This week’s Ms the Word is all about “muse medicine” – the creative outlets and hobbies that made you feel alive as a child, and why so many of us stop making time for them as adults.
What Is Muse Medicine?
When we’re children, we’re encouraged to paint, dance, sing, and play. Somewhere between responsibility, bills, and career, that part of us gets shelved — and we call it “growing up.” Muse medicine is about reclaiming it.
The panel shared their own:
- Theatre and musical theatre — a lifelong passion held onto since childhood
- Music — rediscovering old garage tracks as a way to reconnect with a freer, younger self
- Poker — proof that “fun” doesn’t have to look traditionally feminine or relaxing; sometimes it’s competitive and stimulating instead
Why We Don’t Prioritise It
The honest answer: guilt. Many of the panel admitted to buying pianos, booking pottery classes, and starting hobbies — only to never actually show up. The reasons were familiar:
- “I’ll do it when I have time” (you never do — you have to make it)
- Feeling like joy has to be earned after everything else is done
- Guilt around taking time away from children or work
- Needing a hobby to be productive or profitable to justify it
Why It Matters
Muse medicine works like a form of meditation — it pulls you out of daily pressures, even if only for an hour. And the benefits ripple outward: a more present parent, a better version of yourself at work, and a way to process emotions that are hard to put into words.
As one panellist put it: what if doing something that lights you up for half an hour made you a better, more present version of yourself the rest of the time?
How to Start (Even If You Don’t Know Your “Thing”)
For a viewer question — “I don’t know what my muse is anymore” — the panel’s advice:
- Time-block it. If it’s not in the diary, it won’t happen.
- Lower the bar. Joy doesn’t have to look aesthetic or Instagrammable.
- Redefine self-care. Sometimes it’s dancing badly. Sometimes it’s doing nothing.
- Ask what your 10-year-old self would do.
- Stop performing your joy. It doesn’t need an audience.
And if trying something new feels daunting — just be a little brave. Show up, see if you like it, and if you don’t, try something else. Nothing implodes because you picked the “wrong” hobby.
What About Doing Nothing?
Not every outlet has to be active. For some people, rest and stillness is the recharge — space to think, to write, to simply be. The key distinction: are you retreating to recover, or avoiding something deeper? Either way, it counts.
Modelling It for Our Kids
The panel agreed: letting children see you enjoy yourself — dancing in the lounge, playing wrestling, being a bit silly — teaches them that joy is a normal, healthy part of adult life, not something you age out of.
The Takeaway
Muse medicine isn’t about becoming someone new — it’s about remembering who you’ve always been.
What did you love doing before life got busy? What would it look like to bring a little of that back?
Transcript:
Welcome back to Ms the Word. And today’s M word is muse medicine. Now you might be thinking, what is your muse and what is muse medicine and why are we talking about it? But let me ask you this: what makes you feel lit up, creative, playful, like you did when you were a child? And have you stopped making time for it, like so many others in the UK right now?
When we’re children, we’re encouraged to paint, dance, sing, create, try new things, be expressive. But somewhere between responsibility, bills, motherhood, career, that part of us gets shelved, and we call it growing up. So, we’re going to talk about that today with our lovely panel. So, what is your muse medicine?
Any creative outlet, I say, but specifically theatre for me. When I was a kid, I did dancing and theatre, musical theatre, and I still do it now. I’m not a kid. So, you know, this is talking to me in a big way, because it isn’t my career path or anything, but it is something that I hold so dearly. And if I didn’t have moments in my week, in my month, in my year that had these opportunities in theatre, I just don’t think I’d be that much of a happy person.
Oh, I really — that is so important to me. It is everything to me. Yeah, wow. So, I think it’s music. So, I just love — and I found my old music again in the last year, and it’s just transforms how you feel, doesn’t it? So, I think when I was in troubled times, listening to songs helped me process some of what I was going through, because you can’t always find the words for it, and here it is in a neat little song, and it kind of all makes a bit more sense all of a sudden. But more lately, I seem to have gone back to old-school garage in my kitchen. That’s just how it’s going at the moment. But I think what I’ve been reflecting on is like, why have I gone back to being — I was called “Carried Favor” in my kitchen. But I think it transports me back to a time before children, before being married, before anything, when I was just young and free and just living your best life. And so, yeah, I’m reliving it.
So do you think maybe that part of you is coming out? Yeah, definitely rising in you. Definitely, yeah.
Wow, I love that. What’s yours? I’m discovering mine. So I’m quite a creative person. I love painting, drawing, dancing, all of these things. But do I do any of it? No. So, my goal this year is to try and prioritize, but I’ll always push it. So, I’ll be like, “Right, tonight I am not going to work. I’m going to put the kids to bed and then I’m going to do some painting.” Do you think I’ve done that? I’ve started about 18 hobbies. I’ve bought pianos. You name it, I’ve got it. But it’s just all the gear — we don’t do it. I won’t do it because I will prioritize, I don’t know, work or just anything. So yeah, we discover it.
