I’m straight off the back of sharing my first in-person workshop for a hot minute + I BLOODY LOVED IT!

I loved it for many reasons:
1. It was in Glastonbury + I NEVER need an excuse to spend time/speak/share on that land.
2. I got to be in-person with amazing women + we laughed, cried + told stories together + that ALWAYS fills my heart all the way up.
3. it was part of an entire weekend dedicated to Sheela Na Gig who I ADORE + organised by the incredible artist, Susie Quartermass who I also ADORE.
We even hand-painted our own Sheela pants - I have never been happier + will model them later!

+ 4. Maybe, most controversially of all, unlike so much ‘spiritual work’, Sheela won’t EVER let it become ‘precious’ or ‘pretentious’, she keeps it rooted, raw + real which is the ONLY way I EVER want to share the work I do in the world…


A SHEELA-INSPIRED HEART RIFF
Do you know Sheela Na Gig?
She’s the wild, rooted, unapologetic one.

I crossed several not-entirely-legal thresholds to meet THIS particular Sheela on a golf-course in Dublin.

Found on churches, castles + sacred sites across Ireland, Britain + western + central Europe - my illustration below is based on the ‘Kilpeck Sheela’ - this fierce, mysterious figure bares herself, her vulva, boldly - part warning, part blessing, part portal to our forgotten truths.

She’s often misunderstood, dismissed as ‘grotesque’ +/or ‘obscene’ + THAT is the point. She dares to make us really bloody uncomfortable because she mirrors the parts of womanhood we’ve been told to hide: our power, our rage, our pleasure, our portals of life AND death.

The woman carved into stone, legs wide open + vulva on FULL display is our forever-reminder that, in our body:

Creation lives here.
Power lives here.
Truth lives here.

She holds herself open not as an invitation but as initiation.

She says:
‘You want to create something real?
You want to write what matters?
Then come THROUGH me.
But, FYI, you come as you are - no masks, no pretence, no preconceived ideas + concepts as to how it SHOULD be.’

You absolutely can NOT fake it with Sheela.
She sees through it ALLLLLLLL.
The ‘nice girl’ scripts.
The spiritual talk, but NOT the walk.
The obsession with being ‘liked’ + ‘palatable’.
She wants you vuvla-wide open.
To truth.
Untamed, blood-hot truth.
YOUR TRUTH. (That can + will look, sound + feel very different to that of other people + that’s really OKAY.

Sheela is the portal to the poem you never dared write.
The business idea you thought was too weird.
The desire you were told to downplay.
The version of you that isn’t ‘nice,’ but IS true.

If you’re reading this + you’re feeling a tug in your womb, your belly, your chest, your voice, she’s reminding you that YOU, like her, are a portal.
+ me/you/we are on the threshold of our next great creation.
OUR REALITY.

We’ve all been told stories.
About what it means to be a woman.
What’s acceptable.
What’s appropriate.
What’s too loud, too messy, too wild, too much.
And what’s NOT enough.
Too big + too small, all at once.
We’ve been told we’re meant to be ‘pleasing’.
Pretty.
Polite.
Palatable.
We’ve been taught to say ‘yes’ when we wanted to say ‘no’.
To apologise for our bodies, our desires, our knowing.

And of course we’re rage-full.
OF. COURSE. WE. ARE.
Of course there’s a fire in our bellies.
A roar stuck in our the throat.
A scream that echoes back through lifetimes + timelines.
We are carrying generations of women’s silenced stories.

I WANT your rage.
I BLESS THE SHIT out of your rage.
It’s sacred fuel.
But this isn’t just about burning it down. (Although, y’know…)
THIS is about building what comes after.
WHAT. COMES. NEXT.

This is about remembering that yes, there’s rage AND…
There’s joy.
There’s love.
There’s laughter + pleasure.

We are remembering.
We are remembering that we are the mother-loving Creatrixes.
Mothers of galaxies.
Carriers of codes.
Architects of the unseen.
Women who can dream, write, create entire worlds into being with the stroke of a pen, the beat of a drum, the sway of our hips, the sound of our voice.
The ones who remember that WE are the one’s we’ve been told to fear.
The ones who are retelling a NEW story.
OUR STORY.

A story where we write ourselves ALL THE WAY IN because:
YOUR VOICE, WRITTEN, SPOKEN + SHARED IS A SPELL.
WHAT YOU WRITE, SPEAK + SHARE MATTERS.
WHAT YOU SAY RESHAPES THE WORLD.

And so it mother-loving is.

A LIL EXTRA LOVE NOTE: Sheela-na-Gig feels REALLY important, now more than ever, because I feel she represents EVERYTHING our culture has tried to bury AND everything we’re ready to reclaim.

If you’ve felt the relentless pressure to be pleasing, polished + palatable, Sheela-na-Gig is the ultimate disruptor.
She is raw.
Wild.
Unfiltered.
She shows us what’s been hidden - our power, our instincts, our sovereignty - + dares us to STOP APOLOGISING FOR IT.

She reminds us that the sacred isn't always soft.
That creation isn’t always pretty.
That power can be both fierce AND feral.
She tells us that the body is not shameful.
That our rage has a place.
That our sensuality is not for sale.
And most importantly, she invites us to reclaim the stories of our own becoming, NOT the ones handed to us by culture, patriarchy, +/or perfectionism, but the ones that rise from the blood, the bones, the bellies of the women that have existed across timelines + lifetimes.

Loves, I speak to this often, the divisiveness in the world right now is getting stronger, they want us pitted against each other, they want us inflamed + angry + full of rage, they want us to forget our humanity, our capacity to love, that our power is in our capacity to cultivate courage.
The courage to remember.
Magic.
Love.
Humanity.
Can you/we do THAT?

If you weren’t there in person this weekend - I WISH YOU WERE!!!! - I hope that these words I’ve riffed in real-time, go some way to capture a feeling + a sense of ‘her’ in + as ‘you’.

HEART RIFF PROMPTS

What do I remember - in my bones, blood + entire being - as real + true to ME?

If I could tell the world one truth, based on what is I KNOW, it would be…

What’s the new story, YOUR story?

+ if you’re called to share your responses in the comments, you KNOW I want to read them please + thank you!

PS: The Sheela Na Gig weekend is a yearly event, held in Glastonbury, UK + I PROMISE YOU, MAGIC IS MADE THERE.
For details about NEXT year, follow @susiequartermass on Instagram

…………………………….BOTTOM OF THE PAGE LINK LOVE……………………………

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