Be a good girl.
Don't cry.
What's wrong with you?
Why are you always angry?
Aren't you over that yet?
 
As women, we get all sorts of messages from when we are tiny little girls about how we are meant to behave. Or what not to do. To be a good girl. To not show our true feelings because it'll upset someone else. 
 
But what happens to us when we suppress those feelings? When we don't have a healthy way of dealing with them? When all we do is push them down further every time they dare to bubble up?
 
We get women who are disconnected from themselves. Who don't know what they are feeling. Who don't know what they want because they've never been asked or even thought to ask themselves. Who keep thinking and thinking and thinking but never really deal with the underlying causes. 
 
Women are allowed to feel and be the entire range of the 88 keys of a piano. They DO NOT need to stay within the 5 or so “acceptable” keys. You are allowed, hell, you NEED to, feel the entire range of your emotions. The rage, the fear, the grief, the sadness, the p*ssed offness, the joy, the happiness, the turn on, your radiance. But how do we do that?
 
As part of my coaching training, I have been learning about ways to help you feel into those emotions in a safe controlled way. It's called Swamping. Here is a Spotify playlist for you to use to move through the Swamping practice.
 
Swamping is a practice where you first tap into all the shitty heavy feelings you have going on - you might like to start by focusing in on a particular event, for instance an interaction you had with a work colleague or at Centrelink or with your partner or your kids. Get into that Rage and then press play on your playlist and start moving with it. Punch a pillow, jump up and down, throw a tantrum like a 2 yo, scream. Do what ever it is that you need to to move that angry energy through your body. 
 
Then you move into Grief. Quite often our rage is disguised as grief. Feel that sadness in your body and move with it in the way your body needs to move with it. Cry if you want to. Wail if you can. 
 
Finally, you move into Turn On. Into bringing yourself back to yourself. Back to your inner light, your inner radiance. Gently caress your body, your face. Move your hips. Find the most pleasurable way to move your body right now. You are a Goddess in her most radiant power. Feel that. BE THAT. 
 
Have a go at Swamping and let me know how you go. If you have any questions about Swamping, please feel free to ask away. 

​I love the warmer weather. I'm not a huge fan of shoes at home and once it starts to warm up, I'm barefoot outside as much as possible. Feeling into the ground, getting dirty and being closer to nature. 
 
As I age, I am embracing this side of myself, the one that is supremely happy being dirty, not wearing much and relishing the sunshine. The inner child who just wants to make mud pies or mud angels or stomp her feet in puddles. The more I allow myself to play, to give myself permission to follow my intuition, the more I enjoy each and every day. 
 
I remind myself that we are only on this earth for a short time. I can find joy in each and everything I do as long as I remember to look for it. A nice simple way of doing this is to change your phrasing around tasks that you don't particularly enjoy. 
 
For instance, instead of “I have to do the dishes” try using “I get to… ”. You get to do the dishes because you have a home, a kitchen and food in the fridge. 
 
“I have to do my tax” becomes “I get to do my tax” because I receive an income which allows me to live in comfort. 
 
“I have to take the kids to soccer" becomes “I get to take the kids to soccer” because they enjoy it and I have the money for them to be able to play sport.
 
So what do you “get to” do today? I'd love to hear how you've been able to rephrase one of your less than desirable tasks, comment below to let me know.  

When was the last time you prioritised your pleasure over what is expected of you? When you listened to what it was that YOU wanted rather than someone else's ideas? When you picked YOU over everyone else?
 
So many women are people pleasers. We feel that we need to care for everyone else and make sure that they are happy regardless of what we want or how we feel. We don't honour our "NO" because the other person might get upset or be unhappy with that response. 
 
And then sadly, if we do honour our “NO” it's often not respected as a whole answer. You never have to justify or explain your reason to someone for saying “NO”.

​“NO” is and has always been a whole answer. 
 
Standing for your boundaries, standing for what it is that you want, being in your power has historically been frowned on for women. We've come a long way from being regarded as the property of our fathers and then the property of our husbands. BUT there still is a lot of push back on women taking their own power and agency over their own lives and bodies.

It seems as though no matter what we do, someone will have something to say about it. I am working towards, and am helping women to demand it, of a world where we can do what makes us happy without comment.

Keep your own last name. Change your last name. Not getting married. Getting married. Not having kids. Having kids. Returning to work after having kids. Not returning to work after having kids. Having multiple lovers. Being celibate. Drinking. Not drinking. Travelling the world solo. Doing yoga eight times a week. Not exercising. Taking pole dancing classes. Wearing a bra. Not wearing a bra. Leaving your body hair where it is. Removing your body hair. Having your nails done. Having a boob job. Sunbathing nude. Dancing in the moonlight howling at the moon. 
 
My dream is that as you read this post you start to see ways how you can honour what it is that YOU want. Because life is far too damn short to care about what other people think about what you are doing! 

​So you've found out about Qoya but you're still a little unsure about what it is and how it can help you. I thought I would share with you how it helped me and how I have seen it help other women who are coming to my classes.
 
