High Tea - flashback post

So right before I left my dear friend Violet and I finally threw ourselves a high tea that we had been talking about for over a year. When I say "we" threw I really mean Violet threw for me as a going away celebration.

I've been so caught up in everything Nashville since I've been here that I completely forgot that I had all these gorgeous photos from the afternoon and all the yummy treats that she whipped up for us.

The cute vintage teapot and the beautiful weather we were treated to.

Doing things before you're ready - my Youtube channel

So this is something I've been thinking about a lot lately. I'm a firm believer that messages come to you when you need to hear them and this one has been coming at me a lot lately.

Since I've been in Nashville I've been really focusing on writing songs, refining, editing, making sure that they are the best that I can possibly make them before I put them out for feedback from other people.

There is an inherent problem with this though and that is that they may never be "ready". I do this in a lot of areas actually. For over a year I have been meaning to get into the world of Youtube. It's the biggest music discovery service out there and while it's not the only component if you're not on there at all... You get the idea.

Speaking of ideas, I have lots of them, lots of song ideas, lots of blog ideas, lots of video ideas, and yet for the last however long I haven't posted a blog, I've been working on but not released (to anyone) any songs, and I have yet to start my Youtube journey.

Not good.

I got an email recently from a good friend and trusted mentor, Steve Palfreyman, about just this topic.
He summed it up beautifully:

"The funny thing is, I'm not short of content.

I'm not short on ideas.

And I'm certainly not short of confidence to speak to you.

But I am scared of delivering anything sub-par.

I'm scared that what I put out into the world won't be amazing."

Steve sent this out because he figured, and I'm sure he's 100% right, that this is an issue all creatives suffer from. The solution to this of course is that if something's stopping you from doing something, do it anyway!
There are a lot of people that can explain this better than me, Joel Runyon for example.

The bottom line is that I decided to do it anyway and as I made this decision I had another magnificent article come across my path that reinforced something else I was afraid of and was in fact the reason behind me delaying. As Steve says I didn't want to put out anything that was perfect, or not even perfect that wasn't good.

Then I read this:

Moving Toward the Ugly: A Politic Beyond Desirability

There's a lot of content in there and it is all fantastic, but the thing that stood out to me in this regard was this,

"Our communities are obsessed with being beautiful and gorgeous and hot.  What would it mean if we were ugly?  What would it mean if we didn’t run from our own ugliness or each other’s?   How do we take the sting out of “ugly?”  What would it mean to acknowledge our ugliness for all it has given us, how it has shaped our brilliance and taught us about how we never want to make anyone else feel?  What would it take for us to be able to risk being ugly, in whatever that means for us.  What would happen if we stopped apologizing for our ugly, stopped being ashamed of it?  What if we let go of being beautiful, stopped chasing “pretty,” stopped sucking in and shrinking and spending enormous amounts of money and time on things that don’t make us magnificent? "

This hit home for me. What was it that made me think that whatever I put out there wouldn't be good enough? It was this. That I wouldn't be pretty enough, skinny enough, funny enough, polished enough. That I, it, the whole endeavour would be some form of ugly.

So, I did it anyway. It's ugly and unrefined and messy in every possible way but it's done and hopefully, in it's own way, magnificent.

*EDIT* apparently the link didn't attach to the screenshot so here it is: https://youtu.be/zB7qwXXaKrI

x

Snow, Ice, and over a month since posting. Whoops.

Oh dear. I had grand plans for blog updates but as it does life got in the way.

I keep thinking about whether to write about what I've been doing or how I've found the changes and it's all been a bit hectic and crazy.

So instead here are a few pics that made it onto Instagram just in case you missed them and in the meantime I will collect my thoughts and get back on track with posts.

The amazing Jeni's ice cream. This one was Salty Caramel and 

Askinosie Dark Milk Chocolate with Salty Graham Gravel