by marie-nicole

There is a quality you feel in certain people before you’ve consciously formed a thought about why.

A groundedness. A settledness. Something your nervous system recognises as safe before your mind has caught up.

What you’re feeling is the result of work done in private. Work that never makes it to a highlight reel. Work that happens in caves, in journals, in early morning kitchens with both hands wrapped around a ceremonial cup — with no audience, no applause, and no proof it’s even happening.

This Field Notes is about that work. Mine, and that of a treasured friend and fellow traveller whose cave altar images open this video and carry its visual story.✨

A journey I have embarked on recently, quietly behind closed doors, is one called ‘The Songwriters Journey’ while journalling in response to one of the activities this phrase came through that I’d like to share with you as it speaks to this beautifully.

“The darkest moment’s what cracked me open to reveal the ember within, that then got air. It became clear that I was the one who needed to fan that flame, fuel the fire and allow myself to shine.”

The work nobody sees is the work that changes everything.

What would it look like to turn that same devotion — the devotion you give so freely to others — back toward yourself? 🌟

✨ Full story in the video — link in bio & stories.

Don’t overlook the essence of what you bring into your everyday living experience. 🌿

The objects you wear, use, and surround yourself with carry an energy and a frequency — and that frequency is quietly shaping your personal ecosystem whether you’re aware of it or not.

For me, choosing to wear predominantly natural fibres has created a coherence in how I move through my days. An ease. A quality of presence I can feel in my body and see reflected in how I engage with the world around me.

Days — not hours — go into the creation of these vests. And what follows is years of enjoyment, of stories, of character earned through living.

What draws people to reach out and touch them when they encounter them out in the world? I believe it’s wildness. A remembering. These pieces carry something that most of our built environments quietly strip away — a connection to nature that the body recognises before the mind does.

These vests aren’t made to be saved for special occasions. They’re made to be lived in. Worn on ordinary Tuesdays and extraordinary adventures alike. Each one develops its own character through use — infused with the life of the person wearing it.

Which leaves me wondering — and maybe leaves you wondering too:

Do the items you choose to wear and use throughout your days align with the experience you wish to have in life? 🌿

✨ Full story in the video — link in bio & stories.

Nothing to Prove 🍑✨

Close-up shot of my butt on a rocky, driftwood-lined beach. Two dogs, a full camera bag and a tote that weighed more than my dignity — all navigated down a steep, root-covered path just to get there. And not a single flinch when I saw the angle.

That’s the whole story, honestly.

I spent most of my life hyperaware of how my body looked — whether it measured up, whether it was enough. And somewhere between starting strength training earlier this year (not to shrink, but to build) and navigating that descent with two leads, a full bag and zero regrets — something quietly shifted.

51 years old. Finally too busy noticing how capable I feel to care about how I look doing it.

Strength isn’t just physical. Sometimes it’s the moment you realise you didn’t even flinch. 🥁🪶

Save this if you needed the reminder today.

SelfAcceptance MagneticByDesign

Every piece begins long before I pick up a blade or a pattern.

It begins in the choosing.

And the choosing — I’ve come to understand — is everything.

When I move through a supplier’s range I’m not shopping. I’m *listening.* To size, colour, the appearance of the skin. But also to something beneath all of that. A quality you can feel before you can name it.

I can tell if an animal lived a happy, healthy, vibrant life by the quality of its fleece. The sheen in it. The life still present in it. That’s not a concept — it’s something my body knows before my mind catches up.

The same intelligence that tells me when something is misaligned. When trust is warranted or when it isn’t. When danger is present before I can see it.

I trust that. Completely.

And once the hides come home — we’re not done yet. What you see here is the smudging process. Returning the energy of the piece to neutral before anything new is set into it.

Because what goes into the making is present in the made thing.

Synthetics create a barrier between you and your environment. Natural fibres create a ‘connectedness’ to it. 🌱

Once you feel that distinction in your own body — you can’t unfeel it.

🌿 What the Hide Remembers — full video in bio link & stories.

Even after years of experience, I still walk away from a shoot feeling completely enlivened — and then the analysis begins. 😄

Every image I didn’t quite catch. Every moment I could have moved faster, seen differently, held the light a little longer.

And honestly? I’ve stopped trying to make that voice go away.

Because that voice — the one that notices, questions, reflects — is the same voice that makes me better with every single shoot. It’s not self-doubt. It’s devotion to the craft.

What I have learned is how to work with it rather than be flattened by it. To sit with what worked, what didn’t, and what I’m taking forward — and then let it go.

I’ve also learned something else entirely: that the only way I can genuinely hold space for a client who feels uncomfortable in front of a camera is to know that discomfort from the inside myself.

So I keep putting myself there. On purpose. 📷

Because the purpose-led business owner who steps in front of my lens deserves a photographer who understands exactly what courage that takes.

The full Field Note — where I walk through all of this and more — is linked in bio. Worth a watch if you’ve ever finished something you loved and immediately started picking it apart. 🌿

And if this kind of honest, behind the lens conversation is your thing — follow along. There’s more coming. ✨