Welcome to my newsletter celebrating (and demystifying) the journey of the heart.
It comes out 1 - 2 times a week, focusing on:
Tongue-in-cheek social commentary, because if we’re to trust ourselves, it makes sense to figure out the BS in life;
Exclusive subscriber codes from beautiful partners like Somavedic;
Unconventional Recipes aka healing rituals, recipes & ceremonies from my family to yours;
Stories from my own life as I navigate the learnings and mistakes of my heart journey.
How do you feel about trusting the wisdom in your heart?
Okay about some things?
Deeply unsure about others?
Trusting our hearts can be and is often scary because what they ask of us can so often feel counterintuitive.
Part of this is due to our dear, brilliant brain who’s rather fond of familiarity. And will therefore do its utmost to stop us going in a direction it identifies as unchartered.
Recently, I’ve also been wondering if part this fear is due to epigenetics. That we carry in the cells of our bodies trauma from 7 generations back. And so, is there a part of each of us who remembers what it is to be persecuted for having unconventional views?
Sartorial choices.
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Why am I saying this?
Shouldn’t I be sugar coating how easy trusting our hearts is?!
Well, one of the new practices I have in my family is to speak directly to what is hard.
Rather then bypass something that my kids are finding frightening or challenging, or simply try to focus on the positive, I name it to my kids. When I do, there’s an immdiate calming effect. It’s honouring to the part of them that knows this particular thing is hard.
It's about honouring their intelligence, their perception of something as off, and also, my infallibility as a parent. (And yes, that’s uncomfortable).
And so, this is what I want to do with you now.
Because, sure, if you’re a visionary going against a system, who’s expanding the world view of the collective, often they do incur real serious impacts, as you will see from below.
But for the most part, what our hearts are asking of us, is not to defy the Catholic Church, or speak to the BS of politicians, but instead, simply to turn our head towards that which feels scary and overwhelming in our own lives.
And YES, though trusting ourselves can mean others will judge us, the more we trust ourselves, the less this becomes something we’re willing to be cowed by.
Also, the more I trust my own heart, the more I’m convinced that our hearts are channels for a healing force that wants to pour through each of us. Restoring our relationship to ourselves, our family, our friends, our partners... and eventually, collectively as well.
With a girlfriend & my dog Bongo many moons ago, in a garden we’d stumbled upon with wild strawberries & a giant conch shell…
And because trusting ourselves is culturally a scary thing to do, one of the ways I seek to be less scared about trusting myself is to learn about others who’ve dared to honour the stage directions of their own hearts - on a much larger scale. The thinking being, well if they can do it for that, I can do it for this…
Which is why I present you with the following 4 women, who all lived by the truth in their hearts. Even if it was uncomfortable or a nuisance for others.
Their lives are too extraordinary and rich to reduce to a few sentences, so if you have time and willing, I encourage you to find out more about them, and have provided some links as a starting point.
Without further ado, 4 brilliant woman, who lived by their hearts:
Pagan, philosopher, teacher, truth speaker, astrologist, mathematician. Incredibly powerful woman - on a par with many men of the day. one who was poked at teh illusions of the church and encouraged people to think for themselves, and to explore the possibility of there being ‘one source’ from which we all come. For her maths was more a design of the universe. A philosophy. Sacred geometry - the kind I wish we’d been taught at school! As Soraya Field Fiorio states in the above article I’ve linked to on Hypatia; “Geometry was used as a meditative tool for understanding the dualism between matter and spirit.”
And because of all that free thinking, she was deemed a threat to the Church. And like so many women before her and after her, she was accused of one of the two things that will bring a woman down (or used to…): black magic…
So that eventually, in the name of all things honourable, her death was sanctioned by Bishop Cyril, so that one day, when in her 60’s, she was pulled from her chariot by a mob of Christian fanatics and brutally - and really that’s a vast understatement - murdered.
So we have the traditional version of who Mary was – a tainted prostitute (the 2nd easiest way to ruin a woman’s reputation). Or, we have Watterson’s offering of the truth of who Mary (and so, therefore Jesus) was: a wealthy, Jewish benefactress, an equal to Jesus, his great love. Highly intelligent, and cough cough she wrote her own gospel, though sections were ripped out... what was it that she said that was so revolutionary?
