Welcome to the Loved Cooled Gifted Podcast.

This is your place to come for musings about spirituality, identity and purpose.

I'm your host, Catherine Cowell.

I'm absolutely delighted for this episode to be joined by artist Sophie Killingley.

So would you like to introduce yourself a bit, Sophie?

Hi Catherine.

I am Sophie Killingley.

I am from Wales originally.

I feel it's important to say that, that's my roots.

But I've lived in Surrey for the past twelve years or so And I am an artist and writer.

So I do a lot of visual art.

A lot of it is digital, graphic.

It uses text because I really like using art and words together to explore different themes of Oh, all things, mental health, faith, subcultures, the body, so many things, and neurodivergence, because we are one of those families too.

And I live with my husband Pete and our two teenagers who are both autistic and our cat, Major Tom. We don't have a diagnosis for him [the cat] as of yet.

Do you think he might need one?

He might do.

He fits into out family very well, let's say.

That's brilliant.

So how did you get into the art Oh, great question.

Well, I was always one of these intensely creative kids.

I learnt piano and violin as a kid used to participate in loads of orchestras but then I was always writing my dream was to be like Jo March from Little Women she was my app Absolute icon back in the day, just a feisty, amazing writer trying to make her own way in the world.

So she was my like icon.

And so I was constantly writing.

I forced my primary school to have a school newspaper which I edited and wrote.

I used to create our own family newspaper where I'd draw pictures and sell it to the family to read.

And then being a weird people pleaser I ended up actually going to law school.

That doesn't fit the Joe March.

Exactly.

I ended up doing a whole law degree and then After that I sidestepped back into the arts again.

I couldn't stop creating basically.

It just i any time I I did af to stop drawing or writing, my brain would have a mental health episode.

So I found that I needed to keep doing this, keep writing, keep drawing.

So I just continued to do that, set up a website and it turned out that people liked my stuff and kept hiring me to do things and it's kind of grown out of that.

So I do an awful lot of very varied things now from designing logos for organizations to doing live illustration, which is when events hire you as an artist to live illustrate keynote speeches.

So I've been all around the world including Cyprus and Beijing and Nashville drawing at conferences, which has been really fun.

But I also do my own kind of cartoon and kind of graphic work exploring elements of life and faith in particular.

I really like to kind of make people slightly uncomfortable, basically, with the kind of things that I'm exploring Yeah, I imagine that you managed to kind of get into that gap having looked at some of your stuff, which I really love.

Get into that gap. between sort of this is so uncomfortable that we never want to talk to you again and that this is presented in a way that enables people to kind of engage with it.

Absolutely.

Well, I'm a big fan of using humour because I find that it's very disarming.

If people laugh, their kind of guards are put down slightly and it enables something quite important to get through.

So I've been involved in quite a lot of more kind of conservative evangelical spaces, but I feel that I've somet got away with quite a lot in terms of my satire and my cartooning because I've done so in a a disarming way.

I've made jokes which people kind of relate to.

And kind of go, oh yeah, no, I see that's us.

And then I've got in some little critiques of the culture that way.

It's a good way to do it, I think.

Yeah, I'm sort of imagining when you've kind of really hit on it and they can see themselves, there is a lovely sense of being seen, isn't there?

Yes, absolutely.

So many of our kind of little subcultures that we have within faith are so incredibly niche.

So having kind of grown up around various church spaces, I feel like I know them so well.

So it's been really fun to kind of poke some gentle fun.

Maybe sometimes people don't receive it so gently.

Occasionally I get into trouble and people get very cross about it.

But I just love Trying to like sh hold up a mirror and make us laugh about ourselves.

Cause I'm always like, I take God seriously, but the rest of us, we're absolutely blinky ridiculous.

We do and say the weirdest things and we need to acknowledge that.

So Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

And probably there are people in those spaces for whom having somebody kind of opening a window will be a great relief.

I hope so.

That's always my aim.

I've always felt at odds, I guess, with a lot of the cultures that I've been in.

I was talking to you earlier about the Japanese artist Makoto Fujimura, who talks about being a border stalker.

And that's always where I felt kind of called to.

I I feel like I stand on the edges of whatever group I inhabit as a kind of signpost to be like, You have permission to be here. uh signpost to other weirdos and people to kind of show that there is space for them as well.

So it's not a very comfortable place to inhabit because you run the risk of being misunderstood and unseen a lot of the time, or not truly seen, but I'm there for the other people who don't feel seen and are just desperate to kind of have their experiences illuminated in some way.

