Prompted by Nature – Détails, épisodes et analyse

I'm thrilled to announce that Prompted by Nature has been shortlisted in the podcast category for a Bookshop.org Indie Champion Award. This was completely unexpected and I immediately felt sick when I got the initial email a couple of weeks ago!

I wanted to record a quick episode to share this news, and a little about my writing sabbatical, with you.

Thank you for listening and supporting this podcast. I'm so happy you're here; I'll be back soon (and remember you can always find me on Substack www.promptedbynature.substack.com , on Instagram @prompted.by.nature and my bookshop.org shop is here: https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/promptedbynature )

And of course a HUGE thank you Bookshop.org for recognising the podcast and for having it on your shortlist - it means everyhing to me.

Sending you lots of love,

Helen x

Hello, welcome to series 6, episode 5 of the Prompted by Nature podcast.  I’m your host, Helen, and this is the final episode for some time.  I’ve made the difficult decision to put the podcast on ‘indefinite sabbatical’ so that I can be more present and consistent with my writing.  I have a short solo episode coming up to talk about it but you can get all the updates on my Substack newsletter.  Just search ‘Prompted by Nature’ on the app or website. Onto today’s episode.  Today, I’m speaking with Lucy Power from Rowanbank Environmental Arts & Education.  This is a conversation we actually had before the summer and with summer holidays taking me away from anything other than my kids it fell by the wayside a little.  I’m so happy to be releasing it now though as it’s full of hope and creativity. Lucy is the director of Rowanbank.  Rowanbank Environmental Arts & Education CIC is a social enterprise, combining science with the arts to bring people together to enjoy and learn how to better care for their environment.  They engage people in an imaginative and inclusive way, helping them to connect with and experience the magic of nature. Lucy is a Climate Ambassador with Climate Outreach, and has been awarded a Churchill Fellowship in creative climate communication and education. Lucy is a qualified Forest School Leader and an EcoHomes and BREEAM Assessor. Lucy is also an aerial performer and teacher for All or Nothing Aerial Dance Theatre and Dance Base, Scotland’s national centre for dance.  Lucy has worked successfully with schools, community organisations, government agencies and the private sector. In this conversation we discuss: What Rowanbank is and how it came about How Rowanbank merges art and science to make environmental education more accessible and exciting The Natural Flights of Steps and the part it plays in Rowanbank The importance of carbon literacy and finding a variety of ways to teach this Rowanbank’s commitment to sustainable transport Rowanbank’s collaborative approach to creating stories Sustainable costume design The advice she would give to her younger self What she has coming up that she’s looking forward to You can find Lucy on her website www.rowanbank.org.uk and social media @rowanbank_environmental_arts Episodes that would go really well with this one are: 1.13a Dawn Nelson, Rewilding the Self through Storytelling 5.6a Angeline Morrison, Folk Music as Storytelling 5,10a Moya Lloyd, Building a Creative Community at the Boundary Way Project As always I’m on Instagram @prompted.by.nature, on my website www.promptedbynature.co.uk and on Substack, where you can become a free or paid subscriber - Prompted by Nature. I’ll be back soon with the writing prompt that accompanies this episode.  Sending you lots of love.  Happy listening and I’ll speak to you soon.  Bye!

Episode transcription available here:  https://www.promptedbynature.co.uk/podcast-transcripts 

Welcome to series 5, episode 14 of the Prompted by Nature podcast.

Action point: See episode page on my website.

Substack newsletter: Sign up for the free subscription via the link in the show notes or by searching ‘Prompted by Nature’ on the app. If you’d like to go paid, I’m offering this at 30% off the monthly option until 30th April.

Onto today’s episode!

LiLi K. Bright is a writer and workshop facilitator who’s obsessed with city nature. They write climate fiction and ecopoetry, and their main poetry project is about migration, liberation, London, Freetown, Accra, and the painted lady butterfly, exploring textile arts as part of their creative process. They love supporting people to connect with nature and creativity by facilitating writing workshops, climate science training and nonviolent communication training.

In this conversation we discuss:

• LiLi’s insights into a multi-media approach to their creativity
• The merging of science and art in their work and the ways in which these disciplines can interact
• Their relationship with nature, how it developed and how it has shifted and changed
• LiLi’s fascination with trees and birds
• Wellbeing for writers and reframing ‘time management’
• How LiLi approaches their creative practice

All link to the website and events that LiLi mentions in our chat are in the show notes on the episode page of the website. You can find LiLi on their website https://cherrytreewalk.com and Instagram @cherrytree_walk

Companion epiodes:

1.8a Ian Solomon-Kawall: Biodiversity, Creativity and Safe Space in Urban Settings

2.1a Avni Trivedi: Reconnecting with the Wisdom of the Body

4.5a Cheryl Duerden: In a Land of Giants, Empathetic Forestry

5.1a Bryony Benge-Abbott: Exploring the Intersections

As always, I’m on Instagram @prompted.by.nature and the website www.promptedbynature.co.uk where you can find upcoming nature writing courses and day retreats here in East Sussex.

