"You can claim your space too in whatever art form feels right to you"

In this episode of The Intentional Mum I chat to the incredible Rabya Lomas about reinvention and nurture.

Rabya Lomas is a super talent woman who inspires others through her incredible photography and passionate words and our conversation is no exception. Rabya’s story is such a powerful one. 

We start by chatting about Rabya’s experiencing of returning back to the workplace following maternity and her feeling of being jaded and burnt out. A creative outlet at the time was Instagram where Rabya developed her photography style and found her voice, but found that even in those online spaces she faced the same erasure she was feeling in the workplace.

These experiences led to Rabya publicly speaking out on Instagram stories about her frustration – something which as well as being incredibly cathartic also opened up her own learning and unlearning when it comes to racism. In bringing these experiences to her photography Rabya has made her Instagram into something truly empowering and inspirational.

We talk about the importance of representation and for children from global majority backgrounds to be able to see themselves in leading roles (whether that’s in film or in business), as well as the importance of centring stories on joy rather than just pain and trauma.

Rabya shares her experiences of the workplace and how her ethnicity has impacted on those experiences. We talk about how motherhood changed our perspective on work and the events that led to Rabya’s decision to leave the 9-5 system and the growth required to be able to take that decision. We also chat about predominantly white spaces and the need to create inclusive workspaces. Rabya is passionate about reinventing what work places should look and feel like.

In spring 2020 Rabya created the ethnicity pay gap petition – a petition to the UK Parliament to make ethnicity pay gap reporting mandatory for businesses alongside the existing requirement to to report gender pay gaps.  Rabya’s shares her feelings about the attention her petition received as a result of George Floyd’s murder.

We also talk about self-care and nourishing yourself and the importance of that, whether through cooking, gardening or just taking time offline. This is especially important for mums as we often put ourselves last. Rabya loves solo cinema trips so we have a great chat about going to the cinema for some alone time. This chat brings us onto board games as both Rabya and I are big board game fans.

I finish by asking Rabya what the biggest thing she has learnt from the last year in lockdown and I know her answer will really resonate with you.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Rida Suleri-Johnson @Beforeandagain_
• Ms Marvel
• Spill the Chai
• Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg
• Ethnicity pay gap petition     
• Thor: Ragnarok
• Rocks
• Tenet
• Queen and Slim
• Jojo Rabbit
• Wingspan
• Carcassonne
• Hive
• Spirit Island
• Azuleo
• Forbidden Island / Forbidden Desert

You can find Rabya on Instagram @sheflourished_ on Twitter @sheflourished and on Patreon

Loved this episode? Why not check out episode 4 where I chat to Lucy Lucraft about activism and the importance of self care.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit theintentionalmum.substack.com