changes

Time to Water Your Roots: The Rise Up Rooted Wellness Symposium

| Sheree

The Natural world – from the heavens to our gardens – has so much to give and to teach us

I just manage to get this note in under the wire as today still is in the month of April. But this month has been a busy one. If not being away dog and house sitting then one of birthday celebrations, as both my babies were born in April. I have also been trying to crack on with a commissioned essay, and managed to present something decent at the final event in connection to my exhibition at the BALTIC.

Coming out of my hibernation into a full on month has had its trials and tribulations. But I know what has kept me on the straight and narrow and mostly full of joy has been my connection with nature.

I missed the sea at the beginning of the month, because I was land locked. But this was an ideal time to appreciate the blossom. Cherry blossom, apple blossom, plum blossom, pear.

I’ve always loved on blossom. The blousy pink and white blooms, just fill me with joy and gratitude. I’ve been putting myself in the path of beauty as Cheryl Strayed would argue. Then once I returned back to the North-East it was time to reacclimatise with the sea after an almost three week break. And it was painful. But I needed to get back in, to get close with her, and remind myself that I am alive. And this life is a gift. The sea, along with nature as a whole, is my medicine. And I feel it deep when I am not taking my medicine, through choice, circumstances or self-neglect.

Nature is always there for me when I’m in need or guidance. And I’m grateful for this connection. Even while I worry that we are losing more and more species and ecosystems, I keep faith and hope that we can work together to recognise and reconnect with ourselves, each other and nature to bring about systematic change to benefit all species, and the generations to come. Even in the little ways we show up for nature all count in the grand scheme of things, I think. This is why I’m excited about

🌳 The Rise Up Rooted Global Wellness Symposium 🌳

Join me on May 15th and let the Natural world lead you back home to yourself!

🌳 The Rise Up Rooted Global Wellness Symposium 🌳

Reconnect with the Earth, Reawaken Your True Nature, and Rewild Your Busy Life!

EVENT AIRS: Monday – Friday, May 15 – 19, 2023

Click here to join now for FREE! 

I’m delighted to be a featured speaker at this free global event, created by my friend Alex Strauss to serve busy people all over the world. The 5-Day Rise Up Rooted Global Wellness Symposium, May 15 – 19, is your invitation to devote a few quiet minutes each day to your own well-being. I’ll be sharing more about my connection with nature and how she helped me fall in love with myself and others as part of a panel of 20+ featured speakers. From these authors, coaches, speakers, physicians, teachers, and healers, you’ll learn practical ways to…

  • Clear space in your life to connect with the healing and uplifting power of the Earth, even when life is crazy busy
  • Find hope and inspiration for uncertain times
  • Learn simple, Natural self-care practices you can use anywhere
  • Boost immunity, beat stress, and re-energize by growing and eating your own organic herbs and vegetables
  • Reignite your creative spirit 
  • Bring the life-affirming power of “forest bathing” into your everyday life (even if you don’t have a forest near you)
  • Attune to the seasons and cycles of the Earth (and stop working against them!)
  • Recognize and apply “life lessons” from the Natural world
  • Become more intentional about the time you spend outdoors…and indoors
  • Embrace the power of mindfulness in Nature to quiet your busy brain

and so much more!

CLICK HERE to RSVP for this free event. When you register, you’ll be notified when my interview and other speakers’ interviews are available to watch. 

This isn’t like any nature-focused event you’ve seen before. During this five-day journey, you’ll learn not only WHY we all need more Nature now, but also HOW to integrate more Nature into your daily life, and exactly WHAT to do when you you do get outside.

Note: This event was created for busy people. None of these pre-recorded interviews are longer than 45 minutes, so it’s easy to watch or listen during the day, whenever it’s convenient for YOU!

I really hope you’ll decide to invest a few hours between May 15 and May 19 with me and the other speakers. I know you will come away renewed, recharged, reconnected, and ready to tackle whatever comes next!

CLICK HERE to register now.

I hope to see you there!

Sheree x

PS – Don’t worry if your bare feet haven’t touched the Earth for months or you’re not a gardener. The Rise Up Rooted Global Wellness Symposium is NOT about any one way to connect with the Earth. Instead, it’s about simple, practical steps we can all take in our day-to-day lives to be healthier, happier, and more peaceful in body and mind. (Some of them can even happen while you sleep!) CLICK HERE to RSVP now.

