Motherhood, Self-Care Rituals, and the Art of Poetry with Melissa Spratt

Jennifer Norman:
Hello, beautiful humans. Welcome to The Human Beauty Movement Podcast. I'm Jennifer Norman, founder of The Human Beauty Movement and your host. I created The Human Beauty Movement to help inspire radical self-love, radical self-acceptance, and radical self-expression. On this podcast and in our community, we have open discussions about the diverse aspects of the human experience. Diving deeper into the richness of our souls is where we find our truest, most authentic selves. It's a source of everything creative, imaginative, and beautiful that we have to offer. Take a moment now to subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss an episode. I'm so glad that you're here, joining me for today's show.

Jennifer Norman:
Now, of all the things that touch my soul, I have to say that poetry is high on my list. There's a real magic in the art of weaving words to capture and express beauty and emotion. My guest today is a poetess, a mama, and a woman on a soul mission. Melissa Spratt is the author of My Roots Grow Strong poetry collection. Let me tell you, I so align with what Melissa is about. Her mission is to empower women to heal through inspiring creativity, bringing awareness to mental health, and sharing practices for self-care and self-love. She wants you to know we are all connected, beautiful beings who can overcome anything and manifest your dreams.

Jennifer Norman:
Welcome to the show, Melissa.

Melissa Spratt:
Hi, Jennifer. I'm so honored to be a part of The Human Beauty Movement.

Jennifer Norman:
Yes, welcome to the Movement. You are the Movement, Melissa. You have everything going on that is so much about what The Human Beauty Movement is about. It's about soul, it's about beauty, it's about expressing, it's about people who have gone through a journey, right?

Melissa Spratt:
Yes. It really is about the human experience.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah. And so I would love for you to tell us about your human experience and what led you and inspired you to start writing poetry in the first place.

Melissa Spratt:
So when I was a child, I really struggled with my self esteem. I had a lot of anxiety and it steamrolled into an eating disorder. I really was depressed. And that was something that I went through many years of recovery and treatment. I was always motivated to live life, to have a beautiful life. And so that was my spark inside. But it was a struggle, and it stayed with me for a really long time. And even today, I have body image issues, just like probably all of us do.

Melissa Spratt:
And I see it differently now.

Jennifer Norman:
So was it because of what you saw in terms of yourself and what you believed about yourself that caused you, you think, to have low self esteem when you say you still have body image issues?

Melissa Spratt:
I think it all comes down to self worth. I just didn't feel worthy. I don't think I felt very validated. I was very sensitive, and my emotions. I think I felt misunderstood. And the, as you know, you go into middle school, I had a traumatic friendship that somehow I got into. And I'm still trying to do the inner work on and see why was I friends with this person? It really affected me. I think, again, it came down to self worth, and then I started to do things that I could control.

Melissa Spratt:
Right. And that was an eating disorder.

Jennifer Norman:
Oh, my gosh. Your story is so prolific, and it wrenches my heart because I feel like I've been there. I feel like so many people have been there where they just didn't feel good about themselves.

Melissa Spratt:
Yeah. And I think part of it, too, was thinking that it was making me special. And, in fact, it was not. My body does not define me. And it really was through this that at some point, I developed writing as a tool, so it became a coping skill. And I don't think I really did it much until later on in my life. When I got married is actually when I started writing.

Jennifer Norman:
Oh, okay.

Melissa Spratt:
So I wrote in spurts, and it was when I think we were ready for our next chapter. We were back in New Jersey, going back a little bit. My husband and I, we met at college, and I lived in New Jersey. He lived in Connecticut. He came to live with me for a couple of years while I worked for the family business. And I think we knew we weren't meant to be there long term, so we were ready to transition. And he got a job up in Connecticut, where he grew up. And then I got a job.

