Malcolm Stern: 0:46

So welcome to my podcast, slay your Dragons with Compassion, which I'm doing in conjunction with my friends John and Sandra Wilson at online events. Very happy today to be exploring with Jenny Boyd, who is part of pop history, actually rock history, travelled with the Beatles to see the Maharishi in their very early days, to see the Maharishi in their very early days, and has written a wonderful book about her life, involved with all of rock, called the Icons of Rock, and currently writing a fiction novel as well. You've had an amazing life I mean travelling with the Beatles and your sister, of course, is Patti Boyd, who was married to George Harrison. You got to be close up with some of the sort of legends of our time Also, not to forget that you married mick fleetwood of fleetwood mac as well, twice.

Jenny Boyd: 1:36

Was it that you married, it was yep, yep twice.

Malcolm Stern: 1:39

Um, so you've actually been around that world, and I wonder what you learned in that world. What we're exploring here in the in this series is how adversity has shaped people's lives and and often, you know, we, we what looks like glamour is not glamour at all. I mean, you obviously have. A thing I forgot to mention, of course, was that Donovan wrote Jennifer Juniper for you as well. Uh, which must be lovely having a song, especially a beautiful song. I found myself, um, just as I was getting changing my clothes, because I normally wear t-shirts, um, I was just changing my shirt and I was humming Jennifer Juniper and I just thought what?

Malcolm Stern: 2:13

an iconic song that is actually and that was for you by Donovan and that's why my memoir is called Jennifer Juniper.

Jenny Boyd: 2:23

Was it a journey beyond the muse? So, not just the Jennifer Juniper, but she had a journey and there must be such.

Malcolm Stern: 2:33

There must be such sort of um projection and when you're in traveling, moving in those circles, um to be a beautiful model which you were, um to be with the Beatles and hanging out with the Beatles and, of course, seeing that the the normality beyond the legend of that as well. So maybe we could start with your trip to see the Maharishi with your sister and with the Beatles.

Jenny Boyd: 2:58

Yeah, okay. Well, just before that I'd spent six months in San Francisco excuse me in 1967, without any idea about flower power or what was going on there but, I was searching.

Jenny Boyd: 3:13

I got what I'd called like a spiritual awakening before that and I didn't want to do modeling anymore. But I didn't know what I was searching for. And then a friend just happened to say well, would you come to help me with my shop I'm opening in San Francisco. So three months rent on my flat or a one-way ticket to San Francisco. So I bought that one-way ticket and that's when I saw all these, the subculture really, and everybody was searching exactly the experience that I had had and using either acid or smoking pot or you know, but it was in a very innocent way and a lot of it was searching.

Jenny Boyd: 3:56

Music was very important. You know the san francisco bands, and when the beat was brought out, all you need is love. It's like what a relief. You know, we don't need to be searching anymore, all we need is love. But the musicians were the spokespeople of our time. And then, when I got back, patty and George came to because I've been telling them about San Francisco and how wonderful it was, and you know that they would be able to walk down Haight-Ashbury no problem, because everybody was very cool. Well, by the time they arrived in August, all the sort of original hippies had gone to Marin County or they'd gone to Sausalito, of original hippies had gone to Marin County or they'd gone to Sausalito and you had all the people that had turned on, tuned in and dropped out right across America. So when we walked down Haight-Ashbury we'd all taken they thought we should actually all take some acid so you really get the sort of feel of the place. So we were all kind of out of our minds walking down Haight-Ashbury and uh, and then finally George sat sort of by the panhandle and someone gave him a guitar and they were saying play, play a tune. You know, play us, play us, give us a few notes, give us a few chords. And what he did was say, okay, well, this is C and this is D and this is A. And then he gave the guitar back and we walked back towards the limo that wouldn't come down Haight-Ashbury and that was it. They said, jenny, we're taking you home. You know it's time, it's time. You came back and the six months was up.

Jenny Boyd: 5:19

So I was staying with them for a while when we heard about Maharishi and Patty had already met not sure she'd met him, but she'd come across him probably the year before when George was on tour and so we all went to listen to him talk at the um some park lane, one of the big hotels, and he realized he had the Beatles in the audience and then had said okay, well, I'd like you all to come the Beatles and I was part of their gang to Wales and get initiated. And so we all went there and while we were there he said what he wanted the Beatles to come to India and to spread the word and to learn how to be initiators, and that he was going to set up a place in London. So I thought, well, great, at least I can be part of that and help in some way or whatever. And we were all given our mantras.

