August 31, 2025 • 54 mins
What if everything you've been told about feminine power is wrong?
In a world that tells women to "be like men" to succeed, attorney-turned-feminine wisdom teacher Julie Dean Richards reveals why embracing your cyclical, intuitive, and receptive nature is actually your greatest superpower.
Discover why the divine feminine has been deliberately suppressed, how sacred rage can transform your life, and why your personal "heroine's journey" looks nothing like the masculine hero's path you've been conditioned to follow.
If you're a high-achieving woman feeling burned out, disconnected from your body, or constantly competing instead of collaborating, this episode will fundamentally shift how you view feminine power. Julie shares practical tools for embodiment, the hidden meanings behind 60+ sacred feminine symbols, and how to work WITH your natural cycles instead of against them.
This isn't about adding more self-care to your to-do list—it's about remembering who you really are.
Key Takeaways
Your worth isn't tied to your productivity - The feminine thrives in being, not just doing.
Sacred rage is medicine - Anger, when properly channeled, becomes transformative healing energy
Competition is programming - The feminine naturally collaborates, like trees sharing resources through root systems
Julie Dean Richards is an intuitive astrologer, herbalist, doula, and founder of Feminine Alchemist School. After working as a research consultant then practicing as an attorney, Julie discovered her true calling in helping women reclaim their sacred feminine power. She guides women through their personal heroine's journey using astrology, embodiment practices, and ancient feminine wisdom.
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Rose Wippich bridges ancient wisdom and modern life, teaching people how to tap into their natural healing abilities. As an Energy Alchemist, she guides women towards vibrant health and helps them rewrite limiting narratives around aging and step into their sovereign power. Discover how to protect your energy, honor your boundaries, and reconnect with your true desires. Your journey to energetic sovereignty starts here.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Rose (00:00):
Whether you're feeling overwhelmed by career demands,
seeking to understand ancientfeminine symbols and their
relevance today, or simplycurious about what the divine
feminine actually means.
Beyond the buzzwords, thisconversation offers valuable
insights you can immediatelyapply to your daily life.
So get ready to discover howmoon cycles can inform your work
(00:22):
schedule, how herbs can supportyour feminine essence and how
understanding your personalheroine's journey can transform
how you navigate challenges.
This isn't about addingself-care to your to-do list.
It's about fundamentallyshifting how you experience your
feminine power in a modernworld, ready to unlock your most
(00:43):
vibrant, authentic self.
Your journey to radiantwellness starts now.
Welcome to Chat Off the Mat.
I'm your host, Rose Wippich, andI'm here to guide you on an
extraordinary journey offeminine healing, energy, work
and total well-being.
Get ready to be inspired byauthentic conversations with
leading women practitioners,wellness experts and holistic
(01:06):
healers who understand yourunique journey.
Subscribe to Chat Off the Mat,wherever you get your podcasts,
and let's create magic together.
Today, I'm thrilled to welcomea true Renaissance woman of
holistic feminine wisdom.
She's an intuitive astrologerwho reads the language of the
stars, a knowledgeable herbalistwho harnesses nature's healing
(01:28):
power, a compassionate doula whoguided countless women through
the sacred threshold of birthand a dedicated advocate for the
divine feminine in all itsforms.
In our fast-paced,productivity-obsessed world,
many women find themselvesdisconnected from their deeper
feminine wisdom, leading toburnout, health challenges and a
(01:48):
sense that something essentialis missing from their lives.
Our guest, Julie Dean Richards,has devoted her life to helping
women reclaim their sacredfeminine power through practical
rituals, herbal support and anunderstanding of their unique
heroine's journey.
Welcome, Julie.
Julie (02:07):
Thank you so much.
I'm so excited to be here.
Rose (02:10):
I'm excited that you're here as well.
I didn't mention in the introwhat career you came from, but
maybe you want to kind ofintegrate that into your own
personal narrative.
Julie (02:20):
Oh sure, yeah, so I'm actually an attorney.
I'm still a licensed attorney,but before I was an attorney and
I think where my story reallystarts is when I worked in
research.
So I actually, right out ofcollege, my major was in this
communications piece but my reallove was the research piece and
(02:42):
that was kind of like my minoror my emphasis.
And so I got swooped up by abig tech company right out of
college to be a consultant on,you know, big research projects
for high touch clients likeHarvard, Yale, Stanford, google,
like you name it.
I've worked with them and youknow what I would do with the
(03:04):
logistics part of the research.
And people would come and saywe have this study we want to do
.
I would help them go throughand say, okay, we need to change
the study this way, this is howwe can do it.
And they would say is itpossible for us to get this many
participants in Bangladesh andhow can we do that?
And I would figure out all thelogistics of how to do the study
and everything like that.
And it was during that processI really started to kind of
(03:33):
question my own reality andbecome more open-minded, because
I was raised by a nurse andlike a super, like totally
normal Western family.
You never would have guessedwhere I would end up today.
And it was during that process Istarted to see something that I
think all of us know, but likethat the world is ruled by money
, you know.
(03:56):
But for me it was like this bigwake-up call, like oh, these
studies that I'm consulting on,the data is getting switched,
and there's these pieces andthis is not the research that
they taught me in school andlike this is not how we're
supposed to be doing research.
And I found out that it wasn'tjust like my company or whatever
, it's just the researchindustry.
You know there's so much thatwe take for granted as like
(04:20):
we're just like, oh, it's thisgreat study out of Harvard.
And it's like, actually, youknow that data isn't what you
think it is.
You know that came from a placeyou don't know where it actually
came from, and so for me itbecame this like ethical issue
and I tried so hard to stay init and you know, be helpful, and
(04:41):
of course, everybody hasexplanations for why it works
the way that it does, but Ifinally there was actually a
completely fraudulent study thathappened and I was, and it
ended up being published.
Like I, it was not my project,it was a friend of mine's
project but I knew that the datahad been faked and so finally I
(05:03):
said I'm totally out of here,like I can't do this anymore.
This is not for me.
But that experience really mademe start to question my own
reality.
Like what do I believe?
What are actually my beliefs?
Like, what do I think aboutthis?
And so I started doing my ownresearch and I started
unraveling my own belief systemand things like that, and so I
(05:24):
became more open-minded.
And that open-mindednessallowed me to enter into the
world of things like astrologyand the sacred feminine.
And you know, of course it'sdrop by drop.
You know, it doesn't happen allat once.
Rose (05:37):
Yes, you're right.
Julie (05:38):
Yeah, it's just, it's drop by drop, and so I had met a
woman.
I went on this herbalistretreat and I met this woman at
this herbalist retreat and shewas like you've got to meet my
niece.
And it turns out her niece islike a big time astrologer and I
didn't know that.
And we met up and she asked methe fateful question what time
(06:01):
were you born?
When were you born?
Right?
And she started telling methings about my life she
couldn't have possibly known.
And we just hit it off andbecame such good friends and
that really I couldn't stopresearching.
From that time I had to knoweverything about it.
I still was going to law schoolbecause that was still my path.
(06:21):
You know that experience withthat fraudulent study really
pushed me to want to go into lawand learn about it and so I was
already an astrologer when Istarted at law school.
But it's just really moved fromthere and my experience in law
school was actually what pushedme even more into the sacred
feminine and realizing, oh mygoodness, women need this so
(06:43):
much.
We need to open up our innerdivinity.
So, because I found out, when Iwas in law school, I was
pregnant with my daughter, withmy third child, totally
unexpectedly, and I was like, ohmy gosh, I can't bring my baby
girl into this world, you know,and I had already been studying
(07:03):
the sacred feminine a little bit, but then it really opened up
everything and I think this wasbecause, you know, I was in this
very masculine environment likelaw.
There's like there's no moremasculine environment than law
school, right, like it's justthe most masculine environment
you can have.
And so it really pushed me theopposite way, that like I had
(07:24):
this life growing inside of meand doing this such a feminine
process and being with that, andso the sacred feminine helped
me to balance that and to learnso much more and I just realized
, you know, this is what I needto do with my life.
Wow.
Rose (07:40):
So that's my story.
That's an amazing story.
Wow, I love it.
Oh, such a journey to to get towhere you are today and to
embrace it and to understandearly on in your life that, hey,
you know, I I can still be alawyer, but I still have this
other passion and learn, andlearning astrology is not easy
(08:01):
either, because I've lovedastrology like most of my life,
but for me it's been.
I understand a lot of it, butto take it and explain it the
way an astrologer does, Icouldn't do that.
But let's talk about the divinefeminine.
How would you define the divinefeminine and how does it differ
from cultural stereotypes aboutfemininity?
Julie (08:23):
Oh yeah, totally.
Cultural stereotypes aboutfeminine femininity?
Oh yeah, totally.
So you know, for some people,that the divine, when they hear
the word divine feminine, thisis like such a buzzword right
now.
People are talking about it allthe time and people have
different definitions, and thisis that's why sometimes I like
to use sacred feminine asanother alternative to divine
feminine, and not that I don'tlove that word, I love the
(08:44):
divine feminine.
But for some people, there arecultures, right, and people who
worship a goddess, right, anactual divine feminine deity who
is a goddess.
But most of what we're which Ithink is amazing, and I also
personally have this as part ofmy beliefs and things like that
but when we're talking about thedivine feminine, it's about the
(09:04):
fact that inside of you, right,inside of every woman, there is
a divine part of you, thissacred feminine part.
There is a goddess livinginside of you, right?
You have an inner goddess inyou and of course, both men and
women, they both have masculineand feminine in them.
Of course, I'm concentrating onwomen because that's who I work
(09:25):
with the most, and so, yeah, ofcourse men also have this
sacred feminine piece of them.
But for women it's reallyimportant because I think most
of the time this is not alwaystrue for all people, but most of
the time for women we're about90-10 when it comes to this.
We've got this feminine pieceand how this differs.
(09:49):
So for people who are freakingout right now, how could you say
that about femininity and howcould you stereotype?
The divine feminine is sodifferent than our stereotype.
When we think about femininity,we think about a 1950s world in
most cases, right Like womenpregnant barefoot in the kitchen
.
You know.
Rose (10:10):
In a cocktail dress or in a nice dress.
You know all dolled up.
Julie (10:14):
Yes, yes, yes, totally, and that's the whole thing is
like no, that is not femininity.
Femininity is not like yourability to cook and clean, like
femininity is not just yourability to create or raise
children.
Femininity is not being meekand submissive, like that is not
the sacred feminine.
That is not femininity.
(10:35):
Those are societal expectationsthat we've created and roles
that we've created based on oursociety and the culture that we
live in.
The sacred feminine is very welearn about her.
So this is going to be verydifferent than most people are
used to.
So I want to take the yin yangsymbol, because I think it's
such a beautiful epitaph of this.
(10:58):
But when you think about the yinand the yang, for people who
don't know, the yin yang kind oflooks like two fish swimming
around each other.
That's what it's supposed to beand there's a white side and a
black side and each one has adot on it.
That's the opposite color.
So the white has a black dotand the black has a white dot,
and these represent themasculine and the feminine.
And most people would be like,well, isn't the feminine the
(11:21):
white fish?
And it's like no, no, no, thefeminine is actually the black
fish.
It's the black part of that,the yang side or the yin side of
things.
And so the feminine if we thinkabout these two colors, white
and black well, white is goingto be more associated with
daytime, brightness, lightoutside right, and then the dark
piece is going to be moreassociated with the moon,
(11:44):
darkness, softness, creation.
And so the sacred feminine is alot more about this womb space,
right, if we think about like awomb or, in ancient times, like
one of the symbols of thedivine feminine is the cave,
which is like such a greatsymbol for that, because it's
dark, it's wet, it's warm.
It's the void where anything ispossible.
(12:04):
Right, everything is possiblein this space, and we have
conditioned ourselves to be soafraid of that space.
You know, we're like, oh, thesun is good and the nighttime is
bad, and like the dark.
You know, but black is a colorfor darkness and evil and white
is a color for goodness, andthat's just not the way that it
works.
You know that is not the truth.
