Hi Mindful Writers,
Back in February 2023 shortly after I started this Substack I wrote a post called ‘The power of love to fuel our writing’ and today I want to build on what I said there as now, three and a bit years later, I believe that the power of love is what we need to fuel our entire lives, of which our writing is just one element.
Last weekend, me and Mr Saint went into Glasgow for the day and the Pride 2026 march and celebrations were taking place there. The sun was shining and as we walked from the train station towards the festival site we caught up with the marchers and walked alongside them. Everywhere were messages of love. On t-shirts, on banners, on signs in the shops we walked past, on people’s faces and in their eyes. In their arms draped around each other and in the millions of bubbles being blown that sparkled rainbows in the sunshine.
When we reached the festival site, the Rock Choir were on stage filling the streets with beautiful harmonies. People were dancing and singing along and the energy was so potent. So charged with love. It brought tears to my eyes to feel it flowing so freely and see everyone so joyful. There were rainbows painted on the ground and graffiti chalked on a wall saying: “Life is Beautiful.” I couldn’t agree more.
Later we went for a walk in the park and it was filled with families, with couples, with friends of all nationalities, ethnicities and genders. It was filled with laughter, peace and joy. There was no sign of all this division and hatred the media would have us believe is everywhere. And I knew, without a doubt, that it’s hardly anywhere. There are only a minority of us that are filled with fear and suspicion. To steal an expression from my great friend Teri Leigh 💜, I know that the vast majority of us are filled with fierce love. I saw the evidence of it everywhere on Saturday. I see the evidence of it all the time in my work with writers, in the interactions I have on Substack and out in the world everywhere where I go. And I go many places as I am prone to wander.
Ever since I started writing here on Substack, I have been sharing how important it is that we write stories that bring more connection and love to the world, and I know that this is true. I have shared so much evidence of the difference it makes in posts like The Science of Storytelling and The Water in Your Body is Listening, and in the personal stories I share from my own life of how it transformed when I told a different story about myself.
Now I am taking it further, it’s not only important to tell and write stories that are powered by love, it’s vital to live a life that is rocket-powered by love. I have been reading a lot lately about the cosmos and it’s influence on how our human lives unfold on this amazing planet we’ve been gifted with as our home, in work by Wizard Withwords and FarStellar, and now more than ever is the time to live the way you want the world to be. To open your heart and your mind and be love in the world in everything you do and say and write and think.
In reading their work, I have come to understand that the way my path has unfolded before me over the past decade has prepared me for this time when I needed my heart to be open and ready. I have been following this path with no idea where it is leading, shedding old ways of being and disconnecting from the mainstream way of living and working, finding myself learning so many unexpected things and becoming a version of me that I had never envisaged.
This version of me is ready to keep being love and spreading love in the face of all the chaos and all the propaganda. To speak up and out with love no matter what. To help as many people as I can to find their way to love, of themselves first and foremost as we have to have self-love to be love in the world. And that’s the hardest love to have.
But everything I’ve been through, all the grief from all the bereavements, from the estrangement from my abusive family, from the dreams and versions of me I let go of, taught me how to love myself and that taught me to love everyone else, to love life, and to know that despite how mad and bad and dangerous the world can be, love will see us right.
With a whole lot of love,
Amanda 💙
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100% agree - at heart, we are all the same really. We all want to give and receive love, we all want to be happy and live in a safe world. Those who prioritize anything above these desires aren’t being true to themselves. ♥️
Yes, Amanda! If we can find even one spark of that love within us, we can fuel that and expand to share with others. I try to express my love and the love of this world through it photography, especially when I’m too flooded with emotion for words. Can we simply see the beauty in everything, the interconnectedness of every single thing that exists? That is love amplified.