Rebel Mothers

Hello! Welcome to another episode of Rebel Mothers. Today’s episode is all about the motherline and reclaiming the stories of women. The motherline is simply your matrilineal ancestry, your mom, your mom’s mom, your mom’s mom’s mom, and so on. In the United States we typically live in a patrilineal society, where women usually take their husband’s last name when they marry, and children carry their father’s last name. So the stories are often told through men. Today I want to go into more depth on uncovering our personal and cultural stories from the motherline and why it’s important. Because ultimately, reclaiming our motherline means reclaiming the voices and stories of women that have been lost, hidden, stolen, or silenced.

For thousands of years women have been ignored, punished, gaslit, and sometimes even killed for speaking out or sharing knowledge and stories. Women have been burned at the stake, confined in psychiatric asylums, given drugs or shock treatment. Even today, women and girls who speak out against powerful men are often publicly shamed, disbelieved, and mocked. History is written by the one who holds the pen, and for thousands of years, the authors were only allowed to be men. The silencing of women perpetuates a cycle of inequality, denying the world the wisdom, perspectives, and innovations that women can offer. Recalling women's stories, both historical and contemporary, is crucial for dismantling these oppressive narratives and fostering a future where every woman's story is heard and valued.

It is also crucial for understanding how we know what we know about motherhood. The story of the first mother, of Eve, is often told as a story of sin and shame. Eve, as the first woman, is blamed for the fall of humankind, and it came from being curious and defiant. This story is written down in the Bible at the hands of men, and it is one of the most enduring myths of humankind. It sets up the understanding that menstruation marks women as sinful, and that childbirth and motherhood are painful burdens to bear. What else have we learned about what it means to be a woman from the story of Eve? What could we have learned if Eve was able to tell her own story?

It is often through the stories of our own mother, or grandmother, either told or witnessed, that we learned how to be a mother. Understanding the stories of your own personal mother line allows you to recognize patterns, traits, identities that you might share with the women who came before you. Reclaiming women’s stories helps the world to Reclaim lost aspects of the feminine self and connect to images of female wisdom and maturity.

There’s an excellent book that I’ll reference a few times in this episode by Elizabeth Lesser called Cassandra Speaks: When women are the storytellers, the human story changes. This is what today’s episode is all about, reclaiming the stories of women so that we can tell a new story about what it means to be a human. We’ll look at our origin stories and cultural understandings of motherhood, and I’ll break out some fascinating stuff I’ve learned about societies that worship a divine mother goddess so we can think about how our perception of mothering might look different if we lived in a world where God was a woman. We’ll wrap it up by talking about specific actions we can take to both reimagine the old stories and also start to tell new ones with our act of mothering.

The first module in my MotherBLOOM coaching and workshops is called SOIL: Motherline, because The soil is the starting base for every plant’s life. The health of the soil in which a plant grows affects the health of the plant itself. Our motherline is the soil, and if we want to create a motherhood revolution and empower mothers, we have to start first by reclaiming the stories of the mothers and women who came before us. This topic really lights me up, so let’s dive in!
Goddess cultures
Let’s start with our origin stories, and our pre-historic roots. It’s said that history begins with the written word, which means “history” is only the last five thousand years. But modern humans have been around for about 200-300 thousand years. Imagine how much knowledge and wisdom came before the written word. Imagine how many different ways of living, different value systems, different deities, different family structures have existed. I think a lot of times we get stuck in thinking the way we live now is how it’s always been. But we’re learning more and more every day that humans have organized themselves very differently in various places and times throughout our history.

One of the things that fascinated me the most when I began studying women’s spirituality was that throughout prehistoric times, various cultures around the world engaged in the worship of a Mother Goddess, embodying the divine feminine and symbolizing life, fertility, and creation. These ancient societies, often characterized by a close connection to nature and a reverence for the cycles of life, looked to a Mother Goddess as a central deity. One of the most famous is the Neolithic culture of Catalhoyuk, which existed from around 7500 BCE - 6400 BCE, so about 1,100 years, and was found in what is now modern Turkey.