Melissa Spratt:
And it was at that point, I was starting to really just journal my feelings, some of the struggles also, I was going through working for a family business, as you can imagine, and also visualize and think about our next chapter. And so I started to write then. And when we moved to Connecticut a couple years later, we settled in. And although I didn't know if I ever wanted a child, I felt called it was our time to have a baby. And so we conceived, and then I had a miscarriage. So this was the second part of my journey that I felt was very transforming and painful, where I did a lot of writing, and a lot of that writing is in the book, and I'm very vulnerable and open about it, because in all of these issues and struggles that I'm talking about, this is something that many people experience might not be the same exact thing, but we all are experiencing something and you just don't know what someone's going through. And so when I was writing this book, there was one poem I wrote called Disconnected. And then at the end I realized, wow, we are all connected.

Melissa Spratt:
It's all about the human experience. Finally. It was like a light bulb went off and this kind of was like the moment I finally understood. And we're not alone. We're not alone.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah, I think that that's beautiful, that the writing, and it sounds like it started out as journaling, and then perhaps it became a little bit more structured, but yeah, just that free flowing form of expressing and being able to do it without anybody else looking at it for the time being. It's just for you. It's just for you to be able to put your emotions and your thoughts down on paper and to almost release it in some way and then put it away. And it's been proven to be so helpful, so healing for so many different aspects of mental wellness and emotional wellness. Being able to articulate how you're feeling, because a lot of times that's difficult and there is an art to trying to express how you really feel, rather than just saying, I'm mad, I'm upset, I don't feel good. It's like really getting into that and then dissecting how the words move you afterwards. It's like, first get it out, and then, oh, let's play with this a little bit. And it becomes more of a creative process.

Jennifer Norman:
It's equally as liberating and freeing as it is creating.

Melissa Spratt:
And what I find interesting with journaling is you may even notice that there's themes with what you're feeling or what you're going through, your triggers, and it really helps. And when I was journaling at this time, I had no intention of writing a poetry book. It is something that I realized during COVID that I had written so much and I had this calling. I really feel like it was a download to write this book. But it started out as journaling, which is a wonderful coping skill. And that's something I definitely recommend as self care. There's so many different avenues you could go. You could do release journaling where you're just letting everything out from your mind, any of your thoughts, no judgment.

Melissa Spratt:
You can visualize, you can reflect, you can write poetry. There's so much. And it's just a wonderful self care tool.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah. And to your point, a lot of people are carrying these inner burdens, and sometimes people don't like, not everybody feels comfortable mentioning to the world that they've had a miscarriage. And my heart goes out to you for that. I know that it's a loss. It's truly, truly something that is devastating to the heart. It could have been a compounding time in your life where you're like, okay, I'm going to take it upon myself. It's my fault, it's my body's fault, all of these different things. And so in doing something that was going to be more constructive and helpful and healing, you were able to convert your pain into words and into feelings, into emotions that you were able to lift outside yourself and provide first to the page and then to the world as you've turned it into a book.

Jennifer Norman:
I'm curious about how you felt like when you first started journaling. What would you say that your mindset was? Where you were emotionally and then how long do you think that it took? Or how much time or how many entries? If there could be a quantifiable way of talking about this, did you start feeling like, oh, this is helping, this is good?

Melissa Spratt:
I don't think I realized that journaling has been helping until a decade later. I don't think I had that awareness, and now I'm reflecting on it. When I started it, this was in spurts, so I would write a little bit. I was in a space that I just was so ready to move on, and I was dealing with a lot of stress and anxiety, and I was feeling it in my body. And then I didn't write for a while after that. And then I started writing again after miscarriage. And I don't think I realized it was helping. When I wrote poetry, though, it wasn't like I was intending to do it, but it was flowing out.

Melissa Spratt:
And I would be inspired by nature symbolism, so I would think of lotus inspiration, yes, trees. And I would get a glass of wine and think about that and look at the symbolism, and it would just flow out of me after the wine. But I was finding a lot of calm.

Jennifer Norman:
There you go.

