(An edited version from a January 2026 reflection)
When my daughter was born, I was born into something, too.
This tiny being who had lived inside me now lay beside me, breathing and growing, already becoming her own person. I found myself wondering about the invisible thread between us: how we could be so deeply connected, and yet she was already someone entirely her own.
Where to begin? Well… when it comes to motherhood, I experienced so much that was definitely not commonly talked about. It wasn’t until getting pregnant, giving birth and asking the right questions that I discovered how common some of these topics were.
So let’s talk about them…
Motherhood has felt profoundly spiritual to me, and I think we leave something important out of the conversation when we don't make room for that.
I was surprised how much of this I experienced in the first trimester and throughout pregnancy. I don’t believe it’s possible to cover everything. There is wisdom and embodiment in the experience and it’s the experience that helps with understanding. And still, I found myself frustrated but what’s just not commonly talked about. I believe these conversations are a piece of lost lineage from when multigenerational women gathered regularly.
I am an extremely energetically sensitive person, so when I got pregnant I was in for a wild ride. What I experienced was a very extremely spiritual pregnancy, labor, birth and initiation into motherhood - dare I say psychedelic.
To carry life into this world is to invite another being, another soul into your physical body to be temporarily housed, while your body then creates a house for this soul - a body of its own.
When I was first pregnant with my daughter, I knew it. I denied it. But I knew it. I was traveling through Nicaragua, and continued to get really sick. When I connected with my womb I felt life in it, but I didn’t want to believe it.
To carry and bring a child into the world is to enter a different relationship with responsibility. Our decisions begin to ripple through another life, through family histories, and into futures we may never get to see.
As a womb carrying human, I felt I had a huge responsibility. The responsibility of making decisions that wouldn’t just impact me, but also the future. These decisions can take place in a moment and ripple out into all time and space. It’s such a huge responsibility, yet, I knew I was and still am capable of making decisions like that. And this isn’t to say there aren’t other decisions that don’t carry weight – there are, but we’re talking about the spirituality of motherhood, and this is the heart of it.
As I meditated with my womb I asked my daughter if she was sure she wanted to be born in today’s day and time — I explained to her all that’s going on, the craziness, the uncertainty both politically and in my personal life at the time. I heard a clear answer from her – it was “yes” she was ready. Even though I wasn’t sure I was.
As I navigated pregnancy there was a reckoning. Between who I was, who I will become and how supported my ultimate decision was by the universe, my guides and my community.
As the nine months were coming to a close and I was approaching the birth portal. I knew birth would be the most challenging thing I’d yet to do. Birthing my daughter earthside means there’s another life taking place here on the earth. It changes the course of history, because this being can and will make decisions that will affect life here on earth, no matter how “big” or “small” these decisions seem, they matter. And in the process of birth taking place, I in the process will be changed, transformed.
Now earthside, this little being holds in her body the perfect and messy combination of my partners lineage, history, and stories as well as my lineage, history and stories. We are family.
Life, death, past, present and future are all connected.
The act of becoming a mother can be a beautifully deep portal of transformation if we allow it to be. But it does require our participation and awareness.
To live an intentionally conscious life means sitting with the weight of your decisions, how it impacts you and the people around you regardless of intention.
Motherhood is a big responsibility and a deeply spiritual journey. To steward a life is a gift. It requires surrender. Not everyone who will be a mother initially wants to be a mother, and not everyone who wants to be a mother will mother physical biological children in this lifetime.
The reasoning behind this is beyond me, but I do believe motherhood can take many forms and the process itself regardless of form has the opportunity to deeply transform us, if we will allow it.
There are thresholds in life that change us simply by asking something new of us. We may not understand why a particular path opens, why another remains closed, or why our lives unfold as they do. Sometimes all we can do is meet the life in front of us as honestly as we know how in the present moment.
Motherhood and spirituality is a big topic that will take more than one blog post to talk about. And even then I’ll probably only scratch the surface. The spiritual realm dwells among us, and there is so much mysticism in the mundane.
As I share my birth story and the stories of other mothers. I hope the threads and tendrils of the mysticism present will show up more in these topics, of caring for a soul in this way.
I also hope these explorations will help me learn more about myself, as my motherhood journey unfolds.
