

3. Rather than adding things to your to-do list and habits, is there a to-do or habit that would better serve you to get rid of?

4. What is the feeling you want to feel most in 2026? How could you use the word to describe this feeling as your guiding sense check and reference point in 2026?

I hope 2026 brings you more into alignment with all the things your heart and souls needs. I wish for it to light you up and inspire you to create a life that feels so truly yours that it makes you giddy from the inside out.

Much love

Adele x

There’s something about the energy of 2026 that will feel different.
Not louder, not faster — but bolder. Clearer. More forward-moving.
Almost as if the creative path that felt foggy or fragmented in 2025 is starting to come into focus again.

And if you’re a creative, this shift won’t just be conceptual.
You’ll feel it in your nervous system.
You’ll feel it in your work.

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Looking Back: The Slow Undoing of 2025

2025 asked a lot of us — and most of it happened beneath the surface.

It was a year of slowing down.
A year of quiet reassessment.
A long in-between space where life didn’t quite seem like we thought it would.
It was a year of listening, waiting and feeling like things weren’t quite happening the way we wanted.

If you felt stuck, foggy, or strangely held back, I want you to know, I did too.

I don’t think we were losing momentum.
I think we were being forced to shed the momentum that didn’t belong to this next season of our lives.

The version who carried us this far has reached the edge of her usefulness. And without realising it, we were releasing the old ways that couldn’t support who we were becoming.

That kind of inner restructuring never feels glamorous.
It feels like stillness.
It feels like confusion.
It feels like nothing is happening — until suddenly it is.

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The Arrival of the Year of the Horse: Forward Motion in the Body

As 2026 arrives, there’s an unmistakable energetic shift — one that mirrors the spirit of the Horse in the Chinese zodiac.

Horse energy is momentum you can feel in your body:
a deep inhale after years of holding your breath,
the weightless moment right before taking your first step onto new ground,
clarity settling into your muscles instead of your mind.

It brings:

• doors opening that once felt impossible to push through

• ideas that land fully formed

• projects that finally get started

• creative confidence that feels ready, not forced

• work that begins to match the vision you’ve been whispering to yourself for years

This is a year that wants you in motion — but not the frantic, performative kind.

It’s the kind of motion that comes from alignment.
From readiness.
From the grounded knowing that you’ve cleared enough space to finally move with intention.

If You Don’t Know Your Direction Yet… You’re Not Behind

This is the perfect time to uncover it.

Clarity is not something you “should already know.”
It’s something you build gently, like a muscle that strengthens through attention, not force.

And if you’ve spent the last year in a liminal space, it makes sense your inner compass might feel a little blurry right now.

You’re not late.
You’re not indecisive.
You’re emerging.

If you’re feeling frustrated that you don’t have a vision yet, I might be able to help!

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A Tool to Help You Feel Your Way Into 2026

Because so many creatives are entering this year with fresh energy but foggy direction, I created something to support you:

A free Vision & Values workbook
— a gentle space to explore where you want to be in 2026.
What’s calling you forward? And what are you ready to leave behind?

It’s designed to help you meet this new momentum with:

• clarity

• steadiness

• self-trust

• and a direction that feels like yours

If you’d like it you can find a link at the end of this post.

Wherever you are in your creative arc — foggy, emerging, or already in motion — I’m glad you’re here.
This year has a fresh energy for you.
And I have a feeling it’s going to bring us all somewhere beautiful.

FREE DOWNLOAD: THE CREATIVE COMPASS VALUES WORKBOOK

It’s frighteningly easy for me to realise I’ve spent hours — sometimes entire days — pouring energy into something that, if I’m really honest, adds absolutely nothing to my life.

Don’t get me wrong, hyperfocus can feel soooo good. There’s a rush that comes with being completely consumed by something — that sense of flow, clarity, and purpose.

But more often than not, I’d look back the next day and think: why that? Why did that feel so urgent, so important, when in hindsight it really wasn’t?

It’s like misplacing all that beautiful, powerful focus of energy and using it up on something meaningless.

When Hyperfocus Becomes Avoidance

Eventually, I realised that my hyperfocus often wasn’t about the task itself — it was a form of avoidance.

A way to sidestep something uncomfortable or something I didn’t want to face.

Sometimes it was a survival response: my nervous system trying to regulate itself by making me feel productive, even when what I was doing wasn’t actually moving me forward.

I can trace a lot of this back to my corporate years, when my sense of identity and value came from overworking and overachieving.

Proving my value through consistent productivity became my default.

So now, whenever I feel a wobble in self-worth, I instinctively double down — become extra productive, do more — just to feel that sense of control again.

This productivity-driven society we’ve been raised in has a lot to answer for!

Unlearning the Loop

In recent years, I’ve been unlearning that loop — the one that equates worth with productivity.

I don’t want to burn through my focus and energy just to feel like I’m “enough.”

I want to choose ease when I start to doubt myself.
I want to exist in a state that feels relaxed, open, and expansive.

And when I do choose to be productive, I want it to come from alignment — from genuine desire and purpose, not pressure or survival.

Recognising Survival States

The key, I’ve found, is noticing when I’m in a survival state.

From there, practising nervous system regulation helps me shift back into an embodied, grounded space — where I can choose consciously how to spend my time and energy.

Here’s how I recognise the different states my body can fall into:

Fight

• Feeling the need to work harder/push harder/prove something

• Judging myself harshly (an internal fight),

• distracted doing all the things, things that are not really effective, but I’m convinced they are.

Flight

• Avoiding, scrolling, procrastinating

• jumping from course to course or idea to idea,

• Telling myself “this isn’t worth my time” or “I’ll never be consistent enough,” while staying stuck in the loop.

Fawn

• Seeking validation/acceptance/external approval,

• Pleasing the inner critic, putting others on a pedestal/imposter syndrome

• Pouring energy outward instead of inwards.

• Waiting for something external to happen for things to feel ok or ready to start

Freeze

• Feeling paralysed/overwhelmed or numb.

• Body still, brain racing.

• Reading but not absorbing.

• Knowing what I “should” do, but unable to start — which only deepens the freeze.

Understanding the Loop

An event or thought can trigger a survival state response. As a neurospicy person, a dysregulated nervous system can do the same. In a survival state, we’re scanning for danger and finding it in places that it might not realistically exist. Ever felt like responding to an email seems far scarier than what seems justified? It’s usually because we’re in a heightened state and the email feels like a gizzly bear in the middle of a dark forest.

Once we’re in this state, we then want to avoid the thing, the grizzly bear (or the email), so our brains find a way (often a very clever way) of avoiding it. This reinforces the message that we can’t do the thing, or we’ll never be able to do the thing. And then we feel bad and start processing negative internal messages about how incompetent or useless we are. This further pushes us into a survival state, where we avoid the task even more because of the past messages and feelings we have about it. This loop continues in a cycle.