Catalhoyuk provides archaeological evidence that suggests a reverence for a Mother Goddess deity. The site was first excavated by James Mellaart in 1958, and initial and subsequent excavations at Catalhoyuk reveal intricate wall paintings and figurines depicting a central female deity adorned with symbols of fertility and abundance. Mellaart proposed that these suggested a society that worshiped a female goddess. Later archaeologists have debated this, but it’s undeniable that these symbols and images of women existed and must have meant something important.

Marija Gimbutas, a Lithuanian-American archaeologist and scholar is particularly renowned for her groundbreaking work on the importance of goddess worship in prehistoric societies. Born in 1921, Gimbutas dedicated her career to reshaping our understanding of ancient cultures and challenging prevailing paradigms.

Gimbutas pioneered the field of archaeomythology, which is an interdisciplinary field of study that seeks to explore and understand the connections between archaeology and mythology. This approach involves interpreting archaeological findings through the lens of mythic narratives and symbols, aiming to uncover deeper cultural and symbolic meanings embedded in ancient artifacts and structures. Central to her studies was the identification of symbols, artifacts, and cultural practices indicative of goddess worship in ancient societies.

Gimbutas's research brought attention to a wealth of symbols associated with the divine feminine, including images of the pregnant belly, spirals, and bird motifs. These symbols, she argued, were not mere decorations but integral expressions of a deep-seated reverence for the goddess in various ancient cultures. Her meticulous analysis of archaeological finds, particularly in Neolithic and Bronze Age contexts, revealed a consistent pattern of goddess-related symbolism. Gimbutas focused extensively on the cultures of prehistoric Europe, particularly in regions such as Old Europe and the Balkans. Through her excavations and analysis of artifacts, she argued for the existence of matrilineal and matrifocal societies where goddess worship played a central role. She also contended that these cultures had a harmonious relationship with nature, emphasizing fertility, cyclical renewal, and the interconnectedness of all life.
While Gimbutas's theories gained significant acclaim, critics have questioned the extent to which she interpreted the archaeological evidence through a feminist lens, suggesting that her emphasis on goddess worship might have been influenced by her commitment to promoting a more egalitarian view of prehistoric societies.

But archaeologists interpret their findings through their own lens and bring personal biases to work all the time. When the ancient cave paintings in France were discovered, it was believed that the images of animals and humans were meant to represent men hunting, as either a way to ensure a successful hunt or a celebration of the strength and virility of man. Now can you honestly tell me you don’t think that interpretation is a little biased? In fact, in Cassandra Speaks, Elizabeth Lesser writes about Dean Snow, an archaeologist based in Penn State who analyzed some of the cave paintings and believes that at least 3/4 of them were painted by women, based on the hand size of the artist. Which led Lesser to question a lot of the assumptions and stories we were told. Quote, “it seems that everything we had learned about caveman in school or from watching the Flintstones was incomplete and misleading. Who were these people who retreated eep into the womb-like caves to paint stories about their interwoven relationship with nature and animals, birth and death? The image I had formed of crude, hairy men holding clubs and grunting around a fire did not match u with the images on the cave walls. And what about the cavewomen? No one ever seemed to mention them. Why had we been led to believe that our ancestors were merely violent survivalists bent on protection and conquest? What about the mothers and caretakers, the artists and the mystics and the healers who hands had painted and molded the cave art? Their handprints were on the walls of the caves, but the cro-magnon cavewoman had not made it into our history books” end quote

We talked a little bit in the partnership families episode about reevaluating the stories we share, and the importance of collecting and sharing stories that emphasize partnership values. So much of our history is told through acts of war or violence. How many wars did you learn about in school? I bet you can name a fair amount, both wars that happened in the US and also around the globe. But what about the stories of the human desire to care for one another, to live in community and create art and look at the stars in wonder and curiosity? Why aren’t these stories given the same amount of importance in the history books? Why have we celebrated the warriors and fighters and not the peacekeepers and caretakers?
I don’t have the answers to these questions, but I continue to ask them so that I can tell the stories of the peacekeepers and the caretakers, and importantly, to me at least, the mothers and the daughters.
Let’s take a look at how the lack of positive mother-daughter stories in both myth and popular culture leave us with very little guidance for our current role. By examining the images of Mother presented in legend and in current books and movies, we see how our culture has shaped the idea of what it means to be a “good mother.”

