When I step out of the car, the sea air surrounds me. My body softens, and I’m filled with a warm, fuzzy feeling. I’ve returned to Portugal, and the light has waited for me. I go to the beach and wade into the ocean. I watch the surfers play and set out a plan to take a beginner’s surf lesson, inviting myself to step out of my comfort zone.

The creative process often involves setting an intention without knowing the exact outcome. We might know that we want to make a drawing (or a painting, a photograph, a poem, a piece of music, or something else), but we’re not sure exactly what it will look like, feel like, or sound like when it’s finished. We can begin with an idea, a color, a shape, or a rhythm, and see where it takes us.

Life is full. I’m writing to you from my desk near an open window overlooking Lisbon. The sky is the softest blue. The breeze is sweet and warm. I can hear a gentle mix of voices and nature, punctuated with the sounds of a city that likes to take it slow.

AI images are easy to create, so why would anyone still pick up a pencil and struggle through the messy, imperfect process of drawing by hand?

‘If you don't risk anything, you risk even more.’ — Erica Jong

It's those in-between days of late winter. Sunshine teases and the air is soft. I meet with friends for dinner on a Friday night.

Have you ever stopped yourself short from fully throwing yourself into making something, worried it will get messy Maybe you keep thinking about the thing you want to make, or say, or do, but you never get started.

When we receive a creative impulse, it can come through quickly. When it arrives, it doesn’t always make sense in that neat kind of way. And when we spend time with our ideas, developing them through the creative process, meaning can be fluid. We’ll start one place and end up someplace radically different.

Have you ever felt it was challenging to feel truly free to create and express yourself? Maybe you hesitate to spend time doing the things that you enjoy — painting, singing, drawing, writing, playing the guitar, taking photos — worried that you should be doing something more practical, concerned what you make won't be good enough?

One of my mentors once shared a way of looking at how we grow and move through life. She suggested I imagine the process of drawing a flower — like a daisy or a wildflower with a circle at the centre and petals looping around.

It's springtime in London and the season of renewal takes on an even greater resonance this year. Out in the hazy sunshine, I feel myself taking gentle and playful steps in the world.

When I moved to London over eight years ago, I underestimated the change I’d experience in this city. Letting go of ideas of girlhood to become a woman, facing some of my greatest personal challenges, and allowing myself to reconnect with parts of myself I had abandoned.

Your essence is your fundamental nature and what makes you uniquely you. It is the deepest part of yourself, where your authenticity lives.

From the moment we wake in the morning until we drift back to sleep at night, we move along the path of life making decisions and taking actions that steer our life in a nearly infinite set of directions.

I'm seated on the balcony of a cafe overlooking a rice field. It's a soft blue day in Canggu, Bali, an easy-going beach town filled with open-air bars and trendy hotel. Since hitting the road six weeks ago, I've been on a journey that's taken me around the world.