Well, I think that’s because with a lot of people it’s like, “Oh, I’ll do that when I’ve got time.” And by the way, you never have time — you have to make the time. And then we wait for permission, like, “Once I’ve done this, I’ve earned this free time,” and that’s only for people that have achieved everything else. And again, that doesn’t happen either. So you have to — it’s like a form of self-love, isn’t it? It’s like you deposit back into you by giving yourself this stuff, but I think we are not conditioned to do it.
And I struggle if it doesn’t make me money — that’s the goal. I’m like, what am I doing it for? And I know I’m doing it, but me sitting there painting that picture, what is that for? Yeah, I get — well, it’s not going to make me money, so what’s the point?
Mine was — I was in your position, I can’t remember when I changed it, but it was towards the end of last year. Maybe it was you, Jeremy — it probably was you — “What do you do for joy?” And I started thinking about what I find fun, and I knew that I like to be competitive, so I have to have a sense of purpose too. So, for me, trying to win something, being competitive — and I don’t know if this is controversial to say, but not many women are wired that way. So women generally meet for drinks or coffee or hot chocolate or a chat, and I’m like, “Do you want to play something?” So I sort of thought, well, I don’t have to hang out with women to have fun — it doesn’t have to be a female hobby. So I joined a poker group and I love it. It’s become honestly one of the highlights of my week — on a Tuesday I go to this league, I’m in a league, and I go every Tuesday.
And the first four times I went, it was so hard. I was so stressed in the buildup — even at 3:00, 4:00, but as the time was creeping close and I knew I had to eat dinner and be there, I was thinking, “This isn’t worth it, it’s just not worth the effort to have fun or to relax.” Like we say sometimes, if we do like a Reiki day or something, they’re like — just to get there and then we’re — you know, have palpitations about how much work we’re not going to get done, but we never regret it. And it’s the same with poker — it took me a good month or so for it to become normal in our household. Normal that “Are you going this week, Mom?” — goes out on Tuesdays, the kids all know, “Have fun at poker, where are you, hope you win.” It’s not a chore, but it took a while, and I had to carve it into my life.
Don’t you have the word “medicine” in the episode as well? The reason is because it’s like a form of meditation, because it’s just taking you out of your norm, your everyday pressures, be them great pressures or troublesome ones, but it’s just taking you out of that for that bit of time that gives you so much. But like you said, sometimes it’s hard to turn up. Yeah, and I just wanted something — because I think we’re very similar in lots of ways — needed something to stimulate me, and I understand that about myself, and I fought it for so long, tried to meditate and just relax, and I’m not always wired like that. So actually, for me, thinking about what hands to play, how to play it — I don’t think about work, I am there to play cards. So it’s what works, doesn’t it?
It is what works for you, and that’s why I think this message is so important — it doesn’t look one way and it is so individual, but so important. So why do women need this? So women that are watching might be like, “That sounds nice, why do they need it?” You need it for your soul, don’t you? So it makes you a better person, better at work, a better mom. I think if you’re just doing all the chores all the time, between the juggle of life, you lose yourself, don’t you? And I think that just tops it, fills up your cup again, doesn’t it? It releases frustration, it makes you a better version of yourself, you learn a lot about yourself. But reframe that — why do kids need activities to do? Why can’t they just sit there and watch telly? Why can’t they do nothing? You’d be able to answer that, because you’re trying to encourage them to learn about themselves, trying to get them to grow, you’re trying to engage different parts of their brain, and that feed their soul, make them happy. We didn’t suddenly become different — we’re still all humans, we’re still children. They didn’t come to an age where that doesn’t apply anymore — of course it does.
I think as well, like, knowing a lot of people have children, and then straight after that first year they lose themselves — you hear a lot of people going, “Who am I? I’ve lost myself.” And I think finding their outlet really can help with that as well. That’s what I enjoy.
I think a lot of people — and it’s great that you know what you like — I’m going to ask you something else in a minute to speak on behalf of the women who will identify more with you in this panel today. Some people, when I ask friends, they don’t know. They say, “I don’t know what I like, I just want to watch reality TV, that’s all I want to do is do nothing.” And I’m like, “What about — is there anything, honestly, I don’t do anything else?” Like, they’re so out of touch with that part of their soul. Where do they start?
Well, they obviously need a break first, because that’s why they’re craving that. And then I think, in a way, you have to be brave and start somewhere, because what’s the worst that can happen? You turn up to something, you didn’t like it that much, don’t go again, try something else. Like, the world doesn’t implode because you hit the wrong hobby. You just have to be a bit brave, be a little bit explorative, I suppose, and a bit uncomfortable probably, because you’re going to be out of your comfort zone. You’ll have every reason not to turn up, you’ll make a million excuses.
