She Gathers Beauty | Living Your Wildly Naked Truth

Hello dear listener. Today I share that the podcast is moving from a weekly offering to a seasonal offering. I'll be taking a hiatus from recording new episodes so that I can focus on the next book as well as another very exciting and expansive creative project. I'll be back with fresh new insights, offerings, and a heart full of love! We also work a bit with change, being present, and exploring the ways in which we can hold ourselves back from living the life we long for.  Sometimes we have to let go of something in order to do so. This can bring about loss, grief, and uncertainty.  And yet, turning toward ourselves, toward the life calling us now is a great liberation. Letting ourselves be pierced by the changes, by this moment, exactly as it is. Be inspirited—let yourself be held. You are nothing but love. I look forward to being with you when it's time to pick up the chalice of this podcast. In the meantime, I am still available. You can be with me near the hearth fire—your own private hearth fire. Visit www.shegathersbeauty.com to learn more about spending sacred time with me. There's also a nice library of episodes to listen to. I'd love to know some of your favorites if you'd like to reach out! Visit the link above for contact info. If you've enjoyed this or any other episodes, please leave a rating and loving review. That's the best way for people to find us. As always, may you know that you are sacred. This moment is ceremony. And you get to live your wildly naked truth. Vast blessings & love, Wendy    

Wendy explores the importance of honoring our daily needs as a way to be available for knowing and tending to the desires and aspirations beckoning us into the life we long to live.  This episode looks at homecoming as it relates to turning toward, not away from, the fires happening both around and inside us. Coming home to ourselves in very basic ways increases our ability to be present in a challenge and available to joy, healing, rest, truth, and relaxation. These are dynamic, game-changing keys to being part of the great revolution happening now. Stillness is an essential ingredient to tending the hearth fire of daily life. What is living at the center of you? Let's look at how often we get lost in checking off to-do lists moving from task to task and choose something different. Life's grand invitation at this time is to lean into and build upon supportive and nourishing practices that feed us—body, mind, and spirit—helping repair hurt, be with uncertainty, and be nurtured more. We can't be fed from perpetual exhaustion. How can our daily choices be acts of grace and devotion? I provide simple practices that can help increase ease, clarity, and focus and cultivate greater trust in the goodness available to each and all of us. We explore the empowered surrender of a one-word prayer, the beauty of making offerings and gestures of love to nature and hence, ourselves, and other sacred, daily practices.  How I found this altar built out of words, plus how it can be used: “let your desires counsel you.” Turning inward and locating stillness. Dropping into the profound calm of our breath, leaving behind stressful to-do lists and excessive task-oriented ways of being, if even for a moment or two.  When we know what we really need and act on that, we increase our ability to create a larger vision of wholeness from trust, spaciousness, clarity, and creativity.  Rest and repair create more room for our gifts and wisdom. We can draw upon the powerful practices of ritual. I share a few of my own personal practices, including water offerings, rattling, and journeying to commune with my helping spirits.  Everything is ceremony. We can turn our gaze toward the sacred in each moment. BONUS: at the end of this episode, I take you on a guided visualization into your heart cave where you can relax, receive, and enjoy a special offering that has been waiting for you.  Come home to the quiet stillness that is you.  Remember, you are sacred. This moment is ceremony. And you, dear heart, you get to live your wildly naked truth.  If you'd like to learn more about my offerings, visit www.shegathersbeauty.com.     

Today Wendy shares a poem entitled “Of Belonging” and sets a sacred place to welcome in the topics of relevance, refuge, and reverence. She addresses loneliness and isolation, chaos, and the longing for more ease and connection. ”We are not broken.”

Today Wendy speaks to the power of dreaming and the Dreamtime, the potent portal of resting into the mystery and the darkness. The opportunity to release AND receive. Practical ways of showing up in an active state of surrender by recording our dreams. Poems as thresholds to bridge the whole and holiness of mystery. I share two poems from my book, The Reach is (W)holy. “Cultivating Yin” poem. Ways to catch our undone dreams and struggles. The stirring of sadness and hope. Darkness and fear and the ability to be called into a deeper truth. Exploring the elegant edge that leads us back to the center of ourselves. Dreams that are asking for our full attention. Our ancestors asking to be honored, received, longed for, invited.  Inviting grief to the table and inquiring, “what do you wish for me to know about you?” How can we be a bridge between the worlds? How can we plant new seeds while resting for ourselves, for the ones who have gone before us, and those who will come after? The darkness helps us see, know, and understand what is really living inside of what is True. We came equipped with tools to see, know, hear, and understand in various ways. What we are supposed to know and how we are supposed to be can be vastly different from what is true and longing for us.  Accessing the hearth-fire of your heart for steadiness with a simple breathing practice. The powerful practice of asking yourself “what feels good?” This is a way to cultivate yin. To know and acknowledge the sacred available in the moment. And to catch, receive, hold, gather all that is needed. This “vessel” can also empty out what is needed, too. A few ways to practice recording and retrieving our dreams so we can be aware of what they want us to know, do, be. Dreams as a part of the Great Call Back—calling back all of our parts (for more on this topic, see previous episode).  Weaving together all the pieces of our life in the midst of mystery unfolding. The importance of sharing our dreams, as well as helping others understand their dreams.  The significance of being a reflection of the Dreamtime for our community, family, and the collective at large. Our dreams often have medicine to share and don't just belong to us individually. “Clear Seeing” poem. How are you being written? What is your heart's promise? Letting mystery do what it does—letting it nourish you and teach you how to trust. May you be deeply nourished. May you remember, you are sacred. May you remember, this moment is ceremony. May you remember, you get to live your wildly, naked truth.

Today we explore the sacred threshold of endings and beginnings. We dive deeply into our vision and trust with the poem: The Truth About Gathering Joy  There is a story I will tell  about not compromising living a life of big love   trusting truth   this story is rooted in magic  beautiful but not always pretty moments down on the ground  wailing praying empty begging    do not be fooled these times are perhaps the (w)holiest    I will build a circle of sacred for you to embody the desire you are holding   this is the medicine for all of us now   all of us   now   the fire has already been lit many are waiting for us to join them there   wisdom keepers are pouring gifts through the dense mists of fear   you will hear how to love your passion  into creation taste the truth perched  on your lips   some of what you love will choose a new form you will let your sadness want you float in your blood like eager lanterns of hope   you will close your eyes and trust your hands know what to hold onto    and how to let go   you will let your desire council you  visit the place where longings live   often   your soul will make itself known in your body a new song will emerge from your bones   this is how you will know your own fierce story the only one you can live   so many of us making new stories from the ones already undone   sometimes  it's closer than you think   this is a story about deep love.   ~Wendy Candida Havlir Cherry, 2020   Holding hope and fear, joy, and sadness at the same time.   Working with trust and the ways your body knows what to do.    What will you hold onto from this year (and your entire life) and what will you let go of?   How will you be held?   A short guided meditation—flowing with the divinity and grace of your breath—available right here, right now, in the home of this moment.   The sudden uprising of yes in your inhale & the rest and letting go in the descent of your exhale—and the pause in between.   In the length of our longing, belonging arrives.   The Mistress of Longing comes to us as a dear friend and companion of deep love. She is hope and a reminder that we are never alone.   Moving into a deeper relationship with your life—and permission to (be)long. Imagine moving beneath what you perceive you long for and into the holiest and wisest doorways of your soul's true knowing—an oceanic love—longing is an ever widening expansion into true home and union with the sacred.   Life is a constant divine invitation—a divine hand reaching for you—how will you reach back? What parts of yourself will you step toward? What parts of yourself will you no longer reject but instead gather and embrace? With wild and holy abandon?   Wind & Water poem from my first book, The Reach is (W)holy.   As you move toward 2021, how are you holding death and life? And the idea that grace is infused in every moment, even when you feel dismantled?    Meeting ourselves and others from a place of compassion and messy alchemy.    Writing prompt: How am I wild AND holy? When have I felt wild and free, liberated, holy, truly myself? When have you chosen yourself regardless of what might be the result? What is true about you now? What are you willing to choose no matter what? How is life asking you to come out of the darkness and say yes to something new and into the light? What am I willing to no longer compromise?   May you know boundless blessings. Thank you for listening.    As always, YOU are sacred. This moment is ceremony. You do get to live your wildly naked truth. May it be so!    Big love & rose petals, Wendy  

Greetings Beautiful & Wild Soul. Join me as I share an honest moment, let truth bring ease and freedom, and choose being over doing. May you know the magic and miracles available from not holding on so tightly to how things should be, how you should be, and let the answers come as they are ready.  Let us stand together at the beginning, where mystery and truth meet.  Let us remember ourselves back home, choosing curiosity, trust, and love. May the holy days remind you of your wholeness and may you feel every blessing and possibility. If you'd like to enjoy more, scroll through the library of previously recorded episodes and see what nourishment finds you. Thank you for listening. Sharing this space with you means the world to me. I'll be back in 2022!