More or less: trust in and live by the credo of your heart!
Now, the church found in Mary a threat to all they were about, so in order to dismantle her they brought her down to the most discredited level they could: a prostitute! And it worked. (One almost feels guilty, and/or mad, – even now - seeking to suggest that maybe the Bible as we know it is not the whole truth, not even a smidgen of the truth...(!) )
A few years ago, when I started looking into this, it struck me as interesting, that a National Geographic special looking at the life of Jesus had but one setence about Mary’s role in his life. I bought the magazine, excited, and flicked through, increasingly dismayed when I realised how unwilling its authors were to explore current research around Mary’s real role with Jesus.
And it’s kind of interesting, because if word on the street is true, that what the Tantrics have been saying for ever, that true power is a man and woman coming together, then Jesus and Mary, (not the Church!) are the real symbol of the potential of partnership…
Certainly, it’s only very recently that I'm beginning to intuit that it’s by uniting the knowings of my heart, with the vision of my partner, that real healing starts to happen.
Alice Wheeldon – WW1 pacifist, accused of plotting to assassinate the then British PM, Lloyd George in a show trial not too dissimilar from the worst in Russia during the Stalin years, and which resulted in Alice and her children being sent to jail as a warning to all other dissidents.
It’s Alice’s declaration “the world is my country,” that goes to my heart. This seems to be a common theme for all women in this list: their capacity to transcend illusory boundaries. To focus on what unites, instead of what separates.
My son Jack and I, in our kitchen.
Rosa Parks - this is a recommendation from my 7-year old son Jack when I asked if he knew of a woman who had trusted her heart.
Researching Rosa, the way she explains why she was willing to say “no” that day on the bus, - as a result of having endured more then she was willing to endure – is key to why so many finally surrender to the call of the heart. Summed up by Janis Joplin, in that wonderful line from the song: Me & Bobby McGee, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing else to lose.” (And you can listen to the song, on this playlist I’ve compiled for all seeking to trust the beauty in their hearts!)
Rosa also speaks to the way our ancestors can play a part not only in what can feel hard in our lives, but also what we’re willing to face, when she explained what gave her courage that day on the bus:
“When I made that decision, I knew that I had the strength of my ancestors with me."
I hope that this has given you a little more confidence to peek around the curtain, and trust the beauty in your heart a little more.
With great love,
Laura xxxx
PS: What others say about the newsletter:
“Laura amazes me with all she is doing to heal and bring people along on her journey.” Dee K.
"Reading Laura’s newsletter makes me marvel at her journey, exploration of self and life. Her zest for living and searching. For me, she is a natural wonder!” Tracy H.
“I want to tattoo these anecdotes all over me!! All the blocks are familiar and I know them only too well but the anecdotes are fresh and new and heart led and I LOVE them. I will be practicing them all. So thank you sister.” Chessy T-W.
“Simply beautiful!” Julia M.
“Your newsletter cracked me wide open… so deeply mirrors the threads in my life that are pulling me this way and that, and is such a contagious beacon of light to that part of me that knows…” Eliza P.
“Laura your words are so powerful, every time I read them, somehow, each time, they are right for the phase I am going through. I love your writing, and I love you helping us feel that indeed we are not alone with our experiences!” Natasha D.
“Thank you so much for writing your newsletter…I wanted to try and convey how much I relate to what you’re writing about in the newsletters.” Alex MH.
“A wonderful accompaniment to my morning…” Skye G.
“Laura's willingness in her life to keep an open heart has been a continual thread of connection, and I love how there are some people who mysteriously circle in and out of your awareness with interesting junctures where your direction is shaped by theirs; Laura has inspired me to be more full in the expression of my heart, in ways she probably doesn’t even know! Whenever we share our writing or our song, our dance or art, whenever we honour the creative fire that is, always burning within, it will leave a mark for people to follow; for their hearts in turn to recognise.” Charlotte H.
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I have 5 in our home & friends always ask about them, and they’re a few of the precious items, I’d take with me everywhere.