Jenny Boyd: 6:14

And then when Brian Epstein died, we came back prematurely and I was in the car with Patty and George and they dropped me off in London and when I had to get out I was obviously staying in London then and I said to George, you know, said goodbye to them, and and he said how would you like to come to India with us all? And I remember saying how can I ever thank you? And he said just be yourself. And for me that has been a mantra in itself and that's been the the journey really, and you know, obviously he had spoken to patty and they decided because they knew we were all on this spiritual path and that was probably the most amazing trip I have ever been on and um, take some beats yeah, take some beating and um, and we had our own sort of um.

Jenny Boyd: 7:07

It was quite hard to explain, but we had our own rooms and our own sort of bungalow in those um, with those rooms, you know, along the corridor. So we all had our own room. And then there were other bungalows all the way down with different people who were in there, but we had our own bungalow and they would sit on the roof during the day and they would bring their guitars, george and Paul and John, and start playing songs, just um, things they would make up just off the hoof, you know. Or John couldn't sleep very well and he said, you know, he started singing that song. You know, I couldn't sleep. And then, of course, prudence, and she was, uh, kind of lost the plot and gone into a sort of trance and nobody could get her out. I'd gone in there with this pipe I'd brought back from San Francisco and John went in with his guitar and just started singing, dear Prudence. So what was extraordinary? That everything that was going on in that ashram was all they needed to create songs.

Jenny Boyd: 8:11

And many years later, when I did a, it was actually a dissertation about creativity, and that's when I interviewed all the musicians it was just remembering that time where they were so creative and at one point I'd got, I wasn't well and every now and then a doctor would appear because people who you know weren't well but we were way out, you know, off the beaten track. And so I had a high fever and a doctor came and he said it was tonsillitis, which is a bit strange, but luckily, because the high fever got worse and worse and luckily another doctor happened to be around that day and of course it was dysentery. You know that everybody had got, and so, um, I was in bed and then people would come and sort of say, you know, hope you're feeling. Okay.

Jenny Boyd: 9:03

John and cynthia came in and john had done this wonderful drawing of, um, a sort of guru type person with a. He was playing as a, he was cross-legged, playing a flute and a basket with a snake coming out and he'd written underneath by the power that's in and the power that's out I cast your tonsil lighthouse out Love, john and Sin. And so what I'm trying to get at is that they were so creative. Everything was about creating something music, drawing, whatever it was. So, yeah, it was an extraordinary time.

Malcolm Stern: 9:46

And it's so easy to sort of project onto John, george, paul Ringo, you know as these amazing figures, but you were around them in real life and I mean, I've always been very drawn to George. I always felt like there was something so deeply spiritual and sort of wise about him.

Jenny Boyd: 10:05

Yeah.

Malcolm Stern: 10:06

But these were human beings, so how did that show up in your meetings with them?

Jenny Boyd: 10:11

Well, I suppose it was easy for them to be human beings there because everybody was on the same path. There was no sort of photographers. Well, actually there was one guy who came to visit his mother who was there, paul Saltzman, and he ended up and they befriended him and he ended up creating a wonderful book of all the photographs of them and all of us. But generally they they were hassled. They weren't hassled in any way.

Jenny Boyd: 10:44

they could be normal human beings and nobody said, oh well, I want to sit next to them, you know, at the sort of lunch table, or you know, it was just like everybody doing their thing lovely, and so, of course, you didn't realize you were.

Malcolm Stern: 10:57

You were in the midst of history, being made as well oh, exactly, I was 19. You know, life is exciting because you're 19 yes, exactly and and so you got into transcendental meditation, which became a big part of your life, I think, for for quite a long time. Is it still a part of your life now?

Jenny Boyd: 11:14

it is interesting. You should ask that because I always meditated and I did the TM meditation for quite some time and then I did. Then I came across Paramahansa Yogananda, the Self-Realization Fellowship, when we moved to LA and George had given me the book. You know, years before, when I was a teenager and I would often go there with a friend of mine and we'd do all the chanting and stuff.

Malcolm Stern: 11:38

But then I did Buddhist meditation for quite some time and now I've gone back to TM just in the last couple of months actually oh, okay, and using my same mantra that I was given when I was 19, 18, 19 well, I think John became disillusioned with the Maharishi and sort of like stormed out. I don't know if that's a story.