Enjoy this Sacred Replay. Today we explore: The opportunity to gain clarity and soulful insight in the darkness.  The mysterious power of yes. Acknowledging the many kinds of ancestors and the magic we have to offer them.  Rumi's poetry and lineage—words as a  sacred portal. Unwrapping the gifts only available in the darkness and retrieving an expansive vision. Gravitating to the hearth-fire for warmth and rest.  What is asking to be honored within and around you now? “Solstice Birth,” a poem written for me by Morgan Farley, a magical being I met because I said yes to a very special and life changing opportunity. Katie Hess and her incredible flower alchemy @lotuswei. Numinous presence and clarity in the darkness is ever waiting and available for us as we walk through life.  Nature's truth longs for you. Becoming who you already are—you are already the entire feast. ”Deep in your body there's a door,” from the poem, “Solstice Birth” by Morgan Farley— ——a ritual you can use to access the truth and mystery of you that came while I was recording.  Your life is an altar. Whatever you have, use that. YOU are an altar.  Say yes to what inspires you. ”The Guest House,” by Rumi.  What “guests” are arriving for you? What is your emotional landscape like now? We are not alone. Saying yes can lead to miracles. It can happen in so many ways, even when we are down on our knees. Even sobbing is a yes. Letting your yes—your longing—be honey for your heart. Your inhale can be a yes. Your exhale a softening. May you know you are sacred and that this moment is ceremony. And may you live your wildly naked truth.  Thank you for listening. If you like what you heard, please leave me some stars and a favorable review. To learn more about me and my offerings, please visit www.shegathersbeauty.com or @shegathersbeauty on Instagram and Facebook. 

My helping spirits made it crystal clear that a message needed to come through for this episode and I'm so glad they did. I think you will be, too.  This message takes us on a journey to meet three sacred messengers who have something special to offer us as we make our way to the end of 2021 and into an expansive view of 2022. Gift yourself 15 minutes of deep self-care and receive what your guides want you to know. Enjoy how far you've come on your own journey and be gifted with something fresh and new for your soul's path. If you'd like to take these messages even further, visit my website to view my current offerings in The School of Wild & Holy. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/tsowh  

This is a writing ritual to help deepen your awareness and access the velvety remedy that lives in your heart center. Allow your words to become an altar, an offering for your life today, and all the days to come. If you'd like to dive into more heart-centered teachings and soulful connections, join The School of Wild & Holy and be moved. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/group-offerings

I made something for you, beautiful listener! As we enter into the holiday season, there's no better time to increase self-care, receive kindness, feel restful, and practice coming home to the center of us. You are wild light.  Magnify your love and radiance. Enjoy this guided meditation to experience reverence for all that is sacred within. Light a candle, get comfortable, gift yourself ease, love, clear-seeing, and comfort. 

Join me as I share my own behind-the-scenes process about betrayal and the path back to sovereignty. This is a story about my body and what she's trying to show me when I choose external validation and reject the most sacred love story of my life--choosing to be the poet of my own heart. I live for poetry and often the subject is about love and longing. Recently, I've been able to see how every poem I write is a love letter to my soul.  Explore the ways your body will tell you when you've strayed from true self and true home--and the myriad ways we have grown to diminish ourselves when we place our love and power in someone else's hands.  Knowing the feeling sense of "diminishment" can be a potent signal to step back into ourselves.   I wonder if you know all the miracles waiting for you on this day and all the days to come when you choose to fully occupy the wild country of yourself? I wonder if you're open to the vast potential living within you? What will it take to walk love's wild edge and choose yourself again and again? What if every prayer, poem, and love song was written for you? Life mirrors the possibility for homecoming in each moment. Especially when we abandon ourselves. Cancel culture and self-abandonment. Daily preventative practices that summon our sovereignty and restore soul are so important. Perhaps now more than ever. If you haven't already listened to episode 64, "Be Coated With Love," now is the time. This is an Akashic reading for our community that provides powerful instruction for heart tending, protection, and feeling love(d). At the end of this episode, I share a short, guided heart ritual for homecoming.  Special Offering: Let's summon the power of this time of year and feel deep connection to self & others. Join us for a very special storytelling series as we approach the threshold of releasing this year and all that has come, and enter into a new year and all we are becoming in sacred community. Be seen. Be sovereign. We begin this Sunday, November 21st with the story of The Ugly Duckling. It's not too late to sign up and gather round the hearth fire with us. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/group-offerings

Tell me, what is your yes? What is alive within you? What is life asking you to release? To fully embody? The way you feel, it matters. The way the moon is moving inside you, it matters.  How are you meeting the wild edges of yourself? What will you give yourself permission to be, feel, do, receive, believe, give? There's always a threshold opportunity to help us embody our yes. This life is a constant ceremony—and everything is a love story. The power in believing in your love—and leaning into the unknown. I beg you, don't let go of your hallelujah. If you'd like to receive a love note from my heart to yours and be supported while you're living at your edges, you can sign up for my newsletter here: https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/ Poems shared in this episode: She Is Mine, Lion's Moon, The Curve of Yes, and An Unplanned Gathering of Love.    

Be coated with love is the theme for this week's episode, channeled from the Great Akasha. Make your favorite cup of tea and listen in. Let yourself get cozy and comfy and see how the message translates to what you're experiencing.  We are being invited to trust where we are, let go of any ideas about right and wrong and let life surprise us. We're offered a daily practice for the month of November to help us “grow into ourselves.” There's a lot of medicine packed into this little episode—I hope it brings some comfort and blessings to you.

What if the tenderness living wild and alive inside you is a prayer? How is it being answered? What if our tenderness and vulnerability are a prayer? How are you praying? Even in the silence, your heart is asking for something. One of the miracles available is our ability to see how the answer arrives. Especially when it doesn't arrive the way we think it will.  Your desire is a prayer, even when you won't let yourself feel it.  Answers arrive when we liberate our longing—when we give it free speech to take up space.  How are you living wide and taking up space?  There's a community of revolutionaries rising and I share more about that and #longingproject in this episode. You can learn more at https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/longing-project You get to live your wildly naked truth. May it be so. 

