Welcome back to Honing In and to my interview with Michelle Pellizzon.

Michelle Pellizzon is a writer, researcher, and intuitive business advisor. Her work spans mediums — podcasting, publishing, teaching — and often explores the liminal space between mysticism and pragmatism. A former professional modern dancer and Feldenkrais practitioner with a background in tech, she blends somatic expertise with creative entrepreneurship.

Here are some of the things Michelle and I discuss:

• Seasons of learning and metabolizing ideas
• How Michelle built and curates an intentional online community for creatives
• Practicing new skills and finding the fun in being bad at something
• Moving with self-awareness through the Feldenkrais Method
• Honing in on what it means to have ruthless clarity and agency

Resources & Links:

• Michelle’s Holisticism website and Instagram
• The North Node community membership and waitlist application
• The Twelfth House Substack and podcast
• Cosmic Valley Girl with Michelle and Emmalea Russo returns this month
• Bunny by Mona Awad
• Notion for organizing projects into boards
• Ira Glass on the gap between taste and skill
• “Use it or lose it!” Dementia research article from Swiss Med Weekly
• Seven of Cups tarot card
• The Feldenkrais Project and their “pelvic clock primer”
• Alexander Technique for mindful movement

SUPPORT FOR CREATIVE THINKERS
⭐ Productivity Coaching with Dr. Kate Henry
💌 Sign up for Kate's twice-a-month newsletter
📚 Download Kate's free Sustainable Productivity Planner

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

Today's episode with Emilia Richeson-Valiente, Creator and Director of Pony Sweat Aerobics, is such a blast. You can tell from our giggles how much we enjoyed our conversation, and as a long time fan of Pony Sweat, I was thrilled to learn more from Emilia.

Emilia Richeson-Valiente (she/her) is a performer, writer, teacher, business-owner, and the creator of punk-feminist aerobics practice, Pony Sweat. She has cultivated a loyal following through her “fiercely noncompetitive” dance aerobics format, which celebrates anti-perfectionism, self-expression, and the liberation of all bodies. Alongside her Pony Sweat work, Emilia writes about music and somatic practices and is published in Dopamine Press's 2025 WITCH Anthology, and she currently performs with her dance troupé Haaagz. From 2017-2021 Emilia performed with the band Object As Subject. She has choreographed music videos for Alice Bag, Hayley Williams, Wallows, and Scrunchies, and has performed her work at Weirdo Night(s), SORORITY, and many many punk shows. She holds a BFA from Emerson College in Boston, and is an AFAA certified aerobics instructor. Originally from WI and VT, she moved to LA in 2006 to pursue her dream of becoming Weetzie Bat. She lives in the San Gabriel Valley with her wife and pup.

Tune in to learn more about:

• Pony Sweat’s origins, evolution, and amazing core values
• Emilia's creative practice of making mixed tapes and dance moves
• How building one project can beget other projects
• Honoring our past selves through music
• The important of creating and protecting a queer-centered space
• Honing in on loosening your grip

RESOURCES & LINKS

• WITCH Anthology
• Object as Subject
• Pony Sweat’s core values
• Pony Sweat’s newsletter
• Across Time + Space online video subscription (Includes Exercising and Listening to Records)
• Pony Sweat’s Instagram
• Pony Sweat’s YouTube Channel

SUPPORT FOR CREATIVE THINKERS
⭐ Productivity Coaching with Dr. Kate Henry
💌 Sign up for Kate's twice-a-month newsletter
📚 Download Kate's free Sustainable Productivity Planner

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

I’m excited to introduce you to Gabrielle Ione Hickmon and invite you into our conversation about art, research, home, history, and how Gabrielle blends them in her creative practices.

Gabrielle Ione Hickmon is a Black woman from a middle place—Ypsilanti, MI. A visual artist and History PhD student at the University of Michigan, Gabrielle's practice is concerned with African American and Indigenous histories, presents, and futures in the Great Lakes Region. As a breast cancer survivor, Gabrielle’s practice also engages illness, disability, and health toward an attempt at clarifying her experience to herself and exploring cancer's intersections with history and culture. She is concerned with breast cancer, its aftermaths, and its impacts—especially on Black women. Her writing has appeared in Vox, Condé Nast Traveler, The Baffler, The Pudding, and Literary Hub. She has exhibited ceramic work domestically and internationally. Her ceramics are in the private collection of the North Carolina Historic Sites Division and the Modern Ancient Brown Foundation. Gabrielle has been an artist-in-residence at Pocoapoco, Mas Palou, Mudhouse, John Bauer Ceramics, the Visual Art Center of Richmond, and the Modern Ancient Brown Foundation. She lives, works, and studies in her hometown, Ypsilanti, MI.

