Beauty – HOW TO BE;

HANNAH; reflective;

“Now I understand what a healthy support system feels like.”

Hannah’s interview comes to a hugely reflective end as she touches on where she has come from, where she is now, and where she wants to be. She might not have all of the answers just yet but that hasn’t stopped Hannah discussing how she finds beauty in the mundane, how her mind works like a puzzle and how she is coming to terms with uncertainty.

Hannah’s pronouns are “she/her”.

What is your biggest fear and how do you prevent that from taking over?

I have two: one is a personal fear and the other is a career fear. The personal fear may be irrational but I am terrified of my family dying and I think that is pretty obvious. And actually, on reflection, quite rational. What do I do to stop that? I just ignore it! Repress, repress, repress. It’s going to happen but we will cross that bridge when it comes. I have experience of an immediate family member dying and that was horrendous. Because I know how that felt, I am fearful of feeling that pain again. I know it’s going to happen and because I am only child, I am scared of being that alone but I, even though you can prepare yourself for that, I don’t want it to happen. I try not to think about that. The career fear is not achieving my dreams. That is one of my biggest ones. Now that I am 30, and not quite running out of time, it’s making me realise all of the pressure we put on ourselves. I am nowhere near when I want to be. The pandemic has stopped so much. My mind says “well, we are here now and nowhere near where we want to be so let’s keep trying”. I am scared I won’t be a successful actor. I think therapy really helps with that. If I think about it too much, I will spiral but it’s about finding joy outside of that. Acting is not the be all and end all. I have to find things which fulfil outside of this part of me otherwise we are [she whispers] fucked.

What is something you really want to do/start that you aren’t doing? Why aren’t you doing it? What can you put into place to achieve it?

That’s really hard! The first thing that comes to mind is that I would love to own my own flat in London but that is not something we can check back on easily. There are a lot of steps involved. Number 1 is making money and the property ladder is too hard to get on. A realistic thing? Let’s say a genuine thing is that I want to leave the pub and invest more time and money in acting. Actually! I can answer that. Something I really want to do is be a full time, freelance actor. It’s not because I really hate the pub because I am in a very privileged position where my job does allow for flexibility to pursue my acting career. It gives me stability to go off and do other things. My boss is actually my friend too which is fantastic. It’s just that the pub is not creatively fulfilling for me which makes it quite difficult to do. I would like to, at some point, give that up and put all of my attention and effort into my acting career and I am doing that now. I want to keep the same peace and control of my time in lockdown throughout my entire life because this does actually make me really happy. Why I’m not doing that now is because I am not financially in a position to be full time freelance just yet. My plan was to save enough money to support myself for 6 months so I can take a sabbatical of some sort but I need to have a financial cushion. London is really expensive to live in. When things re-open, and I get a full salary, I will save more and push harder at the career.

What type of outlook on life do you have? Where do you think that comes from?

I am quite impulsive, quite spontaneous I think. Wait. Am I spontaneous? I would like to think I am more spontaneous that I am. I am definitely still impulsive: I do move through life taking each day as it comes. I don’t do a lot of forward planning which works against me sometimes. I don’t really have a clear idea of where I am going. I know where I want to be but I am so unsure of myself in terms of how to get there. I don’t always trust my judgement in where I am going so it’s hard to navigate my way through life with a plan. I would like to be more positive even though I do have a positive outlook on life. I just doubt myself every step of the way so I I feel more cynical. Interestingly, I was having a conversation with my mum because she always says “I don’t know what happened. You were such a confident child!” And when I talk to her about my mental health, self-worth and self-esteem, she is confused because she doesn’t know where it’s come from. We share that confusion. In some ways, I am extroverted and a confident person but I think that is a front that I actually believe. I don’t know where things changed. I was a confident child and I am still am to an extent but there is so much doubt. It might be because I am not where I want to be and I’m not getting there as fast as I had hoped which is causing me to have so much doubt and feel really insecure which affects my self-esteem. I am truly a positive and confident person but, because things aren’t happening how I thought they would happen, it’s causing my to struggle internally. I am internalising the rejection I face and it’s making me doubt myself and that is where the shift has come from. I couldn’t tell you when that started but I would love to be fearless again, like when I was younger. There is such a sense of playfulness in childhood and everything is fun. There is so much curiosity and you lose that when you are older because you are bogged down by responsibility and that sucks! You’ve got to find that sense of play and silliness. That’s joy, isn’t it?

What book/album/film/artist/play has changed your life? What did you take from it?