Before I go on, I'd like to let you in on a little secret. You are a divine being that is perfect as you are right now. EXACTLY as you are right now. There is no thing you must achieve or goal you must reach to become perfect. You are worthy. You are incredible. And you are deserving of love - especially your own love. You should be loving yourself sick! Look at you!! You are a miracle of life.
 
As human beings, we spend all our waking moments thinking. Our brains are working 24/7 (thank goodness or we'd all die in our sleep) but sometimes the thoughts we have can be negative and downright nasty. The idea of embodiment practices such as Qoya, is to redirect the mind's thought processes to feeling into our bodies. During a class, I invite you to feel into your body with questions like:

• How can you make this movement feel even better?
• What does it feel like to follow your heart?
• What does the hand that you shook feel like compared to the other hand that stayed still?
• What does it feel like when you are connected to your inner power? And where in your body do you feel it?

 
This process of concentrating on what particular emotions feel like in your body can be very enlightening. To notice what an emotion feels like and then using it as a dance partner, without thinking or choreographing, just moving the way your body wants to move with that feeling. Dancing with themes like "Wild", "Free", "Love Yourself", "Power Within" and "Shine Your Light" enable you to explore and notice things you may never have noticed about yourself before. You may have a realisation or an epiphany. That's when the magic happens.
 
For me, Qoya has helped me to realise and feel my own power and strength. That I am so much stronger than I have ever given myself credit for and I can do so much more than I ever thought I could. That the world is my oyster. That life is too short to worry about the size of my belly and that if I want to do something, I can and I should do it.
 
I don't think I would have ever worn a bikini if not for Qoya. I certainly never had any desire to open my own business - actually just the idea filled me with dread. I've stopped standing in my own way. Now if I see an opportunity, I will give it a go. Let them say no to me, rather than me being too scared to try and saying no to myself. I've pushed my edges in ways I never imagined and met some incredible women along the way. Women who have shown me that we are not in competition with each other. That another woman's success is to be celebrated as it raises us all higher.
 
I've seen Qoya work its magic for the women who are coming to my classes. It's helped them heal after heartbreak, shift the way they think about their body, empowered them to take a stand when they were being treated poorly. It's reminded them of the joy of moving their bodies for fun rather than the "no pain no gain" mentality of the gym. That dance doesn't need to be set steps or kept only for the nightclub floor. That the idea of "there's no way to do it wrong" in Qoya helped them to ditch perfectionist ideals in their everyday life. Unless its brain surgery, of course!
 
Qoya is a dance class like no other, and the benefits are more than you can ever imagine. I urge you to take advantage of your first free class and see if Qoya is for you. 

​As much as Qoya is an adult dance class, it is equally (if not more so) a spiritual practice. It is a safe space for women to gather, share, connect, feel and dance. It is for this reason that I set sacred space as part of my ritual to prepare the room for a Qoya class. 

Setting sacred space is the practice of bringing positive energy into a space through actions and thoughts. There are many different ways to set sacred space and it might be something that you do yourself, but didn't know that's what it's called. You can smudge the room with sage or palo santo, spritz a smudge spray, burn incense, dance, sing, meditate, set up an altar, call in the four directions, chant... there really are lots of ways to bring positive energy into a room.  

I use a number of ways to set sacred space. It not only prepares the room but it also prepares me for the class. I hold space for my dancers to allow them to experience the class in the way they need to. I ensure they feel safe to explore what they are feeling and empowered to share their experiences.  They are valued, heard and held exactly as they are at the time. 

To start setting sacred space, I pick a gentle Spotify playlist to play to set the mood in the room. I then move on to preparing my altar. I use mats, candles, crystals, oracle cards, leaves and flowers from my garden to build it. Each altar is unique to that particular class. While I set up my altar, I calm my mind from the day that was and try to be as present as I can be. 

Next I roll out my yoga mats, one for each dancer and one for me. My yoga mats are from Jarin Street, a female owned and operated indigenous business from Gadigal country (Sydney). The artwork on the mats is by indigenous women artists who are all recognised and properly compensated for their art. I had been eyeing these mats for weeks before I launched Sunranges Qoya but thought they were out of my price range. Then I won some money on the Melbourne Cup (and no I don't know anything about horse racing, it was a fluke!) and decided that it was a sign to buy them. I now have one of each of their designs. 

I light my bundle of sage and first smudge myself as another way to help ground and prepare me for the class. I then dance around the outside of the room with the sage, calling in the spirit of the Qoya to help me to create a sacred space. The word Qoya means "Queen" as an empowered woman, however there was also an ancient group of people who lived around Lake Titicaca, Peru that were called the Qoya. In my mind's eye, I am calling the Qoya of the Qoya, the empowered women of the people to help me with my class. 

I go on to sage each of the yoga mats to purify them and then the altar, in particular the oracle cards. I want to ensure that each woman who comes to my class is able to select the card that calls to her without interference from my energy or the energy of a previous class. I put my sage into the paua shell I bought in New Zealand in an upright position to allow the sage to burn itself out. 

Lastly, I go to my own mat and start to mediate while I wait for my dancers to arrive.  

How do you set the mood for your own self care practices and rituals? I'd love to hear about them in the comments below!