A Letter to the Woman Defining Herself by What She Does // Leah Jacobson
Have you ever wondered why we are so divided as women today? There are mommy wars, with different women setting up camp on different sides of every issue - everything from how you school your children to how your kids sleep. Then there are arguments between women who work and women who are at home with their kids. And that’s not even scratching the surface of division within our political system as women living in America, or issues that are dividing us within the church. A quick look at everything from headlines to Instagram stories is a daily reminder of the division that many of us are seeing in our daily lives as Catholic women.
Then there’s feminism, but it doesn’t seem to be uniting us by addressing core problems we all face as women. In fact, in my experience, even conversations around the topic of what feminism is and isn’t can be divisive.
Maybe you feel that being a woman today comes with unrealistic expectations and a side of shame for not doing it all, not being enough, or not having it all together perfectly. You’re worried you’re not measuring up, and those worries are only enforced each time you compare yourself to your sister, your best friend, the mom’s from your small group, the woman you sit behind at church, your neighbor, or the gal you follow on Instagram but you’ve never met.
In today’s episode, I’m sitting down with Leah Jacobson.
Ten years ago, Leah founded The Guiding Star Project, care centers you can find around the nation that empower women to understand, embrace, and love their natural bodies. Today, it’s her goal to spread the word about wholistic feminism - a principle that has been at the heart of The Guiding Star Project for the past decade. Leah writes about how the American women’s movement has defined success in a way that keeps us always striving, but never fully arriving.
Today, we’re having a conversation about the history of different waves of feminism here in the US, the good and bad of the results of those waves of feminism, and how realizing and appreciating our distinctly female abilities to ovulate, gestate, and lactate can help us understand what wholistic feminism looks like in today’s world - and provide the key answers to those struggles with expectations, comparison, and frankly, exhaustion, in our lives as women.
If your health is taking a back seat to all of the things on your to-do list, your relationships are strained to the max, and you struggle to overcome guilt, shame, and fear, sister, this letter is for you.
Topics we talked about in this episode:
What wholistic feminism is and how it has shaped The Guiding Star Project for the past decade
A brief overview of the different waves of feminism in American history
How past waves of the feminist movements have failed us, and what grains of truth we can find in them
What ovulating, gestating, and lactating reveal about our nature as women
Leah’s recommendations for daily practices that help you honor your feminine identity and your WHOLE health
Resources you should check out after listening to this episode:
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