ISSUE NO. 06 | April 14, 2025
Rather the podcast version (more ad lib'd + with a touch of warmth and extra bits)? Click the SoundCloud player below... Otherwise, read on and hello!
This is a bit of a mini-series for the next while with an invitation to Sanctuary Social Club. Shall we?
What It Means to Feel Safe, Seen and Sacred in Your Space
The spaces we live in are more than places—they’re invitations.
Invitations to pause, to feel, to return.
To remember who we are… and who we are becoming.
In a world that demands more than it gives at times — where inboxes overflow, to-do lists tower, and the nervous system frays under constant noise — what if your home environs - infused with healing nature - intentionally held you?
What if nature could remind and restore you of your deepest self?
And what if feeling safe, seen, and sacred in your space… was not a luxury but a vital part of our individual and collective healing?
Sanctuary, the Nervous System, and Spiritual Remembrance
Let’s root this in science and spirit.
Studies have consistently shown that time in and connection with nature supports regulation of the autonomic nervous system(1). Time spent among trees, under the sky, or even just in view of natural elements lowers cortisol, decreases heart rate, and increases parasympathetic activation (that’s the rest and restore mode, for the curious in the crowd).
Nature doesn’t just calm us—it co-regulates us.
It welcomes us back into rhythm.
From a spiritual lens, nature has always been a portal.
A place where the veil is very thin.
A remembered space where we don’t have to try so hard to connect with something greater.
As author and wild church pastor Victoria Loorz says in Church of the Wild(2),
“The Earth is not just a resource, but a relative.”
Safety as a Sacred Design Principle
Feeling safe isn't a style.
It's a spiritual and biological necessity.
And while commercialized design focuses on consumptiveness and quickness, and traditional talk therapy focuses on the inner world, we can tend the outer world in ways that gently reinforce what’s shifting inside in a more meaningful and tangible way.
For example:
✨ If you're processing childhood trauma in therapy, you might add in a soft blanket or a candle with a scent that evokes a safe childhood memory.
✨ If you're healing a burnout pattern, your entryway might become a space of sacred pause—with a bench, a bowl of calming lavender, a spritz bottle for energetic cleansing, and a ritual to transition from work mode to rest and replenish mode.
✨ If you're rediscovering your voice and worthiness, maybe a small altar with a bold flower, a mirror, where quotes are pinned, that convey: You are allowed to take up space.
Your surroundings don’t just reflect your evolution—they fuel it. In color, texture, flow, scents. They are sacred contracts between you, your True Self, and the Earth.
"We don’t heal in isolation, but in community.” — Satsuki Ina, PhD(3)333
Sanctuary Is Not an Escape—It’s a Return
When we are focused on feeling replenished, we’re naturally closer to feeling peaceful. And when we’re peaceful?
We show up stronger for ourselves, our families, our communities—and the world.
We are not, nor ever will be, separate.
Sanctuary “design” isn’t just about a physical space. It’s a practice—a curation of pace, person, and presence that says:
I matter.
My energy matters.
My peace is worth protecting.
We need space to evolve.
We need others to witness that evolution.
We need a rhythm that honors both our silence and our story.
Sanctuary Social Club: A Circle for Safety, Sacredness, and Self-Expression
This is why I created the Sanctuary Social Club.
It’s not a program. It’s not a course.
It’s a soul-centered circle for women (mostly midlife-ing) to explore the sacredness of and in design, personal growth, and spiritual reconnection—together.
Now, a note regarding "spiritual": this is not religion or religion-based. This is not a study of any one dogma. Au contraire, this is soulful exploration for the sake of creating more peace in place, person, and planet. We all share in spirit. We all express our souls.
✨ Each month, we read a book that stirs the soul.
✨ We work with the energy of a flower that holds a complimentary and empowering message and medicine.
✨ We glean inspiration to curate our spaces—large or small—to bring healing into our lives.
✨ We nourish our nervous systems with beauty, rhythm, and ritual - in community.
This is the practice of Sanctuary.
This is your small, intimate circle to do just that.
Because healing doesn’t have to wait.
Because Sanctuary isn’t an escape—it’s a return.
Because you deserve beauty, belonging, and peace that reflects your true essence.
✨ Enrollment is open now, and the space is intimately-sized to suit us (and my introverted, deep nature, personally speaking). ✨
👉 [Join us here.]
And if now isn’t your time, know this: You are still welcome. Always.
If you need something else or perhaps want to speak heart-to-heart, reach out to me personally.
Because I believe in connection. Not just the inbox kind nor the social media kind —but the real, natural kind.
Until next, take good care of your precious Self,
Footnotes:
Bratman, G. N., Hamilton, J. P., & Daily, G. C. (2012). The impacts of nature experience on human cognitive function and mental health. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1249(1), 118–136.
Church of the Wild is one of our selected 2025 Sanctuary Social Club Book Club reads! What an honor it will be to be in community with you as you nurture the wild within you and seek the sanctuary of the wild - including the small rewilding connections - that replenish you.
“We don’t heal in isolation, but in community” quote is attributed to Satsuki Ina, PhD, therapist, filmmaker, and advocate for collective healing, especially in trauma-informed work with communities.
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