Jenny Boyd: 12:01

What happened is that the person that I rented a flat from in London at that time his name, they called him John called him Magic Alex. He wasn't magic at all. You know, john was seeing him do something or other while he was on acid and thought that Alex was magic. But anyway, just before I went off on that trip, john and Cynthia came round to the place where we were staying, because John and Alex had sort of a good relationship and Alex was trying to get him to go to his guru. I mean, I don't know if he even had a guru, but actually there was a jealousy there.

Jenny Boyd: 12:41

So we, when we were at the ashram, at some point right towards I don't know, after we've been there about two months or so, alex came over and I thought, oh, here comes trouble. And sure enough, he befriended um this. We would see him walking around the ashram with this woman from America and she said that Maharishi had acted rather inappropriately towards her and Mia Farrow had said sort of a similar thing. So at some point then Alex went to John or John and George and said that and embellished it, probably kind of like see, you know, told you you should have gone to mine, a kind of thing, and anyway. So then George and John went to see Maharishi that evening, before we all left, and Maharishi had said you know why are you going? Why are you going? The story has it that John said well, you should know if you're so fucking cosmic. And you know it's like oh God.

Jenny Boyd: 13:45

And so the next day was just awful, because there was Maharishi, I'd been told by George OK, come on, you, patty, and I, we're moving, we're going to go and visit Ravi Shankar in South India. We're going. And I didn't know any of this was going on. I was completely oblivious and loving the meditation and Maharishi had been alerted. You know, the prize troop were leaving and as he sat there with his person, you know, holding his umbrella above Maharishi's head to sort of, uh, you know, stop him getting sunburned, um, and we all had to walk past him and he it was just a sort of silence and every now and then he'd say boys, boys, why are you leaving? And I tell you it felt.

Malcolm Stern: 14:30

I mean, I never was a great fan of Maharishi himself, but I'd got to love the meditation that's very interesting, by the way, because it's like I mean, I've got many, many friends who've been involved with the meditation. That's very interesting, by the way, because it's like I mean, I've got many, many friends who've been involved with the meditation for years and yet I've never felt the Maharishi was someone who appealed to me as a character. So that's, that's quite interesting yes, that is.

Jenny Boyd: 14:50

And yet you know, I was content. I mean I kept thinking, gosh, he can see, if he's so cosmic he can see that I don't actually, I'm not actually sort of keen on him. But in the end I started forgetting about all that and just enjoying the meditation. But, um, so when I did get back to england, so patty and george and I went to south india and that was pretty amazing trip and toured with ravi shankar for a while. And, um, when I did get back to england and I heard that maharishi was coming over and he was going to be back in Wales doing, you know, giving people their mantra and stuff, I went, got the train there and went to see him and I said to him I'm so sorry that that happened and he said why? Why did it happen?

Malcolm Stern: 15:33

So he was still confused and I said I don't know, but I just came, came to say I'm so sorry it did, and that was it and, of course, you know, despite all the trappings, he's a person and and it's so easy to be wounded by people, no matter what position you're in.

Jenny Boyd: 15:51

True, basically, seeing you as rubbish, yeah turned yeah positive projection to the negative projection but but years later, george told me, when we were living and when I was living in LA, and um many years later, george told me that he'd um gone back to TM and he'd um been in touch with Maharishi, and so there was obviously a deep, you know, a reconnection that's nice, yes, um, and and what, what?

Malcolm Stern: 16:17

so what led you to donovan and to mick fleetwood? How did, how did those?

Jenny Boyd: 16:21

okay, so the donovan well mix first, because I was still at school in nottingham gate and um, I'd go with my friends to the local coffee shop afterwards, the coffee mill in nottingham gate, and sometimes um mix band called the shanes, um, I guess that's where they would go, the restaurant near next door where they'd have an omelet. Uh, before a gig, and um, and I remember being in school and in a class and a friend of mine brought out this wire figure and put it in her inkwell, empty, inkwell um hole and uh, I asked her who it was and she said oh, it's this wonderful man, a wonderful boy in. He's in this band called the Shanes, and she obviously had like major crush on him, said I'll introduce you to him. But anyway, I, you know, got to see him and he was very nice and he took us to this do you want to come to the gig, kind of thing. And so it was in Brentwood, and while I was there we were sitting because they all had to put their own equipment on stage themselves. And so it was in Brentwood, and while I was there we were sitting because they all had to put their own equipment on stage themselves and bring it themselves. And while we were there and I was sitting next to him and Dale, my friend, was on the other side just waiting for the rest of the band to arrive, and he put his foot on mine and I tried to sort of take it away and he pressed harder, you know he wouldn't let me take him away and I thought, oh, oh, no, dale's got the crush on him and so I sort of ended up going out with one of the other, the singer, or something.

