Summer Series: Freeing Our World from Patriarchy and Other Systems of Oppression with Samantha Nolan Smith

Wild + (finally fcking) Free: Real & Raw Stories of Midlife & Metamorphosis

Samantha Nolan-Smith believes we can reshape the world when more diverse voices and perspectives are shared and heard. She knows that as we break through the silencing influences that have been plaguing women for millennia (hello patriarchy), new ways of living, working, and relating to one another and to the planet, will become apparent. What she also knows is that we cannot do this individually. The the collective voices of women must be expressed. Social, economic and political change is needed to address the challenges of the 21st century. Women's voices are critical to ensuring those changes are equitable, innovative, and sustainable. It's time for us to speak up.

This podcast episode with Samantha, CEO of the School of Visibility was so thoughtful and thought-provoking, it will be reverberating through my mind and soul for years to come. Our rich conversation covers:

- Samantha’s shift from a 20 year old high functioning, type A young woman who battled on the inside with depression and anxiety, and did not feel safe in her body to the 50 year old thought leader full of quiet power and deep self trust, anchored in her own identity and intrinsic value.

- How the patriarchy (which is first evidenced more than 4500 years ago in writings from the Sumerians which speak about a woman being hit in the mouth with a brick for speaking out) influences and shapes both our boys and girls and forms a system of oppression that most of us so familiar with, we cannot see the ocean of conditioning we are living in

- Samantha’s journey through chronic fatigue and how she was forced to feel the emotions from big T and little t traumas in earlier life, her gentle path forward and the way this has informed her quiet, safe, simple environments she has created for herself - including the way in which she does business.

- The important of not only healing our individual stories around not taking up too much space (being too loud, too enthusiastic, too big, too [fill in the blank here]) but also healing the collective stories we have been conditioned to believe - and our favourite starting point which would be blowing up the good girl BS on all levels - the good mum, the good wife/partner, the good worker, the good friend, the good daughter, the good caregiver, ect etc etc!

- My own personal chiropractic adjustment of the soul moment when Samantha says “It is a radical act to centre yourself in your life and then take up space from there”. I don’t know about you, but that will stay with me for a very very long time indeed.

You can find Samantha and the work she does in the world online here

Also mentioned: Carol Gilligan book “Why Does the Patriarchy Persist?”
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