Ep54 - Kat Mahale: The Transformative Power of Self-Portrait Photography

In this episode, Kim speaks with Kat Mahale about how photographing herself completely changed her life. The conversation explores the deep connection between photography and mental health, and the ongoing process of self-discovery, growth and healing through self-portraiture. The discussion also highlights the subjective nature of photography and the different ways joy and happiness can be expressed.

Connect with Kat:
Website: https://www.feelmorecreative.org/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/feelmorecreative/
Kat's Book: https://www.feelmorecreative.org/whatnow

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Website: https://www.photographicconnections.com/

5 Senses Activation: https://www.photographicconnections.com/five-senses-activation

Immersive Photography Weekends in Scotland:
https://www.photographicconnections.com/photographyweekends

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YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/@kimgrantphotography
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Music by Mark Robinson
Song: A Thousand Lifetimes
Website: http:/www.markrobinsonmusic.com
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@MarkRobinsonMusic

Transcript

Kim (00:00)
Hello and welcome to the Photographic Connections podcast. The podcast where we guide you to heal, grow and flourish through the art of photography. My name is Kim Grants and in this episode I'll be speaking with Kat Mahal of Felt Photographic about how photographing herself completely changed her life. I describe the images as like a life anchor so they make sense of everything up until that point.

what was going on in the moment and then how you want to progress your life moving forward. These images for me capture a transformation, a pivotal, crucial moment in my life that is constantly changing. I spoke with Kat back in April and felt really called to share her story as it's one which holds a very special place in my heart. With many experiencing challenging times at the moment,

I hope Kat's story will offer some comfort and support. Before I share Kat's words, however, I'd just like to mention that I'm currently taking a break from the Photographic Connections community. With many eager to see its return, I'm hopeful that it'll be back in the near future. Until then though, may you enjoy the other Photographic Connections offerings, including this podcast and a guided meditation, which I'll share more about later in the show. For now though,

Please join me in welcoming the lovely Kat Mahal.

Hi Cat, thank you so much for coming on the podcast this week. It's so nice to see you, always lovely to see you Kim, thank you for asking me. it's always nice to see you too Cat. For those who don't know our story, we sort of met about four years ago now. I first saw you on SheClicks and your story resonated with me so much that I had to reach out and at the time it was during lockdown wasn't it and I spoke to you for my YouTube channel.

And then we've just kind of been connecting on and off ever since. And last year we did the mindfulness photography course with Look Again together. And then we finally met in person back in March in Birmingham at the photography and video show, which was just so beautiful to finally meet you. It was just lovely. It was really, really nice. And I always think when I know somebody on Zoom and then you meet them, it's slightly weird because you're like, are you sure we haven't met before?

There is, because there's that familiarity. But it was just, it was so lovely seeing you. Thank you. and seeing your exhibition was lovely as well with everybody that had contributed. And I love what you said there. You know, it's like when we have these connections online, especially these consistent connections where we're actually seeing each other on video and connecting. It's amazing what the internet's brought us over in recent years and these connections and

I'd say now that like to me you feel like a friend, which is just so beautiful that the internet's given us that. Likewise, likewise. I feel exactly the same. It's one of the beautiful things that's come out, I think, of where we all were in lockdown and the pandemic and the boom of Zoom and online connection has just made things.

so much easier and I love the fact that you can go, I'd really like to meet somebody but A, I can't because I'm in a different country or B, I can't be bothered because I've got so much other stuff on or I'm so tired. And it's lovely to be able to go but actually yes, I can hook up, we can have a live conversation online, it can only take half an hour out of my day and then I can do other stuff. So it means we can fit more in which does have its challenges as well. But I really like that, I really like the fact that

You know, we don't have to just use audio now, we can audio and visually connect instantly. It's just lovely. Yeah, it's beautiful. It's beautiful. And as you say, everything's got its pros and cons. But I think when we can bring people together, especially, I think me living in quite a rural part of Scotland, it's opened up so much connections with me, with like minded people like yourself, which

which has been beautiful. And we, of course, there mentioned the pandemic and that was when I first met you online, which was just so beautiful. And your story about what photography and specifically photographing yourself did for you when you did this, this photo shoot of yourself, it just completely transformed your life. And while we've spoken about this before on my YouTube channel, this of course is the first time you've been on the Photographic Connections podcast. So...

