Thank you Sark, au revoir for now.

Sometimes there are moments in life where we are struck with deep gratitude. This weekend was one of those moments.

I have wished for a long time to hold a retreat without stress, drama and with students who are dedicated to their practice and to doing the work on themselves. It felt as if the universe conspired to fulfil this wish and I couldn’t have asked for a more amazing Sark retreat to end my Sark retreating.

A huge thank you therefore to the moon, the stars, the sun, the earth, Sark and indeed all the amazing beings who both supported and indeed attended this last retreat. I am really so grateful to each and every one of you for giving so gracefully of your selves and having the courage to go deeper still. There is a lot to be said for bringing yoga, Reiki and indeed Ayurveda into one’s life as you all beautifully demonstrated and embodied.

A huge thank you too to Helen and the other staff at Stocks Hotel who held us so well (and to Helen who held us as a family at the Chill-Inn) . Stocks is truly a beautiful place, healing and centring sited in that rather ethereal Dixcart Valley and the views of sunrise from the Chill-Inn are rather spectacular! Thank you also to Ana of the Sark yoga community and all the Sark yoginis and yogis for their presence on Sunday.

I started retreating in 2009 to fulfil a dream, initially on Herm and then later on Sark. I’ve held quite a number over the years and each has brought with it its challenges, learnings and joy, laughter and love too. There have been cancelled boats and difficult personalities, my water’s breaking on a super full moon and a lifeboat taking Ewan and I back to Guernsey, noisy venues, last minute changes to bookings, students who have never practiced yoga previously, students who complain or find it challenging to go with the flow and all sorts of other challenges in the background.

My shadow teacher back then told me that the retreats were my way of growing, because they each triggered a shadow for me to look at and try to resolve ahead of the next retreat. I think she may have been right about that.

Because while there have been challenges, there has also been a great opportunity let go and let go again, to realise that I have very little control when it comes to weather and boats and noisy venues, let alone the state of the rooms allocated to students, or even the students who choose to attend the retreats. It has been a valuable lesson in service too. And going with the flow. But ultimately it is about patience and trust and acceptance and detachment too.

I suspect those of you who have regularly attended the retreats can understand all this, because you will each have been triggered too, whether it be around other participants’ behaviour or energy, the food, the state of the room, the weather, or just something to throw you a little bit off balance and bring up your patterns (Samskara) for healing/resolving.

This last retreat though was trigger free - just a delightful group of students, blissful weather, relatively easy boat journeys and a deeper immersion into yoga (and a good dose of Reiki) with lots of laughter thrown in for good measure. Sark was utterly magical, especially at night. I couldn’t have asked for more and I felt a deep level of gratitude, which I had never felt before.

However, I wouldn’t have gotten from there, back in 2009 with the first Herm retreat bringing a cancelled boat and fire alarms waking us in the middle of the night, to here, where everything unfolded so easily, without all of you who have given so much of yourself and attended the retreats over the years.

So a BIG thank you to ALL of you who have retreated with me over the years, both on Herm and Sark, it has been an honour and a privilege to have had this opportunity - thank you for your hearts and presence. But all good things must come to an end, it feels the right time now to let go of these Bailiwick retreats and create space for the new to come in.

I have Chalice Wells Retreat Centre booked for April 2026, which will be offered on an invite-only basis initially to honour those who have dedicated themselves to this practice and path, and then to those who are drawn nearer the time.

There are other rumblings in the background, including a yoga immersion day here on Guernsey in February. Keep an eye out if you wish to deepen into this yogic path.

For now though, a huge thank you again and a lot of love to share - thank you Sark especially, what a magical land you are.

Love Emma x

P.S. Thank you to Charlotte for the photo. x

Feeling stuck?

And with the change, sometimes comes the feeling of being stuck.

Wanting change but not sure what to do to create it?

Feeling stuck in the same old rut?

Think you’ve brought in change, only to find you straight back where you started?

Same old narrative still swirling in your head?

Approaching a big birthday and determined not to make the next decade like the last one?

Weary of taking anti-depressants and still feeling low?

Approaching peri-menopause and feeling a bit sad?

At the root of a lot of this, is the continuous denial of your deeper self, which is trying to get your attention, through this feeling of stuck-ness and groundhog day and boredom and frustration and just feeling that something is off.

It usually is. You’ve usually rejected a part of ourself.

Yoga offers tools to help us. So does Reiki. Ayurveda helps enormously too. These are all spiritual practices, and the more we practice them, the more we gain. Not that it’s all about this of course, of getting somewhere, at least not outside of yourself. It is very much about going inside and discovering what is missing from your life (usually our connection to heart and soul) and somehow bringing more of that (back) into life.

We have tendency to throw parts of ourself away during childhood or teenage years, often in a quest to meet the needs of others, to be what they wanted us to be, denying our own truth in the process. So much of our lives are lived pleasing others and meeting their expectations, teachers, parents, care givers, partners, even friends. Sometimes people don’t want us to thrive, to be ourselves, because it shifts the status quo and makes them feel uneasy because they may no longer be able to control us or feel quite so secure and safe.

But meanwhile we suffer, a part of us dying inside until something happens to wake us up - illness, injury, chronic depression, extreme tiredness, relentless sadness, terrible menstrual and/or peri-menopausal symptoms, infertility, and/or deep grief. All of these are signs that something is off, that we are not in alignment with our truth, not thriving and not living our life as was intended when our soul chose to incarnate here on Planet Earth.

