So I left, went to India, and spent the next few years following the things that had always mattered to me: yoga, cooking and making, without yet knowing where they were leading.

They led me to France, to the house my mother had bought for her own retirement dream. I moved here in 2013 and spent the next years building a life from scratch: creating Little French Retreat, hosting retreats in France and in India, teaching yoga, studying Ayurveda and returning to pottery.

Then Covid came, and I moved my teaching online. Alongside changes at the house, I began welcoming only two guests at a time. Life became quieter and gentler, and I found it offered something others wanted too: a peaceful place to rest and replenish.

In my fifties, I found myself needing an even slower pace and a better balance between my creative work and teaching yoga. In the yogic tradition it’s called vanaprastha, the forest-dweller stage, when we turn from striving towards stillness. Rather than rebuild what had been, I let go, stepped fully onto the yoga path, and began to live life as an invitation. It was, I see now, a coming home to myself.

What I learned in that unfolding is what I bring to my work. That change rarely arrives with a clear map. That the body knows things before the mind catches up. That nourishment (the right food, the right rhythm, the right quality of attention) changes everything. And that a life built from the inside out gives you solid ground to grow from.

Today my life is deliberately quiet and richly creative. My world is the house, the garden, my animals and the footpaths and fields around Montesquieu. Years of daily practice, cooking, making and moving with the seasons have given me a steady, unhurried quality of attention. Here I hear my own intuition more clearly, and I’ve learned to listen more deeply to others.