Today I open the Akashic Records, revealing a potent message for the listeners of this podcast. I briefly describe the Akasha and share what often happens for those who are the recipients of these messages.  The Records are a sacred space for us to access Truth from the great Storehouse of all that is, remember our sovereignty, life purpose, and provide myriad expressions and opportunities to receive healing, upliftment, and ceremony. The ritual of and ways to receive an Akashic Records Reading.  A guided relaxation and deepening into the presence of being held. The Blue Lotus shares Her message with us: it is dark and yet there is so much light; the message is about remembering hope; even in darkness, Great light and beauty is happening; darkness is the mystery of all life; life happens with death; the Blue Lotus is a great healing light reaching for us, inviting us home; this time is the Great Gathering Sacred; breathe now, She says; Open and rest, open and rest; what moves away from you is meant to, it will return your Truth back to you, with noble wisdom; You are Noble Wisdom; lower your gaze to the center of yourself, to the center of everything, where we all are, held in the center of Her; She holds the vast and luminous great mystery; the stars are Her heartbeats, Her eyes, and I's, the multiple perspectives of Her, which is us; we must forget and re-member ourselves again; release and let go, strength and clarity is returning now; re-chord your dreams, your vision, your hopes, and aspirations, belong to this homecoming now. The Blue Lotus offers a nighttime practice and ritual for deep rest, healing, and homecoming. Thank you for listening. If you'd like to receive your own Akashic Reading, you can book yours here https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/booking/akashic-records-intuitive-reading. Many Blessings and All Love.    

What are you growing into?  What do you long to embody? What if something you experienced was the last time you'd experience it? What if the last kiss you had was the last one? And what if it wasn't but you let yourself remember that everything will change—how would you bring your whole self into the next kiss? Into grief and sadness? Into this moment? Into whatever you love? Appreciating being here. What can you find home in right now? Being rearranged, knowing the sacredness of it, even when it doesn't feel that way. Inviting the breath in, letting it show you the way with its elegant rhythm, moving in and out.  If you pick one thing to wear today that would represent how you want to live into this moment like it's the last moment, what would it be? Your favorite shirt? A piece of jewelry? An essential oil? Choose comfort and ceremony. How will you wear your love? Slowing down and growing into the journey of this life. Letting longing be birthed as a spark from within.  Getting acquainted with the fire of our soul.  The practice of living your wildly naked truth. Remembering to trust. And the trust in remembering. I share the poem Deep Violets, Wild Pines. Where can you let go of being so careful and live your you-ness now. Seek it out. What would living more wildly look like? Begin a new alchemy. “Wear your love like perfume.” Saturday, October 23rd, join me for Permission, a luscious and sacred virtual retreat. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/booking/three-divine-doors If you'd like to receive invitations to special offerings and love notes from me, visit www.shegathersbeauty.com to sign up for my weekly newsletter. As soon as you land on the home page, a little note will pop up and you can sign up there.  

How do we hold our intentions, longings, dreams, and desires while simultaneously not holding too tightly to any particular outcome? Explore the immensity of how so many of us are being asked to let go, be redirected, and move into the center of our lives. I share a personal story about being rear-ended and all the ways I gained clarity that sometimes we need to be rerouted. *Trigger Alert: this is a fairly mild, or “gentle” story about a car accident I was in. It comes at the beginning of the episode. If in any way that feels like too much, you might fast forward to the middle of the episode or skip this one.  When we experience trauma, it's so important to let someone help us move through it. Please reach out to someone who is a trauma-informed practitioner, a therapist, a friend, a shamanic healer—someone you can trust to help you find peace, comfort, safety, and healing. Letting go of practicing learned self-abandonment and choosing our whole selves instead. Taking up space and having full permission to claim that which has been unclaimed within us. Working with embodiment and presence practices in order to locate who and where we are and where we might be being nudged to go.  When we're re-directed or rerouted, we are ready.  I share the poems “The Song” and “The Dream” by Naomi Shihab Nye. An invitation to my upcoming offering, Permission: Moving Through Sacred Thresholds, October 23rd, from 1:00-4:00 pm EST. This is an experiential virtual retreat, designed as a sacred container to come home to yourself, and uncover and say yes to your deepest truths. During our time together we will merge the practical with the mystical. You will experience what it's like to live your yes and be supported by and deeply connected to your soul's longings. For more information visit https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/booking/three-divine-doors.  

You are not broken. You are wounded. And inside the wound, is your remedy.  The world might be broken. Systems and infrastructures certainly are. But we aren't. We've forgotten the truth of who we are. Your remedy involves your soul's dream. And your soul's dream is part of the collective dream. Lingering for a while in curiosity widens our capacity to dream again. We suffer when we forget this. How can you give yourself permission to be present with your sense of woundedness while also being open to finding the remedy there, as well? The (w)holiness of Eve and her longing. How gifts become wounds and wounds, gifts. Thank you for listening! If this episode or previous episodes inspire or resonate with you, I invite you to join me for Permission: Stepping Through Sacred Thresholds, an afternoon virtual retreat on Saturday, October 23rd.  We'll explore the topic of lingering inside the gift of you, the dream of you, and the moving toward knowing and living the truth of you. In this spacious and sacred experiential retreat, I will provide a safe and grounded container to explore your yes and the healing and expansion you're ready for. This virtual retreat is for women who feel as though they are standing at a crossroads and sense or know it's time to step forward and be who they are in a new way and are ready to be guided by their own inner wisdom keeper and the support of a beautiful and intimate collective, my shamanic practices and helping spirits, and the elegant nature of soulfulness. Participants will walk away with a much clearer picture of what's truly calling them and how to take the next steps forward, while feeling aligned with their authentic truth, desire, and sense of belonging. Here's the link to learn more and save your seat for Permission: Stepping Through Sacred Thresholds https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/group-offerings  

Embracing the harvest: gratitude, reflection, and calling in. Join Wendy to explore the deeper call of what it means to honor grace in your life right now. How are you being invited into an experience of expanding joy, meaning, passion, creativity, and love? What would it be like to hold the intention of just being you?  What are you harvesting and celebrating now? What are you still hungry for? I share from personal experience what it means to follow soul's call, how I devote myself to love, divinity, and my path, through change, challenge, and uprooting my entire life.  Permission to be terrified, ask for help, live supported, and make your life sacred. Longing is the embodiment of sovereignty when we are willing to know and trust our truth. Longing goes deep into the roots of us. It is why we are here. It is a generous expression of soul. It is your divinity whispering into you the way to get home. It's not a “beach read,” it's the book of your life. There is a gorgeous seed of light living inside each of us. Now is the time to let the layers fall away so that the light can grow. Our desire is that light. Claiming what is unclaimed within us is how we come home.  You are allowed to change, to move your life in a new direction. You are allowed to rest. Reflect. To let things fall away. To begin again. To create. To love whatever you love.  “There is no such thing as one way liberation.” —Glennon Doyle You are here to be you. And you are so much more than you know. “Accept the nudge, be moved by love.” Home is a deeper expression of who you really are—and home will always show you this. I share the poems See-saw & All This Time. ”I want to know what you ache for but do not say.” Create your own map so that you can freely explore the home of you in your fullest expression. To join our revolution of desire, visit https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/longing-project. and to treat yourself to a luscious afternoon virtual retreat, join us on October 16th for Permission: A Sacred Threshold to Your Desire https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/booking/three-divine-doors.  

In this popular replay, Wendy shares a love story. Three of them, actually. The Mistress of Longing Poem; words chanted over me during the Dreamtime and the bones of the book that came as a result. Sending postcards to ourselves. Having a love affair with yourself and your life exactly as it. “You are already the entire ocean.” Reminders to carry on with grace and hope, truth and trust. Falling in love with a numinous presence. Our deepest longings and values and how our lives depend upon them. Trusting the truth of this moment, impermanence, and letting longing lead the way to the life we want to live. The path to living my wildly, naked truth and what I value. Falling in love with a woman and our path of beauty. Intimacy, sensuality, creativity, and connection. Giving and receiving. Cultivating our love affair and some of the ways we tend our hearth-fire. Personal growth, healing, and the expansion available through relationship and co-creation. Tending the flame. Cultivating courage. Leaping into the great unknown—what can you hold onto? How do you wish to be more intimate with your life? Walking through the last 4 months of the year. Making contact with what you value and living in love. ”Longing brought you here—births you again and again.” ~The Mistress of Longing. Remember, you are sacred. This moment is ceremony. You get to live your wildly, naked truth.  

