TRANSFORM: Kelly Van Zandt on The Power of Postpartum (Ep. 54)
“You are allowed to take down your facade to make space for your full potential.”
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In this episode of Moonwise, we speak with author, doula and spiritual mentor Kelly Van Zandt about the transformative power of the postpartum time. She shares her insights about new motherhood as a unique opportunity for growth and how this often looks and feels like an unraveling of the self.
We talk about:
Meeting ourselves with compassion
The complexity of feeling loss, grief and joy at the same
The big shift from the external to the internal world
The true length of the postpartum process
The leadership skills and wisdom gleaned from motherhood
Links:
Get 15% off a digital copy of Powerful Postpartum with code: MOON15
—> Leave us a written review on Apple Podcasts, and get a shout out on the show!
TRANSFORM: Kelly Van Zandt on The Power of Postpartum-Ep. 54 (Transcription)
Dorothee: Hello, and welcome to Moonwise podcast, a space to celebrate seasons, cycles, and rights of passage. I'm your host, Dorte Sophie Royal, And today, I speak with author, doula, and spiritual mentor, Kelly Van Zandt, about the transformative power of the postpartum time. She shares her insights about new motherhood as a unique opportunity for growth and how this often looks and feels like an unraveling of the self. We talk about meeting ourselves with compassion the complexity of feeling lost, grief, and joy at the same time. The big shift from the external to the internal world the true length of the postpartum process, and the leadership skills and wisdom gleaned from motherhood.
Before we begin, I want to thank everyone who has left a rating and review of Moonwise on Apple podcasts. It really helps others find the show and it takes just a few minutes to make a big difference in spreading the word. So if you've enjoyed an episode of Moonrise or are a long time listener, I'm creating an extra incentive for sharing your review this month. I will be selecting one review in April twenty twenty two to win a copy of rooted the pregnancy journal I wrote to honor the inward path to motherhood. So get your ratings and reviews in ASAP.
Thank you so much for your support. Okay. On with our show. Kelly Van Zandt believes that the early moments of motherhood are some of the most transformational of a woman's life. In her new book, powerful postpartum, Kelly presents a fresh and empowering perspective on the postpartum period as one filled with tremendous potential for growth and an opportunity to rediscover the woman's truest essence.
Kelly is a spiritual mentor and doula, and she works with mothers one on one and in group mom sessions. Kelly has generously offered Moonsise listeners fifteen percent off the digital version of Powerful Postpartum. You can just use the code moon fifteen at checkout. Find that and more at powerful postpartum dot com. Hi, Kelly. Thank you so much for being on the show today.
Kelly: Hi. It's a pleasure to connect with you, and thank you for having me.
Dorothee: I have been following your work for quite some time and was really excited to learn about your book Powerful Postpartum, exploring the spiritual significance of early motherhood as that is a topic that I am very passionate about as many of our listeners probably know. And it's something that when I was going through my first pregnancy and postpartum, it was a topic that I was really looking for information and support around, and it wasn't as readily available as I think it's starting to be more and more these days, which makes me so very happy and you are part of that movement. So I would love to just start by hearing bit about the process of why you wrote this book and why you felt it was so important to talk about the spiritual aspect of early motherhood as, you know, we know that they're many resources out there about, okay, the physical changes that are happening in your body, you know, practical stuff, how to care for a newborn but we don't explore as much about the inner landscape and the growth that happens within a new mother.
Kelly: Absolutely. So I can completely relate with what you're seeing. So my son now is seven years old, so this all began seven years ago. And very much, it arose out of the search. Search for the significance, the meaning, the phenomenon, and the tower of what happens in early motherhood.
I mean, to be completely candid, I was Google searching the spiritual significance of motherhood. Transformative nature of motherhood and just really coming up with absolutely nothing. Now prior to motherhood, I had spent many, many years on this journey of inner discovery and personal growth. And I felt really, really paired for motherhood.
I kind of walked into motherhood like, I've got this. And when the reality of new motherhood, sunk in. I was shocked. Absolutely blindsided. And most alarming for me, you know, aside from the adjustment of current her baby and physically recovering.
Most alarming for me was that I found myself really spiritually flatlined. I could not come to that place of clarity and divinity within, and my teachers were not resonating with me because either they themselves were not others or if they were, they were not speaking of one is it. So it took many, many months to come to any sense of clarity around early motherhood and, you know, I just woke with an aha moment and I said this I I think I have an understanding of what is happening here and I just started writing. Seriously writing writing writing. It took about six years to leave a message.
