Creativity & Navigating Uncertainty
A 16 week practice-based intensive for re-wilding your creative spirit
2nd November 2021 to 8th March 2022 (with a break for Christmas)
What it is and Why
16 weeks of experience-based learning, exploring how we can integrate the creative principle into all elements of our living.
Live group workshops, practice experiments, peer support, visiting artists and optional weekly Maker's Exchanges. We are living in uncertain times... how can we learn to play and experiment in the territory of unpredictability and flux? There are ways of working with uncertainty that Creativity understands deeply. This course aims to lead you back to the part of yourself that knows all about this intrinsically. There is a generative principle at work in all organic life, that follows a cycle of birth - life - death . It bears little relationship to the false dominant narrative of 'continual growth'. This course will support you to build practices that dismantle these false narratives and grow pathways towards articulating your heart and nourishing our collective dreaming. . . . .
“Magic doesn't sweep you away; it gathers you up into the body of the present moment so thoroughly that all your explanations fall away: the ordinary, in all its plain and simple outrageousness, begins to shine -- to become luminously, impossibly so. Every facet of the world is awake, and you within it.” ― David Abram, Becoming Animal: An Earthly Cosmology
How it works
We will meet weekly on a Tuesday (6pm-8pm UK time), for most of the 16 weeks (there will be a 3-week break for Christmas). The course takes place via a combination of live zoom classes, creative provocations, visiting professional artists, video classes, peer 'creative ally' sharing, home adventures (as opposed to 'homework' ;-) and reflection weeks. There will be opportunities to follow approaches you are enjoying as well as invitations to test out your edges. This course is also about application - so ultimately, you will be supported to bring this new (old) tool kit out of the practice room and into your life. It is set up so you can move as deeply or as lightly through the material as you want. You choose the level of intensity.
"You cannot use up creativity.
The more you use it, the more you have".
- Maya Angelou
Working With Artists...
To help bring some of the themes to life, we will be joined by three brilliant guest artists, each of whom approaches their art making and life in a way that speaks deeply to that adaptive creative principle. The gift of bringing in practicing artists is that they are used to working with uncertainty as a resource. Perhaps even courting it. So we have much to learn from them. [photo of Rachel in rehearsals for Moon Project - photographer: Greg Allum]
Hugh Fox - Week 5
Hugh is an award-winning British photographer. He has worked commercially for over ten years, shooting portraits and documentary projects. He is also a practicing artist and resident of The Phoenix Studios in Brighton.
In 2012 Hugh completed his MA at Brighton University, during this time he worked with his chosen medium of photography, incorporating sound, moving image and sculpture, all of which helped to enrich his practice as a commercial and fine art photographer. The main focus of Hugh’s work is spaces; physical, metaphysical and virtual, how we react and interact within these spaces - what they mean to us, as the lines between these spaces become more and more blurred.
What you are really into at the moment, Hugh?
Learning about the neurodiverse brain.
Images by Hugh Fox
S.A.A.R.A - Week 9
Born in North London, producer, performer and sound artist; S.A.A.R.A, began her career in music as a bass player. Through her involvement in a diverse range of projects she has developed her own unique sound – described as “orchestral funk” (Ollie Winiberg, BBC Essex Introducing).
S.A.A.R.A also experiments with the creation of immersive, interactive multimedia environments that use sound and video to explore the roles of composer and audience, reality and hyperreality. She has led Master Classes in Digital Performance for Brunel University where she recently completed an MA in Experimental Music.
A passionate believer in the power of creativity, she founded CTRL+ALT NOW, a platform to encourage others to take the leap and follow their creative calling.
What are you really into at the moment, Saara?
Ohh toughie... I'm really into galleries being back open - as a space to go and get inspiration, just be quiet or spend time alone. I'm really looking forward to seeing Shilpa Gupta, Sun at Night at the Barbican, 1.54 African Art Fair at Somerset House, and loved Mixing It Up: Painting Today at the Hayward Gallery.
Images of S.A.A.R.A by Dee Haughney.
