In this conversation with Jessie Harrold, we talk about her creative process of writing her second book and what that looked like practically, with two children. Jessie’s own matrescence experiences and the work that she does with mothers around this transformation and identity shift.
You’ll hear us discuss:
- Jessie’s personal story with Matrescence
- Jessie’s process of writing her new book Mother Shift Reclaiming Motherhood as a Rite of Passage
- How Jessie started Women’s circles and why they are a big part of Jessie’s life
- Why Jessie created MotherShift as an online program
- Jessie’s personal experience with creativity and Motherhood
- We hear Jessie’s experience of being a Doula before having kids
I wanted to write my book during National Novel Writing Month but I was solo parenting and I didn't want to let go of this dream. I would set my alarm for 4am and write for 2 hours, because that's my best time to write. The part that took four years was writing a book proposal, shopping it around to agents. Getting a lot of rejections, building my social media platform, doing a tonne of articles, podcasts and all kinds of things to Increase the strength of my platform.
MEET JESSIE HARROLD
Jessie Harrold is a coach, women’s mentor and doula who has been supporting women through radical life transformations and other rites of passage for over a decade. Jessie works one-on-one with women and mothers, facilitates mentorship programs, women’s circles and rituals, and hosts retreats and wilderness quests. She is the founder of MotherSHIFT, the internationally acclaimed matrescence support program, and its sister program for postpartum professionals, The Village. Jessie is also the author of Project Body Love: my quest to love my body and the surprising truth I found instead, as well as the forthcoming title with Shambhala Publications, Mothershift: Reclaiming Motherhood as a Rite of Passage. Jessie’s work has been featured in Spirituality & Health, Green Parent, Expectful and Explore Magazine. She is also the host of The Becoming Podcast. Jessie lives on the east coast of Canada where she mothers her two children, writes, and tends to the land.
When we fail to grieve in motherhood, what we find ourselves doing is either scrambling back to the way things were. I usually see that leading to suffering among mothers because things are not the way they were, they just can't be right now.
