I can’t believe I’m finally announcing this—my debut EP What Comes Next is coming on October 18th! 🎉
This project is deeply personal and represents a journey through time. From how we deal with a past that we once loved, to the present we struggle to fully embrace, and a future that is unknown.
You’ve already heard the first four songs, which guide you through: 🌞 the turbulence of nostalgia (Girl In The Sun); 💃 the sometimes disappointing nature of mundane life (Twenties); 🛌 how this can be suffocatingly overwhelming (Battered Bruised & Sore); 🏜️ and nurturing your passion when all feels lost (Lose My Hope).
But the final addition completes the cycle.
My New Meaningis about something I’ve been learning more and more each day—letting go of control and trusting her (the universe 💫).
This song means the world to me, and I’m so excited to finally share it with you.
✨ For a long time, I planned every step, organized every detail, and felt pressure to control the future. But I’ve realized that peace doesn’t come from constant planning—it comes from living fully in the present moment. 🌿
This song is a grounding reminder to slow down, reconnect with nature, and find joy in life’s simple experiences. It’s about embracing what the universe has in store, trusting that what is meant for you will come to you, and knowing that “she delivers all her promises.” 🌍
I hope this song can become your own personal mantra, reminding you to let go of fear and live with trust. 🙌
Thank you for being part of this journey. I can’t wait to hear what 'My New Meaning' and the whole of 'What Comes Next' means to you. 🖤
Organising and managing projects and tasks as an independent
The thing I'm most excited by (this is possibly going to sound really sad) is that I completed update my music career homepage on Notion so now I've got a much clearer focus. Previously everything was all over the place with random goals and tasks written in different locations.
I've brought them all together in one place, with a few extra features. Here, have a look:
Notion music homepage
Notion music homepage
I've been using notion for years and still find new ways to use it.
The 'Missions' and 'Projects' sections are inspired by things talked about in Cal Newport's book Slow Productivity. He's a great writer about how to manage work in a modern age, as well as lots of interesting things related to detaching from the all consuming habits of modern technology.
I've got sections on the left for my most used links and pages, as well as space to write general thoughts during my work session of the day.
A central section highlights the current project I'm working on, connected to a database which is setup to show everything within the project that is currently an active task.
Then inspired by my job in hospitality I've got a 'handover' section. This is where I can make a note to my future self of what I have completed and what is still in progress. This means when I next sit down to focus on work I have a quick pick up point, rather than scrambling around trying to remember what I was working on specifically.
Then finally there is a general task list. This is surface-level tasks that I will need to dedicate time to organise and expand on.
Also inspired by Cal Newport I structure my working day so that in the morning I have 3-4 hours of 'deep work' where I intensely focus on one large task. At the moment that is the creation and production of social media content. Previously it has been creating or recording music.
Basically anything that is in the 'projects' section will become something that I tackle in my deep work sessions.
Then during the afternoon I have a more miscellaenous working session. This is when I tackle more smaller tasks. So this is when I will schedule my social media content (because I found doing this takes me out of the creative mindset so is not good to do in my deep work session), any feedback I need to provide, or emails I need to reply to, and also things in that general task list.
I loooove it so far. But it is new and shiny so let's see how it fairs in the long run.
Quickly caption videos for social media for free
My main focus this morning has been filming and editing more videos for my promotion. I had done all the planning for each video last week so it was actually very quick to sit down and film them.
I find the longest part of the process to be adding captions to videos though.
I wanted a way to add captions before I upload to Instagram or TikTok so I can avoid the dreaded social media watermark.
Today I finally found a fantastic option.
On the web version of Adobe Express you are able to upload a vide and it will automatically add captions for you. It is super easy to edit the words, and personalise the visuals. This has made my workflow so much quicker already.
So this is what the progress of my current project looks like. Some videos at different stages, and much more to do, but a great day to start the week.
Yes I've played around with final cut pro before but i still don't really know what I'm doing.
On the audio side of things I'm pretty good becayse all the plugins are the same as those stock ones on Logic Pro X. But visually, I'm making it all up as I go along.
Today I edited a whole week's work of instagram reels and posts. (That's 11 pieces of content that I've prepared in 3 hours pretty much).
Obviously I did the planning and the filming earlier this week, today was just the editing.
For my speaking to the camera videos it was a pretty basic process of cutting out the silences between my voice, enhancing the audio, and boosting the vibrancy of the colours a little bit.
Audio effects for speaking to camera footage
However, I have done a 'guided mantra' video that has a lot more editing in it.
I wanted to have an 'eye closing effect' - but I had no idea how to achieve this. Alas, I found a very easy to follow YouTube video and managed to effect using masks and keyframes.
Blinking effect
Then also in this video I wanted to create a dream-like sequence of videos. I didn't want anything too complicated so made the clips all 50% speed, and found an effect called 'romantic' in the Final Cut effects library and used this. It added a nice softness to the footage.
Final Cut Pro effects library
'Dreamy' style visuals
Half of the videos I created today though were just text based videos. These are very speedy to do as there is now filming involved. the most difficult thing is aligning the text with the vocals in the audio. I always just use Final Cut's 'basic title' and adjust its font and colours to suit my style - I don't need anything complicated.
Timing titles to audio
It took me longer to complete all this content than I wanted to but I'm very happy with everything I've achieved. This is what the progress looks like now.