We are all here with a purpose. But often we live far removed from it, caught up in the illusion of the material world, selling out to some false idea and notion of success (this is not your fault, we have been deeply conditioned to this 3-D reality) and meanwhile dying inside.

Some of us do die, too young. We forget our impermanence. Think we’re here for ever. Live for tomorrow. Put it off, we’ll deal wit it later. Buying into the ‘one day it will all be OK’ mentality. But maybe that day will never come?

It is never too late.

Never too late to heal the trauma, ditch the negative inner narrative, let go of false identifies and begin again, start afresh, be more of who we are and less of what makes us feel so lost, broken and/or heavy.

Yoga recommends taking action in a positive direction, doing something different, looking at our self honestly and accepting what needs to be accepted and changing what can be changed.

Reiki offers us the opportunity to heal ourselves with our own hands and to raise our vibration supporting our personal and spiritual development - just becoming attuned changes things, we start to shift our perspective, let go of the old, allow the new to trickle in.

Ayurveda is huge too. Changing our diet can make a huge difference to our wellbeing and connection to ourself, let alone adding in a few lifestyle changes to support our positive transformation.

All of this can be experienced by signing up for Spiritual Life Coaching. This has really changed things for some of my clients. They have started to come alive again. They have healed. They have spoken about their dreams for the first time in years. And some of them have even started living them. All of them though have found a deeper connection to self, cultivated a more positive attitude, trust, faith and become increasing grateful for the small things, to make a difference, heck some are even loving themselves now, being kinder, saying no, better boundaries, improved relationships, sleeping well.

It’s quite amazing what happens when we face our fears and take the leap, when we step out of our comfort zone. When we make the choice to unstick ourselves and try and live a better life, a happier life, a more peaceful life, a more contented life, when we decide we are done with our suffering and meeting the needs of others beyond our own, when we are tired of our own self-depreciating crap and realise that we only get one chance at this precious life.

If you are interested, if you want to tap into this major lunar standstill approaching in 2025 and the huge energy of change it is bringing then take a look here, start to value yourself, start to invest in yourself, look at where you are spending money and realise how much is spent needlessly, supporting more of what is out of balance, start to make changes, start to orientate towards your dreams and accepting your beautiful and marvellous YOU.

Love Emma x

Embracing change!

That was quite some storm which passed through as we head to the solar eclipse tomorrow. Today is so calm in comparison, the dark night, argued as being the most intuitive part of the moon’s cycle, likened to the day before us women may bleed, many an insight can come through if we are quiet and listen.

We are reminded of course that all of life is subject to change. The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali talks about this – Sutra 2.15 proposes that our suffering arises from our resistance to change.

We are encouraged to accept changes and not allow our underlying patterns around consistency and control fight against it. We don’t know. And we are never truly in control.

Acceptance then is key. The Sutras has something to say about this too, in 2.1, when Kriyā yoga – the yoga of action - is presented to us and offers us tools to navigate these times of change and the choppy waters that such times can bring.  There are three components:

Tapas – meaning to heat/purification. We are encouraged to make a certain effort towards doing things that are positive and constructive and in the right direction such as getting on our yoga mat, eating better, getting more sleep.

Svādhyāya – reflection. This can include reading spiritual texts and reflecting on these as a guide.

Iśvarapranidhānāni – surrender – the idea that we are not ibn control and the world does not revolve around us. This includes our acceptance of our place in things, and recognition that there is something higher than us.

We are reminded – like karma yoga in the Bhagavad Gita – to do the work without attachment to the fruit. We surrender to that – do as an offering for the greater good -most of the time we have a motivation of gain.

We are reminded to let go of things that don’t work out and in the process change our attitude. We are also reminded that change is inevitable but we can learn to make the most of it, reducing our suffering which in turn offers us a more peaceful state of being and indeed living 

It does feel that this eclipse season is trying to encourage change. I can certainly feel it and am excited by it, being open to what the universe now wishes to co-create, and letting go in the process.

I find myself dropping deeper into my practice and beginning new yogic studies, eating better, getting more sleep, immersing myself in more of what sets my heart alight, and letting go of ways that cause stress (driving on Guernsey!). It’s a work in process. But I am trying to make certain effort.

Beinspired embarks on its first women’s series this evening, having started its first Opening to Self-Love series which was delightful on Sunday. We have more exciting offerings ahead. We have our last Sark Retreat next weekend, and a provisional booking for a retreat at Chalice Wells in Glastonbury in April 2026, and more ideas for future locations whirling in my head.  There is another opportunity to become attuned to Reiki in early December – albeit there is an also an online offering.

Yoga wise, I hope to have some more recordings soon to help those of you practice at home. Albeit we are encouraged to work with a teacher directly, so we don’t fall into bad habits, and my intimate classes have been well received in this regard and of course the Monday evenings and Friday morning drop-ins. There’s another Spiritual Rejuvenation this Sunday. And more Vedic chanting coming soon and a new three-week Breath Well series for those who need to maximise their prana and positively shift their vitality.

