Rebranding from a spiritualist into a filmmaker: A Hero’s Journey
Inciting Incident
I was about 16, when I decided to become a filmmaker. My dad was driving back home from “The Dark Knight Rising” premiere in IMAX and, sitting in the passenger seat, I said that I want to become a director. I was still in my first school and I have never shown any interest in filmmaking before. But if you have watched this film, you know how incredibly impactful the final scene is. I watched the crowd in the cinema stand up in ovation to the creators of the movie, who weren’t even there. It was a life changing experience.
I voiced my ambition and my father said that I have to try to organise something before even thinking about this industry as my future. And I heard that. I’ve done a lot in my last 3 years in school: directed a graduation ceremony, filmed a couple short videos, worked with various fandoms, attended comic cons as a photographer and more. That little comment from my father made me prove to myself and him that not only am I willing to do this, I also am very capable.
That defined the beginning of my journey in film and creative industries and in 2014 I started my first year in a university in the UK. I can do a deep dive into my experience as a student, but most of that is irrelevant to the topic of this post. So maybe next time?
The Threshold
After four years of BA (including a Foundation year) and a year in MA, I finally graduated in November 2019. I was so clueless about what’s to come, but so excited to finally make my way into the industry. My drivers licence was in the making, I got married and was ready to take on the world. Until March 2020, when the pandemic had halted the industry.
It was crickets online. No one was hiring because companies were worried that they were about to lay off most of the existing staff already.
I have lost hope to get anywhere with it. Being unemployed and scared for the future, I fell down the soul searching road and reconnected with my spirituality. 2020 was very eventful for me and my personal development. The free time that I had I spent on understanding what spirituality means for me, spent a few months in the New Age community (which is a whole other story and it didn’t end well) and almost established myself as a healer. I still believe that I have that aspect in mr, however a very big part of my personality and my life was being forgotten about. At the end of the day, I am and have always been a storyteller.
Forgetting who I was didn’t affect me at first, only later did I realise how much was repressed.
Trials and Obstacles
Life never stopped testing me. Since March 2020 until summer 2021 I have moved house, left a New Age cult and went through a very intense post cult recovery. (Which again, is a very different story).
Summer of 2021 however, was a turning point for me. Around Spring that year, I started looking for a way to come back into film. I have approached multiple film festivals and ended up volunteering in one and later was helping to long list things in Lift-Off Global — a massive film festival network that is based in Pinewood Studios — the home of 007 and now, Marvel. This process was a turning point. By the end of my 5 week volunteering program with them, I made it to Pinewood, on a meet up with the organisers and other volunteers. A tour around the studios and filming spaces made my day and reminded me how much I miss the sets and how much I miss this creative process.
I came back home after that and finally accepted the fact that the filmmaker that I almost killed inside of me, was still there. And by the end of summer 2021, I was full time employed in a production company. Although, that was still the trial that heroes usually go through in any story.
The experience in this company was the most incredible, but taxing and exhausting experience. As a production assistant and executive assistant, I was responsible for so much, that truth be told — I didn’t handle it well. But I have learnt a lot about the processes and about myself. Which is actually priceless.
My conclusion was simple: I am very skilled in admin things and production paperwork, I can do it and I can do it very well. However, my creative skills, if not used, die. And with that, a part of me doesn’t get realised and it makes me miserable. So I needed a change. And to my luck — I found it. Back in the university that I graduated from only 3 years back.
Rebirth
A lot has happened since November 2019. In March 2022 I was back on campus, but this time with the staff lanyard, staff title and a goal of helping someone.
Everything culminated as soon as I entered the doors. I have felt free, happy, and emotionally stable. I became a part of a diverse team that could share their experiences with me and I started working with students.
Here are the things about this: when you work with current students, there is absolutely no way that you won’t be able to pick up their drive and passion. Seeing them working tirelessly on the projects that they are interested in and passionate about will not leave you disappointed.
I truly found myself.
But online I was still connected with the spiritual side of the internet, fighting the New Age crazies, watching the weirdest and the most obnoxious drama unfold on TikTok (which I might talk about later) and I was still positioning myself as a Tarot reader and healer.
Having that platform, while rapidly developing as a storyteller and filmmaker felt like a massive dissonance. Something didn’t line up.
The final part of my character transformation was very simple — there is a way to implement my spirituality within the film industry. Both represent human experience to me. And if I focus on that, I will be able to understand what my path is in reality.
Back to the New Ordinary
In a theory of story structure, the hero always comes back to the ordinary world, but it will never be the same after the final battle. This is what my summer this year is about: coming back to my world, but it’s new and old at the same time. The big and probably the only reason why I am changing the direction of all my platforms lies in this.
I talk about films a lot. I love them, I can’t shut up about the current state of the industry and I can’t keep lying to myself and the tiny audience that I have by pretending that the only thing that I am interested in is spirituality.
As The Cinema Witch, I want to position myself as someone with some expertise in filmmaking and as someone who believes that art can be magical. It is actually magical, in its own way. And I will be talking about this a lot as well.
As a filmmaker, I want to talk about the projects that I am currently working on and what I am writing or directing. I don’t want to separate these two worlds, because they are alchemised in my mind and my body and there is a way to express that.
That’s why my Instagram, my Podcast and my Medium at this moment are changing. All my plans to develop 1–1 sessions as a healer are cancelled. And my direction is clear: I want the wider audience to learn how to consume films and media consciously. I want the wider audience to understand why the quality of films is the way it is now. And I want filmmakers and storytellers, regardless of their background, to learn how to make the industry the way we want it to be.
And that is the story of my rebranding and what has been going on in the past weeks. Trust me, it was a turmoil. But I know for a fact, that this is the path I am meant to be on and this is the space I am meant to take.
I will see you very soon.
M.
