Sisterhoods Encourage Strong Women to Ask for Help

“When women come together and make a commitment to each other to be in a circle with a spiritual center, they are creating a vessel of healing and transformation for themselves, and a vehicle for change in their world.” -Jean Bolen

There was a time in my life I never shed a tear. Not one single, solitary tear.

People who are close to me now wouldn’t believe that statement because I cry whenever I need to now, and apparently I need to a lot. Nowadays, I don’t care if I’m in a café or my living room, if I have a feeling, I feel it. But the old me never shed a tear…ever!

I remember attending my aunt’s funeral and even at the most tragic event that had happened in my young life I did not shed a single tear. My aunt was a woman I loved more than the moon. She made my heart light up whenever I saw her. When she came to family functions, I stared at her in awe. I studied the way she styled her dark hair and the way her bright red lipstick stood out against her pretty pale face thinking that I wanted to be just like her someday. She always had a smile. She was free with her hugs and I always wanted to be in whatever room she was in. She knew how to make kids feel special. She knew how to make me feel special and I was her biggest fan.

But when she passed away, I didn’t shed a single tear. I didn’t cry when I watched my dad break down. I didn’t cry when I watched my grandparents break down. I didn’t shed a tear throughout the entire funeral while a church full of all my relatives wept. People commented on how strong I was.

But I wasn’t strong.

 I was disconnected from my own emotions while I was busy trying to take care of everyone else’s.

Strong women ask for help and they open up and lean on other people. I wasn’t strong. I was lost. I didn’t ask for help. I held everything in and tried to be strong for everyone else and it led to a break down. I was in my first year of University at the time and my grades plummeted after my aunt died. I started skipping classes. I stopped caring about everything. I didn’t understand what the point of my life was. And still I never cried or asked for help. Instead, I got kicked out of University and I had to go to college to raise my grades again before they would let me back in.

Holding in your feelings, not speaking your needs or dismissing what is going on for you is not strong. It might seem easier but in the end it always leads to chaos. It leads to depression and relationship conflict, health problems and a general feeling of not knowing who you are, what you want or what is important to you.

If you are like I was and you have no idea how to express your feelings or release them and move on, joining a compassionate sisterhood might be exactly what you need right now. Leaning on a circle of wise sisters is so important and it’s something we need to carve out time for. Women have been gathering in healing circles for centuries because our tender hearts need it.

In my Moon Sisters Art and Ceremony Circle, I am committed to creating a space where the women who join me feel safe enough to reveal the places within themselves that are hurting. You can’t break open and change your life if you can’t see your pain but most of us weren’t taught how to reveal our pain and we certainly weren’t taught constructive ways to deal with our pain. Most women tend to other people’s pain all the time. We are natural caretakers and like an old cliché, we usually fall in the trap of putting everyone else’s needs ahead of our own. But sisterhood reverses that tired trap.

If you are not yet part of a conscious sisterhood, a sisterhood that is committed to offering unconditional support with zero judgment, I suggest you google your area and search for one. We are lucky to live at a time when spiritual sisterhoods are popping up everywhere and you will probably find something that suits you perfectly.

If you live in or around Calgary, you might want to check out my sisterhood. I host and guide a very specific type of sisterhood . I use art, ritual and ceremony along with my emotional therapy techniques to help the 6 women in my circle heal and live from their authentic spirits.  In my sisterhood, you will meet with the same 6 women twice a month for a year. The group is small, intimate and magical. We sit in sacred space together and as a sisterhood we try to lift some of the burden you are carrying off your shoulders. Because you really aren’t meant to carry it all. You really don’t have to hold it all together. Not here. Not in this circle. After we’ve unburdened ourselves and received the support from our sisters that we didn’t even know we needed but we’re so glad we received, we do what all great sisterhoods do best; we sit around the kitchen table and laugh and drink wine.

If you don’t live near Calgary but you’re a strong woman in need of support, I also offer Moon Sisters Art and Ceremony Circles online. You can learn more about that here.

With love,