Lastly, the Spiritual Life Coaching is really helping people to embrace change. It incorporates Reiki and Ayurveda and various other tools and really makes a difference - we can only stay stuck so long until we fall into sickness and bouts of anxiety and depression. We don’t need to. Every moment of every day we have the choice to set outlives free and life differently, thrive! See the website for all these offerings!

Enjoy the new moon and the solar eclipse and I hope you can flow with the changes it ushers in.

Love Emma

Ultra Processed foods - we have a choice

I’ve recently finished reading Chris van Tulleken’s book, Ultra Processed People: Why do we eat stuff that isn’t food…and why can’t we stop, link to buy off Amazon here, which is both hugely validating and very scary.

It has concerned me for some time that increasing numbers of people are eating ultra processed food (UPF) to the extent that it has become more of the norm (in our busy lives) and for some people there is little choice as they live in food swamps where access to fresh food is minimal. It is perhaps not surprising that we are becoming increasingly sick as a society, not that the powers that be will acknowledge the connection.

In fact this is what scares me the most - that people are actually producing data to validate the need for UPF. these are people who are prepared to compromise on people’s health and wellbeing simply to make money. You have to be so careful with research - scientist can prove anything in their favour if they so wish and as our society now places them on pedestals, we can fall for their crap.

It’s a no brainer in my world - we are what we eat. Therefore eating UPFs devoid of any actual life force is certainly not going to help us thrive. We have to remember that we are energy first and foremost, as is nature, and nature provides us with all we need to thrive. We have to think in vibrational terms. A strawberry grown at home in the moon and sunlight, with love and care, if likely to taste a whole heap nicer than a strawberry grown on a mass level in depleted soil, covered with pesticides and picked with little love.

Of course it’s even worse with UPFs as they are not even real food.

The problem is that life is busy and many people live their lives in their heads, devoid of connection to their body, and have very little awareness of how much the food they eat negatively affects the way they feel. Furthermore lots of people are poor and cannot afford to eat well because sadly UPFs are often cheaper than proper food.

And of course UPFs are addictive, which means that people easily get hooked - look at Pringles, one of the classic addictive foods, developed with that very notion in mind, there is not one healthy ingredient in Pringles, even the way they have been shaped has been designed purposefully to maximise the taste buds on your tongue and cause you to want more - ““once you pop, you just can’t stop”.

Obviously all this UPFs is leading to changes in our relationship to traditional foods as well as creating chaos in our bodies, with increasingly levels of obesity and type 2 diabetes. Chris is keen to highlight that this is not our fault. We are sold the idea that UPFs are somehow good for us, affordable, plentiful and making our lives easier because we are spared the time is takes to prepare foods from scratch - sod the fact our body struggles to digest them and our overall wellbeing is negatively impacted, let alone the impact on traditional society and our ecosystem.

Sadly it all boils down to money. We live in a capitalist, patriarchal and consumer society and most people are driven solely by the idea of making money. They don’t care so much about our health and well-being, not really - a hard realisation to accept, I know I struggled, we have this tendency to think that people all think the same way we do -= they don’t!

Even those food stuffs marketed as healthy which you might find in Hansa might be ultra processed, containing ingredients that have been manufactured to take the place of more traditional (and healthier) binds and thickeners. The vegan craze was the worst. Yikes. It certainly isn’t healthy to eat those vegan products, a marketing dream thought, these fads.

I was saddened to read how many animals are bred, tested upon and therefore suffer, in the process of making UPFs.

I was also saddened to read how many people sell out to these big corporations and actually feel that they are doing a positive thing when they introduce indigenous cultures to these products, encouraging obesity and dental issues in numbers never known previously, when traditional foods were eaten. Even the Amazon has not been left untouched.

Mind you we are all contributing in some small way. if we’re not buying these products and therefore creating a market for them, then we might be invested in them, especially thorough pension funds.

And we wonder why the world is in the state it is in.

I was heartened though to read how many people are trying to make a differences who are not selling out to the broken system, who want to see positive change in the world and are prepared to do something about it, be they lawyers, activists, economists, doctors, nutritionist etc, people who actually care about their fellow man and this beautiful planet we live on.

I wa also heartened to read about a study which validated that children know what is best for them to eat. I am not talking about UPFs. I mean proper foods. Left to choose intuitively children knew when they needed to eat more tomatoes or fish or potatoes or whatever it might be, they knew how to make themselves well using food as their medicine. They take about food lags, where children will eat say a tomato at each meal for a few weeks and then suddenly they stop. This is not fussiness. This is them knowing that they have taken all the vitamins and minerals from the tomato that they need and are ready to address another lack instead.

Ayurveda has always recognised this. It is tried an tested, 5,000 years old and it too works on the premis that whole food are best and food can be used not only as a medicine but as a preventative, supporting optimal digestion and immunity. When I was given the choice for a blood transfusion following Elijah’s birth, I turned it down and chose to heal myself through food instead. A staunch vegetarian at that point, I was literally salivating at the idea of red meat and followed my body’s need to eat this until the desire dropped away, putting my morals to the side, realising that I was going to of little use to Elijah sick, especially breast feeding - and my iron levels returned to normal - a few months later and I went back to my staunch vegetarian ways!

I have food lags even now. Times when I want to eat say a ton of pumpkin seeds and then that desire drops away and I crave almonds instead, or whatever it might be. Ultimately our body knows what it needs. But the trouble is, our mind often gets in the way, or our emotions, and we eat for a myriad of reasons, not always healthy - in fact often not healthy, which is what leads to weight and other health issues.

