A little bit about me.
Hi, I'm Amanda, a writer, poet, and mother. I grew up wild on Turrbal Yuggera country, Brisbane Australia but spent most of my adult life in cities far from home. After 25 years away, including six in the middle of nowhere, I found myself back near where I started.
Writing continues to help me chart the often strange course between my internal and external worlds, between the seen and unseen and back and forth through time in my quest for personal and collective remembering and reconnection.
Freedom starts within with small acts of liberation and love that ripple out in powerful ways. Together we can create the more beautiful, just and compassionate world we long for.
What’s Appetite for Living?
Appetite for Living is my newsletter delivered to your in box and ears every second Sunday via Substack. Every two weeks you’ll receive a letter and/or a poem sown and grown from my conversations with life.
What’s it about?
Through poetry and personal essays and practices, I explore everyday emancipation, sacredness, mysticism and animism as portals to remembering and reconnecting with the greater web of life we all belong to. In remembering our interconnectedness, we begin our journey back to ourselves, each other and our more than human kin. We remember how to fall back in love with the world.
Here is what other Substacks recommending Appetite for Living have to say:
"If your soul needs nourishing, head here immediately. Amanda sprinkles deep wisdom and mystical truths like confetti, and her poetry always facilitates a homecoming. For reconnection to what is most important, there is no better Substack." Chloe Hope, Death & Birds
“Amanda's poetry is a balm for the soul during troubled times. Her connection and commitment to presence with all things show us the way forward.” Mariah Friend, Heartbeats
“I love Amanda's mystical lens on life, and her beautiful poetry.” Phoebe Freer, Life Writing Alchemy
Is it free?
Yes it is! Every new edition of the newsletter goes directly to your inbox. You can also read it via the Substack app for 6 weeks after publication, before it disappears behind a paywall.
My writing and contemplation practices are labours of deep love and if you feel called to support me and my work in a material way, you can upgrade to a paid subscription at any time. With a paid subscription you will gain access to the full archive, including posts paywalled after 6 weeks, past audio series, and occasional subscriber only posts looking behind the scenes of my creative and contemplative practices and projects.
If you’re not into subscriptions and would still like to show your appreciation by supporting me and my work financially, you can make a one off donation.
Sharing a post you love, liking or leaving a comment are all equally and gratefully received with so much love, so no pressure!
As always, if you are un or underemployed, or otherwise feel a paid membership is financially out of reach, reply by email to any one of my free letters you receive and I’ll comp you a subscription, no questions asked!
Anything else I should know?
Appetite for Living has its own bookshop. You can browse HERE.
I’m fundraising for the Indigenous Literacy Foundation with $2 from the sale of every limited edition hardcover of Reunion Songs donated to help provide culturally relevant books and learning resources to children and families living in remote Communities across Australia. Donations also support the publishing of books written by Communities, for Communities, in languages of their choice. You can make a direct donation to the ILF HERE.
If you’re keen to get a feel for what I write about, you can dive into the ARCHIVE.
You can also find me and my work on my website and Instagram.
I really appreciate your good company here and if you know someone who might also enjoy Appetite for Living, please let them know. This also really helps support me and my work.
I truly appreciate you and your precious attention. In these saturated times, giving it here is no small thing, so thank you!
Yours in reconnection and radical hope, Amanda x
P.S. You can download the Substack app here.
I acknowledge the Yuggera/Turrbal peoples, the traditional custodians of the land I write from, and pay my respects to their elders throughout time, as well as the ancestral spirits, waterways, and lands on which I live. It's a privilege to live and create on this beautiful land, for which I am deeply grateful.
