Today marks one year of We Hyperfocus. And I’m excited to be in deep hyperfocus, as I work on the platform. Reflecting on the past year, and making plans for the future.

I’m actually on holiday, in Cornwall, but the rain is slowing down the day’s plans nicely. The kids are on screens and I am, too. We needed the rain.

In hyperfocus, I ignore everyone around me and everything that isn’t what I’m working on. But we’re in a caravan and people keep coming in.

So, I am moving from room to room, so that I can be alone.

When I’m in this state, my husband side-eyes me. He knows what’s happening. He knows I’m not available. Once upon a time, he’d have found it rude. Now, he gets it.

He trusts that in this state, I can make good things happen. He trusts the power of hyperfocus. (I suspect he gets into it himself, with his own work.)

I recently wrote about circling back to the start, with this platform. I said that I wanted it to return to being about creative business.

But it wasn’t quite right. Not yet. So, I shifted it over to creative coaching. That felt like a better fit. But it wasn’t perfect.

Business and coaching are part of it, but not what’s at the centre of it all.

And I love that on the day We Hyperfocus turns one, the most simple explanation for what it is has landed so heavily in my mind, body and soul.

It’s about hyperfocus.

Of course it is.

And the ‘We’ is there, because it’s for people who hyperfocus. It’s about coming together. Gathering online. Feeling united in this powerful way we operate.

We hyperfocus, hard, and everything around us drops away.

Yes, we might seem selfish, rude, rigid, fixed, unavailable. So be it. This is who we are.

Hyperfocus feels positive to me and and this is important. I am here to help neurodivergent people to focus on their strengths.

There is a lot out there about the challenges. And I’m not brushing over them or pushing them aside but I want to bring it back to one thing that is an asset.

Hyperfocus.

And to help people to harness it. Work with it.

This past year, I’ve interviewed lots of people for the We Hyperfocus magazine. I’ve heard so many incredible stories of neurodivergent creativity.

I’ve heard about the challenges, and the strengths. I’ve listened. I’ve learnt more.

And, one year on, I’ve come back to my ‘what’, with this platform, which is:

To create a global hyperfocus movement.

Through courses, coaching, workshops and online gatherings.

The ‘why’…

I want every neurodivergent person who has dreams and ambitions - or would like to have dreams and ambitions - to feel bolstered.

Woven through the platform is the understanding that we might face different challenges and together, we find ways to work around them.

This is about community.

So, if you like the sound of this and would like to be part of the movement, make sure you’re subscribed here for weekly Wednesday ideas, stories, gatherings…

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Become a paid subscriber, if you’d like to support the movement and have access to all future workshops I’ll be running on this platform.

I'm invested

Join the Facebook group for discussion with other hyperfocus creatives, freelancers and entrepreneurs (it’s free).

And join my new online course - What do I want to do with my work/life - if you’d like my help with dreaming, imagining, planning, doing.

It starts in September and costs £30.

I’m a trained and experienced coach, and I’ve had three non-fiction books published, all with a coaching angle: looking at challenges we face, and working through them.

(‘Raise your SQ’, ‘Shy’, ‘The Freelance Mum’.)

But what I love about running online courses is that I can break them down into really short, manageable modules and topics, which makes them more accessible.

This course will be a series of coaching exercises designed to crack open your imagination and to help you dream. After that, we start to formulate a plan.

Your plan might look different to mine, and everyone else’s. That’s fine. In fact, it’s encouraged. Because it needs to be a plan that feels exciting and manageable for you.

When I design my courses, I make clear that there is never just one way. I offer options. I encourage you to take what I’m teaching and bend it until it fits.

For those of us who hyperfocus hard and then need to completely stop, our work/life might look quite different.

And yet, this is rarely offered as a legitimate way of working.

I’m here to say that it is.

I will be there, on emails, for the course duration, for all your questions/ challenges/ thoughts. I love hearing from the people who are on my courses.

I love helping to untangle limiting beliefs and doubts.

And to help you to break the bigger dream down into tiny manageable steps.

Together, we make it happen.

Stay (hyper) focused.

Annie x

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I was lying in bed in the house I’d just bought with my husband. The sun was peeping through the curtains and I’d been woken by my alarm. I lay there, thinking about going for a run. Telling myself I didn’t have to. Knowing that I would.

My life is like Groundhog Day, I thought. I don’t know where it came from as my home-life was happy and my work/life was quite good. I had a full-time job as a copywriter, writing about films. It was easy. Creative. I got paid what felt like loads of money.

But perhaps it was the rigid structure of my days. Wake with the alarm, tug myself out of bed, leaving my husband sleeping, drink a coffee, go for a three-mile run, home to shower and get dressed and head to the Underground, for the commute.

I hated the commute. I was at the end of the line, so I always got a seat, but it would get packed and hot. I’d arrive, go for a coffee and a croissant and write some poetry. Then, into the office. A tech company. Hundreds of us. No natural light.

No natural light.

Meetings about nothing.

Stinking lunches being cooked up in the tiny windowless kitchen near my desk.

People talking about going to the local food market for lunch but not wanting to go with them, because I couldn’t be bothered with the small talk. I had one friend, but she wanted to go with the group so often, I spent my lunchtimes walking alone.