I saw Alice’s answer to this question. [Ed: “Oh wow, you’re a fan.”] When I said I read your blog, I really do read it! I knew I would struggle with this because I will have no idea. Do you know what? The thing that got me really excited about performing. I had a VHS of “Annie/Oliver”: it was a two film VHS and I used to watch those two films all the time as a kid, just over and over and over again. I first really got excited about performance through watching musicals. I wanted to be all singing and all dancing and that matched my personality so much as kid. My favourites would be “Annie”, “Oliver”, “West Side Story”, “Chicago” (with Catherine Zeta-Jones, Renee Zellwigger and Queen Latifa. LOVE. THAT. FILM.) [Hannah proceeds to sing “He Had It Coming” nearly in full]. I love a group song and dance number. It literally brings tears to my eyes. If I hear an orchestral piece of music, and I hear that choir of voices, it moves something in me. I feel like I’m going to cry now thinking about it. It feels and sounds lovely: those harmonies, this community of people working together to create this, I want to be a part of it. I guess that is what changed my life. Musicals changed my life? How gross. I am not a musical theatre person, that is not my industry but I love musicals so much. It’s that old school Hollywood vibe. I just love it.

What song should we listen to whilst reading this about you?

Oh my god. Okay, give me two seconds. I did a desert islands discs interview for a show two years ago. I am going to go with “Black Gold of the Sun” by Rotary Connection. I really like that song. It’s just one of my favourite songs.

Name five beautiful things in life. Tell me why you think they are beautiful.

The natural world. It’s so intricate and connected: it’s magical.
Deep and meaningful connections with human beings. We need them for support. Life is easier when you have people around you that want to help. I keep banging on about this but it’s because it’s only recently that I have allowed people in to support me in that way. Now I understand what a healthy support system feels like.
Finding small pockets of joy in the mundane. You have to find joy where you can in these times. The world is so brutal that you’ve got to find small sparkles of joy. Grab the joy where you can.
Delicious food. I guess that is connected to small joys in life. Actually taking the time to enjoy what you are eating or what is nourishing you. I feel like food can sometimes be seen as an inconvenience: it can get in the way. Or you have a working lunch or be on your phone/watching TV whilst you are eating. But then you don’t enjoy what you are doing. You need to take time to enjoy what nourishes you.
Rest. Is that beautiful or necessary?! That is connected to taking care of oneself. Actually no, scrap that. I think it should be the choir of voices that I spoke about earlier.

If you could sum up your life so far in one word, what it would be and why?

A jigsaw puzzle. I am piecing it together. Not fragmented because that feels like scattered parts. It’s not broken up like that. I am referring back to the analogy of fitting my way through my day. Through my life, it feels like Crystal Maze. You have to complete the task and then pass through to the next section. It’s a mad scramble like “this fits in this hole, that doesn’t work so let’s try something else, try to cut it in half RIGHT that’s worked, onto the next thing”. It has felt like trying to fit different parts of a puzzle together. I have all of the pieces but they might not work at that time. There is a bigger picture but we have lost the jigsaw box. We have the outline, the edges are there, but we are working on trying to figure out the picture. There has got to be something that joins them.

What do you think the meaning of your life is?

[laughs] I have no idea. All I know is that I have an affinity to a sense of community and belonging. Whether that means bringing people together or helping a group of people or being part of something that is bigger, I don’t know. I genuinely don’t know the meaning of my life is. I haven’t figured it out.

After talking through all of this, what have you learnt about yourself or your life? What do you feel the need to reflect on?

I talk such shite – such drivel! The puzzle analogy even works for piecing my sentences together. I have learnt I still do not have a clear idea of where I am going. It’s an exciting experience just living moment to moment. I am really enjoying the current period of discovery that I am in. I feel like I have focus but I would like a little bit more direction. I know where I want to be and I need to trust myself more in the process and not doubt every turn I make. Does that make sense? [Ed: “That makes perfect sense. What a fitting bookmark in your story.”] I have learnt that I still don’t know where I am going. I think I will forever live in uncertainty… I am okay with it and I am not okay with it.

My love letter to Hannah will go live tomorrow.

You can keep up to date with what Hannah is up to on her Instagram here. She also runs an incredible self-help account called you may grow.

STU; resilient;

**“Whatever makes you different can be your superpower.”**

In these final eight questions, Stu and I discussed the other parts of him: from fears to aspirations; outlooks to the meaning of his life. Stu never held back with anything and laid his cards bare on the table which made for some incredible answers.

It’s been a joy to talk to Stu like this and I hope you have all taken something from it.

Stu’s pronouns are “he/him”.

What is your biggest fear? How do you prevent this from taking over?

