When you were five, what did you want to be when you grew up?
When I was 5 it never occurred to me that I couldn’t be whatever I wanted to be…
Poor deluded Catholic school girl that I was.
So when my kindergarten teacher asked us to draw what we wanted to to be when we grew up, I drew myself as a priest.
My teacher took me aside to explain the patriarchy of the one holy and apostolic Church.
And that, my friends, is when this feminist was born.
Happy Easter
Self-Centred
in the Kin Keepers’ Haven
is a space for us to
Unlearn Capitalism
& Soothe Our Nervous Systems
When we slow down and listen
to our bodies, to nature, and to each other,
we remember our enoughness;
We remember our needs, and can ask for them to be met;
We are able to sustainably give from an overflowing cup;
to support each other, and thrive,
So we can return to a place where every living being has equal access to abundance, joy, justice, and liberation.
Becoming Self-Centred is a powerful healing power move for all versions of us that have been decentred by systems of harm.
Becoming Self-Centred creates space for others to thrive, because your boundaries are dynamic and healthy and clear
Becoming Self-Centred is a lifelong process of learning & unlearning
Join Self-Centred in the Kin Keepers’ Haven to explore:
🌳 the difference between Capitalism & Commerce
🌳 Nervous System Basics
🌳 You’ve got needs!
🌳 Dynamic Boundaries
🌳 Truth Aligned Leadership
🌳 Cultivating Rhythms of Care
🌳 Connecting to Joy & Pleasure
🌳 Essential Service – finding right time/size/pace/relationship
🌳 and more as we follow the breadcrumbs together
Each monthly live call will include a check-in, a lesson, and an essential practice that you can integrate into your day.
Calls will be recorded and posted in the private space,
so you can take your time.
Self-Centred draws on the teachings of many world-changers whose work will be named and referenced in the call notes,
so that you can dig deeper as your capacity allows.
The Kin Keepers’ Haven is a space for us to remember and relearn our connection to ourselves, our communities, our environment, and each other;
a space to disarm the influences of systems of harm in our behavior and relationships;
so we can return to a place where every living being has equal access to abundance, joy, justice, and liberation.
When you join today as a Founding Member, you will have access to the Kin Keepers’ Mighty Networks space to connect with other members and join live calls such as:
🌿 Held: an intimate and brave space for reclaiming our lineage and honoring the land (hosted by Trevia)
🧙🏽♀️ the Caucus of Crones (hosted by Janine) a space for Culture Makers and Haven Members over the age of 50 to cackle, collaborate, and cultivate change.
✍🏾 Weekly Coworking Sessions
🌒 Moon Circles to set intentions for the month ahead and connect to nature
🧶Monthly Stitch n Bitch Sessions where members come together to craft and crab (no judgment)
🕯️Monthly Grief Circles to allow our grief to move & make room for more joy in our lives
Join hosts Trevia Woods & Janine Bertolo
in the Kin Keepers’ Haven
to unlearn the messages of capitalism
and embrace interdependence
with a slow and delicious yes.
We can’t wait to meet you inside!
Kin Keepers’ Haven is a consensual, collaborative, co-creative space for culture makers, caregivers, and world changing witches to unlearn systems of harm and support each other.
Our best classroom is each other. We welcome members’ feedback to add offerings, make adjustments, and course-correct as required.
“Covid is a mass disabling event” ~ Imani
When you know better, you do better.
Systems of power want us to believe that Covid is over. It’s not
“The cultural messaging, and the ways that we’ve been manipulated into not caring for each other in our behavior around (Covid) is serving to massively disable and kill off a huge group of people.” ~ Rebecca Studer
My nervous system cannot embrace that truth without rebelling. There is no acceptable level of collateral damage.
I choose to navigate life focused on community care and disability justice
Despite being gaslit and distracted from the truth by capitalist powers, we have a choice – to recognize the science and mitigate harm in every way possible. In small doable messy and imperfect steps
“I would rather have a grief process than collude with harm.”
I have so much love and appreciation for Rebecca Studer, for sharing, for caring the science, the somatics, and the emotional process of navigating this reality in her Substack podcast Start Making Sense, episode 2:
“By ignoring the truth of the pathogen and listening to the cultural messaging of minimization, you could be permanently disabling or killing your neighbor. we need to baseline care about not infecting each other and creating spaces with clean air that everyone can access”
“By ignoring the truth and listening to the cultural messaging of minimization, you could be permanently disabling or killing your neighbor. We don’t need to be perfect or change everything all at once; we get to make the next doable step/choice towards care and community and let that be momentum towards a different future. We get to create something else, and I invite you to join me.”
