So it’s like this. I’ve got a new camera, and lots of sparrows in my garden. This particular one has been tugging at the string that ties the plum arch to the framework. I think he wants to use it to build a nest.

So it’s like this. I’ve signed up to an introductory month of bikram yoga at Lano Yoga in Chichester. £39 and unlimited hot yoga classes for a month. I’ve thought about doing this before quite a few times, but this time it has actually happened. I said to Rosa ‘I’m thinking about signing up to do the yoga’ and she said ‘There’s a class tomorrow – I’ll go with you’ and I said ‘Oh, Ok’ Tomorrow was yesterday, and I’ve done another class today, so that’s two and I feel totally energised and totally shattered at the same time and incredibly smug. I am so pleased with myself.

I’m working through the Artist’s Way, a transformational book written by Julia Cameron. It helps you transform your artist self. I’ve had this book for a long time and worked through from beginning to end more than once, but somehow this time it is totally working. Or I am totally listening. I’m not sure which. But somehow everything is falling into place. My artist self, my inner child, some part of me has wanted a camera for a long time. Not a phone camera or a compact camera but a really good one, with a telephoto lens and a macro lens. I’ve bought it. I have it. It says to me over and over ‘You are worth it!’ ‘You deserve this!’

In another part of the Artist Way there is an exercise where you ask your 80 year old self to write a letter to your self now. I did this a couple of weeks ago. He said I was doing well. He said my writing would work out the way I wanted it to, and my relationships were good, and my garden ideas would develop well. He also gently said that he would appreciate it if I looked after my body a bit better.

This is part of the reason for starting at Lano Yoga. It’s a brilliant place, and incredibly welcoming and positive. And I discovered today that Lano is an acronym – Looking after number one! That is so brilliant. To be an artist – to be a healthy human being – to be able to give to others – we must first look after number one.