Hey, and welcome to This Creative Life - conversations with creatives on creativity and how can cultivate, inspire and nourish our creative souls. We’re back for 2022, and I can’t think of a better soul to start the year off with than Dr Marion Piper.

Marion is a Creativity Coach and Copywriter based in Melbourne, Australia who is so damn passionate about creativity - she lives and breathes it. We had a deep chat about the beginnings of her creative life, and how it led to her studying a PHD in post traumatic growth which she discovered through the simple act of creative journalling. We also explore the mind-blowing concept that it’s not about time, it’s about energy when it comes to prioritising creativity, the creative process and how we all manage to skip a step in some way, and she shares the most perfect advice for creating on your own terms.

In today's ep, I chat with best selling author/writer/strategist, award winning creativity coach, tarot reader, meditation teacher, podcaster and all round good person, Jerico Mandybur, based in Sydney, Australia. Jerico's musings on introspection, perfectionism, cringe, social media and liberating ourselves through creative audacity are bound to leave you feeling inspired and ready to take on 2022 after recovering from the truly creatively challenging year that 2021 was.

This is the last ep for 2021! This podcast has been so creatively cathartic for me - every conversation leaves me feeling more inspired, more passionate, more open, more playful, more connected to my creativity - and I hope you feel this too. I hope you feel called to create. Thank you so so much for your support this year.

In today's ep, I chat with Jade Rennie, designer and owner of The Brainchild, a design studio based on the South Coast of New South Wales, Australia. Because we're IRL friends, our convo goes to many places - flowing from tangent to tangent beginning with Jade's creative journey of building an incredibly successful 1 woman design studio, to exploring how mental wellness can impact our creativity, running a business, motherhood and everything in between in a really refreshing and relatable way.

In today's ep, I I chat to award winning multidisciplinary designer and illustrator, Lou Wright of Well Fed. We talk in depth about her creative journey and her love of being a creative, and Lou also shares candidly about what led to her diagnosis of adult ADHD, and how she creates day to day with this superpower - as well as the importance of prioritising health and rest in creative business.

So today, we're having a much deeper, creative sesh - I chat with London based, award-winning hypnotherapist and coach for creators, Jessica Boston. Jessica shares her creative journey as an artist and illustrator in Barcelona, to becoming a hypnotherapist and creating her amazing mediation album "This Feeling Is You", and we talk unfiltered about creative mental health and how to overcome the blocks that all creatives experience - perfectionism, comparison, consumption and failure. By the end of this ep, I guarantee you'll be feeling seen, heard and held, and hopefully more connected to your creativity.

P.S.: Sorry for the audio quality - it was too good of a convo to scrap it and start all over again!

In today's ep, I chat with designer, Edila Stace-Smith of Blank Tela Studio.

Whilst we explore the many curiosities of creativity - from whether we're born creative, to what creativity looks and feels like, and everything in between - this ep is for the multi-passionate creators. Ed shares her multi-passionate revelations, stemming from her early love for fashion and how it inspires her when she's designing brands and websites and the infinite possibilities being a multi-passionate creative brings - and how to embrace your multi-passionate nature.

In today's ep, I chat with designer, photographer and content creator, Eloise Jenkins.

Eloise shares so openly about her relationship with Instagram and how she navigates all that comes with being a content creator, what lead to her recent Type 1 Diabetes diagnosis and the lessons it has taught her when it comes to running a balanced business as a creative, and tips for keeping creative and taking charge of the work you want to do and who you do the work for.

In today's ep, I chat with designer, Sian Richardson. Sian is a force of nature and a straight shooter - what you see is what you get - and she shares so openly, unapologetically and unfiltered (just a warning, there's some f-bombs in here). We talk about the start of her creative journey in New Zealand to now, living and roadtripping in Canada, how she creates on her own terms, how staying true to her style and voice has impacted her biz and how a life lived in nature is her fuel for creativity.

Today's ep is a biggie and full of so many gems. I chat to Helen Koker, creative director, graphic designer and photographer, about quite frankly everything (including our favourite biscuits - but that's for another ep!). This is a conversation I think we all need to hear right now with everything going on in the world whilst we try to juggle our creative projects with our creative wellbeing. Helen's sage advice on staying inspired, prioritising rest and play, owning your talents and putting your mental health first is so uplifting, and I really hope this chat uplifts you too.

KEEP CREATIN' ☺️

I'm so thrilled to share such a big and bright conversation with designer and author Olivia Herrick today. Olivia is a Minnesota-based graphic designer with 11 years of design experience, and she runs Olivia Herrick Design, a multidisciplinary design studio. She's a mama who also plays competitive golf, loves spending time in nature, a vegan, and a self-confessed chronic optimist.

Simplicity and ease in design is her main goal. Her Instagram feed is filled with her bright, punchy but deliciously simple style and design that is instantly recognisable and uplifting - there's at least 6 of Olivia's graphics scattered on my vision board and within journals.

I chose Olivia to be my first guest on This Creative Life, because her course was a catalyst for me in recognising that I had stopped prioritising my creativity a long time ago - and that I needed to essentially rebuild it from the ground up. This podcast is just one of the by-products of that rediscovery!

Enjoy!