There'll be a number of people that have never heard your story before and it had such a deep impact on me because until I spoke to you, I'd never understood or appreciated or maybe that seed had never been planted for me about how transformational it can be to photograph ourselves and particularly when we're in deep dark places and we're struggling with life and your story and the image completely

changed your life and when you look at this image it just it spoke to me on such a deep level and when we met in Birmingham I brought it up again because it's never left me so I would love you to share with the Photographic Connections listeners this this story the image you created and what it did for you and how it's yeah really transformed your life in many ways. Thank you it's really beautiful and very

humbling and touching and emotional to hear that, that it stayed with you this image. Because, I mean, it totally changed my life, but to know that other people resonate with it, I mean, that's just, that's the beautiful byproduct, I think, of any photography is that you find people that resonate with an image that you also resonate with. And it just...

underpins for me the longevity of the therapeutic nature of photography and how transformational it is and how and how lasting it is. So thank you, I really appreciate that. It was an image that I'd had in my head for about six months and you know when you've

an image in your head just doesn't leave you. The only way it'll go out of your head is if you create it physically so you can look at it. And I'd been in and out of talking therapy for 25 years following a period, a very dark period where I was in hospital, where I tried to take my own life. And I was kind of, I'd done all this.

therapy and I was utterly sick of talking, really tired of talking and I wanted to do something a bit different and I thought I'm going to do stuff my way now. I'm going to take ownership of my depression. I mean that had never even occurred to me before that I might know better than other people about what's best for me. I never had that confidence to really look into myself in that way. I always thought other people

would always know better than me. And so I just had this pull to create this image that was in my head. And it was me just sitting with barbed wire wrapped around my head. And in the shoot, I decided that I wanted to sit with my most difficult emotions and photograph what was there because talking hadn't worked for me and I needed to look myself in the eye to face myself fully.

called the shoot face to face and to see if it's as bad as it felt so I was it was a bit like a self -challenge and it was an ult, actually an ultimatum for myself because if it wasn't, if I didn't see anything in the images I was going to park my depression and I was going to not work on myself anymore.

That was basically what I decided. It was if I couldn't see how I was feeling, then I would just stop thinking about it. I would stop work, I would stop spending money, I would stop working on myself. I would just park it and then get on with the rest of my life, knowing that I'd always have this underpinning of depression. And it was quite extraordinary because what I saw in my images, I didn't expect at all. I didn't really know what to expect, but what I...

did see that I didn't even think of was that I didn't dislike the person that was looking back at me. I didn't think that she was ugly, because usually I don't like myself in pictures, but I didn't see that at all. I saw a woman in agony and pain, and the only person that could help her was me. And I allowed myself compassion. I saw myself as someone slightly removed because of the space between my head.

and the computer screen and I was able to extend myself compassion for the first time and then that was the catalyst for everything I've done since. I mean it's quite extraordinary, it was like I was looking one direction one minute and then another minute I'd done a 180 degree turn and I was looking in a totally other different direction and my life, I talk about my life as in two halves so pre, pre, not even pre my shoot actually it was pre looking at my image.

for the first images where it started. And the second part of my life is from that moment. So it's changed everything. I'm not depressed anymore. It literally, it didn't go overnight, but the catalyst, the process started when I first started looking at the beginning of my gallery. And it took about...

I don't know, because I didn't look at my images for five months. So within that time, a huge shift had gone on and I used to wake up every day thinking, well today I'll feel shit again. It's bound to happen. Nothing lasts forever, so I'll feel crap again. And I never have done. And I do have down days, I do have really bad days. I mean, a lot of stuff has happened in my life since the shoot. My mother has died, I'm going through divorce.

So huge life changes are happening to me, but nothing has been as pivotal as this and I haven't gone back to that space of wanting to end my life since. And it's like the baseline has been raised hugely. So I've got my images to look back on. I've got my images to work with still if I'm feeling in a bad place and things are

been difficult, but they've never been as bad as they were. And, you know, I keep asking myself, am I depressed? And I'm not, and I'm not, I check with people all the time. I check with professionals. I check in with myself. I might check in with my daughter. But no, I've never been back there again. And I do understand why it's so powerful, but I also don't understand because every year

is a new learning, every day is a new learning about how and why photography is so powerful for mental health and wellbeing. And it's an eternal learning. So as the time increases between where I am and when I did my shoot and I first looked at my images, there's just learning, learning, learning going on all the time. And it shifts and changes, you know.

the woman in that image, I thank her for everything. I mean, she is the reason that I'm sitting here today. It's quite overwhelming even now. And I look at the images every day. I've got particularly the barbed wire image I've got on display and I see it every day. And she reminds me about self -acceptance, about self -love and self -compassion.