Mother figures in popular culture seem to be divided into two camps, either totally idealized or completely reviled. The idealized mothers all share similar traits - they are nurturing, selfless, protectors, teachers, and more. You get mothers like the Virgin Mary, Maria von Trapp, Demeter, Mrs. Weasley. Whereas the reviled mothers share traits like being neglectful, selfish, cruel, sexual and ambitious. Mothers like the Wicked Stepmother figure, Betty Draper, Medea, and Cersei Lannister. A lot of times mothers in popular culture stories are missing altogether, just think of Luke Skywalker, Harry Potter, or nearly every Disney princess! These characters are all fairly one-dimensional, and serve to remind us what it means to be a mother, and how to act if we are going to be a good mother. I know that I am a pretty patient, nurturing, creative person and that carries over into my motherhood. I am also impulsive, judgmental, and have been accused of being bossy. Sometimes in my attempt at getting to the solution of a problem quickly, I’ll snap at people or not allow them time to fully express themselves, and I’m sure I do this with my kids. I know that I’m a good mom, but I’m not a one-dimensional person, I’m a human with the same types of flaws, desires, and goals as anyone else. I want more stories of mothers like me out there in the world, in the books I read and movies I watch.

There’s a fantastic passage from the book Of Woman Born by Adrienne Rich that imagines what it must have been like to live in the goddess cultures mentioned earlier, surrounded by images of a divine mother goddess. She writes, Quote, “let us try to imagine for a moment what sense of herself it gave a woman to be in the presence of such images. If they did nothing else for her, they must have validated her spiritually (as our contemporary images do not), giving her back aspects of herself neither insipid nor trivial, investing her with a sense of participation in essential mysteries…the images of the pre patriarchal goddess-cults did one thing; they told women that power, awesomeness, and centrality was theirs by nature, not by privilege or miracle; the female was primary. The male appears in earliest art, if at all, in the aspect of a child, often tiny and helpless, carried horizontally in arms, or seated in the lap of the goddess, or suckling at her breast.” End quote

Besides these images in pop culture and history that shaped our view of motherhood, A lot of times we form our understanding of motherhood based on watching our own mothers. Of course, even these stories are sometimes hidden or lost, and it takes some time to remember and reclaim them. Let’s talk about how we can look to our own personal motherline for more stories of women.
Personal motherline
There’s a quote I love from the book, When the Drummers were Women by Layne Redmond: “We vibrate to the rhythms of our mother’s blood before she herself is born, and this pulse is the thread of blood that runs all the way back through the grandmothers to the first mother.” I’m sure you know how as a female fetus develops, she carries all the eggs she'll ever have throughout her life before she’s even born. So when my mother was pregnant with me, all the eggs I would release over the course of my life were present as I developed in her womb, This means that not only is a woman intimately connected to her mother through the womb, but there's an even more profound connection—my daughter, in a symbolic sense, was already present in the womb of her grandmother. This interconnectedness of generations is a beautiful reminder that our existence is part of a larger narrative, where the potential for future life is already present within us from the very beginning. And this realization highlights the deep, ancestral ties that bind mothers, daughters, and grandmothers together.

All life begins in the womb, but it is often only the names of men that are passed down. I was present in my mother’s womb, but I carried my father’s last name until I married my husband and took his last name, which is the case in nearly 80% of heterosexual marriages. This is something that a lot of us don’t question, we just accept it as tradition or the “way it’s always been.” This is because we live in a patrilineal society. Patrilineal societies trace descent and inheritance through the father's line. In these societies, family names, property, and social status are typically passed from father to son. Many cultures historically have been patrilineal, reflecting a focus on the male line of ancestry.

