Conversation with Caitlin Erica - a birth doula turned stripper turned embodiment coach, erotic dance teacher, sensualist, and basically here to return women to themselves, to help them feel safe, sovereign and sexy in their bodies.
The feminine is rising and there is a calling for women to return to and trust in themselves.
Exploring desire, responsibility, motherhood, fear and shame, failure and success, humility, embodiment, open erotic orgasmic birth, reclamation of our power.. and so much more !
Get in touch with Caitlin below to join her powerful events, courses and 1 : 1 mentoring.
"Strip Her : 8 weeks to strip away sensual shame and unlock your feminine hypnotic prowess" with Caitlin Erica ***JUNE 2024***
Strip Her with Caitlin Erica
So let's just take in a deep breath together, and a long breath out, two more, just coming into our bodies, coming into each other's energies, and just honouring the time and the effort that you've made to come here. And I'm so grateful for you and your work that you do, and your purpose that you follow, and your heart, and how much you give. So thank you so much for being here, Caitlin.
I just hope that this transmission and this conversation that we have together finds the heart that it's meant to resonate with, and helps other women blossom in their power, their sensuality, their sacredness, as it has helped me on my journey, and as you have helped so many women, and you will help so many women. Ancestors, evolution guides, Isis, Mary Magdalene, may they guide me and speak through me so that the messages of love and celebration and erotic innocence can be channeled through me, and meet the ears and the hearts of all of the women that are longing, yearning for this medicine to see themselves as whole, and glorious, and pure. Thank you for being here, and sharing your voice, and your energy, and I just love everything about you.
Thank you listeners for being here, and I felt like I had to have Caitlin here speaking with us, because she's been such a big part of my journey and my growth, and I see my space in Sanctuary as a platform to help people understand who they are, and help themselves heal and integrate into their wholeness, and the work that you do is so important to that, and the space that you hold and the embodiment that you are is just so powerful, and I honestly also am in disbelief that I've gotten to know you so well over the last few weeks, the eight weeks of the program, and also just had the pleasure of going to Roots Women's Festival with you. Fun buddies. Yeah! Ten buddies.
Yeah, they're ten buddies. So yeah, I met Caitlin at, earlier this year almost, at a Christmas, well late You've been to my event like a year prior. That's true.
So I first met Caitlin at a Strip Hair event, one that you did maybe two years ago, or three. It was the second one I ever did. No, were you at the one with, yeah, you were at the second one that I ever did.
So like June 2022. That's the one. And I think some of my friends had gone and were like, oh you really need to go to this event, and Sam Sheehan was there as well.
I think she'd just done a week, a strip time maybe or something. No, but she came to the first event and then she did another event that I used to run, which was an embodiment workshop called Return to Her, which I think the vision of that was that it would grow from a workshop to a course, and I'm actually looking to bring that back. Amazing.
I think I saw that on your website when I was looking up strip hair. I was like, oh when's Return to Her happening? So I've been trying to follow and find. But yes, so I met you at my first Strip Hair, your second one that you're hosting.
And yeah, one of my friends had recommended it, Sam. And so I started looking at your stuff on Instagram and I was like, oh my gosh, I just love the way she speaks and what she's talking about makes so much sense, and it was just really hitting a chord with me. And yeah, I went to the event not, kind of knowing what to expect, but also not knowing what to expect, because like, who's done this before? You haven't gone into a room of women that you don't know and just taken turns stripping for each other? No.
And I remember telling my partner and he was like, oh that's exciting, can I come? And I was like, no, it's like an all-women's event and it's not like that. Oh my gosh. Like caressing each other's with roses.
Yeah. Putting affirmations into each other's lingerie. It's beautiful.
So yeah, that was a while ago, that was two years ago, and I got to reconnect with you at Christmas time, and you mentioned that you were doing your course, and so yeah, that was, I was kind of thinking back and forth about that, just financially with other things going on, which is also probably a thing that we should speak about today, because it's so tied with our work. But yeah, so then, and I was trying to justify it, and I know I've said this to you before, but I was trying to justify, okay, like how can I make this be for my business and not just be something because I just want to do it, and for personal growth, because how many things have I done for personal growth that, you know, just is another thing? And where is this desire coming from? And it's not just personal growth, it's like just to feel good, and I think this is one of the hard things with what I'm offering, because women so easily deprioritise the things that will fill our cup. You know, it's like, oh, but if it's going to enhance my business, great.
If it's going to, if I'm going to be able to manifest more money, great. Like, what's it going to give me? Oh, more self-confidence? Like, more self-love? There's other things I want more. Whether it's because you don't believe it will, whether it's because we don't believe it will really work, or it's a self-worth piece, it's really hard to get women to invest in themselves just because they deserve it.