(12:25):
The truth is that both havevalue and both need each other,
and that's the point of the yinyang symbol.
You have to have both right.
And even in a sunny day, youstill have shade and you need
shade during that sunny day,right, and that is like that
black part of the white yangsymbol.
And even during the night, youneed light, and that's the stars
and the moon, and they all playa part together and they're all
(12:47):
working together, right.
And so I want women tounderstand you are this creative
space where anything ispossible, right, ever shifting,
but constant growing andlearning all the time and making
you know you make everythinghappen.
You are the veil, right, likeyou weave time and space
(13:10):
together, right, not just withyour body, with your soul, with
your heart.
And I think people are reallyscared of that because they've
never heard it that way before.
But it's so, so important forus to understand that, because
in our modern society we've madeit so only that white part is
(13:31):
good, like we have made it soonly the day is good, only
summer is good.
Oh, winter is so bad, it'sterrible.
The nighttime is bad, it's ugly.
And we've told women over andover again to be successful, you
must be like a man, you have tobe like summertime.
You got to be on all the time.
You got to be shining all thetime.
You got to be like big and boldand bright all the time Not
(13:52):
emotional.
Yeah, you can't be emotional.
Burn off all your emotions,right.
Instead of being like, no,you're actually like the moon
and you can work in your owntides.
Right, like you can pull thosetides and you can shift and
change every single day.
And you can do that in thissofter way that brings
everything to you, cause that'sthe part of the feminine.
The feminine is the cave,because she receives everything,
(14:15):
she gets everything intoherself.
She not only does she create,right, Like she is like the
honeybee.
She takes in this dust and shemakes this beautiful honey out
of it.
Right, taking in this pollenand receiving, receiving and
then making magic out of that.
And that is truly the divinefeminine.
Rose (14:32):
That is awesome.
I love the way you explainedthat it was.
I was just so captivated by theway you were explaining
everything and I love that youuse the yin yang symbol, because
I use it a lot in my practiceas a yoga and Qigong instructor.
I use it a lot in my practiceas a yoga and Qigong instructor
and, yeah, it's like embodyingthis beautiful receptive quality
that we forget that we have,and you know, being a part of
(14:54):
this male society where wealways have to compete, even
against other women, it's reallynot supportive, no, no.
And it's really wonderful thatyou're doing the work to help
women reconnect with the sacreddivine feminine and that we need
to embrace it and not forget itand to create the environment.
(15:15):
We have the power to create theenvironment and move towards
more of a society where we'reworking together and
collaborating, versus competingagainst each other and inviting
more of that yin quality.
I love that.
Julie (15:27):
Totally and like women, you know, especially, but the
divine feminine in general.
I mean, I know we'll probablytalk more about symbols later,
but I wanted to bring up thetree, because it's one we see
all the time.
We talk about the tree of lifeand you can see it in necklaces
and jewelry.
Well, that's a symbol of thedivine feminine and people don't
realize that.
And at first, you know,scientists thought that trees
(15:50):
competed right in the forest.
They were competing for light,they were competing for
resources, they were competingfor water, because that's our
assumption, right?
Our assumption is, like animalscompete, they compete for food
and resources, but trees don'tcompete like that.
Trees actually collaborate.
Now we know, right, trees areconnected through the root
system and through myocilliumpathways in the ground.
(16:13):
They communicate with eachother, they talk to each other,
they give each other resourcesand they collaborate.
They don't compete, they helpeach other, they communicate
with each other and they allhelp each other grow.
They will keep what looks likea stump alive for hundreds of
years.
Actually, now we know, they'llgive resources to it because
they love it.
Right, like they are acollaborating community.
(16:35):
And that tree stump gives itswisdom back, it communicates to
the other trees, and it helpsthem get away from danger and it
gives.
So that's the society that thedivine feminine could create.
Is this collaborative societywhere we work together instead
of always, always having tocompete with each other.
Rose (16:52):
I love that that is so true.
And I love also how you talkabout trees.
How might one recognize whenthey're disconnected from their
sacred feminine energy?
Julie (17:03):
Yeah, this is a great one , because I think most women are
going to be like oh, I amreally disconnected, right, but
you can't receive meaning likeyou won't let people do things
for you, right, you have to doit yourself.
You know you have a really hardtime asking for help.
You have a really hard time,you know, with this idea of rest
.
You know, if you can't rest, ifyou're go, go, go all the time,
(17:26):
if you feel like you must bedoing to be worthwhile I think
this is a huge one that mostwomen have is if your worth is
inherently connected to what youdo, then you're disconnected
from your divine feminine,because it is not about doing,
it is about being.
And if you hate your body,that's another big disconnection
(17:46):
from the divine feminine,because embodiment is a huge
part of tapping into that sacredfeminine place.
And if you are judging otherwomen, you know backbiting,
talking, feeling like you haveto compete, you have to get on
the top of the food chain andeven if you are afraid to be
(18:07):
seen, that's a really big one ofbeing disconnected to the
divine feminine is being afraidto be your true self, your
authentic self, and being afraidto be seen by other people for
who you truly are.
So I would say those are thereally really big one.
But particularly looking at,where do you get your worth from
?
Is your worth?
(18:27):
The checklist, and finishingthe checklist Is that where your
worth is from.
Is your worth from being betterthan other people in any way?
Is your worth?
You know why.
Why are you saying what you'resaying about other women, or
even men?
Like, where's that coming from?
Is it coming from a place ofcompetition?
Right, cause we can look atsomeone and it's really easy to
(18:50):
to look at these qualities andsay like, oh well, she hasn't
made cause she's so skinny andpretty, and, like, you know,
make these excuses and put stuffon other women or someone who
is, you know, hates on powerfulwomen.
You know, you might want tolook at yourself and maybe
you're disconnected because thefeminine is not afraid of other
people being powerful.
Right, it knows that we're alljust as powerful as each other.
(19:12):
We don't need to compete.
But yeah, that checklist andagain that body piece, is really
important to look at.
Do you hate your body?
Rose (19:20):
That's a big thing?
Yeah, no, that's importantbecause your body changes all
the time.
And having children changesyour body.
Surgeries change your body.
I know voice is reallyimportant.
Women are afraid to be heardand expression, self-expression,
is important as well.
Totally lot of the illnessesthat women have, whether it's
(19:45):
breast cancer or ovarian cancer,any of those cancers or
anything associated with thefemale anatomy, is because we
repress our own authenticity orthat sacred femininity.
Julie (19:56):
Totally, totally, and that and sex is such a big one
to look out to like.
Are you disconnected, can you?
How is intimacy for you?
Because if you're having a bigstruggle in the intimacy
department, then you might bedisconnected from that sacred
feminine Right.
And especially if you're afraidto look at your lady parts, if
those are, you know, scary toyou, if it's scary for you to
(20:19):
have full expression in yoursexuality, that's something
really to to look out there,because, again, the feminine is
receiving right.
And so if you're blockingyourself, especially in intimacy
, if you can't orgasm, if you'rehaving a really hard time, then
there's a piece of you that'snot able to relax.
There's part of you that'sdisconnected from that divine
feminine piece as well.
Rose (20:40):
That's really important.
I'm glad you mentioned thatBecause I think nowadays, well,
that's really important.
I'm glad you mentioned thatbecause I think nowadays women
have more access to help in thatarea, where years ago it was
more of a taboo of a discussionwomen to talk, even with their
doctors.
I think their doctors didn'teven talk about that and
probably may not today.
But we have authority over ourown bodies and if you want to
(21:04):
experience pleasure in any way,just you know, understand how
you are, how you feel, how howyou're not feeling, and to
embrace that sensuality, I thinkthat's super important.
Julie (21:16):
Oh, totally, totally.
And how are your emotionsaround it?
Are you scared of it?
Are you scared of yourself?
Are you afraid?
Are you even letting yourselfhave emotions in general, even
outside of intimacy?
Where are you scared to expressyour emotions and you know?
Or is your default emotion onlyanger?
(21:40):
I think we, in our society,anger is acceptable because it's
more masculine, it's more fiery, it's more you know you're
protecting yourself, you're, youare protecting yourself with
that anger You're lashing out.
The anger is truly a secondaryemotion, right?
What's underneath that anger?
Usually it's sadness,abandonment, hopelessness.
(22:01):
Right, that's what's under theanger.
But we are, we're okayexpressing anger because anger
makes you look strong and big.
Right, like I'm so strong, I'mso big.
And not to say that the divinefeminine cannot rage yes, she
can.
We talk about sacred rage, aton in the work I do.
Rage is so important.
It's important for women tofeel rage.
But lots of times what I willsee in a lot of women who have
(22:23):
really masculinized themselvesis they will turn to anger over
everything.
They're too afraid to cry,they're too afraid to let any
kind of emotion out.
But if it is anger, it's okay,because then they're strong, if
they feel like they can be angryand they're not getting to
those root emotions underneath.
They're trying to hideeverything underneath that fiery
(22:45):
anger, because that's moreacceptable.
Rose (22:50):
Yeah, it makes sense.
And also I feel that if yourepress a lot, you get to a
point where you're numb and youcan't cry.
And you can't express even angeror you're not allowed to.
Yeah, totally walking around,not knowing what you're feeling,
(23:12):
how you're feeling, what'sgoing on and, oh my gosh, sacred
rage.
Talk a little bit about that,because I haven't heard of
anyone that I've known talkabout working with women with
about sacred rage.
How do you, how do you uncoverthat like what women have, and
how do you work with that withwomen?
Julie (23:32):
Yeah, so I love to look at let's look at like another
symbol, cause it can teach us alot about this the ocean, right.
So the ocean, you know it canbe very nourishing and deep, and
like who doesn't love a day atthe beach?
And like being with the oceanand she's got low tides and high
tides, but the ocean can alsorage, right Like, the ocean can
(23:53):
create hurricanes and it canwash over cities and wash out
surfers and divers and boats anddrag boats to the bottom of the
ocean.
Right, like, no one wants tomess with the ocean because, you
know, even though she isbeautiful and nourishing, she's
also the most powerful force onearth.
Right, water is the mostpowerful and sometimes, you know
(24:14):
, she doesn't always look thatway, because she looks soft and
she looks sweet and we drinkwater, but then all of a sudden,
she's beating up against thesecliffs, right, and she's the one
who wears down these cliffsmore and more and makes sand out
of the rock and does all ofthose beautiful things.
So, as women, this is like sucha great view of the divine
(24:35):
feminine within us.
Right, we are all like theocean.
We we can have emotion and wecan have flow, we can have
intuition.
But that rage portion, right,there's not a day, probably,
that the ocean doesn't ragesomewhere.
You know, there's always somestorm.
She's so big.
There's always some storm onthe ocean, and so it's really
important for women to be ableto tap into that rage, and not
(24:59):
now.
I want to talk about thisdistinction between sacred rage
and what I would call somethinglike indignance.
And you know, there there islike petty anger, right?
This anger that we we get forthings like you know, we're mad
about whatever, stubbing our toeor doing something wrong or
(25:23):
whatever.
And then there's sacred rage,and sacred rage is this rage of
you know, something dear to youyou know has been taken away, or
it's this feeling of enough isenough, right, I'm here to
protect my own, I'm here to youknow, make something.
Right, you know, you come tothe end of your rope, and I'll
(25:44):
give you an example of this.
Like, every woman has sacredrage, and that rage can build up
over time, because anger isthis emotion, and especially
sacred rage is really about thisemotion of I deserve to exist,
I deserve to have my needs met,right, I deserve to be here and
I deserve to be listened to.
(26:05):
That's what sacred rage isreally really deeply about.
It can also be aboutgenerational stuff that has come
up over the generations andgenerations of women being
suppressed or whatever it is inyour line that is happening.
But that sacred rage is reallyimportant for the taking charge
of like no, I deserve to exist.
You know, I deserve to be hereand I'm allowed to take up space
(26:30):
, I'm allowed to have myemotions.