Melissa Spratt:
And now, again, I didn't realize the benefits until very recently. In the last two years, I would.

Jennifer Norman:
Say, yeah, depending on the intention of it. I think that it's nice that you reflect back on it and say, yeah, this was part of my healing journey. And the reason why I asked that, I appreciate you so much saying it was a decade, because sometimes it takes even longer than that. Sometimes it can take 20 years, 30 years. Sometimes if you go in and you really just relinquish yourself and you have that intention up front, you can speed that healing along, but the important thing is not to force it, because anytime that you force a flow, then it's not really true. It's really something that I think just needs to happen until one day you're like, my gosh, it's like, yeah, that was it. I do. I feel better.

Jennifer Norman:
I feel calm. I feel good about life now.

Melissa Spratt:
I think that's a great point. And it's really important to point out that healing is not linear at all.

Jennifer Norman:
No, it's not linear, and it's different for everyone. For everyone, it looks different. Just same thing with grief. Grief looks different for everyone. Healing looks different for everyone. And even if it's not necessarily what we would consider healing, it's personal development. It's constantly learning and growing and creating and doing something new, discovering something new about yourself, discovering something new about the world. You may not necessarily think, oh, my life is.

Jennifer Norman:
I didn't go through a tragedy or a trauma. And that's not to say that you have to. Congratulations. If you haven't, that's amazing. But, yeah, if you have or if you haven't, these things are always wonderful to think about as ways that you might be able to incorporate them into your life, that the might be helpful in ways that you wouldn't have even imagined, I think.

Melissa Spratt:
Yeah. And now I am very intentional with journaling and the inner work and the process. I feel that I had a spiritual awakening, and now I'm on my path to my purpose, and it's very clear to me now since I've been through that, and I reflect it, and we're always evolving. And writing is not for everyone. Journaling is not for everyone. So I do like to share different things you could do for self care, but I will always share with my community the power of words and poetry.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah, your word is your wand. So let's talk about your spiritual awakening.

Melissa Spratt:
Yes. Still early on. I feel like it's very exciting.

Jennifer Norman:
What do you think was the onset of it, or what caused you to peek into saying, oh, there's something more here?

Melissa Spratt:
Miscarriage and becoming a mother, I think, was what really set me into a lot more spirituality. When I had the miscarriage, I started trying to understand what that was to me. And then, as I said, I was doing a lot of writing, and then when I became a mother in the pandemic, the height of the pandemic, May 2020, it was very challenging. But as I have mothered, I have learned so much, and I'm teaching my daughter, for example, validating her emotions, things that I wish that happened for me when I was a child. So we're kind of like teachers of each other. And it's through all of this that, again, I'm on a self love journey. I'm learning, and alongside that, mind, body, spirit is the spiritual piece. So right now I'm in a space that I feel that spirituality is very personal.

Melissa Spratt:
It's something that is like a feeling, can't explain it. There is some kind of divine source and love, and there's something else. This is what it feels to me. And I'm starting to bring spiritual, like little mini spiritual practices into my day. So I've started getting oracle cards and reading some books along, spirituality and self love and just figuring it out and listening to more spiritual type podcasts as well.

Jennifer Norman:
Really exciting. I think that everybody is in this place where you can either think about it like, oh, we're here on Earth, we have our time here, and then that's it. And that is a belief. And the thing that I have learned after meeting and speaking with a lot of different experts is when you have this knowing that there is something more, something much more, and something greater than just our physical bodies, something that is really guiding and carrying us through, and a lot of that, something more is your connection to your inner being and to your higher source, or a higher source, whatever you decide to call it.

Melissa Spratt:
Yes.

Jennifer Norman:
Could be God, it could be Allah, it could be Vishnu, it could be so many different forms. But your connection to that greater guidance is really so powerful in having a life well lived and feeling like you are being much more fulfilled in what you're doing. And so, yeah, spirituality looks and feels different for everyone. And that's why I was curious to see what your journey was. And for me, it was similar where it was born out of tragedy, where it's like it shakes you up and it kind of takes you into this place where you're searching for meaning and you're searching for purpose, only to find that you are the meaning and you are the purpose.