“What is the next doable step? You are enough, you belong by being human, and you get to make choices that serve the collective”
Here’s mine: I am dedicated to wearing an N91 mask in shared spaces that vulnerable persons cannot avoid – grocery stores, medical clinics.
You can listen to/read Rebecca’s podcast episode here.
Hello!
I’m Janine. My pronouns are she/her.
I am an anti-capitalist crone, post-trauma growth coach, and consensual copywriter.
I strive daily to identify and unlearn the voices of white heteronormative patriarchy that are insidiously planted in our brains from an early age – voices that, without critical inquiry, we often confuse as our own.
I dream of a return to the Commons and a world where all living beings have equal access to the necessities of life, including laughter, rest, creativity, and joy.
Even though I didn’t always have the words, this dream has been the undercurrent of all of my pursuits from an early age.
I host the Caucus of Crones and Self-Centred in the Kin Keepers’ Haven, co-held online with my dear friend Trevia Woods.
I am available for 1:1 coaching sessions.
Drop a reply or check out my website if you’re interested in connecting.
If you would like to have the Self-Centred Newsletter sent to you in real time, you can subscribe here.
From the Self-Centred Newsletter January 20, 2024 – what I’m reading, writing and wrestling with
Personally, my body prefers the Spring Equinox as a more natural new year.
Winter is for hibernating, resting, warm soups and slow yesses.
That’s all to say, I get to wish you Happy New Year again on Tuesday March 19 at 11:06 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
I like to think that I’m preparing the soil of my being for spring planting at the turn of the real new year.
As well as launching a business, but in a slow-yes kind of way that’s actually working. I can honestly say that cohosting and participating in this space is giving me joy.
So, even though the Gregorian calendar has rolled into a bigger number, and tax returns are a thing I should be thinking about, it’s still winter here at crone central, and while there’s shit to get done, I remain in a place of hibernation, trying to rest and replenish and integrate.
My dear friend and business partner, Trevia Woods, is very busy with her graduate studies in social work, and I am trying somewhat successfully to refrain from distracting her, so I thought I’d tell all of you about what’s been going on here. (Hi Trevia!)
So you get to hear about what I’m reading, what I’m writing, who I’m listening to (and who I’m not listening to)…
I chose the wording with intention because I find that my attention span and focus for reading has diminished greatly over the years, likely due to an overdependence (I didn’t say addiction) to screens and devices.
So, I am in the middle of reading a lot of books. (Which sounds better than saying I can’t finish a book because I’m addicted to my devices. Indulge me.)
Here is a sampling of what I have on the go. The ones that are really lighting me up:
Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver: from one of my all time favourite authors (I’ve read and reread Prodigal Summer and will inevitably read it again, to the end even. Curiously, most of my friends list the Poisonwood Bible as their all time fav, but after three times trying (so far because I am no quitter, except when I am) I can’t remain engaged. I just read something about the plotline recently that made me think I should give it a go again. This book was a 2023 Christmas gift; yes, it’s been more than a year, but the story is so memorable and vivid I know I can pick it up again without having forgotten a thing. (The Lacuna is right up there too; I may add it back to my read-again list)
The Overstory by Richard Powers: this one is an epic piece of ecofiction, brilliantly written and constructed. I’m almost done, I’m in the place where you put the brakes on the reading because you don’t want it to end, but you really want to know how it ends, if it ends. One of the characters is based on my grrl crush, Diana Beresford Kroeger who you may have heard me rave about before and likely will again.
Which brings me to book number three: To Speak for the Trees: also an unfinished read. Diana’s story is amazing and magical and you should listen to her interview with Jane Fonda here.
Next up is the five volume series called Kinship: Belonging in a World of Relations (spoiler alert, they’re not all human relations) One of the editors is Robin Wall-Kimmerer, another grrl crush. I haven’t done more than unwrap the set and smell the pages, but I’m very excited about getting into it. I have listened to a couple of the Kinship Podcast episodes available on the website, and found them to be very compelling.
Everything Jessica Lanyadoo; podcasts she hosts, podcasts she’s a guest on, particularly Episode 802 of the Heal Squad Podcast with Maria Menuounos
I honestly know nothing about Maria M, but I go where Jessica goes. Listening to her here has given me more hope for being able to remain engaged in the world and contribute to changing it for the better when all the horrible things happening activate the natural instinct to turn away.
Except that nothing will change if I turn away and I so desperately want the world to change.
What I heard Jessica Say was that, especially those of us who are empaths and sensitives need to increase our capacity to hold difficulty and grief and still remain functional in the world. That’s trauma healing.
And that makes a lot of sense to me. Give it a listen and let me know what you think.
And the Upstream Podcast, particularly the 6 part series on Palestine, and most particularly Part 4: False Solutions and Paths of Resistance with Sumaya Awad.
