Even if you don’t know it yet

or your life has made you forget,

I want you to know you are one too.

{This post is not about a book, but it starts with one…} One of my favourite books as a teenager was Women Who Run With The Wolves: Myths & Stories of The Wild Women Archetype by Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés, I brought this book everywhere with me, it hid behind an upright textbook during class, accompanied me on bus rides and helped pass the time during breaks at my first job . The book helped shape the type of woman I would become, but at the time its  lessons were lost on me, I didn’t understand the profound importance of its message. I only knew that it stirred something in me. To give you an idea of what that was, here’s the synopsis:

Within every woman there lives a powerful force, filled with good instincts, passionate creativity, and ageless knowing. She is the Wild Woman, who represents the instinctual nature of women. But she is an endangered species. In Women Who Run With the Wolves, Dr. Estés unfolds rich intercultural myths, fairy tales, and stories, many from her own family, in order to help women reconnect with the fierce, healthy, visionary attributes of this instinctual nature. Through the stories and commentaries in this remarkable book, we retrieve, examine, love, and understand the Wild Woman and hold her against our deep psyches as one who is both magic and medicine. Dr. Estés has created a new lexicon for describing the female psyche. Fertile and life-giving, it is a psychology of women in the truest sense, a knowing of the soul.

It’s a lot to take in. Even now when I feel more certain about my womanhood, the book’s title still calls to me when I feel like I’ve reached the limit of my capabilities.  Then I remember, I AM A WOMAN WHO RUNS WITH THE WOLVES.  I can go further. Push harder. Dig deeper. I can find what I need inside of myself. The strength. The courage. The discipline. The resolve. The energy.  The conviction. And yet, there is something else…

I have surrounded myself with other women who run with the wolves.  My pack. The women I have the honour of calling my friends, my sisters and my teachers. I will run for these women and run beside these women until my last breath. I will support their dreams. Celebrate their accomplishments. Lift them up. Hold their hand. Lend them courage. Fight for their rights. I will always see their light.

Your girlfriends play an important role in your life.  They are powerful. They influence, impact and shift you.  They can bring you up or drag you down.  Be ruthless about the company you keep. Remember what I said:  I will run for these women and run beside these women until my last breath. I will support their dreams. Celebrate their accomplishments. Lift them up. Hold their hand. Lend them courage. Fight for their rights. I will always see their light. This is not too much. This is the minimum standard of sisterhood.  You owe this to them and they owe this to you. Make no time for the women that walk with the sheep. Surround yourself with women who RUN WITH THE WOLVES {howl}.

Light & Love, 

SheWolf, 

Alicia.