So Jade, do you feel guilty when you prioritize joy? 100%. But I’ve discovered what makes me happy — why? And it’s purely because I’ve gone back to childhood. Like you said, I was like, “Okay, well what did make me happy at one time, what did I do for enjoyment?” It was dance, I love rounders, being creative, painting, pottery, you name it. And then, am I going to do something about that? Probably not. Or I’ll book a class and I’ll be like, “Right, there’s a pottery class, I’m going to go 7:00 on a Tuesday.” Guarantee you I won’t go. And someone we work with said to me the other day, “Right, I want you to get off the phone to me and go and book that class, and I want you to call me back when you’ve done it.” Do you think I gave her a call back? You didn’t. And is that because you feel guilty? It’s — our working balance is a little bit off as it is. I feel guilty for taking time for myself, but I always hold a lot of guilt that if I’m not with my children 100% of the time, which is impossible, being completely present — again, impossible — I’m failing. So I always will fail in my head. It will take a lot of rewiring, I plan to get there.
So for example, I’ve joined the gym, so I keep telling everyone, and I will go at 6:00 a.m., because it’s the only time I know my children are asleep and I can still do everything while I’ve not done it — I’ve just got to get up earlier. So my sacrifice is sleep instead of sacrificing time with my children or work. Wow — what if, by doing the things that light you up for half an hour, an hour, meant that when you are with the children, you were a really great version of yourself and a more present version — would that tip the scales for you at all? I think it would, it’s just I’ve got to get into rhythm — it’s just I’ve got to get, or if I say I’m going to do it today and then the kids don’t go to bed at the right time and I’m like, “Oh, there’s no point, because I’ve only got 55 minutes.” I said, “I’ll do it for an hour” — do you know what I love? Showing my kids I’m doing it — I’m like, “Bye, mommy’s going to dancing tonight,” and the littlest one, she’s five, she might go, “I don’t want you to go to dancing tonight,” and I’m like, “Okay, well, I’m going, see you in the morning.” And that’s because I want them to know — particularly one — that this is part of being a healthy human, and so I never ever apologize for leaving.
No, but you only know what you’ve been modeled, and I know in a previous episode you’ve said your mom was a stay-at-home mom, she was there all the time, you said that before. So you know what your standard of life is from what you’ve lived, and it’s hard to break your own mold. And our mom is so different — her goal in life, and you ask her now, is to be a stay-at-home mom, she’s got no other goals other than just to be a mom. And I’m not wired like that, but it’s almost like I was brought up like that. So it’s like, why am I different?
So for those people watching, we like to ask what we should give people as advice here. When do we stop playing? Say, what did you love doing at 10, and if no one was watching, what would you try? So obviously you know the answers to that, and you guys sound the same, but that’s something for you to try at home — that’s a good place to start. If you’re someone that’s like, “I don’t have any interest other than reality TV,” maybe that’s a good idea.
I’d try martial arts — that’s something I’m not doing and I haven’t really got time in the calendar, but I really fancy it. Horse riding, actually, I keep — I’ve been playing with it for ages, and I did used to do it when I was 10, I just feel like — powerful thing — I feel like I have an ice cream in my hand, so yeah, it will happen this year, actually. I’ll just take — even if it’s one Sunday — and just try it, why not?
I think you’re very good at a bit of thrill-seeking — you know, going on the rally cars and all that, you’ll just try anything, within reason.
Okay, so we got a question here. Hardeep says, “I don’t even know what my muse is anymore. Between work and kids, I feel like I’ve forgotten what I enjoy. How do I reconnect with myself without feeling selfish?” So, we’ve talked a lot about this already. Number one is time-block it — if it doesn’t go in the diary, it won’t happen. That’s so true. Lower the bar — joy doesn’t have to be aesthetic. I love that one, true. Redefine self-care — sometimes it’s dancing badly, and sometimes it’s doing nothing. Ask, “What would my 10-year-old me do?” And stop performing your joy — it doesn’t need to be on Instagram. Oh, that’s a good one.
Yeah, that has pulled on a lot of the stuff we’ve said, but the points about performing it, or it being aesthetic, is that the point is to do it because you’re enjoying it, not because it’s, I don’t know, acceptable, beautiful, Instagrammable — like, sometimes the joy is in that though. And I know there’s certain things that are built around that, aren’t there — like, I get joy out of wreath making. If you make something beautiful, it’s a really lovely thing, like the wreath making, I’ve never done it, but it looks really aesthetic — vision boards. I think that the process of that, and then the end result, is the time, isn’t it? And that reminds me, some people just need to get in their garden and start planting things, and that is their moment, so it’s just a walk. I think the problem is you start to think, “Oh, do I need to join a club?” And actually, a lot of the time there are things that are a bit more accessible than that — because that’s a lot of effort to join a club and do something. Yes, and it’s how long you need to do it for, isn’t it? I mean, I just went into the gym the other day, and we’ve got a new facility, and it just looked like you should do a cartwheel in it. So I did — I went, “Okay, I’m just going to” — and I did a cartwheel. People are surprised at that, but it’s a life skill of mine. I can do it wherever I want. But I just had this overwhelming urge to do it, so I just became my 10-year-old self, I did it, and then yeah, then someone else had a go, and then someone else had a go, and it became like a really — moment.