And I, you know, I take her with me. I never want to be without her because it was her strength and courage that I didn't think I had that has meant that I found my own answers. So beautiful and so powerful. I think it's just absolutely incredible. And even listening to you speaking about it again, you know, every time we say a story again, there's slight differences in it, but also the similarities of it as well.

as we grow and progress. And I think it's really interesting when you speak about the image, because you say, you have her with me, with you, you know, and it's like, she's not you anymore, but she still is you. And I know like in the therapy world, quite often a therapeutic technique can be to carry a photograph of yourself as a child around with you and connecting back with your child. And that's not you anymore, but it still is you. And it's like, you've done this with this image you've created as well. It's like,

you're not really looking at yourself and you're referring to that image as her rather than you because she recognized that you're not her anymore, but she's still a part of you. How has that process been for you? Ever changing, ever, I think ever more meaningful in fact. And it's interesting you bring up that thing about carrying a picture of your younger self around with you. And I could never do that.

because I found my childhood really difficult and connecting back with her has always been really painful. But connecting with this image is I can still see my inner child, but it is in the picture of my younger self, of my childlike self. So I describe the images as like a life anchor. So they make sense of everything up until that point.

what was going on in the moment and then how you want to progress your life moving forward. So they capture, as images just capture a moment, these images for me capture a transformation, a pivotal, crucial moment in my life that is constantly changing. And you know, what I'm really excited about is...

I'm going to feel about it in a year's time, what am I going to be doing in a year's time and what will she mean to me then. It's just a really emotional process and it's really important for me to have her visible and in my mind and in my heart because I don't want to lose that moment, I don't want to lose the significance and the importance of it, I don't want to lose how far I've come since I did it so my shoot was.

April the 18th, 2018. And reflection over time is really, really important. And that was one of the key things of the shoot was that after not looking at my images for five months, I looked at them again and I looked back and realised how I'd changed towards my images, what had changed within me. And...

So those periods of reflection are hugely important to see and feel the change. So as time increases, the change will get greater. Yeah, it's funny, because this image, this image, the barbed wire image, I'm looking, I nearly said she, I'm looking straight at the camera. And when you get eye contact with yourself through an image, it's very...

affronting, it's very challenging and you know in a good way it's very like I need you to see me and because I am changing and I sit so I will see something different in my image every time I look at it and you can look at the same image for years and see something different in it. I had a client who looked at her an image of her

not one that I'd taken, but an image of her, 11 years, every day for 11 years she looked at it. And the day that we did some work together, she noticed something new in it that she'd never noticed before. So it's that kind of stuff that I find really extraordinary and kind of awe inspiring and wondrous. Cause I'm like, well, what's going to come up next? What am I going to feel next? Who is she going to be for me next? Wow.

That is such a deep and profound thing that you have this visual representation of yourself in that moment. And I heard recently that, you know, when we have a photograph of a person, there's so much energy in that image because it was, you know, when we photographed it, it's like a moment in time and the energy of that time. But of course, we're always growing and evolving. And the fact that you see something different in that image every time you look at it, or at least every year, that's such a profound thing. And it's really interesting. This month,

It's April right now and as part of the Photographic Connections community we're doing, you know, self -portraiture and photographing yourself. And when I was creating the webinar this month, I'd realized in recent months that I've been photographing myself quite a lot. And the one thing I noticed is that I cannot look at the camera.

When I'm photographing myself, all of my images are of me looking at the light or looking to the sides or not actually looking the camera dead in the eye. And I find it so hard and I notice that with other people as well. I can look in the mirror now and look myself in the eye. But when I'm photographing myself, I really struggle to look at the camera. And also I just find it fascinating. And, you know, in that image, it's like you really saw yourself.

fully saw yourself, not just your physical being, but like your soul, you know, you're looking into your eyes, you're being as vulnerable as you possibly could be in that image. And then the representation of the barbed wire and stuff. But it's amazing because I've experienced in the last few months, wow, what is it? Why can't I photograph myself looking in the eye? It's like, what am I afraid to see? Or what am I struggling to accept? And it's almost like when you photograph that image of you,

You were fully accepting yourself as you were in that moment. You were struggling, you were depressed, but you were like, I'm going to face it, as you said, I'm going to face it. And you really sat there with yourself and you allowed yourself to see the things that you'd maybe not been able to see before and accept it so that you've been able to move forwards. I just experienced these last few months, this is interesting when we start looking into it. What is this discomfort? What is it that...

that I'm struggling to accept within myself. And it can be hard for some people to contemplate that and to sit with that, but I'm very curious about it. I'm like, hmm, what's going on here? Well, I'm a great believer in not, we don't sit with stuff or see stuff unless we're ready to see it. So literally our bodies won't let us.

