Hello!

Autumn has well and truly arrived here in Northern Ireland. In fact, as I write this morning it is lashing down outside and strong winds are whistling, making it almost feel like a winter’s day. On days like this all I want to do it curl up by the fire, stay cosy, with blankets, candles flickering, hot drinks and a good book to read. It’s those simple things in life that bring me the most joy, not the hustle and noise of modern life which always seems to make its way in despite endless attempts to simplify and go slow…

You may have noticed that I’ve updated my website name and address to wildwordsbykelly.co.uk. When I first started out writing on this site many moons ago, I was primarily utilising it as a space to document mine and my family’s adventures in the mountains and beyond, and then as time ticked on, it became a place to share about my work with Wild Women Events. Now, with my children a little more grown-up and me feeling less inclined to share about their lives online, it has evolved to become an opportunity for me to share more of what I am passionate about in the way that I love to write. This feels very vulnerable for me, my writing has been my first love since I was a small girl with a typewriter, so much so that it propelled me to study to become a journalist, to write poetry and has brought me to a place where I feel ready to share the thoughts and ideas that burn within me more openly and permanently than just a quick post on social media.

I guess there’s always been the accompanying fear that my words won’t land well, that they’ll be misunderstood, that they’ll be viewed as woo-woo or wack-a-doodle, or that someone will ask ‘who are you to talk about this or that?’ But, alongside those worries, those nail-biting doubts and niggling fears also lies great possibility… that my words might meet someone just when they need them. That my words might inspire or encourage, or even help someone on the pathway to healing. And, although my words have yet to pay all my bills, I do believe in the depths of my being, in that wise and ancient part of me that just knows, that my words are my purpose and my gift.

I invite you to join me on this journey as I take this bold step forwards. Let’s walk side-by-side and allow our souls connect. For although this world is noisy, messy, confusing, scary, and although there is much falsehood, it is also a beautiful, mesmerising world, where meaning, joy, pleasure and authenticity can still be found.

Here goes…

Kelly x

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REST

I rest, as a choice,
So that I can hear my own true voice.
I rest, as a choice,
Not as a response to burnout or illness.
I choose rest,
Deep, bone-reaching rest.
That too nourishes my soul and mind…
I choose rest, press pause, make time and space to explore my inner wilderness,
the landscape where I meet with her…

Wild Woman

In that multi-faceted terrain many treasures are to be found
If only we can drown out the noise
There is so much to be explored in the safe, womb-like sanctuary of rest

I choose rest to commune with her
To catch the fierce glint in her eye,
Know her healing touch as I wade into her warm, dark, earthy burrow,
It is in the depths I meet with her
She smiles… knowingly sees me laid bare and accepts me as I am
Offers the seeds of wisdom in a leather take-home pouch
Wraps me in a checked blanket,
Mothering, nurturing…
As she gives me soup, homemade medicine, then stokes the fire as I inhale the
aromas and drink
It is in this place of rest I meet with her
Wild Woman

I choose rest as an act of rebellion in a world that wants me to go and grow,
push, graft and grind until I collapse into my grave…
I say no.
I choose rest as a symbol of my resistance
I deepen my commitment to go slow…
I choose rest for those who cannot, because not all get to choose.
I choose rest as women everywhere are rising up to declare
We don’t want to do it all

My sisters shout

I am not a powerhouse.
I am not a machine.
I am a woman…
I was made to feel, to live alive…

I am slowly, slowly, slowly
Learning that rest is a sacred segment of the wild feminine work
That only from a place of deep, nourishing, soul-igniting rest
Can true abundance flow…

 

Words and pictures by Kelly Hargie