Yes, yeah.

The thing that made me think I really would like to record a conversation with you was a particular piece of art, written piece of art. about a character in the Bible called Vashti.

And I'd done quite a bit of thinking about Vashti before I saw your piece of art.

And feeling that actually I'd got quite a lot of respect for her.

And that there was something very, very relatable about her and her situation.

So Your piece of art I think says she said no.

Yeah, it's a massive piece of graphic art.

It's very bold, kind of colourful, swirling kind of background, kind of messy, but it kind of spills over the borders.

And then in this kind of big block bald lettering, we've got she said no.

And instead of a a full stop, there's like a tiny little crown as well, because I wanted to kind of Both show her as the queen of Persia that she was, but also in modern vernacular, what a queen Yes Yes queen.

Absolutely.

So Vashti, I'm guessing that 'cause she's not very well known, people will not be immediately thinking, Oh yes, yes, yes, Vashti.

So do you want to introduce us to who she was and where she turns up?

Yeah, absolutely.

So Vashti, she is we know very little about her really when it comes to the the biblical text She appears at the very beginning of the Book of Esther.

And she is the Queen of Persia, married to her husband, King Essaueros, who was the king.

And At the beginning of the Book of Esther, we see the king decides to hold this massive 180-day feast, and she kind of hosts one for the ladies as well.

And it goes on for all these days and he gets very drunk with all his friends.

It kind of goes into detail about the fact that there was, you know, no one was wanting for any wine.

So it sounds like an absolute rager.

So by the end of this, he decides with his mates who are probably all incredibly drunk and slightly lechy as well.

They call for Vashti to come and show herself off to kind of cause it says she was really gorgeous to look at.

Now we don't get this exactly from the text, but Jewish tradition would suggest That when they call for her to come and parade herself, they're wanting her to be naked.

That's one interpretation that she has to show up and basically kind of be, you know, a strip show, a porno aid for the drunk king and his friends.

And to refuse the king in those days, obviously, that was y you just you couldn't.

I mean it was punishable by um possibly death or banishment.

But Vashti, the absolute badass lady that she was said no.

She was just like, No, thank you.

I'm not not doing that.

And that is all we know about her, because then the king just flies into a rage that she's basically shown him up in front of his friends. by refusing to come out on parade for them.

And she gets banished, which then paves the way for change and for the whole story of the Book of Esther to be set in place.

And so Esther can come in. and save the Jewish people from genocide later on in the book.

So she's this amazing catalyst for change.

The fact that she is there at this point and she says no.

For whatever reason, we don't know, but I'm assuming she doesn't want to be paraded in that way and she gets banished.

Some sources would suggest it might have even meant that she was executed again, unsure.

But she was deposed, she was gotten rid of.

So I just think it's such a powerful statement as as a female now. uh that she just said no.

I mean, we all know how hard it is to say no and especially with a male-female dynamic, I think many of us will have been in situations where we've had maybe a man approach us or, you know, offer us compliments that we don't want and We know the danger of kind of rebuffing that, you know, that we can put ourselves in.

It's just it's still present today.

But the power of being able to say no It's really interesting.

It's really interesting.

So the the kind of Jewish tradition a around Vashti, there is intimation that that she was of royal birth.

Yes.

So she may well have had some status of her own.

Yes.

What is very interesting in the text is how unsettled all the men are.

By the fact that she fairly reasonably has said no, I'm not gonna parade myself in front of a whole pile of drunk lechy men.

'Cause I mean, who wants to do that?

By Who knows what would have happened?

It sounds like they're all still fairly drunk at this point.

But they decide, don't they, that he's going to write to the whole of the nation and explain that a man is the king of his own household and women must do what they're told.

And in order to explain to people that you can't be having your own thoughts, we need to make sure That everybody knows and so Vashti must Vashti must go.

Yes.

All the men are just horrified, aren't they?

Because they just say, Oh, if she can say no, then that might encourage our wives to start saying no and there will w where will we be?

So there's a a quick doubling down where they have to reiterate, nope, uh you could not allow to do that.

So it's really interesting really interesting how scared she's made them all.

Yeah, she's made them terrified.

Uh which is incredible 'cause it Again, it must have been you know, it was a momentous thing for her to do in the first place, to say no.

So I just I just love her as a character, even though we know very little.

And she often gets, I think, a bad rap.

She often gets presented as like the disobedient wife.