The Way Out of The Loop

The way out requires us to notice that we are in the loop. Once we can step back and see that we’re in a survival state, we can try and step out of it. By regulating our nervous system, we move back into an embodied sense of safety, we can face the task or do the thing. And what’s even better is that this then starts a new loop! We feel good, we realise we can do the thing which changes what we tell ourselves, and our self-esteem begins to grow. Which then in turn helps us do the thing again the next time because we’ve built an internal sense of safety and knowing that we can handle the grizzly bear that is an email.

Shifting Back Into Safety…

You can’t figure anything out when in a survival state!!! You have to feel your way out.

That means shifting from mind to body.

Shifting to an embodied feeling of safety. Some things to try:

• Move your body - shaking, swaying, dancing, stomping. Put some music on and FEEL it move through your body.

• Bilateral tapping (cross your arms at your heart centre and tap your right fingers to your left collarbone and your left fingers to your right collarbone. Take deep breaths as you tap.

• Sighing, humming, or letting out a long “vooo” sound.

• Using grounding touch — a hug, a hand on your heart.

• Lying on the floor and feeling your body being supported by the ground beneath you.

• “Tense and hold all the muscles in your body, and then release!!!!

Fight, flight, and fawn all ask us to pause. Freeze asks us to move.

Regulation is what brings us back to ourselves — back into the driver’s seat.

Zooming back out

Once I’ve grounded my body and the fizz of survival energy starts to settle, I can finally zoom out. Zooming out is how it feels in my head, it’s the process of moving from tunnel vision and focusing on one thing that feels super important to stepping back and seeing the bigger picture with a more expansive and open energy that’s less anxious, stressed or intense

That’s when I can ask myself:

• Is this really helping?

• Am I soothing anxiety with busy-ness?

• What do I actually need right now?

• Can this wait until I’m clearer?

This pause creates space for choice.

Soul-Lit Alignment v Dopamine-Driven Hyperfocus

I started to wonder: how do I tell the difference between being driven by soul-aligned motivation and being caught in a dopamine-chasing state?

When I ground and regulate first, I’ve discovered I can feel the difference!

Soul-Lit Alignment feels….

• Deeply meaningful, even when progress is slow

• Spacious, grounded and connected

• Motivating over time — even through boredom

• Like gentle joy, resonance, or a quiet knowing

Dopamine-chasing Hyperfocus FEELS….

• Urgent, addictive, intense or compulsive

• Revved up and buzzy

• Like tunnel vision or escape from discomfort

• Followed by an energy crash or emptiness.

The Uncomfortable Question

Am I feeding my soul, or feeding the part of me that fears I’m not enough unless I’m achieving something?

I often feel a lot of discomfort when I ask myself this question.

Discomfort is my body’s way of nudging me back into alignment.

My mind will always try to convince me I’m safer repeating familiar patterns. But my body knows when I’m truly safe, grounded, and connected.

If I can tap out of my mind long enough to check in with how I feel, I can usually redirect my energy to where it needs to be.

My complicated relationship with boredom

As I’ve realised that I’ve built an identity around productivity as proof of worth, stillness can feel threatening.

But boredom isn’t the enemy.

It’s the threshold to creativity, emotional truth, and realignment with what matters most.

Accomplishment feels amazing — it’s one of my values and a very valid pleasure.

But when it becomes my only source of vitality, it often masks deeper needs: for meaning, connection, or rest.

So now, when I feel that restless pull toward doing, I ask myself:

Is this action nourishing me, or distracting me from something deeper?

Coming Home to Flow

I’m learning that hyperfocus isn’t the enemy — it’s just energy without direction.

When that energy is guided by survival states, it can feel misaligned.
When it’s guided by my inner knowing, it becomes flow.

Every time I pause to regulate, breathe, and come back to my body, I reclaim my choice.

I can step back into alignment and focus on something meaningful, or I can choose rest.

This is what allows me to better live in flow.

Do I manage to do this every single time? No. But the more I practice it, the more I notice, and the more I get a chance to make a different choice.

If you’ve ever felt stuck, blocked, or strangely resistant to doing the very thing you say you want to do — whether that’s making art, sharing your work, or raising your prices — chances are you’ve brushed up against your shadow.

Don’t worry — this isn’t about anything spooky. Shadow work is simply a way of getting curious about the parts of ourselves we tend to push away, ignore, or feel uncomfortable with.

I’ll share a real-life example of how I work with mine later in this post.

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So, What Exactly Is Our Shadow?

The term comes from psychologist Carl Jung, who described the “shadow” as the hidden or unconscious parts of our personality.

Think of it like this:

• The “you” everyone sees is what you show in the light — your talents, values, and the parts of yourself you’re proud of.
  

• Your shadow is what gets tucked away — fears, insecurities, stories you’ve picked up about yourself (like “I’m not good with money” or “I’ll never be successful doing creative work”).

The shadow isn’t bad. It’s just hidden. And when we take time to bring those hidden parts into the light, we often discover they’re not monsters at all, but unhealed parts of ourselves that actually hold a lot of power and creativity.

Why Shadow Work Matters for Creatives

Creative work is deeply personal. Which means our shadows often show up in big ways:

• Money blocks (“I can’t charge for this, who would pay me?”)

• Visibility fears (“What if I share my work and people criticise me?”)

• Perfectionism (“If it’s not perfect, I shouldn’t put it out there, it won’t be good enough, so there’s no point starting yet”).

Shadow work helps us name these patterns, understand where they came from, and gently release their grip, so we can create with more freedom, confidence, and flow.

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How Tarot & Journalling Can Help

The shadow likes to hide — but tools like tarot cards and journalling can help us bring what’s hidden into the open in a safe, creative way.

• Tarot acts like a mirror. A card can symbolise an inner pattern or energy we didn’t quite have words for, giving us a way to explore it. It is also full of rich visuals and symbolism, which our creative minds might be able to interpret and work with more easily than words.

• Journalling creates space to dialogue with the shadow — writing down thoughts, questions, or “what if” scenarios that might reveal what’s underneath a block.

Together, they turn shadow work into a ritual: a practice you can return to again and again, not just when you’re stuck, but as part of maintaining your creative health.

A Gentle First Step: Journal Prompt

Take 10 minutes with your journal and write on this:

“If I weren’t afraid of failing, being judged, or running out of money, what would I create or do differently in my creative business?”

Notice what comes up. The answers might feel exciting, or they might make you squirm — both are useful. That’s your shadow showing you where it’s been quietly holding the reins.

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A Real Life Example… This Morning’s Cards

This Morning I drew these cards. The Hierophant, The Devil & Temperance. I keep drawing all the big guns from the major arcana at the mo.

