No. 24 - TAKING SPACE ☁️☁️☁️

TAKING SPACE ☁️☁️☁️

November 19, 2025 • Issue No. 24

There’s something I’ve been wanting to share with ya’ll for months and today is finally the day! 🥳 In preparation for a workshop I was planning with my Wrkwell co-founder, Michaela I found out about spaciousness. The deeper I went into the research the more I wanted to bring what I’d learned to The Sparkle Sheet 💎, but I didn’t want to get ahead of the workshop. Since Michaela and I hosted our Zoom discussion yesterday afternoon (a fab time and a success!), I can share this gem with you today.

Here’s some quick context:

UK-based researchers Megan Reitz and John Higgins wrote a report on an idea they call spaciousness, which is “an expansive and unhurried attention where we are neither grasping towards the next moment, nor running away from the previous one.” Their research demonstrates how the spacious mode is missing from many of our lives, and how it costs us in the form of burnout and low-self worth, two things that make it really hard to do our work (and sparkle ✨ while you’re at it!)

Reitz and Higgins have labeled the opposite of spacious mode as doing mode, and this is where most of us spend our time. We’re running — narrow minded and in a rush — to the next moment, the next project, the next email… and doing mode urges us to measure our ability in what we produce. Staying in this state is a recipe for disaster.

Here’s the twist:

Spacious mode and doing mode aren’t presented as opposites on a binary, because you don’t have to live in one or the other. The most strategic and holistic approach is to integrate the two. R&H illustrate this with a 2×2 that identifies where we can land when the two modes commingle.

Here’s my experience:

High Doing with Low Spaciousness is ‘Busyness’. Michaela and I compared this to a dog digging to nowhere. This is me when I’m deleting promotional emails instead of cleaning my office. I’m doing something, but it’s not moving the needle in terms of purpose.

On the other hand, High Doing with High Spaciousness is ‘Flourishing’. The ability to dream something and bring it into fruition is the coveted spot on the quadrant. There are a few work activities that allow me to combine my spacious and doing modes:

• designing slide decks (or the thumbnails for this newsletter!),

• reading new research and letting my mind go crazy with connections, and

• being fully present in a 1:1 client session.

In those moments I can take action and continue to be expansive and intentional, and I can feel my sparkle peeking through without even trying very hard. ✨ 

Here’s where you come in:

Take a look at each of the four boxes on the grid. Reflect on what activates each one. What makes you feel stuck/busy/idealistic? Which quadrant has been feeling familiar lately? (Side note: during the workshop I realized that I don’t spend a lot of time in Idealistic and I’m trying to figure out what that means!) What/when/how do you make your way to the flourishing box? How much of your work day do you actually spend here? How can you get to this box more often?

What I’ve really treasured about Reitz & Higgins research, as well as my time diving into the report with Michaela, is the way they’ve put words (and diagrams, which I love!) to the feelings and states of being that we inhabit when we’re taking on challenges.

They’ve also delivered an easy formula to hack your sparkle. If doing + spacious = flourishing/sparkling, then it’s easy to figure out what to add to turn it on. It feels like a call back to middle school algebra, which was one of my favorite classes. You solve for sparkle by finding the missing variable. ✨ Here are two examples:

1. If I have a cool idea (spacious mode) but it’s not sparkling yet, I probably need to shift into task initiation (doing mode).

2. If I’m knocking down to-dos (doing mode) but not feeling the personal sense of accomplishment that’s key to my sparkle, then I need to double check that my to-do list is aligned with my larger vision (spacious mode).

If spaciousness interests you, I’d encourage you to check out the full report on Reitz’s website. I found it to be an intuitive and enjoyable read, though it was an adjustment to switch to the British use of passive voice/spelling conventions. If you want to talk more 1:1, book a no-fee consultation with me. My calendar is open through mid-January. I’ll close with a quote from Reitz that’s a perfect companion to adrienne maree brown’s what you pay attention to grows, which has become our Sparkle Sheet mini-motto. 💎

P.S. Do you know someone else who would be into the idea of ‘spaciousness’? 💕 Share this newsletter with a friend.

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