The motherline reflects a Matrilineal descent. Matrilineal means that family ties, property, and names are often passed down from the mother's side. But how did we get here? Has it always been this way? Nope! Matrilineal societies have existed, and continue to exist, so Let’s get a quick history lesson on why we are today a patrilineal society, shall we?
Shift to patrilineal
The transition to patrilineal systems started in Europe, and it is a complex historical process that evolved over centuries. In many ancient and medieval European societies, kinship and inheritance were often traced through both the maternal and paternal lines.
However, as medieval Europe progressed, and particularly with the emergence of feudalism, there was a gradual shift toward emphasizing paternal lineage and inheritance. This shift became more pronounced with the development of primogeniture, a system where the eldest son inherits the bulk of the family's wealth and titles. Primogeniture reinforced the importance of the male line in passing down property and maintaining social status.
The enclosure of the commons in Europe during the transition from feudalism to capitalism played a significant role in reinforcing patrilineal structures. As communal lands were enclosed and transformed into private property, the control and inheritance of these assets became closely tied to individual family units. The privatization of land and resources shifted economic power and social status toward those who could accumulate and pass down property, often along patrilineal lines. This process disproportionately benefited men, as the prevailing norms of the time favored male inheritance. The ability to pass on land and wealth to male heirs became crucial for maintaining family prosperity and social standing. Incidentally, this also reinforced the nuclear family as the ideal unit for managing and inheriting these assets. Virginity before marriage and monogamy, at least for the wife, became a crucial institution, ensuring a clear line of inheritance and legitimate heirs within the confines of a single family unit. This shift towards monogamy and the nuclear family model served to consolidate familial and economic control within a patrilineal framework, reinforcing gender roles and shaping the trajectory of European societies during this transformative period.

If you’re interested in learning more about this, I highly recommend reading Caliban and the Witch by Silvia Federici, I’ll link it in the show notes.

So patrilineality is not the natural order of things, it is a system that was influenced by social, economic, legal, and religious factors over many centuries. And here we are today, where property and history have typically been passed down through the father line. Part of reclaiming the stories of women means we need to look at our own motherline, so let’s talk about how we do that.
Your own motherline

Exploring our motherline allows us to connect with our personal history and roots, our cultural heritage and traditions. Recognizing the patterns within the motherline can be a path to healing and personal growth, and can offer a guide for mothering our own children. Ultimately, it allows us to know who we are through the stories of women that have been lost or stolen from us.

My mom and I have a great relationship, and while she made plenty of mistakes during my childhood, she’s owned up to all of them. She’s one of the strongest women I know, although I know she’d never describe herself like that. A few years ago, when I was diving into my own ancestral history, she graciously shared stories from her childhood about her own mother, and tried to give me as many details as she could about her maternal grandmother, who died when my grandmother was only a young girl.

So this brings me to my first step in reclaiming the stories of the motherline. (Also, don’t worry about writing these down, I’ll list them out in the show notes and probably post about them in social media so you can do this work on your own time.)

Step 1 - reflect on your own narrative. What do YOU remember about your mother, grandmother, maybe even great-grandmother? What stories have you already been told? Can you ask people in your life to tell you some of these stories? These can be the big stories, like when they got married or how they immigrated, or they can be little stories, like how your mother always hiccups when she’s nervous or your grandmother’s legendary chocolate cake.
And before we get too deep into it, there’s something I want to talk about here - Sometimes the stories of our motherline are painful or traumatic, or missing entirely. What do you do if you had a terrible mother? What if you were raised by two fathers? What if you are adopted and don’t know your biological mother? How do you reclaim your motherline if you had a bad or an absent mother?

Whether you had a great mother, an okay one, a terrible one, or an absent one, You can perhaps instead look to maternal figures, maybe if you had an aunt or family friend who supported and nurtured you, someone you were particularly close to who you feel mothered you in some way. You can also include the women on your father’s side as well - my paternal grandmother was one of the kindest women I’ve ever met, and she absolutely mothered me during periods of my life.

It may also take a certain amount of creativity and imagination to connect to our ancestral matrilineal roots and our feminine heritage. There are two different ways of “knowing” your motherline - thinking and feeling. Thinking is more rational and linear, this is when you go to ancestry.com and learn the basic historical facts and data about your motherline ancestry

Feeling is more intuitive, cyclical. And this really gets into: What counts as knowledge? Is it only knowledge and wisdom if it’s passed down by a dead white guy who wrote it down? Are there other ways of knowing? When we feel something in our gut, does that count? What about dreams or intuition? When we’re exploring the stories of our motherline, sometimes the historical data just isn’t there because these stories have been lost or stolen, so it may require a fair amount of creativity, imagination, and trusting intuition. This is a skill that is required, and this bring me to step 2 - the motherline meditation

This is a meditation practice you can do to help you connect on a more intuitive level to your motherline. During your next meditation practice, or any time you can quietly sit and reflect, imagine yourself in conversation with a matrilineal ancestor. Ask her what she does during the day, how she mothers her children, what she eats for lunch, what her dreams and frustrations are. Ask her what she would tell you if she could give you any advice.