Monica Gaga - Week 11
Image of Monica by Amar Chundavadra
As seen, heard, staged and featured on BBC Three, BBC News, BBC Click, ITVBe, London Live, BBC History, BBC Radio London, Talk Radio, Global Pillage, The Comedy Store, Hoopla Impro, Omnibus Theatre, Boulevard Theatre, Battersea Arts Centre, Bristol Improv Theatre,The Guardian, Timeout and more...
Monica Gaga is a British-born black African queer improviser, facilitator, host and scripted actor and performer.
She trained in Community Theatre at East 15 Acting School, and her boundless love for improv stems from time spent at Second City in Chicago.
When she is not performing, hosting or teaching, Monica is championing diversity, inclusion and equity in improv and trying to get as many people, particularly POC, involved as possible.
Monica is based in London, UK.
What are you really into at the moment, Monica?
I am loving time just for me at the moment. In the past if my calendar was empty and people asked if I'm available I'd always say yes. Now I'm like sorry, I'm busy that day with me.
Image of Monica by Unai Garcia Ramos
Rachel Blackman - Facilitator
Theatre & Feeling Ridiculous | Embodiment & Somatic Re-Education
Rachel Blackman will be your guide and lead facilitator through out this course. Most of your course content will be either be hosted by or led by Rachel.
Rachel is an artist, somatic educator, theatre maker, trainer and mentor. Rachel has been creating original theatre since 2008 and collaborated as an actor, director and movement coach on many artistic projects for others. Her latest piece is a celebration of the creative potential of failure, called, You Aren't Doing It Wrong If No One Knows What You Are Doing (Tiny Failures) and is a Brighton Festival Commission. She is also an actor & you may remember her best when she had a lot less hair, as Charra in Matrix Revolutions....
(Photo by Hugh Fox - promo shot from the Tiny Failures show)
Being in Community
We learn best when there is also a relaxed social element. So when you join, you'll be offered a peer support group, a community environment via a social platform, and regular connection via WhatsApp. The peer groups will be allocated according to the level of involvement you want ... this might be weekly, bi-weekly or 'now and again'. It can also change as we go. The weekly Makers Exchange sessions are peer run, so we can get a feel of each other's practices and active creative enquiries. [photo by Annie Spratt]
Sounds good...
how do I know if this course is for me?
This course looks at what creative practice can teach us about navigating uncertainty with more courage, playfulness and application. This course is for anyone who wants to rekindle their relationship with the creative, generative principle in any aspect of their life and work. You don't have to want to be an artist or have any experience of being intentionally creative in your life. Curiosity and openness are the only prerequisites.
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[egg image by David Jericó]
'The most interesting moment of a person's life is what happens to them when all their certainties go away. Then who do you become? And then what do you look for? That's the moment when the universe is offering up an invitation saying, 'come find me.' - Elizabeth Gilbert
Course curriculum
11 x live workshops, sessions with visiting artists, reflection weeks, practice weeks, optional weekly Maker's Exchange drop ins, creative provocations, home enquiries, Creative Ally support teams, community - and more...
*Please note that dates/order of sessions are subject to change*
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1
Welcome to the Course!
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What it's All About Really...?
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Welcome Video and Orientation
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2
Week 1. Attention as a Creative, Generative Tool - LIVE - 2nd November
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Week One: Attention As A Creative Resource
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Noticing Where We Are Placing Our Attention - Creative Task
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Focusing tools - Asking the body for creative idea generation - Live Zoom class - 2nd November 2021
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Recording of Week 1 Session
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Recording of the Week 1 session - Audio Only
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Body Listening for Creative Practice
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First Creative Ally meet up.
