The Self Expression Sessions Bristol: Words Weave Worlds

Self Expression Sessions: Bristol

A Reclamation Evening. The precursor to the Beyond Palatable: A Manifesto for Unapologetic Women book tour

The Self Expression Sessions is coming to Bristol as part of the Reclamation tour, an evening of bold conversation, lived experience, spoken word, and creative courage, exploring what it really means to take up space, tell the truth, and turn mission into words that move people.

This special Bristol edition is an in-conversation event featuring three authors and a book coach, exploring:

• How lived experience can create the best non-fiction

• Why words don’t just describe worlds, they build them

• The role of non-fiction in social change, cultural reckoning, and collective healing

• What it takes to write (and share) work that refuses to be palatable

The evening will also feature spoken word poetry from Rosina Buck, weaving emotion, politics, and presence into the room, reminding us that voice lives in the body, not just on the page.

This is not a talk you sit politely through. You will be invited to join the conversation and explore your own self-expression. Perhaps even uncovering the big idea you will one day turn into a best selling book. 

All profits from this event will go towards supporting The Fearless Girl's Club, an award-winning non-profit sparking adventure and curiosity in girls aged 8 to 12.

Your speakers for the evening are:

Yinka Ewuola is a Multi-Award-Winning Business Stratgist, Mindset Coach, Speaker, Trainer and Content Creator working with inspired and ambitious women around the world wanting to have their all, on their own terms!
As a unique business leader, Yinka founded Calla Success Systems to support busy & ambitious women to create wealth both within and through their businesses, by helping them to focus on what matters most of the business (cashflow and strategy), and what matters most for the
business owner (mindset and habits). She supports them to create both a journey and a business that leaves them feeling both Rich and Rested.

She was selected for the inaugural UK Linkedin Creator Accelerator Programme in 2022 and as a UK delegate for the UN’s Commission on the status of women in both 2023 - 2025 – as she continues to share her message of holistic empowerment, freedom and success for women across the globe
Along with running her business she is a charity trustee and is committed to building an incredible legacy of love, life and excellence for as many people as she can, while being a mum to 3, a wife to 1 and working to live her one wild and precious life to the full.

Yinka's upcoming book, Rich and Rested, is an unflinching look at the lies we've been told about money and holistic tools we need to uplevel our thinking, actions and outcomes for ourselves our businesses and lives.Creating a business that leaves you feeling Rich and rested is NOT a dream nor wishful thinking. It is as a result of aligned and strategic actions, which this book will outline.

Samantha Harman, The Style Editor, is an award-winning editor and style strategist who helps founders and leaders turn their wardrobes from frustrating to best business asset. Her book, Just Get Dressed is out in spring 2026 (presale January 30).

Just Get Dressed: Why you have nothing to wear and what to do about it
This is not a book about clothes. It’s about identity, mindset and finally feeling at home in the place you’ve felt like an outsider your entire life - your wardrobe.

Sophie Jane Lee is a writer, speaker, and facilitator working at the intersection of self-expression, storytelling, and visibility.

She is the creator of Self Expression Sessions — live, participatory events designed to help people reclaim their voice, challenge internalised rules about how they’re “allowed” to show up, and speak from a place that is embodied, honest, and unapologetically human.

Sophie’s work is rooted in lived experience, cultural critique, and a deep belief that self-expression is not about performance or polish, it’s about truth, nervous system safety, and the courage to stop diluting yourself for comfort or approval.

The Reclamation Tour will be promoting Sophie's first book, Beyond Palatable: A Manifesto for Unapologetic Women, which will be published by Luath Press in March 2026. 

Beyond Palatable is a call to the women who have learned to make themselves easier to swallow — quieter, nicer, less threatening, more agreeable — in order to survive, belong, or succeed.

Blending personal storytelling, social commentary, and reflective prompts, this book explores the cost of self-censorship and the quiet grief of self-abandonment. It examines how women are conditioned to walk a tightrope of acceptability — never too much, never too honest, never too visible — and what it takes to finally step off. Beyond Palatable invites readers to reconnect with their voice, listen to their bodies, honour their anger and tenderness, and reclaim the parts of themselves they were taught to smooth away. It is a manifesto for women who are done contorting themselves to fit systems that were never built for their fullness.

Vicky Quinn Fraser is a book coach, writer, and creative mentor who helps business owners, entrepreneurs, neurodivergent people, and other bold humans turn their ideas into published books that can take a reader from “who the fck are you? to “TAKE MY MONEY!” She is the founder of MicroBook Magic, a programme which makes writing a book achievable, even if you struggle with focus, perfectionism, or overwhelm. Even if you think you’re “not a writer.” Vicky’s work is informed by her love of storytelling as connection, her experience navigating life as an autistic person, and her mission to help platform voices that don’t always fit neatly into the mainstream. She has guided dozens of first-time authors to publish independently, combining practical frameworks with empathy, love, and a generous dose of humour. Her approach is unapologetically human: messy, playful, and transformative. When she’s not helping clients write their books, Vicky can be found performing stand-up comedy, twirling on a trapeze, renovating her 400-year-old cottage, or curled up with a good sci-fi novel and a roaring fire.

Rosina Buck is a poet, songwriter, and storyteller whose work rises from the tender, elemental, and unafraid places. Rooted in the ache and shimmer of lived experience, her poems braid lyricism and raw emotional truth into pieces that feel both deeply vulnerable and fiercely present.

Writing from the body as much as from the page, Rosina’s work carries the pulse of someone who has learned to rise through pain, addiction, and the exquisite strangeness of being alive. Her performances are known for weaving an intimacy that can hush a room or set it alight.

She has been supported by Arts Council England and has shared her work at Lyra Poetry Festival, Shambala, and aboard the SS Great Britain. With her debut poetry pamphlet on the horizon, Rosina continues to expand her practice, inviting audiences deeper into the landscapes she creates.

“Rosina’s performance was full of charm and joy, she writes movingly about her life with a conversational lyrical style.

Here’s an artist who’s managed the difficult task of bringing into harmony their inner most feelings and their work, turning her art into an act of pure translation. Rosina’s spirit, story, performance and words appear as one triumphant smile.”

Bristol 24/7

Guided by themes of connection, recovery, belonging, love, queerness, grief, and the quiet revolutions of everyday life, Rosina creates work that invites people home to themselves.

Whether on stage or on the page, she writes with a heart wide open, offering a unique experience that feels like being met exactly where you are with radical compassion - and being gently transformed by it.

A big thank you to our venue sponsor, Watershed Bristol, and other sponsors, Electric Peach and Calla Success Systems Ltd.