And so when we talk about, youknow, sacred rage, we want to
separate it from violence,because the scary thing about
rage and part of the reason, youknow, over hundreds of years,
women have been told you're notallowed to be angry.
(26:50):
You know, just be nice, just benice, be nice to everybody,
just be nice.
You know, sit back, relax,don't tell anyone they've done
anything wrong, right, like,just, you're not allowed to be
angry.
And it's important to breakthrough that.
And the reason that we've oftenbeen told, you know, you can't
be angry is because we're.
(27:10):
And the reason we're scared ofanger is because of the violence
aspect, because we have allseen what violence can do to
people and what anger can do topeople.
It can kill people, it can hurt, hurt people, maim people.
But when we talk about sacredrage, we separate it from
violence, because sacred ragedoesn't have to be violent
against anyone else.
Right, like we do not.
(27:31):
To perform and help ourselves,let go of this rage, we don't
have to be violent and some waysthat we can do that and make it
a safe space.
And that's why it's sacred.
Right, it's sacred becauseyou're setting up a container
for yourself to have this happen.
Just like a temple is sacred,like sacred things happen inside
a temple.
Right, sacred things happen ina special designated space.
(27:53):
And that's the first step withsacred rage is we need a special
designated space that can be acar, like just in your car, can
be a great place to just screamand scream and scream and yell.
You know by yourself that canbe out in the middle of the
woods, you know that, where youcan like throw some, you can
throw rocks into a lake.
That can be whatever space youwant.
It can be your backyard, it canbe your garage, whatever you
(28:15):
want it to be.
And there are places that theyhave now like rage rooms where
you can smash stuff with abaseball bat.
Rose (28:22):
Right, you know what I use ?
My shamanic drum.
Yes, yes, that's perfect.
I used it the other day justfor a minute.
It felt so good.
Julie (28:32):
Yes, rhythm is so important to the feminine.
Rhythm, and drums particularly,can be so healing.
And so what we want to do whenwe want to have sacred rage is
we want to set apart a space forit, a locked door, wherever you
want to be, and then we want toallow ourselves to let go in
that space.
So a great thing that people dosometimes is take a stick and
(28:55):
hit it against the ground, orhit it against rocks or trees.
Like I said, you can throw bigstones into a lake or a river.
If you want to set up somethingin your garage where you can
smash something with a tarpunderneath it, whatever you want
to do, if you want to pound ona drum, you can do that.
But just setting apart yourtime to allow yourself to be
(29:17):
angry.
And sometimes we have to dothis on the fly, right, because
that anger can just boil andboil up and suddenly fly out.
And so maybe just like tuckingyourself into a closet real
quick, or like screaming into apillow, but allowing yourself to
really not just be angry,because there's a difference.
Right, you can be angry and youcan snap at your kids all day
(29:38):
long, right.
Or snap at your husband, yellat someone and say whatever you
want to say.
But actual rage involves a lotof that physicality, letting
yourself get physical, becausewe are very scared of being
physical.
And so one time what I didwhich was really helpful for
people, which might be reallyout of people's comfort zone,
(29:59):
but it's so, it's.
I recommend, highly recommendthis practice is I locked my
door.
Right, this was me all alone inmy bedroom, door locked, window
shut, and I let myself take onthe persona of a dragon, which
can be really helpful.
Like taking on a persona aJaguar or some kind of animal
(30:20):
can really help you if you'rehaving a hard time letting out
rage and you imagine yourself asthis dragon.
And I did, and I allowed myselfto like hit my pillows around
and like tear things up with myteeth and, you know, like let
myself claw and scrape andscream.
You know, and that was so atthe end of that it was so
(30:40):
healing for me I literally laidback on my bed and just laughed.
I like laughed, laughed andlaughed, you know, for a full
belly laugh, because that's whathappens is, once you have
worked through the rage and letit out, then it alchemizes into
something beautiful, right, italchemizes into laughter and joy
.
It alchemizes into letting goin peace.
(31:01):
It alchemizes into tears, youknow, and letting yourself cry
what's underneath that rage andletting it go.
And so just I do recommend, ifyou are having a hard time
tapping in, think about somekind of archetype, persona,
animal that's really easy toimagine getting angry and being
that thing and letting yourselfbe that thing, because your own
(31:22):
rage will come up as you do that.
It just needs space to come up.
But your own rage will come upand it can become this beautiful
alchemized thing.
We don't need to be afraid ofit, we just need to alchemize it
into something beautiful, whichit is.
Rose (31:37):
I love that.
So I'm so glad you shared that,and I also am glad that you
laughed, because a lot of peoplethink, oh, we're gonna cry
afterwards.
But laughter is an amazingemotion that just shows that
you've just peeled off all thosetough layers right.
And dragon is a great analogy,because I know in Qigong we have
dragon movements that are bigand expansive and you're
(31:59):
throwing and you're picking upand you're letting go and it's
like really shifting that energyinside and outside.
So, oh, I love that Amazing,it's great.
Yes, and please be in a safespace.
I mean, if anyone is going tobe anywhere, just maybe even
tell people that you're goinginto your safe dragon lair and
(32:21):
you're going to let go of somestuff for a bit.
Yes, yes.
Julie (32:25):
Container is step number one.
Yeah, very important.
Rose (32:30):
So you talk about the heroine's journey a lot.
Can you talk?
Julie (32:34):
about that.
Oh yes, ah, I love theheroine's journey, so people
have.
You know, we've beenpopularized by Joseph Campbell.
So Joseph Campbell popularizedthis idea of the hero's journey,
which most people have probablyheard of, which includes, like
having a mentor, you know,leaving the real world, getting
a mentor, doing all these tasksthat you do, achievement,
(32:54):
achievement, achievement, andthen ultimately, you know, you
get the girl.
The heroine's journey, or thehero's journey, is very much
just for a contrast.
The hero's journey is reallywhat we see in most, you know,
tv series, we see it in mostmovies and also it's what we see
in video games.
A lot is like, you know, youdefeat level after level after
(33:16):
level and then you beat the bigboss at the end and you win.
You know, and it's beenpopularized so much.
But you know, when JosephCampbell popularized this, there
was a a group of women whoasked him what about the
heroine's journey?
And he said oh well, you know,women, they don't need a journey
, they don't need a heroine'sjourney because they're the
(33:38):
place that everybody's trying toget to.
And I always like to say, well,sorry, joe, there may be some
truth in this idea that, youknow, the divine feminine is
what the masculine is trying toget to.
That's true, right, themasculine wants to get to that
feminine.
But there is actually a journeyfor women and it is just as
(33:58):
archetypal as the journey formen, the hero's journey.
And the way that Campbell didthis was he took old myths, he
took the structures of storiesand studied them all out and saw
okay, this is the format thathappens over and over again.
Well, what we have done andwe're not the only people to
have done this Obviously we'restanding on the shoulders of
giants as well, but we havelooked through so many myths and
(34:21):
gone back in the archetypes tofind the heroine's journey.
What is the archetypalheroine's journey, the journey
for women?
It's very different, as you canimagine, than the hero's
journey.
So the heroine's journey hasfour parts to it.
The first part is thisawakening piece.
Sometimes this is called aninitiation.
Oftentimes it's like thisawakening, and I would love to
(34:46):
take you through this, you know,with some stories that we have
heard, and I'll do one that ismore familiar to people in our
modern context.
So let's think about Alice inWonderland.
Okay, in the form of thisheroine's journey, Alice's
awakening, or initiation, isseeing the white rabbit right.
So Alice sees this white rabbitand she starts following it.
(35:07):
She knows she needs to followthe white rabbit.
And in our initiation phase, forwomen, oftentimes what happens
in this awakening is the worldis not what you think that it
was.
You wake up to this idea okay,the world is not what I thought
it was, what I believed.
There's some piece that isn'ttrue, something's not working
for me, and this can happenthrough an event, sometimes,
(35:30):
lots of times, for women,because we're so burned out.
This often happens with thehealth event, right, we're like
oh no, I'm hypothyroid now, whatam I going to do?
You know, we have cancer,whatever it is.
Oftentimes it's a physicalevent for women.
Other times the awakening isI've done everything in the
hero's journey, right, like I'vedone everything the masculine
(35:51):
way, and I still feel empty.
Why am I empty and where isthis emptiness coming from?
And so those are often thepaths.
Other ones are, like I said,like my awakening piece right
was the world is not what Ithought it was.
Oh my gosh, we're running thisfraudulent study.
Holy cow, I've got to like gointo the rabbit hole, right Like
(36:11):
I have to follow this down.
Now, often in the initiationphase, there is this piece where
you'll have guides or peopletell you to don't go down that
rabbit hole.
Okay, like, don't go down,don't do that, don't go astray,
be careful.
You know, like, be careful,don't go into this stuff, don't
do this alternative whatever.
And you'll have warning peoplewho will tell you that.
(36:34):
But something in you just saysno, I need to go down this
rabbit hole, right, like I'vegot to go down.
And in the heroine's journeyit's very much a descent to
ascend.
So you must descend to ascend,just like Alice.
She's a great example becauseshe actually tumbles in through
a hole, she goes down right.
And so that is the second step.
Is this descent phase?
(36:55):
And in the descent phase wemeet our shadow pieces.
And when I say shadow pieces,you've probably talked about
this before.
Everyone's talking about shadowwork.
But we meet the pieces ofourselves that we have isolated
and that we've tried to get ridof, and stuff in a corner right.
We meet these pieces ofourselves that we've hated and
we start to peel back the layersof ourselves that aren't true
(37:17):
to us.
The descent phase is very muchthis part of like.
Okay, is this true or is it notLike?
I don't think this is true,let's peel it away.
I don't think this is true,let's peel it away.
It's very much like findingmore and more information about
yourself.
Okay, what?
What is the shadow piece of medoing?
What do I need?
What's actually coming up sothat that descent phase is
(37:37):
really like okay, we're peelingback all these layers, we're
peeling, peeling, peeling.
We're going down, down, down,down.
We're learning more and moreand more and more, and then we
hit the bottom Right.
And this can be a really hardpart for people because, as it's
called a descent like, somepeople feel really depressed,
right At this, because the worldis not what you thought.
(38:01):
You're having to face demons.
You're having to say, oh, someof the things I thought were
true were not true.
You have to come to grips withreality in a totally different
way.
And so some women this is partof the reason we created the
Heroine's Journey, and what I dois because some people will get
stuck in this phase, right,like, they get stuck, they get
(38:21):
really sad, and we don't wantpeople to get stuck in this
phase and eventually it allcomes through, right, like I
think, eventually people get tothe other side, but this phase
can feel hard, like really hardand difficult, and so we want to
help people know there's moreto the story, right, you don't
end down at the bottom of therabbit hole, you don't.
(38:48):
What does Alice do next?
She goes through the door intoWonderland right.
And when you're in Wonderlandright, everything's kind of
topsy-turvy and there's oddthings, and she's on a search.
She's trying to find the whiterabbit and she's got some guides
, she's got the Cheshire Cat,she's got the Mad Hatter and all
these people pushing and thecaterpillar, whatever you find
down there.
And so this third part iscalled the search phase.
(39:09):
So we're searching, and inancient times, oftentimes this
search phase was categorized orepitomized by a labyrinth that
you go down into the cave andthen you hit the labyrinth and
you have to search in thelabyrinth.
Now, this part is very intuitive, right, because it's in the
dark, it's different, it'semotional, it's searching for
yourself, and in this place,this is where you get to decide
(39:33):
your fate.
You could decide who you areand you decide which way you're
going to go, right, you decideam I going to turn left?
Am I going to turn right?
Okay, there's a stone wall here.
I need to go the other way.
And this is really the partwhere you're trying things on,
right, I'm trying things on, I'mtrying something new, I'm
putting these on, I'm going totry this new diet or this new
workout or whatever.
It is right.
And it's the search where you'relooking for you.
(39:55):
Now You're trying to find yourwhole, worthy, authentic self,
because she's down here, right,like, the key to your wholeness
is in this search place.
You just got to find her and,like I said before, like with
Alice in Wonderland, often thispart has some guides to it.