I mean, there's different Jewish traditions where the Midrash is quite positive to her, but the Talmud kind of portrays her as a disobedient vain wife.

But in our text I don't think we get that.

It's it's interesting seeing the different interpretations.

I think a lot of men would want to put her as the disobedient wife, much like the men in the story.

But I think she's just incredibly strong.

She is.

The other thing that interests me is how the text then portrays her as a foil to Esther.

So you can see he doesn't want a queen who might have her own opinions.

So we need to find somebody much more malleable is the plan.

And so they go and look for a replacement by Well, basically creating a harem of lots and lots of eligible virgins, of which Esther is one, and she's portrayed as being very very obedient, but in the end she isn't.

She's also subversive, but in a in a different way, just not so openly, but still gets what needs to happen done.

Yeah.

So I l I love it.

So there's a couple of like feminist theologians who've like commented on Vashti.

Yeah.

So like Harriet Beecher Stowe calls Vashti's disobedience, the first stand for women's rights, which I love.

Yeah, and another one, Elizabeth Katie Stanton, she says that Vashti added new glory to her day by her disobedience because resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.

Which I love that quote.

So I put that quote on my artist statement when I was asked to contribute to this exhibition.

It was a touring exhibition about biblical women. and ways they're presented and treated.

And so I wanted, I was just like, yes, Vashti.

Simple but strong Yes, yeah.

I'm wondering what you had already been thinking about or what had already been live to you, kind of in the run-up to doing this piece of art.

Interesting.

Well So I was invited to contribute and I think yeah, it was a exhibition which was opened on International Women's Day and it was, you know, looking at whatever biblical woman character you you wanted to in the Bible.

And there's there's many to choose from.

I guess I possibly saw myself in Vashti having often gotten myself into trouble for being outspoken in church spaces.

So my husband and I were in ministry for many years and it was a fairly painful ending which wasn't of our choice and some of that people I think had issue with me and I think I didn't fit a lot of the way people wanted a pastor's wife to look or present.

Obviously I have my bright red hair, I dress like a a toddler who's raided the dress up.

I'm constantly in dungarees and bright colours.

So I feel like I saw myself in Vashti that I'm often in these places where people want me to behave a certain way and I just won't and and that people get annoyed at me or I get pushed out or misunderstood.

And that had definitely been part of my journey that the previous year with the end of our ministry.

I'd felt like we'd stood up against certain things and had been punished for that.

You had also been banished.

Yes, absolutely.

I'd lost you know, my whole community.

We'd lost the house that we lived in, the manse, and we had to kind of move on.

And it was incredibly painful.

And I was already familiar with being outspoken in uh evangelical spaces and even with my cartooning and my satire that I'd done for a Christian conference, you know, I'd received the odd angry email saying that my characterizations and caricatures were inappropriate and you know, things like that.

So I saw myself in Vashti, somebody who kind of stands up and says no and then gets punished for it.

So I think that was partly in my mind, but then I also loved just the strength that she shows and the way that she is viewed by other females now.

You know, we look at her and go, Wow That's that's quite a strong statement that she made.

You know, and I've also I was thinking as well around the Me Too movement and the Church Too movement, so looking at abuses of sex and power.

I'm thinking how powerful women's voices are in that and necessary to listen to them.

So part of that was in the backdrop of my mind when I just wanted to make this big bold statement.

Yeah.

So many of us are standing up and saying, No, enough.

Which is actually the opposite of how the Book of Esther is so often used in in certain kind of church spaces.

'Cause often the mistake I think it's a big mistake that is made is of portraying the king as God And we want to be like Esther.

So we want to be like the women in the Hall Reim who are being perfumed and prepared and secluded from society in order to have this kind of moment with the king, who actually is a drunkard. and power crazed and could kill you if you wanted to.

Totally.

So yeah, I I love your f feminist theologians that resisting a tyrant is obedient to God.

And actually a lot of women who have ended up lots of people actually, not just women, but lots of people who've ended up in that place of being abused, have been in that deception really of seeing the pastor or the the powerful person as a representative of God and their job as being unconditionally submissive.

Yes, totally.

And we are like in so many on healthy spaces, that is exactly how we're trained.

We are trained and and groomed in a sense to see the authority at the front as God's mouthpiece almost.

And they wouldn't put it in those terms.

I think they'd probably be more careful than that.

But I've definitely grown up in places where the man's authority at the front was you don't question that.

And if you do, then you will be punished in some way. like whether that's just a a subtle uh social kind of shunning within the church circles or whatever.

