Unleashing Sacred Rage

I have spent many tragic hours wishing for my body to be other than what it is, and it has taken me until age forty-one, to realise that my thinking efforts were misdirected. Today, I long for all women to feel wonderfully empowered by the beauty of their own skin, their bodies, their minds, their talents, and their capabilities. I want this because as a young woman growing up, I rarely felt this for myself. I cannot say with great authority how common this is in 2023, but from the circles I move in, it appears to me that more women than not, don’t feel great about their bodies, and despite some delicious moments in between, my mid life is only now awakening to the pure joy of my female body and all her wonderful imperfections.

     It has been said that we often try to create that which we feel lacking or missing in the world, and I am no different. I have been burnt by the glare of others’ judgement, and as a sensitive soul with a yearning for love, and peace, and beauty, and acceptance of the glory of our female selves, I have taken on board more than a little of the harsh criticisms about what it is to be female. Yet as I transition to the full delight of my early forties, my desire to create a life full of joy, and recognition of what it is to be female is supported more and more by the women I surround myself with.

     One of these women is the artist Kat Shaw.

     To be clear, I don’t know her personally. I am a fan of her artwork which seeks to portray women in all our fabulous glory, however we look. She loves women.  She is a fierce defender of our rights to live in and celebrate our bodies whatever our shape or size. She is a bold temptress who encourages us to tap into our courage and to share our beautiful, sensual selves with the world. Hiding does not come naturally to her and thank f*ck for that.

     She is a blessed tonic in a world that shames women for existing. She deserves more recognition for her work than can ever be mustered up in words, but simply put, to be around her social media spaces, to take part in her projects, can only empower and heal parts of you, you didn’t even know needing healing, and what woman doesn’t need that?

     Earlier this year, she put out a call for volunteers to take part in her Sacred Rage project for International Women’s Day 2023 (IWD23). She was looking for women to take pictures of themselves, naked, in poses that represented Sacred Rage, and to write a story about what sacred rage meant for them. Her intentions were to use the images and inspiration provided by the women taking part to create new artwork to celebrate IWD23.

     Intrigued, I signed up, and awaited further instruction. Kat recommended setting up your phone to video mode and letting it run while you, naked, got into various poses that represented your scared rage. She then advised you could take screenshots from the video. Oh, and the light had to be good too.

     At face value, these instructions were simple and clear, and hypothetically, at least, I was happy to follow through, or at least I was, right up until the point of delivering the goods. Distracted by work deadlines and child rearing, I kept putting off the necessary camera shoot and before I knew it, there was just a few hours left between a return trip on the Scotrail redeye down the A9, and Kat’s impending deadline.

     Mercifully, I got through the bedtime routine with my son quite quickly, and soon my body became aware of what I was going to do. Sh!t was about to get real. My chest felt the sense of deep foreboding, like I was doing something wrong, or weird, or worse, disgusting. Immediately, I thought about what other unknown people might think of me for doing this, but with a few deep breaths to reassure myself, something inside me said, push that thought aside, and just play around with the poses, and see what happens.

     I was in my own bedroom, with no-one else around, in a home I feel safe in, and yet, naked, in front of a camera, I worried about whether this was too lewd (because women taking naked pictures of themselves must be, right?). I felt exposed to the world, but still I kept on. I got annoyed with the camera angle and my protective brain tried to tell me to give up, that it was too hard, and not worth bothering with. But I was determined to accomplish this part of the task at least, and not become too overwhelmed by all the thoughts or feelings that might come afterwards.

     Eventually I found a resting place for the phone that would give me the chance to capture the shots I needed. I spent the next three minutes getting into poses that I felt showed me in strong yet soft poses, images that might convey what it feels like to be a strong woman expressing her sacred rage.

     I did symmetrical poses, ones with my eyes closed or my fists clenched. I did relaxed poses with my hands behind my head, pulling my curly hair up and out of my head.  I stuck two fingers up (you know which ones). I did my version of Viola Davis’ portrayal of Woman King.  I placed my hands over my womb in a heart shape. I thrust my first skyward, while I looked deep into the camera, willing anyone to thwart the sacred rage being channeled through my body. “Who even am I?”, I mused as I smiled wryly at the camera. 

     After my earlier fears of how weird doing this might make me appear to others, I felt instantly liberated and transformed, and more than a little surprised at how good it felt. Why aren’t there more spaces or places creating these opportunities for women and girls to feel this good about themselves and their bodies?

     Why on earth did I need to randomly volunteer to take part in a project by an artist I met online, who isn’t paid by anyone to show up and do this work, in order to catch a glimpse of this liberating feeling? The fury unleashed, my sacred rage was alive and kicking now.  Frustrated and saddened by all those years of not feeling good enough in my own skin, then I watched back the video…

     …I saw myself in full naked glory pulling poses, and genuinely, for a few short seconds I was humbly captivated by my own image. I saw my curvaceous, beautiful body anew for the first time in a long time, particularly, since giving birth, and I thought “wow, you sexy woman!” No longer was my head criticising my body and telling me that what I was doing was weird or that my body wasn’t good enough, it was saying “holy shit, you look fabulous!”

     Don’t get me wrong, the whole thing wasn’t quite as bold as Betty Dodson and a hand mirror (one day perhaps…), but that delicious feeling of liberation at seeing a positive image of my own curvaceous self was arresting in its simple beauty. And if that wasn’t enough, the fun and the fear wasn’t over yet.

     Next, I had to take a series of stills from the video and attach the pictures to an email and send them to Kat, a social media and creative Goddess, but a stranger nonetheless.  I cannot tell you how many times I thought this must be a joke, or that I was going to end up on Only Fans. Fortunately for me, it wasn’t, and so I rushed out a few words about my scared rage story and sent them off with the pictures to wait and see what would happen next.

     I needn’t have worried where they’d land, because ever the caring Goddess able to hold safe space for other women, the very next day, there was a simple, yet generous message in my inbox “Received with love – absolutely amazing xxx”.  Phew, she was real, and I am safe to have done this.

     Every day since then, Kat has been posting pics into our private FB group so we can see her progress.  As well as being a bold, caring, creative Goddess, she’s also been sharing her process with us all, taking us on the journey of creation with her. The group is private so I cannot share what is written there, but what I will say is that I am not alone in feeling this way, and that many of us have thanked the courageous Kat Shaw for all that she has given us; a little bit of ourselves, in a world that too often, seeks to keep us quiet or hidden, unless we display a view of ourselves that matches the unobtainable, and frankly absurd, beauty standards of the patriarchy.  We say f£ck that.

Follow her here https://www.facebook.com/katshawartist or better still, buy her artwork here https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/KatShawArtist