The Hierophant can represent rigid rules, unquestioned beliefs, or living by someone else’s truth instead of your own (or just cultural expectations in general).

The Devil can point to being chained by our own rigid thoughts/beliefs and being entrapped in a relationship with ourselves (or others). Often, the “chains” are self-imposed — linked to fear, shame, or desires that have taken over. In shadow, The Devil magnifies where you feel powerless, hooked, or tempted to give away your power/agency.

Temperance suggests harmony and balance. Here, when it comes after The Hierophant and The Devil, it can read as the antidote to the rigidity and bondage of the first two. This card is the invitation to synthesise your truth, integrate extremes, and move toward inner freedom and wholeness.

The Backstory…

I had just spent the previous day, adamant that I was going to stick to all the habits I thought would help my energy levels (so many should have been a little warning flag in itself, but I missed it!).

I did this in my typical fashion, by trying to implement several new things at once and completely overwhelming myself. I had successfully ticked off all the things on my list that I wanted to achieve (go me! - it only ever lasts a day 🙄), but I already wasn’t feeling good about it; something felt off. I didn’t feel in flow or alignment, like I had hoped I would.

I felt grateful I’d caught the off feeling before it turned into me abandoning my habits altogether the next day, and reinforcing a belief that I don’t stick at things.

I was sure that because I had established rituals in my daily routine, which help to keep me rooted and grounded, adding on some daily habits should be easy and essentially no different, after all, they were “healthy”. But for some reason, this didn’t feel good.

Reflecting on the guidance from the cards, I thought about what it was that didn’t feel right, and I realised I was trying to force things that I felt I ‘should do’ because I was trying to push myself to be more productive (The Heirophant & Devil sitting on my shoulders).

I know on one level that my relationship with productivity is not good for me and doesn’t generally end well. It’s something I’ve been working on for a while. Pushing myself into burnout through hyperfocus and overproductivity is my Achilles heel.

Productivity was a badge of honour that I wore throughout my 20s, until it made me sick. I ended up changing careers not long after being hospitalised and having major surgery. It was quite a wake-up call. But still, there was a part of me that looked back on those years as my golden years when I could do and achieve anything. I had been incredibly successful, and I’ll be honest, my ego really enjoyed it. Productivity had become a cornerstone of my identity and getting shit done was how I did life (Hello Aries Stellum in my birth chart!).

But I moved here, to the coast, seeking a vastly different pace of life. The life I imagined had very different values and goals at its core. But I keep finding myself drifting back to familiar patterns of wanting to do and achieve more. My ego’s just learnt to try and dress it up as a habit or ritual or even as “healthy living” just so that I’ll get on board!

The truth…

There’s still a part of me that is wired by the system I first succeeded in, that wants to smash the ceilings, prove that I can do anything and hyperfocus my way to high-productive success. I know on a soul level this is not what I want or need. It’s like an old muscle that wants to keep working overtime that I need to tend to and remind it can rest. I use journaling and cards to keep a check on this part of me, and this particular spread of cards helped do just that. A mental check of where I am, so that I can course correct.

This part of me is protecting a shadow part. A part that felt like I had to overwork, overachieve and try harder than anyone else in the room, in order to be good enough. The part that had a point to prove. That part of me needs reminding that I don’t need to overwork anymore, that it’s safe to rest and be in flow and that I don’t need to sacrifice myself and my wellbeing… because I’m already enough (I can still feel the resistance in my body when I say that, which is precisely why I still need to consciously keep realigning back to this. It’s not my default!).

I told myself that taking my vitamins, exercising and eating well was good for my brain, but the underlying narrative was

“I need to optimise myself so I can have more energy, so that I can do more”.

It was coming from the wrong place; my intentions weren’t honouring what I really needed. I was trying to find a loophole that allowed me to be overproductive, in the guise of being healthier and more energised. There was nothing wrong with the things on my list, it was the driver behind them and how I’d gone about it that felt like an energy drain.

Yesterday, I spent an inordinate amount of time planning and preparing healthy food, and this is one area of my life which massively depletes my energy. It’s the bane of my grown-up adult life, and I forgot that when planning to eat better, I need to be realistic and not overcomplicate the planning and prep. It literally drains the life out of me, as one of those super mundane, I’d rather peel my own skin off than finely chop another vegetable, type of energy drains (If you don’t know what I mean, feel relieved you’re not afflicted with this specific neurospicy trait).

Anyhow. The upshot of this “successful” tick-list day was that I had no sense of flow and there was zero creativity. I’d strangled the life force out of myself by doing all the things I thought I should do to improve my energy. I now know I need to tune in more to what I actually need rather than trying to tick off ideals and other people’s must-have habits.

Temperance is asking me to move back into flow and balance. MY flow and balance. Not a flow or balance compiled of passive information I’ve absorbed from Instagram. Of things that I should be doing to feel better. It’s scary how that stuff can seep in without you really noticing!

Yes, in an ideal world, I’d love to enjoy cooking and spending time in the kitchen making nourishing food. But the reality is, it takes any available flow and energy that I do have and leaks it out of me like a sieve. I still need to cook myself food, but lower energy options are needed! I also realised that exercise that requires me to get changed and shower after, isn’t something I can do regularly, and sometimes all that’s needed is a walk down to the sea or some somatic dance, Qi Gong or squats in the kitchen whilst something cooks. I need to tune in to what I need and what works for me!

All this had me reflecting on what the difference is between what feels like an obligation and what feels like a devoted ritual.

Writing my morning pages feels like a devoted ritual, as does making my morning pot of coffee and drawing cards. Writing on here, too, feels like a devoted ritual rather than a check-box thing I feel I ought to do. Trying to cram so much into my day so I can accomplish a list, did not feel like a ritual! It felt out of flow and out of alignment. I missed my time and space to just be in the joy of the mundane things, like enjoying a cup of tea or having my hands in the warm, freshly run dish water.

I drew a card from my Faeries’ Oracle deck. I’ve been told on more than one occasion that I’m surrounded by faeries and that they’d been a strong presence in a past life, so I like to check in with this deck from time to time.

I picked The Dark Lady, a card which speaks of endings, renewal and rebirth. There was a line that struck me like a lightning bolt in the accompanying book…

“ritual is something we surrender to and we allow to enfold us, rather than something we do or control.”

I could recognise this so clearly in how my usual rituals felt so different to the day of “habits” I’d tried to do or erm… control. Control being another go-to default mechanism of mine 😂 that I’m trying to let go of.

My coffee, morning pages and cards were something I surrendered to each day. They felt expansive and as though I was opening myself up to flow and possibility. The list of to-dos was restricting, full of control and strangling any flow.

