2016 was the year I finally decided I couldn't carry my not good enough story around any longer.
I was freakin weary from lugging this incredibly heavy burden for more than 3 decades - plus I had a plethora of back issues which I intuited were deeply connected to the weight of this load - and so I courageously made a loving and heartfelt commitment to do whatever it took to let this baggage of non-serving beliefs go for good.
Feeling unworthy, of little value, a failure and never enough had plagued me my whole life, sabotaging any attempts I had of creating success. In reflection (gotta love hindsight) it's so easy to see why I always 'failed' at things - the underlying core belief I held that I just wasn't good enough fed into everything I did - and the ultimate lack of (perceived) success only kept me going around in circles as it went straight into my 'I'm a failure' story.
It was exhausting, and I know that this pushy, striving and always 'on' way of being in the world ultimately led to my burnout experience 10 years ago which saw me and my world fall apart through a nervous breakdown.
It was a sticky web of false belief, stories and emotional trauma that I knew wasn't going to be healed over night, yet I was no longer willing to believe the lie (or burn out again), and so the journey began.
I had no real plan, or idea of what to do - only a deep trust in my vow, a yearning desire to own my worth and a willingness to follow wherever the journey should lead me.
What I am offering you here is my uncensored unfolding journey and the steps I took to wholeheartedly and unconditionally embody the true essence of who I am.
Like most things, this isn't a one size fits all approach, so some of my tools may or may not resonate with you, but I trust you will remain open to them all and see what fits.
The purpose of my sharing is in the hope that it may give you faith that if I - a normal woman with all sorts of hangups and 'stuff' can move from what felt like a lifetime of not feeling enough to a 'FUCK YEH I AM ENOUGH' - then you can too sweetheart.
May my journey and the insights gathered be a guiding light for you to once and for all embrace your own divine essence, value and unconditional enoughness.
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+ I journeyed intimately and deeply with a closed group of women on a weekly basis for close on a year.
Within this Temple group the primary focus was feminine embodiment and sisterhood. Each week as we arrived we were asked to show up as the full and truest version of ourselves in the moment - and as we called ourselves present into the space to do so without words - expressing with sound, movement, tears, rage - whatever was arising.
Now words come easy for me, they always have.
As an extroverted soul, sharing and being truly vulnerable feels effortless for me.
With the invitation ( all was an invitation - nothing was compulsory) to show up just as I am and to express all of myself nonverbally - letting myself be seen, heard and held unconditionally by my sisters - allowed something to crack wide open within me.
Witnessing my journey unfold over the year - as more and more I found solace and power in the silence, the strong emotion, the primal roar of a woman in pain, rage, grief, bliss - was a profoundly healing experience, and one that finally allowed me to step into my power and see the truth and essence of who I truly am. A woman who belongs and is truly enough, just as she is.
You can find out more about the divine Anna Sangeet and her beautiful offerings HERE
+ I reclaimed my beautiful body
Though my relationship to the physical body I currently inhabit has had its ups and downs over the years, I have certainly noticed that as I navigate my forties the layers of 'story' and 'attachment' are dropping away without much effort at all. I give way less fucks, the body shame is simply not there anymore and I feel a confidence + deep acceptance and love that just wasn't there in my twenties and thirties.
So, even though I have a loving relationship with my feminine form - listening to and honouring her needs (most of the time) - over the year this connection deepened as I explored breast, womb and yoni (vagina) massage plus another loving new practise called Goddess Touch (another gift from Anna Sangeet) which involved gentle loving (non-sexual) touch to my entire body.
It was a very heart-opening experience to touch myself the way I might another with such tenderness, reverence and love, and the deep exploration of my breast, womb and yoni has opened me up in ways I could never have imagined. I am now able to fully embrace ALL of myself in a way that had eluded me in the past.
+ I reconnected (with) my heart and womb
These two feminine energy centres for many women lie dormant and disconnected, the majority of life's decisions being made purely from the mind. We can get so stuck trying to 'figure it all out', playing small, competing and keeping everything in neat compartmentalised boxes that we don't access the deep well of wisdom that resides in our heart and the innate knowing that is our birthright and awaits us in our womb.
Living within the current patriarchal paradigm I can see how this has impacted the collective consciousness of the feminine on a global scale, as more women each day burn out from living a life deeply disconnected with their feminine essence and instead coming too much from the masculine energy of excessive striving and pushing.
Having been that woman (the striving 'people pleaser") for the vast majority of my adult years I know firsthand the importance of activating and living from these feminine centres.
Over the course of the year I practised a variety of meditations, visualisations and breath exploration that focused on opening and activating these centres within me, allowing me to begin to truly embody my own truth + wisdom and to know deep in my bones how enough I really was.
+ I dove deep with a psychologist who specialised in a technique called EMDR (Eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing).
EMDR is a psychotherapy that enables people to heal from the symptoms and emotional distress that are the result of disturbing life experiences by creating new neural pathways (this is the simplified version!)