Melissa Spratt:
You are a soul with a purpose, and you had to go through that. That was part of you finding out your true purpose and mission on earth. You had to be tested and go through that.

Jennifer Norman:
It's a wake up. It's a wake up call. And I love Dr. Shafali and what she talks about in terms of kids teaching their parents. And our kids are our greatest teachers, and we have to sometimes just step out of the way and stop trying to control, because they are, it's almost like when they are born we are reborn. You've never been a mother before, and now you are birthed as a mother. And so it's a beautiful thing to co create with them in order to.

Melissa Spratt:
Really, as you say that, I'm just laughing because I wrote a poem called Born A Mother.

Jennifer Norman:
So I want to talk about your poetry. I'm curious about, and maybe you can share some of it with our audience here today. I think that that would be so special. Do you write in rhymes? Do you write in prose? Can you share a little bit about the nature of your poetry?

Melissa Spratt:
It's very freestyle, most of it. I also like doing haikus, and I'm learning a little bit more about different styles of haikus. It could get very complex. But I do the traditional haiku from a western perspective, I would say.

Jennifer Norman:
And for those who don't know a Haiku, it's a 5-4-5?

Melissa Spratt:
575. Haikus tend to evoke a moment in time. Usually there's a connection to nature and there's a subject and action within that. So I do have some in the book, and I like having a mini notebook where I write them sometimes. But most of my writing is really inspired by a beautiful moment, a challenge. And if it's something that comes up for me, I just have to write it down and let it flow out. So I don't really have a very structured writing time, like how often I have to write or I don't have any rules around writing. It's really just for me to let it flow. And it's very free verse.

Melissa Spratt:
I tend to like to put a lot of rhyme into them as well. But for me, I think there should be no rules and to just create that space and let it come out, create. We are all creative beings, so put what's flowing through your soul onto the paper.

Jennifer Norman:
Oh, that's beautiful. That's beautiful. So, yeah. Do you happen to have any with you that you might be able to share?

Melissa Spratt:
Oh, yes, I do. But now that you are saying this, I would like to read Born A Mother, I've never. Oh, it's unpublished. Yes. I have not written.

Jennifer Norman:
Okay, everyone, beautiful human, this is an unpublished poem by Melissa Spratt, and you are going to be some of the first to hear it.

Melissa Spratt:
I'm bringing it up now...Born A Mother.Every 2 hours awake in dark hoursPumping so sticky, I just want a showerTo sleep is a dream, latching on me mentallyNot vibing with me"Fed is best" becomes my new sloganAfter the mom guilt and tears that keep flowingThey could fill a four-ounce bottleBehind the glass, behind the maska pandemic is spreading its graspIsolated together, just us three.Crying is how you communicateBut I can't let you cry it outHighly sensitive parent hereFilled with self doubt, anxiety, and fearYour first sound was "agu"So it became your nicknameWhen you said "Dada" your face lit upMaternity leave spent circling neighborhood streetsThis is when you would sleep or cryNestling my face into your head at nightThe softness, the sweetnessI wish I appreciated this When I was born a mother.

Jennifer Norman:
That's lovely and so relatable. Pandemic new moms that are out there, they can probably be like, yes, that is me. That was me.

Melissa Spratt:
It was tough. I do have other motherhood poetry, especially connected with being a first time pandemic mama in the book as well.

Jennifer Norman:
It's nice how you put words and the feeling, and the rawness of the feelings that you had during that time definitely come through.

Melissa Spratt:
I like to bring in the feelings and the imagery.

Jennifer Norman:
Now, everybody knows that new moms are some of the most tired, strung out, weary-worn, and I'm sure that you were no different. What does self-care look like to you with a toddler in the house?