At the end of the day, the train would be busy. There were no seats. I’d hold onto the clammy metal rail and rock around as the train rumbled through tunnels. I’d get home, make dinner, eat, watch telly, go to bed. Wake up, run, commute.

Groundhog Day.

Losing that job when I was about to give birth to my first baby was shit, and good. I didn’t have to work out whether I wanted to return, after maternity leave. I couldn’t. Now, I’d design a different career, from home. One that didn’t feel so repetitive.

And that’s what I did, over the next 12 years, which leads me to now. I write poetry that I share on Instagram. I’ve self-published collections and I’m waiting to hear back from a commissioning editor at a publishing house to see if I’m getting a book deal.

I run a writers’ membership, The Creative Way Collective, which is where I teach writing, mentor and get to connect with other writers, online. There are co-writing sessions each week for accountability and pre-recorded writing workshops.

And then there’s We Hyperfocus. This platform. That is still evolving. What I want to use this platform for is to help neurodivergent creatives to make stuff happen. Like a productivity platform. Only, everyone hates that term. So, I’m thinking of other words.

Confidence is a big part of ‘productivity’. Having the confidence to make a change. Having the confidence to believe you can try. Having the confidence to deal with failure and rejection (of which there is always quite a lot, on the way to success).

And then, there is energy. Knowing how to hyperfocus when energy is high and rest when it’s low. How to seek inspiration, get the dopamine hit and also stop. How to crack into your creativity. How to trust your ideas and run with them.

Lastly, there is understanding that you don’t have to do it how everyone else is doing it. You don’t have to be consistent. You don’t have to do public speaking or social media platforms that make you feel uncomfortable. You can do it your way.

The career I’ve set up means I get to write poetry every day from a studio at the end of my garden, or - more likely - while out walking. I can wake when I like (except on my children’s school days, and then I wake naturally without an alarm because I’m relaxed.)

I have a structure to my weeks, through the writers’ membership, and I can add in new courses to We Hyperfocus when I need ‘newness’ and have loads of energy to funnel into something. I’ve recently joined TikTok and YouTube, sharing my poetry.

I can choose which work I’d like to do each day. Write essays for Substack when new ideas land. Shift my focus from one part of the business to another. There is variety, creativity at the heart of it all, connection with other creatives and lots of time alone.

Life isn’t always simple. Sometimes my children are struggling with school and that takes over. Sometimes I’m needed by family. But, I make time to work, around it all, because I love my work. It makes me feel whole and full, alongside everything else.

What do I want to do with my work/life?

If you’d like to re-think your work-life, perhaps you’re having your own Groundhog Day - or maybe you’ve taken time out of work and would like to now try something different - I’m running a creative coaching course that will help you to dream and plan.

It’s called What do I want to do with my work/life? and we start on Monday 7th September. As it’s part of the re-launch of We Hyperfocus, I’ve priced it low. An introductory course, if you like. It’s just £30 and includes email coaching with me.

It will meet you where you’re at, unlock your inner dreams - that have been tucked away - help you design the ideal work/life and make a plan. You can read more and sign up here: wehyperfocus.com/product/what-do-i-want-to-do-with-my-work-life/.

Annie x

A year ago this month, I launched We Hyperfocus with this post about building a business live, online. ‘Notes on a scrappy, piecemeal launch rather than a pristine, flash one,’ I wrote, going on to explain my vision for a global hyperfocus movement.

I didn’t know what the business would be, back then.

But I knew that there needed to be an online community for those of us who think differently. Who don’t like rules and want to hold our own power. Who get into a trance, when we’re doing the right work. Who shun hierarchy.

Soon, I’d created a digital magazine on the We Hyperfocus website, publishing several articles and interviews a week. I’d do a round-up each Wednesday on Substack. I loved hearing other neurodivergent creatives’ stories and handing over the mic.

I launched an online course with my sister, Lauren, called Becoming the Artist. It was a permission-giving course: permission to create; permission to properly become the artist. We ran live creative coaching workshops, too.

And then I had this idea to host other people’s online courses. To create the first online course platform by and for neurodivergent creatives. But, after getting started and liaising with some amazing creators, I realised I didn’t have the capacity.

Instead, I collated a list of courses by other people and sent out an email each month promoting them. I liked putting this list together but there wasn’t much of a response, so I shelved that idea and returned to just running the magazine.

I brought it over to Substack so that people would have entire articles, essays and interviews landing in their inbox. It was easy to maintain. But I felt I needed to be putting more into We Hyperfocus. I imagined holding that glowing ball in my hands…

I asked, in meditation, what the next steps were. And eventually, it landed. It was always there but I needed to give it space to present itself. I’d also gone to the website and looked at the stats to see where people headed, when they visited the website.

Research + intuition + deciding what you want to do.

As We Hyperfocus approaches its first birthday, I am shifting the focus back to creative business. Going forward, We Hyperfocus will be the creative business school for people who think differently.

On here, expect inspiring stories of creativity, business, success and failure. Over on the We Hyperfocus website, you can find the magazine and our workshops, courses and - soon - coaching/consultancy. Everyone is welcome.

Who’s in?

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Annie x