Happy listening and I’ll speak to you soon. 

Helen x

A meditation that takes you through the five layers of the energetic body to the space of oneness that we all have.  

First I guide you into the visualisation of moving through each layer surrounding the body and then into the centre of the rib cage, the still, unchanging space in which we can find peace and unity.

You are then left for 3 minutes to focus on this space and then invited to write whatever comes up and through.  As always, no judgement, no expectation, just write in whatever way you feel drawn to at that moment.

Enjoy!

Helen x

Hello and welcome to episode 12 of Prompted by Nature.  This week you are in for a treat as I’m releasing the conversation I had with the wonderful Dr. Sheree Mack a couple of weeks ago.

Sheree is the Project Coordinator for a Heritage Lottery Funded project where she works with Northumberland National Park Authority, Durham Wildlife Trust and the National Trust, to offer opportunities to BAME communities to spend time outdoors to develop and deepen their relationship with nature.

Sheree’s practice manifests through poetry, storytelling, image and the unfolding histories of black people. She engages audiences around black women’s voices and bodies, black feminism, ecology and memory and facilitates national and international creative workshops and retreats in the landscape, encouraging and supporting women on their journey of remembrance back to their authentic selves. She is currently writing a mixed-genre memoir around a black woman's body with/in Nature.

In this conversation, we discuss:

• Her background and time as a teacher in inner city schools
• Her desire to support and encourage BAME creatives in the North East and beyond
• Her own connection with nature and her passion for sharing this with others
• The inspiration behind her Earth Sea Love project and some news about her new podcast supporting this initiative
• The importance of BAME visibility and representation in natural spaces and the marketing of nature-based brands as well as the need to motivate a new generation of black women leaders
• The financial side of accessibility in nature
• Land as holding trauma and associations with enslavement
• Nature as a space of oneness
• Trauma and grief as a manifestation of our disconnection with nature
• Self-care as a revolutionary act
• Love as the source of everything and the importance of being in nature in order to re-connect with this
• Her first memory of nature
• Her hopes for the future and what she would like to pass onto you

Sheree contacted me a couple of months ago and I jumped at the chance of having her on the podcast. We had had the conversation ‘booked in’ about a month before it happened and the week we spoke turned out to be a real tipping point in our history with the death George Floyd happening just a few days before and the Black Lives Matter campaign ramping up with protests and marches across the globe. The conversation then became all the more pertinent and important in discussing the link between social justice and environmental justice.

You can find Sheree at www.earthsealove.com and on Instagram @earthsealove and also Sheree’s personal page www.livingwildstudios.com and on Instagram @shereemackwrites

As always, if you enjoy the interview, please give it a five-star rating and a positive review - it really does help to push these voices out there. And you can find me over on my website www.promptedbynature.co.uk or on my instagram @prompted.by.nature

Remember to stay around until the end when I’ll be giving you a little insight to the meditation and writing prompt that follows this episode.

Enjoy the conversation and I’ll speak to you after!

The Climate Reframe list can be found at www.climatereframe.co.uk

For this meditation and writing prompt you will be taken on a journey to connect with a 'wild' character in your imagination.  This can be used as a creative writing exercise, to develop a character you may be working on in your own writing, or as a journal prompt for your work around wellbeing.

I guide you into the meditation through visualisation techniques, leave you for 3 minutes and then guide you out.  You can use this as a 'traditional' meditation or as an exercise in free writing by using the questions as prompts.

Enjoy!

Helen x

www.promptedbynature.co.uk

Hello! Welcome to episode 11 of Prompted by Nature. I hope you enjoyed your Solstice and were able to make the most of the extra long day!

In this episode, I’m speaking to Jan Stannard, founder of new rewinding charity, Heal Rewilding.

Jan Stannard is a co-founder of Heal, the new UK charity which is crowdfunding for rewilding. Jan has a business background and is a resilience specialist and former coach. She still serves on the boards of two businesses she helped to found. Her work with wildlife has been local and very practical. She founded a swift group which has the world record for the most swift boxes installed in under a year; she was a co-founder of Wild Maidenhead and leads the group's Wild About Gardens scheme; and she project managed the largest installation of amphibian rescue ladders in England. Nature is what makes her heart sing, she says.

Heal's mission is to buy land for rewilding in the English lowlands, to help with nature's recovery, to combat climate change and for wellbeing.