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3
Week 2. Being with Vulnerability and Discomfort - LIVE - 9th November
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Week 2: Vulnerability and Discomfort
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Neurosis Cocktail Party: All The Reasons Why You Can't, Daren't, or Probably Shouldn't - PRE WORK
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Creative Ally Meet Ups
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Feeling Like An Idiot Practice / Failing at Something that Matters - Live Zoom class - 9th November 2021
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Recording of Week 2 Session
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Week 2 - recording of the live class - audio only
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Beginning a Habit Breaking Habit Practice - daily practice
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4
Week 3. Active Day Dreaming and What-Ifness - LIVE - 16th November
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Intro to Week 3 - Video
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Different forms of Conscious Attention - Pre session reflections & Writing exercise
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Ways In And Down - Not Knowing As Creative Opportunity - Live Zoom Session - 16th November 2021
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Recording of the Live Class - Week 3 Session
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Week 3 - recording of the live class - audio only
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Home Enquiry: Go to Sacred Space and use it as a starting point to generate some creative material
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Creative Ally Meet Ups
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5
Week 4. Practice Week 1
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Week 4 - Practice Week set up
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Photographing what pleases, intrigues or fascinates you
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Date with the artist's work prep video
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Practice Week 1 - Creative Ally Suggestions
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6
Week 5. What An Artist Knows I - Session with Hugh Fox - LIVE - 30th November - LEARNING TO LOOK
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Week 5 - Pre work for Live Session with Hugh Fox
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Week 3 - What An Artist Knows - Live Zoom Session with Hugh Fox - 30th November 2021
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Intro to Week 5 with Hugh Fox
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Recording of Week 5 Session
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Week 5 - Home Enquiry - Take Your Wonder for a Wander Date
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Home Enquiry - Taking Your Wonder For A Wander
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7
Week 6. Reflection Week - Being a Transmitter & Receiver (Recorded session)
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About Reflection weeks - What is the invitation & what is the point of these?
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Reflection Week 1
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Being a Transmitter & Receiver - Set up Video & Introducing Darvish Fakhr
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Being a Transmitter and Receiver - Recorded session with Darvish Fakhr - Part 1
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Being a Transmitter and Receiver - Recorded session with Darvish Fakhr - Part 2
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Home Enquiry: A Giving Less Fucks Practice - Creative Task
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Giving Less Fucks Practice - Set up
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8
Week 7. Opening to the Ordinary and Non Ordinary World - LIVE - 14th December
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Week 7 - Pre-session reflection - identifying sources and lineages
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Week 7 - Pre- session Exploration - Opening to the Ordinary & Non Ordinary World
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Week 7 - Intro - genies Guides & Muses
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Genies, Muses & the More than human world - Live Zoom Session - 14th December 2021
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Recording of Week 7 session
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Week 7 - Home enquiry - Being another 'I'
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9
Week 8. Navigating Obstacles and Road Blocks LIVE - 11th January
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Winter Holiday Bonus Session - Guest Artist - Sophie Abbott
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Week 8 - Navigating Obstacles & Road Blocks - Intro
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Intro video 2 - Week 8 Navigating Obstacles & Road Blocks
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Week 8 - pre session exploration... Taking a line for a walk
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Navigating Obstacles and Road Blocks - Live Zoom session - 11th January 2022
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Recording of Week 8 session - Navigating Obstacles and Road Blocks
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Recording of Week 8 session - Navigating Obstacles and Road Blocks - Audio only
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Week 8 - Home Practice Experiment - Cultivating Curiosity for What is in your way at the moment
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Date with the Artists work - prep
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Week 9. What An Artist Knows II - Live Session with S.A.A.R.A - 18th January - TRUSTING YOUR INTUITION
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Week 9 - Pre-session exploration
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Week 9 - Intro Video
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Week 9 - What an Artist Knows - Live Zoom session with S.A.A.R.A - 18th January 2022
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Recording of Week 9 session - SAARA
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Week 9 Home Practice Experiment
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11
Week 10. Practice Week 2 - Identifying our Story & Our Themes
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Week 10 - Pre-Session Exploration - A Story Experiment.
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Week 10 Over-view video
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Practice Experiment - Considering Your Audience & the flow of story
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Week 10 - Intro to the 2nd Practice Experiment
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Date with the Artist prep
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12
Week 11. What An Artist Knows III - Live Session with Monica Gaga - 1st February
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Intro to Week 11
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Week 11 - What An Artist Knows, with Monica Gaga - Live Zoom Session - 1st February 2022
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Recording of Week 11 session
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Week 11 - Home Enquiry
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Week 12. Problems, Irritants, Inequalities and Injustices - Creation as Transformative Medicine - LIVE - 8th February
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Week 12 Pre Session Exploration
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Week 12 Intro - Problems, Irritants & Injustices
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Problems, Irritants, Inequalities and Injustices - Creation as transformative medicine - Live Zoom Session - 8th February 2022
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Recording of Week 12 session
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Home Enquiry for week 12
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14
Week 13. Reflection Week 2 - being on a useful edge (recorded session)
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Extra Date with the Artist - Brooke McNamara - prep
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Intro for Week 13 - Being on a Workable Edge
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Being on a Useful Edge - with Brooke McNamara (Pre-Recorded Session)
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Home enquiry
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15
Week 14 - Practice Week 3
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Week 14 - Practice week intro
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Practice Week - OPTION 1 - Discipline, Editing and Refinement - Honouring your Audience -
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Practice Week - OPTION 2 - Honouring Endings
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Life Application Intro - prep for next week.
