Bend and Snap.

Why bend and snap?

Firstly it references Legally Blonde and the iconic scene with Jennifer Coolidge and Reece Witherspoon. But more importantly it captures Nat’s identity through yoga and my creative identity through photography. Bend - yoga and Snap - photography. This blog will draw on yoga and photography.

Bending and snapping is also the personal and political. We may bend as we try to incorporate others ideas and aims, this bending can help us grow strong in directions we may not have seen as possible before, like a tree growing at the angle of the wind. The bending might also be a discomfort. We might push against it if the bend is challenging our values and identity in ways that might be harmful. If the push and pull becomes too great, eventually we snap. This snap can be a reclamation and empowering, it can also feel like defeat. The snap is complex. Sara Ahmed (2017) talks about snapping as a breaking of bonds, a revolt and from the shattered pieces we start again. This blog at times will reflect on those moments of bending and snapping for us, and drawing on Ahmed, seeing these moments as a starting point for new or revised thinking and actions.