Some illuminative insights from my Teen Girls: Wisdom Within course

I’m now almost at the end of my first Teen Girls: Wisdom Within Course and it’s been fantastic. What I love about this course is the shared understanding that we are each complex inside and there's value in understanding how to interact with our inner life more effectively, instead of focusing on what’s “wrong” with us.

It’s been fascinating to explain some core basics around the inner life to the girls and show them how to listen, and see them instantly understand these concepts. They get it, because it’s already within them. They just had no language for it previously.

I’ve noticed this over and over with women - as soon as we are given words to describe an inner experience, we understand it. It’s like switching a light on.

Not knowing what we have within us, not trusting our body’s innate intelligence and not having the skill to navigate our complex inner life is a symptom of our culture that lives exclusively in the mind, doesn’t like to feel, and sees the body as separate.

With rising mental health issues in children and adults, and the alluring but constant distraction of technology, it’s pretty clear our exclusive devotion to the rational mind is not working for us anymore. So whilst none of what I am teaching is new or especially complex, it is new for so many of us. We need lots of reminders to balance all the external distractions and stressors with some quality inner know-how.

Of course, the inner life isn’t easy to make sense of at the best of times, especially in the teen years, but there are some simple things we can do to start building skill in navigating it. The foundational piece is learning how to listen to and connect to the whole body.

It's been beautiful in the course to hear the girls now refer to their inner life with more confidence, demonstrating to me that they are listening to themselves … they’re noticing red flags around “toxic” people, seeing the impact of too much worry and recognising habits such as checking their phone last minute before going to bed doesn’t actually make them feel good. Their insights have been exceptional.

The outcome is the girls now understand their bodies give them subtle cues and information as to their needs, feelings, wellbeing, situations and other people, and they know how to listen. That was my intention in putting this course on, and I’m so pleased it’s come to fruition.

I will be running the next round of Teen Girls: Wisdom Within in February/March 2019. If your daughter is in high school, preferably years 8-10, and you would like to register your interest, please email info@laurellewishart.com and I will be in touch.