So you'll get mentors, you'llget people who come into your
life, who push you, andsometimes guides don't look the
way we think like with the MadHatter, right, like who would
(40:16):
take advice from a Mad Hatter,but like, sometimes we get that
person who doesn't you wouldn'tthink would be a good guide, but
they give you a good piece ofinformation and maybe they're
not your true guide, but theyhelp push you in the right
direction, right, and so,eventually, once you've done
this search, what does Alicefind?
She finds the white rabbit.
Finally, she goes to the castle.
(40:36):
She's got the white rabbit inher sights and so in this search
phase, you get the key to yourwholeness, which leads you to
the last phase, which is theascent phase.
You get to ascend back upwardto the light of day, and so
you've got the key to yourwholeness.
The ascent phase is all aboutintegration.
How do you integrate all of thepieces of you together?
And the ascent phase often alsohas to do with becoming more of
(41:00):
a teacher, helping other people.
You become a mentor to otherpeople.
And every woman, like everyonegoing through this, you know
that's why so many people theygo on their health journey and
then they're like I got to teachthis right, like I got to help
other people right.
That's always people's journeyis like oh, I went through all
this stuff and like it worked sowell for me and I found my
wholeness, and now I've got toteach you.
And that is that ascent phase.
Let's integrate it, let'sascend, let's integrate all of
(41:22):
our pieces.
Now there's one more place tothis, because I could say and
then you live happily ever afteryou ascended right, like you're
ascended.
But for the heroine's journeythat's not the way it works,
right.
The masculine journey is verylinear.
It's point A to point B.
The heroine's journey is notlike that.
It's always a spiral.
So you got to go on the journeyover and over and over again.
(41:45):
We're always journeying, we'realways spiraling right, descend
to ascend, and if you've everseen a spiral and we're like,
look at a top when it spins andspins, you can see how somehow
it's constantly going inward andupward at the same time.
Right, it's constantly goinginward and upward, inward and
upward.
And that is the heroine'sjourney inward and upward, in
this perfect spiral whicheventually allows you to ascend
(42:07):
all the way up.
Rose (42:09):
I love this Beautiful yes, and as you're talking, I
thought about that that you willgo up and you'll come back.
You go in and come out in thatlabyrinth and it's beautiful.
That's amazing.
I love that.
Thank you for explaining that.
Julie (42:24):
Yeah, yeah, we're very cyclical, right.
We live in cycles because we'relike the moon.
We are of course, this journeyis cyclical.
It's cycles and you get todecide each cycle right, what
you're going to change and howyou're going to ascend.
Rose (42:43):
And I think some of the work you do to help women move
through through parts when theycan be stuck because we can get
stuck and we can get stuck inthat sadness or we can get stuck
in a loop or we can go down aroad that maybe we don't need to
go down and we need to just beguided.
That's why there's so manywomen.
Like you said, we've gonethrough some of these parts of
awakening and now we're comingthrough to help others and I
(43:06):
love that.
I want to talk a little bitabout sacred feminine symbols
because I know you're verypassionate about that.
When we talked, you said you'rein search for are there other
symbols, and how women can usethese symbols in, maybe, their
daily life or when they'relooking to find some of this
(43:29):
ascension.
Julie (43:31):
Yes, totally Okay.
So I've been, like I told you,I've been on this journey.
I really I wanted to find asmany feminine symbols as I could
, because I think, as women, wehave this idea that there aren't
really feminine symbols, rightLike we don't, we don't
associate symbols with ourselves.
But so far I've been, you know,scouring different countries
(43:52):
and different cultures, and Ifound more than 60 feminine
symbols.
Wow, yeah, I think I'm up to 65now.
So they're out there, they'reeverywhere.
Once you have the eyes to seethem, they're everywhere.
What's my favorite?
I don't know if I have afavorite, but I, uh, right now I
(44:13):
feel very close to the Jaguar,actually, as a feminine symbol.
I've been really, uh, workingwith that energy a lot, but, uh,
and I've been trying on, I feltlike, you know, if I'm going to
help women find these symbols,I've got to learn how to embody
them, Like, I need to haveexperiences with each of them,
and that's what I've been tryingto do, is deeply have
(44:34):
experiences with these symbols.
So let me explain a few.
I'll tell you some of them.
We can go through a few quicklyand, if you want to touch more
in depth, because I love to dothis to open people's minds so
that they can see, like, oh,this is so much bigger than I
thought that it could be, youknow.
And then I would love to talkabout like, why are symbols
(44:56):
important, right?
How can you use them?
Why do we use them?
And so some symbols you know,you're going to be familiar with
.
So here are some peopleprobably might be familiar with
it and they'd be like oh, thismakes sense for symbolizing
women in the feminine right.
We've talked about the tree,the moon, water.
Of course those are veryclassic feminine symbols.
There's also I mentioned thehoneybee earlier.
(45:18):
That's a divine feminine symbol.
It's also, I would say, aclassic divine feminine symbol.
But let's get into some thatmaybe are scarier for people and
might be surprising.
So the serpent, which I thinkis popular, right, if people are
like why am I seeing snakeseverywhere?
It's because it's a divinefeminine symbol.
(45:39):
And as we go through these kindof like we talked in the
beginning with the yin and theyang because we have demonized
the divine feminine, some ofthese symbols might make you
uncomfortable when we talk aboutthem and they might be.
Things like snakes are scary,right.
Like, don't snakes representthe devil?
Actually, no Long before theyrepresented the devil, they
actually represented eternallife.
(46:00):
Right, we always have the snakeshedding its skin, always
growing, always changing.
Right, it flows.
The way that it moves flowsjust like water flows, right, so
the snake has so many beautifulthings, but now we've demonized
it as evil when it's reallytruly not so.
There's the serpent, the spideris another one, and again, it's
(46:23):
probably one that people arelike why are we talking about
spiders?
How could that be Like?
Why are you?
You know, this is an awful bug,you know.
But the spider, right, sheweaves her web.
She weaves her web, she letsthings come to her.
She's associated with motherspider in shamanic cultures.
Right, that she weaved theearth, the idea that the goddess
(46:46):
weaved the earth and weavestime and space.
And what do women do?
We weave time and space rightWith our bodies, and so does a
spider.
She weaves right With her body,she takes things in and she
makes this beautiful web that'sso gorgeous, the patterns on it.
So that's another one to thinkabout.
And while we're talking aboutweaving, obviously veils are
going to be associated with thefeminine and you're going to
(47:10):
have looms and things like thatwill also be associated.
Some other ones that are prettytypical is the pomegranate.
You want to think aboutPersephone?
She eats a pomegranate that redthe seeds, the fertility piece,
right is really tied to this.
But let's talk about some that,like, maybe are more rare, like
the jaguar that we talked about.
I bet most people didn't knowthat the jaguar was not, now,
(47:32):
yeah, symbol.
Um, the orca is another divinefeminine symbol and you that one
makes more sense to people, Ithink, sometimes because they
they're matriarchal society, orOrcas are the grandmothers.
They're one of only threespecies that has a grandmother
and it's orcas.
Elephants and people were theonly ones that have grandmothers
, and elephants, coincidentally,are also a divine feminine
(47:54):
symbol.
I can see that, yes, andelephants I don't know if you
knew this.
Did you know that elephantsworship the moon?
No, I did not.
Rose (48:02):
Yes, they have every full moon.
Julie (48:04):
They have like these actual ceremonies that are
documented and they make like aspecial circle and they take
branches and they wave at themoon and they have like a whole
ritual that they perform everymonth to the moon, which is
really beautiful, oh I love that.
Rose (48:19):
I have to look into that more.
Julie (48:21):
Yes, yes, orcas do the same thing.
Orcas dance for the moon.
They have like a special fullmoon swim that they do, so
that's something really cool tolike look into.
Rose (48:32):
Yeah, and I think if women are drawn to some symbol,
whatever that is, I feel it'swhat they need, whether it's
masculine or feminine.
Right, so if you're drawn tosomething or if you see repeated
.
So I see a fox.
So here's a symbol.
Lately in my backyard, likeright near my window at the same
(48:53):
time in the morning, walks bythis fox.
He comes, you know she.
It's a she because she'slooking for food, I think.
And I'm like, oh my gosh, andso I looked it up, is a fox
related to divine feminineenergy?
And it absolutely is.
And I needed to hear that orsee that symbol for something
I'm going through.
I'm like that is a beautifulsymbol for me.
(49:15):
So I've been seeing the fox alot lately.
So if you see, something that iscoming up for you.
Look it up and see what itmeans.
Julie (49:23):
Yeah, foxes are magical, like I love that you're seeing
the fox.
I love the fox, yeah me too.
Rose (49:29):
I love it.
They're so beautiful.
I just wish you would pause fora moment so I could just have
this nonverbal communicationwith it, or something you know.
That's beautiful.
I really love this.
I want to wrap up a little bit,so if you want to talk about
what your offerings are, how youhelp women, what you have, you
and um, the floor is yours.
So tell, tell everyone outthere what, what you have to
(49:53):
offer yeah, can I tell peoplewhy symbols are important?
Julie (49:56):
oh, yes, of course yeah yeah, so the reason we use
symbols and there are tons morethese are just like a sampling.
But the reason that we usesymbols and there are tons more
these are just like a sampling.
But the reason that we usesymbols is because symbols are
very tangible.
We can relate to them right,when I say the word pomegranate
or spider, like you know whatthat is and you can see it and
experience it and understandright its qualities.
(50:17):
And that's part of the reason.
And so when I talk aboutembodying symbols, we use the
nature of that symbol to help usin our own physical path, our
bodies and the meaning.
And of course, symbols havelayers and layers and layers of
meaning and that's why they'resuch a good tool to work with,
because you can dig into themmore and more and they always
have more to teach you.
So that's part of the reasonthese divine feminine symbols
(50:38):
are so important, because theyhelp teach us what the divine
feminine is and how to embody itin our own bodies, right In our
own lives.
But as far as the work that I do, I have a school called
Feminine Alchemist and you cango to femininealchemistcom.
That mist part.
Alchemist is spelled M-Y-S-Tlike mystical, and we have a
(51:05):
school for women who want tolearn right all about the divine
feminine, embody it.
We teach sacred embodiment,which is like what we talked
about, that sacred rage portion.
We actually have created theheroine's journey, and so we
take women step by step on theheroine's journey, help them
through that.
We do guided meditations, tasks,rituals.
(51:26):
We take women through and teachthem about the symbols.
We teach women about astrology,we teach them about human
design and energetics, and sothose are like the three big
pillars that we teach as sacredembodiment, astrology and
energetics, and we really helpwomen get to know who they are
and awaken the divine femininewithin themselves.
(51:48):
So that's what we do.
We do retreats, we take womenon the heroine's journey and I
personally do astrology andhuman design readings, which you
can find me at astrologicalattorney on Instagram.
Astrological attorney andastrologicalattorney.
com is how you can get in touchwith me personally.
Rose (52:08):
Yes, I'll put all the links in the show notes.
I really want to have you backat some point to talk more about
astrology and human design,because we didn't have a chance
to do that.
There's so much here that youspoke about that resonates with
me and I'm sure will resonatewith so many people.
It's just really a gift thatyou have and that you're sharing
(52:29):
with everyone, and I'm so gladthat your path led you to here,
because you're just magical andI really mean that.
So thank you, thank you forsharing your time and your space
here.
So many times when you weretalking, I just felt like my
whole body, like I could reallysense what you were saying in my
own body, and it just wasreally enlightening for me.
(52:52):
So I wanted to share that withyou.
Julie (52:54):
So thank you, thank you so much.
I love to do it and thank youfor having this beautiful
platform and for all that you do.
I just feel so grateful to beconnected to you, thank you.
Rose (53:06):
Thank you, julie, and I do want to have you back one day.
And thank you and everyone outthere, please check Julie out.
She's amazing and I know youknow that from everything that
she talked about today, so thankyou.
Thank you for joining me onChat Off The Mat.