I like to think of myself as a good socialist, or at least an aspiring socialist, and as such I have often adopted the stand of my socialist comrades, sometimes without passing it through the lens of critical thinking. Embarrassing as it is to admit.
One of the most popular and prevalent tenets of the socialists in my neck of the world is that the answer to the question of Israel’s existence relying on genocide in Palestine is a two-state solution.
Suffice it to say, after listening to Sumaya Awad in this podcast, I no longer believe that.
If you feel compelled to give these episodes a listen, or you’ve read these books, I’d love to know what you think.
As far as what I’ve been wrestling with, it’s all in there – time changes, season changes, the refusal of the colonial capitalist patriarchy to recognize or honor that we are creatures of nature and should be able to follow those natural rhythms rather than be endlessly extracted from to keep the economy rolling, how to live in the world without contributing to its destruction, boundaries, grief, unlearning, creating kinships of all kinds, and finishing books.
I hope that you are finding ways of walking in the world without disconnecting from it, the ways of feeding your bodies, minds, and souls, so you can thrive.
Because my loves, the world needs you.
That’s why you’re here.
Hello!
I’m Janine. My pronouns are she/her.
I am an anti-capitalist crone, post-trauma growth coach, and consensual copywriter.
I strive daily to identify and unlearn the voices of white heteronormative patriarchy that are insidiously planted in our brains from an early age – voices that, without critical inquiry, we often confuse as our own.
I dream of a return to the Commons and a world where all living beings have equal access to the necessities of life, including laughter, rest, creativity, and joy.
Even though I didn’t always have the words, this dream has been the undercurrent of all of my pursuits from an early age.
I host the Caucus of Crones and Self-Centred in the Kin Keepers’ Haven, co-held online with my dear friend Trevia Woods.
I am available for 1:1 coaching sessions.
Drop a reply or check out my website if you’re interested in connecting.
If you would like to have the Self-Centred Newsletter sent to you in real time, you can subscribe here.
Acknowledging my colonial settler privilege in living and working on the unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe People, in progress of learning right relationship with the land and its First People
In 2021, when the social media trend was to choose a word for the coming New Year (is that still a thing?) mine was ‘embody’.
2021 me had no idea.
I have always been astounded at the power of intention, of setting an idea/desire/concept/dream free into the universe and releasing attachment to an outcome (as best as this imperfect human is able).
So much wonderful has manifested in my life with a practice that I never really realized was a practice. It was just something I did.
I remember a past version of me as a cheerful warrior in high school in the 70’s, encouraging myself and my friends to embrace a PMI. That’s a positive mental attitude btw; a concept originally introduced in 1937 by Napoleon Hill in his book Think and Grow Rich – a book I’ve never read, a person I hadn’t heard of back then, but somehow that phrase seeped into my consciousness and sparked my imagination and optimism for creating something better, for myself, my loved ones, my world.
Perhaps it was written into my DNA by one of my genealogical ancestors before I was born. Who knows?
1970’s me had no idea.
In any case, when the troubles of living in a post-colonial late-stage capitalist world got to feel like too much for me and my capacity to bear, there was always something deep inside that called for a pause, for a retreat into myself and land in the stillness to try to imagine a better way.
When I practiced Nichiren Buddhism, the intention took the form of chanting for an hour a day each morning and evening for a couple of months.
In a space of six weeks, three transformative events happened two weeks apart from each other and changed my life utterly and completely, and set me on the path out of crippling debt, isolation and toxic work environments.
The chanting was a form of intention that cleared out resistance and cleared a path for the universe to deliver the joy and abundance that I believe is the birthright of every living creature.
When my partner and I were forced to move from the house we were renting in a time of unaffordable housing prices (it’s only gotten worse since then) and my manager brain was working overtime to find a place to leave, I remember calling for a moratorium on the search, and creating a cozy bed retreat for us to dream and write our desires for the perfect home as a way of inviting it in.
And a few days later, I saw a real estate ad for a house in the hills north of us, in a town I’d never heard of, and whose kitchen had the word “Cucina” stenciled in large letters, and I knew we’d found our home before any of us had stepped foot in it.
Late in 2019, when I was burned out and exhausted from years of fighting the good fight as a union activist turned political staffer, I took my retreat. This time it didn’t feel so much intentional as unavoidable. I had been running on empty for too long, trying to pour from an empty cup, extracting every ounce of life and love towards the cause, like a good capitalist should.
But there was somewhere deep inside of me that knew that the healing and transformation would come in the pause, as terrifying as it might be. This time the intention took the form of a pause.