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16
Week 15. Co-creating What Is Already Becoming & Applications - LIVE - 1st March
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Week 15. Introduction - Co-creating what is already becoming
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Alchemy - Your Life as Raw Material - Live Zoom Session - 1st March 2022
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Recording of Week 15 session
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Experiment Circle - Heidi - Recording of the Live session - 9th September 2021
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Week 16. Endings and Celebrations - Onwards Journeys - LIVE - 8th March
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Intro to week 16 - prep and what to expect
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Ritual for Ending And Commitments to Continue - Live Zoom Session - 8th March 2022
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Revisiting our Journey Together - pre-session reflection questions
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Recording of Week 16 session
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CNU3 - Reflection Survey
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What past students are saying....
(scroll right & left to see more)
I now have tools to hear the whispers
I came to Rachel feeling pretty much defeated by the cacophony of critic figures, cop types, dragon teachers and fake parents in my head, who daily insist that I focus on work, get the household chores done, keep myself in a narrow worn groove, never play or risk.
The weeks with Rachel turned the volume down on those voices enough to hear another, offering permission.
Working with care, and with a deep well of experience, Rachel gifts her participants a set of questions, suggestions and rituals that support you to develop a different way of listening to body and deeper self. I now have tools I can use whenever I need them, to hear my own permission, however quietly it whispers.
This course held me and helped dance me
This course is a magnificent act of creation. There are so many layers of discovery, exploration, consolidation and inquiry to be experienced within it. The course had a way of meeting me and inviting me into new territories, wherever I was at week to week. I found I could hold a very light attention on it and still be fed, or some weeks if I wanted I could take a plunge right in and see what was there for me…. Whichever way I approached it, I was met with great rewards of discovery and feeling. The ability for the course to meet me exactly where I was at any time, I put down to the masterful, rich, delicate and deeply felt design of the course, steeped in Rachel's knowledge, experience, care and curiosity. As well as her masterful facilitation skills.
This course held me and helped dance me out of a period of low spirits and depression into an enlivened and deeply centred place of commitment to and delight in my creative agency once again. The course material will continue to feed me as I revisit it over the coming months. Thank you Rachel for creating this course-being, drawing on so many threads of your experience, training, practice and personal inquiry, which have it be such a multi-layered, wholistic, alive vessel for learning.
'I can't recommend this course highly enough.'
I can't recommend this course highly enough. Rather than being just another course on improving creative output, it takes a wholesome approach to transform the ability to live as a creative being in the world. It helped me not only to be more inspired and more confident with my creative work, but also with my overall connection to spirituality and wellbeing. This is partly due to the perfectly picked, placed, and developed skills, topics, and methods, and partly due to Rachel's brilliance as a teacher. She knows how to create a space that feels not only warm, but also safe to show vulnerability in order to transform it. I still use her methods to approach new and challenging tasks, and I still have her voice in my head to remind me to be more confident and playful.
'I wish I could have a course like this always...'
All classes were explorations rather than ‘have tos’, all ‘homework’ was optional, and I did all of it as I wanted to explore, see where a prompt can lead me. Very interesting guests, varied people who shared their own creative processes. I wish I could have a course like this always, to be accompanied and cared for and carried through without intrusion on my own process, in a knowledgeable nurturing way as Rachel is able to do. Also to be reminded, while going through the thicket of every day life, that we have a body, there is a lot more out there and we could just dare: as being creative is everybody’s birthright.