Yeah.

It's subtle, uh but, you know, very felt for the one who's stuck their neck out.

Yes, yes, absolutely.

And church is not the only place where that happens, but it No, it happens everywhere.

Yeah.

Happens everywhere.

But I think I get very incensed about it in church because That is where I've experienced it.

And that's also like that's where we go to commune with God, to be in the presence of the one who loved us and made us.

And how dare other people interrupt that relationship and corrupt the idea of who this loving heavenly god is, you know?

And that just makes me so angry because I'm like, that's just It's kind of it's corrupting the most beautiful thing and that just makes me angry.

And we're often our most vulnerable in those spaces because we have opened ourselves up. spiritually, emotionally, psychologically, in order to connect with the divine.

And then when that is corrupted, that becomes awful.

As you were talking, I was I was thinking about Jesus in the temple equally incensed by barriers, in that case, financial corruption, getting in the way of people connecting with the God who loves them and yeah, he sweeps it all away.

I think we can find Christ much more accurately in Vashti and in Esther than in the king.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

I know.

The kings are wrong and let's say.

He is.

He absolutely is.

Yes.

So yeah, no, so I was very drawn to to Vashdi to be able to do that.

I'd considered various other women as well.

I did consider for one piece just a big picture of myself with my like eyes scribbled out and the word Jezebel written on it because that is shorthand, obviously, for a troublesome woman.

So that was another thought.

But I was like, you know what?

I'm gonna go with Vashti and just make a more general statement.

So I did.

I really, really connected with that.

And as we've been talking, I've been I've been wondering, Sophie, about Your journey from compliance to non-compliance.

Because you you talked about going into law despite the fact that that didn't really fit.

Yeah, no, interesting.

Yeah, it's been a very long journey and continues to be for me.

I grew up in quite a st strict church circles I was very anxious to people please.

I'm fairly sure that I have some neurodivergence floating around here.

So because I have two neurodivergent children, it makes sense.

I've applied to be assessed myself because I think I was susceptible to take things literally when someone at the front said something to completely take that on board and so I think I definitely suffered from maybe moral or religious scrupulosity.

I was very rule keeping.

And that came from a place of just wanting to please God, which is often it is, but that gets kind of exploited by systems who don't understand that.

And so I spent a long time just trying to please a god who didn't seem that he would ever be pleased.

And it really wasn't the God of the Bible.

It was just the people like the men in the church really that I was trying to please and get the approval of.

But it took me a long time into my adult life.

I had to really come away from that. and go through a real time of exploration and just sadness and just trying to find my way until like God very graciously just brought me back and showed me who I was.

And so I was able to kind of start my journey towards unlearning some of the unhelpful things that I'd picked up, wanting to be that person, that guidepost for somebody else. to let other people know that, you know, there's ways of finding your way through some of the cultural things which have gotten in the way of who God is, of who Jesus is.

I feel very strongly about that.

So that's why a lot of my explanation it is pulling apart and making little jokes and fun of church culture. because I want people to see beyond that to the God who is there, you know And so much of what we say and do gets in the way of that.

Unintentionally often, but so much of it clouds who God is, who Jesus is.

And I want for us to be able to laugh at some of the things that we do. and then see the beauty and the fun and the playfulness and wonder of who God is Yeah, yeah.

So there was a lot of kind of trying to shape yourself around what other people thought you ought to be.

Yes, a lot of that.

And did you do a whole law degree?

Oh, I did.

I did.

I did very well in it too.

I even I did like the proper f full qualifying honours degree where you had to do the really like big stuff like trusts and wills and contract and all of that.

So I really put myself through it to achieve that.

And then sidestepped into art.

It was basically as soon as I graduated.

I'm sure much to my family's delight, I went, Nope, can't do law and went and worked in a music shop in London.

Yeah, so you were presumably in your fairly early twenties at that point.

Yes, I was.

And then yeah, and then got married and had children who were both neurodivergent.

So That yes.

And anyone who has neurodivergent children will know that the parenting journey is somewhat different to others' parenting journeys and there's a lot of unlearning within that too.

And especially a lot of unlearning within Christian spaces on how parenting goes, how it looks to parent your children when they do not conform to the norm.

So again, it was a whole more journey of unlearning with that, which again I think my writing and my art have really helped me explore and to keep going in that journey of understanding who I am as a woman of God.

Yeah.

It sort of pushes you, doesn't it?