It took many, many forms, but now it is out in the world and mothers are really resonating with the message and not only resonating with the message, but much much like what you said acknowledging that this is really a missing piece to the postpartum conversation. This is not a how to guide. This is not an instructional manual or six steps to your positive postpartum, nothing like that. This book is exploratory and it acknowledges what happens to the mother. And her inner landscape through the process of early motherhood and postpartum.
So hopefully that gives a synopsis of with the inception of the book and motivation for the book and how it came to be.
Dorothee: Absolutely. And I find it so validating and my son is now six and I've been reading your book over the last weeks and there are so many beautiful things you've said that are have been aha moments for me now even six years later, where it's so good to hear another person say it, basically. And like you, you know, I spent my twenties doing a lot of spiritual earth honoring work, rites of passage where I would be out in nature, no food, no water for days and nights praying - all these very intense ceremonies and you think I would have been so prepared and I imagined I would be for this great transformation and yet pregnancy, birth, and new motherhood was more challenging than anything I had ever done. Previous. It made all of the other ceremonies rights of passage, spiritual growth look like a piece of cake. And so I too was shocked. And what I find so interesting about your framing of the postpartum time is that it's an opportunity for growth and in particularly a process of unbecoming.
And I find that word really important and I would love to hear about your thoughts on that process that's not so much a new identity but actually a process of growth that kind of almost like dismantling the false sense of self, our ideas of control, our illusions of who we are in the world, and our external validation. So Yeah. I'd love to hear.
Kelly: Yes. So I look at early motherhood as a catalyst for tremendous growth and personal discovery. I call it the u-turn, you know, you you move from a life of the external and you take this slow, wide turn begging you to look within. And You are taking and postpartum with the mystic's call the first and most important step. Of spiritual growth and that is know thyself.
Know thyself. And you come to see all that you hold within In post pilot, it all comes to the surface. There is absolutely no masquerading. The part you will see parts of yourself that you knew existed, parts of yourself you've perhaps never seen before, and parts of yourself that you'd rather not admit are there. And this is an opportunity to really take a deep dive. To take a very authentic look at all that you hold within. Because like you said, in terms of this persona and this this identity, and and a lot of new mothers will attest to a very natural phenomenon early motherhood that is sort of an identity crisis or loss of identity. All of a sudden, you don't know who you are. There are parts of yourself that's seemingly have just been stripped away overnight. And that is one of the challenges in early motherhood that you can't necessarily prepare for that is you'll have to face your image. And you'll either face your image or you'll evade your image if that makes sense.
So you'll come to see all the friends of yourself that have sort of been pulled away or torn away or no longer there. And when I say to new mothers is any part of yourself that could be removed or lost could never be the truth of you who who you are can never be the essence of your beating. You are working through layers and layers of persona and masks and identities because none of those things are the truth of who you are and you are you're in this moment where you have a tremendous tremendous opportunity to discover yourself in the highest form, the highest self. If that makes sense. Now I'm not saying that this is an easy process or that this is an automatic or a quick process, but like I said, it's that slowwide u-turn and you start to really focus your attention inward. And through this process of motherhood, of service, of caring for another, and all of the elements that come with caring in early motherhood and caring for an infant, all of your inner landscape will be revealed. And It's tremendous.
Really, what happens in early motherhood, not only from a spiritual perspective of coming to know your true sense in your highest self, but also just from the basic essence of maturation and really, you know, becoming the grown up in the room and you know, all of that. So it's it's a phenomenally powerful journey. All of the all of that sense of self and identity, it's a very real phenomenon, and it's all very much seemingly part of the process.
Dorothee: I find so interesting the way that you talk about that shift from the external to the internal world and that was certainly my experience and I fought it pretty hard. Having been, you know, as many of us raised to kind of assess ourselves based on external validation whether it's the good grade or the, oh, you did a good job or, you know, good responsible girl or whatever it is and suddenly and immediately you're in your home and there's you are the grown up in the room and there's no one to tell you oh, great job changing that diaper and waking up at three AM. You know, you're like, am I doing this correctly? And and that is a really big shift.
And I love what you say about. It's perhaps the first time that our actions are not met with any form of external validation. And how that can really mature us.
