For Women

Heart Work Scripts™ and the Wise Woman ® counseling program are designed to facilitate the return to your True Self, the authentic you.  With my clients, I often see that painful early life experiences and trauma have set them up to feel shame or a sense that they are somehow not good enough, worthy, adequate, or lovable. Sometimes women think they have lost themselves in life, relationships, family, children, and career.  Mired in anxiety, depression, dead-end marriages or relationships, they feel a sense of dis-ease. And sometimes they want more authenticity, aliveness, and joy.

Our first step is the reclamation of your innate sense of Self. As we work together, we will answer the questions arising from the soul, such as. “Who am I at this stage of life?” “Have I lost parts of myself?”  “What is my current relationship with the younger girl/woman inside me?” “Where is my creativity and passion for life?” “What is the state of health of my relationships?” The foundation of this program is my signature Heart Work Scripts -healing yourself home™ and the Shame Reduction Script for Your Younger Self © 2016

Together, we will explore any areas of a disrupted connection with yourself. Self, with a capital S, represents the larger “I” of your psyche. The Self contains the entirety of who we are: our light and shadow, our soft center and sharper edges, our identity, and our spiritual aspect.

Next, we will examine any relevant parts of your history to uncover recurrent themes in feelings, thoughts, and behaviors. The process of telling and working through your story is a powerful one. Author Brene Brown reminds us, “You either walk inside your story and own it, or you stand outside your story and hustle for your worthiness.” Reclaiming your story and walking within it produces resilience, courage, empathy, and compassion for yourself and others. These are the building blocks of self-love and the ability to relate to and love another. Owning your story is an invaluable part of claiming the inner Wise Woman, healing toxic shame, and restoring balance within the psyche.

Within the story, patterns emerge around family and relationship dysfunction, codependency, addictions (yours and others), abuse, trauma, betrayal bonds, unexpressed grief, anxieties, and depression. We will explore not only what went wrong but also what went right. What surfaces are your innate strengths, talents, and natural inner beauty. Expect to reclaim your voice, learn to speak your truth, and walk in your own story.

Reclaiming challenges you to shift from a head-centered orientation to a heart-centered awareness. As you move into your heart, you become more mindful and restore your ability to be aware of and feel your feelings. I find that most women don’t know what they are experiencing emotionally. When I ask, “What feelings are you having?” the typical response is, “I feel like life is hard,” or “I feel like my ex is a jerk.” These are not emotions but thoughts. Emotions, long-repressed, might be coming out inappropriately or squashed into numbness.

If we took all the words we use to describe our feelings, we’d come down to these core examples: anger, pain (sad/hurt), fear, loneliness, guilt, shame, passion, love, and joy. Learning to name, claim, and process feelings is paramount to reclaiming our authentic feelings. Journaling, mandala journaling, guided meditation, and exploring creativity are all aspects of the reclaiming process.

The renewal stage is where you can begin to take a deep breath. Here is where you find your voice and learn to love yourself again.

At this point, you understand that though you may have felt a profound sense of loss, nothing in your psyche has ever been lost to you. All you are or ever were has steadfastly waited for you to come and find again. The forgotten, neglected, and perhaps wounded little girl, adolescent, or younger woman is waiting patiently for you to breathe life into her again. These orphaned and forgotten parts will start to experience a renewal of energy and balance.  To assist this process, I have developed exercises and scripts I call Heart Work to facilitate the renewal of energy and love to the orphaned parts of the psyche.

During the Renew stage, women often participate in a Women Who Run With the Wolves Book Study Intensive or a  Wise Woman retreat. These events are profoundly healing and designed with your progress and needs in mind.

With the renewal, you awaken to yourSelf and begin to step into your Wise Woman, your fully functioning adult woman plus her broader spiritual dimensions. Here you encounter your adult self as you learn to honor and embrace the wise part of your psyche. You have lived through much; you have survived. Your Wise Woman has been with you always, walking by your side and whispering in your ear. Now you will find the courage to listen to her.

Women spend much of their lives not feeling right in their own skin. During the return, you claim your right to live freely and joyfully. You have owned your story, restored your feeling heart, reclaimed your voice, and now it is time to turn to face your daily life. The order of the day is the art of setting boundaries, practicing mindfulness, and continuing to empower your Wise Woman with Heart Work. The return stage integrates all you’ve learned and bestows you with the knowledge about what you must do and what you must have. Clarity and increased consciousness about your life and choices are this stage’s gifts. Once a woman has returned, she is a sight to behold. She is strong, brave, lives with a clarity of heart, can set boundaries, and perhaps most importantly, can speak her truth.

The Wise Woman ® program is a process. Although I present Reclaim, Renew, and Return as stages, in reality, they overlap and occur at the same time. In the beginning, it can feel as if we’ve dumped a 1,000-piece puzzle on the floor. Ey! It can seem a bit overwhelming. But piece by piece, together, we begin to reclaim the whole, the picture, and the story of You becomes clear, potent, and beautiful.

Most of us want a life hack that will make it easier and shorter to achieve our goals. Give me five steps so I can get it done right now. Well, you can’t hack being a wise woman! It won’t work. You must strive for it and be willing to work through the process if you desire to step fully into your Wise Woman Self.