Hello, 

welcome to the thirteenth issue of the Flourishing Spaces Newsletter~ a small offering to pause as we bridge the two seasons~ from blossoms to leaves. This issue officially begins the second year of our newsletters. Thank you for reading, and happy May!

We aim to connect a growing community committed to re-humanising medicine and education through creativity, reflection, and care.

This isn’t about adding more noise to your inbox but some encouragement, a signpost to something meaningful, and a glimpse into what’s unfolding in our shared landscape.

All previous newsletters can be read here (scroll to the bottom of the page).

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NEWS FROM THE FIELD

Sustainable Healer Conference in March 2026

Flourishing Spaces were particularly happy to be invited to present and workshop on flourishing at the Sustainable Healer conference in Inverness and to encounter the work of Dr Kath Jones (speaking in the picture above). It was an extraordinary space that Kath created, bringing together patients, clinicians, and alternative health practitioners to explore living and engaging with persistent physical symptoms. Kath is creating fantastic resources in the field taking a recovery and complex systems, Human Dimension approach. 

Click here to access The Learning Library by Wild-ness Health.

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Flourishing Spaces brought to the Clinical Teaching Fellow Conference

10th April 2026

Flourishing Spaces were invited to present on #HumanDimension & #FlourishingSpaces at a recent Teaching Innovation and Collaboration Conference (TICC) for clinical teaching fellows (CFTs). It was so great to be there and be inspired by many CTF presentations, too, brilliant to hear what the next generation of educators is up to. For example, Dr Luke Murphy’s ‘Don’t think slow’ quiz with 3 rounds of increasingly tricky medical diagnostic questions, used to warm up and engage students prior to simulation work.  

Click here to view the programme!

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Invitation to introduce Flourishing Spaces to QMUL colleagues at the School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science (EECS)

It was a pleasure to step back and take stock of our underpinning philosophies, methods, and stories with a team from EECS. Some fantastic questions followed, with Louise’s favourite being - ' Do we as educators, need to experience flourishing spaces in order for us to enable that for students, and how might we do that?’ ~ I hope to have more of these kinds of co-creative conversations in this space between different academic fields. 

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Bath Spa University hosts “Doing Together 26” symposium exploring collaborative creative research

Monday 30th - Tuesday 31st March 2026

Flourishing Spaces were invited by co-organiser, Dr Natasha Kidd, to attend a two-day creative research symposium at Bath Spa University, where healthcare and the arts run in parallel.  

Reflections from attendees highlighted the symposium’s distinctive atmosphere, emphasising themes such as ‘practice-based research as a way of being with materials, with each other, and with time’ and the importance of being able to pause as well as being in a space of activity with others. 

The themes which emerged from the symposium connect to wider conversations in healthcare education, suggesting that the symposium’s emphasis on slower, relational and collaborative practices could inform more humane and reflective approaches to learning.

Click here to read more about the symposium.

INTRODUCING FLOURISHING SPACES TEAM

Chie leads the new Digital Education Studio at QMUL, which consists of a multi-disciplinary team of academics and professionals to carry out both strategic and operational work of transforming digital education practices for the Faculty and beyond.

Her research interests lie at the intersection of critical digital pedagogy, with a focus on humanising digital spaces, educational/medical technology and interculturalism in re-thinking how they might enhance teaching and learning practice within the higher education sector.

We are delighted to share a poem she has written about her thoughts on…

Flourishing Spaces 

I am drawn to spaces

where people can take the time to learn and develop.
where learning is not only about outcomes and numerical data points,
but about meaning-making, and asks what it means to be human in a machine-filled world.

My work asks how the digital shapes why we do, what we do at universities and beyond; how we might humanise the digital experiences for students and staff. 

Flourishing space offered me a counter-rhythm: more attentive practice of listening, co-creation, boundary crossing and staying staying attune to the lived experiences of those people I work with. 

In this space, uncertainty is welcome; stories matter; relationality has always been central. Time and space often intersect; boundaries blur.  

As a linguist turned digital education leader, the flourishing space gives me permission to remember that educational and leadership work are always relational- particularly now in the post-digital world where AI is everywhere.

Flourishing Spaces; what we need more of. 

— Professor Chie Adachi

Interim Academic Director for the Centre for Excellence in AI in Education, Dean for Digital Education, Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry

UPCOMING EVENTS

Creativity and Wellbeing week

📅 18th-24th May

Creativity and Wellbeing Week is a national festival celebrating the role of arts and culture in supporting health and wellbeing across the UK. Organised in partnership with London Arts and Health and the Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance, the event brings together artists, community groups, healthcare professionals and the public.

Across the week, there are multiple events taking place across London, ranging from exhibitions, workshops, and talks!

Out of Practice

by Dr. Mashael Ishaque

“The finite afterwork hours slip away from me like honey, slowly, then all at once. Between trying to make up my sleep deficit, life admin, and everything else, I’ve noticed that creative outlets seem opulent and therefore nonessential. During my F2, I found myself fascinated by swans at sunset and tired of the blank white walls in my apartment. I set out to paint something to fill the space. Feeling out of practice but hopeful, I bought a large square sheet of cardstock and sketched a preliminary line drawing of three swans floating on the surface of the water, creating ripples between the reeds.

Two months later, the image was unchanged. I stared at the lack of progress and wondered if my dreams of completing a painting or the end of my lease would come first. I secretly loved the blankness and simplicity. It felt as though hope was contained within it - undifferentiated with potential to become anything.”

“Part of me also felt afraid that I could not make something beautiful, and maybe everything I had painted in the past had been a fluke. I wondered if maybe the identities of ‘artist’ and ‘doctor’ were discrete? Could I be both at the same time, when my time was distributed so unequally? Still troubled by a lack of self-belief and indecision, I tried to begin. Painting felt unfamiliar, and my swans lived in a state of limbo for a few more weeks.

I finally dedicated some evenings to painting, and I found myself lost in thought as I created a peaceful landscape with swirling turquoise clouds. Every time I felt unsure, I let myself paint over and try again. The colours evolved, and so did my feelings of self-doubt.

It’s not unnatural to feel disheartened by the distance between wanting to make something and actually executing the idea - but it’s reassuring to know every possibility can still be beautiful.”