And it's something that's a real part of the work I do with other people. It's like, I can't make somebody do something that they're not ready to do. It's just, the shoots just unfold as they are. The client's completely in control. But stuff comes up because it's ready. Stuff comes up because we're in a place where we're able to see it. It might be really, really difficult. Comfort, you know, comfort is...

is not the way that we progress our mental health. We have to go through the discomfort. So it's like finding that uncomfortably, uncomfortably comfortable place, I think. And we see what we're ready to see. And so if you were to look into the camera, you would see.

when you looked back at it, you would see what you're ready to see. You wouldn't see all the stuff that perhaps you might find too scary. And there were, you know, there are some images that are still as raw today as they were for me in 2018. So there's some I find more difficult to look at than others, but I'm not ready to go there. And in fact, those aren't even the ones where I'm looking at directly at the camera.

Interestingly enough. But yeah, you know, it is the fear of the unknown, isn't it? It's the fear of what am I going to see if I do do that? And I didn't consciously look at the camera when I took this shot. So I think in terms of self -portraiture, when you are doing it, the important thing is to do what you feel is right.

and don't push yourself to do something that you maybe haven't planned or feels too much. Because if it feels too much, it might well be too much. And you don't have to look at the camera to get really extraordinary and powerful images. And when you look, images particularly when you're looking straight down the barrel of a lens, what you see,

is what's being reflected. So whatever was there in that image, in my barbed wire image, I can't remember what I was thinking about then. In fact, I'm not sure I was thinking anything. I think I was a bit blank, to be honest. But in the image, I see whatever is going on for me at the moment.

So, and it can be the opposite of what you think is going on. So I'm just looking at the image now and I'm just thinking, what am I seeing there? I'm seeing vulnerability, massive vulnerability today. I don't feel particularly vulnerable. I don't feel that things are particularly raw, but maybe they actually are. If I took some time to sit with that, there will be stuff there. So that's what's being reflected.

So it's never quite what we think it's gonna be. I don't think. Wow. So it's deep self -inquiry, isn't it? It's quite, it's incredible. But I really, I really liked that you brought up there that, you know, we can't like not to force ourselves to do things that we're not ready for, you know, things unfold when we're ready for it. And I've just got back from Malta, I was at a spiritual and emotional wellness retreat and it was quite a profound experience.

But that's one thing they kept saying to me was they said, you know, when the student's ready, the teacher will appear, you know, because it's like, and we also can't do everything in one go, you know, so we can obviously work on things and then things build over time. And the beautiful thing about being human is that our journey is forever unfolding. You know, we think we face something and then something else comes up. And but it's about getting comfortable with that, I think, and just being like, okay, now is not the time.

But I'm consciously aware of this now, so when I am ready I can be more, you know, I can open up to it. Realising when we're ready to grow is a great moment. One thing Kat and I both wanted to do last year was deepen our understanding of mindful photography, leading to the teacher, Ruth Davy, appearing in our lives. I gained many insights from her course, including seeing her use meditations during our sessions. Following the course, I designed one called the Five Senses Activation.

combining my own experience with some of what Ruth shared in her mindfulness teachings. I've been sharing the five senses activation in the in -person immersive photography weekends and in online sessions ever since. And now I'm delighted to say it's available to download from the Photographic Connections website as an audio file. This 14 minute meditation takes you through an introduction

guiding you through a five senses experience enabling you to slow down and bring all your senses into your photographic practice. I've discovered in my own journey that when we engage all our senses we can create really emotive and meaningful images. This audiophile is also great to use when you're feeling stressed or anxious leading to relaxation and a sense of wellness.

To download your copy, you can head to photographicconnections .com forward slash five dash senses dash activation. That's photographicconnections .com forward slash five dash senses dash activation. You'll also find a free sample and an introductory video there too. May you enjoy the experience. Now let's get back to the chat with Kat as we explore bringing emotion into our photography.

