*Picture credit to Kat Kissick
Meet Peg Elam of Pearlsong Press
and thank you to Nine Sister Network of Magoism.Net
“Gauging bodies against external weight/size standards fuels stigma, oppression, and disordered eating and disordered exercise, all of which can constrict people psychologically and physically, crushing their ability to live fully. How much mental and physical energy do women, especially (but not exclusively—all genders can develop disordered eating and exercise patterns), expend trying to make or keep themselves smaller? What else could they (we!) do with that energy? There is evidence (ignored by the multi-billion-dollar weight loss industry, which includes portions of the medical community*) that weight-loss dieting is not only not sustainable long-term for most people—almost all people who lose weight intentionally will gain it back, and often more—but actually physically harmful. It’s healthier to maintain a stable “over” weight than to repeatedly lose and regain weight, a pattern known as weight cycling. I think of dieting/intentional weight loss as a kind of bodily exorcism, an attempt to reject parts of the body (especially adipose tissue) that are deemed “other” and demonized. This binding of the body constricts the spirit as well.”
As Naomi Wolf said, “Dieting is the most potent political sedative in women’s history; a quietly mad population is a tractable one.”
The above excerpt is taken from (Nine Sister Networks E-Interivew) Peg Elam and Pearlsong Press by Mary Saracino
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The below quote is from CPE’s bible … read and seared into my brain over a decade ago!! May everyone have these watershed experiences!
“I had two watershed experiences when I was in my early twenties, experiences that went against everything I had been taught about body up to then. While at a women’s weeklong gathering and at night at the fire near the hot springs, I saw a naked woman of about thirty-five; her breast were emptied out by childbearing, her belly striated from birthing children. I was very young and I remember feeling sorry for the assaults on her fair and thin skin. Someone was playing maracas and drums, and she began to dance, her hair, her breasts, her skin, her limbs all moving in different directions. How beautiful she was, how vital. Her grace was heartbreaking. I had always smiled at the at phrase, “fire in her loins.” but that night I saw it. I saw the power in her haunches. I saw what I had been taught to ignore, the power of a women’s body when it is animated from the inside. Almost three decades later, I can still see her dancing in the night and I am still struck by the power of body.”
From Clarissa Pinkola Estés PhD: Joyous Body: the Wild Flesh in Women Who Run with the Wolves Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype
Pearlsong Publishing “I chose the name “Pearlsong” because pearls are formed when an irritating substance enters an oyster or clam or mussel and triggers its protective response. The irritant is coated with shimmering, opalescent nacre (“mother of pearl”), the coats eventually building up to produce a beautiful gem. The self-healing response of the oyster transforms suffering into a thing of beauty.
I think that’s something to sing about! The pearl-creating process reflects my desire both as a psychologist/psychotherapist and writer/editor/publisher to move outside a pathological or “disease” based model of “mental health” and “mental illness” and into a more integrative and transcendent perspective of life, health, and well-being. Out of suffering into joy.
And—the Pearl River runs through Jackson, MS, where I was born in the month of June. There are three birthstones associated with June, the most common being pearl. – Peg Elam, Pearlsong Press
*Image by Satyress from Pixabay
Creating Pearls We Are!
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