Jenny Boyd: 17:46

But then afterwards Mick and I got together and so we were probably about 17 and he was the same age and yeah, and very, very sweet. And then I think there was because we were so young. There was a part of me that just felt I needed to go and explore the world, and so that's when I went to San Francisco and then India, so we'd always be in touch, but then, you know, not as boyfriend, girlfriend. And then later on he asked me if I would marry him, and I suppose you know we were both young, and so that's what we did, and by then, um, peter, peter Green had just left the band. I did quite a lot of touring with Peter then. He was just this wonderful, amazing musician and person and Chris McVie had joined it and John McVie, we were all in Kiln House and then they had this album called Kiln House and that's where we lived for a while because Peter had left and they were trying to kind of, you know, get songs going. So that was Mick, but also I did have a couple of songs. I had co-wrote a song with Chris and another one on another after. Their album was called Bear Trees.

Jenny Boyd: 19:03

So Donovan was before, after we'd gone to Wales, had been initiated, and then we had to wait a couple of months to go to India and they opened up the Apple Boutique and so I was asked if I could be the manager at Apple Boutique, plus someone called Pete Shotton who was a friend of John Lennon's, and so I worked there for a while and while I was working there, donovan happened to come down the stairs with his friend Gypsy Dave, and I'd met him before at Patty and George's house and he didn't know I was working there and obviously wanted to know all about Maharishi and about San Francisco and you know he was kind of like this is something new, that's happening.

Jenny Boyd: 19:48

Anyway, one day he asked me if I'd go and visit, go and have lunch with his manager and him and there were a few people, and it was while we were there at his manager's house and he I've written a song for you and so he started playing Jennifer Juniper when there were just the two of us in the room and I didn't know where to look because I was actually very shy, and I realized it was about me and I realized, you know, he said something is she pretty? Yes, ever so Would you marry her. Yes, I would sir Something like that. Ever so would you marry her? Yes, I would sir something like that. And, um, so it was sweet, but I wasn't, but it was never that sort of relationship and you know, it's like just, and whenever I hear it nowadays, it just represents this time of innocence yes, yes yeah I think I hear a lot of innocence, actually even in all of the characters involved that you've spoken about as well.

Malcolm Stern: 20:39

It's like there's this new world seemingly being born, the magical 60s, and all that went with that, and actually also all of the shadow of that as well.

Jenny Boyd: 20:49

Well, exactly, we believed we could change the world.

Malcolm Stern: 20:52

Yes, yes, yeah, yeah, and in some ways I mean the Beatles certainly have the, in terms of music, have had more impact on the world than any other musicians ever.

Jenny Boyd: 21:04

Absolutely. And it continues.

Malcolm Stern: 21:06

And it continues. Yes, I'm actually doing.

Jenny Boyd: 21:09

I've been asked to go to Chicago and give talk at the Beatlefest. You know they have the Beatlefest in New York and then in Chicago every year and apparently the guy Mark Lapidos, he asked John all those years ago, can he do this? And John had said yeah, sure. So it's like over 50 years that all these people who've been Beatle fans or just had Beatles in their lives and their children or their grandchildren, you know it's extraordinary.

Malcolm Stern: 21:38

Yes, that's lovely. I mean, I hear some very beautiful memories of those times and I wonder if there was darkness and obviously Magicalic sounds a bit of a dark shadow in this as well. But I wonder if there was darkness in those times as well that you were aware of. But of course you were very young then as well. I may not have noticed that.

Jenny Boyd: 21:56

I was very young and naive in very many ways. Yes, young then as well I may not have noticed. Very young and naive in very many ways. Yes, I think. You know, when I was in san francisco, um, I was offered a lift from a hell's angel and um I kind of thought, oh okay, and actually it was fine. But and then I remember going to a party with all these hell's angels in there in the middle of the woods with friends and stuff, I mean, and everybody was high on acid. But there's this naivety in some ways sometimes that can protect you yes, yes, innocence, yes, you're not putting out sort of you know yeah yeah and fear yeah so um.