During these sessions I journeyed to the core of some of the beliefs that were feeding into my 'not good enough/ I'm a failure' story and the emotions that were still stuck within me (some since childhood)
All the sessions offered insight, but the one that really nailed it for me was when I went all the way back to being in my mother's womb.
My mother had 3 children in 3 years and then fell pregnant (unplanned) 8 years later with me. I had held on to a story for a very long time that I wasn't wanted, and having this moment in my mother's womb as she carried me and experienced sickness the entire pregnancy was where this seed was originally planted.
She was exhausted, sick and had 3 young children to care for and a husband working hard to grow his business. I could see with such clarity how my 'not enough' story had grown from this seed and how I had attached to it, continuing to drip feed it over the following years and decades with the life experiences that came my way.
Within that particular session I also had a moment of deep forgiveness for my mother who I realised was doing the best she could at the time (with very little support) and in turn saw her hugging me asking for my forgiveness as she whispered all the words I longed and needed to hear - 'beautiful girl, you are and always have been enough, so go out into the world and SHINE!
+ I journeyed through a 3 month program with my dear friend and sister Angela Fitzgerald called 'Birth your Truth'
Each fortnight we had a 2 hr session together which usually consisted of deep and vulnerable sharing, womb clearing and activation, guided meditations + visualisations and loving body work.
Over the 3 months we:
* traversed aspects of myself that had been abandoned and left alone in the darkness for many years and slowly began to gently shine the light on these tender parts
* weeded my womb garden of some old non-serving mindsets and planted a garden filled with the vibrancy of many flowers and new loving beliefs
* created a crystal clear super-highway of connection between my heart and my womb
* shared the really raw, dark details around some parts of my life story and subsequent wounding that had been holding me back. Allowing myself to share with her things that no-one had ever heard was liberating and profoundly healing plus offered an opportunity to once and for all let go of any shame I carried
* reignited my body's senses with divine and loving touch
About half way through the journey Angela encouraged me to write 'I am ENOUGH' on my bathroom mirror so I could be reminded every day of this truth. About 8 months after the journey I took the photo (below) and posted it on my Instagram and Facebook page where it was seen by over 30,000 souls!
Find out more about Angela Fitzgerald and her amazing work HERE
+ I aligned how I show up in life with my Menstrual Cycle
From my early twenties I have had a reasonably connected relationship with my cycle, offering my blood back to the earth, using natural products and tracking my cycle each month - yet at the same time for many years I would totally override it - even as far as getting to the gym at 6a.m on the first day of my cycle (that was old pre-breakdown Star's style, not me now!)
Over the course of the year this connection deepened significantly and it was was exciting to become aware of how this was impacting all areas of my life.
The more attuned I was with my cycle plus aligned with how I showed up in the world according to this information, the more I was able to drop the old stories around needing to always be in 'doing mode' to prove my worth, and instead become more intimately aware of my deeply cyclic feminine nature.
Trusting this embodied knowing saw old ideas around my worth as a woman simply disappear and has become the greatest act of Self Care I now offer myself.
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Wow, what a ride!
If you made it this far thank you so much for reading all the way to the end.
I truly hope that even one thing I shared may help you to know your inherent worth sister. May you find the tools that empower you to rewrite your own enough story, and may you always know your value.
On a side note, a few other things that were less significant yet still a beneficial part of my embracing my enoughness journey were:
+ I massively pulled away from social media - there can be way too much comparisonitis here
+ I pivoted my business so that my services were more face to face offerings (therefore less online)
+ I let go of what felt like competitive friendships that only fuelled my feelings of 'not enough'
+ My meditation and mindfulness practise (which can ebb and flow) took centre stage once more
+ I practised self-enquiry reflection daily and journaled all that was needing to come through
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Feeling not enough is sadly an epidemic I see women from all walks of life experience at some point in their journey. The women who attend my classes, workshops and retreats all share that they too have there own version of this same old story running on repeat, and it seriously breaks my heart.
The truth is - truly embracing your enoughness isn't going to happen in your mind. No matter how hard you try you can't magically think your way to feeling enough if your emotional memory plus whole being is screaming a different story to you. You actually have to embody this feeling - to feel deep in your blood and bones and emotional core that just by simply existing you are enough. From this embodied knowing old beliefs will drop away and the mind will align with this new known truth.
I know what it feels like to not love who you are and to wish you could change aspects of your self so that you may perhaps finally feel worthy.
Now that I have deeply embodied what it feels like to value and love myself for the woman I am without changing a thing it seriously blows my mind to think that I judged myself so harshly for all those years, or that I ever didn't feel worthy or enough!
Please know that even with all the tools I have shared I can still have moments where I hear that old story desperately wanting to take over the show. The difference is now I am able to recognise the lie and consciously choose a new belief - one where I am loveable, worthy, valuable, divine and always enough.
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If this post has triggered you, there is something I have shared that deeply resonates with you, or you too know what it is to feel unworthy and not enough I would truly love to hear from you so please share in the comments below.
It is time we heal this wound - one woman at a time - so that our daughters and their daughters and all women everywhere remember the truth of who they are.
ENOUGH....
With a depth of love in my heart,
Star xxxxx