Kelly: Yes. I talk a lot about validation because this is something when brought to the forefront and is in is in your awareness can be a very very powerful tool for mothers of all phases of life. So We all seek validation. We're human. It's a very natural phenomenon of the mind.
We're always gonna seek validation. For most of our lives, we're set up with instructions where we received a validation where, you know, we haven't had on the back from the boss or a monetary raise from a job while done. But in motherhood, you might for the first time be in a situation where you are in a moment that is very challenging, Also, very important. Right? Caring for your baby is very important. Very challenging.
And you're facing this challenge and this responsibility with absolutely no validation from the external world. Right? Your neighbor is not gonna come over at the end of the day after bedtime and give you the gold star. It's just not going to happen. And the sooner that we can just recognize that we might be seeking validation from those around us, it might be our spouse. It might be the midyear in our family. It might be our mother, mother-in-law, aunt, sister, whatever it might be. It's not necessarily true that the validation the need for validation will subside, but when you catch it and you're aware of it and you say, oh, there I am seeking validation again. Oh, there I am seek there I am seeking validation again.
Every time you catch it, you just free yourself a little bit from that incessant need. And like I said, it publicly will never go away. But it doesn't have to necessarily hold that much power and that much control over you. And the other side of that validation, I think that's important to consider is this lube that a lot of us get into in motherhood. And that is this guilt and blame cycle.
I've never met a mother who hadn't experienced mom guilt. And, you know, I'd love the opportunity to actually look into a little bit further. But just on a very basic level, you can just watch. You a lot of times, you're oscillating from mom guilt to blame on someone else, mom guilt to blame on the partner, mom guilt to blame on our mother, mother, and love. Right?
You can just see that constant loss inflation, and there is a way to step out of that loop, step out of that framework. And again, most of it just begins with being aware that you're even in the loop. But, yeah, I mean, some of those very basic functions of the mind when really understood and brought to the forefront can be really freaking for mothers. In this in this process of motherhood.
Dorothee: I'm wondering in your experience, do you feel that those are ways that the mind is trying to make sense of grasp and control the situation because it is almost like you're just diving into this dark whole of loss of identity and I remember myself just trying to grasp to onto anything to anchor me into a sense of my previous reality and nothing was there. So I would just be grasping and grasping And do you feel that that's sometimes the way that the mind is it's trying to protect us and hold on to something, but if we can become aware, then we maybe don't have to use that tactic.
Kelly: I couldn't agree more. I could not agree more. I think that when I think that when the ego gets the sense that it's in this tremendous process and it's sort of being outdone, it will fight like an animal to hold its sense of authority over us. And that is what a guilt and blame are two very basic manipulations of the ego and trying to keep us away out of center. I couldn't agree more.
Yeah. I think that's just a natural phenomenon.
Dorothee: I mean, it sounds like and it was also my experience that just so many things come up, as you said, in particularly in the post part of period as we really are just, like, stripped raw. And I love how you frame it as an opportunity and a time for the purification of our inner world. And also the compassion we can have with what comes up and the acceptance of what comes up and not just be blaming ourselves if there's any negativity in there because we are human?
Kelly: Yes. Exactly. And this is such a tremendous and I wouldn't say lengthy. It doesn't have to be lengthy, but often it is, like, Right? This doesn't happen overnight. And so we have to remember, like, all the care and compassion any gentleness we give to our babies, you know, compassion for another begins with compassion for ourselves. Right? And, you know, really being so so gentle and so kind with yourself and nurturing yourself in any way that you possibly can I often tell moms don't minimize this experience? What you're especially in expected mothers, you know, that they're trimester, I try to offer too much advice. What I just what I what I say is that this is a grand significance and do not let anyone minimize what this is.
You're in you're in the threshold of a tremendous tremendous moment of personal growth and discovery. Right? And so if you were if you were working with anyone through that process, think about how tender and how gentle, you know, how accommodating would be. You can send that to yourself as well and really cultivating that sense of compassion within. Definitely.
Dorothee: Yeah. And it makes sense that if if we are growing and we are maturing and ripening and learning so much about ourselves and our new role that that loss would be a very real part of it, that grief and feeling, what is falling away is also part of the process. I love how you say that motherhood is complex, that there is this deep love and this loss happening at the same time, and I imagine that can be very confusing for a lot of new mothers.
