Hi, I’m Laura

I’m a writer, speaker, founder of the Scintilla Centre and thought partner.

I came to this work out of two paths in my life.

The first was a catalyst of mental breakdown at age 14. I found myself struggling with crippling depression, rage, and disordered eating, and spent several years in and out of hospitals, police cars and therapists rooms.

There were multiple reasons I experienced this, and healing was a process years in the making. These early struggles however brought two profound gifts into my life:

  1. My deep love and curiosity for wisdom… in what it means, how we cultivate it, and what it can offer us.

  2. The knowledge of our capacity for change.

The second catalyst for this work was my time in climate and environmental activism. I believe firmly that another world is possible - one more just, loving and regenerative in nature. I also know that it will take a widespread collective shift for us to get there - with radical changes needed at the level of the personal, relational and the systemic.

My time in grassroots activism inspired several questions in me:

How do we ensure we make change without replicating the energy of the systems we’re disrupting?

What do we need to stay joyful, resilient and creative in long haul work?

How might we understand collapse not as the end of things, but as a reshaping - a creative process we can engage with? And what becomes possible when we do?

With these two threads, my life and work has always been about bridging the inner with the outer, the sacred with the material, the relational with the systemic.

On a personal note, I live with my wife in London, with regular time in my hometown of Sydney, Australia. I’m a lover of travel, having explored 55 countries and now lived in 5.

In my efforts to reshape the world, I’ve been a trainer of nonviolent direct action, and studied Kingian Nonviolence and Conflict Reconciliation.

I’ve also travelled to Bhutan to learn about Gross National Happiness, solidifying my passion for wellbeing economics, and I’ve authored a chapter on internalised capitalism in in the book Inner Development Goals: Stories of Collective Leadership in Action.

Reach out

Have questions? Want to collaborate or work together? Send a quick message and I’ll get back to you shortly.