In this episode we discuss:

• Jan’s background and how she realised she could make a difference
• How Heal Rewilding came about and Jan’s desire to create a large scale refilling project that we could all feel a part of
• What Heal is and how it works plus a look into their Heal 3x3 initiative
• The importance of affordability and accessibility and ‘doing this together’
• Definitions of rewilding and some core considerations
• The role of semi-wild animals in the project
• The role of education, young people and their Heal Future initiative
• Creativity and nature and Heal centres as artistic as well as scientific bases
• The need to loosen the grip on gendered approaches to nature e.g. women as caring about nature vs. men as the scientists
• Her advice for staying creative and what she would like to pass on
• And Jan asks me a question

I’m really excited by everything that Heal are up to and the possibilities that it could open up for the UK. If you’d like to donate to the charity, as I did, you can find them at www.healrewilding.org.uk You can also find the team on Twitter and Instagram @healrewilding

As always I’m at www.promptedbynature.co.uk or on Instagram @prompted.by.nature. Remember to stick around until the end of the episode to hear about the meditation dn writing prompt that follows this episode.

Enjoy the episode and I’ll speak to you after!

Helen x

Welcome to my meditation and writing prompt for my interview with Jini Reddy.  For this one, it's more of an explanation.  You'll decide on your own prompt - fractals, patterns, similarities, synchronicities, details, reflections and such - and use a walking meditation to help you to slow down body and mind into a state of deeper 'noticing.'  

At the time of recording we are in the latter part of 'lockdown' and so if you are still shielding, this is still possible to do inside your house, in a community garden or in your own garden.

Please do let me know how you get on - www.instagram.com/prompted.by.nature or www.promptedbynature.co.uk

Happy writing!

Helen x

Welcome to episode 10 of Prompted by Nature. I hope this one finds you happy and well wherever you are!

This week I’m excited to release the conversation I had with the lovely Jini Reddy back in mid-May.

Jini is an award-winning author and journalist, originally born in London to Indian parents who grew up in apartheid-era South Africa. She was in Montreal, Canada and has a passion for writing travel, nature and spirituality. She has been published in publications such as The Guardian, Time magazine, The Times, Sunday Times Style, National Geographic Traveller, and BBC Wildlife to name just a few! Her first book Wild Times, which I highly recommend, was published in 2016 and she is a contributor to the forthcoming Women on Nature anthology.

Her book Wanderland, which we discuss in the episode, is utterly beautiful and charts Jini’s search for the magical ‘Other’ through her travels around the UK. From the blurb, ‘along the way she tracks down ephemeral wild art, encounters women who worship the goddess, falls deeper in love with her birth land, and struggles, but mostly fails, to get to grips with its lore. Throughout the book she rejoices in the wilderness we cannot see and celebrates the natural beauty we can.’ This is a book full of magic and if you’re feeling a bit disconnected from nature, I highly recommend this as a gentle nudge to get back into it and remind yourself that you and nature are both as magical as each other!

In this episode we discuss:

• Her background and her inspiration for the book
• What she means when she talks of the magic in the landscape
• The concept of the magical ‘Other’ and how this relates to ‘Othering’
• Accessible nature and the need to shift the dialogue around visibility in green spaces
• The importance of hearing a range of voices in nature writing
• Following your intuition and the source of creativity
• Writer’s block and how she stays creative
• The link between Belonging and Nature
• Nature as an animate entity
• The joy of being given freedom to what the book you want to write
• The link between travel writing and nature writing
• What she would like to pass on

Before we get started, we had a few connection issues, which you’ll hear in the episode, it doesn’t detract from Jini’s words, but explains if there are a couple of fuzzy bits.

If you would like to find out more about Jini, you can find her on her website www.jinireddy.co.uk and on Instagram @jinireddy20 and Twitter @jini_reddy Jini also offers mentoring and consultancy for writers which you can find out more about via her website www.jinireddy.co.uk/work-with-me

As always, you can find me on the website www.promptedbynature.co.uk or on the ‘gram @prompted.by.nature and if you like this or any other episode, please do leave a five-star review wherever you are listening or share with your circle via social media or in real life. I’m passionate about getting these words and voices out there, so anything you can do to share the podcast is always welcome!

Remember to stick around until the end when I’ll give a little insight into the meditation and writing prompt that follows this episode.

Enjoy the conversation and I’ll speak to you soon!

A meditation centring around envisioning a utopia constructed by your hope and optimism for the future.

I guide you into the meditation and then stop speaking for three minutes.

The prompt is to create a description or other piece of writing around the world that you see in your imagination and to then write a set of action steps that can help to create this world.

Happy writing!

Helen x

www.promptedbynature.co.uk

www.instagram.com/prompted.by.nature