Kelly: Right. And I always just stand in awe of the design of it. If you really zoom out and look at yes, there is this the sense of loss and this very deep personal discovery and it can be grueling and what is gifted to us on the other side and that is this tremendous love and connection. I mean, it's all inspiring And, you know, it's it's my thought that it's not that motherhood is moving us towards love. It's that love was always there and always listed.
It's just that our channel and our portal is now open to sort of experience the ambiance of that higher self. And you you can likely relate because you've done so much work prior to motherhood, you know, the growth and the discovery and all of these rituals and processes. All these things we do, you know, it's very rare that that love was necessarily and neatly built in to those experiences. Like, I've had moments of you know, tremendous joy and love felt as my being, but not to this extent. And I just think that that such an important gift and it sounds cliche to say gift, but it's an important integral piece to this puzzle that we often ignore.
Like, mothers will say, you will never know a love like it is to hold your new baby. And it sort of overlooks like, okay. Yeah, that I'm gonna love this baby. But honor that, acknowledge that rumple on that. That is, you know, it's one of the tools in this process that moves that moves us through this journey.
So it's very, very secret. The love part of it and, you know, and the loss that love can be really, really grounding would be really powerful and always it always brings us back. Right? The love always brings us back to be able to reach down and keep doing this, to find the strength within, to keep mothering to wake up for the hundredth time in the middle of the night or whatever the challenge might be, but it's that love that really fuels us, I think.
Dorothee: I so agree and I love how you say that that early motherhood is this time of living beyond the limits of the self. And I feel that that love is is really like you said, what propels us and you talk about the mysterious well of strength within and I certainly felt that also in postpartum where I my body and my mind were beyond what I could even imagine in terms of exhaustion and just Like, I I I had given everything that I could consciously will myself to give and yet I just continued to give more. Beyond what my mind wanted to do, beyond what I thought my body could handle, I continued to feed and hold and rock, you know, this child. And that's to me the strength beneath the weakness of my small mind, my identity, my I wanna go to sleep. I don't wanna wake up again and be this child. And it's there. It's and and to really tap into that and understand it, I just can't imagine how how strengthening that is to realize there is this well that that is just infinite strength beneath all of your weakness.
Kelly: Yes. Yes. And I agree that that kept that kept me going for a long time, this visualization of this well beneath me. Because I agree you get to the point and just on a practical level, you say to yourself, I just don't know how I'm gonna get through this day.
Yeah. I am so I've never been so exhausted. You know, the the brain fog, the mental uncertainty, the physical exhaustion, and I yes. I can completely relate you just I remember same time. I just don't know how I'm gonna do it today, and somehow we do.
Yeah. And somehow we really do. And it feels like you're just drawing from another realm, from a mysterious well of strength beyond you. It just moves through you and you care for another. And it's like you said, it's more than you ever thought you were able to get.
Dorothee: Yeah. Yeah. That idea of constant service where, you know, people go to monasteries or they go volunteer to be of service and it such a rewarding beautiful sacred thing. And in motherhood, it it's built in this constant service and I just love when we can think of it as a sacred act and you know, everything that can feel very mundane and very like, oh, okay. I'm changing a diaper, but it is so important.
It is so sacred. Yeah.
Kelly: I think that any think on any faith, any spiritual organization, even yoga, one of the branches of yoga is surface. You know, I mean, you're not gonna find basically a faith on the planet that doesn't have service integrated in some way. Service is legally a sacred process. And just a service part alone in motherhood. I mean, you can look at that from the externally, the internally, from next channel perspective.
Yes. You're constantly in motion caring for another being. But that service is moving you out of your own way. Right? It's no longer just about you anymore.
And that that's most obvious. Right? We see mothers caring for their children, and that's one of the things in motherhood that we can anticipate. We can see that it's not about us anymore and you're gonna be in service another, but I think what you don't realize until it's your own experience is the reciprocity of service and how what it feels like to give and how much receiving there is in giving and how the connectivity really presents itself in service. Right?
You move away from this limited eye existence, and now you're in full relation with another human being. You're now a weak Right? You're seeing very, very clearly how connected we are as humans and sometimes we are the giver and sometimes we are the receiver. And, you know, the service part for me is so rich and so filled with meaning. And you're right.
A lot of times, we think, you know, in order to have a spiritual practice, we have to go off on a rich treat or go to the top of a mountain and then I say to mothers, here we are sitting in our mesh use, in our mesh underwear. And wondering what has just happened and how we look recalibrate to this new reality, and that's and you're and and it's starting now. If you are in a spiritual process, now. Don't wait for some other moment for practice. Use the service.