When your kids will not conform and respond to how parenting is supposed to work, particularly how Christian parenting is supposed to work, and particularly how Christian parenting in Fairley conservative evangelical spaces is supposed to work, you end up being an involuntary border stalker because y you sort of have no choice.

Because it just the way our children were and just didn't conform.

And it was a very lonely and isolating thing.

That's why I think it's so important to be talking about this because it's There's such a homogeneous way to approach parenting, but every child is unique, every child is different.

It's been a really massive learning journey, but I'm so thankful though for my kids being Eurodivergent.

I think had they been really conformist. robotic kids, I think I would have been insufferable.

I think I'd have I think I'd have been like, yeah, I've got this nailed.

I've totally Do you think your scrupulosity would have kind of absolutely flourished?

It would have absolutely flourished and it would have been awful for me.

And everybody around me, I think, you know.

I think I would have been offering top tips on parenting all over the shop.

That would have been your podcast.

That would have been my podcast, yeah.

I would have been like the model Instagram Christian Mom.

So I'm just very glad that Gord was like, nope.

That's not for you.

And my kids being the wonderful, rebellious, sweet, funny maniacs that they are.

Uh it's just been brilliant because it's forced me to learn things about myself.

I wouldn't have ever really faced my own neurodivergence had it not been for the journey I've gone on with them.

So having been kind of forced to do that and realizing how much in my early years I'd been masking to fit in, how much I'd been squashing myself. to conform to other people's ideals.

So it's been the best thing to understand how different people with different neurotypes relate to God.

It's an entirely different thing.

Yes, yeah.

So if you were gonna give us an image of you before you're kind of coming out of your sort of scrupulosity box into who you are now.

If you were to give us a picture or an image for both of those, what would they be?

Interesting.

So I sometimes call my phase, like my sad beige phase, because I looked very different.

I definitely dressed more conservatively.

Probably not conservatively enough for some But more muted colours, because I thought this is how a sensible Christian woman with a young family who has a husband who is about to be a pastor should dress.

So my hair colour was muted, my clothing was a lot more muted.

So it would be a lot of very drab, muted colours.

Not that there's anything wrong with very muted colours, but for me that was not who I was And for me it was just an absolute squishing of myself to try and conform to be something.

And then the presentation of me afterwards it has been a great big kind of I don't know, rainbow explosion, I suppose, in terms of colours and exuberance and and vibrancies.

Yeah.

A friend the other day said that he appreciated me because I was unapologetically myself, but he could also see within that how devout I was.

Which it helped me to to feel seen because I think so often people see the exterior.

I think, well, this is a person who's not very serious Or this is a person who is just kind of wanting to poke fun at the faith or wanting to just be a pain in the butt for whatever reason.

But but it's not, it's because I care so much because my relationship with God is always the most important thing in my life.

And the more I've leaned into who I am and who I've been created to be the more I've wanted to kind of show others you can be the person that God has made you to be and delight in that So how has your image of God, your understanding of who the divine is, how has that shifted Hmm.

Well, I think I've gone through a process of a lot less doing and a lot more being.

So I've shifted from an idea of a god who is just so exacting and waiting for me to fail Which is kind of what I felt growing up that I was always on this tightrope.

Whereas now I'm like I I think And I think one key thing that is missing from so many spaces is a really clear idea about what union with Christ does.

If I am united to Christ, then I am found in him and I'm found in God.

And that cannot alter.

So no matter how I'm feeling or what my like spiritual performance is doing.

It doesn't impact that.

I'm united in a very mysterious way to Christ.

Can't get away from him.

Have tried.

God But that's a beautiful thing to be able to truly rest and be like, this is not on me.

This is not about my performance and how well I'm doing and how I think so much of our faith can be just so focused on what are we doing?

It makes us, I think, well, for certain types of us, anxious and striving and just constantly trying to do things to prove somehow that we love God.

Whereas I I think I've gotten into more of a place Where I can fully accept that I am loved by God, I am held by Him, and I can't stop that, and that's a wonderful thing.

Yes.

Yeah, yeah.

Which absolutely takes the pressure off and it means you can be and you don't need to do.

And if you do do, then it comes out of who you are and your being and your relationship with yourself with with Christ.

Right.

'Cause it always has to start there.

And I think so often we get it the wrong way round where we're trying to do in order to show who we are.

But I'm like, no, it's accepting who you are in Christ, in God, that enables you to be more fully the person that you are.

Yeah.