Chris highlights the costs to our health of UPFs which I have summarised here:

1. The destruction of the food matrix, UPF food is generally softer, which means you eat faster and eat far more calories per minute than say a traditional meal. Potentially this reduces facial bone size and density and leads to bone and dental issues.

2. UPF is high in calories by way of fat and sugar and low in fibre so negatively impacts the body’s digestive system.

3. Whole foods are displaced from the diet, especially among low income households - this because UPF is usually much cheaper than whole foods.

4. Taste is disrupted when consuming UPF, which negatively impacts metabolism and appetite and can lead to over eating.

5. UPFs are often addictive and designed to be so - think of the of Pringles, which might lead to ‘one you pop, you just can’t stop, until you pop’. Inevitably overeating of UPFs leads to obesity and type 2 disabetes.

6. The preservatives, emulsifiers, modified starches and other additives negatively impact the body’s microbiome and can lead to increased suspectibilty to inflammation.

7. UPFs play into our busy lives, because they are marketed as convenient and at an atrcativce cost. No hours spent slaving away in the kitchen cooking from scratch and the time and money spent buy-in the ingredients in the first place.

8. The additives and physical processing affect brain and endocrine function, and of course the plastics used affect fertility.

9. And of course we cannot ignore the fact that the product methods lead to environmental destruction, increased carbon emissions and plastic pollution to say nothing of the harm to us.

It saddens me that not more is done to regulate this industry. Maybe the health services wouldn’t be so over run if people realised the connection between what they eat and their health and wellbeing.

The only way things will change - beyond government intervention and legislation - is for each of us to take responsibility. We have the choice of what we put in our mouths. We have the choice to thrive by remembering that we are what we eat.

I shall be forever grateful to Carol Champion and my Ayurvedic doctor for not only educating me, but inspiring me to make positive changes to my diet, which massively changed the way I felt and created a passion for good food.

But it is my Mum though, who I really have to thank. She is the best cook I have ever known and has always made us food from scratch which not only tastes amazing but oozes love You just cannot put a price on that. It’s her fault really that I struggle to eat out. No one makes food like my Mum and I don’t like not knowing what ingredients and products are being used in kitchens, let alone whether food is microwaved (yuck) or prepared/made by people who are not oozing love. I don’t want to eat that crap!

You see we are not only what we eat, because our digestion is also affected by the way food is prepared and cooked for us. Food made with love tastes very different to food made with anger. I like to eat well. I like to cook from scratch for my family. Some days I might make three different meals meeting everyone’s needs and the shopping and preparation takes time, but it is a form of meditation, and it helps to ground me as much as it helps to nourish my children. It is worth the sacrifice in other areas of my life.

I highly recommend reading Chris’ book, especially if you struggle to let go of UPFs. It’s not your fault by the way, they are designed to catch you and get you addicted to them - they want your money!

Love Emma x

Happy Equinox from Rousay!

Looking for seals

We are on Rousay for the Equinox. This because there are a number of cairns aligned to this solar event. Many of them are ruined however, yet the island retains the energy, we could feel it overnight and into the sunrise this morning.

Beautiful heather

Rousay is a wild place, the kind of place that this family loves. A hilly island, 3km north-west of the Orkney mainland, Rousay has been dubbed ‘the Egypt of the north’ due to its wealth of archeological sites - the reason we are here!

Untouched pebble beach, over a few fences to get here

Smaller than Guernsey with an area of 18.8 square miles, it is the fifth largest island in the remarkable Orkney archipelago. It is sparsely populated - only 250 inhabitants, which is a draw for us, living amongst 62k of people on busy Guernsey, which I certainly struggle with at times. Even Sark doesn’t always provide quite the same ‘getting away from it all’ experience - but I am grateful to have that magical island on our doorstep (and there’s still one space available on our Sark retreat in 3 weeks).

Midhowe

Elijah Midhowe Broch

Inevitably here the wildlife thrives - several parts of the island are designated Sites of Scientific Interest (SSSI) with a RSPB bird reserve too. Eben especially has loved seeing the seals. And has been on constant look out for the otters.

They move fast!

Love a derelict boat or house to investigate

For me Rousay is cairn heaven and I was delighted to find that we are staying - quite by chance - next to Taversoe Tuick Cairn. This two-storey cairn was discovered in 1898 and is the only double decker cairn in Orkney, and only one of two known to have been built in this way. Should you be interested, you can read more here.

The boys at Taversoe

We’ve visited the other cairns too of course. One of the most famous is Midhowe, which is huge and now contained within a hangar to help preserve it. Despite it’s modern situ, it still retains the ancient energy, as do others which have also been subjected to cement roofs for preservation reasons such as Blackhammer and Yarso.

Eben trying to perfect his handstand at Taversoe

There’s tons to explore here from the Neolithic stuff to the Iron Age broths, Viking graves and abandoned churches, crofts, farmsteads and even a boat!

Eben’s energy doubles in the cairns - here at Taversoe

Yarso - everyone suitably non plussed!

We chose to get out on the land, exploring what we could of the coastline and the beautiful heather clad moors, out to visit Yetnasteen, a seven-foot standing stone. I’m going to miss this wild walking back home.