If you're ready to transformyour energy and step into your
fullest potential, I'd love towork with you.
As an energy alchemist, I helpwomen release blocked energy and
(53:27):
reclaim their vibrant essence.
Visit rosewipichcom to exploreworking together and discover
free resources for your journey.
Love today's episode.
Subscribe wherever you get yourpodcasts, leave a rating and
share your biggest takeaway withme on Instagram at Rose Wippich
.
Remember wellness warriors.
Your energy is precious.
Nurture it wisely.
Whether you're feeling overwhelmed by career demands,
seeking to understand ancientfeminine symbols and their
relevance today, or simplycurious about what the divine
feminine actually means.
Beyond the buzzwords, thisconversation offers valuable
insights you can immediatelyapply to your daily life.
So get ready to discover howmoon cycles can inform your work
(00:22):
schedule, how herbs can supportyour feminine essence and how
understanding your personalheroine's journey can transform
how you navigate challenges.
This isn't about addingself-care to your to-do list.
It's about fundamentallyshifting how you experience your
feminine power in a modernworld, ready to unlock your most
(00:43):
vibrant, authentic self.
Your journey to radiantwellness starts now.
Welcome to Chat Off the Mat.
I'm your host, Rose Wippich, andI'm here to guide you on an
extraordinary journey offeminine healing, energy, work
and total well-being.
Get ready to be inspired byauthentic conversations with
leading women practitioners,wellness experts and holistic
(01:06):
healers who understand yourunique journey.
Subscribe to Chat Off the Mat,wherever you get your podcasts,
and let's create magic together.
Today, I'm thrilled to welcomea true Renaissance woman of
holistic feminine wisdom.
She's an intuitive astrologerwho reads the language of the
stars, a knowledgeable herbalistwho harnesses nature's healing
(01:28):
power, a compassionate doula whoguided countless women through
the sacred threshold of birthand a dedicated advocate for the
divine feminine in all itsforms.
In our fast-paced,productivity-obsessed world,
many women find themselvesdisconnected from their deeper
feminine wisdom, leading toburnout, health challenges and a
(01:48):
sense that something essentialis missing from their lives.
Our guest, Julie Dean Richards,has devoted her life to helping
women reclaim their sacredfeminine power through practical
rituals, herbal support and anunderstanding of their unique
heroine's journey.
Welcome, Julie.
Julie (02:07):
Thank you so much.
I'm so excited to be here.
Rose (02:10):
I'm excited that you're here as well.
I didn't mention in the introwhat career you came from, but
maybe you want to kind ofintegrate that into your own
personal narrative.
Julie (02:20):
Oh sure, yeah, so I'm actually an attorney.
I'm still a licensed attorney,but before I was an attorney and
I think where my story reallystarts is when I worked in
research.
So I actually, right out ofcollege, my major was in this
communications piece but my reallove was the research piece and
(02:42):
that was kind of like my minoror my emphasis.
And so I got swooped up by abig tech company right out of
college to be a consultant on,you know, big research projects
for high touch clients likeHarvard, Yale, Stanford, google,
like you name it.
I've worked with them and youknow what I would do with the
(03:04):
logistics part of the research.
And people would come and saywe have this study we want to do
.
I would help them go throughand say, okay, we need to change
the study this way, this is howwe can do it.
And they would say is itpossible for us to get this many
participants in Bangladesh andhow can we do that?
And I would figure out all thelogistics of how to do the study
and everything like that.
And it was during that processI really started to kind of
(03:33):
question my own reality andbecome more open-minded, because
I was raised by a nurse andlike a super, like totally
normal Western family.
You never would have guessedwhere I would end up today.
And it was during that process Istarted to see something that I
think all of us know, but likethat the world is ruled by money
, you know.
(03:56):
But for me it was like this bigwake-up call, like oh, these
studies that I'm consulting on,the data is getting switched,
and there's these pieces andthis is not the research that
they taught me in school andlike this is not how we're
supposed to be doing research.
And I found out that it wasn'tjust like my company or whatever
, it's just the researchindustry.
You know there's so much thatwe take for granted as like
(04:20):
we're just like, oh, it's thisgreat study out of Harvard.
And it's like, actually, youknow that data isn't what you
think it is.
You know that came from a placeyou don't know where it actually
came from, and so for me itbecame this like ethical issue
and I tried so hard to stay init and you know, be helpful, and
(04:41):
of course, everybody hasexplanations for why it works
the way that it does, but Ifinally there was actually a
completely fraudulent study thathappened and I was, and it
ended up being published.
Like I, it was not my project,it was a friend of mine's
project but I knew that the datahad been faked and so finally I
(05:03):
said I'm totally out of here,like I can't do this anymore.
This is not for me.
But that experience really mademe start to question my own
reality.
Like what do I believe?
What are actually my beliefs?
Like, what do I think aboutthis?
And so I started doing my ownresearch and I started
unraveling my own belief systemand things like that, and so I
(05:24):
became more open-minded.
And that open-mindednessallowed me to enter into the
world of things like astrologyand the sacred feminine.
And you know, of course it'sdrop by drop.
You know, it doesn't happen allat once.
Rose (05:37):
Yes, you're right.
Julie (05:38):
Yeah, it's just, it's drop by drop, and so I had met a
woman.
I went on this herbalistretreat and I met this woman at
this herbalist retreat and shewas like you've got to meet my
niece.
And it turns out her niece islike a big time astrologer and I
didn't know that.
And we met up and she asked methe fateful question what time
(06:01):
were you born?
When were you born?
Right?
And she started telling methings about my life she
couldn't have possibly known.
And we just hit it off andbecame such good friends and
that really I couldn't stopresearching.
From that time I had to knoweverything about it.
I still was going to law schoolbecause that was still my path.
(06:21):
You know that experience withthat fraudulent study really
pushed me to want to go into lawand learn about it and so I was
already an astrologer when Istarted at law school.
But it's just really moved fromthere and my experience in law
school was actually what pushedme even more into the sacred
feminine and realizing, oh mygoodness, women need this so
(06:43):
much.
We need to open up our innerdivinity.
So, because I found out, when Iwas in law school, I was
pregnant with my daughter, withmy third child, totally
unexpectedly, and I was like, ohmy gosh, I can't bring my baby
girl into this world, you know,and I had already been studying
(07:03):
the sacred feminine a little bit, but then it really opened up
everything and I think this wasbecause, you know, I was in this
very masculine environment likelaw.
There's like there's no moremasculine environment than law
school, right, like it's justthe most masculine environment
you can have.
And so it really pushed me theopposite way, that like I had
(07:24):
this life growing inside of meand doing this such a feminine
process and being with that, andso the sacred feminine helped
me to balance that and to learnso much more and I just realized
, you know, this is what I needto do with my life.
Wow.
Rose (07:40):
So that's my story.
That's an amazing story.
Wow, I love it.
Oh, such a journey to to get towhere you are today and to
embrace it and to understandearly on in your life that, hey,
you know, I I can still be alawyer, but I still have this
other passion and learn, andlearning astrology is not easy
(08:01):
either, because I've lovedastrology like most of my life,
but for me it's been.
I understand a lot of it, butto take it and explain it the
way an astrologer does, Icouldn't do that.
But let's talk about the divinefeminine.
How would you define the divinefeminine and how does it differ
from cultural stereotypes aboutfemininity?
Julie (08:23):
Oh yeah, totally.
Cultural stereotypes aboutfeminine femininity?
Oh yeah, totally.
So you know, for some people,that the divine, when they hear
the word divine feminine, thisis like such a buzzword right
now.
People are talking about it allthe time and people have
different definitions, and thisis that's why sometimes I like
to use sacred feminine asanother alternative to divine
feminine, and not that I don'tlove that word, I love the
(08:44):
divine feminine.
But for some people, there arecultures, right, and people who
worship a goddess, right, anactual divine feminine deity who
is a goddess.
But most of what we're which Ithink is amazing, and I also
personally have this as part ofmy beliefs and things like that
but when we're talking about thedivine feminine, it's about the
(09:04):
fact that inside of you, right,inside of every woman, there is
a divine part of you, thissacred feminine part.
There is a goddess livinginside of you, right?
You have an inner goddess inyou and of course, both men and
women, they both have masculineand feminine in them.
Of course, I'm concentrating onwomen because that's who I work
(09:25):
with the most, and so, yeah, ofcourse men also have this
sacred feminine piece of them.
But for women it's reallyimportant because I think most
of the time this is not alwaystrue for all people, but most of
the time for women we're about90-10 when it comes to this.
We've got this feminine pieceand how this differs.
(09:49):
So for people who are freakingout right now, how could you say
that about femininity and howcould you stereotype?
The divine feminine is sodifferent than our stereotype.
When we think about femininity,we think about a 1950s world in
most cases, right Like womenpregnant barefoot in the kitchen
.
You know.
Rose (10:10):
In a cocktail dress or in a nice dress.
You know all dolled up.
Julie (10:14):
Yes, yes, yes, totally, and that's the whole thing is
like no, that is not femininity.
Femininity is not like yourability to cook and clean, like
femininity is not just yourability to create or raise
children.
Femininity is not being meekand submissive, like that is not
the sacred feminine.
That is not femininity.
(10:35):
Those are societal expectationsthat we've created and roles
that we've created based on oursociety and the culture that we
live in.
The sacred feminine is very welearn about her.
So this is going to be verydifferent than most people are
used to.
So I want to take the yin yangsymbol, because I think it's
such a beautiful epitaph of this.
(10:58):
But when you think about the yinand the yang, for people who
don't know, the yin yang kind oflooks like two fish swimming
around each other.
That's what it's supposed to beand there's a white side and a
black side and each one has adot on it.
That's the opposite color.
So the white has a black dotand the black has a white dot,
and these represent themasculine and the feminine.
And most people would be like,well, isn't the feminine the
(11:21):
white fish?
And it's like no, no, no, thefeminine is actually the black
fish.
It's the black part of that,the yang side or the yin side of
things.
And so the feminine if we thinkabout these two colors, white
and black well, white is goingto be more associated with
daytime, brightness, lightoutside right, and then the dark
piece is going to be moreassociated with the moon,
(11:44):
darkness, softness, creation.
And so the sacred feminine is alot more about this womb space,
right, if we think about like awomb or, in ancient times, like
one of the symbols of thedivine feminine is the cave,
which is like such a greatsymbol for that, because it's
dark, it's wet, it's warm.
It's the void where anything ispossible.
(12:04):
Right, everything is possiblein this space, and we have
conditioned ourselves to be soafraid of that space.
You know, we're like, oh, thesun is good and the nighttime is
bad, and like the dark.
You know, but black is a colorfor darkness and evil and white
is a color for goodness, andthat's just not the way that it
works.
You know that is not the truth.
(12:25):
The truth is that both havevalue and both need each other,
and that's the point of the yinyang symbol.
You have to have both right.
And even in a sunny day, youstill have shade and you need
shade during that sunny day,right, and that is like that
black part of the white yangsymbol.
And even during the night, youneed light, and that's the stars
and the moon, and they all playa part together and they're all
(12:47):
working together, right.
And so I want women tounderstand you are this creative
space where anything ispossible, right, ever shifting,
but constant growing andlearning all the time and making
you know you make everythinghappen.
You are the veil, right, likeyou weave time and space
(13:10):
together, right, not just withyour body, with your soul, with
your heart.
And I think people are reallyscared of that because they've
never heard it that way before.
But it's so, so important forus to understand that, because
in our modern society we've madeit so only that white part is
(13:31):
good, like we have made it soonly the day is good, only
summer is good.
Oh, winter is so bad, it'sterrible.
The nighttime is bad, it's ugly.
And we've told women over andover again to be successful, you
must be like a man, you have tobe like summertime.
You got to be on all the time.
You got to be shining all thetime.
You got to be like big and boldand bright all the time Not
(13:52):
emotional.
Yeah, you can't be emotional.
Burn off all your emotions,right.
Instead of being like, no,you're actually like the moon
and you can work in your owntides.