PAD/ 027 – Taking a risk

| Sheree

When is the last time you took a risk? How did it work out?

being an archive

oh it’s so sad/ she said/ when reading about slavery

oh it’s so wrong/ she said/ to anyone who’d listen

I listened/ to her going through the motions/ performing

they say peonies are showy flowers/ blousy bursting blooms/ for the show

at least peonies sense when it’s their time/ chance/nature to keep shut and wilt

PAD/023 – empty

| Sheree

The last thing I emptied was my heart

I emptied my heart of lies and shame.

Took out the crammed spaces and rot/

carried them all out to the trash.

It was decluttering to the max of my heart/ of my love – for others/ for myself

I tell, you I haven’t felt better. Heart beating full-blood-red.

Like a new lamb to the slaughter, I’m showing up in my day to day/ jumping/

Springing/ heart open and bleeding.

PAD/022- You have a choice

| Sheree

You have a choice.

Like the dandelion

flowering within the edge

of a verge or between pavement slabs,

you have a choice.

Arousal. Finding joy

in life, is not something

someone else can give to you.

You must take it.

Like breathing.

Like the tulips coming

up for air, right here. Right now.

You have a choice.

An electric current swirling

always, through you.

Between you and the cherry blossom

bursting into pink glory.

To live from this bounty,

you have a choice.

PAD/ 021 – Let’s say …

| Sheree

Let’s say you find yourself going down to the sea shore each day. Each day you’re there at a different time. At the sea shore, you find the space to let go, to surrender yourself to the moment.

The sea pulls you like a magnet, a magnet you cannot resists or pull away from even if you tried. And you don’t try because you feel as the light touches each crest of wave, rolling them with gold that your soul is fed love.

Let’s say, along the sea shore, you also take off your shoes to get closer. You might feel the damp sand between your toes. You might also feel the cold bitter water tingling your toes. You prefer the warmth yet you move further into the ebb and flow. You allow your ankles to be caressed. You allow your flesh to moan.

PAD/019 – i am becoming my mother

| Sheree

Commentary: years ago I wrote a poem titled ‘ i am becoming my mother’. I think it’s in my first full collection Family Album, Flambard Press 2011.

A few weeks ago while attending one of my late night across the Atlantic poetry group workshops, I had an inkling to revisit this poem with the intention of bringing it up to date. To try and incorporate all the ‘Sherees’ that have developed, spored since the first poem, since my mum’s death and teachings have passed into decades gone by.

So I created this piece. Same title but definitely more expansive.

i am becoming my mother

Dehumanising the Black woman. Mammy, Jezebel, Sapphire, Bitch.

The black woman is seen as one dimensional; the mule of the world, carrying the heavy burden of mothering all others except her own.

Her own children are lost; lost to the auction block, the ocean, the noose.

A Black woman is a source of strength and love. Passing on power as well as pain.

Her body carries stories, carries histories, carries an archive.

as a black woman,

resting deep within the meadow,

held in softness,

grass tickling shins,

dress billowing about

like blossom,

is a political act.

PAD/ 017 – for god’s sake, we must stop this coloured invasion

| Sheree
Stop the Coloured Invasion Protest Meeting, Trafalgar Square, London, 1959. Taken from Black Britain: A Photographic History, Ed’s. Stuart Hall and Paul Gilroy

a white banner shifts against Nelson’s Column, ‘KEEP BRITAIN WHITE.’

a bright white suspension of unwelcome and hate

ladies and gentlemen with heads turned up as if taking direction from God himself, listen to the message

from a man, on the platform, with Union Jack legs

as if whiteness and rightness runs through him like quickening sap/

the threat is real murmurs through the crowd/ a gathering searching for answers to stop the invasion

let me enter the scene/ from the extreme right/

let me mingle at the back/ near the man in a flat cap

let me feel the heat of the air/

let me sense the crackle of fear in their white, wholesome bodies

my body would be one of those coloured they want to stop

my body would be one of those aliens they want to exterminate

but what they don’t care to know is that this body belongs to a love evangelist

who’s at pains to show them how love can save us all

if only they’d part their ways and let me through