In recent guided meditations, I’ve received messages that I need to keep working with cards and I think this is an example of why it’s so important for me. They really do keep bringing me back into alignment with myself. I like that they are something visual and tangible that I can use to reflect on.

I strongly believe that there’s a part of us inside that knows what we need and where we’re heading. Whether we think of that as our soul, our gut, or our higher self, or even whispers from spirit guides or the universe. However you want to think of it, I really believe there’s something that deeply knows what we need. And cards, for me, are a way to get easy access to that.

Getting my cards out daily is a devoted ritual that allows me to come home to myself and connect to the part of me that knows. That’s what I mean when I say they’re anchors that keep me in alignment. The more I use them, the more I’m drawn to what I need to hear and the more they seem to bring just the right nuggets of wisdom when I need them most.

I invite you to give them a try! There’s a link in my previous post Tarot, Astrology & Anchors for the Creative Mind, that includes a free printable deck of tarot cards if you want a simple way to start. You can also find beautiful decks online. If you feel drawn to using them, choose whichever deck you feel most attracted to. It might take a while for you to start feeling at home with your deck; my intuition with the cards grew the more I used them.

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A Quick Poll

I have so many ideas for this community, I can’t wait to try them all! I’d really love to know which ones you’d be most excited for me to prioritise first. Leave your answers below…

An Important Note

Shadow work isn’t about fixing yourself. It’s about meeting all of who you are — even the parts you’ve tucked away — and inviting them back into your life and your creative process.

Over the next few weeks, I’ll share ways you can use tarot spreads, journalling prompts, and gentle rituals to do this kind of exploration, especially around creativity, money, and business.

Your shadow doesn’t have to stay hidden. In fact, when you learn to work with it, it often becomes the very source of your deepest creative power.

One of the most powerful things we can do as creatives isn’t just to plan, dream, and set goals — it’s to release all the things that hold us back or keep us stuck.

We all carry old thoughts and ideas that we’ve outgrown: money stories that keep us stuck, self-doubt we inherited, “shoulds” from family, teachers, or past versions of ourselves and even restricted ways of viewing our creativity and career based on what society deems the norm. Over time, these things become like mud that we wade through, back and forth, day after day, and it can sap our energy and stop us from living a life we truly want, a life that feels freer and lighter and filled with more ease.

Release work is the practice of consciously letting go of what no longer serves us — so that we can create with more clarity, lightness, and freedom.

Why Release Work Matters

As freelancers, we are our own managers, content creators, motivators, and makers. That means our energy can quickly be drained trying to pour it into so many different places. Through release work, we can free up energy by directing it away from things that no longer truly benefit us, allowing us to refocus it on our creative work and business.

Our energy can get depleted by:

• Internal narratives like “I’m never going to be successful enough” or “I don’t deserve financial stability.”

• Spending time looping on decisions and/or procrastinating

• Doing things that we don’t really want to do, which drains our energy way faster than the things that light us up can replenish.

Release work brings clarity and clears space for new opportunities, aligned business actions, and deeper creative flow.

Option 1 — Journalling Prompts: What Wants to Be Released?

Set aside 10–15 minutes with pen and paper. Ask yourself:

1. What am I holding onto in my creative or freelance life that feels heavy? What am I dreading this week? Where do I feel like I’m draining my energy?

2. Where am I saying “yes” when my body wants to say “no”?

3. What stories about money, success, or creativity no longer fit who I am becoming? Where am I limiting myself or feeling boxed in?

4. If I trusted that something better would flow in, what would I let go of today?

Write freely. Don’t overthink. Let whatever wants to surface come through.

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Option 2 — Tarot Spread: The Release Spread

Shuffle your deck with the intention: “Show me what I’m ready to release and what I can invite in.”

Draw 3 cards:

1. What needs to be released — the old pattern, story, or block weighing you down.

2. What is being created in its place — the energy, opportunity, or gift that opens up once you let go.

3. How to release — a step, action, or ritual that supports your letting go.

✨ Tarot can be used in conjunction with option 1, by asking the question and choosing a card to reflect on before journaling your answer. Consider how the cards might apply to your creative work, business, money or relationships? Sometimes you’ll intuitively sense the cards drawing your attention to a specific life area.

Option 3 — Guided Meditation: Meeting What Wants to Leave

Close your eyes and take three deep belly breaths. In through the nose, and out through the mouth.

Imagine standing on a shoreline. You’ve been visiting this shoreline day after day for your entire life, collecting pebbles and shells as you’ve walked, listening to the sea as it laps against the shore.

Today, you are holding all the pebbles and shells that you have collected. Your arms are laden with all you have to carry, and the rest you have in a bag weighing heavily on your back.

You decide it’s time to set these pebbles and shells down and return them to the sea — each one representing a project, fear, money worry, or belief. Some are memories, and some are the grief of plans not actualised. One by one, place them down into the sand on the shoreline. Feel the weight of each one leave you as you set it down.

Stand looking out at the sea, out towards the horizon and take three long, deep breaths as you feel the relief of no longer holding all these things.

Now, imagine seeing the tide coming in. With love and gratitude, watch the water cleanse and take back the pebbles and shells and watch the waves and tide come further and further into the shore.

Say silently: “I release what no longer serves me. I trust the tide will return with what I most need.”

Stay here a few moments, feeling the lightness in your body, listening to the cleansing sound of the sea waves. Just allow. Allow for the tide to come and release you from all you’ve carried. Allow yourself to let go. Allow yourself, as you let go, to feel the space you’ve created for something new to grow.

Option 4 — A Simple Release Ritual

Choose one of these rituals to ground the release:

• Paper Burn: Write down what you’re releasing on pieces of paper. Burn them safely over a candle (or bury them in the earth if fire isn’t an option).

• Saltwater Bowl: Write down what you’re releasing on pieces of paper, fold them, and submerge them in saltwater overnight. Dispose of the water the next day.

• Creative Offering: Paint, doodle, or collage what you’re releasing. Then tear or transform the artwork into something new.

The act doesn’t have to be big or dramatic. The power lies in the intention.

Your Invitation

Release work isn’t about “getting rid of” parts of yourself. It’s about creating space. Space for new projects, aligned clients, new beliefs and fresh creative energy.

Today, under the full moon lunar eclipse, ask yourself:

• What one thing can I lovingly release — to make room for something better?

Try the journaling, the tarot spread, or simply sit with the meditation. See what shifts.

Because every time we release, we return more fully to ourselves — and our creative tide flows more freely.

I think we’ve all been there: working hard, pushing through, feeling like we’re dropping spinning plates and can’t keep up. Perhaps even losing a grip on our health or important connections and relationships in the process. Maybe you haven’t experienced this first-hand, but have witnessed it with a parent or someone close to you.