This episode of She Gathers Beauty marks one year for the podcast! Thank you, beautiful listener, for your grace and presence here at this hearth fire where we meet each other each week. Let's consider that surrender is a rite of passage, an awakening to all of who you are. What wants to be released from your tight grasp? How can the breath in your belly move more freely? What would it be like to try letting go and stop holding on so very tightly to how things are supposed to look, feel, and be? I share a story about my own rite of passage and what ceremony really wanted to happen once I let go of trying to control every detail and let myself be free instead. What longs to be free inside of you?  What refuses to be silenced anymore? ”whatever you feel, it's a blessing. claim it.” How chaos and confusion can be a great navigational tool and prompt to surrender. I want all of me. What would it be like to want ALL of yourself? Not just parts. Not just the “good” parts. Every little bit of you. The offering of two poems for you: May the Butterflies Be Freed & I Want You to Show Me. May you remember that you are sacred. This moment is ceremony. You do get to live your wildly naked truth. Thank you for joining me at the hearthfire. Have a beautiful week!    

September invites us to slow down, root down, release. Let the change happen.  Open, trust, receive. Strength & wisdom is right here. Working with the “and” space and all that we are holding. I share the poem “Being Safe Space.” Being radically redirected by even the smallest gesture can bring reverence and generous expansion for all of us. ”The lightest touch changing everything.” Anything is possible now. A few ways to practice being a safe space for ourselves. What gesture can you make to receive what is wanting you now? What “parts” inside of you want to be free to be “who they are” so they can be seen, heard, known? What choices can you make from that place of reclamation? What feelings can be felt now so that you can say yes to the momentum of lifeforce that is happening right now? Grace happens in the “empty” space between the exhale and the inhale. In the in-between place. Why this moment is ceremony. Crossroads as rite of passage and bringing reverence to the past, present, and what has yet to come. A story about a moth and a gesture of offering choice. Practicing the release of mental critiquing. I share the poem “Crossroads” dedicated to my dear friend, Marion. ”All of everything” is helping us move forward.       

While this message feels deeply important to share, the recording level is a bit low. I invite you to crank up the volume! We explore being with the domain of our heart—and with the tender and wobbly vulnerable parts of life.  Permission to show up exactly as you are—no matter what's happening and no matter what messaging might be occurring that says you need to be different than you are. I channel a message from the Akasha for all of us. Some glimpses into what we are shown in this guided journey: move through the threshold presenting itself to you now. there are leagues of angelic ones standing with each of us. stand at the precipice you've been led to. they're asking us to remove the blindfolds to truth when we're  ready. open your eyes and see what you see. there will be glimpses of what's available now. our eyes are adjusting while we are digesting the new content and reality of life now. we are integrating what is deeply good. we are remembering what has been forgotten. we are being asked to trust at the precipice. we are being asked to be willing to take the next step and know that we will be met by something soft and divine. The messages continue and deepen. Listen in and see what nourishment arrives for you. We are given helpful instructions for ways to be supported and grounded at this time. There is the promise of a new legacy. We are invited to be the fire keepers of our own Hearthfire.  I share a poignant and powerful poem, a favorite of mine, by the great Mary Oliver.  May you know great comfort and boundless blessings. 

Hummingbird makes a visit and shares a message about gathering nectar and being a part of something beautiful and true. The invitation to locate the ways you are being held while you are holding so much.  Practicing presence in the midst of despair, fear, and challenge to access the sacred breath of peace that Life has to offer. Your breath is a prayer. Cultivating calm and increasing the relaxation response with mindfulness. What is alive and true for you in this moment? What brings sweetness into your life? How can you be nourished with what is available now? There's nothing right or wrong about how you're breathing right now. You are so much more than the limitation of right or wrong. Something elegant is occurring in this moment.  You are being supported in this moment. Practical ways to make contact with the Mystery and altar your life. Let yourself remember you are being held. Give your weight to what's holding you. Be supported. Stay. I read the poem “the soft curved bowl of you.” Join us in a sacred collective, “Writing & Ecstasy,” a virtual retreat experience Saturday, September 4th—we'll enjoy a luscious afternoon filled with spacious inner self-care. Receive a message from Spirit uniquely for the collective that gathers that day. Find (w)holy ecstasy in the ordinary rounds of daily life. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/group-offerings

Anger has incredible healing power and it wants to lead us back to something sacred within.  We can learn how to be with the wild edges and unknown force of our own anger, even when it feels scary, we can learn how to titrate our experience. Rage and anger are different. Rage is anger that has gone unseen and untended to. Learning how to BE WITH our anger when it arrives can be a profound healing story and can be a preventative measure that brings about greater intimacy, love, and connection with our whole selves. Messages about anger and the real wisdom of its essence. Anger wants expression—it wants to move through us. The body has a world of intelligence about this. Being mad is a fierce storm that when given permission to pass through, a clear realization and fresh beginning becomes available.  After working with children and adults over the years as a psychotherapist and mindfulness instructor, I've gathered a few helpful tools for how to move and express the energy of our anger. I share a few practical ways to be with anger when it visits. All of our feelings want us. They all have a sacred message and it's up to us to be with, care for, and discern what is needed in the moment. This helps us learn how to trust ourselves with our biggest feelings and challenges and create a safe and loving environment within us and around us in which we can truly and fully express ourselves. I share the poems “Chispa” and “Great Dark Wing” from my first book, The Reach Is (W)holy. www.shegathersbeauty.com/books    

Welcome to August! Enjoy this special Akashic Records Reading for our beautiful, expanding community. The doors are open wide now and we are invited into the place of possibility. There are all kinds of openings, including doorways that lead to the past. This is a portal to review past dreams, aspirations, and visions to better understand and be with what is current for you now.  The sacred role of fear. It is the energy that can help us move in the direction of our true life path. It can feel scary to leave the past—the invitation is to trust that you have the sovereign right to review and rewrite, feel and reclaim what continues to be true and what does not—what has been shed and is ready to be released? Feeling the truth of this, the depth of what you are being shown, including the loss, will enable you to actually move more freely and into the presence of now with increased confidence and embodied discernment. There is much to be gained.  The New Moon in Leo and the Lion's Gate August 8, 2021. Trusting ourselves and the heart of expansion. That which you are drawn to is drawn to you. Opening the heart space creates a mirror for you to see the truth of this reflection. Working with the body to see, know, and feel. Your light is a mirror of the One Great Light. We belong to great expansion. Creative and insightful ways to work with the guidance of this Akashic Records reading. Three Divine Doors begins tomorrow and is perfect timing to weave in this message from the Akasha! Join us—it's not too late! https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/booking/three-divine-doors

It is time to take up space, receive, be drenched in delight.  You are meant to experience being honored, celebrated, and receive all that is meant for your rooted, sweet, expansion. You are possibility wanted by Possibility. Why ritual and rites of passage are so very necessary and why your soul wants them. Welcome to the Signature Soul Bath Experience! This is my new one-on-one offering—a rite of passage, created for the celebration of you and the honoring of where you are along the winding path of your life. I discuss what these soul retreats are, what you will receive, and the empowering blessings and tools you will walk away with at the end of our journey together. Current offerings will be phased out soon—please do take advantage of these! Special bundles and exquisite rates are currently available. Stock up while you can!   Visit my website https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/booking to learn more. Diving into the poem “Be Wide.” Belonging, expansion, replenishment. A guided meditation. A ritual suggestion for the upcoming New Moon in Aries. As always, thank you for being here. Your presence means everything! May you know every boundless blessing this New Moon is ready to offer you. May it be so.   

