The honest inconsistency of a true multi-hyphenate

I’ve been holding back from showing up on Substack.

My fingers have hovered over the QWERTYUIOP and…nothing.

Why?

I felt shackled. By the need to be consistent. To have an easily recognisable set of content pillars to share with you all. To have one message.

Multipassionate me, represented by the wonderful Trina Dalziel

My working life is one of the most richly multi-hyphenated of anyone I know. I am happily obsessed with so many aspects of the things I do to make money. I even said to a friend today:

“I don’t want to be apart from the kids and [my husband] for too long…but it would be so good if I could create a time-machine, which gave me a whole week just to sit and create, to walk and think. Where time could stand still whilst this great outpouring of creative endeavour and energy emerged.

It’s the limited pockets of time that are so hard…just because I can “use 30 minutes so much more efficiently since I’ve had kids” doesn’t mean I want to. I don’t want a pocket, I want an expanse.

Oh, for that week of unadulterated creation, where the only thing that stops you is the thing you choose.”

The words I asked Trina to write for me, to represent my work.

When working on my updated website art with Trina, I asked her to hand-write these words for me, as they represent my multi-hyphens. It is a great treat to earn money from nearly all of these, and to earn joy (and frustration) from being a mother. But which to focus on here? And do any of these labels truly mean anything, or should this be a space to explore my feelings around them?

I know I can go to

Kat River

or

Lauren Barber

and expect to read a conversation around motherhood, community and business.

I’d expect to go to

Keris Stainton

and read about money. I’d expect to go to

Anniki Sommerville

and read about midlife. To go to

Claire Venus

and

Writers at Work with Sarah Fay

and learn about writing and Substack. To go to

Jo Elvin

to laugh, to reminisce and to learn. (This is not to say that all these creatives don’t explore more than these main themes!)

---

Should I talk about my work as a coach and mentor?

Or explore how I sometimes wonder if having children was both the biggest gift and also the source of so much profound heart-hurt. Indeed, that sometimes it felt like the heart-hurt made it too much to bear (spoiler alert, it doesn’t, it is worth it: my heart has room for all the emotions).

Or running for a train, rucksack on back, laptop ready to be tapped away at, arriving at Abbey Road, headphones (or “cans” as we refer to them) on, sight reading a new score depicting a scene of immense action or beauty.

Or turning up in a concert hall, rehearsing, stifling a cough, getting changed into your all-black clothes, stage make-up, bowing and performing?

Or days out at National Trust places with the kids, panicking about how expensive coffee is these days, but knowing that my coffee is my happy place and having a flask of coffee makes me feel a bit meh. And feeling guilty that I can’t be happy enough with a coffee in a flask?

Or secondary school classroom teaching, observing and respecting the energy of so many young people whilst creating respectful and essential boundaries?

Or teaching singing?

Or how much I hate making meals for my kids, which makes me sad, as I thought I’d love being that mum who loves her slow-cooker? Instead I just feel like Mrs Skivvy.

Or how much a kitchen disco or doing a “Draw with Rob”, or a walk in the woods and a chat about everything and nothing with my loves is the actual best thing ever.

Can you see why I’ve been getting my knickers in a twist?

---

I don’t know if you’ve come across

Claire Venus

: she’s kind of a big deal around here?!?! (she’s just become a Substack bestseller. I tried to find a post or note where she’d celebrated that…the woman is too humble…) She’s also a dear friend and soul.

She told me today what I (and what you) might need to hear. You don’t need to shackle yourself: that this is the best place to show up in all your wonderfully inconsistent, wonderfully full glory.

Of course she’s right. I always say to clients:

“we want to hear what you have to say! The qualities that make you unique are the whole reason we want to buy from you!”

I want to tell stories: stories about my life, stories about music, stories about motherhood, stories about my own joy and frustration and excitement and creativity. I also want to share your stories: to learn from you, to develop ideas in co-creation. I also need to be wildly honest here: I think I’m a good writer. I think I have a wonderful way with words. And, the performer side of me is saying:

“I want to have some main character energy here: to show off my voice.”

I hope you stick around whilst I find my voice here.

With love,

Laura x