As a women’s holistic doctor I firmly believe that if a woman is feeling supported. loved, honoured and nurtured – her physical and emotional health will have a power for remarkable healing and well-being. So I do red tent style women’s gatherings and circles.
Today my husband was graciously playing with my young son and off I went. Backpack on my back with posters, beads, herbal teas, silk cloths, milk sweets, pens, papers and signs!
I cycled down the packed and busy village road in India. I live at a pilgrimage site and being Sunday it was packed! Buses come and drop off people there from near and far villages and towns. I mazed my way through the throngs of small Bengali’s and their bright red and yellow saris. Cycling in public roads in India definitely takes practice- and I am still practicing! I drilled my little bell hoping they would stay to the side as I dodged buses and their loud elaborate song horns, motorbikes whisked past me with their deep incessant and very urgent hooters making them seem far more close and menacing than they really are. Bicycles, rickshaws, people, Indian spitting…smells of fried puris, the odd beedie being smoked, car fumes and incense. Shops playing their Krishna dance videos with children singing Krishna bhajans on the small screens for all the shopping pilgrims.
Then it opened up and their was a relief from the intensity! The shops were left in the distance and the roadside revealed the nature. Cows walked slowly, the air felt fresher, cars and buses became less and I could see the rice paddies on the left, still soaked from when the river Ganges flooded last month. Green, blue..space and beautiful. I appreciated the rhythm of my bicycle peddling round and round. Passing the rickshaw bicycle also cycling round and round with its regular squeak. Squeak. Squeak. Strangely reassuring and lulling.
I started enjoying my ride and appreciating the village atmosphere here. I put up my sign saying “Women’s Gathering Here” at the turnoff from the main road. Directions in India can be very confusing – “Carry on until you see a road on your left…don’t turn there! Turn at the small lane 8 metres after that road!” So I placed some signs so people would know!
And again at the nameless apartment block.
Inside the beautifully decorated Spa – a perfect space to honour and nurture women – I set up a small altar with rich pink silk scarf I had bought in Jaipur. Some beautiful women figures, beads, incense in my lotus incense holder from Bali and my African Sage and Lavender smudgestick from my Chinese doctor friend in Cape Town.
Some soft music, some Rooibos and Mint tea on the boil.
We chatted, we shared, we shed a tear, we laughed, we loved and appreciated and respected and learnt. We discovered this is ImPOrtANt! Every young and old girl and woman should have this opportunity as a human right. It should be part of the community script that every woman has the opportunity to feel part of a caring community of women. Where she can share her fears, doubts and learn from her older mothers, sisters about her body, her fertility, her mooncycle, her sexuality, childmaking, childrearing, pregnancy, birth…. in a circle of non-judgemental, caring and loving others.
We are an international community and we were internationally represented this afternoon.
I left touched, grateful and appreciated!
I want to do more! I want to honour women so much for the role and significance they play in society.
I have so much planned to share and to nurture our Sacred Ladies!
I rode home eager to embrace my sons, listening to their excited time with his dad and the cows; and cycling with friends.