Malcolm Stern: 22:34

So you married mick twice. I'm interested why you would marry someone okay.

Jenny Boyd: 22:38

so we married and it was lovely and everything. And then when we went to LA after a few years and we had our children by then, and that's where they met Stevie and Lindsay, and then everything took off. So not only that, you know, then it was a time huge where everyone was taking cocaine, especially in studios and especially because you've got to get this record done, you know, for Warner Brothers at a certain time. So that it was tough and it was because I was the only one that had kids. It was tough because often Mick wouldn't come home or, you know, he'd just need his time before he had to go back into the studio or they'd go on the road.

Jenny Boyd: 23:27

And it was quite a tricky time. And I think at some point that we sort of separated and then we got back together and that had been the what happened throughout our whole married life. We'd be separating, going back together because it's like we both wanted it to work. But there was so much and what was so difficult was the whole drug, alcohol thing and um, and this absolute need to make it yes you know, to become famous to this they were, they were getting it, and then it was.

Jenny Boyd: 24:03

You know, it's, it's. Everybody was out of their heads a lot of the time and so that's tricky. You know, I can go down and I'd go down to the studio and the kids, and then I'd have to go back, and you know. So it's sort of like a very, um, a difficult time in that way.

Malcolm Stern: 24:19

Yes.

Jenny Boyd: 24:20

And then there was one point the three-year-old back did become enormous, didn't they?

Malcolm Stern: 24:23

They were one of the great iconic acts of our time.

Jenny Boyd: 24:26

But people change. We know that because it's the drugs or it's the alcohol, and so that's very hard. I didn't know about Al-Anon or I didn't know about therapy or anything like that, and both of us were terrible and always had been at communicating. Um, you know, those are things to be learned later. But uh, and then we did, we got divorced and um, and then, uh, we needed green cards, because then they were big and they were having to go. They needed to go to england but come back to the states, and so there was somebody who was one of the I can't remember who he was, but he would allow us to have a green card if the, if fleetwood mac did a concert for him. So that's why mick and I but we had to get married beforehand wow so we could go as a family.

Jenny Boyd: 25:19

It wasn't like romantic. Oh, we realise we really love each other. No, that part was gone. You know, it's just like it was all about Fleetwood Mac. Literally, you marry the band.

Malcolm Stern: 25:30

Yes, yes. And are you respected as a wife of a band member as well?

Jenny Boyd: 25:36

Yeah, yes, I think I was respected. I remember their lawyer that they had. I remember him saying to me you're the only woman who's you know married or going out with one of the band members. That was never changed by the fame oh, that's interesting.

Jenny Boyd: 25:53

That is a big compliment because I suppose it didn't really phase me, because you know you can't get much more famous than the Beatles, or you can't. You know I'd been in that life, in that lifestyle where it doesn't you since, since being so young yes, and and when you look back on that, what, what do you?

Malcolm Stern: 26:13

what do you miss about that life, or do you miss anything about that life? And and what does your life look like now?

Jenny Boyd: 26:24

Well, I loved listening to their music. It was so much fun, you know, because I love to dance, and so it was just so cool. There was a lot of it. That was really tough and especially, you know, with children as well. And then I married another musician, went to go and take the children to England I hadn't heard about him, had you? So the children to England, because I thought I want that my kids to respect their dad and I thought maybe this is just something he's going through or I don't know. So we moved to England.

Jenny Boyd: 27:00

But by then, you know, Mick had got somebody else and, um, and somebody called Ian Wallace and he was the drummer from uh North England. In fact it was at a Christmas at uh Chris McVie's house, because I'd go there with the children and I met him there and he had played with Dylan and he played with a lot of musicians, um, that we know, know, and so we got together and then I moved back to LA vowing. I would never move back to LA and I would never marry another musician. I did both of those things and he played with Bonnie Raitt, he played with Dara Crosby, Stills and Nash and you know, let's see, yeah, Anyway, a lot of musicians who I was then able to interview for my book. And so I think what I had, a turning point when I was with him, because I realized I'd made a mistake. I just kind of swapped Mick for somebody else with a different name another Mick. I just kind of swapped Mick for somebody else with a different name another Mick.

