It was in one of those little books by Austin Kleon that I first understood the distinction. ‘Like-minded’ sounds at first like a great guide for convivial company, and I’ve often used the word to gather people in to my therapeutic writing spaces. Join me and like-minded others I would say, ignoring the vague twang of discomfort.

Because actually I think that the company of like-minded people can be a bit dull, even suffocating, at least to creativity and progress. Like-minded folk are in agreement. They have the same views, beliefs and attitudes. There’s a lot of synchronised nodding and shaking of heads, a lot of comfort, a lot of safety. In our increasingly polarised world, we sink into saturated spaces of agreement either side of gaping division.

Like-minded company is nice, for which synonyms in this context may include sterile, siloed, monotonous. Nothing grows here, nothing becomes. No new ideas, no experimenting, no new experiences nor changed perspectives.

Like-minded. I meant the word as encouragement: come in, you’re in good company here! While I can neither guarantee the minds nor the hearts of your writing fellows, like-hearted brings me so much closer to the reality of what I wish to facilitate. Possibility proliferates.

And all hearts, I believe, are beleaguered just now. We exist deep within systems designed to drown out some natural rhythms and bring others to a deathly stop. We are separated from our own aliveness, from feeling the buzz and beat of it. We receive missives to choose one reality and stick to it, to swear an oath to monolithic truth, to live as if the heart were small and fragile. But the heart is strong, the heart is capacious, that heart is wise. I’ve just returned from a retreat on Ulva - an island off an island off an island - where I became gratefully reacquainted to the thrum of the land, to the hum and twitter of creaturely life, to the delightful song of women in conversation, and to the melody of my own heart.

Away from the distractions and duties that plague our moments, therapeutic writing is a space to come into awareness, to arrive in relationship with the self, to sit with the heart as teacher. It might feel selfish or indulgent, I know this. But listen, should you need such rationale: we tend to the heart within us to tend to other hearts - not as hierarchy, ‘me first’ oxygen mask style - but in symphony. From the greek word ‘symphonia’: sounding together. Beating together.

We need this, I need this, the world needs. The world needs our creativity, our capacity to feel and express with courage, to listen to and communicate from the heart. Rare are the spaces for reflection, and rarer still opportunities to reflect with other hearts for company.

Join me at 6pm this Sunday for my monthly therapeutic writing hour* when we will be guided by the many gifts of hawthorn, medicine for the heart. We will gather with like hearted folk for some guided private writing time with no need to share - simply listening for your own rhythm to join the symphony of others.

(*if you’ve previously booked through my website, you’ll notice this is a new link via The Portal Collective. This is a wonderful new space for learning, community and collaboration, and it’s a happy new home for my writing experiences.)