Heart and Soulcraft

01/08/2025

OK, I think it's about time we talked about cake!!

As a child, cake was my happiest thing....but during the perimenopause my body stopped being able to handle refined sugar and wheat flour, so cake became less of a pleasure! That is until Kia (my daughter, and cook for my upcoming Womens Retreat in West Cornwall) started creating 'alternative'cakes.

At last, I can have my cake and eat it!!!

She and I have both been perfecting our wheat free, dairy free, refined sugar free cakes and sweet treats over the last few years, and look forward to sharing them with you.

Obviously I'm not trying to bribe you with cake, but I do still have a couple of spaces left on the aforementioned Retreat, and that includes 6 days of cake 🥰

29/07/2025

I've been visualising my upcoming Women's Retreat; seeing a group of heartful women sitting around a firepit, with a gentle log fire burning, letting go of old stories and learning to tell new ones.

I see this group of women walking down through a tree-lined country road, with the sweet smells of early autumn on the air, to plunge into the silky soft turquoise ocean, letting the water wash away their worries.

I see us walking in prayerful silence along an ancient path, following the footsteps of our wise and wild ancestors to a circle of stones; sitting with our backs to a chosen stone, calling in clarity and power, and re-awakening our innate wisdom. I see us seeing eachother; witnessing this re-awakening and bursting with pride and joy and love for the beauty and courage and resilience that blossoms when we have space to be our most authentic selves.

And I see me, after you've all gone back home, lighting the fire in celebration of our time together, giving thanks for the depth of trust and openness you brought to this circle, and feeling truly blessed to have been able to hold this space for you to come home to yourself in.

If you see yourself as one of these women please do reach out to me. There are still spaces available for this delicious Cornish Retreat, from Sept 21 to Sept 27 in far West Cornwall

23/07/2025

Is one of your core values "Caring"?

If it is, how good are you at setting boundaries around the level of caring you do?

Most of the women I work with are amazingly generous carers of others, and less good at caring for themselves.

I used to have a very negative take on boundaries; I thought they were un-generous! I also thought that putting myself first was selfish!

But, as the cabin crew are always keen to remind us, we have to put on our own oxygen masks before helping others with theirs! Being boundaried around the amount of giving we do and when we do it, doesn't mean we stop being generous and caring. In fact, if we learn to care enough about ourself through setting healthy boundaries, we won't get depleted, and we'll have enough unconditional caring and love to give where it is most needed.

Plus, caring, when it's reciprocal, is totally joyous, as you can see from my face as I receive the best hug from my grandson!!

22/07/2025

So excited to be offering this beautiful Retreat in 2 month's time! I still have a couple of spaces left....might it be just what you're needing? 🥰

20/07/2025

Are you a fan of ChatGPT?

Lots of people have been mentioning it to me recently. I’d like to know what you think! Personally, I am such a simple “old fashioned” soul and my instinct is that if I use it to write posts I’ll NOT be writing the posts, so they won’t be authentic or heartfelt, and you’d be able to tell.

I hate the idea that we don’t know what information we are reading is actually written by a human being. I’d like to let you know that unless I tell you in the post that I’ve got Chat GPT to write it as an experiment, ALL of my posts are my words. A bit like my face!!! It may not be the most polished or classically beautiful, but it is my face; ALL mine – no makeup, no fillers, no filters. I wonder, if it wasn’t, would you see who I really am? Just a thought!

17/07/2025

One of my favourite books of all time is Women Who Run With the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes. I love her re-telling of folk and fairy tales from the perspective of the female psyche; I love how profoundly changed one can be by the deep wisdom these stories convey in metaphorical form. She invites my over-analytical mind to take a back seat so that my heart and soul and gut can do the listening and hearing.

Over the past years I have been painting images that I hope will do the same; invite the soul to feel something that perhaps the mind might miss. This image is called “Mending”. I hope that it speaks to you of mending in more than the literal sense!