When the Covid pandemic arrived a few months later and changed our lives, I remember feeling like I could deal because I’d been living in a sort of self-imposed shelter in place for months already. None of us expected it to last more than a few weeks. Right?
2019 me had no idea.
That retreat was an intention that created opportunities that would otherwise have been inaccessible to me because of geography, expense and time limitations. When the world moved online I was there.
So, in the true nature of both/and, a most terrible time was (and is, because despite what economists want us to believe, Covid is not over) also enriching and transformative.
An extended period of simultaneous expansion and contraction that now seems perpetual.
Birth is a death wish. (I wrote that to myself a few months ago and sent it in a post-dated email. Does everyone do that or is it just me?)
And I’ve heard Buddhists say that death is a birth wish.
Wishes are intentions.
Protests are intentions.
Intentions can take as many forms as our bodies can imagine.
I look back at the one-word intention for 2021 – Embody – and marvel at the time traveling me that planted a seed.
And as 2023 comes to a close, I know that seed has germinated and taken root, with the maturity of seasons still to come.
Have I arrived yet?
Once again, I have no idea. Maybe it’s because ideas are manifestations of our brains, and our brains are only a small part of the sum total of us as fully embodied humans.
Maybe it’s time to change the question.
Because as cheesy as it may sound (as cheesy as a cheerful chant of PMI) the journey just might be the destination.
These words traveling from my laptop to your screen may be an intention of their own.
My wish for you and for all of us at the end of this calendar year, is for the days and weeks and years to move us all closer to peace, justice, joy, and community.
May it be so.
Hello!
I’m Janine. My pronouns are she/her.
I am an anti-capitalist crone, post-trauma growth coach, and consensual copywriter.
I strive daily to identify and unlearn the voices of white heteronormative patriarchy that are insidiously planted in our brains from an early age – voices that, without critical inquiry, we often confuse as our own.
I dream of a return to the Commons and a world where all living beings have equal access to the necessities of life, including laughter, rest, creativity, and joy.
Even though I didn’t always have the words, this dream has been the undercurrent of all of my pursuits from an early age.
I host the Caucus of Crones and Self-Centred in the Kin Keepers’ Haven, co-held online with my dear friend Trevia Woods.
I am available for 1:1 coaching sessions.
Drop a comment or check out my website if you’re interested in connecting.
Subscribe to have Self-Centred delivered directly to your email inbox here.
Are you over the age of 50?
Do you identify as femme or non-binary?
Are you a culture maker, caregiver, kin keeper, world changing witch?
Do you crave a space for cultivating leadership and authority around age & aging?
the Caucus of Crones may be the space for you
As elders, we hold an immense resource of wisdom & experience that should be documented, protected, cultivated, disseminated, and shared.
The Caucus of Crones is an online space hosted in the Kin Keepers’ Haven to:
Previously hosted in Kelly Diels‘ Gathering space,
the Caucus of Crones is now open to
members of the Kin Keepers’ Haven aged 50 and over.
Crone Calls are scheduled for the second Thursday of the month at Noon and 7 pm Eastern. These calls will include a brief check-in and somatic practice to land in the space, followed by a discussion focused on issues of age and aging in late-stage capitalism.
Group coaching calls are scheduled for the third Thursday of the month at noon and 7 pm Eastern. A time to receive and give mutual support. Bring something you’re grappling with to the wisdom of the collective cauldron.
You are welcome to attend one or both calls each day.
Recordings will be posted for you to view at a later time if you are not available to attend live.
Embrace your inner Crone
hosted by Janine Bertolo & Trevia Woods on the Mighty Networks platform
Your membership in the Kin Keepers’ Haven gives you full access to the Caucus of Crones and more.
Subscribe now at the Founders’ Rate of $30/month in your own country’s currency.
You can pause your membership at any time.
Live courses to support your nervous system, unlearn capitalism, and foster connection including:
Learn more about the Kin Keepers’ Haven here
I was looking for a plant-based low-carb (don’t get me started) protein option & found that lupini beans fit the bill. Just 1 cup of lupini beans is a high source of protien, fibre, and vitamins K, C, and potassium.
These beans were a regular staple on the holiday snack table in my childhood home. If you haven’t experienced them, they have a sweet, nutty flavour, and they’re fun to eat! Squeezing the brined beans out of their skins to pop into my mouth gave me childhood glee.
My mom always bought canned lupini, but when I couldn’t find any in cans, I secured a bag of dried lupini from our local Italian grocery store.
Little did I know that preparing dried lupini for consumption a long, labourious process. Unprocessed lupini contain high levels of alkaloids, making them toxic & giving them a bitter taste (nature’s safety warning) Dry lupini need to be soaked and rinsed for WEEKS and when the alkaloids have leeched out in the rinse water, the beans are ready to be brined and eatern. A taste test tells you when the bitterness is gone
I have been tending to my lupini for weeks now and they still have a slight bitter taste. They should be ready to use as a Solstice holiday snack.
