What they taught us about our bodies. And what it actually cost us


The religion I grew up in had a lot to say about women's bodies.

Keep yourself pure. Guard your worth. The messaging was relentless and specific, and it came with vivid illustrations - a used piece of chewing gum, a heart passed from hand to hand until it was battered beyond recognition. The point was clear: your value as a woman was bound up in your body, and that value could be lost. Damaged. Given away.

I absorbed all of that. Most of us did. And what it left behind, once I'd walked away from the institution that taught it, wasn't nothing. It was a deeply ingrained sense that my body wasn't quite mine. That I wasn't quite worth taking care of. That I needed to earn my place in my own skin.

Unlearning that took years. It was, in fact, where my inner work actually began - not with spirituality, not with Brigid, not with any of the things I now associate with this path, but with the slow and sometimes painful process of learning to value myself as I actually am.

This week's post is about what inner work really means in practice. Not the Instagram version. The real one.

Read it here

If any of what I've described above sounds familiar - if you've carried something similar from your own religious upbringing - I want you to know that the post was written with you specifically in mind. You don't have to have it resolved to start. You just have to be willing to look.

Bríd libh

Órlagh

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Hi, I'm Orlagh, of Brigid's Forge

I'm dedicated to helping women in particular develop their spiritual path in life. I'm focused heavily on Brigid in Ireland, although not all my followers are! I teach, speak, coach and mentor people to help them along their own individual path, based on what lore we have, but also allowing for each individual path to develop as it needs to.

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