Tune in to learn more about:

• Differentiating projects, practices, and offerings
• Integrating place and family history into an art practice and scholarship
• Calling attention to young Black women’s experiences with breast cancer
• Working with different materials and techniques as a visual artist
• Gabrielle’s rituals and routines in her ceramics studio (this was such a delight to hear!)

RESOURCES & LINKS

• Gabrielle’s website and newsletter
• Gabrielle’s offerings, including Applications for Artists
• WORKING PROCESS podcast
• The Cancer Journals by Audre Lorde
• The Cancer Quilts
• Imerman’s Angels
• Worthwhile Paper Inquire Within deck
• Nala Sinephro (Gabrielle’s reading music)
• Sisters of the Yam by bell hooks
• When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chödrön

SUPPORT FOR CREATIVE THINKERS
⭐ Productivity Coaching with Dr. Kate Henry
💌 Sign up for Kate's twice-a-month newsletter
📚 Download Kate's free Sustainable Productivity Planner

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

*Note: I republished this episode on July 24 to correct an error where I accidentally re-published a solo episode twice. Whoops! All should be good now. Enjoy this convo with Sadie!*

Today's episode is a fun exploration of creative processes with Sadie Dupuis, the guitarist, songwriter & singer of rock band Speedy Ortiz, as well as the producer & multi-instrumentalist behind pop project Sad13. Sadie also heads the record label and journal Wax Nine, and is a founding organizer of United Musicians & Allied Workers and its local UMAW Philly.

Tune in to learn more about: 

• How a personal process can fuel collaboration with other artists
• Sadie's process for building collections of poetry and albums
• The importance of harm reduction in nightlife
• How to best support musicians as a consumer

RESOURCES & LINKS

• Sadie's website
• Sadie's writing
• Poetry is Not a Project by Dorothea Laskey
• Sixteenth Minute (of Fame) Podcast
• My Year in Mensa Podcast
• Couplets by Maggie Millner
• “How the Music Community is Fighting the Drug Overdose Epidemic” (Pitchfork article)
• Be The Place
• United Musicians and Allied Workers
• Living Wage for Musicians Act
• Run the Song by Ben Ratliff
• Calling All Crows

SUPPORT FOR CREATIVE THINKERS
⭐ Productivity Coaching with Dr. Kate Henry
💌 Sign up for Kate's twice-a-month newsletter
📚 Download Kate's free Sustainable Productivity Planner

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

Today's episode is a fun exploration of creative processes with Sadie Dupuis, the guitarist, songwriter & singer of rock band Speedy Ortiz, as well as the producer & multi-instrumentalist behind pop project Sad13. Sadie also heads the record label and journal Wax Nine, and is a founding organizer of United Musicians & Allied Workers and its local UMAW Philly.

Tune in to learn more about: 

• How a personal process can fuel collaboration with other artists
• Sadie's process for building collections of poetry and albums
• The importance of harm reduction in nightlife
• How to best support musicians as a consumer

RESOURCES & LINKS

• Sadie's website
• Sadie's writing
• Poetry is Not a Project by Dorothea Laskey
• Sixteenth Minute (of Fame) Podcast
• My Year in Mensa Podcast
• Couplets by Maggie Millner
• “How the Music Community is Fighting the Drug Overdose Epidemic” (Pitchfork article)
• Be The Place
• United Musicians and Allied Workers
• Living Wage for Musicians Act
• Run the Song by Ben Ratliff
• Calling All Crows

SUPPORT FOR CREATIVE THINKERS
⭐ Productivity Coaching with Dr. Kate Henry
💌 Sign up for Kate's twice-a-month newsletter
📚 Download Kate's free Sustainable Productivity Planner

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

This episode is all about self-efficacy, or our belief that we’re capable of completing our tasks and achieving our goals. ✅ ✅ ✅ 

I dive deep into four key psychological concepts of self-efficacy and talk through how each of them has shown up (or not!) in my past and current projects. 