Just a reminder that the Photographic Connections community is currently taking a break, but I hope to bring this resource back in the near future. I think that's been one of the beautiful things about doing this month's theme with the community is many people in the community have photographed themselves doing what brings them joy and it's really helping them to connect with the things that light them up and you know photographs of them sitting in nature or photographs of them with their family and

it's bringing them a lot of joy and I think that's beautiful as well because as well as these moments of photographing these you know images like we're talking about with your barbed wire photograph in these moments where we're struggling you know and seeing ourself and you facing that and the transformation of that equally photographing ourselves in moments of joy it's such a beautiful thing and it really makes us consciously aware of what does light me up in life and how beautiful is it to see a photograph of myself doing what I love

It just shows all the different ways that we can engage with self -portraiture, I guess. Yeah, definitely. And actually, you reminded me of my freedom shoot. So five months after my face -to -face shoot, I was feeling so good. I wanted to capture some of the joy I was feeling, some of the... I wanted to celebrate who I was, which was such a weird concept for me. Who the hell does that?

And it certainly wasn't me and suddenly I wanted to create some really big powerful images showing me feeling really set self -celebratory and and you know, I Just talk about it. I think God people just think that's really like egotistical and I full of self and

But it wasn't, it was about me going, my God, I feel good for the first time in my life. I think I might have finally cracked my lifelong depression. I need to mark this in a really powerful way. So I did a shoot and it felt like such freedom, I called it a freedom shoot. And I also do that with clients as well. And those pictures, I have those pictures up as well. And they are about me understanding my potential.

and what I can achieve.

and they are full of my inner joy. And I'm not smiling, but there's something huge and liberating about them and it's an internal joy. And I love that actually as a different take on joy and how we feel joy and happiness. And it doesn't have to be laughing. I mean, those shots are...

just wonderful when somebody catches you when you're mid belly laugh. I mean, they're just fabulous. But it can manifest itself in totally different ways. And it doesn't have to be of self either. You know, it can be of anything, can't it? We don't have to be in it to photograph joy. But I love the sense of depth of images that may be very difficult to look at and also images that are.

easy to look at but both of them have something that makes you stop and go my goodness I need to look more at this what is here and that's all about what's being reflected for us and who is looking at it it's not about the picture it's about the viewer and that's something that Judy Weiser said that really struck stuck with me when I first learned about therapeutic photography she is one of the founders of therapeutic photography

And she was basically saying what I'd been thinking. And I was like, yes, there's someone else in the world that I found that gets it. And then her whole community had then opened up to me, which I know you're part of. And I love that, that it is the beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Theory is that everything that we see is entirely subjective. What we see, how we see it, how it makes us feel.

the responses that we have to anything is all subjective. Yeah, totally. It's really interesting, isn't it? It's almost like, like you said, about the subjectivity and the perception there, you know, we all see the world differently. I mean, I know we've spoken before about, you know, photographs and like competitions and stuff, you know, like 100 people can look at an image and 50 or 60 people could think it's wonderful. Another 40 could just not get it. And it just shows, you know, that we all see things differently. And it's like,

when I'm doing workshops sometimes, you know, I'll take somebody to a location and some people in the group see so much opportunity and they're just in their joy and they're photographing tiny blades of grass and little flowers and somebody else could come along and be like, there's nothing here. And it just shows how we're all just so different. And I think what's so beautiful there, going back to your self portraiture, you know, you've got these two images that have come from a place of deep emotion, the place of

depression and sadness and despair and maybe helplessness, but then this place of, of joy and liberation of freedom of empowerment. And both of those photographs that you created there and both of those moments, they come from a very deep place of sparked emotion, but it also shows almost the two sides of being human. And I guess when you look at them together, you can see, you know, being human, we can

really we struggle sometimes massively and then we also have these moments of elation and joy and to have those two visual representations of not only places you've been and things you've been through but of the human condition side by side I think that's so beautiful. Yeah thank you I often think about that actually and and I couldn't have done my freedom shoot without doing my face -to -face shoot first. I couldn't have have sat in that place of celebration if I hadn't done the hard work first.

And so the face -to -face was self -acceptance. The freedom shoot is what's my potential moving forward. So there is a kind of yin and yang about them. But there's also a one couldn't come without the other about it as well. There's definitely the progression for me. I had to do that hard work first before I could have even considered... I mean, I never would have thought about doing a freedom shoot before.

So it is interesting having them side by sides, you know, and actually the face -to -face shoot, you know, beget that liberation. So through my shoot and through expressing myself, seeing myself and then accepting myself fully, I allowed myself that sense of liberation. And, you know, the self -acceptance...