All the care that you do for your baby. Everything that's coming up, all of your inner work, all the development, you're in it. This is it. Right? Don't wait and don't look for it outside of yourself and outside of your own experience.
Dorothee: Right. Because I can imagine many new mothers feeling like, okay, if I could just have a moment alone to like light a candle and sit and meditate by myself in peace. I could I could reconnect. And often that's, you know, certainly it's wonderful if you can build that into your daily routine, but often it's especially in those beginning weeks, it's just it's so difficult to carve out that time and yeah, perhaps unrealistic in terms of the baby's needs and your levels of exhaustion. So to be able to acknowledge that the everyday stuff is just as important.
Kelly: If you can do it and you can carve on the time, like and please do that. That's You know what I mean? Please. Please. Please.
I'm not discouraging you from doing that. All I'm saying is if that if the that hour doesn't present itself for you. Don't overlook every single task of your day. And say, congrats, say to mothers, the divine, fully recognized exactly where you are in this really, really demanding moment of life. You feeding your baby is sacred.
You changing the diaper is sacred. All of it is it's caring for the most vulnerable among us. So don't discredit or diminish everything that you do in a day as ritual, as service, as sacred, as important,And please, if you can get the five minutes to your side. Often that ends up being in the shower or something like that, right, where we're just like, oh, okay. Showers, that's that's a very that's a very holy place in my home.
Dorothee: I wanna take a moment to talk a little bit about self care and this idea that kind of permeates popular culture where it's like, oh, you know, get the facial, get your nails done, get your body back, you know, self care. And while that can be nice, you address also in the book this deeper layer of what true caring for the self in this process is. Sometimes that's trying to gloss over the unraveling that that really does need to take place and that we need to be present for it if we can be, though it's very difficult.
Kelly: Yeah. Well, fortunately, I think about self care a lot. And it's something I think about in terms of depth, I guess, is how you could put it. So I find for New mothers, there's sort of a dangerous rhetoric around self care encouraging moms to sort of wade in shallow water. If that makes sense.
When every opportunity begs them to take this deep dive to the bottom of the ocean for these ridges. Right? So, yes, if you need the manicure, if you need the facial, whatever it is, and that's gonna give you a boost by all means, do it. However, don't anticipate that the care for the small cell, but they care for the external is going to anyway support you or sustain you in the perpetual needs of motherhood if that makes sense. So that polished fingernails really not gonna mean much in the middle of the night when you're wicking up again to take care for your baby if that makes sense.
So if you're able to really work in self care and I call it self care care of the highest self, and really start on this journey of self discovery, start on this journey of authenticity, really take that slow wide u-turn within and start the process of know thyself. That. clarity And that sense of that clarity and that sense of truth. If that's gonna make sense for you, truth may be the right word. That is going to sustain you throughout this powerful process of whether Right? You're gonna face so many so many so many challenges and many phases of motherhood, not just early motherhood. So you coming to your inner truth and your inner clarity, that is going to be the most powerful tool in your tool belt.
Right? So when you're when you're thinking about self care, sometimes you're just in survival mode. Like, I just need five minutes to whatever it might be x y or z. And that's okay. That's fine.
You please don't deny yourself. You should take care of yourself. But care of the higher self, care of the inner self is really going to be what sustains you or what supports you in motherhood and not only you because like we said, it's not only about us. We're in full connection with another being. But that's going to radiate throughout your relationships with your children and your family, you know, to extend past you into your household, if that makes sense.
So taking this opportunity, like I said, not waiting in shallow water. But really, at some point, committing to making this deeper dive and coming to know myself and this journey of inner discovery, that can be very very powerful in terms of self care.
Dorothee: Yeah, that makes so much sense. And some of the things that you recommend are things like finding support groups of other mothers or perhaps a doula or a counselor to really do some of that deeper diving into how do we truly care for ourselves and our inner resources and our internal life.
Kelly: Yes. And one of the recommendations my doula gave to me after the birth of my first son was to find a mom's group. And there was a part of me that kind of physically recoil like, oh, how would I do that? But I took her advice. She hadn't let me let me wrong. Thus far. So I took her advice and it was honestly the best decision that I made. And first of all, when you're forming relationships in this moment of life and you're sharing such depth and such richness.