It wouldn’t be surprising that we might then tell ourselves that the success we really want comes at a cost. A cost we don’t really want to pay. We fear success because we believe it will bring burnout or another area of our lives to fail. The energy of success doesn’t feel good.

Perhaps you have got to the point too, where you don’t want to devote all your time and energy to running a freelance business. A business you started because you wanted the freedom to do what you love with the time and energy that you have. None of us started down this path with a love of pitching, selling and marketing ourselves. Never mind the boredom of the admin and finances.

If you’re feeling under-resourced, underpaid and a bit underwhelmed with creative freelancing, it’s entirely understandable why!

That’s why I’m here to hopefully help. To help you shift out of that funk. Out of the energy and beliefs that maybe you’ll never be able to make this thing work.

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Starting with a creative passion and no manual on how to turn it into a freelancing career is a brave jump into the unknown. I’m now here to help you shuffle yourself forward with the skills and resources you need to fill in the blanks.

As a neurospicy creative, I think I know exactly how this needs to be done, and it needs to include community, body-doubling and accountability as part of a support network to get you to a place where it all makes a lot more sense and feels a lot more doable.

Using ritual and intuition to keep us grounded in our own personal energy and rhythm, we’re throwing out the neurotypical business blueprint.

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A lot of how it works requires you to start accessing a deeper, wiser part of yourself. The part I often refer to as your inner knowing. The reason why I think this is foundational is because it’s what helps guide our rhythm and keeps us in alignment with how we need to work and do what we do. If we bypass that (and I just prescribe steps to you), it will just feel like every other neurotypical way of doing life. It won’t fit and it won’t work.

Are you game for giving it a try?

If you are, I need you to open your mind. Wide open. And consider that there might be a different way for things to work. A way you’ve not tried before.

If you’re not into tarot & astrology and release work, but have come across my posts, I ask you to keep an open mind there too. So much of this is about connecting to ourselves and our inner knowing; you don’t need to believe in religion or the universe to access that. You might not even believe in yourself at this moment in time, but I honestly believe, if you start really tuning in to what is in there, you will.

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A Starting Point

Not everything you think and believe is true.

Our ego likes us to think all our thoughts and beliefs are true, but our truth is subjective. Our truths are formed by what we’ve experienced in the past. But we will continue to live as our past selves if we don’t sometimes grow past what we believe to be true.

Many people hold truths that they can’t do a thing. Until they do it. Then they have to update that truth.

So, as a starting point, I want you to consider that any beliefs and truths you hold might be subject to change. They might need to be challenged so that you can expand and grow into a new version of you. A version that can do the thing you currently think you can’t. Do you think you can loosen your grip a little bit on what you believe to be your truth? Just enough to allow possibility in to play?

A Second Idea

Fear affects our thoughts and beliefs.

When fear is present, our ego mind will come up with thoughts and beliefs that will stop us from going near the thing it fears.

Referring back to the start of this post, many of us have a fear of success. In fact, it’s more common than a fear of failure (though you might have that fear too)!

This can be because we have a belief, based on past experience, that success is going to cost us. Whether it’s too much energy, our health, our time or our relationships or even our identity as a starving artist. We believe it will cost us something, and that scares us. Our ego mind is very clever at giving us all the thoughts and beliefs needed to keep us away from what we fear. Those thoughts and beliefs can become our “truth”. A truth we don’t think to question and update.

It’s what keeps us stuck in the place we are.

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Energetics

Our energy is affected by our thoughts and emotions. These are, in turn, affected by our truths, beliefs and fears, as well as our values. So much of this is happening behind the scenes. We’re not even conscious of it.

If this is something that feels a bit alien to you, think about something really exciting that you’re looking forward to and see how differently that feels from when you think about something you dread doing, like your annual tax return. The energy is different, right? And that’s because of the thoughts and emotions we have about these two things.

Beliefs and emotions can be stored deep down, they can exist within us for decades, and they can be silently running in the background, creating all our current beliefs and feelings about our lives in the here and now.

Our actions also affect things, as does our inaction. However, our thoughts and emotions often get in the way long before we ever get to a point of action. It’s one of the reasons we put things off and procrastinate.

How This Plays Out In Creative Freelancing

1. How you value yourself. The beliefs you have about yourself, your abilities and the quality of your work, even your capacity to do things. Before you say “ yeah but…” hear me out. What if, even with low energy, you believed and trusted there was a way to reach your goals? What if, even with ADHD, there was a way that you could work with your own neurobiology and achieve what you’ve always wanted to achieve? If we open ourselves up to believing there’s a way, even when all we can see are obstacles, maybe just maybe, by using our inner knowing, we can find a way that actually finally works for us.
   
   What if we believed that our inner knowing wouldn’t have given us the dream and the goal in the first place if it didn’t also have the guidance and support to get us there? It’s just our ego and belief system (and the noisy outside world) is getting in the way of letting it.

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   Our thoughts and beliefs have been so influenced by a patriarchal, neurotypical world telling us how things should be done, we may have never questioned if that’s the only way and instead assumed that there’s something about us that means we can never do it.
   
   We believe that the neurotypical way is the only way. It’s become our truth and our map, and then we berate ourselves when we can’t navigate our way there. We think our navigational system is broken, but it was never our sea to navigate, and the compass we’ve been using isn’t aligned to our true north!
   
   Because we’ve tried before, using someone else’s map, we think we can’t and won’t get to where we want to go. But what if that’s all faulty logic and faulty truths? Truths that belonged to someone else, that aren’t ours; ones we can let go of.
   
   We’ve been listening to the wrong source!

   Our own inner knowing knows what we are capable of, and it knows how to get us to where we want to be. We just have to learn to listen to it and tune out all the other noise that doesn’t hold true to who we are! It’s the same reason we have a fear of success, because we followed someone else’s formula in the past that didn’t work for us, and it cost us.
   
   What if there’s a different way! A way that is our own unique path to our own unique longings and desires.
   

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2. How we think and feel about others. We project our fears and beliefs onto other people, too, including our clients. How many times have you thought, “people can’t afford it at the moment”, or “no one would pay that”? That is us projecting our own thoughts and beliefs onto other people, and you guessed it, fear is probably at the root of it. We believe it because that’s the limited experience and thoughts we currently have possession of. But like all our truths, it can evolve and grow and change.
   
   Another way we project onto people is by being confused in ourselves about what we want from them. What are we seeking most from our clients? Praise? Gratitude? A sense of validation that we’re good enough? Money? What we project out is often what gets mirrored back, so if we’re desperately seeking validation and secretly squirming about receiving money for our work, guess what we’re more likely to receive?
   

3. Selling, what we think about selling and how we feel about doing it.
   

4. Marketing, what we think about marketing and how we feel about doing it.
   

5. Money and how we relate to it, and how much we allow it into our lives. How open we are to receiving it. And how safe it feels when we do/don’t have it?