When I kind of, you know, processed in an embodied way the images, the self -acceptance was then like so obvious. It was like, well, yeah, obviously I need to accept and love this part of myself. Obviously the difficult parts of me, I need to draw closer and not push away. You know, I was terrified of my anger. I was always thought I'd be depressed and...

you know, that kind of the hopelessness, the hopeless part of me, where there was still hope as well and the parts of me that I thought were ugly. I no longer think that because I now understand that each part of me has equal value. There isn't one part of me that's more or less important than the other. They all have a seat at the table and they all need to be seen and heard. And if they don't, that's when they start to get...

you know, they start to get out of control or it starts to fester and things start to go wrong. So the consistent work for me in that sense is about being very mindful of what's going on, really noticing my responses to everything on a much more than a daily basis. I mean, if I could do it.

every minute of every day I would, but it's multiple times a day. I'm just checking in with myself, seeing what I need, what's going on, which part of me am I not hearing? And adapting that into my life. So I'm living my evolution. I'm not just talking about it. I'm continually doing it. And my image keeps me there. It reminds me and goes, okay, Kath, bring it back. What do you need? What's going on? Just take a minute to stop and notice.

and then I can live my potential when I'm balanced inside and when I have peace. It doesn't mean that everything has to be sorted inside, not in the slightest, but everything needs to know that it has a voice. And so it's not shouting at you and it's not clouding other stuff. And that's literally for me.

and my clients, I teach them how to do it. But that's literally what helps me keep my peace is the compassionate internal dialogue. And it's such an important thing, isn't it? And something that incorporating that into our life and becoming consciously aware of it, it can be transformative. Because, you know, it's like you were saying there, you know, we often like

don't accept elements of ourselves, we push certain elements away, we don't want to see certain things. And I think maybe in the culture we've grown up in as well, you know, we've been brought up to believe that feeling sad is wrong, or feeling angry is wrong, feeling jealous is wrong. But actually, we're all human beings. And some days we are going to have anger in us. It means that there's a yearning inside of us, a need that's not being met or

something that's triggering us and it's almost like, well, why is this triggering me? What is this trying to teach me? And if we're jealous about something, it's about, again, not shutting that off and being like, I'm not jealous. It's like, okay, what's going on here? Because it's like the yin and yang, the balance, isn't it? And again, going back to your images, it's like, we need both of these elements. If we just kind of go along that road in the middle of not feeling the pain, but not feeling the pleasure, and we're just kind of almost numb to life.

then that's when we just, we can't evolve and grow because we're just on this steady path all the time, but we're not joyous in it and we're not experiencing life. It's interesting, isn't it? And I just love that photography has given you that connection to this, it opened you up to this and given you a path of something that's anchoring you and consciously bringing you back to it every day. And I love that you have those images with you now, all these years later, they're still there, you're still looking at them every day, they're anchoring you.

They're reminding you of the self -inquiry and almost giving you just that visual representation of how you want to live your life and then what offerings and service you want to give to others as well to help them with what they're going through. Yeah, and the world becomes a much more expansive place for me. And I think for a lot of other people too, when we are good inside, it's much easier to be good outside.

Do you know what I mean? If we are compassionate with ourselves and we are loving towards ourselves, being loving to other people, it feels much bigger. We feel we're more open, we've got more love to give. When I was really depressed, I could still love people, absolutely. I don't believe in that saying that you can't love others until you love yourself. You can, of course you can.

But what happens when you do love yourself is that the love you give just grows exponentially and it feels much freer, it feels less conditional and you know the self judgment, if we can get rid of the self judgment then we don't judge others and that's really important and the noticing is so key, it really is. It's about

honesty, noticing yourself with honesty and without judgment. Yes, yes, very much so, very much so. And I love there how we've began speaking about others as well, because one thing we spoke about a little bit when we met in Birmingham was about the book that you've created, which I've got a lovely copy here, which is lovely. And it's called, How Creativity Helps Humanity, What Now? A Photographic Response to the Pandemic.

And what's so beautiful about this book is of course it's linked with the pandemic we've all been through, but you've also brought together a number of people's experiences with regards to photography and the pandemic and put that together into a beautiful book which I think really shows the rawness of humanity and this experience that we all went through, but also how photography helped so many people through that. So...