Melissa Spratt:
Yes. So self-care is not selfish, number one, and it's always evolving. So when my daughter was a newborn, I really struggled. Again, I was very highly sensitive. I needed sleep. We didn't have a lot of support, so self-care at that time was taking a shower. If I could get it. Now that I have a clear awakening to self-love and the process I've been going through, I'm really thriving. And so for me, self-care is lots of mini rituals throughout the day.

Melissa Spratt:
So for me, I'm a morning person. I'll start my day early. I'll get ten to 20 minutes of movement in. I like to do yoga and pilates. I like to get on my mat. And this is something I recommend. A great tool every day for someone is say your three things. So it could be either three intentional words for the day.

Melissa Spratt:
So today I actually have words. Visualize light and love. Those are my three words. Or it could be three things you're grateful for. And that intention really helps with a positive mindset throughout the day, and it helps you to carry that with you and focus your intent. I also think nourishing your body. I love certain face oils, face masks, things that I'll try to incorporate throughout the week. It doesn't mean I need to do it every day, but it's something that feels good, smells good, and I like to use them.

Melissa Spratt:
And then once a week, try to get a bath in or one self-care activity where I'm stepping away or I'm writing, asking my husband, is it okay I'm going to step away for a half hour or an hour. That might include writing. I'm also trying to journal a little more at night or read, and that's usually just sometimes it's even next to my daughter when she's in a more quiet, chill mode with her tablet, so it looks different. And when I don't do self-care, I get very irritable and I do feel off-kilter and every day will not look the same. And you could try and integrate it as best possible that you can, right? You're just trying to do the best you can and fill your cup so it overflows to others. But I'm very big on self-care, and I like to post self-care every Sunday on my Instagram.

Jennifer Norman:
Oh, that's so nice. All right, listeners, I know that you even listening to this podcast is a form of self-care because you wouldn't be listening to it unless you really wanted to hear some beautiful things either, whether it's entertainment or whether it's learning something new, whether it's feeling a sense of connection. This is self-care. But aside from listening to this podcast or perhaps some others, what are the things that you incorporate into your day that you consider self-care? Is it even just drinking a cup of tea and being able to say, look into the tea and say, I am so grateful for this tea? Is it to get outside and take a few deep inhales and just say, thank you for this fresh air, thank you for the blue sky, or thank you for the rain? I know that a lot of people don't like rain. I'm in Los Angeles, so rain is a gift over here, and just say, thank you for this weather that we have, because it's helping the earth to cycle and to survive and to come into its own. Thank you so much for having a family, for being able to, if you're a mom, to have children, if you're a dad, to have children, if you are a child, to have parents or parents that have passed on, that have given you the gifts of their life, if you have a job or if you have more than you need, and you know that you have more than you need, the gratitude of being able to have enough to give to yourself and then give to other people, all those things are forms of self care. And just like ways to express. They look different for everyone.

Jennifer Norman:
The are different for everyone. As long as you're giving yourself some free space to feel alive, to feel you, to give yourself room to just be. That's what I consider self care. It doesn't have to be a day at the spa. It doesn't have to be a pampering mask or anything like that, although those are lovely.

Melissa Spratt:
And sometimes it can be, sometimes it can be. It can even be as simple as I'm hydrating today, I'm focusing on hydrating my body. Let me get a big water bottle or one thing that I started incorporating is reducing my caffeine. So I love my coffee in the morning, but in the afternoon I'm getting a cup of matcha with my little frother. And it's so simple, but it's a treat. It's a treat. It makes me feel so good. And I also work at home, but when I step outside to the mailbox, I am taking in really deep breaths, smelling really clear, crisp air.

Melissa Spratt:
Over here in New England might be cold now, but it's just being outside for a couple of minutes just does wonders for the body. Regulates as well as meditation. Five minutes. You don't need to do anything long. You could do something guided. So these are additional ideas that you could incorporate into your daily self care that are small. Yeah.