My biggest fear is loneliness. Being an only child, weirdly I am one of those people who doesn’t like their own company. I do stupid shit when I am on my own because my brain does a wobble. To end up being really lonely would be a nightmare. That is a fear of mine. My friends tell me to do things on my own (which I have done but they’re rubbish) because I do like to have people around me all the time – maybe in a co-dependant way but hopefully not. When I used to live on my own I found that really difficult. I prevent that by hitting people up to make plans but the older you get you realise that people don’t want to meet up in the week because of work. God forbid they get to bed after 10pm! Then the weekend comes and people want to chill out because they’ve had a tough week. You can end up scrambling for things to do or people to meet up with. Luckily enough, I live with Alessio so I always have company and I also have this dickhead [cat]. I didn’t have siblings to play with growing up and it did make me jealous of people who had that. Whenever I had friends round, I was always the person that said “Stay for tea! Play another game! A few more hours!” because I didn’t want to be on my own by the end of the evening.

What is something you really want to do/start that you aren’t doing? Why aren’t you doing it? What can you put into place to achieve it?

Not a lot. I’ve always wanted to do a YouTube channel and now I’ve started it. I’ve always wanted to draw or make a comic book but never got around to it because of the confidence thing. “There are better artists out there. What the fuck are you doing? Why are you putting pen to paper when people can do this better than you?” That instantly stops me doing things. The thing that is stopping me is literally my brain. I need to start drawing for fun again. Just doodle. I can always think of other things to do instead though. Last year, I wanted to do a drawing of each drag artist I know. I started with Ruby [Rawbone] and never did another. I had the wrong paper so bought a new pad but never started again. I used the paper to make little notes to send to people instead!

What type of outlook on life do you have? Are you naturally positive? Where do you think that comes from?

I have a fairly pessimistic outlook on life and that comes from the depressive side of my brain. That’s the most honest answer you’ll get from me. Part of my brain tries to say it’s realistic. I try to look for the best in people and think the best about them but in situations to do with me, I am always pessimistic. A pessimist is never disappointed as they say.

What book/album/film/artist has changed your life? What did you take from it?

I can whittle this down to two things.
From an early age, I have always read comics. I understood myself more when I started to read X-Men comics. The X-Men are an allegory for minorities, as we know. I was growing up and not understanding anything about my sexuality (because it was the 80s and 90s with Section 28) in a small town, you just hear and see things on TV and know that whatever you are is “wrong”. This is a comic I was reading where people were born different and they used that to celebrate themselves and help people. I was always reading Batman, Iron Man, Catwoman and they all wore masks. None of the X-Men did that except Wolverine. These people were out and proud. They had codenames but used their real names too. They were superheroes that didn’t mind seeing being seen and were proud to be different. Even Nightcrawler who had blue skin and looked like a monster! Everyone was afraid of him but he was really nice and religious… and didn’t wear a mask. He let people see him. Given that, I hid in the closet for so many years and I probably shouldn’t have. I still read that comic. It’s nice that that was being seen and they were in the public eye. It gave me an outlook of a) don’t judge a book by it’s cover and b) whatever makes you different can be your superpower.
Second thing is obviously Garbage [band]. My mum always said she was worried I wouldn’t get into music because I was so into art and comics. She thought videogames would be my thing but she loves music. When I hit my teens, all I wanted to do was listen to music I went from pop to rave and everything that was around in the 90s: the weird hip-hop swing grunge. I latched onto that. I was the only one that gave a shit about NME, Melody Maker, Kerrang. Other people cared about what the Spice Girls were up to. In the 90s, indie rock was given the biggest platform it has ever been given. Female fronted bands had a massive surge in that time. It was huge – even that was in Smash Hits and on Top of the Pops. I enjoyed that part of it. These rebellious women were there and my brain instantly saw them as a woman in a man’s world doing something which men usually do [play rock music]. They were front and centre. They felt like me: not fitting in but not minding and doing my own thing, For some reason, Garbage came along. I heard “Vow” on the Evening Sessions and I remember having this massive stereo and the song started and, as soon as it kicked in and I listened to the lyrics, it kind of floored me. I sat on my ass to listen to the song. A few weeks later, they turned up on TV and from that moment there was something about it. These weird samples and hip-hop beats but it was rock and heavy and didn’t sound like BritPop. I saw the band and she was so striking. So beautiful but not conventionally so. The rest of the band looked like weird old men. I responded to that because they were freaks. I liked it. I saw an interview with Shirley and she was so forthright and very outspoken. Then that was it. I thought “this is what I’m into”.