Looking for a stone

Yetnasteen menhir

It’s a fascinating place, very much alive, and reminding us of the simplicity of life, and a slower pace, for now at least, no doubt the hectic pace of Guernsey will catch us soon and we’ll be back into it - but these pauses are helpful headspace providers and with that an opportunity to see things differently, look at where change may be helpful, certainly an increasing move towards simplicity and living increasingly lightly, I am astounded how much waste this family creates in a couple of days, and a drive towards greater patience:-)

What was a cairn - looking for the standing stone

Wherever you are, I hope you enjoy the balance that the Equinox encourages, and the insight it gifts.

Love Emma

Happy full moon eclipse from Orkney!

Sun, moon, sea, stones and family. Orkney is heaven. This after a fantastic few days in Findhorn with some sensational yoga teaching courtesy of Louise - can’t wait to share - and river and sea swimming, and of course Recumbent stone circles in Aberdeenshire (shall spare you the photos) and lots of playgrounds. Hope the moon is blessing you too and let’s see what the eclipse brings - they have a habit of changing things so let’s flow with it and trust.

Moon setting this morning over Hoy

The ring of Brodgar

Elijah running at Radwick

Famous Dwarfie Stone on Hoy

Us at Dwarfie

Eben at Radwick

Ewan and boys exploring Hoy while Mummy is in the Dwarfie Stone!

Not sure boys as excited as Mummy at Dwarfie!

Thank you Orkney. What a memorable full moon eclipse day.

Love Emma x

That annoying thing called imposter syndrome

I have many talented clients who are keen to offer Reiki or other holistic and trauma-based therapies, teach yoga and/or write books, but let the imposter syndrome get in the way.

This is a syndrome which essentially tells you that you are not good enough to offer whatever it is that you are wanting to offer, that you don’t know enough, aren’t clever enough, expert enough, knowledgeable enough, that you don’t have the right qualifications, that you won’t be able to do a good job, that compares you to others and concludes that there’s too much competition anyway and that you will never be able to make a go of it etc.

But really when it boils down to it, it shows that you just care too much what others think of you and that you don’t recognise your own magnificence.

It also shows that you don’t trust spirit and/or have faith in whatever it was that gifted the idea in the first place.

And that you are Ok about selling out on your heart.

It might also indicate that you have forgotten that we co-create in this life and it is about so much more than you.

We let our ego get involved.

This is the self-depreciating ego which tells us that we are not loveable, or good enough, or enough of this and that, or too much, or whatever other negative self-depreciating inner narrative we repeat over and over again and make manifest in our lives simply because we are always seeking validation of this negativity and embedding it deeper into our psyche and belief system.

If we look for trouble, we will see only trouble.

If we look for love, we will see only love.

If we look for validation of our uselessness, we will see it everywhere.

It is all about perspective.

And we have a choice.

We can keep limiting ourselves with all this negative crap, or we can choose to shift our mentality to something far more positive and expansive and live our best life.

It’s not our fault. We have been conditioned since birth to question ourselves, to doubt ourselves and to be down on ourselves.

We are constantly criticised for not being intelligent enough, or quick enough on the sports field, or arty enough, or musical, or thoughtful enough, or kind enough or polite enough, or not wearing the right clothes, or saying the right thing, or walking down the corridor correctly, or sitting still, or any of the other many, many ways that we are told how to be and judged for behaving differently.

No wonder so many are so tired.

This trying to be what others want us to be and this caring what others think and the hyper vigilance this requires, is really rather exhausting. It creates so much insecurity, anxiety and depression. It causes us to lose our centre, close our hearts and, at times, think we are negatively losing our mind.

Consumerism thrives on this insecurity. It thrives on our externalising of our worth. Of caring too much what others think. People make millions selling products that we are told will help us feel better about ourselves. Even in yoga, it has become all about the building or the mat or the clothes we wear, and this when yoga is absolutely an internal practice.

But that aside, it is crazy isn’t it, to base our self-esteem and sense of self on other people’s fleeting thoughts. Watch your own mind and ask yourself, “what thought will I think next?”, and watch the constant stream of thoughts that appear from the ether in all their randomness. Thoughts come and go. The trouble is we give them far too much energy and believe that they are a concrete representation of reality. They aren’t. So why on earth we care what other people are thinking about us or the opinions they hold one us (which are just thoughts) is quite beyond me.

If we don’t care about our own thoughts - and we really shouldn’t, especially those self depreciating ones, then why on earth should we care about other people’s thoughts? And this to the detriment of our experience and quality of life.

Because when we care too much, it stops us fulfilling our potential, it limits us and it keeps us stuck. And slowly a part of us begins to die, to give up, to feel hopeless, to accept our miserable lot. We close down to excitement and joy, we let our head drop, we drink more wine, eat more junk food, watch more TV, spend more time meaninglessly scrolling through social media, we might manifest illness and we tell ourselves all sorts of stories to justify why we won’t bother trying to move our life forwards and step into our power, share our gifts with the world, just yet.

Sometimes we are scared of failing. Or scared of our potential success.

Somewhere though, we have forgotten that there is a bigger picture.

You see spirit works through us. It wants to co-create with us. It needs us to be the channel and vehicle to bring more heart and soul onto this planet. The trouble is we block this flow by getting in our own way.

We make it all about us, rather than the people who may benefit.

