Contemplating Expansion... a Journaling Ritual for you this Full Flower Moon

Settle in with a pen and your journal, listen to my playlist and contemplate your own expansion in this blooming season...

Hello to anyone who is new here… I am Lauren, a Mother of two daughters, a Writer Soulful Business Mentor, Website & Branding Creator, Human Design Guide, Sacred Space Holder and multi dimensional human being. You can find out more about my work here. Please do subscribe to join the journey, and if you enjoy this, and you do have the means, I would be so grateful if you chose to support my creations for £5 a month…

Curious little hands meet the unfurled ferns by our front gate.

Hello dear heart, how are you today?

MAY feels like a month of possibility to me, and we only have to look around (in the UK anyway) as the underground work of winter is coming towards it’s peak.

The cow parsley stretches high above my shoulders now as I walk down the path by my home, laden with intricate lace-like flowers, it now bows over after a night of rainfall.

The ferns by my front gate tickle my legs every time I walk through them - their feathered leaves reaching way beyond the space that those magical spirals inhabited just a few weeks ago.

The roses are unfurling day by day and I cannot resist a chance to stick my nose into their centre and deeply inhale the fragrance every time I pass them. The scent greets me like a long lost friend and invites my entire body to soften.

It looks, and feels like, Heaven on earth.

Everything around me, and within me, is expanding.

As we edge towards the Full May Flower Moon on Thursday at 14.53 in London, I can feel the stirrings of her fullness moving in my body. The slightly electric energy that also sometimes couples with exhaustion. A paradox… always.

Every full moon is different for me, I no longer have a set of rituals that I lean on every single lunar month, instead I listen. I watch. I FEEL what she is illuminating in me.

This May Flower Moon is calling me towards EXPANSION. There is a sense of awakening, emerging and stepping into a phase of stretching my wings a little further.

What are you feeling in this phase of the moon? Take a moment now to tune into sensation and emotion and simply witness what is rising in you.

I held a Women’s Circle on Monday night. In person, near my home in Kent. It was delicious, and heart filling and nourished parts of me that I didn’t know needed tending to.

Sitting with other women in Circle is like entering another dimension to me… something happens the moment that the space is opened and the vibrational resonance courses through my body for days after.

I can feel it fizzing around my being right now. Like little fireflies of magic dancing in my cells. A mysterious holding wrapping around my heart.

It’s magic. It’s medicine. It is a balm.

The altar for our Circle on Monday

An offering from the magic of circle to you here…

I tuned into the word EXPANSION as a theme for the Circle and offered it as a contemplation for the women who gathered with me on Monday. Now I am sharing a little offering from that space in the hope that it will support you in this season of blooming.

Take some time to land in your body before you begin.

This might look like some gentle movement, dance, or simply a few minutes of lying down or sitting in stillness to be with yourself and let the residue of your day thus far settle.

Whatever you choose, invite a sense of spaciousness into your being. In your body. In your breath. In your mind.

You can put this playlist on if you would like to let the music guide you in this process.

Once you feel like you have arrived, grab your pen and journal and let yourself scribble on the following prompts…

• What does the word EXPANSION mean to you?

• Is there anything that is currently stifling your expansion?

• What if you were to live your life as your fullest, most expansive self?
  How might you show up differently? What does this version of you look like? What do they wear? How do they move? What qualities do they exude?

• What courageous steps would this expansive self take over the next lunar month? And beyond?

• How can you stay anchored into this version of yourself? What can you do to remember them daily?

Once this feels complete I invite you to take a few moments to move your body once more, notice how it feels, and then pause to integrate what you have surfaced through your explorations.

I would love to bear witness to your journey with expansion, do share in the comments or DM me if you prefer.

My own current perspective on expansion

Expansion looks, and feels, different for us all.

As I took my turn to share in our Circle I realised that for years I thought expansion was supposed to always feel GOOD. I imagined that I would know when I was growing and spreading my wings in the right direction because it would feel light and airy and freeing.