Right, like you can pull thosetides and you can shift and
change every single day.
And you can do that in thissofter way that brings
everything to you, cause that'sthe part of the feminine.
The feminine is the cave,because she receives everything,
(14:15):
she gets everything intoherself.
She not only does she create,right, Like she is like the
honeybee.
She takes in this dust and shemakes this beautiful honey out
of it.
Right, taking in this pollenand receiving, receiving and
then making magic out of that.
And that is truly the divinefeminine.
Rose (14:32):
That is awesome.
I love the way you explainedthat it was.
I was just so captivated by theway you were explaining
everything and I love that youuse the yin yang symbol, because
I use it a lot in my practiceas a yoga and Qigong instructor.
I use it a lot in my practiceas a yoga and Qigong instructor
and, yeah, it's like embodyingthis beautiful receptive quality
that we forget that we have,and you know, being a part of
(14:54):
this male society where wealways have to compete, even
against other women, it's reallynot supportive, no, no.
And it's really wonderful thatyou're doing the work to help
women reconnect with the sacreddivine feminine and that we need
to embrace it and not forget itand to create the environment.
(15:15):
We have the power to create theenvironment and move towards
more of a society where we'reworking together and
collaborating, versus competingagainst each other and inviting
more of that yin quality.
I love that.
Julie (15:27):
Totally and like women, you know, especially, but the
divine feminine in general.
I mean, I know we'll probablytalk more about symbols later,
but I wanted to bring up thetree, because it's one we see
all the time.
We talk about the tree of lifeand you can see it in necklaces
and jewelry.
Well, that's a symbol of thedivine feminine and people don't
realize that.
And at first, you know,scientists thought that trees
(15:50):
competed right in the forest.
They were competing for light,they were competing for
resources, they were competingfor water, because that's our
assumption, right?
Our assumption is, like animalscompete, they compete for food
and resources, but trees don'tcompete like that.
Trees actually collaborate.
Now we know, right, trees areconnected through the root
system and through myocilliumpathways in the ground.
(16:13):
They communicate with eachother, they talk to each other,
they give each other resourcesand they collaborate.
They don't compete, they helpeach other, they communicate
with each other and they allhelp each other grow.
They will keep what looks likea stump alive for hundreds of
years.
Actually, now we know, they'llgive resources to it because
they love it.
Right, like they are acollaborating community.
(16:35):
And that tree stump gives itswisdom back, it communicates to
the other trees, and it helpsthem get away from danger and it
gives.
So that's the society that thedivine feminine could create.
Is this collaborative societywhere we work together instead
of always, always having tocompete with each other.
Rose (16:52):
I love that that is so true.
And I love also how you talkabout trees.
How might one recognize whenthey're disconnected from their
sacred feminine energy?
Julie (17:03):
Yeah, this is a great one , because I think most women are
going to be like oh, I amreally disconnected, right, but
you can't receive meaning likeyou won't let people do things
for you, right, you have to doit yourself.
You know you have a really hardtime asking for help.
You have a really hard time,you know, with this idea of rest
.
You know, if you can't rest, ifyou're go, go, go all the time,
(17:26):
if you feel like you must bedoing to be worthwhile I think
this is a huge one that mostwomen have is if your worth is
inherently connected to what youdo, then you're disconnected
from your divine feminine,because it is not about doing,
it is about being.
And if you hate your body,that's another big disconnection
(17:46):
from the divine feminine,because embodiment is a huge
part of tapping into that sacredfeminine place.
And if you are judging otherwomen, you know backbiting,
talking, feeling like you haveto compete, you have to get on
the top of the food chain andeven if you are afraid to be
(18:07):
seen, that's a really big one ofbeing disconnected to the
divine feminine is being afraidto be your true self, your
authentic self, and being afraidto be seen by other people for
who you truly are.
So I would say those are thereally really big one.
But particularly looking at,where do you get your worth from
?
Is your worth?
(18:27):
The checklist, and finishingthe checklist Is that where your
worth is from.
Is your worth from being betterthan other people in any way?
Is your worth?
You know why.
Why are you saying what you'resaying about other women, or
even men?
Like, where's that coming from?
Is it coming from a place ofcompetition?
Right, cause we can look atsomeone and it's really easy to
(18:50):
to look at these qualities andsay like, oh well, she hasn't
made cause she's so skinny andpretty, and, like, you know,
make these excuses and put stuffon other women or someone who
is, you know, hates on powerfulwomen.
You know, you might want tolook at yourself and maybe
you're disconnected because thefeminine is not afraid of other
people being powerful.
Right, it knows that we're alljust as powerful as each other.
(19:12):
We don't need to compete.
But yeah, that checklist andagain that body piece, is really
important to look at.
Do you hate your body?
Rose (19:20):
That's a big thing?
Yeah, no, that's importantbecause your body changes all
the time.
And having children changesyour body.
Surgeries change your body.
I know voice is reallyimportant.
Women are afraid to be heardand expression, self-expression,
is important as well.
Totally lot of the illnessesthat women have, whether it's
(19:45):
breast cancer or ovarian cancer,any of those cancers or
anything associated with thefemale anatomy, is because we
repress our own authenticity orthat sacred femininity.
Julie (19:56):
Totally, totally, and that and sex is such a big one
to look out to like.
Are you disconnected, can you?
How is intimacy for you?
Because if you're having a bigstruggle in the intimacy
department, then you might bedisconnected from that sacred
feminine Right.
And especially if you're afraidto look at your lady parts, if
those are, you know, scary toyou, if it's scary for you to
(20:19):
have full expression in yoursexuality, that's something
really to to look out there,because, again, the feminine is
receiving right.
And so if you're blockingyourself, especially in intimacy
, if you can't orgasm, if you'rehaving a really hard time, then
there's a piece of you that'snot able to relax.
There's part of you that'sdisconnected from that divine
feminine piece as well.
Rose (20:40):
That's really important.
I'm glad you mentioned thatBecause I think nowadays, well,
that's really important.
I'm glad you mentioned thatbecause I think nowadays women
have more access to help in thatarea, where years ago it was
more of a taboo of a discussionwomen to talk, even with their
doctors.
I think their doctors didn'teven talk about that and
probably may not today.
But we have authority over ourown bodies and if you want to
(21:04):
experience pleasure in any way,just you know, understand how
you are, how you feel, how howyou're not feeling, and to
embrace that sensuality, I thinkthat's super important.
Julie (21:16):
Oh, totally, totally.
And how are your emotionsaround it?
Are you scared of it?
Are you scared of yourself?
Are you afraid?
Are you even letting yourselfhave emotions in general, even
outside of intimacy?
Where are you scared to expressyour emotions and you know?
Or is your default emotion onlyanger?
(21:40):
I think we, in our society,anger is acceptable because it's
more masculine, it's more fiery, it's more you know you're
protecting yourself, you're, youare protecting yourself with
that anger You're lashing out.
The anger is truly a secondaryemotion, right?
What's underneath that anger?
Usually it's sadness,abandonment, hopelessness.
(22:01):
Right, that's what's under theanger.
But we are, we're okayexpressing anger because anger
makes you look strong and big.
Right, like I'm so strong, I'mso big.
And not to say that the divinefeminine cannot rage yes, she
can.
We talk about sacred rage, aton in the work I do.
Rage is so important.
It's important for women tofeel rage.
But lots of times what I willsee in a lot of women who have
(22:23):
really masculinized themselvesis they will turn to anger over
everything.
They're too afraid to cry,they're too afraid to let any
kind of emotion out.
But if it is anger, it's okay,because then they're strong, if
they feel like they can be angryand they're not getting to
those root emotions underneath.
They're trying to hideeverything underneath that fiery
(22:45):
anger, because that's moreacceptable.
Rose (22:50):
Yeah, it makes sense.
And also I feel that if yourepress a lot, you get to a
point where you're numb and youcan't cry.
And you can't express even angeror you're not allowed to.
Yeah, totally walking around,not knowing what you're feeling,
(23:12):
how you're feeling, what'sgoing on and, oh my gosh, sacred
rage.
Talk a little bit about that,because I haven't heard of
anyone that I've known talkabout working with women with
about sacred rage.
How do you, how do you uncoverthat like what women have, and
how do you work with that withwomen?
Julie (23:32):
Yeah, so I love to look at let's look at like another
symbol, cause it can teach us alot about this the ocean, right.
So the ocean, you know it canbe very nourishing and deep, and
like who doesn't love a day atthe beach?
And like being with the oceanand she's got low tides and high
tides, but the ocean can alsorage, right Like, the ocean can
(23:53):
create hurricanes and it canwash over cities and wash out
surfers and divers and boats anddrag boats to the bottom of the
ocean.
Right, like, no one wants tomess with the ocean because, you
know, even though she isbeautiful and nourishing, she's
also the most powerful force onearth.
Right, water is the mostpowerful and sometimes, you know
(24:14):
, she doesn't always look thatway, because she looks soft and
she looks sweet and we drinkwater, but then all of a sudden,
she's beating up against thesecliffs, right, and she's the one
who wears down these cliffsmore and more and makes sand out
of the rock and does all ofthose beautiful things.
So, as women, this is like sucha great view of the divine
(24:35):
feminine within us.
Right, we are all like theocean.
We we can have emotion and wecan have flow, we can have
intuition.
But that rage portion, right,there's not a day, probably,
that the ocean doesn't ragesomewhere.
You know, there's always somestorm.
She's so big.
There's always some storm onthe ocean, and so it's really
important for women to be ableto tap into that rage, and not
(24:59):
now.
I want to talk about thisdistinction between sacred rage
and what I would call somethinglike indignance.
And you know, there there islike petty anger, right?
This anger that we we get forthings like you know, we're mad
about whatever, stubbing our toeor doing something wrong or
(25:23):
whatever.
And then there's sacred rage,and sacred rage is this rage of
you know, something dear to youyou know has been taken away, or
it's this feeling of enough isenough, right, I'm here to
protect my own, I'm here to youknow, make something.
Right, you know, you come tothe end of your rope, and I'll
(25:44):
give you an example of this.
Like, every woman has sacredrage, and that rage can build up
over time, because anger isthis emotion, and especially
sacred rage is really about thisemotion of I deserve to exist,
I deserve to have my needs met,right, I deserve to be here and
I deserve to be listened to.
(26:05):
That's what sacred rage isreally really deeply about.
It can also be aboutgenerational stuff that has come
up over the generations andgenerations of women being
suppressed or whatever it is inyour line that is happening.
But that sacred rage is reallyimportant for the taking charge
of like no, I deserve to exist.
You know, I deserve to be hereand I'm allowed to take up space
(26:30):
, I'm allowed to have myemotions.
And so when we talk about, youknow, sacred rage, we want to
separate it from violence,because the scary thing about
rage and part of the reason, youknow, over hundreds of years,
women have been told you're notallowed to be angry.
(26:50):
You know, just be nice, just benice, be nice to everybody,
just be nice.
You know, sit back, relax,don't tell anyone they've done
anything wrong, right, like,just, you're not allowed to be
angry.
And it's important to breakthrough that.
And the reason that we've oftenbeen told, you know, you can't
be angry is because we're.
(27:10):
And the reason we're scared ofanger is because of the violence
aspect, because we have allseen what violence can do to
people and what anger can do topeople.
It can kill people, it can hurt, hurt people, maim people.
But when we talk about sacredrage, we separate it from
violence, because sacred ragedoesn't have to be violent
against anyone else.
Right, like we do not.
(27:31):
To perform and help ourselves,let go of this rage, we don't
have to be violent and some waysthat we can do that and make it
a safe space.
And that's why it's sacred.
Right, it's sacred becauseyou're setting up a container
for yourself to have this happen.
Just like a temple is sacred,like sacred things happen inside
a temple.
Right, sacred things happen ina special designated space.
(27:53):
And that's the first step withsacred rage is we need a special
designated space that can be acar, like just in your car, can
be a great place to just screamand scream and scream and yell.