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Our businesses are a mirror of who we are, what we think we’re worth, how we expect to be treated and how we expect to succeed. And can you see how all these things are formed by our thoughts, beliefs and truths?

This is why I think shadow work, journaling and release work are so important. It’s all part of getting to know ourselves more and excavating the nonsense we feed ourselves from other people and a society that didn’t understand us.

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The key to everything is reconnecting to ourselves and who we are, accepting all of who we are, and then moving forward in alignment with that. Nobody else’s formulas and productivity hacks. Just really, truly knowing what is the right course of action for our very unique souls.

Can you be really honest with yourself and identify which of the above you think could be holding you back?

If you could do and be anything you wanted tomorrow, without any fear, what would you do? Did your ego mind quickly object and give you a reason why you couldn’t?

How Do I Know the Difference between my Ego and Inner Knowing?

You can tell the difference by how it feels when you listen to them.

The ego talking will often feel restrictive, logical, limited, negative and certain. It can’t imagine a world outside of what it already knows, so it won’t feel expansive and open to possibility.

Your inner knowing will feel expansive, excited, open and curious. It might even seem illogical because your logical mind will not be able to fathom how it might work out. That’s how you know it’s your more open and expansive inner knowing.

We can feel really confused between the push and pull of the inner knowing and the ego. One has all the excitement and ideas, and the other has zero confidence that you can ever pull it off. Sound familiar?

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Your ego thoughts are not the truth. They’re just a version of a story, and you get to choose whether to accept it or not. You can always choose a different version.

Fear Doesn’t Protect You

Fear doesn’t protect you; it’s just a sign that your ego can’t predict an outcome or have any certainty on how things will go. We have to remember it’s built on old scripts, and that isn’t a predictor of what we have the capacity to grow into now. Your fear is showing you where you’re on the edge of growth; it’s a signal that if you continue, you get to uplevel your belief system. If you keep backing away, you miss out and stay stuck where you’ve always been.

The more we give in to fear and don’t do the thing, the more we reinforce the ego’s story that we can’t and shouldn’t do things we’re scared of. It becomes its own truth. And the more we do the things that scare us, the stronger the story gets that we are capable of feeling the fear and doing it anyway.

The key is learning to recognise when fear and the ego are in the driving seat. This requires us to take a moment and step out of autopilot and actually listen to what we’re telling ourselves.

We need to strengthen the muscle that allows us to switch back to our inner knowing. We do this by listening and regularly checking in with it.

I promise it will get louder the more you use it!

This is why I bang on about the tools and practices that I share. They’re tools to help you strengthen your intuition and get wise to the ego mind that’s been running the show and keeping you stuck.

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It’s time to tune in and listen. We need to let our inner genius out!

Are you up for it?

This is the perfect time for releasing all the doubts and beliefs that no longer serve us. The eclipse season, starting on Sunday, 7th September, asks us to let go and release all that is holding us back. Astrologically, it’s the perfect time to do this. Are you in? Subscribe below to find out how…

Much love
Adele x

Footnote: Anxiety happens when we don’t have enough information to predict a future outcome. The interesting thing is, the information we need is on the other side of doing the thing. And once we do the thing and get the information, the next time we come across the thing, it doesn’t create the same sense of anxiety. This is how anxiety is treated in therapy, through gentle exposure to whatever we’re anxious about.

Preparation

Sometimes I will light candles, incense, and cleanse the area with sage. Other times I will just grab the cards I want to work with and get started.

I will often put music on. Chantresse Seba is one of my go-to tracks at the moment for helping me tune out the noise and feel reconnected. The Insight Timer App also has loads of free meditation music tracks, which I love.

Essential Grounding

Whenever I want to use my cards, I always start with the same grounding exercise. This step is really important; if I don’t do it, I feel like the cards don’t feel right, I don’t feel connected to my intuition, and the whole process feels a bit off.

I take 5 deep belly breaths, breathing in really deeply until I fill my belly with air, and then releasing. As I breathe out, I imagine releasing any and all negativity that I’m holding in my body, whether it’s tension, stress, or frustration. Whatever it is, I release it on my out breath. If I need to take more breaths to fully feel grounded and in my body, I take more. The aim is to relax your body and to feel connected with your body and grounded in it. I spend a lot of time up in my head buzzing with a lot of chatter, so this is a non-negotiable for me. As I come back into my body, I feel like a connection to my intuition/wisdom/higher self is possible.

Here’s a short mp3 guided track of my process if you would like to give it a try. I always find a guided practice is helpful when I’m struggling to quieten my mind on my own.

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Choosing Cards

Once I’m feeling deeply connected and grounded in my body, I will take the deck of cards I’m drawn to working with and I shuffle them. As I shuffle them, I start thinking of any questions that I want to answer using the cards, if I don’t have one, I think “What do I need to know today?” over and over as I shuffle. I feel like this allows me to connect my question to my own intuition/higher self. If a card jumps out while shuffling, I put it to one side to read later.

Next, I spread the cards out in front of me in a big arc, face down. I take another deep grounding breath with my eyes closed. As I open my eyes I scan the cards and see where my eyes are drawn to. Usually, a card jumps out at me or looks really different to the others in some way. I take that card and then keep scanning to see if more cards want to be taken. I’ll take as many as feels right.

If I want to take cards from other decks, I will draw those next before doing anything else. The reason for this is that I want to stay as connected as possible to this state of mind where I feel my intuition is really clear.

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Staying Connected Before Analysis

From my research into left and right hemispheres of the brain and how these work with creativity and the subconscious I feel strongly that breaking off to read up on cards in between selecting them, disconnects us from the intuitive sensing hemisphere of the brain and catapults us back into the logic/analysis/language part of the brain which I’ve usually just spent time quietening in the grounding process.

Once all the cards I want to choose are drawn, I then start turning them over.

An Intuitive First Impression

Before opening any of the books that accompany the cards (Oracle Card and Tarot Card decks often come with these - you can Google tarot cards for optional interpretations), I like to look over the cards and see what my first impression is. This gets easier the longer you work with the cards and the more familiar you get with them. I find there are some cards that I’ll draw over and over again and some that I’ve never yet chosen in a deck.

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Interpreting The Cards

Even when I’m familiar with a card, I still like to read over the words in the accompanying books. Quite often, something really specific will jump out at me or seem relevant.

If I’ve drawn a few cards from the same deck, I’ll read them in the order I picked them, as often, I find that there seems to be a bit of a story arc to them. Maybe they could represent past, present and future outcomes. I let my intuition decipher what that could be, as that is what I use the cards for, as a way to connect with my intuition and higher self.