Tune in to learn more about: 

• Navigating cognitive biases that skew our self-efficacy
• Managing the emotional ups and downs of a project
• The ways self-efficacy affected my creative, academic, an personal projects
• How accountability helps me to keep up with my projects

RESOURCES & LINKS

• Kate's newsletter, Believing You Can Do It: self efficacy and thought patterns
• The Tending Year blog
• Amelia Hruby
• Landscapes co-writing group with Cody Cook-Parrott

SUPPORT FOR CREATIVE THINKERS
⭐ Productivity Coaching with Dr. Kate Henry
💌 Sign up for Kate's twice-a-month newsletter
📚 Download Kate's free Sustainable Productivity Planner

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

Today's episode is an exploration of research, art, and the ways they come together to engage and educate audiences. It was my pleasure to chat with Camila Galaz, a multimedia artist, editor, and creative consultant. 

Here are some of the things we get into:

• How to do studio-based research (this was new to Kate!)
• The layering work that goes into multidisciplinary projects
• The intersection of artistic practice, research, and public scholarship
• Prioritizing an audience’s access point to your creative project
• Camila’s exciting new consulting and advising venture, Structured Knowledge

Resources & Links:

• Structured Knowledge
• Camila's website (check out her art and writing)
• Our Friend the Computer podcast

If you’d like to learn more about my work, check out my website and download my free Sustainable Productivity Planner.

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

If you struggle with building new habits or find it challenging to complete your personal goals, today’s episode is going to be a breath of fresh air! I’m thrilled to chat with neuroscientist and entrepreneur Anne-Laure Le Cunff about her new book Tiny Experiments.

I love how Le Cunff makes scientific frameworks accessible for non-neuroscientists like me, and I found her book to be inspiring and refreshing in a sea of books that ask readers to hyper-optimize ourselves. Le Cunff's approach to experiments rooted in curiosity, discovery, and self-compassion—which we need more of when it comes to productivity!  

Here are some of the things we get into:

• When to choose an experimental mindset over traditional goal setting
• The difference between projects and experiments
• Viewing “failure” as helpful data (instead of judging ourselves)
• How curiosity is necessary for experimenting
• Learning in public (one of my favorite chapters in the book!)

Resources & Links:

• Ness Labs newsletter
• Order Tiny Experiments here

If you’d like to learn more about my work, check out my website and download my free Sustainable Productivity Planner.

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

Welcome back to Honing In and to my interview with Rebecca Maillet.

Rebecca Maillet (she/they) is a queer, working class, first generation farmer / floral designer / and a seeker of Poetry in its myriad forms. She is the Founder & Creative Director at Many Graces Farm & Design based in Hadley, MA, and a co-owner of Sub Rosa, a Botanical Lounge & Flower Shop located in Northampton, MA. Rebecca lives in Western MA on the unceded land of the Nipmuc & Pocumtuc people with her beloved partner & their dog, Goose. 

You can learn more about Rebecca's work at Many Graces here and about Sub Rosa here.

This episode covers many things, including:

• Poetry as a lived experience
• Leaving academia to pursue self-employment
• Working with the land and the seasons
• The joy of creating beautiful spaces
• Aligning our purpose for our work with our values

Resources Mentioned

• John O'Donahue's Discussion on Beauty
• Many Graces Flower Subscription

If you’d like to learn more about my work, check out my website and download my free Sustainable Productivity Planner.

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.

Welcome back to Honing In and to my interview with Kalin Morrow.

Kalin Morrow is an American actress and dancer based in Europe. She earned her BFA in Performing Arts from the University of Oklahoma before futher studying acting at the Mulholland Academy in Amsterdam. In 2023, she was honored by her alma mater with the Arts Luminary Award in recognition of her contributions to the arts. Recently, she garnered critical acclaim for her role as The Hooded Woman in NEON’s film CUCKOO, directed by Tilman Singer, and now works internationally in film, tv and commercials. Beyond acting, Kalin is a professional dancer with over 20 years of experience. She continues to perform while also teaching workshops and repertoire internationally for companies and schools. In 2024, she was awarded the prestigious Swan Prize for "Most Impressive Performance" at the Dutch Days for her role in The Previous Owner by Dunja Jocić. 

You can learn more about Kalin here.

This episode covers many things, including:

• Kalin’s journey as a dancer, teacher, and actor
• Making art as a collaborator and contributing to other creators’ projects
• The mental, emotional, and physical preparation for a performance
• Energy exchange when performing for live audiences
• Finding inspiration and support in community

Resources Mentioned

• Kalin's Dance Reel
• Kalin's Acting Reel
• CUCKOO
• The Previous Owner

If you’d like to learn more about my work, check out my website and download my free Sustainable Productivity Planner.

Big thanks to Softer Sounds Studio for podcast editing and support.