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SG

NATURAL LIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY + BADASSERY + BLOG

Portfolio
Stephanie
Work
Media
Stories
- Blog
- Photo Collections
Desert Glow Life
Grow

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| recommended BOOKS |

| recommended PODCASTs |

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“Know your story as fluid and shape-shifting, and honor the shadowy parts of your soul that may have been called wicked or shameful as precious gifts, holy in their own right and divine in their darkness, that now allow you to become the woman you needed when you were younger.”⁣
| Danielle Dulsky | ⁣
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I forget where I read that we are the universe curling in to reflect back to Herself.⁣
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But I like it.⁣
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Because that’s what I’ve been feeling lately - like I am seeing myself reflected back to me. I’m seeing the parts of me I didn’t realize then were so strong and fiery, but only because they were holding back fear and ache. The things about me that seemed unloveable then are just vividly deep now. And it takes a deep, wild soul to recognize another one, so I’m finding so much forgiveness for the people who couldn’t see me fully or love me well.⁣
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They weren’t meant to. ⁣
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I was. ⁣
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I made peace with my shadow years ago. I stopped shaming myself for being human, for being a whole lot, for making mistakes that ultimately led me to peace. I’m not waiting for someone to love me into wholeness anymore. I’ve always been whole. I just needed to clear the mudslide of theology that told me I wasn’t. I needed to choose the path that took me out of the endless cycle of abuse and into the unknown. ⁣
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Sometimes I forget that I am my own. I forget that I don’t need to stay small or quiet or agreeable in order to keep people happy. I forget that I don’t owe anyone any other version of my story. I like my messy story. And I like the way I tell it with my life.⁣
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I have to turn to reflect myself back to myself. I’m free now. I’m awake to my wholeness now. I’m comfortable with every dark moment in my shape-shifting, fluid existence. God wasn’t in the rigid, blind, heartwreck of obedience. She was everything and nothing, wild and safe, abundance and the void, new thoughts and ancient words, freedom and the terrifying feeling off stepping off a cliff edge into the air, forgiveness and justice, love and boundaries, the forever fluid embrace of the girl I was afraid to be and the woman I’m grateful to be. ⁣God/dess was always in the dark too. ⁣

Bee Spirit 🐝 “Her message is that sweet rewards are on their way if you are willing to get your ego out of the way and immerse yourself in the connected energy of all things. Bee Spirit is always producing honey, and miracles and magic are everywhere. When you connect with The Great Hive, you begin to vibrate in exquisite harmony with all. The bee loses its sweetness when it begins to believe that it’ is alone, because the power of the bee is it’s ability to work within a hive mind to create a great mass of sweetness to share.”
@thechurchwitch

At some point I realized that moving on from past fucked up relationships had nothing to do with moving on to someone else. Actually, that pattern just kept me stuck in the same cycle of pain.⁣
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I had to be alone.⁣
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I had to learn how to be at peace while I was alone.⁣
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I had to face the wounds that surfaced every time the air around me went quiet.⁣
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I had to answer my own questions about worth, and safety, and preservation.⁣
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I had to deeply, irrevocably love myself.⁣
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Self love is a cleansing energy because it moves us away from the past, away from the wounds that have kept us cycling through the same patterns with new people.⁣
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Learn how to be alone, how to love the heart you hold in your chest, and then see what shifts. We attract what we are - so it makes sense that if we heal ourselves, we’ll attract healing. If we grow ourselves, we’ll attract growing. If we are kind with ourselves, we’ll attract kind.⁣
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Loving others is just the overflow of the love we cultivate for ourselves. Maybe write yourself a love note today and clear the energy of all the times you let a shitty shadow of love make the rules. ⁣
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PC: @lalahdelia

“May you believe in your powers of discernment, and may you risk social isolation over and over again in the name of your soulful joy. May you be willing to exist on the fringes in the name of liberation, finding and belonging to those wild circles of openhearted seekers who make you feel as though you are a larger version of yourself and leaving those circles where entry always demands you wear a too-tight mask to disguise your true face… May you write your own holy verses of wild feminine lost and wild feminine regained.⁣
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Hallowed be your heathen soul, and blessed be the Holy Wild.”⁣⁣
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| Danielle Dulsky |⁣⁣
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There’s always more.