Jenny Boyd: 28:07

And so we went on our honeymoon after being together for a few years, and I would say this I was trying to think you know what was my turning point? And we were with a couple of one of the musicians that Ian had been playing with and her boyfriend, and they bought some magic mushrooms like the synthetic ones, and we were on the beach. They said, come on, let's have one of these each. I hadn't done anything like that since the 60s. So I joined in and I could, you know, you start laughing your head off and I thought, God, we're getting a little bit conspicuous. So I suggested we all went into the sea. So they were strong swimmers. I've never been a strong swimmer and I've always been terrified of the sea since I was little. Anyway, I'm out, way out out of my depth. They're even further out. And I'd forgotten.

Jenny Boyd: 28:58

Um, although I had a mask, I didn't bring the bit so you can breathe. Snorkel, yeah, snorkel, and I was looking down and it was like all this wonderful sort of things to look at. I got completely sort of taken away with it and believed I didn't really want to put my head up anymore to take breaths. You know that I could breathe underwater and of course you know spluttering, terrified, way out of my depth no more waves coming and just terrified I was going to start you know, keep on thinking like that that I can breathe underwater again because I was out of my head. So I swam back as fast as I could and when I got back I sort of sat on the beach shivering, just terrified and what could have happened. And then I decided actually it's time I gave back. You know, I've had an amazing life. I was probably 36, about 36. I've had an amazing life, but it's time I gave back.

Jenny Boyd: 30:06

And so when holiday was finished, I went into. I did a three-month course on talking to kids in their little state, in their state schools in America, about drugs and alcohol, and I'd go with a partner we all partnered up with somebody because I was a bit too shy, to sort of actually voice myself in front of the class. But I would talk to the girls afterwards and chat with them and wear lovely jewelry like beaded bracelets and things, so they would come up to me and then I could talk to them. So I did that and then I realized actually I want to go to college, I need to learn stuff and I was interested in holistic health and that's when I went to college. I need to learn stuff and I was interested in holistic health, and that's when I went to college and I had to really struggle.

Jenny Boyd: 30:48

Because of my background they thought I wasn't going to be able to keep up the pace and stick with it. So I was on to. You know, they were checking me out and I carried on for four and a half years and then got my master's in counseling psychology and then I decided I was doing some therapeutic work but realized I want to write, that's what I really love, and so then I did the PhD in humanities and my dissertation was then what became the book. But it was difficult because then I wouldn't go on the road and then I wouldn't go to so and so David Crosby's wedding, or you know that kind of thing, I, for the first time, was saying I'm doing something for me. So that was my turning point and it was huge Now stop drinking, stop doing all that stuff. Which was tricky because you know Ian, at that time if I wasn't drinking he'd drink more, or you know. You know what it's like.

Jenny Boyd: 31:50

And then, after I'd written the PhD dissertation and finished the book and had it published, I needed to find a job. And that was when I went into the addiction field and worked at a place called Sierra Tucson and then over the years, then I came to England and I got people into treatment and it sort of went on for about 20 years and I would take some of the psychiatrists and therapists to Cottonwood, one of the places I worked at, and bring them over to us, and so it was sort of getting people to get to know each other. But I felt that in America they were much more ahead of the game psychologically and so I wanted to integrate it with what we had in England, which was quite sort of far behind in the addiction field at that time.

Malcolm Stern: 32:46

So, that's, you know, my, my life changed and and it feels like you found your sense of purpose. I mean that it must have been incredibly difficult to break free of all that glamour that you'd been around. It was like you were at the pinnacle of that place and also you would have had all the projections like someone like donovan, sort of like falling in love with you and and falling in love with an idealized version of you. Probably. I'm not saying you're not that at all lovable as well, but it's like, yeah, it's very easy to project, yeah, and um, yeah, um. So I think you've, it's clearly you're, you're, you're treading your path now and it feels like meditation has helped you along the way, and and also probably the company of others of like mind as well, where you're not just in the sort of, like you know, the beautiful people's circle, but you're, you're around people who are deeply searching for something. I know that you're a friend of my girlfriend, sarah, as well, so yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, but it's nice now because, well, it's always nice.

Jenny Boyd: 33:45

But it's like, what I mean is that, um, because I never spoke about you know my relationship? Say to the anything in this college. It's like. So I was completely, um, I could be, but the funny thing is I wasn't used to just seeing everyday people. So the first day I was at that college and, um, they were going around that you had to give your name, you had to say why you were here. You know you were definitely getting into the psychology of um, what are you doing here? What, what do you? What is your purpose? And um, and I knew it was getting closer to me and I thought, oh no, they're going to see I'm different because I speak with an English accent. And as it got closer to me, I tried to put my hand up to say I think I'm different because I speak with an English accent. And as he got closer to me, I tried to put my hand up to say I think I'm going to pass out.

