Inspiring Women: Stacey Curnow: Midwife

I’m grateful for Stacey especially for her 30 Days to Inner Peace which I tried earlier this year and it has motivated me to meditate and exercise every day, practices which I have seldom missed since receiving Stacey’s kind and encouraging daily prompts. In these Stacey wrote honestly about her own struggles and showing self-care and redirecting her efforts, which helped me treat myself with kindness and eventually gain some consistency that was previously lacking.

Stacey’s own stories exemplify her teaching. Her perseverance with getting accepted into a program for midwifery (it took her four tries) is a compelling story that she translates into steps for setting goals and following through, including a clear goals; steps for action broken down into small, actionable steps; not being dissuaded by misunderstanding or negative feedback from others; and getting support from sympathetic people in one’s life.

And she’s willing to take risks, once leaving a clinic where she worked as a midwife to volunteer in Mexico with Doctors Without Borders to improve her Spanish and eventually devote herself to serving the Latina population in the U.S., finding a “dream job” that also allowed her to spend time with her family. Recently, Stacey saw that she’d grown “less-than-satisfied” with her then-current job and took another leap, resigning to devote all her time to Midwife for Your Life coaching and workshops. In a related piece she describes her dialog with her “Inner Critic,” portraying as one of several potential sources of guidance. Similarly, Stacey shares this simple exercise on cultivating intuition awareness.

These are great stories. Stacey’s helped a lot of women give birth through her first midwifery practice and who knows how many she will help give birth to their dreams through her second midwifery practice.

Inspiring Women: Barrie Davenport: Action

Years ago, someone said to me "Are you going to remain passive to your life or become active to it," or something to that effect. And I remained so for years, and perhaps so still to this day to a certain degree or a point on the continuum.

However, this isn't about me. This about Barrie who exemplifies being active to one's life and being bold, embodying the well known Marianne Williamson quote which says that one serves no one by shrinking and denying oneself.

Through her blog and her course materials and coaching Barrie offers practical ideas for taking action and changing one's life. Whether it's earning more money in any kind of situation, planning for the future, or giving mindful gifts to people in one's life, Barrie thinks of everything.

While Barrie gives instructions on self-examination and self-discovery, she also emphasizes focusing on the present moment and not losing sight of appreciation for where one is right now, as in this blog post which stands productivity and to-do-lists on its head. I think of the Frog and Toad books and how Toad made a list of what to do one day, invited Frog to join him, the list blew away and Toad refused to chase after it because that activity was not on his list. I know Barrie would kindly and humorously counsel us against such rigidity.

I'm also grateful for what Barrie writes about life transitions and her simple instructions emphasizing self-care, keeping up practices that work, letting go of why and obsessive thinking, using a journal and asking for help.

I'm fortunate to take a course from Barrie and Erin Falconer this month, challenged by the exercises, realizing how much work I need to do, and grateful for the support from the teachers and my fellow participants. Meanwhile, I cannot recommend enough this gorgeous blog by a lovely woman who recognized the need to change, and took the initiative and used the resources available to her to make it happen. I want what you have, Barrie.