I wondered if you could speak about this because I feel like your photography work has all stemmed from, and this book has all stemmed from, the photographs that you've taken of yourself and that it's kind of building and building and building and you've began to realise I guess how incredible photography is in helping people but in so many different ways and I think this book's a fantastic physical representation of that. So yeah I'd just love you to share a little bit more about your thoughts about creating this book and the process and

and how it was for you. Thank you. Bless you. It was a long time coming. I had planned to release it Christmas 2022 actually, but personal circumstances, life happened basically. My marriage broke down that summer, the summer of 2022. And then the...

spring of 2023 I broke my wrist really badly and had to have two operations for that so it got delayed by well over a year but when I finally got it done and published it was the right time it was always it was always going to be the right time and you know I loved going back to reflections I loved

I loved it when I first got a copy in the post and I was able to think back to how long it's taken me to write it. And then how I feel about the interviews and what the message is and how useful this can be for people moving forward. Because this was always about the power of photography to help us through difficult times.

It was so fascinating. I asked my guests. So the book is transcriptions of interviews on Instagram. And I just thought it would be fascinating to talk to people about how they found the pandemic. And I decided to do these Instagram Lives because I was doing my first talk at the photography show and I wanted to practice being live in front of people.

And I thought, I'll just do some interviews on Instagram. And it just evolved into this beautiful body of work, these fascinating conversations. And what I found really interesting was that people didn't dwell on the negative stuff. People talked about it and sometimes only briefly about the difficulties they felt and how hard it was. But what came out was the hope, the hope that their creativity had given them, whether it was...

the creativity was painting, dressmaking, gardening, walking, photography, whatever. There was a huge amount of creativity. And I think that's what really struck me doing the interviews was actually when we were in lockdown, we were like, what on earth are we gonna do with this time? The people that were furloughed and didn't have to go in and weren't frontline workers. And so we...

Like humans usually do, we fall back to our creativity. It's like, well, what can I make? What can I cook? What can I create in the garden? What can I create in my studio? What can I create in my bedroom? Where's my sewing kit? What the hell's in there? And what can I make out of that? It's remembering. And music as well. I mean, everything.

The overarching message for me is that when you're having a difficult time, find your creativity and there you will find a beautiful process in which to work through how you're feeling because creativity is always about the process and not about the end product. I mean, I created my barbed wire image, but it wasn't the image.

At first it was the process, it was like I had to go through this process. The process of sitting with my most difficult stuff meant that I got these pictures that changed everything. But I had to go through the process. The process is always the most important part of it. And you know, people think that they're not creative. Everyone is creative. It's just what we think is creativity.

is very narrow because movement is creativity. How we dress is creativity. What makeup we put on, what we do with our hair, how we stand, how we move through a room, how we organise our homes. There's creativity around everywhere and of course nature is creativity. And so it's everywhere and if you decide to paint a room or you decide to clear out a room, that's

That's beautiful creativity. The end product that is cathartic clearing a room and the end product is this beautiful thing that you have created because no one else has created that. So, it's everywhere. We are created. We're here to create in whatever shape or form that means and everybody is creative. When you dig into it with people who think they aren't, they really are.

It really are. Everything, I mean, science is creative, isn't it? You've got to have a creative brain to think outside the box, to think about new things, to think about new ways to do things. Invention is creative, isn't it? I mean, I could go on forever. Yeah, no, 100%, 100%. We're all creative beings. We're creating our reality every minute. But I love that you spoke there about... Yeah, I love that you spoke there about the process because it's so true.

Like this podcast, for instance, it's not releasing the podcast that is the exciting part. It's the sitting down, the deciding who to reach out to, to speak to. It's these moments right now speaking to you and then the time editing it and putting it together and creating the visuals. You know, it's the whole process. And then that final thing is just like all of that energy and everything put out there. And it's like you say, it's the same with the book, you know.

putting the book out there. It's so beautiful to see it. It's so heartwarming, but it's that process of gathering the interviews, of putting it together, of writing it, of getting the front cover designed and all of that. And like you say, there's so many different ways to be creative, you know, and I'm very much into energy and spiritual concepts. And of course we've got the chakra system and you know, we've got our sacral chakra, which, you know, is partly all about emotions, but also creativity.

And I love that emotion and creativity are linked in many ways, you know, because it's like creativity is helping us with our emotions and to navigate life and to create things. Just like, you know, you spoke there about the pandemic and people going through that difficult time and creativity got them through it in many ways and finding those outlets. So it's beautiful. And I love that you've created this for the world because... Thank you. One thing I...

