The past few weeks have been a time of unexpected beginnings for me — gentle ones, honest ones, the kind that arrive quietly and change the direction of your life without fanfare. Out of this time have come two new ventures: my book Open Door and a new reflective space called Still Waters.

Open Door is brand new. I wrote it only recently, shaped from the coldness, questions, and hesitations that have followed me through life. It's for anyone who has ever stood outside a church physically or emotionally and wondered whether they truly belong. It speaks openly about adoption, domestic abuse, being a trans woman, and the long, slow work of learning to trust again when trust has never been safe. It isn't a book about how church should look. It's a book about gentleness — about lowering the drawbridge for people who feel outside.

In these same past few weeks, something else began to grow: Still Waters. It's a new space for people who want quiet rather than noise, reflection rather than pressure, gentleness rather than performance. Still Waters is for those who feel spiritually unsure, emotionally tired, or simply in need of somewhere soft to land. It's not a club or a programme. It's a room where frailty is welcome, questions are allowed, and belonging doesn't have to be earned.

Both ventures are new.

Both were born in the past few weeks.

Both came from the same longing — that faith could be warmer, kinder, and more human than the cold many of us have known.

Open Door is the story.

Still Waters is the space.

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Together, they offer warmth to anyone who has ever felt outside the walls.

If something quiet has stirred in you recently — a question, an ache, a hope — maybe that's the beginning of your own open door.

Read Open Door here:

https://1drv.ms/b/c/32ec515b38431de5/IQAMZdl17cufS4Z8G_U_mD7qAVyUaFpFOMkuFt84vIUzi3A?e=FghlNm

Still Waters meets on the third Wednesday of each month, 7.45–9.15pm, in the Parish Room at Holy Trinity Stevenage. It's a gentle space with reflective storytelling, a warm welcome, and time to breathe.