You know by yourself that canbe out in the middle of the
woods, you know that, where youcan like throw some, you can
throw rocks into a lake.
That can be whatever space youwant.
It can be your backyard, it canbe your garage, whatever you
(28:15):
want it to be.
And there are places that theyhave now like rage rooms where
you can smash stuff with abaseball bat.
Rose (28:22):
Right, you know what I use ?
My shamanic drum.
Yes, yes, that's perfect.
I used it the other day justfor a minute.
It felt so good.
Julie (28:32):
Yes, rhythm is so important to the feminine.
Rhythm, and drums particularly,can be so healing.
And so what we want to do whenwe want to have sacred rage is
we want to set apart a space forit, a locked door, wherever you
want to be, and then we want toallow ourselves to let go in
that space.
So a great thing that people dosometimes is take a stick and
(28:55):
hit it against the ground, orhit it against rocks or trees.
Like I said, you can throw bigstones into a lake or a river.
If you want to set up somethingin your garage where you can
smash something with a tarpunderneath it, whatever you want
to do, if you want to pound ona drum, you can do that.
But just setting apart yourtime to allow yourself to be
(29:17):
angry.
And sometimes we have to dothis on the fly, right, because
that anger can just boil andboil up and suddenly fly out.
And so maybe just like tuckingyourself into a closet real
quick, or like screaming into apillow, but allowing yourself to
really not just be angry,because there's a difference.
Right, you can be angry and youcan snap at your kids all day
(29:38):
long, right.
Or snap at your husband, yellat someone and say whatever you
want to say.
But actual rage involves a lotof that physicality, letting
yourself get physical, becausewe are very scared of being
physical.
And so one time what I didwhich was really helpful for
people, which might be reallyout of people's comfort zone,
(29:59):
but it's so, it's.
I recommend, highly recommendthis practice is I locked my
door.
Right, this was me all alone inmy bedroom, door locked, window
shut, and I let myself take onthe persona of a dragon, which
can be really helpful.
Like taking on a persona aJaguar or some kind of animal
(30:20):
can really help you if you'rehaving a hard time letting out
rage and you imagine yourself asthis dragon.
And I did, and I allowed myselfto like hit my pillows around
and like tear things up with myteeth and, you know, like let
myself claw and scrape andscream.
You know, and that was so atthe end of that it was so
(30:40):
healing for me I literally laidback on my bed and just laughed.
I like laughed, laughed andlaughed, you know, for a full
belly laugh, because that's whathappens is, once you have
worked through the rage and letit out, then it alchemizes into
something beautiful, right, italchemizes into laughter and joy
.
It alchemizes into letting goin peace.
(31:01):
It alchemizes into tears, youknow, and letting yourself cry
what's underneath that rage andletting it go.
And so just I do recommend, ifyou are having a hard time
tapping in, think about somekind of archetype, persona,
animal that's really easy toimagine getting angry and being
that thing and letting yourselfbe that thing, because your own
(31:22):
rage will come up as you do that.
It just needs space to come up.
But your own rage will come upand it can become this beautiful
alchemized thing.
We don't need to be afraid ofit, we just need to alchemize it
into something beautiful, whichit is.
Rose (31:37):
I love that.
So I'm so glad you shared that,and I also am glad that you
laughed, because a lot of peoplethink, oh, we're gonna cry
afterwards.
But laughter is an amazingemotion that just shows that
you've just peeled off all thosetough layers right.
And dragon is a great analogy,because I know in Qigong we have
dragon movements that are bigand expansive and you're
(31:59):
throwing and you're picking upand you're letting go and it's
like really shifting that energyinside and outside.
So, oh, I love that Amazing,it's great.
Yes, and please be in a safespace.
I mean, if anyone is going tobe anywhere, just maybe even
tell people that you're goinginto your safe dragon lair and
(32:21):
you're going to let go of somestuff for a bit.
Yes, yes.
Julie (32:25):
Container is step number one.
Yeah, very important.
Rose (32:30):
So you talk about the heroine's journey a lot.
Can you talk?
Julie (32:34):
about that.
Oh yes, ah, I love theheroine's journey, so people
have.
You know, we've beenpopularized by Joseph Campbell.
So Joseph Campbell popularizedthis idea of the hero's journey,
which most people have probablyheard of, which includes, like
having a mentor, you know,leaving the real world, getting
a mentor, doing all these tasksthat you do, achievement,
(32:54):
achievement, achievement, andthen ultimately, you know, you
get the girl.
The heroine's journey, or thehero's journey, is very much
just for a contrast.
The hero's journey is reallywhat we see in most, you know,
tv series, we see it in mostmovies and also it's what we see
in video games.
A lot is like, you know, youdefeat level after level after
(33:16):
level and then you beat the bigboss at the end and you win.
You know, and it's beenpopularized so much.
But you know, when JosephCampbell popularized this, there
was a a group of women whoasked him what about the
heroine's journey?
And he said oh well, you know,women, they don't need a journey
, they don't need a heroine'sjourney because they're the
(33:38):
place that everybody's trying toget to.
And I always like to say, well,sorry, joe, there may be some
truth in this idea that, youknow, the divine feminine is
what the masculine is trying toget to.
That's true, right, themasculine wants to get to that
feminine.
But there is actually a journeyfor women and it is just as
(33:58):
archetypal as the journey formen, the hero's journey.
And the way that Campbell didthis was he took old myths, he
took the structures of storiesand studied them all out and saw
okay, this is the format thathappens over and over again.
Well, what we have done andwe're not the only people to
have done this Obviously we'restanding on the shoulders of
giants as well, but we havelooked through so many myths and
(34:21):
gone back in the archetypes tofind the heroine's journey.
What is the archetypalheroine's journey, the journey
for women?
It's very different, as you canimagine, than the hero's
journey.
So the heroine's journey hasfour parts to it.
The first part is thisawakening piece.
Sometimes this is called aninitiation.
Oftentimes it's like thisawakening, and I would love to
(34:46):
take you through this, you know,with some stories that we have
heard, and I'll do one that ismore familiar to people in our
modern context.
So let's think about Alice inWonderland.
Okay, in the form of thisheroine's journey, Alice's
awakening, or initiation, isseeing the white rabbit right.
So Alice sees this white rabbitand she starts following it.
(35:07):
She knows she needs to followthe white rabbit.
And in our initiation phase, forwomen, oftentimes what happens
in this awakening is the worldis not what you think that it
was.
You wake up to this idea okay,the world is not what I thought
it was, what I believed.
There's some piece that isn'ttrue, something's not working
for me, and this can happenthrough an event, sometimes,
(35:30):
lots of times, for women,because we're so burned out.
This often happens with thehealth event, right, we're like
oh no, I'm hypothyroid now, whatam I going to do?
You know, we have cancer,whatever it is.
Oftentimes it's a physicalevent for women.
Other times the awakening isI've done everything in the
hero's journey, right, like I'vedone everything the masculine
(35:51):
way, and I still feel empty.
Why am I empty and where isthis emptiness coming from?
And so those are often thepaths.
Other ones are, like I said,like my awakening piece right
was the world is not what Ithought it was.
Oh my gosh, we're running thisfraudulent study.
Holy cow, I've got to like gointo the rabbit hole, right Like
(36:11):
I have to follow this down.
Now, often in the initiationphase, there is this piece where
you'll have guides or peopletell you to don't go down that
rabbit hole.
Okay, like, don't go down,don't do that, don't go astray,
be careful.
You know, like, be careful,don't go into this stuff, don't
do this alternative whatever.
And you'll have warning peoplewho will tell you that.
(36:34):
But something in you just saysno, I need to go down this
rabbit hole, right, like I'vegot to go down.
And in the heroine's journeyit's very much a descent to
ascend.
So you must descend to ascend,just like Alice.
She's a great example becauseshe actually tumbles in through
a hole, she goes down right.
And so that is the second step.
Is this descent phase?
(36:55):
And in the descent phase wemeet our shadow pieces.
And when I say shadow pieces,you've probably talked about
this before.
Everyone's talking about shadowwork.
But we meet the pieces ofourselves that we have isolated
and that we've tried to get ridof, and stuff in a corner right.
We meet these pieces ofourselves that we've hated and
we start to peel back the layersof ourselves that aren't true
(37:17):
to us.
The descent phase is very muchthis part of like.
Okay, is this true or is it notLike?
I don't think this is true,let's peel it away.
I don't think this is true,let's peel it away.
It's very much like findingmore and more information about
yourself.
Okay, what?
What is the shadow piece of medoing?
What do I need?
What's actually coming up sothat that descent phase is
(37:37):
really like okay, we're peelingback all these layers, we're
peeling, peeling, peeling.
We're going down, down, down,down.
We're learning more and moreand more and more, and then we
hit the bottom Right.
And this can be a really hardpart for people because, as it's
called a descent like, somepeople feel really depressed,
right At this, because the worldis not what you thought.
(38:01):
You're having to face demons.
You're having to say, oh, someof the things I thought were
true were not true.
You have to come to grips withreality in a totally different
way.
And so some women this is partof the reason we created the
Heroine's Journey, and what I dois because some people will get
stuck in this phase, right,like, they get stuck, they get
(38:21):
really sad, and we don't wantpeople to get stuck in this
phase and eventually it allcomes through, right, like I
think, eventually people get tothe other side, but this phase
can feel hard, like really hardand difficult, and so we want to
help people know there's moreto the story, right, you don't
end down at the bottom of therabbit hole, you don't.
(38:48):
What does Alice do next?
She goes through the door intoWonderland right.
And when you're in Wonderlandright, everything's kind of
topsy-turvy and there's oddthings, and she's on a search.
She's trying to find the whiterabbit and she's got some guides
, she's got the Cheshire Cat,she's got the Mad Hatter and all
these people pushing and thecaterpillar, whatever you find
down there.
And so this third part iscalled the search phase.
(39:09):
So we're searching, and inancient times, oftentimes this
search phase was categorized orepitomized by a labyrinth that
you go down into the cave andthen you hit the labyrinth and
you have to search in thelabyrinth.
Now, this part is very intuitive, right, because it's in the
dark, it's different, it'semotional, it's searching for
yourself, and in this place,this is where you get to decide
(39:33):
your fate.
You could decide who you areand you decide which way you're
going to go, right, you decideam I going to turn left?
Am I going to turn right?
Okay, there's a stone wall here.
I need to go the other way.
And this is really the partwhere you're trying things on,
right, I'm trying things on, I'mtrying something new, I'm
putting these on, I'm going totry this new diet or this new
workout or whatever.
It is right.
And it's the search where you'relooking for you.
(39:55):
Now You're trying to find yourwhole, worthy, authentic self,
because she's down here, right,like, the key to your wholeness
is in this search place.
You just got to find her and,like I said before, like with
Alice in Wonderland, often thispart has some guides to it.
So you'll get mentors, you'llget people who come into your
life, who push you, andsometimes guides don't look the
way we think like with the MadHatter, right, like who would
(40:16):
take advice from a Mad Hatter,but like, sometimes we get that
person who doesn't you wouldn'tthink would be a good guide, but
they give you a good piece ofinformation and maybe they're
not your true guide, but theyhelp push you in the right
direction, right, and so,eventually, once you've done
this search, what does Alicefind?
She finds the white rabbit.
Finally, she goes to the castle.
(40:36):
She's got the white rabbit inher sights and so in this search
phase, you get the key to yourwholeness, which leads you to
the last phase, which is theascent phase.
You get to ascend back upwardto the light of day, and so
you've got the key to yourwholeness.
The ascent phase is all aboutintegration.
How do you integrate all of thepieces of you together?
And the ascent phase often alsohas to do with becoming more of
(41:00):
a teacher, helping other people.
You become a mentor to otherpeople.
And every woman, like everyonegoing through this, you know
that's why so many people theygo on their health journey and
then they're like I got to teachthis right, like I got to help
other people right.
That's always people's journeyis like oh, I went through all
this stuff and like it worked sowell for me and I found my
wholeness, and now I've got toteach you.
And that is that ascent phase.