We forget our place in the cosmos.

Maybe I am lucky. I didn’t intend to teach yoga or Reiki or offer Ayurveda. I only signed up for my yoga teacher training course because I wanted to immerse myself in yoga. Together with Reiki it had quite literally saved my life and I wanted to learn all I could about it. I also wanted everyone else on the planet to practice yoga because I knew how much it might help to ease our individual and collective suffering.

It was the same with Reiki. My Reiki Master had to really encourage me along to the first attunement session as I didn’t feel good enough. I was quite sure that the Reiki wouldn't work for me and when I was the only one in the room who didn’t feel a thing during the attunement itself and certainly didn’t see colours or have a sense of energy beings, i concluded that I definitely wasn’t good enough.

But alas a seed was sown and I found myself attending the Level Two training. It was the pendulum dowsing that got me really. I just couldn't believe that it actually worked for me. It was life changing. I slowly started to connect with, and trust, my intuition. It helped that I had by then started receiving spiritual life coaching using Reiki and the Reiki had been working its magic in my life, this to the extent that I wanted everyone else on this planet to benefit.

It was the same with Ayurveda. It felt like magic. I couldn’t quite believe how changing my diet in such an ancient way and taking some medicinal herbs could create such a profound difference in my energy levels and my relationship with myself. The pre-menstrual symptoms which had plagued me for years dissipated. The cysts on my ovaries healed. My disordered eating eased. The overwhelm and accompanying depressive moments abated. I was sleeping better. My digestive system was consistent. I wanted to learn as much as I could. I wanted everyone to try Ayurveda.

And so I ended up teaching yoga and Reiki and becoming an Ayurvedic lifestyle and nutrition consultant simply because I wanted others to experience the benefits for themselves.

I felt as if I had been given these incredibly sacred gifts and the only way I can truly thank the powers that be, is to share these gifts with others. My teachings and sharing then come from a place of deep gratitude.

Not only that, but I realise spirit is just moving through me. I don’t own any of it. Even Beinspired is not mine. It came in at just the right time and it has shaped itself.

The moments when I take myself too seriously, make it all about me, or try in some way to control things, especially Beinspired, is the time it all goes to pot. That I have learned the hard way.

And yes of course, I too have suffered imposter syndrome. Every time I offer something new, I can feel a creeping of anxiety and start questioning my ability and hear myself saying something like, “who do you think you are offering spiritual life coaching, do you really feel you have the qualifications/training/knowledge to help coach others spiritually, and can you honestly charge people for what you are offering?”

I hear those thoughts.

But then I also know that the idea to offer spiritual life coaching was not about me, it was about the people who may benefit from my sharing my passion for yoga, Reiki and Ayurveda, and all the many spiritual practices I have explored these last 20 off years. That is not supposed to sound arrogant, as if I am better than anyone else, I am not. But with all that I offer, it just suddenly comes in as a possibility, I haven’t gone searching for it.

The yoga teacher training course was the first of its kind and arrived on my penultimate day in Byron Bay when I was wondering what to do next with my life, but knowing that I wanted to continue immersing myself in yoga (you can read more about this in Namaste and From Darkness Comes Light). The Reiki came in by encouragement from my Reiki Master. The Ayurvedic training was encouraged by my Ayurvedic doctor. A part of me was cynical - they just want my money. But I know now, as I do this to others, that it is never about the money, it's an intuitive nudge, because you know that other person will benefit - if I have been badgering you to come to class, or do a Reiki attunement or consult with me for Ayurveda, this is the reason, something is telling me that you will benefit!

In many respects I have felt that I have had little choice. My yoga teacher told me to go back to Guernsey and start teaching yoga. My Reiki Master encouraged me to establish Beinspired and start offering Reiki. My Ayurvedic doctor was super keen for me to offer Ayurveda and did all she could to help me. These people are conscious, they have benefitted themselves from these spiritual practices and they also see the bigger picture - that we are co-creating with the divine, we are playing our role in positively shifting the vibration on this planet. We have incarnated at this time in history for this very reason.

So each time I come up against imposter syndrome, I acknowledge it and sit with it. Where is it coming from? What is the fear? And how is my heart feeling?

And as long as it still feels aligned, my heart sings, my intuition is nodding, then I’ll go for it anyway.

I’ll put on my big girl leggings and I’ll face my inner demon.

I’ll trust in whatever it was that gifted me the idea or the nudge in the first place.

I have learned a ton of lessons along the way.

At my first yoga class no one turned up. I went home and cried on my Dad’s shoulder. But I didn’t give up because something was telling me that I just needed to be patient, that Rome was not built in a day, that we all have to start somewhere, that it takes time for people to find their way to you.

And they do.

I have learned to trust in that.

That the right people will find you. That the universe will connect you.

Sure, it helps to advertise, to make people aware you exist. But people will come when the time is right - and for both of you, because it’s a two way process - I learn something from every single client and students who has entered my life.

I have also learned that you can advertise as much as you like, but if you have some resistance within you because you are letting imposter syndrome get in the way then people will not find you because on some level you are blocking them, you are also manifesting the validation you need that you are not good enough so let’s back out now while you can. I have sene this happen lots of times, people make it all about them again.

We have to be careful with our thoughts as they do create our reality. So shift your thoughts. And pray. Pray for assistance. For the most perfect situation for all parties.