It's just lovely. And one thing I read recently was a book by Elizabeth Gilbert called Big Magic. And she was speaking about creativity and how these ideas come to us for us to create stuff, you know, and put them out there and how, you know, half of the process is the kind of the ideas and the creation, but actually to release things to the world, you know, and to share them with the world. It's part of the process because everything we create can help.

or inspire other people, even if it's just two people, do you know what I mean? It's like if you can inspire two people with your creativity, making a beautiful meal or doing something to your garden, you know, it's like, it's all a ripple effect, isn't it? And it's just, it's beautiful. It's really, really beautiful. It is. And art is the one thing we save. It's what we save, you know, it's the stuff that, you know, when we were living in caves.

That's what we did. We made art. We drew stuff on the wall. I remember when the war in Ukraine started and they were getting towards the capital and they rushed to get artwork and all the things in the museums and get them underground because they needed to be saved. They were the most important things.

If this house was to burn down, I'd grab my two photos and artwork that my daughter has made, you know, if I have time. But that's the stuff that we instinctively we save and instinctively we do. And it's interesting because I was just thinking about the process of writing the book and the pain points. And there were pain points like going down the rabbit hole of fonts.

and page sizes and book sizes and how to un -number a page because blank pages don't have a number on. And there were all these things that I was just like hitting my head against a brick wall doing. But now I know how to do that was part of the process. I had to go through these things to create what I wanted to create. And that process was really, really interesting. And then the reading and the rereading and the mind numbingness of

reading and reading and reading and I'm slightly dyslexic so I just read and read and read and nothing goes in. So I have to reread and reread and that's really difficult. But then having it, I look back on the process, having my book, I look back on the process and go I'm so glad I did it, I've now got this, I'm really proud of this and I've got all these people in the book who've come with me on my journey and guessing them.

to approve the copy and the layout and how the images look. And that was lovely as well. So this isn't, I don't really feel that this is my book. It feels like our book. This feels like a book that I've written in conjunction with all these incredible people because I couldn't have done it without them. And that's really beautiful as well. And that was part of the process, an excuse to.

be in contact with these people and to say hi, how are you doing? And build relationships up in that way. I mean, there's so much to our process of creativity always. 100%, 100%.

And I think that's such a beautiful place to end today, Kat. I mean, I could speak to you. Honestly, every time we talk, I'm like, it's just never long enough. There's just so much that we could talk about. I thought, remember the interesting thing to end on. I started pulling oracle cards every day now that I've got back from this retreat. And what came up today was intuition. And there's an eye, which I think is very interesting given what we were speaking about, and the heart. And it says, each person's road to the inner Lord is extraordinary and personal.

liberating to listen inside and sense moment to moment what's needed. I think that really connects with what you said. And then the other one I pulled was satisfaction, which I just thought, what does that even mean today? But it says, let you let the energy of love guide you to self approval so that others no longer define who you are. That I think just sums up partly what we've spoken about in this podcast episode, which I think is quite extraordinary. So how beautiful.

Very, thank you. What a gift. What a gift that is and what gifts you are, Kim. Thank you so much. Thank you, Kat. Once again, it's been a pleasure. I'm sure we'll catch up again very, very soon. And I'll put a link in the description below to your website and of course the link to this book as well. So if anybody would like to get their hands on a copy, they can do so. But yeah, is there anything else you'd like to share before we say goodbye? I think...

In terms of, you know, talking about creativity, what I really feel is that you can't get your creativity wrong and start with the intention that people aren't going to see what you're creating. Start and create from the heart and create for you and you alone. And that's what I did with my shoot. This wasn't about showing pictures to anyone and I never intended to show anyone pictures. And if you do, if you create for you,

because you have a strong pull for it, it will be amazing and amazing things will come from it. So, you know, that self -trust in not knowing why, perhaps why or what you're creating, but just to do the creating anyway and something amazing will come from it. So beautiful, so beautiful. Thank you so much, Kat. It's been an absolute pleasure and I wish you all the best. bless you. Thank you.

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Photographic Connections podcast. If you'd like to connect with Photographic Connections further, including downloading the five senses activation meditation, attending one of our in -person immersive photography weekends, or doing some one -to -one online mentoring with myself, you can find full details at photographicconnections .com. You may also enjoy watching some of the recent videos on my YouTube channel.

where I share a lot about the gift of photography and how we can tap into magic and bring the sense of touch into our photographic practice to enable us to have a more enriched experience and of course, create more emotive and meaningful images. And now that this podcast has come to an end, there's only one thing left for you to do. It's time to pick up your camera and head outdoors. There's so many incredible photographic opportunities just waiting for you to discover.