I feel connected to my ancestry and lineage and am flooded with happy childhood memories tending to my lupini jar. I wonder if the taste will live up to my memories; and I wonder if my non-Italian family will enjoy them. Maybe it’s an Italian thing?
Intentional Holidays in the Kin Keepers’ Haven is a space for sharing traditional holiday foods and ancestral practices. We gather weekly through the month of December to set intentions, celebrate and grieve collectively, share stories and traditions, and more.
Our first call was December 6, but if you feel called to join us, the recorded session is available for you to review.
A $30 monthly subscription that you can cancel and resume any time gives you access to the community care space.
My cohost Trevia (Tree-va) Woods and I would love to see you there!
A note from your hosts Trevia Woods and Janine Bertolo: We are creating a co-creating a space that centers healing from misogyny and working towards a future where we can have spaces that can include all people without harm.
This is multigenerational transformation. This is a brave space for those who have been most harmed by misogyny to do the work of reclaiming our authenticity and dismantling all forms of oppression.
Do you identify as a cisgendered man? Please email us at kinkeepershaven@gmail.com with other options to work with us one on one.
Winter is a time for slowing down, enjoying the fruits of the sunny seasons, resting and reflection.
It’s a time for sinking deep into our crafts and sharing in front of our fires. It’s a time to feel, play, sleep and reflect.
It’s a time for small rituals and meaning making.
It’s a time to grieve and enjoy our blessings.
Modern holidays in late stage capitalism demand impossible social media standards, and glorify spending in a time when the cost of living has risen.
It keeps busy and distracted, with all the baking, planning, shopping, spending.
It’s an intentional recipe for failure that pulls us into an endless loop that serves capitalism and really doesn’t serve us at all.
There’s no time to reflect and rest in the capitalist holiday calendar; no time to build resilience to remain grounded when the people around us might not feel that way , set boundaries, or find contentment in the slow season of darkness.
We end up tired, depleted, and often broke.
Not exactly that Norman Rockwell scenario we strive to recreate.
Give yourself the gift of time to remember what really calls to YOU at this time, and allow space to create it over the next month.
We have created a space in the Kin Keepers’ Haven for you to set intentions, come back to your body, honor grief, and find belonging over the holidays; a space to share ideas about how we can celebrate and honor this sacred time of the year with joy; a space to create and practice small rituals, co-regulation and connection; a space to support the way you want to feel through all the season.
Trevia (TREE-va) Woods (she/her)
I live and work on the traditional land of the Eno, Tutelo, Saponi, Occaneechi, Shakori, and the Tuscarora past and present, colonially renamed Hillsborough, North Carolina, USA.
I am a mixed-race woman with two decades of experience in bodywork, education and community-building. I support people in building community, unpacking cultural appropriation, and assisting people with unpacking cultural appropriation. I also help Culture Makers share their magic with the world, sustainably, so they can thrive along with their clients.
I love plants and books, and I’m a mom to a blended family of 5 boys & 1 VERY cute dog.
Janine’s caring, insight, and crone energy brings me life! Janine brings fun and vulnerability to our friendship and partnership each time we meet. I know she’s in my corner and shows up to support me however she can. We love merging our strengths together as a collective, and exploring ways to break out of the cycles of late stage capitalism.
About Trevia Many Trees Lifeway Instagram LinkedIn
Janine Bertolo (she/her)
I live and work on the unceded territory of
the Algonquin Anishanaabe People,
colonially renamed Gatineau, Quebec, Canada.
I’m an anti-capitalist crone, certified post trauma growth coach, and political junkie who helps humans to identify and unlearn the voices of systemic oppression that are planted in our brains from an early age. I long for a world where all living beings have equal access to the necessities of life, including laughter, rest, creativity, and joy.
I love to read, paint, watch birds, and prowl the countryside with my partner and our rescue pup (who’s also pretty darn cute!)
Trevia introduced me to the concept of a slow yes and I will be forever grateful to her for that. She holds space for me to be me, unfiltered and vulnerable, silly and joyful, angry and determined, grieving and celebrating, all of it. I’m excited to be partnering with her to host the Kin Keepers’ Haven and continuing to follow our slow yes together in this cauldron.
Janine’s Website Instagram Facebook LinkedIn
Over the month of December we have planned gatherings to:
With full permission to participate and opt out of any and all activities to honor your capacity.
Weekly calls on Wednesdays at 12pm & 7pm EST. First call is Dec 6th. Last call for New Year intention setting is on Jan 3rd; calls will be recorded and available for viewing throughout the month.