Uh and these days given that you're not doing the scrupulosity thing, which presumably would have been quiet times and intense Bible study and Making notes in the sermons.

Did you make notes of then?

Yeah.

Oh no.

Oh I actually have a book which is a creative ser spiritual journal which is about doodling and drawing during sermons because I I wanted to create a space where people could feel like you don't have to make these intense notes.

You can doodle and you can just keep your hands busy and that's also a way of interacting with what you're hearing.

And for me I get my art stuff out every week when I'm listening to a sermon. and I draw whatever comes to mind.

Sometimes it's linked to the sermon, sometimes it's not.

Or sometimes I think it's totally not.

And I'm just doing whatever's come into my head.

And then later I look at it and go, oh wow, that was totally linked.

And that was like a an unconscious thing.

So it's just an interesting thing to allow your hands to get busy.

So yeah.

That was my book because I didn't I didn't want to be that scrupulous person anymore.

I wanted to kind of show open ways and show that Deep reflective theological thinking is not and the opposite corner to drawing and doodling.

Bring them together.

So quite a lot of your spiritual thinking connecting you do through your art.

Yeah, absolutely I do.

Uh that's where I can just allow my mind to roam and to play a little bit.

So yeah, I just that's one of my favorite times in the week actually, is just sitting. listening to a sermon and just letting my mind wander as I hear the words and seeing what comes up on the page.

And there's no expectation, there's no pressure. practices, what else do you get up to that connects you?

I'm guessing that you connect with God through everything anyway, but I'm just wondering through particular things.

Yeah, I do.

I found that often being stuck in my head for much of my younger years, I I found that slightly more embodied practices help me these days.

So for me, when I come into my little cabin here, which is my art studio I love in the morning just to light a candle, put on some music.

I'm I'm a real classical music nerd, so I love putting on like minimalist classical music.

And just inviting God into my day. my concentration is very uh you know lacking.

It it it's all over the place.

But I find that at least I just want to start my day by inviting God in.

Like wherever my brain goes next and whatever I end up doing I invite God to be part of it.

And so that's where I start and then away my brain goes.

And there's no stopping it for the day.

Yeah.

Do you know what?

I I I think the Holy Spirit can keep up with your brain.

Yes.

That's a lovely thought.

That is a lovely thought that yeah, the Holy Spirit is at is at play with my mind as it races round doing its thing.

Yes.

Yeah, absolutely.

This has been a fabulous conversation.

I'm wondering if there's anything that's kind of burning in you that if we stop now you're thinking I wanted to say that I don't think so, other than it was interesting that we just got onto the kind of playfulness of gold, because that's another project that I'm actually currently working on with Rabbit Room Press.

It's not coming out until twenty twenty seven.

But I'm working with uh an American woman who's a writer called Katie Bowser Hudson and she's writing a book on play and a theology of play and looking at the playfulness of God. a series of essays and poems and I'm illustrating that and kind of collaborating with her.

And again, I think it draws together all of the things that have been going on in my life for many years.

This kind of gradual unraveling of incredible tension and being completely uptight and uh overwrought to allowing God to be at work to allow a softer, gentler space where God can speak to me and I can listen. and not be afraid that I'm somehow going to tip out of his hand somehow, but know that I'm held um free to explore who he is.

So yeah, that pulls together everything that I'm about.

Fantastic.

So If people wanted to connect with you, with your podcast, look at your art, all of that stuff, where would they find you?

So very simply, my website is my name, so it's SophieKillingley. com.

And you can find me on Instagram where I live out most of my life and my website and then The podcast that I co-host with two other guys, which is an arts and faith podcast, is called Triptych Conversations.

And you can find that on YouTube or Spotify or whatever platform you use.

Triptych conversations.

So how are you spelling triptych?

T-R-I-P.

T-Y-C-H.

Triptych.

So it means like a set of three.

So within the conversations we each take uh an artistic masterpiece, whether that's a piece of film, a song, or a piece of literature, and we introduce it to the others.

And then try and find a common thread and see if there's any links with modern life, faith, whatever, whatever comes up.

It's really fun.

Absolutely brilliant.

Thank you, Sophie Killingley.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Hope you enjoyed this episode of the Loved Called Gifted podcast.

If you'd like to get in touch, you can email lovedcalledgifted at gmail. com You can find a transcript of this podcast at lovedcalledgifted. com and that's also the place to go if you're interested in the Loved Called Gifted course.

Or if you'd like to find out about spiritual direction or coaching.

Thank you for listening.