The decision to write and create ‘Heart of Hope’ spaces and services was born out of many unexpected situations of my own, both those of loss and those of gain. Sharing our own stories by reaching out with empathy and love and opening our own ‘tent flaps’ wide, can create the best atmosphere for connection and restoration, both in the heart and home.
Heart of Hope services and our ‘She Is‘ programs have been enhanced by personal insights; dealing with women in the workplace, community, family, while travelling and generally just doing life. Evolving over this past decade and through creating opportunity for others to be involved in the power of story telling and reading. We can make our collaborative contributions a celebration of all that WAS, IS and IS TO COME ! 🤔 👏👏👏
Yes these holiday destinations will return - the WAS and IS TO COME 😆 🇫🇯 🇮🇩 🇺🇸 🇬🇧 🇳🇮
One of my first confirmations and encouragements of the womans support direction was when I met a lady in Fiji for only 10 minutes before she flew back to Sydney, both couples on holiday at the same resort. I briefly shared that I was away writing a program for women. The outcome of this strategic unexpected meeting was the ‘Addiction’ short story in the ‘She Is Connected’ sessions. It was several years later that she felt to write, an unexpected ‘author’. Her story, like your story continues to evolve, recently she has written a contribution for one of our resource ebooks. As she unravels events and circumstances that were locked away she is experiencing continual ’onion layer’ steps towards the life she was destined to have.
Writing unlocks the soul and releases the mind from strongholds that can keep us captive to our limitations and heartaches. I never ’feel’ like writing but once I surrender and put fingers to the keypad or pen it just flows, yes even if your a 2 finger typist 😂 fortunately im not or these resources would have been another decade away 🙄🤔😆 . Its not the fingers or pen that holds the story! Like life, don't spend too much time thinking, planning or worrying that you might fail, get it wrong or not do a ’perfect’ job. Thats no way to live or write. Let it flow forth with spontenaity, naturelness and authenticity. Then instead of writing ’author unknown’, proudly put your own name at the end. It will be from your heart, your life - YOUR STORY - no one elses. There it’s out, now let someone else sort the edit out if they want! You’ve done your part and are ready for the next chapter. You’ve now ‘Turned the Key’ and unlocked one of the rooms in your heart and beyond.
Do you have something to share with us and then to the world! We invite you to consider contacting us, we would feel so honoured! You never know who else needs to hear what you have to say, know that mistakes are ok, its how we handle them that matters most. It might be for one of our topic specific ebooks, our poetry calendar or ’She is’ programs. Or come along to our online or live ’spaces’ and create a dreamboard or gratitude letter, share it with other women or take it home to a friend at the end. Write to us anytime - we are here to help you sweep that room clean, open the windows and let the breeze flow through.
After my brief encounter with this ’author’ all those years ago in Fiji and out of protection for her 22 year old daughter, she posted her journal notes to me a perfect stranger, for ‘safe keeping’. The previous year the father of her child and her dysfunctional ex from 20 years prior, had taken his own life. The event brought back many memories she needed to put down on paper from that difficult part of her life, they had been buried. Her freedom journey had begun and is still going.
Together we look back now at how amazing it was that she did that, that she trusted a woman she didn’t know. For me it was just one of the many signs along the way that the task at hand was a part of my journey and destiny for both myself and others. I can’t describe how privileged and humbled I feel most days and my promise will always be:
“We hold your stories gently in our hands and hearts with love and care”
After reading this blog today and as we start another month, in a period of time in the world where one month may just seem to blend into another, find a quiet spot with a warm drink and ponder for a moment. Whether your in lockdown, struggling with reviving your business or relationships, facing ill health or just wanting a new season; ask yourself the following questions:
What if anything am I holding onto?
Would I like to start by being interested in listening to stories from others?
Is it possible that someone else’s life could be changed forever by the words I might write or say?
How does that make me feel?
If I have ever thought even once that I would like to ✍️ write, this week I’m going to write down on paper the first event or topic I would like to start on. Maybe just the first word!
Should I write to Cate and the team for encouragement, to share my thought?
PLEASE DO 😃 👏 ♥️
October is a reminder of and honour towards women impacted by:
Breast Cancer and Pregnancy and Infant Loss
She is a Hero
Two very different life crisis situations but both with intense loss and grief involved. All situations likely also impacting others around them; each processing, or not, in their own way. I am a survivor now for 30 years next March and while many closest to me may never fully understand or comprehend that journey, my story became a part of their story. One they did not choose and may yet, even all these years later, have recognised as shaping their ways of responding or feeling in difficult moments.
As a young woman, wife and mother to 3 little children, one who was already experiencing anxiety and fear, it was the scariest situation I had faced and I‘d already had a few. However it forced me to open some of those closed doors. So I am truly In a position to testify to you that the difficult moments lead to freedom if you allow. Or you may be thinking your situations or stories are minor in relation to a women who has lost a child, breast, husband, finances. A loss is a loss and it IS comparable, as it’s all you’ve known and the impact and responses still have significance. No story is too big nor too small to speak or write about, receive support for and in turn help and encourage others to be as courageous as you.
There is a resilience that enters when we survive our most traumatic moments that nothing else is quite able to provide. When we take the hand of another with words or deeds, when we remind ourselves we were never intended to survive life alone on an island. You are urged to put on the armour of unity and transparency that will prepare and protect you during the battles still to come. You’ve got this more than you might realise and we believe in you and your story.
Thanks for reading today
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