Enjoy one of our most popular episodes released many moons ago.  I share a new poem gifted to me by the Mistress of Longing entitled “Cover Her With the Scent of Trees.” I also share and unpack the following ideas: “Longing is the practice of love.” You are so much more than you know. You are. The reclamation of who we already are and who we have always been.  Taking it all off and soaking in the sacredness of our truth. Creating ritual. The Great Call Back—a practice of devotion—summoning all of our parts—any parts of us that we have lost along the way—they long for and belong to us. This is our sovereign right and will cover us in blessing and infuse us with radiant restoration and empowerment. Shamanic journeying and the “call back.” We get to live from a place of deep commitment to our wholeness. You are worth investing in. Reaching for a guide in the darkness is a practice of great strength, love, and confidence. All of you is whole, holy, and good. All of you.  Love is a longing for union, communion, and bearing witness to our totality. We are expansive beings and each moment is an opportunity for us to choose the elegant edge of lifting ourselves into softness, wholeness, and belonging. A love story within a love story within a love story. The poem “Cover Her With the Scent of Trees” is a love story about the woman I love being held within the love story of my own completeness, held by something far greater—Her. Individual reclamation leads to collective reclamation, integrity, healing, compassion, and more love. Honoring the seasons of change as a pivot point to gathering what is rightfully ours. Relationship and community are touchstones to the Great Call Back. Your heart space is a sacred gathering place. The importance of knowing and feeling our own individual calling and how longing can lead us to, strengthen, and support that. Being nourished by all of the love stories that we are. What are you deeply longing for? It matters. For all of us. It matters. How are you or would you like to practice the Great Call Back? I'd love to know. Comment below or send me a private message at shegathersbeauty.com or @shegathersbeauty on Instagram or Facebook.  May you remember that you are sacred. This moment is ceremony. And you get to live your wildly naked truth.  

Acknowledging where we've been, where we are now, and floating in the sacred river of being that is moving us forward.  The role of reverence. How marking big transitions heals, soothes, nourishes, and informs us. Working with loss and joy. Embracing the unknown and the “brilliant sanity” when we don't. I gratefully acknowledge my teacher, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, and the teachings I received from Naropa University. It is from these Shambhala teachings of this lineage that the term brilliant sanity originates.  I share the poems “Be,” & “Float,” from my book, The Reach is (W)holy. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/books In the river of life, we are worthy of receiving, of floating, of going with the current, shift our gaze and allegiance to truth, trust, choice, and joy. I share a practice for the coming days to nourish and ground you and help you be current with the beauty of your life. I also share a short meditation at the end for your pleasure, truth, and empowerment.  “As the river moves you, may you remember to trust yourself.”   Announcing three new sacred virtual retreat experiences + The School of Wild & Holy August 7: Writing As Kintsugi: Using Words for Mending (Kintsugi is an ancient Japanese art form and practice of mending broken pieces of pottery with gold.) September 11: Writing & Ecstasy: Bringing the Ecstatic into Your Daily Experience  October 16: Permission: Stepping Through the Sacred Threshold of Soul November 8: The School of Wild & Holy: Sisterhood of the Sacred https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/work-with-me   Thank you for listening.  xo        

Returning to the center of things and the things that truly matter. Removing our attention from the static and distraction and coming back to the heart compass. Reflecting upon impermanence to choose what is possible and alive in this moment. What do you belong to in this wild, fresh moment?  What do you want to invest yourself in and how do you wish to be invested in? What feels like gentle homecoming? What does that feel like in your body?  Let harmony guide you—your body knows what this means. When are you choosing yourself, your current needs—when does your internal experience feel aligned and harmonious with whatever might be happening around you? And when do you notice feeling disharmony and a sense of leaving yourself behind? It's normal to get distracted and taken away. Even in the most beautiful place we can get lost in thoughts, beliefs, and old patterns and choose “disharmony.” Underneath it all is clear, calm, constant harmony. We get to continue to come back to that space over and over again. It's a practice. Going “off course” doesn't mean we've done anything wrong. It means we're human.  How do you come back to yourself and this fresh, awake, now moment? Let's explore the steady foundation of practicing presence, which can include choosing memories that help us come back to the truth of us—much like the poem I share— “emergence.” Are you willing to believe in the miracles available inside this moment? Watching and witnessing your breathing is a way to make direct contact with the revelation that belongs to you. Emergence can be found in my first book, The Reach Is (W)holy. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/books. To learn more about ways to spend time at the hearthfire with me, visit my website https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/. I'm currently booking individual sessions September - December. I have some exciting announcements coming soon about The School of Wild & Holy; an intimate 6 month program to move deeply with life and receive the sacred mystery teachings you've been called to live and share. Thank you for listening! Please subscribe, rate, and review so more people can find us and listen in. Your investment of time and sharing these episodes means the world to me. 

I'm delighted to announce two upcoming virtual workshops in July & August! AROUSE: Ecstasy in Writing; Casting a Spell with Pleasure Saturday, July 17th, 1:00-4:00 ORGASM: Crafting An Altar of Love & Wild Reclamation Saturday, August 21st, 1:00-4:00 To register and learn more visit www.shegathersbeauty.com or follow me on Instagram & Facebook @shegathersbeauty. Today Wendy dives into the freedom that comes through expression, trusting and using the passionate voice from within. Ecstasy comes in many forms. It is a rising of truth energy. It's a wildness that isn't meant to be contained. Within you, lives a yes space. It's the place where your wild originates and knows just what to do and how to be. Desire is a (com)passionate freedom.  Desire invites us to choose ourselves—our sacred yes space. This is what self-care is. So much wisdom and joy—healing and empowerment lives inside this choice. Massage, candles, sacred baths, exquisite oils and beautiful external environments are invitations to internal, deep, loving care of you and your life. Self-care fills us, fuels us, when we caretake ourselves in both ways. What is pulling you now, asking for your attention?  Will you let your desire want you? I share the poems “all this time” and “love enters.” Perhaps your yes space wants to be written. Take some time today or over the next week and see what wants to move through your hand onto paper. A word. A sentence. A story. A wish. Let this be a compassionate practice of self-care. Set a beautiful environment for yourself. Then let yourself move deeper into the lush landscape within. May you remember that you are sacred. This moment is ceremony—and you get to live your wildly naked truth— unapologetically.  

I was called to channel a message for you today. I hope that it lifts your spirits, brings great relief and remembering. This message invites us to understand the ways in which we have moved through great challenge and that it is time to honor our fortitude, resilience, and step into a new life. This is a “portal,” if you will, carrying us into not just the coming days and weeks but a message that will serve us and cultivate great support and knowing for the remainder of the year.  Take some time to settle in, make some tea, and create sacred space for yourself. Ceremony is waiting. It is my honor to bring forth messages like this one. No matter when you listen, it will be the aligned time for you.  This particular message came through for the listeners of this podcast. Being a channel brings me great hope and connection to what matters most in this life—I'm here to share this gift with you. If you would like to work with me in this way, visit my website at www.shegathersbeauty.com. Thank you for this exchange of abundance—your time and attention is deeply valuable to me.

What does it mean to altAr your life? What would it be like to live your life now? To experience yourself free, curious, and luscious—exactly as you are? The ways we abandon ourselves and give our power away.  Don't wait to “use the good dishes.” Body image & self-worth.  The truth about your (w)holiness. Leaving a life of heterosexual privilege and meeting myself at the door of my Truth. Huge life transitions, wearing new skin, rites of passage. What your soul wants you to know.  You get to take up space and enjoy your life. Now. There's really no need to wait. There is no “perfect” time. This moment is ceremony. Trusting that you know what feels like pleasure and finding ways to abandon pressure and choose yourself—your wants, your nourishment, your joy—instead. The role punishment plays: over-culture might tell us that we aren't worthy of experiencing pleasure and goodness until we are something different than what we are. In whatever ways this message is still encoded within us, it's time to liberate the truth and start a revolution of love. How can you altar your life right now? How can you honor and celebrate all that you have experienced and lived (and long to) so far? Perimenopause and the importance of taking up space. You are a gift and worthy of living the life you love and long for. Choose your power, not the external messages about belonging and fitting in. Beauty in contrast. Feel and experience the grace holding you together. Pleasure is available now—choose lusciousness.  A very sacred question: does what I am choosing now feel like pressure or pleasure? Altaring your life impacts the collective in a very expansive, liberating, joy-filled way. I share the poem “Sacred Gesture” from my first book, The Reach is (W)holy, as well as the “Butterlamp” poem from my second book, The Mistress of Longing.  You can find both of my books and ways to work with me at www.shegathersbeauty.com.     

