Being aware of our connection to our presence regenerates our personal power.
Today for my first-of-the-month newsletter I'm doing something different. I thought it would be an interesting idea to interview one of our online course authors. We are blessed to have such a wide range of course topics from some amazing teachers and healers. What follows is an edited transcription of my conversation with Jumana Sophia, author of Unleash the Goddess Within. I've known Jumana for about 11 years now, and it has been an honor to watch her teach and support women to come home to themselves.
Madisyn Taylor: Let's start by talking about what a goddess is because I think that word is confusing to people and scary-it's a mystery. So what is a goddess?
Jumana Sophia: There are so many answers to that question, and I think that's because when you start to move toward referencing or interacting with the feminine divine, what you're interacting with is something that's ultimately unnamable. When I think about goddess, it's more about that deep feminine current that's been with us from the beginning. You know when she's present-you know when you're feeling her.
MT: Speaking as an American woman, we live in a very young country. Do you think American women struggle more with the idea of goddess than other women around the world?
JS: There is something powerful about being in America because there is such a freshness, there's such possibility and potential, and yet there's something orphaned. What's interesting is that the deep feminine traditions were interrupted thousands of years ago. So it's not just America that doesn't really have a strong living connection to an authentic femininity. A lot of those traditions came up and were created with the exclusion of women.
MT: In your course you mention "priestess poise." What is this? I like saying it, it feels good to me.
JS: It is an alignment in the body, but it's also an alignment with forces that are bigger than us. What priestess poise feels like to you is going to be a little different for me. We're finding our subtleties. A big part of the essence of priestess is a woman who steps into being a woman as an instrument of something greater. It's a specific kind of vessel on a specific kind of power and beauty. It is all the ways we think and believe and hope that we're going to keep ourselves safe. But when we're up and out of the root, especially when we're not down in the bowl, down in our hips, and down in our bodies, we're actually more vulnerable and less safe.
MT: In the course description you write about leaking and losing personal power. As a person who grew up with trauma, I'm always in that fight-or-flight response. I want to mention a few signs for women to look for to see if they are leaking their power: overthinking, worrying too much, feeling self-doubt a lot of the time, not trusting yourself, secretly not believing in yourself, settling for less, abandoning or despising your body, feeling deeply alone, either shrinking or becoming big and tough, and more. All of these are some signs that let you know you could be leaking power or losing your power.
JS: It is especially true for us as women that being aware of our connection to the ground and to our womb and to just our presence is what keeps our personal power regenerating. We have this cup and it needs to be constantly filled. What women often do is erase ourselves out of the picture. Priestess poise won't allow you to do that. It keeps you present so that whatever is happening and whatever we're doing in relationships or in work, we can remain present.
MT: I love when you write in the course, "When you walk into a room the energy shifts because you are in it-because you are the woman in the room." I have to say that when I finally became a healthy and whole person that is what I felt and feel like. And I notice it in other people and I noticed it actually with you too. It wasn't anything you said or anything you did and it wasn't even necessarily the way you carried yourself. It was your energy. It was just you being in your full power.
JS: I love the way you're describing that because I think that's where a lot of us get tripped up. We think our power is going to look a certain way, or there's this constant feeling of trying to get somewhere: trying to get to our power; trying to be more beautiful.
MT: Later in the course you mention the term "queen." Tell me about her.
JS: She's related to priestess poise in a way. It's pulling away all these veils of illusion about what a powerful woman is, what a beautiful woman is, what it is to have nobility. What a true queen does is that she comes under her people and she lifts them up. A queen has her realm-it's your family, it's your work, it's your home, your relationships. When we really sit in that place of enthroned poise, that's when we're of true service to our realm. We don't do this top-down thing. We come from underneath and lift up.
MT: That is a very different energy. Once women go through this, they will understand. It might not make sense now, but when you are in it, it just feels right and you will recognize it. Tell me about some feedback you have received from women that have taken your course.
JS: Women have had all sorts of different kinds of external circumstantial changes in terms of relationships, jobs, energy levels, and more. Overall, the general feedback is about feeling at home in themselves, feeling like there's actual power in them now.
MT: I think a lot of times when we do course work we can get laid out for a while. We're on the sofa laid out, we need to really marinate in the work and integrate it.
JS: It's true because what's happening is you're remembering something that was always true in the first place. Instead of going into another habit of collapse or panic or giving ourselves away, there's a whole different pathway of possibility there.
MT: Being able to create your own safe place to land within yourself, I can't think of anything more empowering than that. I want to read a paragraph that you wrote about why you created this course, and I just think it's really beautiful and I want women to hear this: "I created this course to support an end to the epidemic of women who overthink, over-question themselves, falter in the face of big choices, don't trust themselves, don't believe in themselves, settle for less, abandon their bodies, and feel deeply alone." I want to end our conversation there because I really want people to take the course, I don't want to give it all away-it is too special. Do you have any closing words for our readers?
JS: As you were reading that paragraph I thought to myself, "I want to take that course!" [laughs] I think that there is something that's emerging in all of us women right now.
MT: Thank you, Jumana.
I hope you now have a good idea about how special Jumana is and how amazing her course is for women. She is a friend and a true force of embodying what she teaches. If you are someone who doubts yourself, settles for less, despises your body, or feels deeply alone, you can learn to cultivate your personal power. If you are interested in Jumana's course, you can learn more about it below.
I hope you have enjoyed this format, and I look forward to seeing you on the first of next month with a new course author interview!
Be well,
Madisyn Taylor
Co-Founder, Editor-In-Chief
DailyOM