Like, if it's not for their business, or for their family, or for their relationship, or for something outside of themselves, we have a really hard time, yeah, earning that and giving ourselves that gift. So I'm glad you did it, but yeah, I can totally see why you were trying to, how you were trying to justify it, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, just doing it just because it feels good. Why? Why can't we do that, you know? But yeah, as I've said to you before, I can't imagine not having done it, and I feel like it's just like a spark, a big spark, that's ignited that, although I feel like I've come so far in your eight-week program, I know that I get to continue to do this work, whether it is through you or just
my own journey, and like it's a lifetime practice.
It's one of those things that, yeah, that this work is a doorway. You are stepping through a doorway into a new way of living your life. It doesn't begin and end with the course at all, and that's the joy of it.
It's like you get a new lease on life, and then that pours into every aspect. It pours into your relationships. It pours into the way you show up for work.
It pours into the way you order food with a group of people. Like I remember one of my clients talking about how she would always wait to see what everyone else was going to order before she decided. You know, she always wanted to see like, well, what's the vibe here? What's the expectation? What's everyone else doing? Now she does whatever she wants.
She orders what she wants when she wants it. She listens to her body. It's the little things that just make life more yours.
It is a reclaiming, isn't it? So do you want to introduce yourself? Hi, I'm Caitlin. I'm Caitlin Erica, and I am a birth doula turned stripper turned embodiment coach, erotic dance teacher, sensualist, and basically here to return women to themselves, to the parts of ourselves that we have learned to hide, to distrust, to disregard or suppress and deny. Parts of our nature, our innocence, our power that we have learned to shame.
And yeah, I'm really here to put the feminine back where she belongs in a place where she is deeply revered, respected and trusted and honored. The feminine energetics, the feminine path, the female body, like there's so much riches within her realm. And we just don't realize that we are sitting on a gold mine, like every day walking around with this wealth of embodied wisdom available to us at any moment.
And we're just not listening. We're just not turning in like inward. So yeah, I'm here to help women feel safe and sovereign and sexy in their bodies.
But it just feels so good. It does feel so good. And we deserve it.
We just deserve it. And it's not only that, but it is an act of service. We need more women who trust themselves.
We need more women who have the audacity to own their innate power. We need more women just, yeah, stepping up and reclaiming themselves and all of themselves. You know, in this realm of embodiment, embodiment is such a, you know, it's a hot word.
What does it actually mean? Can you really live from your body if there are parts of your body that you are denying and rejecting? What does it actually mean to listen to the whispers and to trust the wisdom of your body over whatever is outside of you? Because
when your body asks for rest, are you going to give it rest? Like the female body is not cut out for this nine to five, five day a week, like patriarchal setup. And it's not, you know, the patriarch is just as damaging to men and the winery rebels as it is to women. It's, it just doesn't serve the female hormonal system.
Like we've got approximately a 30 day hormonal cycle. Men have that 24 hour hormonal cycle and circadian rhythm. It's a different rhythm.
They're okay to get up and go to work and like do that nine to five. Women are not. And so we are pushing and hustling and like trying, trying to show up for this world, this system that is not designed for us, that doesn't get us, that doesn't honor us, trying to reject our femininity so that we can be seen as powerful, not realizing that like, Oh, hang on.
Actually, my power is back there where I left it. And it's massive. If I can just trust it, this world, which I'm just waiting.
I'm just waiting for it. I definitely feel like we're closer than we have been, especially with people like you sharing more wisdom and wealth and, you know, being on your own journey. My favorite thing in your courses is your story.
I'm excited and I know you're going to eventually write a book. Someday I will. I can't wait for that book.
And you're right. It's a great time to be alive. We are in a really exciting period of life.
It's rough as well in moments. It's also really easeful comparatively, looking down timelines, especially where we are growing up in Australia. But yeah, the feminine is rising.
Yeah, I think like you said, it's rough, but it's easeful. Where are you placing your attention? What are you kind of continuing to butt up against? Where are you forcing to show up rather than kind of going inwards, as you're saying, and then finding that flow that is more rhythmic and held and, yeah, not as striving, not as trying to fit into this mold of success and power and forgetting our true power. And something else that you... Oh, yes.
One thing that I've been feeling is, you know, it is a privilege where we are and to have, for me, to have even been able to sign up for your course. And like, you know, even the thoughts in my mind, which I have a lot of thoughts and it can get very overwhelming in there. So for me, I really love the practice of coming back into the body and embodiment.
And yeah, it's just medicine for me because I've had that tendency always to be in the head and butt up. But, you know, for me even being like, OK, well, I can do this course.
Will I? Won't I? Will I? Won't I? After doing it, I'm like, I almost have... I feel like I have an obligation, like if it's available to me, like, why am I not following that call? Like, you know, I'm fortunate enough to have the resources to be able to choose to make the time for this to not be paralyzed in my maybe negative thought processes or limiting beliefs to see that and then have the rejection of it or a trigger of it.