Finding relief, ease, and softness during times of challenge, endings, and new beginnings. We can remember that we do have choice. We can shake off the heaviness and make a nest of something that brings more gentleness. We are renegotiating our inner and outer worlds—it can be so helpful to choose daily rituals that help increase our sense of safety and calm and decrease the stress response and helplessness. How might even a few deep breaths bring some possibility to this moment? Some gentle stretches for the body can help, too. Pulling an oracle card for guidance or writing in your journal. Taking a break and making a cup of tea. Enjoying a piece of dark chocolate mindfully, slowly. What things work for you? If you aren't sure, experiment. Make a mental list of the things that can transport you efficiently to a sense of more calm and balance. One way might be finding someone who can hold space for you—a friend, therapist, or guide can be a tremendous support.  What does devotion look like for you today? Where will you choose to place your gaze? What feels in alignment for you in this fresh new moment? Taking a moment for ourselves can help us return more fully to the possibility and purpose of why we are here.  The power of blessing and creating sacred space. I share a blessing poem I wrote several years ago and have posted it below so that you can use it if you like. I only ask that if you share it with someone, you credit me. The power of play, innocence, and curiosity can open up a space for wild joy.  Here is the blessing poem. I devote it to you and your gifted life.   Blessing for Becoming   Mark this day as (w)holy may you know you are exactly where you are meant to be— you are in the beauty of becoming may you walk with blessings on your feet may you plant the seeds for a life you love may you know this love is worthy and patiently longs for you may you water the exquisite opportunity of this wild, feathery moment and fall madly in devotion with your biggest dreams the time is now, dear one to live inside the juicy potential of your heart's new moon. Begin. Begin. Begin. Mark this day, and all your days, as (w)holy.   -Wendy Candida Havlir Cherry   May you know swift ease and delight. May it be so. 

There is nothing wrong with you. You can breathe and let yourself be held. In the fear and depths of letting go, something new is coming to life from deep inside you. How are you building sanctuary for your fear? How can this moment be a legacy of fierce self-care? Exploring and staying with the exquisite risks of life, love, and vulnerability. A prescription for a passionate life—soft openings. Letting go. Being seen. The imperfection of trust. Staying with the embrace of freedom. The fragility that lives underneath what we show the world. The courage it takes to be who you are can also be an unbound relief—this is reclamation. I share the poem “the warmth of her.” ”You must have chaos within to give birth to a dancing star.” ~Friedrich Nietzsche.

A circle of mystics wants to lift the veils for you, between this and that, revealing something sacred in the space between. You have always been poetry. It’s okay to want to know what sacred messengers have to share. Ask. Say you are ready to receive. Let the songlines under your feet become light codes from something vast and whole. Be bathed in something new underneath the generosity of the full moon. Go out into the night and find what is waiting for you. Create ritual and practice gratitude. Write down the clues showing up around you. Tuck them into pockets so they can be found treasure exactly when you need them. There are ways, so many ways, to be with the truth that is wanting you. May you know every blessing. May your heart feel clear and true. Even if you are on your knees in wave after wave of grief or despair or feel stuck and cannot move—may you feel the warmth of something Greater holding ALL of you. You are wanted and all of you, sacred. 

How do rest and a sense of safety come to you? In times of despair and traversing the unknown, how can you feel grounded and free right here exactly as you are? And if things are ramping up around you and all you want to do is rest, how do you bring balance to your day? How do you choose what you belong to? How do you choose a moment of kindness for you?   Find a way. There’s something within your reach. Choose what feels good and right for you. Let your gaze move inward while you root down and spread your roots. Choose warm bread and honey daily. These are ways you can be free. When darkness comes, and it does because it is a calling out to something that desperately wants your attention, let it sit next to the light and be comforted. Darkness isn’t a bad thing. It is a gathering place for light.    Remember the truth of sanctuary. Let it rest in your arms. Love is not an extravagant pursuit. It is poetry and the safe roof over your head. It is water. And a vision for something beautiful in your life. It is the joy found when you give yourself to grace. And gratitude.   Love is soul. It is the rootedness of trees and the clouds moving across the sky. It is the stars showing themselves to us on a dark winter night. It is embodiment while we are here. It is the taking in and receiving of beauty as an essential elixir that soothes and restores, reminds us we don’t have as much time as we think we do. Feel more, actually...think a bit less. Lead with the heart.   Slow down, love. Take the walk. Let the ancient ones whisper your true name over you. Feel your feet on the earth. Honey on your tongue. Your lovers heartbeat beneath your palm. Laugh and play. Blow bubbles. Rest in the sun.    May you unwrap a morsel of joy today. May you be armed with love.     

A few moments of mindfulness can gently refocus your inner gaze and be “an uprising of softness.” Mindful awareness can be practiced at anytime. Remember what matters most to you—let yourself rest for a moment or two of calm centering. You have a choice about the pace and focus of your day. Let this be your reminder. Taking a few moments for yourself as a daily practice can “reset” the sacred space within you. You are worthy of being on your “to-do” list. “I have seen warriorship like this.” It’s okay to loosen the grip for a moment. Return to your needs. You and your sense of peace matters. Everything else will wait.  Taking time for ourselves helps us clear the way, breathe a little slower and deeper, and show up for those we care about today with more compassion and presence. This creates more possibility  for us all. This is a practice of love.      

It doesn’t have to be hard. Let it be soft. Dropping into the truth of the moment—it’s your time to shine, be seen, share your gifts AND you don’t have to burn the candle at both ends to light the world (or yourself) up! What do you really need for body, heart, mind nourishment? The paradigm of go, go, go, is no longer relevant. We don’t have to buy into that anymore. We get to bring pleasure and rest into our daily experience. We get to choose softness. We get to choose balance. We get to choose an embodied heart revolution. Pleasure matters.  “Your love is poised to hold it all” because your love is being held by the one great wild heart. You in your human divinity—you are made of stardust and real emotions, needs, desires—you get to altar it all. All of you belongs. There is nothing you need to do or be for that to be true. You came that way. I lead you through a guided meditation to increase your capacity to receive by way of relaxing into presence and a special gift from a sacred messenger. Thank you for listening. May you know more and more ease, joy, and relaxation today.   

A sacred question to consider—how are miracles present in your daily life? How can your perceptions shift and open, creating a wider lens for the truth of you that brings forth more radiance in your daily experience? Messages coming through the Dreamtime. Receiving soul and gathering grace. Poems: Soul’s Heart & Wild Grace An invitation to be with what’s happening in your life right now; build an altar, exhale. I reference Marianne Williamson, A Course In Miracles, and Osho. The process of recognizing—and the miracle of it. Looking for clues—life is showing you all the time. Giving yourself permission to open up and let go now. What questions do you have that you would like me to speak about on the podcast? Topics of interest that feel related to this gathering space are welcome, too!  My desire is to keep building this community for the benefit of all beings everywhere.  The Longing Project and how you can get involved. #longingproject #shegathersbeauty https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/longing-project Experience a softer way inside the story of you. Thank you for listening.   

Daily ritual sets the tone for how we experience life. It increases pleasure, trust, and clarity while also helping us live with grace, feeling held and supported. Setting everything else down so that we can have a moment or two of sacred reflection and intention opens us to the blessings of this precious life.   We all know what it’s like to move through chaos, challenge, and the unknown. The truth is, we can stay connected to what means the most to us, lifts us, and anchors us no matter what’s happening.  I share a few daily rituals of my own and the importance of letting them be imperfect, messy, and real. I also share a few of my favorite blessing poems by John O’Donohue.   Are you ready to be honored and celebrated for all you’ve moved through? Would you like to embrace the coming days, weeks, and years from a place of voluptuous vitality and meaning? Join me for an expansive and transformative three-month series of your own sacred retreats. Find out more https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/current-offerings. Thank you for listening! Have a beautiful week!    

