Psychology (and philosophy) love and appreciation post #2 of 3.
Watching @theschooloflifelondon on YouTube with Lucian years ago was our therapy - the brilliantly animations, the minimalist delivery of such great topics, snippets of witty wisdom, oh and Alain de Botton's poetic voice and fantastic language.
I have recently rediscovered this collective and inhaled their books on emotional intelligence, love, and relationships, and I'll never be the same again. Alain de Botton's theory on post romanticism turned everything upside down, so liberating actually.
"We don't need to be constantly reasonable in order to have good relationships; all we need to have mastered is the occasional capacity to acknowledge with good grace that we may, in one or two areas, be somewhat insane." โค๏ธ
Psychology love and appreciation post #1 of 3.
I've never read as much as I have since becoming a mother. It wasn't just the urge to do right by her, or bring up the next generation as best we can, it was also that dream one has to become an astronaut when gifted a toy rocket.
Urania's fantastic programme All About Parenting is a super comprehensive course that answered all of the questions I never knew I'll have and explained how this parenting thing goes. I took so many notes and bits from the course spring to mind every day as Nina grows from a baby into a child.
Turns out we have these three psychological needs - autonomy (need to be in control), competence (the need to learn skills), and relatedness (the need for love and connection) - and in order to be happy and emotionally balanced you need to satisfy and have satisfied these needs.
One of my favourite bits @uraniacremene.ro says is "All everyone wants is to get as much as they can out of what they want." this applies to us parents as much as it does to our kids ๐
When I last went to Greenwich Market (the best craft market ever), I picked up *lots*, from a lovely fabric birthday crown to honey oat soaps, from rainbow macarons to wooden bracelets.
The best finds though were these art cards by Daniel Mackie @the_dmc_daniel - whimsical scenes of nature, watercolour cards inspired by Japanese prints, Art Deco and the Arts and Crafts Movement. So full of personality are these creatures, we had initially only chosen a couple.
They were intended as greeting cards of course, but I carefully cut them around and made them into a paper garland hanging above a door.
I've been into papercraft recently. As a graphic designer, brilliant illustration is gold dust that I need scattering around the house. We ran out of wall space long ago, so I've been turning great illustrations into paper garlands that I can hang off the ceiling ๐. Adobe have a free section in their stock library where I found this whimsical sea story the other day, printed them on card, and sewed them together.
We spent an entire day in Burano despite it being such a small town, the colours just draw you in and keep a hold of you in wondrous ways, as if you can't escape this joyous candy-like reality.
My head spins at the thought of having to decide one one single colour for our house if we lived there.