Alternative Ways To Work With Cards

Another super easy way to work with your intuition with the cards is to spread the cards face up and see which ones you’re most drawn to. Then follow the same steps as above.

Using A Spread To Guide Your Questions

An alternative way to use cards is to use a spread that answers a specific question or guides you in a specific area of life that you’re seeking help with. As you choose each card for the spread, you focus your mind on what that card represents.

For example, if using the spread below as your starting point. As you pick your first card, you’d focus your attention on the question “where am I creatively blocked right now?”. Then, as you pick the second card, you’d ask “How can I feel more expansive and rejuvenated in my creative practice?” and finally, you’d focus on the question “Show me something that will inspire some new creative work?” whilst picking the final card.

Once all the cards have been selected, you’d interpret each of the cards in response to the question you asked. Simply hold the question in your mind as you select your card.

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There is no right or wrong way

Ultimately, there is no right or wrong way to work with the cards. For me, it’s all about developing my intuition and connection back to myself. So whatever way or method works for you, keep doing it.

Do you already work with cards in some way? I’d love to hear how you work with them in the comments below.

A recap on the chat this week

This week on the chat, we’ve had:

• Journal prompts from The Magician

• Journal prompts from The Two of Cups

• Journal prompts from The Emperor

• Journal prompts from The Ace of Swords

• An Astro Update about the New Moon in Virgo and the upcoming eclipse season

• Journal prompts from The Fool

Wishing you all a lovely, creative week ahead

Much love

Adele

This is a conversation space exclusively for subscribers—kind of like a group chat or live hangout. I’ll post card pulls and reflective questions, which you can use for journalling, and you can jump into the discussion.

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How to get started

1. Get the Substack app by clicking this link or the button below. New chat threads won’t be sent via email, so you may wish to turn on push notifications so you don’t miss conversation as it happens. You can also access chat on the web.

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2. Open the app and tap the Chat icon. It looks like two bubbles in the bottom bar, and you’ll see a row for my chat inside.

3. That’s it! Jump into my thread to say hi, and if you have any issues, check out Substack’s FAQ.

An mp3 audio of the post below...

Hello, my lovely

I have a theory that creativity isn’t as sporadic and unpredictable as it can sometimes feel. It happens in cycles, rhythms, and patterns that mirror the world around us. It can also be nurtured and cultivated!

For me, two of the most powerful anchors I use in my creative life are:

Tarot cards — little mirrors that reflect back what’s swirling in my subconscious.

Astrological transits — the cosmic tides that remind me I’m part of something bigger.

These aren’t about predicting the future. They’re about pausing to listen.

When I pull a card in the morning, I’m not asking “What will happen to me today?” but “What part of me needs attention today?” It’s a moment of intentional tuning in and it allows me to start my day grounded in my body and knowing what I need to do to stay in alignment with my energy & needs for the day.

Sometimes the cards will pose a question I didn’t even know needed asking, and that’s where it can feel a little bit magical.

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When I notice the upcoming Full Moon in Pisces, I’m thinking about how I might better connect with my intuition and what old patterns might need releasing. I see it as a time to journal, meditate, and practice mindfulness to understand my emotions and identify any limiting beliefs or behaviours.

I also like to use a full moon to reflect on what’s gone well and recognise my achievements and practice gratitude. Even if you don’t believe that the moon has any influence or effect on us, it’s a natural anchor point each month for reflection. It brings us back to cyclical living and a more natural pace to live by.

They’re all anchors.

Simple, small rituals that remind me: I can come home to myself, no matter how scattered I feel.

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The Gold…

What these anchors have given me most of all is a slow gentle building of self-trust. I show up for myself every morning and anchor myself, which means a lot, when my tendency is to feel pulled in a million different directions and get swept up in energies I don’t always feel I have control over.

On days when I’m feeling particularly overwhelmed, I might even take 5 minutes to stop and return to the cards, just so that I can regain that sense of grounded alignment and the feeling that I am in control and I can trust myself to centre and come back in line with what I need in that moment. It works every time!

Ritual is powerful.

Why This Matters for Creatives

If you’re anything like me (neurospicy, multi-passionate, easily swept away by a million ideas), having gentle check-ins makes all the difference.

• A single tarot card becomes a journal prompt.

• An astrological transit becomes a theme for the week.

• A moment of reflection becomes a way to step out of autopilot and into flow.

It doesn’t have to be big or elaborate. Sometimes my ritual is just scribbling words in my notebook while my coffee goes cold. Other times it’s drawing a card and leaving it on my desk, glancing at it between tasks and to-dos.

It’s not about perfection. It’s about predictability born from rhythm.

A free digital downloadable Tarot deck if you would like to explore Tarot cards more..

The Creative Tide Rider Waite Digital Tarot Deck

21.4MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

A Gentle Invitation

This week, try creating a tiny anchor for yourself:

1. Pull a single card (from any deck you have or from the downloadable pack linked above) and see what comes up. I’ll be providing more guidance on how to read cards each week.

2. Ask: “What energy would support me today?”

3. Spend 5 minutes journalling, free-writing, or even doodling and see what comes up.

4. Or, if astrology feels more your flow, check in with the current Moon phase and simply note: Does this feel like a time of beginning, building, releasing, or resting?

5. If you have a menstrual cycle, you can even use your own cycle to anchor into your own rhythm, utilising the different types of energies available to you at different points in your cycle. I’ve always found I can write far better in the period after ovulation and before menstruation, as this is when my energy feels more internal and reflective rather than external and social.

There really are no hard and fast rules. Just an anchor to remind you: you’re allowed to be cyclical, not linear.

I’ll be sharing card pulls and reflections here on The Creative Tide — little rituals you can borrow, adapt, or ignore completely depending on your own rhythms. Think of them as gentle reminders that you’re not doing this alone.

What about you? Do you already use tarot, astrology, or another ritual as part of your creative practice? I’d love to hear in the comments.

With love,

Adele

Hello, my lovely,

Do you find that your creativity has its own seasons?

One week you’re riding a wave, bursting with ideas, filling pages and sketchbooks and covering the place in post-it note ideas that you don’t want to forget.

The next week… flat calm. The tide’s gone out, and you’re left wondering if it’ll ever roll back in again. Or worse, overwhelm and anxiety take hold and you can’t seem to get anything done.

If you’re neurodivergent (like me), those tides can feel especially dramatic. The highs are dizzying, the lows can feel like quicksand. And when you’re trying to run a business as a creative, it can sometimes feel like you’re failing simply because your energy doesn’t look like everyone else’s.

You’re not broken, and you’re not behind.

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Your creativity isn’t a straight line. It’s tidal. It ebbs, it flows. It surges, it retreats.

The problem is, business advice rarely accounts for this. We’re told:

• Be consistent every day.

• Hustle harder.