At least two body doubling sessions most likely on Saturdays to craft and cook something we want to bring into our season.
You will have access to the Kin Keepers’ Haven to share and learn together in our online container hosted by Mighty Networks.
With a founding member’s investment of $30 monthly in your country’s currency (priced with joy and justice to honor your cost of living)
You can cancel anytime
We are creating a co-creating a space that centers healing from misogyny and working towards a future where we can have spaces that can include all people without harm.
This is multigenerational transformation. This is a brave space for those who have been most harmed by misogyny to do the work of reclaiming our authenticity and dismantling all forms of oppression.
Do you identify as a cisgendered man? Please email us at kinkeepershaven@gmail.com with other options to work with us one on one.
Hello friends,
I have some exciting news to share about the Kin Keepers’ Haven, but before that, I’d like to give you an update and talk about the times we’re living in.
There has been a lot of movement in my life since my last newsletter that feels energizing and exhausting all at the same time.
It’s an especially difficult time to be human on this planet, with war and genocide and colonization reaching epic and catastrophic levels. I am finding it difficult to remain engaged without falling into deep despair.
I want you to know that if your feeling that too, you are not alone.
I see you and I love you and I am here for you as my capacity allows.
Reach out for the resources that can support and nurture you in these troubled times. It’s more important than ever.
It’s what will keep us moving towards the better world we know is possible.
The world needs your magic, and you deserve care.
When I was in my 30’s I often described my workplace as the last bastion of good old boys supremacy in the western world.
And that just tells you I hadn’t seen much of the world by my 30’s.
Here’s a newsflash for younger me: we can’t escape capitalism. At least not while we occupy this body. The time may come, but not in this lifetime.
So, the question becomes “How do I live true to the values of social justice and collective care for each other and the planet, when my life is governed by systems of oppression?”
Without burning out, without self-extraction, without self-imploding?
It has literally taken a lifetime for me to realize that many of the voices and edicts governing my life and behaviour were not mine. And to realize that tilting at windmills without the support of regenerative community and sustainability only led to burnout and exhaustion.
I dream of a return to the Commons and a world where all living beings have equal access to the necessities of life, including laughter, rest, creativity, and joy.
Even though I didn’t always have the words, this dream has been the undercurrent of all my pursuits from an early age. This dream reflects my true embodied nature.
I occupy a large body, with chronic pain and mobility loss because of severe osteo-arthritis of the knees.
I have been refused surgical care twice because the medical system follows the colonial and capitalist BMI instead of science as its guide for success.
I am on an ongoing journey of learning to love and leverage my body in its current state, understanding its needs and preferences, and striving for greater ease and joy in my everyday life.
I find myself in my third act of life embracing the mantle of anti-capitalist crone, learning to trust my body and its needs, striving daily to identify and unlearn the voices of white heteronormative patriarchy that are insidiously planted in our brains from an early age – voices that, without critical inquiry, we often confuse as our own.
I have grappled with the duality of having to play the capitalist game to survive, and recognizing that there are small, doable ways of disrupting the system by playing the game – at the same time fully acknowledging intersections of privilege that allow me to access safety and comfort that are inaccessible to too many.
Adopting a designer dog rescue pup who was slated for destruction by a designer dog breeder who couldn’t capitalize on his life quickly enough to make a profit (and letting you know this is what’s happening in the pet industry – it’s horrifying) is a small way of disrupting the system, with joy and with justice.
Embracing diet culture to bring my body to the place where I can access medical care.
Taking advantage of a hot real estate market to sell high and buy low can realize profits to flow back into progressive causes and organizations working for liberation, peace, and decolonization.
Striving for community, compassion, connection all disrupt capitalism in small, doable, and regenerative ways. Learning to ask for help, sharing the load disrupts capitalism.
Even though the world upholds individualism, boot-strapping, and dream of the “self-made man” none of us is able to make it on our own. None of us.
And in case you’re wondering, understanding something somatically in your core doesn’t mean it comes easily or without self-scrutiny. Our brains are strong protectors with a lifetime of experience keeping us safe.
To paraphrase Jessica Lanyadoo (and if you are not following her on Instagram or listening to her Ghost of a Podcast, you’re really missing out – just saying): “Being embodied isn’t necessarily comfortable.”
I can attest to the truth of this statement. But I would add that becoming truly embodied allows us to increase our capacity to hold discomfort, and this is the first step towards true healing.
This is the framework of my life and my work, often executed with a messy and imperfect slow yes.
Speaking of slow yesses, I would like to tell you about an exciting new venture that has resulted from a messy, imperfect process of slow yes that began a few months ago with the amazing and incomparable Trevia Woods.