Jennifer Norman:
And I think being able to practice creativity in your own way is also a form of self care, personal development, growth. Ways to innovate and extend your imagination in your life I think are really cool. So what would you say, Melissa, about tapping into somebody's creativity? What would be some avenues that they could try?

Melissa Spratt:
So I think it depends on what you love doing. So look at your hobbies. Is it baking? Because baking is creative, too. Is it reading and podcasts that give you these wonderful ideas for learning and growth? Or maybe, first let's take a step back, and creating the time and space. So we're all very busy, but sitting down and creating the time and space and saying, what really sparks you? What do you love? And maybe listing out what that is first and then going from there and seeing how you could start to incorporate that. If you love arts and crafts, maybe start going to a workshop once a quarter. There's lots of really great, like, I have a garden shop that they do crafty, naturey things, but they also have like winter solstice, tarot cards and yoga at the same time. So you could do workshops like that.

Melissa Spratt:
You could take online courses, just really reflect first and see what it is that you may have a passion for and go from there.

Jennifer Norman:
Certainly, it develops and evolves, and it changes over time with age. I know Gary Vaynerchuk is really big on instructing young people who are just starting out in life to try as many things as possible. It could be music. It could be dance. It could be getting into coding. It could be writing, it could be podcasting. It could be so many things. You could just try so many things, because that's how you discover what you really love.

Jennifer Norman:
If you think that you love something and you kind of go down linearly, then it may not be as fulfilling as if you were to explore and just discover a whole world. And an opportunity may arise. You may even be able to develop your own way. A lot of innovation comes from this. New sports are created all the time. New games are created all the time, because it's like you're iterating and you're making something new out of something that was existing before, and you're making it better, and you're making it fresher, and you're endeavoring to just develop something on your own. You may want to start your own business. You may want to become an author or a singer or a producer or a filmmaker.

Jennifer Norman:
So many different things that you might be able to tap into. And then I think once you do find that thing that you love and you feel that it is truly expressing who you are, and the way that you'll know that is through the way that you feel on an ongoing basis, do you feel like it's constantly feeding your energy? Do you feel like it's constantly joyful, that you are always feeling grateful for those outlets that you have, for those moments that you have, for the life that you have built, and when you feel in harmony with what you're doing and it is aligned with who you are deep down inside, then that is when your purpose and your personality align and you become most truly fulfilled.

Melissa Spratt:
Yes.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah. I want to thank Gary Zukov for that. It's when your personality aligns with your purpose, and that's when you know that you've nailed it.

Melissa Spratt:
It's like a high vibrational energy, and you just feel it. You feel it. But there is so much opportunity to tap into creativity and try different things. And I think to add to that, too. It's good to once in a while, look at your values, what's important to you, and align with that, and constantly assessing your values and what it is you love, what's giving you spark right now, and just taking small steps.

Jennifer Norman:
I know, for me, there was a time where, and this still tends to happen if you're, like, a person like me, who is very easily swayed by other people, I would always look at other people and be like, oh, they're doing that. They're successful. Let me try that. And so that's okay to a certain degree because it helps you to explore, but it is important to always come back and assess and just be like, okay, now I'm coming back into myself. How do I feel about that? Do I feel like this is really aligned with my values? Do I really feel like this is who I want to be? If I were to say this is my own personal brand, I am Melissa Spratt. I am Jennifer Norman. This is who I am, and this is how I want to project my spirit and my soul and my essence onto the world. What kind of legacy do I want to leave behind? Is it this? Is it that? Is it the other? Maybe it is the writing.

Jennifer Norman:
Maybe it is this job well done. Maybe it's being the best mom or child or sibling or husband or wife that you can possibly be. And all of that is absolutely rock on solid. It really is. It's just make sure that you're not giving your power away and not living somebody else's life. Make sure that your creativity and all of these things are really helping you to have a greater understanding and a self discovery, self awareness, and an appreciation for yourself. That's where that self love and that self acceptance and that self expression really comes forth and blossoms to the best of its ability.