I have also learned that we are not in control.

And that we should never base our self worth on external validation such as the number of students in our class or our busy schedule.

Just like we should never look to someone else to make us feel whole.

Or look to love to save us.

Or someone else to make us feel safe.

Or assume we need a community or tribe to feel as if we belong.

Our primary relationship in this lifetime is with ourselves. That much I have learned.

We come in on our own and we will leave on our own. This is the journey of OUR soul.

I know this with absolute certainty.

We can hear the powers that be if we are still enough, quiet enough, gentle enough.

We just need to learn to trust in what we hear, and cultivate greater faith in ourselves and in spirit in the process.

We need to cultivate self-belief. We have to learn to love and accept ourselves. This takes hard work. No one else can do it for us. It doesn’t matter how much money you have, you cannot buy this. Sure others can help you, but only you can really make the inner changes.

We need to switch off and switch in. People love eating energy. Protect your energy. Don’t give it away or let others steal it.

Faith is our protection.

Discernment is our weapon.

I have also learned that we should never have an attachment to outcome. If we do, we will never write that book, or run that course, or offer that treatment.

We do what we do for the love of it, for the sheer joy of the creative process.

We leave others to receive our offering in their own way. We are not responsible for this.

We have to let go of our idea of success or healing or whatever it may be.

We cannot control outcome.

We cannot make someone better if they don’t want to be better.

And we need to remember that we don’t all think and feel the same. So just because we might feel a certain way after say a yoga class or a Reiki treatment, doesn't mean that others will feel similarly. Some may like it, some may not.

And the other lesson I have learned is not to personalise everything. Someone doesn’t come back to yoga. Big deal. That’s their choice. Maybe that one session was all they needed to move them forwards in their life, maybe they can’t get a baby sitter, maybe they have to work late, maybe yoga is just not for them. We don’t need to make up stories that revolve around us, “oh I don’t think they like my style of teaching, oh I am such a rubbish yoga teacher blah blah blah.

Who cares!

Do what you do, offer what you offer, for the sheer love of it.

Stop caring what others think.

And put your energy to loving yourself more instead. Of being your greatest friend.

I have spent thousands of pounds on various trainings, workshops, courses and treatments over the years, but one of my best friend’s gave me the greatest advice for free. He told me to stop caring what others think. No one had ever told me that. Not one single person. or if they did, I didn’t hear them. I started putting this into practice and I couldn’t believe how deep the conditioning around caring what others think. Every time I was triggered, when I traced it back to source, I realised it was always about caring what others thought. I cannot tell you how liberating it has been to work with this and stop caring. It automatically tightens boundaries and helps you value yourself - and - it increases interestingly your compassion not least for self, but for others, because you see how much they suffer by caring too much what others think.

To the extent they don’t live their best life.

And this, to me, is a real tragedy.

So too the fact that they are denying others the benefit of their gifts by not sharing them - it’s like a form of stealing.

If you are reading this, then the chances are that you too have something to share. That you have a passion for yoga or writing or holistic therapies or whatever it may be and that your life has been touched positively to the extent that you would like others to benefit from what you have to share, be that your healing hands, your story or just your ability to listen.

So my advice is to share it. Notice the self-depreciating and limiting thoughts and do it anyway. Dig deep. Find the courage. Trust in whatever it was that gave you the idea. Cultivate faith. Pray for assistance along the way. Please don’t deny others the benefit of whatever gift you are here to share.

If it helps then I am happy to work with you to move you forwards, but remember that I cannot do it for you. You have to do it for yourself.

To help others.

To liberate yourself. Fly free.

To raise the vibration on this planet.

And boy do we need it!

Love Emma x

Healing the witch wound

I’ve been wanting to try to heal the witch wound for a while now. Many of my clients tell me how much they struggle to find their voice, or be authentically seen by others, or put themselves out there in the world, playing it small instead, diminishing their emotions and intuition, all of this because of an inherent fear around being seen and heard, which in many cases is a hang over from the witch trials.

Furthermore, many find it challenging to truly believe in their healing capacity. They might be drawn to earth energies, plants and nature, but don’t have the confidence to work with them. Others are told they are “too much” or “not enough”, all of which lays heavily on them and prevents them feeling they can be themselves in the world.

So a group of us ladies, 18 in total, joined together at the stone circle on my folks’ land near Vazon. Dad and I established the stone circle many years ago now but I haven’t really used it much as the energy hasn’t been quite right, but I couldn’t put my finger on it and my sister in law in Australia has used it much more on her visits to the island - some of you may well have sat in circle with her there.

It is a lovely space nestled within the trees and quite by chance my Dad decided to move the stones around and add a few more without realising that he was shifting the energy and making it into something I had wanted all those years ago, but hadn’t realised until now - there is a timing to everything!

So now the circle has 19 stones, like the stone circles in Cornwall. This because the ancients had an interest in understanding nature’s cycles and harmonising earth and the cosmos.

Thus the placing, design, mathematics and orientation of ancient sites were all carefully calculated to embody the eclipse cycle, the anomalistic year, the solstices and cross-quarters of the year, lunar phases and probably longer-term cycles such as the sidereal and synodic cycles of the planets.

