The Contemporary Spirituality of Women

I am blessed by my work of guidance and support with women transforming challenges to their happiness through the strength and skills of their spirit....or as I say, “taking the grit life delivers to us as our divine instructions for engaging our grace!”.  I remind women how spirituality is not following rules and obeying authority outside herself; it is actively living her deepest values and visions and making her choices with integrity. I remind her how spirituality is not something separate from her daily life; her spirituality is lived in showing up, speaking up, and standing up right where she has been planted.
Contemporary spirituality is conscious partnering with our spirit and soul for practical guidance and support in our daily life. Contemporary spirituality is living grace that is practical and honoring the grit of life as sacred.  Contemporary spirituality honors the teachers that are animal, plant, and "the other" and contemporary spirituality honors our body as not simply a vehicle, rather as a teacher and healer divine.
Contemporary spirituality demands we update our beliefs, definitions, and concepts for daily living of our active, embodied, and emboldened spirituality as women.  Ask yourself these questions-your answers are for living in your daily life!

• If you knew you were always being divinely guided and supported, how would you live differently your life?
• If you were to embrace "where you were planted"-to the beauty, to the challenges, to the gratitude-what would be different? 
• If you took 100% responsibility for your life vs deferring your power to "karma" or "God's will" or "I have no power to make things different" where would you take up your voice, your power, your outrage? 
• If you truly honored your spirit and soul as your most intimate partner in life, how would the priorities for your time change? Would time for meditation, prayer, and self-care become less luxuries and more essentials in your daily life?

Contemporary spirituality is not about furthering our means of control; it is daily living our power, our purpose, and our presence as guardians for all life.  Contemporary spirituality honors relationship, integrity, and creativity and where these are lacking, the responsibility for bringing them forth. Contemporary spirituality is living there is truly no separation between what is spiritual and what is not spiritual....and that our humanity is simply divinity in a body.

Choosing to Be Queen

As women, our roles often involve supporting and accomplishing things for others can leave us with an unease about whether our own life is being supported and accomplished as well. Symptoms that we are not doing so well in honoring our own life show up as feeling overwhelmed, a lack of time and energy to engage in what has meaning and value for ourselves, and crankiness towards those we are supporting and accomplishing for. In short, we have forgotten we are Queen; yes, with the tasks it takes to rule our kingdom..and, not as much through doing for others as through envisioning, empowering, and leading the way.

One of the challenges we will face at mid-life is deciding whether we want to honor being Queen of our life, or not. To be Queen means acknowledging that as women, we are the organizing energy around which relationship, family, and community constellate. When we choose to leave being a princess (daughter) to step into being Queen (a woman sovereign), we choose no longer expecting others to tell us what to do, what is important, and where to spend our precious time and energy. We decide for ourselves using the infinite vision and resources of our hearts and souls, as well as our present minds and conditions. To decide for ourselves means we let go of blaming others for the states of our affairs and instead, with courage and clarity, take up sorting through our life and choices as we do closets, determining what still has value and what now needs to be let go in gratitude for how it has served.

To honor (and act) on what is true for ourselves requires the vision of a Queen-broad and long, the vision of seven generations many traditional cultures remind us is necessary for making decisions that serve all well. No longer can we place our heart and soul's wisdom and guidance separate from what crafts our choices for our daily lives and the lives we guide and support as women. The sacred is meant to be part of our everyday life and the Queen-the visionaries and leaders in kingdoms intimate and common-illuminates and enjoys living this. Through her grace innate, her grit the inspiration of legends, and her gratitude active each day, a Queen uplifts and inspires those she serves with in the sacred temple of everyday life.