• If you don’t show up constantly, you’ll disappear.

But what if your business could work with your natural rhythm, instead of against it?

Anchor Points For Your Creative Tide

I’ve learned that when the waves feel unpredictable, what we need aren’t rigid rules — but anchors.

Tiny rituals that tether us back to flow when the tide feels like it’s swept us out too far.

That could look like:

• Lighting a candle before you open your laptop, so the workday begins with intention rather than panic.

• A weekly money date where you pour a cup of tea, check your accounts, and remind yourself that numbers don’t bite.

• A seasonal review where you ask, “What needs composting? What wants to bloom?”

It’s not about forcing productivity. It’s about creating gentle touchstones that remind you:

You can come back. You can return to flow. The tide always returns.

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An Invitation

The Creative Tide exists for exactly this reason: to hold space for those of us who don’t fit the hustle mould.

This year, alongside my other content, I’m building weekly rituals into The Creative Tide. You can dip in when you need support, step back when you need rest, and find rituals that help you anchor your creative business to something deeper than to-do lists.

If you’re curious, stay tuned — the first wave of rituals will be rolling out soon. In the meantime, I’d love to know… What’s one ritual, however tiny, that helps you feel more anchored in your creative work?

Pop your answer in the comments — because when we share our rituals, we remind each other that none of us are navigating these tides alone.

With love,

Adele

An mp3 audio of the post below..

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A mix of all sorts…

Hello, lovely, how y’ doing? This is how I’m most likely to greet you in person.

Yes, I’m one of those friendly Northerners!

I now live on the coast in the South East of England in an amazing art community full of wonderful people. They’re quite friendly too, to be fair.

I’ve had an interesting journey to where I am today and I thought some of you might be interested in getting to know me a bit better if you’ve just landed here.

My Northern Roots

I grew up in the North West of England, so a Lancashire lass born and bred. At 16, I wanted to go to art college but both my parents were having none of it. I was academically bright, which meant that art college was a missed opportunity to get out of the working-class life I’d been raised in (or so my parents thought). My parents saw my capabilities as a chance to earn a living and thrive in life; they didn’t really know any better, they just wanted better for me than they had had.

All I wanted to do was escape my hometown and the only path I could see out of there was leaving for uni. So I did what everyone wanted and studied boring stuff that I didn’t really want to do in the hope of a life somewhere a little bit more interesting.

Oh Danny Boy, The Pipes, The Pipes, Are Calling - 13 years in bonny Scotland

I still remember walking into my first lecture at uni. My stomach dropped “I don’t belong in here!” Everything in me wanted to leave. It was an actuarial maths class (think insurance, pensions and a room full of the most geekiest boys you’ve ever laid eyes on). I knew I was on the wrong course. I felt like a fish out of water.

I persevered for two years before deciding I needed to try and shift the trajectory of where my life was heading. Sadly, my only option was shifting into the university’s School of Management, where I studied the slightly more thrilling topics of accountancy, tax and business. I couldn’t afford to start again, so I made the best of the options I had. As dismal as they were.

I absolutely adored being in Edinburgh! I loved the people I met there too. If you’re ever wondering why my accent is a bit of a mash up it’s because when I asked “is anyone goin’ ‘t' pub” not a single soul understood me! So, through necessity, my accent morphed a little. There’s more to that story, but I’ll save it for another time.

Post graduation, I worked in Professional Services (it was a new form hell) followed by working as an accountant in Finance for one of the big UK banks.

In my mid-20s I had a huge wake-up call. Rushed into hospital for emergency surgery, I realised the stress of work was making me sick. My body was screaming at me to stop!

The Turning Point

Being told it was probably stress that led me to the operating table had me reassess my life in a new way. I looked at my life and realised that I didn’t even want the career I had. I was still doing it for my parents. I started to make plans to go back and study what I’d always wanted to and I shifted the job I was in so I had the time, space and energy to retrain and live the life I had always wanted.

Becoming a Creative..

I studied Visual Communications, a combination of Photography, Graphic Design and Illustration. I loved every second of it! I set up as a freelance photographer and eventually I handed in my notice at the Bank and moved to London to take my first employed job as a Graphic Designer for an agency in Shepherd’s Bush. Since then, I’ve worked freelance as both a graphic designer and a photographer. I’ve designed my own wedding stationery ranges, successfully run a wedding photography business as well as newborn & baby photography business and dabbled in lots of other side quests along the way.

In all honesty, the business and finance skills I thought I didn’t want, helped me a whole lot! I never realised they’d come full circle back to where I am today.

COVID - And Another Major Pivot

During COVID I was specialising in newborn, baby and maternity photography. My home studio had to be shut down and I was going through a period where I was lacking any desire to create. I’d fallen out of love with photography and I felt lost. I definitely experienced a dark night of the soul around this time and it took me a while to find a way through.

Eventually, I decided I needed to return to what I loved and valued most. That was learning and being in education. I found an online Photography Master’s degree with Falmouth University and for the first time in ages I felt excited again.

The two-year part-time MA was such a tonic. My creativity returned and I was creating at such a prolific rate. I can remember thinking, “I can’t ever let this disappear again, it’s what I need to feel alive!”

During my MA, I studied a lot about creativity and methods for accessing creativity and ways to access the subconscious as a means to create from. This is now a huge part of what I want to bring to the world, and I weave it into all my teaching.

Following the MA, I was so in love with being back in education I decided to complete a PGCHE (a UK teaching qualification in Higher Education 18+). The qualification allowed me to teach on the online BA and MA photography courses that I’d studied on and I was absolutely in love with teaching older students who were passionate about what they were learning.

The online environment felt exciting and full of possibilities. Students were joining from all walks of life, located all over the world, the diversity in the room felt exciting; it was such a rich melting pot of experiences and ideas!

I’d found my way back to myself and something I loved.

Uprooted and Re-rooted

A year later, I’ve uprooted my life to one where I get to live by the sea! I’m in a small creative town on the coast, which is full of artists! I work two days a week lecturing in Creative Business (who knew there would be a course so very specifically aligned to the weird combination of topics that I have skills and knowledge of!).

As I lecture my students, I’ve realised that it’s more than just business skills that we need to thrive. We need ways to nuture and tend to our creativity. We need to understand our values and how we can live in alignment with what feels good and right for us. We need to understand how to manage our time and energy as well as our income, whilst staying fully rooted in our self-worth.

If you’re neurodivergent (like me), you might need anchor points and rituals to keep you moving forward with momentum, and perhaps accountability or co-working spaces to body-double through the more mundane aspects of being a creative freelancer. This is what I’m here to create!

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Say hello….

I’d love to hear from the people finding their way here. Tell me about who you are and what brought you here. What type of creativity is calling you at the moment? Let me know in the comments below…