They tend to be relationships that last. Right? So that in itself is such a treasure and the moms that I met in my mom's group are still so much part of my life. But beyond that, it's really it's really nice to understand that so much of what you're experiencing in early motherhood is not unique to you. And that makes sense so sure.
We're all gonna have nuanced experience it is and everybody's situations are slightly different. But there is a lot of early motherhood that is universal. So for example, I'll just give a tangible experience. I remember thinking that my baby was the only one who didn't sleep. I thought everyone else's babies were sleeping and that I was the only one up all night.
And just going to lunch, we've been realizing that this baby's sleep struggle is so real. And so universal and almost everyone experiences it, there was just so much relief in that. Right? And, you know, if you wanna take it down to a deeper level, we go into motherhood with tons of expectations and tons of ideas around what we think motherhood be like, what kind of mother will be, what kind of child will have, all these ideas with mother around motherhood. And we get into motherhood, and our reality does not match our expectation, you know, that is the root of conflict.
Root of conflict is this gap between expectation and reality. And so often we find ourselves exactly there in this gap where this experience in motherhood is just not at all what we expected, because partly because it's impossible to anticipate how challenging, whether it is. But when we find ourselves in this in this gap of conflict, the sooner we can close that gap and just embrace reality as it is rather than trying to live up to some idea that's sort of keeping us in suffering, if that makes sense. So the student that we can just embrace reality and we commune with other mothers and realize that some of this part of the what we're experiencing is just innate in motherhood. There's a lot a lot a lot of internal freedom and mental clarity that comes in those realizations. So, yes, I do think that the mother scripts are really key counseling, support, doula's, mental health. I work with new mothers one on one. I moved new mother's group support groups seasonally.
And, yeah, I think a lot of spiritual realization, a lot of spiritual work does happen in solitude, and we will have to embrace that to some level that, yes, we are taking this turn within, and a lot of this work happens in the privacy of our own homes. However, there's there are too many women who are just sort of suffering in silence, suffering in isolation, thinking that their circumstances are really unique to them. And I'm not saying that sure everyone can have unique challenges, but some of what you might think is unique to you might really just be a universal phenomenon of motherhood.
Dorothee: Right. And you mentioned in the book people will say, you know, why didn't anyone take care of me. Why didn't anyone tell me that this is what it would be like? And it's there's the sense that there's nothing that can really prepare you until you're in it yourself. I have friends who were nannies and I babysat a lot and, you know, you might think that you would understand the experience, but until it's it's happening, it's good.
Yeah. It's different than what you expect.
Kelly: No. I say motherhood, you don't know until you know. You don't. There's this maiden myth, I think, is what it's calls. Right?
And we're so conditioned to for a lifetime of television shows and movies and magazines of what it looks like to be a mother and, you know, now they're social media involved, so they're all of these very unrealistic, very unrealistic images. Imagery were surrounded by messaging around motherhood. So, yeah, it gets real it gets real it gets very real very quickly. And it's really it can be very powerful to just like I said embrace that reality as it's true to you.
Dorothee: Yeah. And and it makes me think of the way in which you speak of compassion and kind of how we glean the treasures of this growth and we can then apply it to the external world when it's time to do so. And you say, we viscerally feel the cry of our babies And through this experience, we can't help but feel a growing compassion for the cries of all humanity. And I feel like that's also a really important step as we as we emerge, perhaps, integrate a little bit more back into daily life, external world, perhaps when our kids start to go to school, and we bring all these incredible gems from this time of deep growth. And I, you know, personally also awakened a totally different understanding of compassion and connectedness with humanity and also just all the children of the world.
Now when I hear a baby cry, I feel something in my body even if it's not my baby. I I will always I think feel something in my body when I hear a baby cry because it becomes in a way all of our baby once we know what that connection is. And I think that could really If properly nurtured, that could transform the world with with leaders.
Kelly: I I couldn't agree more. I think mothers are our greatest hope for humanity. And I think all that you come to understand and experience in motherhood can't help that shift for you personally, but also your relationship to the world, to the external world. And the last I think it's the last chapter in the book as entitled Worldly endeavors because we often into into your motherhood, like you touched on before, with this idea of bouncing back, bouncing back, bouncing back. And there is no going back.
