Hello, I’m Leslie

There comes a time in every woman’s life when you gain enough clarity to see yourself for who you really are, and enough confidence to claim it out loud and put it down in words.

I’ve spent my entire adult life figuring out how to tell people what I “do”. Growing up in the 70s and reaching adulthood in the 80s, “What do you do?” was almost always the first thing said at parties, and “Tell us about yourself” was usually the opening question in more formal settings. Because I’d trained as an actress and a dancer, and worked in publishing, broadcasting, and PR, and media relations, I was complicated and did not fit easily into a box. My work as a stylist, personal shopper, and massage therapist further complicated matters. At first glance, these may look like separate paths. For me, they were always connected. Styling is about how we present ourselves in the world—through fashion, image, and the language of appearance. Massage is about the body itself: wellbeing, touch, and the felt sense of being present within it.

And running through all of these is a deeper inquiry that has always lived in my writing—one that later deepened into meditation, and then into writing about meditation. My path has never been linear. I did not have a short answer—and that’s usually all the time you got.

I landed on calling myself a Communicator, and I was pretty chuffed with that—as long as I wasn’t confused with someone who sold mobile phones! Communicator is still not a category on the drop-down list. But back in the early 80s, before “communications” was widely recognised as a distinct discipline or a practical field of study, and before universities began developing dedicated departments, it was practically unheard of. Communications would go on to become a key professional skill, central not only to writers but to work, relationships, and everyday life.