This past Saturday (21 September 2019) served me in ways I wasn’t quite ready for and pleasantly so! I particularly want to share on my morning which offered a moving, emotional and positive start to the day, also just so unbelievable! And it’s important that I share on what I was served because it illuminated parts of us (women) that need not be neglected, the gaping holes that need attention and the collective power that we have as women to heal each other.

As early as 06:50 I set off to Midrand for a workshop titled ‘My Be-you-tiful Life’, kicking off at 07:00 with registration/ breakfast and meditation at 07:30. I thought I’d miss breakfast and arrive in time for meditation. Luckily time was pushed a little to accommodate late-comers such as myself but in no time, the programme began.

“Learn how to transform your life into a beautiful, purposeful, inspired and energetic journey by identifying your purpose and gifts and creating a vision and plan informed by your purpose” – this is what participants were going there for and I was relaxed and ready to take notes on the perspectives and experiences of the impressive speakers that were on the line-up (Jackie Freemantle, Akhona Ngcobo and Ayanda Borotho). Different and colourful women kept pouring in the venue as some of us early birds (clears throat) sat sipping on tea and coffee and nibbling on sandwiches.

“This intensive immersive workshop will give you tools to change your mind-set, challenge and re-programme your beliefs and manage your emotions so you can live your best, beautiful life.”  These are words written on the poster and I swear, nothing about “intensive and immersive” unnerved me, I just thought it spoke to being present and being intentional about your own transformation. So of course I was up for it! Little did I know… Jackie Freemantle (International Life Coach and Leadership Development Specialist) stilled us for meditation. Arms unfolded, legs unlocked, hands rested on the knees and deep breaths in and gentle exhales. It was about silencing the noise, listening to the heartbeat, being conscious of it, taking in the feeling of being alive and relaxing. It was good, peaceful and stilling.

And then Jackie started on her session: ALSTAR Coaching Towards your Beauty-Full Life – part one. And let me tell you, none of us were ready. She shared a bit on herself and her journey; being raped at the age of 4 years and going on to redefine and create her future. She is an amazing woman who is set on defying the odds and standing tall as a conqueror who has full control of her life. She then shared a story about forgiveness, where in another workshop was a woman who had lost her parents and had for years held on to the anger and pain. In the same workshop was the man who killed her family and for some reason, the lady changed seats and went to sit next to him. Now the exercise required that you partner up with someone and speak of the hurt that you need to forgive. As fate would have it, the lady partnered up with this older man she had sat next to and uttered the words “I forgive you for killing my parents”, only to have the man confess that he was the person who caused her so much heart-ache. At this point of the story, Jackie also mentioned that we should never think that things happen by chance and that there was a reason whoever was seated next to us was there. There’s a lady who had moved closer to me on my right and I quickly scanned her as it was obvious she’d be my partner for this exercise. So what exactly was the purpose of us being next to each other?

To tell you the truth, I would have gladly skipped this exercise – this was the “intensive immersive” stuff they were on about and I wanted out! I was already feeling emotional and couldn’t place my feelings on how I felt about locking eyes with a stranger and bearing my soul and not just that, but also having this stranger pour out whatever pain… I mean, what was I going to do with it? I had little time to script a warm response but Jackie had said all we’d need to do is utter the words: “I forgive you”, simply because the subconscious mind needed to hear the words. So we stood up and introduced ourselves to each other. We will call her Thoba. A beautiful woman clad in dreadlocks and very little make-up. Upon our first attempt at locking eyes, she immediately announced she was bad at maintaining eye-contact. It turned I was the one who was bad (and really, I’m not), it was just so awkward, I wanted to run out! But soon we settled into each other’s searching eyes and engaged in a “trust” activity which involved leaning on each other and trusting on the support of the partner.

And then we were onto the forgiveness talk. We locked eyes again and before she could say anything, her face was shaking, literally moving out of its own volition. Those couple of seconds were so intense I actually tiered up, tears just streaming down my cheeks. And then she broke my heart; Thoba was abused and molested and is currently being abused in her marriage. After we had both shared, we released heavy sighs and embraced for what seemed like an eternity. How was this light threatened?

Looking around the room, I noticed that more women were in tears and it broke my heart to see how hurt and broken we are but was equally happy about the session and the release it offered everybody. Thoba is my new friend and what an easily loveable heart she is! I don’t know what to do with her current situation, what to say to her and how to be relevant but I realized how being present, listening and loving on another woman can be meaningful for her fight. Women are going through the most and the recent attacks and killings that we have witnessed over the past few weeks are just a fraction of the traumatic experiences that a whole lot of other women go through and are lucky enough to survive, at the hands of men. Moreover, I realized how important it is to affirm another woman; we need each other, our experiences intersect and quite frankly, we get each other. Thoba and I were basically in conversation throughout, whether it was the brief holding of hands, rubbing each other’s shoulders and hushed mutterings of whatever one wanted to share or comment on. I loved her so easily and that emotion I felt made me happy and hopeful for better days. I know why we met and I look forward to seeing her again.

I couldn’t stay on for the rest of the programme so I missed out on Akhona Ngcobo (Life Coach and Enneagram, Behavioral Specialist) and Ayanda Borotho’s (Author, Activist, Transformation Practitioner) sessions. But I’ve no shadow of a doubt that both these women were phenomenal, the atmosphere itself along with the women attending had just the right vibe to transform their lives for the good!

After lunch I sped off to a friend’s wedding and I was in good spirits! Clad in a short blue dress, a brightly coloured headscarf matching my shoes, I was ready for a good time. And indeed it was. Happy faces were all round, there was colourful and delicious food, great music and we danced into the night. Can I just say that the deejay was absolutely great and of course, as you would have guessed it, the deejay was a woman!

To wrap up my weekend, I fished for Thoba’s business card in my bag, saved her number and sent her a warm, loving and encouraging text. May it be well with her.

Show did you care and love yourself this weekend? Tell us about it.