Jenny Boyd: 34:27

And then I passed out because it was such a big leap for me wow so, from wanting to be hidden, I was suddenly the focal point because I'd passed out. You know very interesting and that was the place. But when you know it was great, I loved it was. You know very much psychology and um, it was the place where I could say, actually this is who I am and this is my background.

Malcolm Stern: 34:54

But it was almost like I didn't ever want to say that stuff before and then you, of course, you reversed that by writing uh, the icons of rock, which was your, your experiences of, of moving in those circles, yeah, that must be quite cathartic as well, writing that down well, that's also true, but, um, I always thought I wasn't creative and that was what bugged me for all these years.

Jenny Boyd: 35:16

I wasn't creative. I'd write poems about not being creative, but then look who I was around, you know. Look who I was batting against.

Malcolm Stern: 35:26

Yes.

Jenny Boyd: 35:27

So I thought, okay, my world has been very much, you know, to do with musicians, but also, for my own sake, I don't feel creative. How many other people don't feel creative? And that's what drove me. And it was amazing because I didn't need to look far. Obviously we had, you know, I knew George, and that's what drove me and that's what. And it was amazing because I didn't need to look far. Obviously we had, you know, I knew George, and that was easy, and Eric and you know, because that was all part of the family. But, um, then all the musicians that Ian had been playing with, and all of Fleetwood Mac and, um, I just needed to think of somebody like the blues musicians. How was I ever going to get hold of them? And somehow I did. It was like I was on this. I kept asking them questions about the peak experience. It was like I was on this kind of in the zone just lighting this.

Malcolm Stern: 36:16

Yes.

Jenny Boyd: 36:17

Everything was coming together. All the synchronicities.

Malcolm Stern: 36:20

So it still feels like your purpose is still opening out. You're about to write a.

Jenny Boyd: 36:30

You're part way through writing a fiction novel, as well, yeah, um and and um, are you still working in the field of addiction at all or no? No, I'm not. Then I left it. Then I'd organize, you know, have my own company doing workshops, getting therapists to come over. So then I finished all that and just concentrated on writing, which has been, and I do quite a bit of public speaking as well, and that's fun. Because I used to be terrified, you know, I'd organize a conference, a mindfulness conference, and knew everybody that was going to be speaking at it, but I couldn't stand there and say to everybody this is so-and-so, and this is so-and-so Because, although I knew them some very well, I would forget their names. So I was that petrified, but then, um, and then that changed and now it's just a joy because I feel I'm connecting with people and people want to know and you know it's lovely, it's got a very nice feel about it it also feels a lot more sort of authentic as well, that you're being your authentic self yes stage.

Malcolm Stern: 37:24

Yes, yeah, we're coming close to the end of. I mean, I could go and talk to you for hours and I remember you speaking for me at um alternatives and you have a wonderful talk there and I just was. I was really impressed with the, your capacity to use words and, as you say, you were incredibly shy, but somehow you flipped that on its head and you're very assertive now and when you, when you're speaking uh, or certainly you come across that way yeah, um and I. The question I was asked towards the end of the, the, the interview, is what's the particular dragon you've had to slay? What's the, the hurdle you've had to overcome in order to be who you are now?

Jenny Boyd: 37:58

I would say it goes back to childhood that I never felt loved by my mother. My father was um. He was a ptsd survivor from the war staring balls. We grew up in africa and um, and I think that feeling it's like I had to build myself up. I had to build the father that I never knew, that male part of me, I had to build that up myself. I had to build up, bring the mother and bring that in, and I think that has been the journey. I think yeah.

Malcolm Stern: 38:40

Well, it's a wonderful, star-studded journey, and I can see that you're, you know, you feel in yourself as well.

Jenny Boyd: 38:47

you're embodying what you're speaking yeah to me that's a powerful process yeah, yeah, it's lovely to speak with you, malcolm I mean lovely, nice yeah yeah, thank you so much, jenny.

Malcolm Stern: 38:58

I really appreciate you coming on the show and um and sharing with us, and it's like it's wonderful to get reminiscences from someone who's been there at the making of history at first hand as well. So, yeah much appreciated.