My work isn’t conversion. Conversion embodies a savior complex that I’ve worked very hard to peel out of my personal operating system and I don’t have any interest whatsoever in picking that back up ever again. ⁣
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My work is spiritual wandering, energetic door holding, asking better + forbidden questions, fiercely protecting spaces that are meant to be havens for the exhausted, the spiritually abused, and the waking up. My work is divining in deserts for hidden wells and then the endless digging to see what stories have been piled up and packed down to hide that source of life. My work is messy, always unfolding, fiery, soft, ritualistic, self empowered, unashamed, evolving, open ended, and always, always starting with the heart and not the head.⁣
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And the best part of knowing that THIS is MY work, is that I don’t need it to be anyone else’s. I’ll do it. I’ll give to it and let it give back to me. I’ll create it, breathe into it, and let it grow in whatever wild, untamed way it needs to.⁣
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I have learned how to lovingly release anyone whose energy directly struggles against mine. Without anger, or judgement, or dualism (right/wrong either/or) I am getting better and better at cutting cords and letting what isn’t meant for me to drift away. It’s the only way I’ll ever be full enough, resilient enough, clear enough, and loving enough to do my own work.⁣
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Here’s to the stretches of time where we raise holy hell in our bones and forge paradise out of being so fully alive it almost burns. Here’s to the unique and fantastic work we are all meant to do and the courage it takes to do the damn thing ❤️⁣
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PC: @reena.sternberg

“Her heart was wild
but I didn’t want to catch it.
I wanted to run with it
to set mine free.”
@atticuspoetry

Currently: ⁣
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🐝 I’m really deeply happy. ⁣
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🐝 I’m healing myself in ways I had already reconciled to letting breathe until they were ready to be touched and that feels both vulnerable and liberating. ⁣
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🐝 I just today started reading The Holy Wild and I’ve cried like 4 times.⁣
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🐍 Bees have always held a lot of spiritual significance for me, but lately snakes have too. Which is kind of weird because they scare the hell out of me, but they represent the divine feminine, rebirth, and grounding and that speaks to me.⁣
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🐝 So much is aligning around me. I can look back and see how much work I’ve done to be right here in this moment, open to the really good, really clear unfolding Universe. I’m glad I didn’t stay lost in a life that wasn’t mine.⁣
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🐝 I wish I had a full week to spend adventuring with my kids and I can’t wait for our road trip this summer.⁣
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🐝 I’m impatiently waiting for my 23 and me results. ⁣
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🐝 This photo feels like it was from another lifetime. I guess in a way it was. But it’s a good reminder that yoga is a practice that’s meant to evolve and grow while we do.⁣
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🐝I haven’t had a bestie night with @joannbauerhomes and @micheleelizaga in so long. I’m about to just show up with wine and carbs if someone doesn’t make it happen soon. Even if it’s just me and @scottandmarley 🤷🏻‍♀️⁣
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🐝 Last night I discovered a Friends trivia game tucked in with the board games at @lovecraftphx and now I want them to host a Friends trivia night so I can win all the prizes 😉 But really, wouldn’t you come to that??⁣
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🐝 Speaking of Friends, @andrew.graceson, come in here and watch Netflix with me while we still have some Sunday left.

If you’re deconstructing your faith, worldview, or God view and want to feel safe and heard in a community of the same open hearted people on the journey of dismantling and rewilding come join the Wild Spirituality group attached to my public FB page ❤️ I’m going to do a live feed on Deconstruction + LGBTQ today. This is a topic that comes up ALL THE TIME and something that deeply needs to be healed, rewritten, and embraced. These live feeds are not a place for debate (especially since this group is not for people looking to be convinced or to convince others of something). These discussions are meant to facilitate an unraveling of what we were handed so we can continue exploring the freedom and worthiness that have always been ours, but maybe have felt out of reach. This particular live feed is really important to me and I’d love to have every spiritual wanderer come find a place to land with us 🌈❤️

“If you have yet to be called an incorrigable, defiant woman,
don't worry, there is still time.”
| Clarissa Pinkola Estes |

We had this whole discussion yesterday in the Wild Spirituality group about the symbolism of the serpent in pre-patriarchal Canaan; how it was a representation of the Goddess, the Divine Ancestress, and how it was an embodiment of wisdom. Not of sin, not of punishment, not of shame, not of fear. The Divine Feminine.⁣⁣
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Which turns the whole Adam and Eve story on it’s head.⁣⁣
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There are ideas we are handed and that are normalized, but if we don’t know the story behind the story how can we really attach ourselves to a belief system? I could tell you this image wasn’t altered, but you’d call bullshit. Because you know how to observe and reach conclusions for yourself. Because in context we know exactly how it was made to LOOK like something it isn’t. This is just a photo in your IG feed - it doesn’t shape our worldview or the way we live our lives, so why wouldn’t we give much more attention to uncovering the deeper stories in our faith traditions or belief systems? There’s always more to explore. And ALWAYS the exploring is where we wake up, where we find our good hearts buried under the rubble of a decaying system. ⁣
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Your good heart is worth unburying.

Wild Spirituality Podcast