About Me — Annalise Lewis — On A Journey To Rewild My Poetic Self & Others
To ask a transformation specialist to succinctly express who they are, especially an artistic one, is a brave request. What to many is a simple elevator pitch or an awkward social starter, to a change consultant becomes a new meditation to try and distill the essence of a mysterious, fluid entity that is perpetually in flux.
I will try my best though, and take you through the different lenses of who I believe myself to be. I’ll start practical and work my way through to the more arty and intangible…finishing up at the precipice I am at now.
My Purpose
Demystifying meaningful change to lead authentic, interdependent and ethical lives.
My Business
I am a transformation consultant, cultural design strategist and coach at Manifesto.
Manifesto demystifies the art and science of meaningful change, guiding individuals and businesses toward more authentic, fulfilling, and ethical lives.
Through the lens of poetic self-improvement and change science, Manifesto seamlessly blends creativity, empathy, strategic thinking, and systems design. They help cultivate your poetic self, through Archetypal Narrative Therapy techniques, while offering actionable insights that simplify the navigation of transformation, making it both easier and more impactful.
My Credentials
Early career in Fine Art and Graphic Design.
Trained in colour psychology, culture and personality profiling.
Spent the past decade working in the field of purpose-led brand strategy and cultural transformation for the ethical B Corp business community.
I launched, and serve as Chair of the Manchester B Corp community.
Developed conscious leadership programs.
Featured in The Good Business Festival, Ethos Magazine and B Lab UK.
Guest lecture at The University of Manchester on sustainable and ethical business.
My Values
Empathy and humility to see others completely
Bathe in the nuance and chaos of change
Creative play and storytelling is the bedrock of our species
Befriend your Poetic Self
Seek beauty and awe-like experiences
Vulnerability is one of the bravest things
Embrace the mystery of life through secular woo
My Personality Archetypes
So, I work a lot with archetypes as a creative, exploratory psychological tool; seeing them increasingly as a powerful approach for self and community development.
As a story telling species, we developed the world we live in via the beliefs, stories and folklore of our society. What sets us apart as a species is that we have the cerebral lucidity to choose how we evolve. And this is where the power of stories comes in. We can inspect, question and rewrite our stories of who we are in the world and who we want to become. So using the universally understood characters of archetypes (The Hero, The Sovereign, The Jester) can help us tap into our ability to guide and rewrite our personal stories, which is one of the bases of therapy.
So to give you more of an idea of who I see myself to be, out of a set of 60 archetypes, here are my four primary archetypes that I most resonate with.
1 — The Artist
The Artist has the capacity to make the ordinary into the extraordinary.Characterised by boundless curiosity, playfulness, deep emotion and access to a rich source of inspiration, the Artist makes visible that which might not otherwise be seen. This archetype possesses an intense motivation and deep psychological and emotional need to manifest the power of expression. The Artist experiences and interprets life by using and going beyond all the five senses. This archetype is known to challenge, dispute and reframe society’s most revered concepts.
2 — The Romantic
Possessing an undying belief in the quality of the shared love experience, the Romantic is driven towards a life full of stimulation and intensity of emotions. Inherent in the Romantic is infatuation with sexual and sensual beauty and experience. A sense of oneness and completeness — a transformation of the soul — are found within love relationships and connection with the world around them. This archetype is fun to be with, charming, charismatic, sociable and friendly.
3 — The Magician
Known to be dynamic, influential, charismatic and clever, this archetype is able to view the world through many different lenses. Driven to understand the fundamental laws of the universe in order to make dreams into reality, The Magician connects to experiences of synchronicity, flow and oneness, with a curiosity about the hidden workings of the universe. Using ritual and forces from above and beyond, the Magician manifests ideas into reality. Able to accomplish magic from the inside out, the Magician gets results outside of the ordinary rules of life.
4 — The Warrior
The Warrior demonstrates dedication, honour and an unwavering sense of ethics and integrity. Possessing a strong sense of justice, loyalty and goal orientation, the Warrior is often impatient and keenly focused on strategy and tactics to put an end to what has been identified as wrong. This archetype is empowered to effect change and, in fact, views change as a duty. As a guardian of boundaries, the Warrior teaches assertiveness: how to speak truth, how to meet needs without compromising others, how to fight for a cause bigger than oneself.
My Poetic Self Portrait
The “poetic self” embodies an individual’s creative and expressive identity, engaging with the world through poetic imagination, emotional depth, and language. This aspect of persona, deeply rooted in one’s experiences and identity construction, utilises creativity to interpret and interact with the world. Moreover, your poetic self is the union of your past experiences, your current sense of self, and the vision of who you’d like to become, integrating memory, presence, and aspiration in the pursuit of expressive authenticity.
As someone who sees themselves in an exploratory state of flux, I created the below poem as a Poetic Self Portrait.
My Story — The Lite Version
How did I get here though?
I’m a creative, strategic polymath who is infatuated by the concept of change and transcendence. I’m at home when trying to pattern find between our inner (personality) and outer worlds (culture and system we live and function in). It has always been quite hard to find my place in the world of work, especially as a perceptive empath. The professional world that I got catapulted into was one that revered the single-focused specialist. And so graduating with a Fine Art degree and psychology credentials forced me into a squiggly career. I worked in colour psychology trend forecasting, graphic design, and for an innovative, beauty tech start-up.
This was until I met someone who I would spend the next 7 years going into business with. A period in my life where all my disparate skills and capabilities came together into a clear offering of systemic change for purpose-led businesses; and I levelled up into leadership roles and board rooms at great speed. A place that valued systemic thinking. This was a valuable but complicated time.
Then at the beginning of 2024, things all came crashing down. The universe sent a missile at all I had built and the partnership that had gotten me there. A story that I don’t see as mine to tell publicly.
My Year of Rewilding Myself
What came after is my story to share. The consequence has been a year of picking up the pieces, myself included, and really questioning “who am I now?” and “what’s next?”.
Testing all my skills as a transformation consultant, I know that what is emerging is new, exciting, and something I believe could genuinely impact the world positively. An offering that spans psychology, sociology, philosophy, art, emotional intelligence, the mystical, the secular, ritual, the archetypal and the creatively playful. And this year has really deepened my understanding of the chaos and complexity of how change works.
What does this new offering aim to do? Exploring how we can transform to become our whole, authentic selves while being ethically interdependent with others and the world around us. How can we connect more deeply with one another, and not be run by the hyper individualised, consumer systems that bombard us?
It sounds quite grand and ambitious, I know.
It also sounds romanticised and idealistic (I did warn you about my romantic archetype).
At this moment, I don’t know where this journey will end up. But through experimental writing and academically informed articles I hope to carve out a new path. And I hope you are interested in following along and joining me for the journey…