I know that following your passion whether that be in your job, raising your family, creating your home, engaging in your hobby or even carving time out to do what you love on the odd weekend...makes you a much better parent and human in general. 

Reading and writing have always been passions of mine. I knew this early on in life as books were my great escape and love. Then when learning about authors, poets and playwrights in high school and learning to love the writing process, I knew I wanted to write something meaningful.



I studied English and Journalism at Uni once I left school but abandoned it after one year to go to Naturopathy as I didn't like writing to a formula which is what journalism needs to focus on. I am lucky that I ended up combining Naturopathy with writing blogs and social media posts in my current career but I want to write something much meatier!

Recently I got too many signs not to start writing a book...I saw Trent Dalton (one of my favourite authors) being interviewed on stage by Frances Whiting (one of my favourite journalists) and Trent talked about how he wrote one of his books, Love Stories after he was left a blue Olivetti typewriter by a close friends mum who had passed away. After listening to him talk on stage, I felt inspired to write my book again.



That same week, a few amazing things happened -

1) a close friend asked me when I was going to start writing my book and I hadn't spoken to them about writing for decades.

2) My mum found all my old belongings that had been in storage for 26 years. I had thought they were gone forever as I was living overseas when my mum moved out of our family home when I was 21 and she didn't realise she had kept my boxes with hers! Those belongings included an old Remington typewriter that my grandmother (an aspiring writer that owned a bookstore) had passed down to me which I now have pride of place in my home office.

3) I received not one but two e-mails inviting me to attend a writers retreat! One was being held in Ubud (couldn't really get to Bali at such short notice!) and one was being held just 1.5 hours south of where I live in Brisbane. It was being held at Binna Burra in Lamington national park. I had married my husband 20 years ago in Binna Burra and also made my very first Flower Essence there while studying Naturopathy (this was in 1997) so I knew this special place has birthed some big and beautiful journeys in my life so how could I not book that retreat in!? Plus it fell just 3 days after my Birthday so what a great gift to give to myself!

It was 3 days of retreat, nature, stillness, inspiration and lot's of writing. I am feeling so positive about getting my book/s? started. I think we are pulled in so many directions in this lifetime but if our passion isn't pulling us at all, we need to go looking for it.

A life without feeling like we were born to do this thing...might mean we aren't living up to our potential or using the gifts we were supposed to put out into the world. Which is totally ok because we are TIRED and we are BUSY but we might be busy doing all the wrong things and we might be tired because we don't have our passion driving us! What do you think?

I've always wanted to write a book and I always thought that it would be a fictional novel and I now know what I want to base it on (it weaves a lot of fact with fiction like all good stories do!)  But maybe I have a book to write first for mums who are trying to raise kids while raising themselves?

I know a lot of people are parenting from trauma backgrounds and it can be so hard to be the mother you want to be sometimes. That is a massive passion of mine as I don't think there is a more important job than raising kids with the best emotional health they can access.

It's such a huge responsibility and hard not to feel the guilt when you don't always get it right. But if you work on yourself as much as you are able, you are giving your kids the best that you are able. Maya Angelou's quote comes to mind -  “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” 

Would love to know if people need this book first?!

Yours in Health,

Alisha x

Ps. If you would like to read more about my writers retreat experience (my main take aways and details of the retreat itself) you can do that HERE

I know that following your passion whether that be in your job, raising your family, creating your home, engaging in your hobby or even carving time out to do what you love on the odd weekend...makes you a much better parent and human in general. 

Reading and writing have always been passions of mine. I knew this early on in life as books were my great escape and love. Then when learning about authors, poets and playwrights in high school and learning to love the writing process, I knew I wanted to write something meaningful.



I studied English and Journalism at Uni once I left school but abandoned it after one year to go to Naturopathy as I didn't like writing to a formula which is what journalism needs to focus on. I am lucky that I ended up combining Naturopathy with writing blogs and social media posts in my current career but I want to write something much meatier!

Recently I got too many signs not to start writing a book...I saw Trent Dalton (one of my favourite authors) being interviewed on stage by Frances Whiting (one of my favourite journalists) and Trent talked about how he wrote one of his books, Love Stories after he was left a blue Olivetti typewriter by a close friends mum who had passed away. After listening to him talk on stage, I felt inspired to write my book again.



That same week, a few amazing things happened -

1) a close friend asked me when I was going to start writing my book and I hadn't spoken to them about writing for decades.

2) My mum found all my old belongings that had been in storage for 26 years. I had thought they were gone forever as I was living overseas when my mum moved out of our family home when I was 21 and she didn't realise she had kept my boxes with hers! Those belongings included an old Remington typewriter that my grandmother (an aspiring writer that owned a bookstore) had passed down to me which I now have pride of place in my home office.

3) I received not one but two e-mails inviting me to attend a writers retreat! One was being held in Ubud (couldn't really get to Bali at such short notice!) and one was being held just 1.5 hours south of where I live in Brisbane. It was being held at Binna Burra in Lamington national park. I had married my husband 20 years ago in Binna Burra and also made my very first Flower Essence there while studying Naturopathy (this was in 1997) so I knew this special place has birthed some big and beautiful journeys in my life so how could I not book that retreat in!? Plus it fell just 3 days after my Birthday so what a great gift to give to myself!

It was 3 days of retreat, nature, stillness, inspiration and lot's of writing. I am feeling so positive about getting my book/s? started. I think we are pulled in so many directions in this lifetime but if our passion isn't pulling us at all, we need to go looking for it.

A life without feeling like we were born to do this thing...might mean we aren't living up to our potential or using the gifts we were supposed to put out into the world. Which is totally ok because we are TIRED and we are BUSY but we might be busy doing all the wrong things and we might be tired because we don't have our passion driving us! What do you think?

I've always wanted to write a book and I always thought that it would be a fictional novel and I now know what I want to base it on (it weaves a lot of fact with fiction like all good stories do!)  But maybe I have a book to write first for mums who are trying to raise kids while raising themselves?

I know a lot of people are parenting from trauma backgrounds and it can be so hard to be the mother you want to be sometimes. That is a massive passion of mine as I don't think there is a more important job than raising kids with the best emotional health they can access.

It's such a huge responsibility and hard not to feel the guilt when you don't always get it right. But if you work on yourself as much as you are able, you are giving your kids the best that you are able. Maya Angelou's quote comes to mind -  “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” 

Would love to know if people need this book first?!

Yours in Health,

Alisha x

Ps. If you would like to read more about my writers retreat experience (my main take aways and details of the retreat itself) you can do that HERE