'I got so much out of it - connection, tools and methods, new ideas and inspiration, and plenty of fun'
It was magic! So glad I joined the course, got so much out of it - connection, tools and methods, new ideas and inspiration, and plenty of fun. I loved how immersive and integrated the course was, so that I could see the blossoming of ideas in most surprising ways. I'm still drawing on the wisdom of it all! Rachel seems to be breathing creativity, and designs and holds this (co-)creative space with amazing clarity and grace.
'I honestly surprised myself with my bravery in sharing and making in this space.'
I was kinda blocked last year, had a hunch Rachel might bring just the right amount of humour, curiosity and care to challenge that. Her somatic explorations were a new way of working for me, took me to unexpected and often uncomfortable parts of myself, which of course are a ripe place for creating from.
The open and playful nature of the course was a safe container for student sharing and experimentation and the regular co-practice exploration with fellow students works incredibly well online and some of us have continued to meet. I honestly surprised myself with my bravery in sharing and making in this space. Rachel is incredibly skilful to tease that out of me. I’m most grateful. I put together my first live art piece for Brighton Fringe next month.
'I loved this course...like a magical pop of colour.'
I loved this course. It came along at the perfect time and was a great source of both creativity and curiosity.
It reminded me that creativity is always available even if you think
you’re not that creative.
I started to dream more and see the world more curiously. I naturally wanted to create tiny normal things during my normal day to day life.
It was like a magical pop of colour during an otherwise not very eventful Covid winter.
'It helped me redefine what creativity is and helped me fall in love with my practice again'
I’ve been an artist for 20 years and I thought I knew what an artist was. This course opened up a permissible space, all manner of undiscovered avenues within myself and within my practice. It issued the invitation for honesty, authenticity, mutual exploration with both the teacher and the group members. It was a journey we took together and it changed me. It helped me redefine what creativity is and helped me fall in love with my practice again.
'A perfect blend of structure and freedom, support and allowing to go with your own flow'
Rachel is an incredible teacher who creates a very supportive environment for exploration a growth. The tools and principles she shared in the course allowed me to dive deeper into the nature of creativity and explore it as an embodied experience. The course was a perfect blend of structure and freedom, support and allowing to go with your own flow. I was not sure if the course was for me as I am not an artist, but it is absolutely relevant regardless of what you do and deals with creativity as principles applicable to anything in life. I highly recommend it to everyone, especially if you, like me, are tired of 'creative thinking' as the only way to focus on being creative.
It felt refreshing to free up my own limitations ...and reignite my spark and sense of wonder.
I enjoyed the subtle variety of all the practices. It felt refreshing to have several "ways in" to creativity, to free up my own limitations of myself and reignite my spark and sense of wonder. Rachel has a brilliant way about her- able to encourage, invite, and challenge us all with a deep delight, curiosity and genuine love for this work that radiates.
What's The Investment?
Time, Money and Process...
There are 11 live, 2-hour long classes, 3 1-hour live set up sessions for the Practice Weeks, and about 25 pre-recorded mini classes and creative explorations you can do in your own time. If you can't make any of the live classes, they are all recorded and made available the next day. You can scale the intensity of the course based on how much you want to get out of it. Minimum recommended commitment to get benefit is 2 hours per week. If you're a deep diver, there is up to 6 hours of content you could be engaging with each week, not including home explorations. Of course the more time you invest in the explorations and make space in your life for this work, the deeper your experience and the more value you will get from it.
Regular price is £349. This works out at just under £22 per week and is the recommended price if you are ok for money. Concessions and instalment options are available too. Concession price is £289 and works out at £18 per week - please only choose this option if money is tight for you. If you feel drawn to the course and really can't afford any of these options, please get in touch. There are only 20 places available all together.
[image by Leo Rivas]
Regular price is £349. This works out at just under £22 per week and is the recommended price if you are ok for money. Concessions and instalment options are available too. Concession price is £289 and works out at £18 per week - please only choose this option if money is tight for you. If you feel drawn to the course and really can't afford any of these options, please get in touch. There are only 20 places available all together.
[image by Leo Rivas]
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Like to know more?
If you're interested but unsure about a few things, you're welcome to get in touch and ask me anything you'd like. Before you do, please take moment to watch the video and re-read all the content here to make sure your question isn't already covered.
Rachel x
Rachel x
