Reclaiming Our Stories
A few years ago, I was having lunch with a friend who was expecting her first child – a daughter. Thinking about the kind of mother she would be, she told the story about the coming-of-age ceremony that her mother hosted for her when she turned twelve. On a warm summer night under the full moon, all the important women in her life gathered together to celebrate her passage into womanhood. I was totally intrigued by her story, but also felt some regret. This was not something I experienced as a girl, and suspect that few women have had these kinds of opportunities at that age, if ever.
Although many of us are searching for teachers, mentors, and allies, we may not know how to find them. We pass through major milestones like first menstruation, coming of age, leaving home, marriage, childbirth, the death of a loved one, career change, and illness with no one to show us the way. Each major event has the potential to reveal another chapter in our journey, but far too often, our stories remain untold. We go through life with subtle feelings of regret and loss for the unclaimed wisdom that is our birthright.
As a writer, researcher, and community convener, I felt called to reclaim the stories that mark women’s lives through words, ritual, and by being a witness to the important phases and stages that women go through. This emerged strongly for me as I entered my own major life transition.
In the role of Senior Manager in the non-profit field, I was managing an impossible workload and struggling to bring work-life balance to my day. More and more, my own personal values were compromised by the demands of my job and the standards I felt I needed to live by. I began to experience a number of health concerns, culminating in a hiatal hernia and severe chronic acid reflux, making it impossible for me to eat solid foods for weeks and permanently changing my diet and lifestyle. Around that same time, my cousin was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer – something that my doctors warned me was a long-term risk of my condition. This caused me to take a hard look at what my illness was telling me. I felt it was a warning sign.
Faced with a difficult decision – choosing between a thriving career and my health – I initiated a process of looking more intentionally at what was most important to me and how to live differently, and I began to ask myself some key questions: How can I live true to myself? What have I given up along the way? What major changes do I need to make? I left my job to begin the road to healing and devote myself to these questions. Writing became a guiding force throughout this time and I was inspired to begin writing my first book and to become a certified Life-Cycle Celebrant as a way of helping others, like me, who are going through major life transitions but feel they are alone.
I believe in the healing and restorative nature of stories as a way to acknowledge what is valuable, meaningful, and essential to our ongoing growth as women – and this is the cornerstone of my work. Building on more than a decade of experience in writing and research for non-profits, I now focus my work on the story within. I create courses, women's circles, ceremonies and rituals with women that include oral and written storytelling traditions as a way of remembering the personal histories that are carried within us – sometimes over many generations – and that are the source of our truth, wisdom, and wholeness.
Across many cultures and generations worldwide, women have gathered around quilting circles, kitchen tables, church basements, community halls, and bonfires. We yearn to be nourished with food, to be healed, to sing together, to give and receive emotional support, to connect to the sacred, to know the stories of our ancestors, and to be guided as we transition from one life stage to the next. I work with girls and women across all stages of their lives to honour and call back what was once lost. We each need these traditions in order to embody the fullness of who we are, and pass along the wisdom we gain for generations to come.
Although many of us are searching for teachers, mentors, and allies, we may not know how to find them. We pass through major milestones like first menstruation, coming of age, leaving home, marriage, childbirth, the death of a loved one, career change, and illness with no one to show us the way. Each major event has the potential to reveal another chapter in our journey, but far too often, our stories remain untold. We go through life with subtle feelings of regret and loss for the unclaimed wisdom that is our birthright.
As a writer, researcher, and community convener, I felt called to reclaim the stories that mark women’s lives through words, ritual, and by being a witness to the important phases and stages that women go through. This emerged strongly for me as I entered my own major life transition.
In the role of Senior Manager in the non-profit field, I was managing an impossible workload and struggling to bring work-life balance to my day. More and more, my own personal values were compromised by the demands of my job and the standards I felt I needed to live by. I began to experience a number of health concerns, culminating in a hiatal hernia and severe chronic acid reflux, making it impossible for me to eat solid foods for weeks and permanently changing my diet and lifestyle. Around that same time, my cousin was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer – something that my doctors warned me was a long-term risk of my condition. This caused me to take a hard look at what my illness was telling me. I felt it was a warning sign.
Faced with a difficult decision – choosing between a thriving career and my health – I initiated a process of looking more intentionally at what was most important to me and how to live differently, and I began to ask myself some key questions: How can I live true to myself? What have I given up along the way? What major changes do I need to make? I left my job to begin the road to healing and devote myself to these questions. Writing became a guiding force throughout this time and I was inspired to begin writing my first book and to become a certified Life-Cycle Celebrant as a way of helping others, like me, who are going through major life transitions but feel they are alone.
I believe in the healing and restorative nature of stories as a way to acknowledge what is valuable, meaningful, and essential to our ongoing growth as women – and this is the cornerstone of my work. Building on more than a decade of experience in writing and research for non-profits, I now focus my work on the story within. I create courses, women's circles, ceremonies and rituals with women that include oral and written storytelling traditions as a way of remembering the personal histories that are carried within us – sometimes over many generations – and that are the source of our truth, wisdom, and wholeness.
Across many cultures and generations worldwide, women have gathered around quilting circles, kitchen tables, church basements, community halls, and bonfires. We yearn to be nourished with food, to be healed, to sing together, to give and receive emotional support, to connect to the sacred, to know the stories of our ancestors, and to be guided as we transition from one life stage to the next. I work with girls and women across all stages of their lives to honour and call back what was once lost. We each need these traditions in order to embody the fullness of who we are, and pass along the wisdom we gain for generations to come.