We will meet virtually on Mondays at 5:30pm PT beginning February 16th for discussions, writing prompts, community and connection.

A 12-Week Women’s Circle: The Myth of Normal
A gentle, spacious journey into healing, truth, and coming home to yourself

I’ve been feeling called to sit with a book that names something many of us feel in our bones but rarely have language for:
that what our culture calls normal — constant stress, exhaustion, self-abandonment, chronic anxiety, disconnection..isn’t actually healthy.

Beginning mid February, I’m inviting you into a 12-week women’s book circle centered on The Myth of Normal by Gabor Maté — held slowly, relationally, and with great care.

This is not a book club where you race to finish pages. It’s a circle — a place to reflect, feel, and gently integrate ideas that touch the nervous system, the body, and the heart.

What this journey is:

• A slow, thoughtful exploration of trauma, stress, attachment, illness, and healing
• A space to make sense of your own life with compassion, not self-blame
• A place to be honest about exhaustion, coping, grief, anger, and longing
• A weekly rhythm of connection, reflection, and shared humanity

What this journey is not:

• Not therapy
• Not self-improvement
• Not a pressure-filled academic experience
• Not about “fixing” yourself

About the reading

• Yes — it’s a substantial book. And that’s why we’re giving it 12 full weeks.
• We’ll move at about 40 pages per week, but I want to be very clear:
• You do not need to read every page to belong here.
• Read what you can. Let the ideas meet you where you are.
  If you fall behind, stay in the circle anyway — the conversations will carry you.
• Perfection is not required. Presence is enough.

Who this is for
This circle is for women who:

• feel tired of carrying so much alone
• sense that their body has been holding more than words can explain
• are curious about the roots of stress, illness, and burnout
• want to understand themselves without judgment
• long to live with more truth, gentleness, and connection
• want a community of women to listen to, share with and learn from

You don’t need to be “ready.”
You don’t need to have it all figured out.
You just need to feel the quiet yes.

If this speaks to you, I would love to walk this path together.

Week 1 — What Do We Call “Normal”?
Theme: Naming the water we’re swimming in
Focus: What has been normalized that actually harms us? Stress, busyness, self-abandonment as cultural defaults
Invitation:
Begin orienting women to the idea that something isn’t wrong with us — something is wrong with the system.

Week 2 — Disconnection as a Cultural Condition
Theme: How modern life fractures belonging
Focus: Individualism, productivity, and loss of community; Why so many people feel lonely, anxious, and exhausted
Invitation:
Reflect on where women feel most disconnected — from body, truth, rest, or each other.

Week 3 — Redefining Trauma
Theme: Trauma is not what happened — it’s what happened inside
Focus: Trauma as disconnection from self; Developmental and relational trauma
Invitation:
Gentle inquiry into childhood patterns without blame or pathologizing.

Week 4 — Attachment, Authenticity, and Adaptation
Theme: How we learned to be “good” instead of real
Focus: Attachment needs vs. authenticity needs; The cost of being agreeable, pleasing, high-functioning
Invitation:
Where did you learn to disappear parts of yourself to belong?

Week 5 — The Body as a Storyteller
Theme: The body remembers what the mind forgets
Focus: Stress physiology; Emotional suppression and physical symptoms
Invitation:
Shift from “What’s wrong with my body?” to “What has my body carried?”

Week 6 — Illness Is Not a Failure
Theme: Reframing chronic illness, fatigue, and pain
Focus: Autoimmune conditions, inflammation, stress; Shame around sickness
Invitation:
Deep compassion for the body as an ally, not an enemy.

Week 7 — Coping, Addiction, and Survival Strategies
Theme: Nothing is wrong with you — something worked
Focus: Addiction as adaptation; Overworking, overgiving, numbing as coping
Invitation:
Invite honesty about habits women judge in themselves.

Week 8 — Emotions We Were Never Taught to Feel
Theme: Anger, grief, fear, and the cost of suppression
Focus: Emotional literacy; Why “being positive” can be harmful
Invitation:
Normalize anger and grief as intelligent signals.

Week 9 — Women’s Bodies in a Stress Culture
Theme: Gender, caretaking, and invisible labor
Focus: How women disproportionately carry emotional load; Why burnout is not a personal failure
Invitation:
Name the exhaustion without trying to fix it.

Week 10 — Compassion as a Healing Force
Theme: The opposite of judgment is understanding
Focus: Self-compassion vs. self-improvement; Healing without force
Invitation:
Practice meeting oneself exactly as one is.

Week 11 — Reconnection: Body, Truth, Boundaries
Theme: Coming home to yourself
Focus: Saying no; Listening to the body; Living with integrity
Invitation:
What would change if you honored your inner “no” and “yes”?

Week 12 — Redefining Health, Freedom, and Wholeness
Theme: What does a “healed life” actually look like?
Focus: Health as wholeness, not perfection; Choosing presence over performance
Invitation:
Close with our personal and collective reflection on how women want to live differently — gently, truthfully, connected.

Why join Bookclub?

This Book Club is a women's circle of magnificent souls..many of the women have done every single book club, it has become part of their schedule, and part of the fabric of their lives..and some drop in and out depending on the book. know that all are welcome! These groups are always a community of insightful, supportive women eager to engage in meaningful conversation. We laugh and cry and share from our hearts..most of the women have said that they have never shared like this before..and now it's become a natural, necessary, joyous support and touchstone in their lives.

"These book club gatherings have shown me what truth looks and feels like in others and in myself. Women sharing and supporting each other’s unretouched pains, triumphs, worries, hilarities, fears, loves…it is magnificent and affirming. Most especially, it is real and it is safe. Honoring the truth in others helps me see and honor the truth in myself. What a blessing to experience the divine feminine so beautifully brought to life each week! This is one precious tribe." - Sandy

Love, 

Rachel SatSiri