We were lucky to catch up with Kim Marie recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Kim, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?
Resilience is a capacity to navigate life’s challenges, extremes and difficulties in such a way that we can maintain our sense of center, our flexibility and strength, and an ability to recover from life’s painful moments. It’s not about never having those moments, but rather an ability to meet them with courage, move through them consciously, and cultivate deeper wisdom in the process. This resilience, for me, comes from connection to Soul. When I am connected to my Soul, which I also define as my deep Inner Wisdom, the Wise Woman within me, the Sacred Feminine elements of flow, receptivity and openness, I am better able to connect with Life. I remember that I am one of many threads in the tapestry of life, and if I unravel, that tapestry unravels too.
Staying aligned with Soul is not an easy task. It requires committed practice. Thankfully we are freely given many sacred tools to help us do so. In my journals and programs, every tool and practice is intended to align us more deeply with Soul. These include things like regular journaling practices, staying in harmony with Nature and her cyclical processes like the rhythm of the seasons and moon cycles, meditation and contemplation, body awareness, tapping into the wisdom of fairy tales and mythology for the treasured archetypes they provide for our Soul journey, and listening to Soul language which is communicating with us constantly through our dreams, intuition, imagery, beauty, sensations, and so much more.
My resilience comes from staying present, meeting life’s challenges, celebrating life’s joys, and leading always with Soul.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
Like so many of us, I began this journey of life doing my best to keep up with all the “shoulds” and measure up to the many perceived outer expectations around me. I aimed for the “ideal” life…the husband, the kids, the nice house, the great career. And, as life often shows us, things don’t always turn out the way we’d like them to. I found myself navigating divorce, health challenges, single motherhood, financial strain, anxiety, and a constant wondering “what’s wrong with me that I can’t figure this out?”
As I found myself on my own with two children, I was given the opportunity to go deep within myself, discover more of who I am, heal from years of disregarding my body and psyche, and find a path forward that felt empowering, purposeful, and much more stress free. In my own developing sense of sovereignty and Soul-fulfillment, I wanted to share this with women, particularly women in the second half of life.
Women in the second half of life have a unique and special opportunity to recreate themselves. They’re often reviewing the first half of life, realizing they don’t wish to keep moving forward in the way they’ve been. They feel the disconnect from Soul, as Soul seeks to lead the way in this portion of life. The ego/persona driven first half of life starts to feel stale, insignificant and meaningless. We don’t want to strive for the same definition of success we bought into in our youth. We crave meaning, a sense of deep purpose, an opportunity to bring our gifts and make an impact. We want to feel joy, have a sense of strength and well-being, and connect with something greater than ourselves.
All of my programs center around this mission of helping women to move from stress to solace, disempowerment to sovereignty, and Soul-sickness to Soul-fulfillment. With the purpose of aligning with Soul, I offer publications like my Sacred Nights of Winter Journal, my Sacred Seasons Journals, and my Soul Planner. I also offer regular seasonal gatherings, New Moon circles, Fairy Tale Circles and seasonal planning sessions to help women stay immersed in Soul-aligning tools and practices. I believe we need support and encouragement to maintain connection to Soul in a world that is constantly doing its best to take us out of our Higher Self connection. This is why I created Solace, an ongoing membership program for women on the path to Soul-fulfillment.
Solace offers a nurturing environment of women committed to navigating their second half of life with more grace, peace and joy. We honor the cycle of the seasons, learn practical tools to enhance our relationships, align with our values, and embody our gifts. The program takes us on a journey through 4 stages of Remembering who we are, Reconnecting to our own unique meaning and values, Re-Envisioning new possibilities for our life, and Rebirthing ourselves into those possibilities. These stages apply to the broader journey of our life and Soul development, as well as to nearly ever situation we encounter in our day-to-day lives. We begin a new cycle of the journey every January.