Furthermore, the ancients had a double calendar - solar and lunar. The solar calendar was based on the solstices and equinoxes while the lunar calendar was anchored in the lunar phases, of which there are around 12.5 cycles per solar year. The lunar and solar cycles synchronise once every 19 years and this synchronisation is called the Metonic Cycle.

The solar calendar relates to the seasons of the year and the lunar calendar to cycles of tides, water levels, rainfall, light at night and natural fertility. The coming of spring or autumn is determined by the sun's cycle, yet the visible changes, when flowers come out or the leaves fall, birds migrate or the weather turns, are timed by the moon - particularly at new and full moons. A 19-stone circle thus embodies the integration of solar and lunar calendars, also indicating an interest in eclipse cycles.

The Encyclopedia Britannica defines this as:

...in chronology, a period of 19 years in which there are 235 lunations or synodic months, after which the Moon's phases recur on the same days of the solar year. The cycle was discovered by Meton (floriat 432 BC), an Athenian astronomer.

The Metonic period of 6,939.6 days, almost exactly 19 years, is equivalent to:

• 19 solar years,

• 20 eclipse years (cycles of eclipse positions),

• 235 synodic months (cycles of lunar phases),

• 254 sidereal months (lunar orbits),

• and 255 draconic months (lunar conjunctions with its north node - eclipse-related).

Our stone circle is as circular as possible (some stone circles are flattened and egg shaped as this creates a certain energy), like Merry Maidens, and now contains 19 stones to celebrate the meteoric cycle. It feels right. I cleansed it, called in the guardians and felt held by the ancestors. It is a beautiful space.

We left a stone free for the witch yet to come…and sat around the fire together, enjoying its warmth and indeed energy. We threw rosemary onto the fire to remember our ancestors and those who were burned alive. Then we breathed and used our voice to chant, sitting silently before writing down our fears and burning these on the fire.

We came together with intent and it is intent which changes things. We worked with intent to make our own manifestation and/or healing spell, which we each took home to hide amongst draws and allow the magic to enter in, not trying to control it. We finished by holding hands around the fire, oracles cards and some treats.

I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only one who felt a deep connection to our ancestors and left the session with a lightness in my heart and a determination to reclaim the feminine - the true feminine, not the women’s empowerment masculine equivalent, which sees women more exhausted than ever before, trying to be all things in the name of empowerment and feminism.

Don’t get me wrong, I am grateful to all the crusaders before me who have tried to change things, but I feel it is time now to honour our divinity and our goddess nature and let go of all our crappy patriarchal, religious and political conditioning, and honour our truth and essence - be our true selves.

I will be holding more fires at some point this season so do look out. There might be some wand making at some point too.

What is the Witch Wound?

The Witch Wound is an inherited, collective trauma that is rooted in the dark history of the witch trials and manifests as a fear of being seen, speaking up, and stepping into your full magic and power.

This was all thanks to a famous book called Malleus Maleficarum, The Hammer of Witches written in 1468 by Heinrich Kramer, an Inquisitor of the Catholic Church and was first published in Germany in 1487 where it circulated Europe before making its way to Britain. Its purpose was to find and essentially flush out women and men who were believed to practice witchcraft and therefore ‘dance with the devil’.

It fuelled a frenzy of fear and suspicion that overwhelmed society for three centuries. Many innocent people were accused of witchcraft, tortured and executed. Those who knew them were forced to testify against them including children, family members and friends - or be tortured themselves. 

During this time, tens of thousands of innocent women and men across Europe were imprisoned, tortured, and executed in the most inhuman and brutal of ways: burning, beheading, drowning, hanging.

Some of these victims were healers, midwives, wise women and men, and diviners who served their communities. Others were just people who were too outspoken, too old, too rich, too poor, too beautiful, or too ugly, or in some way a threat to the establishment.

It is fair to say that of them were victims of patriarchy, capitalism and religious tyranny.

Our ancestors who survived these dark times carried the memory of these events not just in their minds, but also in their bodies. Their fear, their grief, their shame, their survival instincts have been passed down through the ages, and now live on in our blood and bones.

This is the legacy of the Witch Wound, which exists on a soul and cellular level. Of course it also exists on a societal and cultural level too. Even today, the toxicity of patriarchy, capitalism and religious tyranny lives on, restricting our self-expression – those of us Reiki attuned are not allowed to practice in St Martin’s Community Centre, for example, as the land is owned by St Martin’s Church.

Here on Guernsey, anyone convicted of being a witch was burnt alive at the bottom of Tower Hill in St Peter Port. In an 80 year period from 1560 to 1640, 44 people were burnt at the stake and 35 were banished from the island for life. It is said these methods drove many of the witches even further underground and meant the island's sorciers stopped writing down their art.

Is it any wonder that those who were witches in previous lives might stay small and quiet to stay safe? That they might have a fear of speaking their truth and denying the innate healing qualities that they possess?

The trauma lies deep in our DNA, passed down through our ancestors. Even now our children are taught to fear the ‘wicked’ witch, that witches are evil.

But witches are not evil. Witches are those who claim their Earth-blessed birthrights of spirituality and magic, who connect with the cycles of nature, worship the planet, who use herbal remedies for healing and believe in the power of positive energy and intent to create positive change.  They are generally intuitive, creative and work with the forces of good, the elements, the moon and the stars to help others and the planet. 

Witches are not the ones we should fear. Instead, it might well be the men wielding the torches.

Love Emma x