I didn’t know how unfree I was until I became free. I didn’t know how much other people’s opinions of a good life and a good person were steering my choices, or how much my childhood was quietly running my marriage. I really didn’t know — until I was outside of it, looking back.
This website is where I merge all the topics I love to explore, and really, that have made me who I am today – money, writing, creativity, power dynamics, identity and all the messy, interesting things in between.
Sovereign Woman
I am a sovereign woman – A woman who decides for herself who she is and what she wants and governs her life accordingly.
Being sovereign requires being truthful about the things that have shaped me and the circumstances that are impacting me now. It is through this acceptance of who I am and where I am, that I have found all movement towards what I want and who I want to be. It is a daily practice, one I’m deeply committed to.
I know I have choices. I know that sometimes those choices are more limited than I want them to be. I know my intention is powerful. I know that sometimes I run on autopilot. I also know that I can notice when it happens and do something about it.
The thing about being a sovereign woman, is that it doesn’t mean bad stuff never happens and it doesn’t mean you live life alone. It means that you decide what you make that stuff mean when it does and then you decide what you are going to do with it. My life is not perfect, but I am absolutely a master at turning the shit life throws at me into a stunning rose garden. (This is a metaphor, by the way. My real life roses could probably use some more shit.)
I am safe because I trust myself to do the hard things. I’ve been there and done it.
I am free because I love me no matter what it is I’m doing or what is happening around me.
I am Dawn. I am morning. I am day. I am beginning. I am never done. I am well on my way.
How Does Sovereignty Look in Practice?
If you want something different for your life and are happy pondering on ideas like creation, identity and perception – I really think you’ll like it here. It is the lens I view everything through.
Here are some of the pathways that my constant self-exploration has led me down and the things I’ve learned on those paths.
Money Matters
I have a real curiosity about how our beliefs about money shape so much else about our lives and our sense of self. I want to hand people practical tools for building the kind of independence I had to fight for.
That’s grown into three things living here now — a growing library of resources for anyone building financial confidence, my advocacy work and story, and the Everyday Money podcast where I talk about both the mindset and mechanics of money.
Advocacy for Financial Justice
My dream is that no one ever has to stay in a job, relationship, or place that’s harming them because of the financial barriers to leaving. Becoming financially sovereign is an essential part of what changes the systems for everyone else too.
Writing
Writing is at the heart of how I intentionally move through the world. What do I think, feel, and need in this moment? An honest answer to that question always leads me somewhere unexpected and honestly, magical. I firmly believe that you can go anywhere you want in life. You can’t go anywhere without starting where you are though (not where you wish you were.)
My background is finance and business and honestly, I still don’t fully know where a comma belongs in a sentence. These things also have nothing at all to do with the act of writing as I mean it – which has only one intention – to be truthful.
That honesty turned into poetry. Poetry turned into my first book, Love, Sex and Codependence. The writing didn’t end there, though — there are new books quietly taking shape, and the writing page holds the rest of it: poetry to feel your way through, and essays that are essentially a constant questioning on paper, for anyone who’s committed to being more intentional with how they’re living.
Photography
Taking pictures around my home of Newfoundland helped me become an appreciator of the rugged, natural beauty right in my backyard, and someone who sees magic in places most people miss. It’s become an integral part of who I am and how I interpret and interact with the world.
Even the process of learning photography shaped my ability to tackle new challenges and to be ok with imperfection. It’s been a wonderful journey that brought me closer to myself and my true ability. I wouldn’t be who I am or where I am without it.
I’ll always take pictures of the beauty around me, and my favorite shots are available for purchase to anyone who’d like some of that beauty on their walls to appreciate.
Who is Dawn Evans?
A bio is supposed to answer who I am and what I do. The truth is, both those things are evolving faster than I can keep up with.
I laugh at the past bios I have made for myself, actually, and my attempt to fit who I am into a concise paragraph or two. I am a person who loves to contemplate and explore ideas such as identity. The more I do, the more sure I am that any description of self is entirely arbitrary and temporary. Basically, I am the opposite of concise.
Dawn Evans 