🌿 A Note for Facilitators

Intention: To help participants move from thinking to making through play and curiosity.

These notes are here if you'd prefer to guide the workshop in your own words rather than play the audio recordings.

Please don't feel you need to follow them word for word.

The most important thing isn't saying exactly what I would say, it's creating a space where women feel welcome, relaxed and free to explore their creativity.

Trust yourself. Your presence matters far more than a perfect script.

01 | Welcome to the Holy Vulva Workshop

Intention: To create a sense of warmth, safety and connection.

Welcome everyone and thank them for joining you.

Take a moment to acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the lands on which you're gathered and honour Indigenous peoples and their enduring relationship with story, creativity and place.

Introduce the Holy Vulva as a contemporary symbol inspired by ancient traditions that honoured the feminine body as sacred.

Explain that today's workshop is about more than making jewellery. Each person will create a contemporary amulet carrying their own colours, creativity, intentions and story.

Invite everyone to introduce themselves and share:

• Their name
  
• Where they're from
  
• What called them to today's gathering
  

Transition into the meditation.

02 | Arriving in your Body

Intention: To help participants slow down and reconnect with themselves before creating.

Invite everyone to become comfortable.

Guide a few slow breaths.

Bring awareness to the womb space—or, if preferred, simply the creative centre of the body.

Invite participants to imagine a small ember glowing there, gradually warming the body before travelling through the heart, throat and into the hands.

Ask quietly:

What wants to be expressed today?

Encourage everyone to notice any colours, emotions, memories or images that arise without trying to interpret them.

Slowly return to the room.

03 | Beginning with Play

Intention: To loosen perfectionism and awaken curiosity through colour.

Invite everyone to begin with the Creative Warm-Up Cards.

Encourage play rather than perfection.

Remind participants that there are no right colours.

Invite them to trust their intuition and allow the colours to choose them.

Suggest they notice:

• Which colours keep calling to them.
  
• Whether a feeling or emotion appears.
  
• Whether a memory or goddess comes to mind.
  

Before moving on, invite everyone to write one word on the back of their colour card.

It might be:

• an intention
  
• an emotion
  
• a goddess
  
• a memory
  
• or simply the first word that arrives.
  

Invite anyone who wishes to briefly share.

04 | Listen While You Play

Intention: To introduce the ideas and mythology that inspired this body of work.

The Story of the Holy Vulva

As participants continue warming up and begin preparing to paint, share the story behind the Holy Vulva.

You might explore:

• The Great Mother as an early symbol of creation.
  
• Ancient vulva imagery and goddess figures.
  
• The evolution of goddess traditions through history.
  
• The changing role of feminine symbolism.
  
• Your own discovery of the Virgin Mary and the question that inspired the Holy Vulva.
  

You don't need to teach every historical detail.

Allow the story to be an invitation into wonder and curiosity rather than certainty.

05 | Create Your Amulet

Intention: To allow participants to create freely while being accompanied by story.

Invite participants to begin painting.

Encourage them to trust the process rather than aiming for perfection.

Remind them there is no right way to create.

Allow plenty of time.

Silence is welcome.

Conversation is welcome.

Laughter is welcome.

Simply allow the afternoon to unfold naturally.

06 | Listen While You Create

Demeter & Persephone

As everyone continues creating, share the story of Demeter and Persephone.

Rather than explaining its meaning, allow participants to discover their own connection with the story.

Notice which themes seem to resonate within the group.

The myths are intended to accompany the creative process, much like stories have always accompanied the work of our hands.

07 | Closing Reflection

Intention: To integrate the experience and honour what has emerged.

Invite everyone to pause and hold their finished amulet.

Encourage them to take a moment to notice:

• the colours they chose
  
• the intention they carried
  
• the story that emerged
  
• the word they wrote at the beginning of the workshop.
  

Ask whether that word still feels true, or whether another has quietly emerged.

Invite participants to share as much or as little as they feel comfortable.

You might ask:

• What colours called to you today?
  
• Was there a story or goddess that stayed with you?
  
• What surprised you during the creative process?
  
• What does your amulet represent to you?
  

Close by reminding everyone that their amulet is more than jewellery.

It has become a contemporary symbol carrying their own story, creativity and remembrance.

Thank everyone for sharing the afternoon together.

Welcome and Introduction

A guided meditation

Before we paint, we begin by arriving in ourselves.

This gentle meditation invites you to reconnect with your body, awaken your creative energy and begin listening to what wants to emerge through colour and symbol.

A playful colour warm-up designed to help you let go of perfection and begin creating with curiosity.

🎧 The Story of the Holy Vulva

As you continue exploring colour and begin preparing your amulet, I'd love to share the story behind the Holy Vulva.

This story traces the thread that connects ancient symbolism, mythology and my own creative practice. There is no need to remember every detail. Simply allow the story to accompany your creative process and notice what stays with you.

This section is intentionally quiet.

You may like to put on some gentle music, make yourself another cup of tea, and allow yourself to become fully absorbed in the creative process.

Take your time.

As you continue creating your amulet, you're invited to listen to the myths that continue to inspire my work.

These stories have been carried from one generation to the next for thousands of years. You don't need to analyse them or search for meaning. Simply notice which characters, symbols or moments stay with you.

Sometimes a story doesn't give us answers.

It simply awakens something that was already waiting to be remembered.

🎧 Persephone & Demeter

A story of love, loss, descent and return.

A gentle reflection to honour what has been remembered through the creative process.

The Goddess Project podcast by historian Dr. Carla Ionescu

Download your Creative Warm-Up Card