And it does… at times… but it also can feel excruciatingly uncomfortable.

There are growing pains and a sense of stretching as we move from one version of our self to another. I have spent the last decade moving towards my expansion and then running back into my safety net again. It is actually an exhausting pattern to be in and has lead me to, at times, feel such frustration.

Some people seem to breeze through these expansion phases effortlessly and climb very high, very quickly, however others — myself included — are a little more sensitive in nature and need a slower, more gentler approach. The ‘hustle hard’ mentality and ‘just do it’ attitude is not conducive to the more tender souls.

If we move too quickly, if we don’t take time to integrate, if we don’t support ourselves with utmost love and compassion as we evolve… then we are likely going to ricochet straight back to our same versions and this is where I found myself for many years.

While there was nothing inherently ‘wrong’ in that version of myself, I knew there was MORE for me on the other side of this perpetual contraction phase.

Sometimes we get in a cycle of staying a little smaller than we want to be. It isn’t something to berate ourselves for, but more an opportunity to soothe ourselves through it. That version of ourselves is often dominant for a reason and ‘yelling’ at them, or speaking critically to them, is unlikely to create sustainable growth.

It is, yet again, another chance to return to love.

Motherhood as a catalyst… again

If anything has shown me my capacity for holding myself in this tension it is Motherhood and for that I am forever grateful… who knew that the very thing that seemed to bring more restriction in my life would actually be the thing that has liberated me in the most expansive way?

Holding Circle is the perfect example of this for me.

It would be easier NOT to do it - there is the organisation, slotting it in around the children and my other work, marketing and sharing it, preparing and setting up the space. There is also the very raw vulnerability of wanting people to have a positive experience, especially when others have invested money and their precious time and energy into joining me.

There is a nervousness I get every time I hold space - and a tiny (sometimes not so tiny) part of me that wants to disappear and not show up. To cancel it all.

I have been holding space in person for almost ten years now and that feeling has never gone away. I can see now that actually it is because the work of our heart and soul is often so, so important to us — it feels like survival in some strange way. So to place it out into the world for others to potentially judge/criticise/comment on, feels like we are laying ourselves bare, naked and open for potential heart break.

BUT… holding space in community — both online and in person — is the absolute epitome of expansion for me. I step into the space and my soul comes alive. I feel vast — in the best possible way.

I feel like I am doing exactly what I am ‘supposed’ to do.

Is there something in your world that makes you feel similar? I would love to know.

The fullness of nature, reaching way beyond the boundaries of the path.

Some parting words

If you are reading this and feeling the resonance, perhaps you too are in an expansion phase. So, as you hold yourself through this, you might like to take these words and repeat them gently to yourself as you travel…

I give myself permission to take up space.

It is safe for me to expand into my wholeness.

I devote myself to my own expansion, with the tenderest love.

Until next time…

With so much love and gentleness,

Lauren

xxx

Upcoming Gatherings

The next in-person offerings in Tonbridge, Kent are TEND - A Mother’s Afternoon Retreat on 8th June and GATHER - A Women’s Connection Circle on 17th June.

AND exciting news… Save the date for the next Holding Stories gathering — which will be held in the morning, online by myself and

Lyndsay Kaldor

on 22nd June. Details will be announced over the next week.

Recent offerings you might have missed…

• What to do when you wobble - support for the tender times

• Balancing Motherhood with an urge to to travel - a post about my recent trip to Germany and what it surfaced within me.

• Merging the inner and outer worlds - a podcast episode with Laura Hart Swann where we talk about birth, business, motherhood and claiming our lineage.

Go deeper together…

If you enjoy my work and wish to go deeper you can…

• Find out about my 1-2-1 Mentoring here

• Explore my Creative Studio offerings - Website & Branding here

• Book a Human Design reading here

• Listen to The Unravelling Podcast here

• Explore my online home here

• Follow me on Instagram here