Let's integrate it, let'sascend, let's integrate all of
(41:22):
our pieces.
Now there's one more place tothis, because I could say and
then you live happily ever afteryou ascended right, like you're
ascended.
But for the heroine's journeythat's not the way it works,
right.
The masculine journey is verylinear.
It's point A to point B.
The heroine's journey is notlike that.
It's always a spiral.
So you got to go on the journeyover and over and over again.
(41:45):
We're always journeying, we'realways spiraling right, descend
to ascend, and if you've everseen a spiral and we're like,
look at a top when it spins andspins, you can see how somehow
it's constantly going inward andupward at the same time.
Right, it's constantly goinginward and upward, inward and
upward.
And that is the heroine'sjourney inward and upward, in
this perfect spiral whicheventually allows you to ascend
(42:07):
all the way up.
Rose (42:09):
I love this Beautiful yes, and as you're talking, I
thought about that that you willgo up and you'll come back.
You go in and come out in thatlabyrinth and it's beautiful.
That's amazing.
I love that.
Thank you for explaining that.
Julie (42:24):
Yeah, yeah, we're very cyclical, right.
We live in cycles because we'relike the moon.
We are of course, this journeyis cyclical.
It's cycles and you get todecide each cycle right, what
you're going to change and howyou're going to ascend.
Rose (42:43):
And I think some of the work you do to help women move
through through parts when theycan be stuck because we can get
stuck and we can get stuck inthat sadness or we can get stuck
in a loop or we can go down aroad that maybe we don't need to
go down and we need to just beguided.
That's why there's so manywomen.
Like you said, we've gonethrough some of these parts of
awakening and now we're comingthrough to help others and I
(43:06):
love that.
I want to talk a little bitabout sacred feminine symbols
because I know you're verypassionate about that.
When we talked, you said you'rein search for are there other
symbols, and how women can usethese symbols in, maybe, their
daily life or when they'relooking to find some of this
(43:29):
ascension.
Julie (43:31):
Yes, totally Okay.
So I've been, like I told you,I've been on this journey.
I really I wanted to find asmany feminine symbols as I could
, because I think, as women, wehave this idea that there aren't
really feminine symbols, rightLike we don't, we don't
associate symbols with ourselves.
But so far I've been, you know,scouring different countries
(43:52):
and different cultures, and Ifound more than 60 feminine
symbols.
Wow, yeah, I think I'm up to 65now.
So they're out there, they'reeverywhere.
Once you have the eyes to seethem, they're everywhere.
What's my favorite?
I don't know if I have afavorite, but I, uh, right now I
(44:13):
feel very close to the Jaguar,actually, as a feminine symbol.
I've been really, uh, workingwith that energy a lot, but, uh,
and I've been trying on, I feltlike, you know, if I'm going to
help women find these symbols,I've got to learn how to embody
them, Like, I need to haveexperiences with each of them,
and that's what I've been tryingto do, is deeply have
(44:34):
experiences with these symbols.
So let me explain a few.
I'll tell you some of them.
We can go through a few quicklyand, if you want to touch more
in depth, because I love to dothis to open people's minds so
that they can see, like, oh,this is so much bigger than I
thought that it could be, youknow.
And then I would love to talkabout like, why are symbols
(44:56):
important, right?
How can you use them?
Why do we use them?
And so some symbols you know,you're going to be familiar with
.
So here are some peopleprobably might be familiar with
it and they'd be like oh, thismakes sense for symbolizing
women in the feminine right.
We've talked about the tree,the moon, water.
Of course those are veryclassic feminine symbols.
There's also I mentioned thehoneybee earlier.
(45:18):
That's a divine feminine symbol.
It's also, I would say, aclassic divine feminine symbol.
But let's get into some thatmaybe are scarier for people and
might be surprising.
So the serpent, which I thinkis popular, right, if people are
like why am I seeing snakeseverywhere?
It's because it's a divinefeminine symbol.
(45:39):
And as we go through these kindof like we talked in the
beginning with the yin and theyang because we have demonized
the divine feminine, some ofthese symbols might make you
uncomfortable when we talk aboutthem and they might be.
Things like snakes are scary,right.
Like, don't snakes representthe devil?
Actually, no Long before theyrepresented the devil, they
actually represented eternallife.
(46:00):
Right, we always have the snakeshedding its skin, always
growing, always changing.
Right, it flows.
The way that it moves flowsjust like water flows, right, so
the snake has so many beautifulthings, but now we've demonized
it as evil when it's reallytruly not so.
There's the serpent, the spideris another one, and again, it's
(46:23):
probably one that people arelike why are we talking about
spiders?
How could that be Like?
Why are you?
You know, this is an awful bug,you know.
But the spider, right, sheweaves her web.
She weaves her web, she letsthings come to her.
She's associated with motherspider in shamanic cultures.
Right, that she weaved theearth, the idea that the goddess
(46:46):
weaved the earth and weavestime and space.
And what do women do?
We weave time and space rightWith our bodies, and so does a
spider.
She weaves right With her body,she takes things in and she
makes this beautiful web that'sso gorgeous, the patterns on it.
So that's another one to thinkabout.
And while we're talking aboutweaving, obviously veils are
going to be associated with thefeminine and you're going to
(47:10):
have looms and things like thatwill also be associated.
Some other ones that are prettytypical is the pomegranate.
You want to think aboutPersephone?
She eats a pomegranate that redthe seeds, the fertility piece,
right is really tied to this.
But let's talk about some that,like, maybe are more rare, like
the jaguar that we talked about.
I bet most people didn't knowthat the jaguar was not, now,
(47:32):
yeah, symbol.
Um, the orca is another divinefeminine symbol and you that one
makes more sense to people, Ithink, sometimes because they
they're matriarchal society, orOrcas are the grandmothers.
They're one of only threespecies that has a grandmother
and it's orcas.
Elephants and people were theonly ones that have grandmothers
, and elephants, coincidentally,are also a divine feminine
(47:54):
symbol.
I can see that, yes, andelephants I don't know if you
knew this.
Did you know that elephantsworship the moon?
No, I did not.
Rose (48:02):
Yes, they have every full moon.
Julie (48:04):
They have like these actual ceremonies that are
documented and they make like aspecial circle and they take
branches and they wave at themoon and they have like a whole
ritual that they perform everymonth to the moon, which is
really beautiful, oh I love that.
Rose (48:19):
I have to look into that more.
Julie (48:21):
Yes, yes, orcas do the same thing.
Orcas dance for the moon.
They have like a special fullmoon swim that they do, so
that's something really cool tolike look into.
Rose (48:32):
Yeah, and I think if women are drawn to some symbol,
whatever that is, I feel it'swhat they need, whether it's
masculine or feminine.
Right, so if you're drawn tosomething or if you see repeated
.
So I see a fox.
So here's a symbol.
Lately in my backyard, likeright near my window at the same
(48:53):
time in the morning, walks bythis fox.
He comes, you know she.
It's a she because she'slooking for food, I think.
And I'm like, oh my gosh, andso I looked it up, is a fox
related to divine feminineenergy?
And it absolutely is.
And I needed to hear that orsee that symbol for something
I'm going through.
I'm like that is a beautifulsymbol for me.
(49:15):
So I've been seeing the fox alot lately.
So if you see, something that iscoming up for you.
Look it up and see what itmeans.
Julie (49:23):
Yeah, foxes are magical, like I love that you're seeing
the fox.
I love the fox, yeah me too.
Rose (49:29):
I love it.
They're so beautiful.
I just wish you would pause fora moment so I could just have
this nonverbal communicationwith it, or something you know.
That's beautiful.
I really love this.
I want to wrap up a little bit,so if you want to talk about
what your offerings are, how youhelp women, what you have, you
and um, the floor is yours.
So tell, tell everyone outthere what, what you have to
(49:53):
offer yeah, can I tell peoplewhy symbols are important?
Julie (49:56):
oh, yes, of course yeah yeah, so the reason we use
symbols and there are tons morethese are just like a sampling.
But the reason that we usesymbols and there are tons more
these are just like a sampling.
But the reason that we usesymbols is because symbols are
very tangible.
We can relate to them right,when I say the word pomegranate
or spider, like you know whatthat is and you can see it and
experience it and understandright its qualities.
(50:17):
And that's part of the reason.
And so when I talk aboutembodying symbols, we use the
nature of that symbol to help usin our own physical path, our
bodies and the meaning.
And of course, symbols havelayers and layers and layers of
meaning and that's why they'resuch a good tool to work with,
because you can dig into themmore and more and they always
have more to teach you.
So that's part of the reasonthese divine feminine symbols
(50:38):
are so important, because theyhelp teach us what the divine
feminine is and how to embody itin our own bodies, right In our
own lives.
But as far as the work that I do, I have a school called
Feminine Alchemist and you cango to femininealchemistcom.
That mist part.
Alchemist is spelled M-Y-S-Tlike mystical, and we have a
(51:05):
school for women who want tolearn right all about the divine
feminine, embody it.
We teach sacred embodiment,which is like what we talked
about, that sacred rage portion.
We actually have created theheroine's journey, and so we
take women step by step on theheroine's journey, help them
through that.
We do guided meditations, tasks,rituals.
(51:26):
We take women through and teachthem about the symbols.
We teach women about astrology,we teach them about human
design and energetics, and sothose are like the three big
pillars that we teach as sacredembodiment, astrology and
energetics, and we really helpwomen get to know who they are
and awaken the divine femininewithin themselves.
(51:48):
So that's what we do.
We do retreats, we take womenon the heroine's journey and I
personally do astrology andhuman design readings, which you
can find me at astrologicalattorney on Instagram.
Astrological attorney andastrologicalattorney.
com is how you can get in touchwith me personally.
Rose (52:08):
Yes, I'll put all the links in the show notes.
I really want to have you backat some point to talk more about
astrology and human design,because we didn't have a chance
to do that.
There's so much here that youspoke about that resonates with
me and I'm sure will resonatewith so many people.
It's just really a gift thatyou have and that you're sharing
(52:29):
with everyone, and I'm so gladthat your path led you to here,
because you're just magical andI really mean that.
So thank you, thank you forsharing your time and your space
here.
So many times when you weretalking, I just felt like my
whole body, like I could reallysense what you were saying in my
own body, and it just wasreally enlightening for me.
(52:52):
So I wanted to share that withyou.
Julie (52:54):
So thank you, thank you so much.
I love to do it and thank youfor having this beautiful
platform and for all that you do.
I just feel so grateful to beconnected to you, thank you.
Rose (53:06):
Thank you, julie, and I do want to have you back one day.
And thank you and everyone outthere, please check Julie out.
She's amazing and I know youknow that from everything that
she talked about today, so thankyou.
Thank you for joining me onChat Off The Mat.
If you're ready to transformyour energy and step into your
fullest potential, I'd love towork with you.
As an energy alchemist, I helpwomen release blocked energy and
(53:27):
reclaim their vibrant essence.
Visit rosewipichcom to exploreworking together and discover
free resources for your journey.
Love today's episode.
Subscribe wherever you get yourpodcasts, leave a rating and
share your biggest takeaway withme on Instagram at Rose Wippich
.
Remember wellness warriors.
Your energy is precious.
Nurture it wisely.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
Cardiac Cowboys
The heart was always off-limits to surgeons. Cutting into it spelled instant death for the patient. That is, until a ragtag group of doctors scattered across the Midwest and Texas decided to throw out the rule book. Working in makeshift laboratories and home garages, using medical devices made from scavenged machine parts and beer tubes, these men and women invented the field of open heart surgery. Odds are, someone you know is alive because of them. So why has history left them behind? Presented by Chris Pine, CARDIAC COWBOYS tells the gripping true story behind the birth of heart surgery, and the young, Greatest Generation doctors who made it happen. For years, they competed and feuded, racing to be the first, the best, and the most prolific. Some appeared on the cover of Time Magazine, operated on kings and advised presidents. Others ended up disgraced, penniless, and convicted of felonies. Together, they ignited a revolution in medicine, and changed the world.