I thought starting a photography business would be easy—announce it online and watch workshop bookings follow. Boy, was I wrong. Between my old Ford Fiesta, frugal meals, and jobs that didn't align with who I was becoming, I learned that business is an energy exchange. The question that changed everything: what was I offering the world beyond pretty pictures?

By creating something beautiful from the place of our deepest struggles, we disarm our most frightening demons." This is the story of how creativity became my greatest healing tool—transforming childhood trauma into art, fear into purpose, and pain into power. Sometimes our darkest caves contain the light we've been searching for.

As I walk along the dusty track, I pass by many of the wicked and wild trees that have been decorating this small corner of the Gwydir Forest for a century or more. There are a handful of oaks but the majority of them here are silver birch trees that love these damp upland moorland environments. I’m just a tiny speck of dust beneath most of the trees, and, despite my hair being a little thinner in some places than it once was, one glance at their weathering bark makes me appreciate my youth. The young should respect their elders, so I pause for a moment to think about how little I know, and how much I still have yet to learn from them.