Then, either during the same meditation or on a different day, Think about yourself as a mother and see if there are any patterns that you recognize. In my own motherline, my grandmother, my mother, and myself all had difficult births, and all three of us went through our own versions of spiritual awakenings. We also have a tendency toward depression. My grandmother committed suicide when I was 12 years old. My own mother was hospitalized for suicidal ideation when I was young, and I have been on and off medication for depression for over a decade. Recognizing this pattern allows me to feel less isolated and ashamed and instead more connected to the women who came before me. It helps me see that it’s not a personal failing.

transition

I often refer to my work as part of a larger “motherhood revolution.” It’s one of my favorite hashtags to use on instagram. And so I loved this quote, again from Lesser’s book Cassandra speaks.Quote, “the word revolution has come to mean a sudden and often violent overthrowing of those in political power. But not all revolutions are violent. In fact the word revolution stems from the latin revolver, which refers to the heavenly bodies making their slow and steady progress through the sky. Women are at the forefront of that kind of revolution now. A paradigm shift away from a gendered value system where the male experience is at the center of reality and all other ways of being, thinking, feeling, and doing are at the periphery. Like in Copernicus’ and Galileo’s times - and like in any time when cherished and long-held beliefs and ideas are being challenged - this revolution of values requires a blend of audacity and patience, courage and endurance.” End quote p 200

If we are rebel mothers committed to birthing a new world that is more compassionate and caring and inclusive for ourselves and our children, we must commit to telling new stories that promote these values. And this brings me to step 3, tell your own story.

When I work with women one-on-one in the mother bloom coaching program, by the end of our time together they have written what I call a Revolutionary Mothering Manifesto. It is a declaration of personal values and actions that mothers can take to create this new world. But even the simple exercise of telling your own story can be revolutionary. What are the books that changed your life? What are the things that make you laugh or cry? What are the dreams you have for yourself and your children? What do you want your legacy to be?

In the heart of the motherhood revolution, the act of mothers telling their own stories is a potent force of transformation. Each narrative is a thread woven into the rich tapestry of the motherline, reclaiming the voices of women that history has often relegated to the periphery.

Furthermore, the practice of being good ancestors is an integral aspect of this revolution. Layla F Saad talks about being a good ancestor on her website

“Becoming a good ancestor is something that we actually have to practice in our everyday lives. Through the day-to-day choices we make, the things we choose to focus on or not focus on, the ways we allow ourselves to deplete our lifeforce energy and precious time, or focus on what is most essential.
Becoming a good ancestor is something that we keep front of mind. It is something that we use as a north star to guide us on whether or not we want to spend time on a certain activity, opportunity, creation, or even”

By recognizing patterns within the motherline, acknowledging the struggles, and celebrating the resilience of past generations, mothers lay a foundation for future generations to thrive. Conclusion
So as we start to wrap up today's episode, let’s recap. Today we delved into the significance of the motherline to reclaim the stories of women that have been lost, hidden, stolen, or silenced. We recognized how women’s voices have been systematically suppressed, and how the impact of narratives like the story of Eve, often framed in terms of sin and shame, shaped perceptions of femininity and motherhood. We discussed ancient goddess cultures and traced the evolution from matrilineal to patrilineal societies shaped family structures and norms.

To reclaim our motherline, we must first reflect on our own narratives, acknowledging both the joys and challenges within our personal histories. Embracing a dual approach of thinking and feeling, I introduced a motherline meditation as a tool for a more intuitive connection with matrilineal ancestors. And finally, understanding the importance of telling our own stories as a revolutionary act, challenging entrenched beliefs and contributing to a paradigm shift. By exploring our motherline, we connect with our roots, recognize patterns, and gain insight into our own mothering. This process is not just a personal journey; it's a vital step in the broader motherhood revolution, advocating for a compassionate, caring, and inclusive world for ourselves and future generations. The episode encourages us to tell our stories, contributing to the audacious and courageous revolution that seeks to redefine values and perspectives.