Today we explore how the heart loves, love as currency, and its true unlimited nature.  The wisdom of an ornamental cherry tree and the message she shared. We don’t have to be small with our love. The story that there’s a limited supply of love can and wants to be rewritten.   What beliefs about “not enough” might hold you back from your truth and the joy waiting for you? How can you unlock the doors of your love and let it be a blessing for the world? The truth about the throbbing ache of love and how our longing is meant to reveal what we already have.  Prayer as a way to move closer to the unlimited resource of love. Why Tai and I created The Longing Project. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/longing-project ——Send a postcard to P.O. Box 6112, Asheville, N.C., 28816. Ways to understand what you really long for and why it’s important. How to get your life back and remember/uncover why you’re here.  The Signature Soul Bath Experience: A rite of passage that honors you, your life, and escorts you through the river of light that encompasses your soul’s signature. https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/booking/signature-soul-bath-experience-with-wendy-an-exclusive-offering A short guided meditation to invite you into your own exquisite nature for relaxation and replenishment. I share the poems Boundless & Chalice. Chalice can be found in my first book, The Reach Is (W)holy. https://www.amazon.com/Reach-holy-poetry-inspired-sacred/dp/1979257876/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1517199876&sr=1-1&keywords=the+reach+is+holy Thank you so much for joining me in this sacred space. I’m always honored and delighted to be with you in this way.  If you’d like to support this podcast, you can offer a one-time donation or become a patron https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/patreon Big love & deep gratitude, Wendy

This is such a juicy episode! I share a very sacred message for you from the Great Cosmic Grandmother Tree.  It is time to take up space, receive, be drenched in delight.  You are meant to experience being honored, celebrated, and receive all that is meant for your rooted, sweet, expansion. You are possibility wanted by Possibility. Why ritual and rites of passage are so very necessary and why your soul wants them. Welcome to the Signature Soul Bath Experience! This is my new one-on-one offering—a rite of passage, created for the celebration of you and the honoring of where you are along the winding path of your life. I discuss what these soul retreats are, what you will receive, and the empowering blessings and tools you will walk away with at the end of our journey together. Current offerings will be phased out soon—please do take advantage of these! Special bundles and exquisite rates are currently available. Stock up while you can!   Visit my website https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/booking to learn more. Diving into the poem “Be Wide.” Belonging, expansion, replenishment. A guided meditation. A ritual suggestion for the upcoming New Moon in Aries. As always, thank you for being here. Your presence means everything! May you know every boundless blessing this New Moon is ready to offer you. May it be so.   

Today Wendy explores the importance of connection, discovering, knowing, engaging with being touched both literally and figuratively by life, by living, and by nature and what is being shown to us daily. Enjoy the poem “She Aches.” Guided imagery and meditations are sprinkled throughout this episode.  Letting your heart fire expand luminosity throughout and around your entire being. How is Nature asking you to engage with your inner experience?  What is longing to wake up within you? What wants to be born? What is blooming? What is ready for a “re-set?” How is this awakening revealing old beliefs that are ready to be transmuted into a new way of being and living? What do you desire to receive? In what ways can you create space to do so?  In the Northern Hemisphere, Spring is displaying all the ways life aches for life. To ache truly is a wild and holy thing. In fact, it’s very good news. We were encoded with this truth—at the center of it all, longing leads us to connection.  You were built to receive. You are worthy of being invested in, in every way. You are meant to be celebrated, honored, seen, supported.  The importance of rites of passage, the ways we have lost this incredibly sacred way of honoring, and how I will soon be sharing this practice in a way that is profoundly essential to the individual and the collective.  A few ways COVID has been a rite of passage. Longing to touch, be touched, hold and be held—this is a wisdom to pay attention to and invite in curiosity to help support this deep aching.  Discerning and gathering sovereignty, self trust, choice, and capacity. In this episode, I also share ways to engage with #longingproject, what’s at the heart of it, what does longing really mean and why does it matter? Send a postcard to longing c/o Wendy Havlir Cherry, PO Box 6112, Asheville, NC 28816 Share it on social media using #longingproject and #shegathersbeauty Leave it as an offering in a public place Build an altar with it Give it to someone you love Or whatever feels most resonant for you! You can also visit https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/longing-project I’ll be announcing my new signature offering soon! Stay tuned to the next episode to learn more about that, as well as ways to enjoy my current offerings before they’re no longer available. Thank you for listening. I am so honored and delighted to share this space with you. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate, and review. This helps this podcast be found, heard and received all over the world, continuing to build a sacred movement of passionate bone knowing and living our wild naked truth!  

Today Wendy explores her thoughts about shared suffering after difficult and challenging events over the last week. Moving from a place of love, together. “I want to know what you ache for but do not say,” from the poem, Rose Petals. Now is the time to move ever deeper into what longing is. I share more on that and announce a new passion project my beautiful partner and I felt inspired to create #longingproject. What does longing mean to you? Is it needy? Is needing okay? Is it naval gazing? Selfish? What if what you long for will save you? And not just you—all of us? Longing as a primary need—a navigational tool for alignment with soul—a deep, directive, inner ache.  How knowing and understanding our own longings can be an embodiment of healer—an uprising that makes love and compassion and evolution possible.  What is it that you long to help heal within yourself and in the world? Longing is the soul’s aspiration.  Are you willing to let your aching come out of the darkness and be seen? Write down your longing (anonymously if you choose)—share it with me—with someone you love—use #longingproject on social media or share with me @shegathersbeauty, www.shegathersbeauty.com, or via email at sacredspacetherapy@gmail.com. LET'S BRING HEALING AND AWARENESS TO THAT WHICH WE HAVE BEEN TAUGHT TO HIDE OR DISCONNECT FROM. What you care about matters deeply—what your soul is trying to point you to, it matters more than you know.  Everyone’s longing should have a safe and sacred space to be seen, acknowledged, and held so that we can connect to each other in new, revolutionary ways. What will you rise up for? That is a longing. Let us share this aspiration together. Let us create an uprising of love, as a community devoted to healing and soulful evolution. I share a short presence meditation to bring some ease and comfort into your day.  I have some exciting announcements coming soon about ways to work with me. Sign up for my newsletter to be the first to know at https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/. May you know deep peace. Please reach out for support or drop a comment below and let me know what you long for.  Sending vast love and gratitude. Thank you for listening.   

Today we explore the topic of belonging to what feels true in the most liberating way.  What has it felt like in your life when you have set the weight down and let yourself be with the truth of you, at this moment? The gift of body and how it can show you what you believe in at this moment. Are you tense? How is your jaw? What might be able to soften simply by bringing awareness to it. “I am the unfolding of desire, soft opening.” Words from the Mistress of Longing. What is the truth about your relationship to desire? To long is the pure essence of who we are and what brought us here in the first place. Why do we incessantly fight against it? Against whatever we are feeling? We can “set down the weight” as the poem “Wings” invites.  Life longs for life and always will. This is a very natural truth. What if we let ourselves soften into remembering this in some way. What have you learned about longing? Does shame come to visit when you dare to long? What part of your story wants to be rewritten? What do you believe is true about your worth and your ability to receive and to long?  The example of diet culture—how has it numbed us to what we are truly hungry for and how to understand the life-giving essence of appetite? Letting ourselves unlearn the things that prevent us from remembering/knowing/feeling when we are hungry and what we are really hungry for.  How do you know when you trust yourself? The importance of the journey away from what we believe home is—being “off course,” getting lost, and the return. We are meant to long for connection. For True Self. For the home that never goes away. The earthquake of your life—what is it trying to shake loose within you? Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche wrote: ”In the garden of gentle sanity, May you be bombarded by coconuts of wakefulness.” From his poem “Timely Rain.” What is waking up within? You have wings. Let them help you move closer to that which you long for.  How will you remember to check in with your bones and set yourself free? You are being breathed. Just let it happen. Place your gaze on the divine orchestration of your inhale and exhale. You actually already know how to belong to your bone knowing. You do.  Ritual prompt for the art of bone knowing: build an altar to what might be hidden and longs to be seen.    