This this this moment is a catalyst forward. It's a catalyst for growth. And not all, but it's not uncommon for some to find a completely different meaning, more purpose in life a different direction professionally. And I'm not at all surprised by that because I don't know how you could go through such a tremendous process of growth and sort of come out of it on the same side that you've entered, if that makes sense. So, yes, I I and you also touched upon this earlier in the sense that an early motherhood, you're contemplating your life up to that date.
I remember thinking in the many challenges of postpartum, while there's not one problem I had before becoming a mother that would even remotely faze me today. I'm planning on one thing that would bother me prior that I that I couldn't handle now. Right? And so, yes, we're growing in in terms of compassion and care, and we hear the cries of humanity, and we're connected, and we're nurturing but there's another side of this and that is the ferocity of the mother and the maturation of the mother and the mother finding her voice. I mean, think about how fiercely you'd be willing to protect your child. You know? And so it's both. It's left and right. It is this tenderness and this Karen's love and this compassion.
But it's also action and it's ferocity and it's your voice. And this is gonna sound strange, but it's sort of It's sort of very in an archetypal I don't know if that's right. And if you think of architects, it's, you know, you're you're embarking on the soul's journey And so you are met with this phenomenon of nature, which is pregnancy and birth, and then there's this loss of identity. And then after that loss of identity, you're in this this search for truth. Right?
And one of the great stories of our time that really illustrates this is it's gonna sound a little bit childish, but it's actually the wizard of Oz. When you think about Dorothy, you know, she enters into this world of color and this completely new realm and Glenda comes and she represents the divine feminine and who's guiding her through this journey And what does she do? She has to first meet this scarecrow, which represents the thinking mind, and then she meets the ten man, which sense our feelings and our emotions and looking for the heart. And then there is the lion, right, which is our courage and our action. And that is exactly what's happening in motherhood.
You are on the soul's journey. You will embrace your mind. You will embrace your emotions and you will integrate that into your into your action, into what you put forth into the world. You know, motherhood is not the only opportunity for this growth.
You know, certainly, we we experience cycles of this growth throughout our life. It just so happens that motherhood is one of intensity. It happens very quick. It happens very powerful. And it's very unapologetic.
It's like, okay. Here's what we're doing. And here's all the scenario that I'm gonna present in front of you and, you know, it's like it it happens very quickly. And with a lot of force. So I just think it's interesting that, yes, all of this soul's journey and this inner work eventually will be so that you take it forth in the world.
This is not your treasure to just sit upon it. It's it's it's your treasure to develop and harness so that you might bring it forth and share.
Dorothee: Yeah. I get full body chills when you talk about ferocity and finding the voice. I just think that it's when when that can happen, when things can integrate and align, and you can kinda step out in this new very powerful form. Having been reconfigured, you know, by this six experience. It really feels like that's what the world needs.
And I just wanna talk with you, you know, as we close, we have just a few more minutes about the time frame of this process because I think a lot of people And unfortunately, in our country, you know, people have to go back to work at, you know, ungodly, early times that's so challenging. But, you know, you talk about time lines up to two years, three years. For me, it certainly felt like three years by the time my body, my mind, and my spirit were fully realigned and re centered. It was definitely a three year process, which is not something I think in our culture we're really aware of and also used to that length of time for anything. So
Kelly: Definitely. I hate to attach any definitive timeline because it can be different for everyone. Personally, I can say that my kids are now seven and four, and I can say I'm officially not postpartum. But some would say that postpartum lasts forever. You know, I I think there was a big shift at two and then another big shift at three. So I would say that It's gradual. It's different for everyone. You're gonna go through many phases.
I would say personally no less than two years. In my opinion.
Dorothee: Yeah. Just to just to kind of say that it does take time and it is a process, then it's okay if things don't feel like they're making sense. Especially in the moment, I think, especially for me, while I was going through the process, I didn't have any clarity or understanding of what I was going through. But in hindsight now, I can really reflect on it and see what that path was though at the time I felt that I was completely lost. So just to give encouragement to anyone out there who's like, you know, I don't feel anything sacred or spiritual about this.
I just want a nap and a shower. It is part of the process and it's extremely challenging and it may make sense in a number of years.
Kelly: You're absolutely right. When you're in it, it can just feel grueling. It can feel absolutely grueling. And sometimes the perspective doesn't come until much later, you know, with the book, I recommend mom's read the book twice. I said read it when you're and your third trimester preparing for motherhood, and then read it again. Maybe when those earth hormones have fated, and the bow tie is wearing off, and you really are in the thick of postpartum. But surprisingly, to me, I can mothers read this book who are now mothers of grown children. And it's amazing.
