I’ve been on this path my whole life. As a teenager I was always hanging out in the Mind Body Spirit bookshop. When I first came across the Eastern concept of Qi, the universal life-force principle that connects all things, it was a moment of instant recognition. Back then, so-called alternative medicines were still pretty hippy, for the ‘unscientific’ folk who were a little la la. But to me, an energy-based model of being human not only made sense, it opened the doors of possibility and wonder.

Chinese Medicine was destined. I’ve always made major decisions on impulse. When the time came to go to uni, I literally let the heavy VTAC course-guide throw itself open to any page and where my finger landed that was it. I love that such a random event was so perfect.

In my first year at uni I was pregnant with my second daughter and spent as much time in the midwifery section of the library pouring over books on Western Wise Women traditions as I did Eastern Wisdom. My first birth had been your average medically-managed birth, a completely disconnected and disempowering experience. Afterward, I felt like I’d been robbed of something I could never get back. I went from pregnant bliss to spiralling into a black hole of new mother depression.

I instinctively knew this wasn’t the way birth was meant to be.

So, second time round I did it different, starting with what I believed about birth. I came across the book, Spiritual Midwifery by Ina May Gaskin. Wow!! What a revolution! For the first time I learnt that birth didn’t have to be a medical event or something to fear. Birth could be loving, something to look forward to, even ecstatic! 

My next birth was a mind-blowing whole-body cosmic-expansion orgasm! It gave me an embodied understanding of the way birth is meant to be, the culmination of female creative power which is both spiritual and sexual energy. The design is meant to be ecstatic. 

I’ve since spent over 20+ years discovering the truth of women’s bodies and diving deep into Women’s Mysteries. Ultimately, this has led me to EMBODIMENT. I had no idea how much I lived in my head until I learned to be more fully in my body! When it’s your ‘normal’ you don’t know any different. I’m a much calmer, centred and balanced person thanks to embodiment practices.

The first time I took a Sacred Female Embodied Yoga class was, once again, a moment of recognition. As I moved my body and used the breathing and sound expression techniques, I felt myself connect to the same energy current I’d experienced during birth. I knew right then I had to train as a teacher in this style of yoga to share these practices with other women, not just for birth but because this energy current is female power. There isn’t even a word in the English language to describe this! The Hindu word for this primordial cosmic feminine force of creation is known as Shakti. I’ve come to know to Her as WISDOM.