We are launching a virtual collaboration called the Kin Keepers’ Haven, a space to gather and support each other, to unlearn and celebrate, to heal and reconnect.
A monthly subscription gives you access to all our courses and offerings, as well as the shared space to connect and collaborate with other culture makers, care givers, and world changing witches. A space to unlearn systems of harm where we don’t have to diminish ourselves to find acceptance.
The Kin Keepers’ Haven will be open for membership December 1. Founding members pay $30 monthly and can cancel at any time.
Trevia and I would be so happy to welcome you there.
AND…I am moving the Caucus of Crones from Kelly Diels‘ Gathering Space to the Kin Keepers’ Haven included with your monthly subscription.
The Caucus of Crones welcomes members of Kin Keepers Haven aged 50 and older to join Crones from the Kelly Diels space to cackle, collaborate, conspire, and cultivate leadership in a world where older woman are made invisible
It’s a space for stepping into our power and agency as elders, to resist ageism in all its destructive iterations, to reclaim our ancestral legacy, to celebrate and support each other.
I’m so excited about offering this space to a wider community of Crones.
If you would like to receive an invitation to join the Kin Keepers’ Haven December 1, you can request one by emailing kinkeepershaven@gmail.com.
I remain available for 1:1 coaching sessions.
As we move into the season of darkness, I wish you warmth, comfort, and ease. May you find alternate forms of light, within and without, until the sun returns, and dormant nature is one again reborn in spring.
Janine
| Thank you for being here! I appreciate you and would love to hear your feedback; just hit reply. Feel free to forward this email to anyone who might appreciate it. If you’ve received this email as a blog post and would like to subscribe, you can do that here. Until next time, Janine Bertolo (she/her) www.janinebertolo.ca Trauma-informed somatic coach & space holder Anti-capitalist crone & Culture Maker |
Self-Centred Newsletter* – August 30, 2023
| I’m learning a lot these days, living an isometric life. Allow me to share a glossary of terms: neu·ro·plas·tic·i·ty (no͝orōplaˈstisədē) Noun the ability of the brain to form and reorganize synaptic connections, especially in response to learning or experience or following injury. i·so·met·ric (īsōˈmetrik,ˌīzəˈmetrik) adjective 1. of or having equal dimensions. 2. PHYSIOLOGY relating to or denoting muscular action in which tension is developed without contraction of the muscle. Prehabilitation: the process of improving the functional capability of a patient prior to a surgical procedure so the patient can withstand any postoperative inactivity and associated decline. In other words, to get you to a better place physically before an operation. (American College of Physicians and Surgeons) |
I’m waiting for knee replacements that may take up to a year and a half to happen, two years before rehab hopefully allows me to move freely in the world under my own steam. If it works…
Digesting and integrating that possibility has been, well, it’s been a lot.
Neuroplasticity:
My default brain* thinks things such as “I can’t wait two years to have my life back” “my body is broken” “my life is over because I can’t move the way I used to”
Bringing curious inquiry into those thoughts has been vital for my mental health.
Is this thought really true?
There’s a lot of internalized ableism embedded in that kind of thinking that could use some unpacking.
What are the ways of easing into kinder, gentler thoughts about my body, where it is, right here and now?
Where do I find life, right here, right now, in this body?
How can I bring myself to a better place?
Healing happens in community.
I believe this with all my heart, even if my head resists it.
It is so valuable to have someone to share my thoughts with, vulnerably and unedited. I am grateful for a partner who can be that someone for me, as well as beloved friends and practitioners. It takes a village.
Speaking my default thoughts into existence allows them to be transformed.
On the day that I got the news about the long wait for surgery, I sat on the treatment table with my physiotherapist and had a big snotty cry.
(Also want to speak to the value of big, snotty, public crying, whether it’s out of joy, or grief, hope, hopelessness, or because of a beautiful piece of music…. yes, I am a crier. Please pass the tissues.)
Prehab/Rehab:
The big snotty cry in question started when I voiced the idea of waiting two years for my life to begin.
(It’s interesting to watch people respond to big, snotty, public cries – the physio intern asked me if I needed to be alone, to which I replied, no, but if my big, snotty, cry makes you feel uncomfortable, feel free to move somewhere that feels more comfortable for you. He stuck around.)
My physiotherapist and the sweet intern helped me to begin unpacking that default thinking that surely does nothing to serve me, to look at the ways of living in my body, right here, right now.
And they introduced me to the concept of ‘prehab’
It’s a word I hadn’t heard before, and it’s so much more hopeful than the fatalistic ‘my life is over before it’s begun’ default voice in my head.