They reach out and just say that they too are still processing this. This has never been acknowledged for them. And they still took a lot away from this message, and it's just It's just so surprising to me that we have ignored this aspect of motherhood for as long as we have and it was maybe to taboo to talk about or unacceptable. I'm not sure why this was never discussed. But now I like you said in the beginning, I do see more and more conversations around this.
I do see mothers experiencing, even if you don't wanna call it spiritual, just considering motherhood as growth, as personal growth. And there's a lot of momentum around that and acknowledgment around that. And I just hold this as such hope for humanity, for women, for families, for communities, and just really truly acknowledging how how critical and important this process really is.
Dorothee: Yeah. I mean, it makes sense to me that it this spiritual significance and sacredness of new motherhood would have been repressed in a time when women were not meant to have power in our world. And so as we begin to emerge again the feminine on the planet that this be acknowledged and truly honored for the incredible I mean, I tell my son that it's like a a path of a warrior in a certain sense I want him to understand that warriors not just the one with a sword, but but the strength that we're talking about, that's a type of warriorship. And yeah, I just imagine that if if we could be truly honored and held in our role, there's so much healing that could happen in our communities and, you know, that part of really finding our voices and acknowledging what we've experienced as being something really significant, which I appreciate so much about, like, how you write.
Kelly: Thank you. Yeah. It was really important to me that a mother just find find a moment for reflection on her own experience through this best thing if that makes sense. So the way the book is designed, it's It's very intentionally designed in short approachable chapters because I really understand how overcome a new mother can be. And for her to sit down to read, please go check out Cali's book,
and this is the time of what information at sit down and read. Very, very hard. And thank you so much, Kevin. It's nothing. To like to talk you with you today. That's gonna require tremendous amount of brain power, if that makes sense. It's an easy easy read. And so it's set up and that it presents an idea, a concept, and then an original poem, I think motherhood lends itself really beautifully to poetry, and then an invitation to reflect on this idea that's presented. So again, realizing that so much of this phenomenon is universal, but giving the mom the opportunity to really reflect on how how how this work works in her life and how her experience unfolds.
And it's you know, I so I was looking through the journal that you've created and, you know, that it it's just phenomenal and it's just powerful to invite a mother to reflect on these ideas and these experiences and you know, it's just it's just a tremendous tremendous offer. So I have to say thank you so much for what you've created. And it's really a beautiful beautiful offering to motherhood.
Dorothee: Thank you. Yeah. I feel like powerful postpartum of your book and maybe Rooted journal could be a great complementary pair for a for a pregnant loved one in in our listeners' lives and And speaking of which, you know, for those who wanna learn more about your work, your circles that you hold for new mothers, how to get your book. Where can we find that online?
Kelly: It's very easy. I'm at powerful postpartum dot com. One of the parts about releasing this book that I could not have anticipated was the really beautiful network and connection that I'd made with mothers and readers. I did not necessarily expect that initially and just selfishly and personally is so, so, so rewarding and satisfying. And I just love connecting with mothers.
It's truly my passion. I am trained as a doula in birth and postpartum and then change his virtual studies and mentorship as well. So it's funny. I tell if I'm meeting a mother in person, I'm like, I meet you where you are. If you need me to watch those dishes and that you, if you wanna sit down for a process and then it's, like, you know what I mean?
Like, whatever you are, whatever your needs are. I really love supporting, surveying, connecting with mothers in the really beautiful time of their lives.
Dorothee: Wonderful. Well, I so recommend your book and I'm so glad that your work is in the world. Thank you for everything you're doing to help our culture move forward in our understanding of this significance of early motherhood and how incredible this process is. I'm just so glad to know that there are other people out there really awakening these ideas in the collective. So please go check out Kelly's book and find more information at powerful postpartum dot com.
And thank you so much, Kelly. It was an absolute delight talking with you today.
Kelly: A pleasure, and thank you for having me. I am thrilled to connect with you and thank you for the tremendous service you do from others. So needed and appreciated.
Dorothee: Thank you for listening to the show. You can hear more episodes on moodwise dot c o or subscribe to the moodwise podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. If you enjoyed the episode, leave us a written review on Apple podcasts and get a shout out on the show. Reviews help others find the podcast and I read each and everyone. Thank you so much for your support.
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