I bought a book of poems, and every now and again, just during my workday, I’ll just pick up the book and read a couple of poems, because I really like poetry. Sometimes I might decide to write a poem, but I’m not publishing them, anyway — they’re not that good, I just really like it. You just enjoy it, yeah.
So, why do we feel guilty for enjoying ourselves? Do you feel you have to earn fun? Yeah, I think that’s where it comes from, isn’t it — I can’t do that until I’ve done this, so I must finish this first — fun needs to earn me. But I think we are people that find fun in things, aren’t we? Yeah. I don’t see the point — not everyone knows about it. I love that you’re aiming at Gemma then. Are we not the fun people, having — does she just completely say what we deep down know but don’t? No, but you know, we’re so organized — fun, but you can’t have the fun unless it’s in the diary, unless you’ve got time and the plan. Yeah, we’re trying to find it, but we’ll just bust out into a little dance move randomly because you feel like it. I haven’t been accused — I remember planning something before and I sort of allowed for free time for fun, and it was a bit of a — this is your type of organized fun now guys, but you know what you do in that fun time, it’s fine.
So what if — and I know I touched on this earlier, but this is a genuine thing I hear a lot — what if your fun looks like nothing? I know you said it sounds like rest is needed, but if what people would just want to do is sit in silence, watch reality TV, not be touched by another human for a little while, you know, overstimulated — what if it’s doing nothing? Is that laziness? Is that burnout recovery? Can that be fun?
Well, yeah, I think — I don’t think any 10-year-old has “sit down, watch reality TV” as their fun. I think, like I said, there’s a deeper thing needed there — there’s perhaps some time needed on their own. Some people really need to restore by retreating and having some space for themselves. Often it’s in that time that you might expand to actually, “I just want to read,” or that’s when they start writing or singing or doing something — just because it’s not fun to someone else doesn’t make it not fun to that person. But I would struggle to think that that is the end part of that person’s fun — I think that’s just them requiring a bit of space to work all that out.
Yeah, I do agree with that, because even for me, sometimes I just want to sit on the sofa and do nothing — probably don’t mean that, I mean I just — I’m such an extroverted introvert, and to fill my cup, I just need to be sat in silence watching rubbish, just in peace. But that’s not the idea of — it’s just I just need it.
So we touched on this earlier — do our children benefit when they see us enjoying ourselves? What are we modeling if we’re always serious? Oh, definitely — my kids love it when I put on a disco ball and — I’m your model today, got a disco ball in their hand — I have never had to go, we have the flashing lights, you’ve got to have a lounge disco, you’ve got to be able to turn your room into a disco at some point, this is not normal, you need to do a manual fun, we don’t know how to have fun. He’ll come through on his skateboard, you know, the kids will start getting torches out, yeah, it just goes crazy, but it’s fun, I won’t be invited. Yeah, I’m going to order today, because Paul gets garage decks out as well — so like my husband’s got decks, but I mean, we go to bed really early, they come out at like 3:00 in the afternoon — perfect garage music. I mean, better in the winter when it’s dark, because then my house colour sounds like a prison — it doesn’t happen every day, “Let’s play chase the ace” — it doesn’t happen every day, it’s just a sporadic thing, but they love it. And then, because I’ve got three boys, they like wrestling as well, so that’ll be like, “Come on, Mom, take me down then, come on then,” so it’s just full-on wrestling. Oh my god, my biggest issue — my biggest took me down the other day, I was livid, so I’m like, “Rematch, this is it, I’m not having it.”
Now we started a thing where we have to dress up as our latest pet — now we don’t have that many pets, so it’s a flawed tradition. Do you want to share this? So we got a fish, we got a fish, and we went upstairs, apart from Paul, and we came down as this week’s kids’ fish, and we just wandered around the lounge as fish. How did you dress as a fish? I’ll have to show you a picture, but I had a mermaid skirt on and some other green jeans. You’ve got a mermaid skirt — of course I’ve got — I need a massive — so many questions.
Okay, well, clearly muse medicine isn’t about becoming someone new — unless you’re Gemma and you wish to emulate fish — it’s about remembering who you’ve always been. Okay, so viewers, what did you love doing before life got busy? And what would it look like to bring a little bit of that back, and maybe buy yourself a disco ball? Thank you so much for watching, we’ll see you next time.