What song should we listen to whilst reading about you?

Something by Garbage. I dunno though. I’d say either “Queer” by Garbage (for obvious reasons) or my favourite song is “Push It”.

Name five beautiful things in life. Tell me why you think they are beautiful.

Music. The reason why is because the same song can mean completely different things to completely different people. It can create some beautiful memories that can help you out. You do a lot of healing with music – not like panpipes – but you can stuff to people’s lives with music.

Random acts of kindness that happen between strangers. I quite like that. I like to do something nice in the moment. You might never see them again but you’ve had a moment where you’ve helped them out for no other reason than you’re another reason and I should help you. I find that beautiful but the way we are now is mistrusting and it doesn’t happen often. People don’t want their actions to be misconstrued and that’s a shame.

Connecting at the end of a night. I have so many memories of being with all my friends in a circle after a gig or club night and we would all be singing at each other at the top of our voices. Having that connection is really beautiful and something I always remember.

Support. I mean all types of support. It might mean nothing to one person but means something to someone else. Not necessarily being supportive, not like “I’m always there for you” but I have people on Facebook who never come to my shows or live near me but, for algorithms sake, they will share an event of mine. It helps with reach and that kind of support is beautiful. There are some people I haven’t seen since school but it’s that little “I’ve got you” wink can mean a lot to someone. It’s really strange that we don’t all do it. It doesn’t take a lot to support someone. It doesn’t have to be monetary either! It can be showing up or a recommendation or sending a playlist. Everything creates ripples in my head.

Purple is beautiful.

If you could sum up your life so far in one word, what would it be and why?

Long! [laughs] and Wide! No. There isn’t one word but it would be doing a little bit of everything.
My thing is that, for years, I have tried to do so many different things. People might see that as a lack of focus but I am always looking for new things which I want to give a go and see where it takes me. Everything in my life has led onto something else. I met a guy at a job who wanted to go to gigs but didn’t have anyone to go with so I started going with him. We started a Facebook group where we reviewed the shows and then a magazine reached out to us to write articles for them but we had to take down the group on Facebook because we were taking all of their traffic. They didn’t say it in those express words but they wanted us. It reached a point where I could pick and choose what I wanted to go to because I was so reliable. That ended up with me going to BeachBreak festival to review for them. I got given free swag and backstage access which was amazing. I ended up blagging my way into various interviews and I met everyone on the bill: Friendly Fires, LadyHawke and shit loads of people. The pinnacle was Dizzee Rascal. I realised I didn’t mind doing that or being on camera and that got me into managing a band. I managed them for a little bit. Through managing a band, I started putting on my own gigs so we did the whole thing ourselves. I did it all: marketing; posters; social media. Through that, I realised I enjoyed putting on events which led into me doing makeup for Halloween gigs and then I wanted to be a special effects makeup artist. Then I did bits and bobs for magazines which, years later, fed into Punka. Everything felt random with me trying everything but it’s all followed on. For the past ten-fifteen years, I’ve done it all and it’s all paid off with Punka.

What do you think the meaning of your life is?

I don’t think we do know. I don’t think anyone’s life has to have meaning. It’s what you do with it that should matter. The legacy you leave. If you’re a bit of a shit in your life, that’s what you’ll be remembered for. If I’m only remembered for Punka, then I don’t mind that. Asking big questions like this is all good but it’s the little things you do which make bigger ripples in life which affects other people. Not being a dick is what I’m here for. I’m just trying to put a bit of positivity out.

After talking through all of this, what have you learnt about yourself or your life? What do you feel the need to reflect on?

I’ve learnt that I talk a lot. I love a natter.
I’ve got a long way to go in the way I see myself in terms of my confidence in myself and my abilities. That’s my problem. This week has been a really good example. In my interview, I outlined my strengths and weaknesses. My weakness is that I can do whatever I put my mind to – anyone can – but the problem is my brain letting me do it. It’s that imposter syndrome. I’ve been at Punka and you have been like “look at this! You have created this!” but I can’t cope. It’s like something else happens. [Ed: “But it’s not because you have made that happen!”] Yeah, I know but my brain won’t let me think that! In the last year of Punka, I started getting up at the end of the show to say a few words and that has helped with a lot of confidence. That has spiralled into me being confident enough to do a music show and go live on Twitch which then gave me confidence to do a YouTube channel. I work on my confidence with all of these things but it doesn’t stop it from being a thing.

My open letter to Stu will go live tomorrow.

You can catch Stu on his Instagram page or his YouTube channel.
Punka, his queer night, can be found on Facebook, Instagram or YouTube.