Melissa Spratt:
We are always comparing, and we have to define what success means to us. So what success looks like for Jennifer is not what success looks like for Melissa. And I'm starting to learn that and be like, well, what does that look like for me? It's not going to be the same yet. We're always comparing and lining up against other people, but we're different people, and that's what is beautiful about the world.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah. In the past, I used to feel like success was getting great grades in school, going to a great college, maybe an Ivy League college or college with high repute, getting that great job, making money, having a house, having the marriage, having the kids, having all of the clothes and the shoes and the bags and those things. And you know what? I felt empty. I felt really like just empty inside, and I couldn't figure out why. It's like if I felt like I was achieving all of these things, I still felt lousy about myself inside. I didn't do that work to really feel fulfilled and that I was living my own life. And it wasn't until I had my spiritual awakening and I recognized that the reason why I'm put on this earth is all about spreading compassion and love and self-love and all these things. Once I realized, yes, that's what all of this has led up to, everything that my life has stood for is really so that I can serve myself as well as others with this sense that you are special, that you matter, that you are worthy, that you are important, that you have something to say, that you deserve to be heard, and that however you wish to manifest that in your life, despite what anybody else says and actually for the better, if people don't think that you're doing the right thing, then you're probably on the right track. It's probably the true you that's shining.

Melissa Spratt:
Through your authentic self.

Jennifer Norman:
That is your authentic self, and that is to be really applauded. And that is not easy in this day and age. It's not easy, and it's brave. It's courageous. And I just want to be the biggest cheerleader for people who have been able to come across that road, that are on this journey. No matter where in the journey you are, whether you're just starting out on it or whether you've come back full circle and you've found yourself and you're sharing. Like, Melissa is on this journey, and she's in this process of sharing her art with the world. That's lovely.

Jennifer Norman:
And I want to celebrate that, and I want to cheer people on to continue doing what they can to really just hone in on filling their own cup. Filling their own cup. And I think that new moms are the ones that have a lot of empty cups. And it's not easy because you're giving so much to this new life. It's almost like, okay, this is purgatory. I have to go through this. And then once the child is a bit older, then I can rest and I can do this. It's learning these things over again.

Jennifer Norman:
And in self-care, it does look different at the different phases of your life, but knowing that, yeah, this is really cool. You got to make a new human being that's really very darn special. That's the most special thing that could possibly ever happen on this earth. And a lot of times, we don't realize how cool and special it is, how much we take that for granted, that, yeah, we made another human. Wow.

Melissa Spratt:
Yes. And that's actually too some of the body image type affirmations when I talk about becoming a mother and how I feel about my body, because it's like, wow, my body did something amazing. I grew an organ, number one. I grew life. And that is so beautiful that women are so powerful.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah.

Melissa Spratt:
And the messages that you just shared and the space that you create for us to come on here is really healing for the collective and for all of us to continue to try to grow and find our authentic selves and find self love and how can we take care of ourselves? So beautiful.

Jennifer Norman:
Oh, excellent. So Melissa, your book is called My Roots Grow Strong. It's a poetry collection and you are offering 20% off for The Human Beauty Movement community. Thank you so much. People can use code HBMLOVE for 20% off code HBMLOVE and I'll put in the show notes where you can find it. I definitely want everybody to go check it out. Thank you so much, Melissa, for being on the show today. What a wonderful conversation.

Melissa Spratt:
Thank you Jennifer. I love what you're doing with The Human Beauty Movement and I can't wait to see it continue to grow.

Jennifer Norman:
Thank you so much. Thank you for listening to The Human Beauty Movement Podcast. Be sure to follow, rate, and review us wherever you stream podcasts. The Human Beauty Movement is a community-based platform that cultivates the beauty of humankind. Check out our workshops, find us on social media, and share our inspiration with all the beautiful humans in your life. Learn more at thehumanbeautymovement.com. Thank you so much for being a beautiful human.