Today I share ways you can create your own whole-hearted toolkit.  We begin with letting the container be your truth and this poem: Feather & Bone “Do not let your winged spirit be caged~ trust your wild.” Exploring and practicing what we love and feel drawn to. The power of words and a disembodied voice. What beauty means to me, connection and making meaning, locating what is sacred. What have you been gathering over the years? What would you like to gather to yourself—for the heartbeat of your life? I share why She Gathers Beauty is a container for who I am and who and what I devote myself to. Altar building. The ways our dreams can reveal homecoming and embracing ourselves. Suggestions for how you can build a whole-hearted toolkit in alignment with who you are and what you long for and love now. What you feel drawn to is a prayer for coming closer to your true self.  You matter. What you love matters. Let your whole heart be gathered and adored.    

Today Wendy addresses the raw truth of grief and navigating the unknown during a year anniversary marking when Covid-19 hit. All the “rallying” and requests to keep showing up—the exhaustion, the desire for hope and goodness, and the gift of bird’s song and the repetitive sacred cycles of nature that comes when we least expect it.  What is nourishing you at this time? What can you keep choosing in order to devote yourself to this kind of heart, mind, and body salve? You are being received, seen, honored, loved, even when you can’t see it or feel it.  Immense and intense challenge now—let’s normalize this. We are all moving through this—you are not alone. Please let this be a comfort. Please be gentle with yourself. Let your breath be your anchor. Just breathe love.  Letting the light in—it can be uncomfortable. And that’s okay, too. It really isn’t a problem. It’s information. For our tenderness. We must hold our sweet tenderness like the most beautiful call from soul. The pericardium—letting the heart have what she wants. Locating home. Finding ground. Practicing stabilization.  Resistance to connection. This too, is (w)holy. All of it. Whole & holy. Descansos—marking a significant and sacred transition. Honoring life. And death.  The intersection of the inner and outer journey—where we locate ourselves in this crossroads—that, too, can be homecoming. What is home for you right now? In what ways are your longings bringing some sense of direction to your life’s course? To be wildly close to love—what does that mean for you?  The frontier of heart I am learning about. I wonder how your heart is a frontier asking for your devotion and sense of adventure? The rules we place upon ourselves and the myriad ways our hearts can teach us a deeper, more boundless truth. What if fear is an invitation to trust yourself? Consider all the times in your life that you have trusted yourself. Can you build an altar of Descansos for those times, let that visual, that map, be a sacred and strengthening reminder for yourself?  Trust is a practice. And it comes from the heart. What do you long to say yes to?       

Today we explore the topic of choosing freedom and love and the ways in which we can devote ourselves to what we bump up against along the way. Embracing and accepting the unraveling we feel inside discomfort.  We can’t pick and choose what we feel if we really want to feel anything at all. I share my poem, “Great Dark Wing,” from The Reach Is (W)holy. Will you find a way to choose yourself when intensity and discomfort arrive? How will you stand at the edge of yourself?  I share a personal experience—a time when I was trying to abandon myself and my emotions wouldn’t let me.  TO LONG IS TO FEEL AND OUR FEELINGS ARE ALWAYS LONGING FOR US. Fleshing out the idea that those we love and are in relationship with need us to need to want ourselves first.  Ways we can bring in some extra support while feeling our longing and embracing our whole hearts. Creating a whole heart “toolkit” The medicine of essential oils and how they truly can shift and open us body, heart, mind, nervous system, and spirit. Of course, this is not a substitute for psychotherapy or medical attention. It is an example of a powerful way I have personally been supported. Having a whole heart toolkit helps provide our whole selves with an opportunity to heal and come into balance. How do you call in extra support? Friends, moving your body, meditation, play, rest? How do you nourish yourself with “food for the soul?” Make a list of what you truly long for—this is a way to build relationship with the “bumps” and edge of your life. This list can include anything at all...your vision, a passion project, a grief calling you, a loss, an anger, an interruption—all of these are examples of what longs for us and how we can come into a state of belonging. Making contact with these things, that we might tend to turn away from, can bring the whole self, the whole heart, into balance.  Inviting it all in (even the willingness to do so) is freedom and a fierce act of love.  Each “bump” can lead us closer to love or further away from it. Curiosity about it can create a healing story. May you know that you are sacred. This moment is ceremony. And you get to live your wildly naked truth.

Today we explore the role of devotion in daily living, especially during challenging times.  Honoring the feast of our lives & celebrating you and all you have experienced in your life thus far.  Planting love notes in your life, especially where fear lives. An invitation for a sacred contemplation: what is your reverence point? Building a circle of sacred for you. YOU are made of DIVINITY.  How are you devoting yourself to your life? To your divinity? Where would you like to place your gaze? Write new devotions—a ritual.  The importance of being seen and witnessed —by others, by something greater, & in your own eyes.  Ceremony and ritual as rites of passage and the necessity of this kind of intention and attention.  The power of asking to be shown when we don’t know how—“help me steep myself and know myself in my own divinity.” Creating pleasure letters—placing pleasure more in the forefront of our consciousness. Pleasure can save us from the depths of challenge. We can hold the grief and fear and discomfort AND invite in pleasure—even the smallest doses can raise lifeforce, hope, and a place of grounded possibility. I would love to learn more about you, your devotion, what you long for, and what is bringing you pleasure now. Please feel free to share in the comments wherever you listen to this podcast or email me at sacredspacetherapy@gmail.com.  You can find me @shegathersbeauty, as well.  Thank you for listening. Sending vast love and gratitude, Wendy       

Would you like a special love note tucked into your inbox for Valentine’s? Sign up at www.shegathersbeauty.com to subscribe to my newsletter. I’ve made something sacred for you—ways you can turn yourself on—and live with more pleasure. This is an exclusive offer for my subscribers. If you don’t love what I send out, please unsubscribe at any time. Now, on with the show! Today I share some channeled messages that keep coming through from the Mistress of Longing and what it means to “leave rose petals at the gate.” —choosing to honor the arrival of your longing as an attunement to soul and soul’s calling. —how longing will show us deep wisdom through the gateways of body, mind, heart, and spirit. —longing is a form of love & life’s reach for us; life longs for us and has a wild desire for us to reach back. —leaving rose petals at the gate is a devotional offering to life—one that says “I welcome you, come, show me what you have to offer.” —Roland, my beloved furry four legged demonstrates the cycle of creativity—which includes longing and belonging—you might hear the pitter patter of his paws and the striking of his tail as he “hunts” one of his favorite toys. —the Divine is available and moves through us during the entire cycle of creative flow—asking us to open our love, feel our love even more than we believe we can. —a sacred invitation from the Mistress of Longing. —when your sadness reaches for you, will you reach back?  —being with grief/working with titration/loving and trusting our wisdom to navigate sorrow and the unknown —the possibility of rejoicing in wanting to be wanted—this is a very (w)holy and basic desire. —creating healing stories —whatever you feel, it’s an expression of love reaching for you.  —longing as an expression of love. —love is a constant invitation & you have not been forgotten. —if we want to embrace our longing, we must first begin with what is already here and longing FOR us —a guided heart meditation. Don’t forget to make sure you’re on my email list! A special offering goes out on Valentine’s for your PLEASURE. To sign up, go here https://www.shegathersbeauty.com/.  As always, if you like what you hear, please share it with a friend. This helps grow the podcast and reach as many longing hearts as possible. Thanks for listening! I value your time and am grateful for you.