How creativity can help after overwhelm, trauma and burnout with trauma therapist Anne Cheshire (Podcast episode)
Many jewellers turn to making when life feels overwhelming and there’s a powerful reason why. In this episode, host Anna Campbell is joined by trauma therapist Anne Cheshire to explore how creativity supports the nervous system after stress, burnout or trauma. Together they look at why we can’t always think our way out of anxiety, and how the physical act of making helps restore safety, focus and agency. The conversation gives you tools to help your jewellery practice feel supportive rather than pressured.
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In this episode of the Jewellers Academy Podcast, host Anna Campbell is joined by trauma therapist and teacher Anne Cheshire to explore why so many people turn to making when life feels overwhelming. Drawing on Anne’s work with anxiety, perfectionism and burnout, they discuss trauma in a broad, accessible way not just as major life events, but as anything that overwhelms the nervous system enough that it doesn’t fully return to a healthy baseline.
A central theme of the conversation is that we often can’t think our way out of these states because they’re driven by the brain in survival mode. Anne explains why the creative act is so powerful: making naturally brings us back into our senses (helping us orient to what’s happening) and into safe, purposeful action (moving towards and engaging). Jewellery-making, in particular, offers a physical process that helps us restore a sense of safety and come back into flow.
Throughout the episode, Anne shares simple, practical tools jewellers can use alongside their creative practice, including physical movements to support regulation, routines that make creative sessions feel safer, and ways to work with the inner critic without letting it shut you down. The conversation offers reassurance, clarity and grounded strategies for anyone who wants their jewellery practice to feel supportive rather than pressured.
key moments in this week’s episode
01:02 – 03:02
Anna introduces the episode and reflects on why so many people turn to creativity when life becomes difficult.
03:02 – 07:02
Anne Cheshire introduces her work and reframes trauma and overwhelm as nervous-system experiences, not just major life events.
07:02 – 15:02
Why creativity can be healing: how making engages the unconscious brain through the senses and safe, purposeful action.
15:02 – 19:32
The idea of flow and why jewellery-making helps people step out of everyday pressure and mental noise.
19:32 – 25:02
Overthinking, decision paralysis and “doing without moving forward” — what’s happening in the survival brain after overwhelm.
25:02 – 29:32
Practical exercise: using gentle physical “pushing” movements to switch on calm engagement and action.
29:32 – 37:02
Inner critic vs healthy striving: how to recognise when fear of the new is shutting you down creatively.
37:02 – 45:02
Making creativity feel safer: opening and closing routines, boundaries, and working within a clear creative brief.
45:02 – 49:02
Overwhelm, big-picture thinking, and why constraints and themes support focus, play and progress.
49:02 – 53:02
Grounding techniques for dissociation and feeling spaced out, including simple, discreet body-based tools.
53:02 – 55:22
How to find and work with Anne Cheshire, final reflections, and episode sign-off.
about Anne
Anne Cheshire, SEP, MINMH is a teacher, a medical herbalist and has been a trauma therapist for 16 years. She is best known for her work in empowering people to overcome unconscious fear and resistance, so that they can live full lives, take action and do what is right for them, deep down inside, without doubt, or debilitating internal stress.
After helping thousands of clients to reconnect with their true selves, feel good about it, and empower their lives, she has found that it is not just about knowing rationally what to do, but about enabling the unconscious brain to feel safe and allow action. Her techniques and strategies bring together rational thinking, and unconscious reactions, so we can go ahead with ease, and achieve our dreams and goals.
Click here for a cheat sheet for managing the physical sensations that come with stress.