14/07/2025

It used to be a pattern of mine that, when I was over-busy and over-whelmed, instead of stopping and giving myself time to replenish, I would force myself on and on, getting more and more overwhelmed until I ended up either hurting myself (sprained ankle, stiff neck, back injury etc) or getting ill.....so I had to stop or slow down.

One of the most useful things I heard in the "Reinvent Your Life" audiobook by the amazing life coach Mel Robbins was that if you see your life as a roadtrip, you start to understand that - as with any roadtrip - there are going to be times when you need to pull over. You are going to need to stop to re-fuel, to have a break, to have a snack, or to check the map to make sure you are heading in the right direction.

If you are ready for a pit stop; if you need to find a way to pull in, have a break and fine tune your directions, do pm me for more info on my womens' retreats...they may be just what you're looking for!

I still have a few spaces available on my 6 day residential retreat in West Cornwall, Sept 21-27 ....and more coming up in March and September 2026.

13/07/2025

What sort of relationship do you have with stillness and silence? I find it's essential for my sanity...but i don't always prioritise it. On evenings like this nature reminds me to stop. And how much richer I feel for having done so 😊

08/07/2025

She who holds you

She is rich in mystery
Cut from ancient stone
With blood drawn deep from holy waters

She rests only to catch a glimpse
Of her shadow
Moon-thrown on the bark canvas

She is magnificent
She strides through dreams
Shedding skins
Whispering of other lands
On feet that leave no sign of passing

When you are afraid
It is she who pushes you over the edge
And runs beside you in the chasm
When you are touched
So deeply you will shatter
It is she who smiles the widest

Let her ruffle your hair
With the winds of change
Let her feed your courage
And guide your steps

Remember her when you feel alone
She will creep through cracks
To hold you

Claire Lucas

05/07/2025

Are you feeling lost, put down, overwhelmed by responsibilities?

Are you ready to remember your wildness, intuition and power to make your own choices in line with your soulpath?

02/07/2025

“I have heard it all my life
A voice calling a name I recognised as my own

Sometimes it comes as a soft-bellied whisper
Sometimes it holds an edge of urgency

But always it says: wake up, my love, you are walking asleep
There’s no safety in that!”

Oriah Mountain Dreamer, form “The Call”

Whether you are hearing this voice as a whisper or as a bull-blooded scream, if you are needing a safe space in which to listen to your deepest calling, my Sanctuary Retreats may be for you!

The next one is Sept 21-27, and I’ll be running more every 6 months…more details to follow.

20/02/2025

Oh how I love these words!

How brave you are for slowing down. For not finishing that to-do list. How courageous you are for not crossing that finish line, because your body said “enough.”

How fearless you are for choosing the quiet of your soul over those voices driving you always towards more.
How bold, how rebellious -
you, out there,
honoring your own natural rhythm,
going against the culture’s breakneck speed.

I want to make heroes of those who slow down.
I want to make heroes of those who listen to their bodies, and do not strive for more than what the soul truly needs.
I want to make heroes of those who do not force or push, but surrender to each moment as it opens.
I want to applaud those who may not be driven towards success as we know it, but instead are nurturing something deep and subtle and needed.
I want to celebrate those brave enough to cease all doing, even for a second, and sit with the ache in their hearts. A task many find harder than summiting the highest peak.
I want to make heroes of those who honor their limitations. Who are unable to keep up with the busy-ness of our times, yet show up to each profound, necessary moment.
Truly, it is an act of courage and rebellion to do any such thing,
in a world demanding you resist your own self, your own rhythm, your own soul.
The paradox is that often when we cease our incessant doing, even for a minute, and listen to that quiet voice within, we discover what it is we absolutely must do, and what instead can fall away.
We finally hear the call towards what serves our soul,
and what then will serve the world. Nothing more, nothing less.
A hero is simply someone brave.
So come, be softly brave.
Be a new, quieter kind of hero.
Few may applaud, it’s true, but your soul certainly will.

Author : Leyla Aylin

Artwork: Sarah Treanor