Women interested in this path might begin with my annual Sacred Nights of Winter Journal (https://KimMarieCoaching.com/SacredNights), which is a beautiful opportunity to dive deeply into realms of Soul during the darkest nights of the year. The journaling and accompanying free community guidance during this time have proven over and over again the importance of tapping into our Soul to guide us in the new year. People return to the Sacred Nights of Winter journey yearly to commit to themselves in a nurturing way that generates support and encouragement for navigating the year to come.
You can find my:
Sacred Seasons Journals at https://KimMarieCoaching.com/SacredSeasons
Soul Planner at https://KimMarieCoaching.com/SoulPlanner
Solace program at https://KimMarieCoaching.com/Solace.
These living offerings and programs are constantly evolving, just as we evolve through our life, and are designed to meet you where you are, and grow with you along the way.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
As I think about my journey through life, I realize that the three most impactful things that supported me were:
1. Courage – We need courage to venture forth on this challenging path of Soul alignment. The journey begins there, and cultivating courage might be the most important thing we do to free ourselves from the trappings of modern life.
2. Clarity – Cultivating the ability to tap into our Inner Wisdom, listening to our intuition and Inner Authority, is one of the most important tasks for being aligned with our own personal Truth and Soul essence. It’s difficult to quiet the noise, but when we are connected with the Wisdom of our Soul, we can make decisions, navigate uncertainty, and find a sense of peace that guides us forward, no matter what life throws at us.
3. Perspective – When we can step back and see from a broader perspective, life doesn’t seem so overwhelming or complicated. Shifting perspective is a constant practice, as we’re so conditioned to see through a narrow lens. This is why I bring elements like story and myth into my work, as we can learn to see through the lens of archetypes and the wisdom they hold, which then helps us to stop seeing things in such limited ways. We begin to realize every archetype lives within us, and we can both see and express in countless ways that make life far more enjoyable and creative. Broadening our lens is a key factor in cultivating the Sacred Feminine within us.
Developing any skill or capacity requires practice, yet so many of these skills and capacities are inherent within us. They may be dormant due to the outer conditioning that pushes them underground, but they are waiting to be awakened and cultivated. Awakening our Inner Wisdom, which gives us these gifts of courage, clarity and perspective, is a lifelong journey that allows us to express in the most fully human and creative ways possible. Find programs and tools that regularly immerse you in opportunities to practice these. Stop outsourcing your authority so you can live from the one true authority that is you, your own Inner Wisdom. Know that even the subtlest of changes make a huge difference in the long run. Don’t rush the process or force things. Have patience, and believe in yourself. Surround yourself with people who encourage and believe in you. We can’t do this alone!
Okay, so before we go, is there anyone you’d like to shoutout for the role they’ve played in helping you develop the essential skills or overcome challenges along the way?
I believe we all need mentors! We need to connect with those who’ve been on this journey, have experience navigating the difficult terrain, and can offer us tools and wisdom along the way. I’ve had many mentors, guides and coaches along the way. Some have been with me for decades, and others just for moments or seasons in my life. All have proven deeply valuable in guiding me forward.
I mentioned before that we cannot do this journey alone. We are initiated by our relationships in today’s world, and those relationships will teach us and show us more of ourselves if we let them. Even the most difficult relationships have something to show us if we can find our center and separate out from the temptation to blame and steep in our anger or frustration.
Today’s world tends to separate us from each other. Loneliness has become epidemic. Find safe and nurturing people and spaces where you can see yourself reflected in others. Ask for help, even when you don’t think you need it, and accept it when it’s offered. Reach out for support, and stop thinking that things like coaching or mentoring are a “luxury” to take up later. Finding guidance today might be exactly what you in your tomorrow are needing!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://KimMarieCoaching.com
- Instagram: https://Instagram.com/KimMarieCoaching
- Facebook: https://Facebook.com/kim.marie.3192
- Linkedin: https://LinkedIn.com/in/KimMarieCoaching
- Twitter: http://X.com/KimMarieCoach
- Youtube: https://YouTube.com/KimMarieCoaching
- Other: Pinterest: https://Pinterest.com/KimMarieCoaching
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