Living, stretching, strengthening, expanding, in the body I have now is prehab.
It’s paving the way to what comes next, whatever that may be. It makes what comes next easier to integrate.
Body Prehab
Then I thought “hey, maybe I’m in prehab for my brain too” but my physiotherapist explained that when referring to a chronic condition, the correct term to use is rehabilitation.
So, rewiring my brain is in fact rehab because it’s addressing an existing chronic condition. Ouch, and okay. I can live with that.
Thankfully, there’s neuroplasticity.
Easing into the thoughts and ideas around living, stretching, learning, expanding in the body I have now.
Brain Rehab.
Stocking my pantry:
I was introduced to the concept of a movement pantry by Hannah Husband, body liberation coach (I cannot recommend Hannah’s Seedling Strength program more)
The idea is to create an individual movement pantry with a wide variety of options, allowing you to plan movement meals and create spontaneous movement snacks during the day, choosing from bespoke variety of movements that work for your body after checking in
(that’s the liberation part – traditional strength training relies a lot on metrics and averages, rules that apply in general, but don’t really work for individual bodies, especially when that body is senior, fat, femme, disabled and experiencing chronic pain)
I love this concept.
I mean, really. Food and cooking are definitely two of my love languages, so this metaphor totally works.
(I bought a rainbow recipe box to create a personal little movement library but haven’t actually gotten to doing that yet. Hello perfectionist procrastinator. I love you.)
Hannah has the unique gift of describing strength training concepts in a relatable, non-jock (that’s me) kind of way. She combines nervous system science, strength training, and body liberation in a way that makes movement accessible for me, in this body, here and now.
(and p.s. – REST is a movement pantry staple as well. Thanks Hannah!)
Speaking of accessible:
Being able to recognize my needs, to ask for those needs to be met, to admit I don’t know something and ask for help (aka trauma healing) has allowed me to feel hope in what otherwise might feel like a hopeless situation, to add practices and movements and mobility aids into my life right here and now that allow for expansion in small (really the tiniest) but significant steps towards healing, in my mind, body, and soul, and regardless of where my body is now or where it will end up.
I now have a walker. I’m learning to make friends with it.
It’s kind of mortifying to be honest, because it makes my disability visible.
But also kind of cool, partially because I am a nerd and I love gadgets, but mostly because it meets my body where it’s at.
I can sit and rest after an embarrassingly small number of steps, that is actually three times the number of steps I can do without it, so win.
And I have been able to walk out of my driveway under my own steam for the first time since moving to this house four months ago. Liberation titrated.
I have a mini pedal exerciser that sits on the floor to use while sitting.
One of my favorite means of transport before the arthritis and pain prevented it was bicycling.
I currently do not have the range of flexion/extension in my knees to allow a full rotation of bike pedals, nor do I have the balance to stay upright on a bike.
I was horrified to discover that I can’t sit a full-size exercise bike with both feet on the pedals, I just don’t have the flexibility to do that anymore.
But I CAN put both feet in the stirrups of the little floor pedaler and move less than a quarter of the way round, forward and back.
It’s really hard to get my body in position to do that, but I’ve noticed that this less than a quarter round the pedal movement feels GOOD when I’m done, because it’s working the muscles without loading my knees.
The old and rigid ‘ride or die’ thinking is still strong in me, but most of the time I am able to look at this little machine as a friend and it definitely helps to think of the small movements as prehab rather than failure.
Isometrics have also become a staple in my movement pantry.
Strengthening by way of “tension developed without contraction of the muscle.”
Isometrics. It’s a metaphor for life in this body, here and now, just as it is.
It may look like not much is going on from the outside, but there’s a lot of movement happening. In my body, mind, and soul.
Thanks for allowing me to share what’s real and vulnerable and active in my life right now.
I hope that you are able to find ways of moving from a stuck place – whether that’s physical, emotional, or intellectual – to a place of spaciousness, more hope, and more joy in your life, right here and now.
And if there’s anything I can do to assist you with that, hit me up.
Love,
Janine
* the language of the “default brain” comes to me via the transformative and healing work of Sarah Peyton, neuroscience educator, constellations facilitator, certified Nonviolent Communication trainer and author who invites audiences into a compassionate understanding of the effects of relational trauma on the brain, and teaches about how to use resonance to change and heal.
***
Hi, I’m Janine, Anti-Capitalist Crone, Post-Trauma Growth Coach & Consensual Copywriter
I believe it’s possible to heal and transform, in our bodies and in our communities, in small, doable, but significant steps.
Interested in working with me?
Check out my offerings here on my website, or send me message
* If you’d like to be among the first to read my Self-Centred newsletter, you can have it delivered directly to your email inbox by subscribing here.