And yeah, probably in the past, yeah, definitely. But, you know, even in this first trip, of course, like it's also, as you say, owning all parts of you, like, OK, I'm judging that woman or I'm judging me. And like, where is this coming from? And why am I doing that? And sort of unraveling that and being honest with yourself about that.
And then there's so much healing in that. And then I can let... I can love my human part more and I can see what... Yeah, part of the feminine just wants to be heard and acknowledged as well. See, I almost see it now as like, well, if I'm considering it, like, where is it my responsibility? You know, and not only for women around me, but also what am I carrying to my future children? Like, that to me is really important.
I know you're a doula and I've told Daniel I'm going to have a doula and I was like, well, I don't think Caitlin does it anymore. So we have a problem. But we'll get there.
It's all good. I do. I just don't know if I'm going to be living in the same place as you. We can move to... I'll tell them. I'll be a flying doula. Fly me in.
But yeah, that's that to me as well. Like, OK. And I would love for you to share your transition from doula and to strict.
Yeah. Gosh, totally. I remember having a bit of a chat about this with you before you signed up to the course and you were sharing your reservations and, you know, like, where is it wise for me to be putting my money right now? What do I want to invest in? And I was really straight up with you.
And I said, well, you know, if you are looking to have children, I don't know, I didn't know you super well at that point. I know you much better now. But I already could gauge, you know, as with anyone who has a desire to have children.
Like, you don't want to just be a mom. Like, you want to be a mom of a certain caliber. Like, you want to pour so much love and power into your children or child and give them the best start you can possibly give them in life and really nurture them.
And that's why you're already doing the work. You've done so much on yourself already. Birthkeeping, hiring a doula is something that is so underrated because most people just don't even know it's an option.
Like, we don't know what we don't know. So there's no, it's such a minefield talking
about this because you never want to shame someone's experience that was different. And we also get to learn.
We also get to learn from someone else's experience or learn from our past experience and be like, okay, that experience was what it was. It needed to be what it needed to be. Nothing is lost because we've learned from it.
But let's make sure that we learn from it, right? Let's make sure that we really honor the lesson that that was and continue to grow and to elevate and evolve. And so the running statistic right now that gets thrown around everywhere is that one in three women describe their birth as traumatic. We think about how much money people are spending on their weddings, like in the thousands.
But the idea of spending, and it used to be so little, like, like maybe 1300 Australian dollars for a doula. It was like, oh, we can't afford that. Like, there's so many other costs coming up for us because we're about to have a baby.
Like, it brings up a lot of fear, anxiety, when we're entering parenthood, because it's like, am I enough? Do I have enough? Like, what do I need? So there's a lot going on. And we can have total compassion for that. And also, you're making, by hiring a doula, you're making an investment into the health, the emotional, physical, mental well-being of your family.
Because if you end up having a birth that you describe as traumatic, that's going to impact your postnatal period. How many women have postnatal depression? We don't have the village these days. Parents, first time parents are out there doing it on their own.
And that's not fair. And that's not good enough for us as a collective society. But that's where we're at right now.
And so we're going to do everything we can to nourish and nurture and be proactive and preventative as possible. And so, yes, okay, you might spend a little bit on a doula. But if that avoids you, and your child, all the years and years and years of like serious therapy that might come from a destabilized birthing experience, then isn't that worth it? And I'm not making any promises.
But like, if it's within our means, aren't we prioritizing that over beautiful candlesticks at our wedding? And don't get me wrong, like, I want to throw the biggest party when it's time for me to get married, because I create events, and I'm all for celebration. And if meeting the person that I want to share my life with and start a family with isn't something to celebrate, then I don't know what is. So I'm all for going big.
And let's just be real with the current state of childbirth. I think that there's just this expectation that it's going to be bad, that it's going to be horrible, scary, traumatic, and
we just, we just follow that production line. Like one in three women, why are we following that production line? How about like, what if we choose to believe that something different is possible? Because a lot of women have had magical birth experiences.
And so I, I trained as a birth doula, I was fantasizing being woken up at 3am with that phone call, like it's go time, you know, and scrambling out the door to go squeeze the hips of a laboring woman for hours and just being in the room when a child is born, welcoming them into a world that is peaceful and harmonious and not in a state of emergency and fear and bright lights and harsh sounds, you know, and just like, hey, hey, little one, welcome to earth. It's beautiful here. And to just being that welcome party and letting a child's first experience, first impression of life on earth, be something that they just want to continue to open to and to help the women and, you know, the parents feel so safe and, and like, to beautify, I really saw myself as a birth priestess.
I'm like, let's bring the ritual back to birth. Let's make this one of like, the most gorgeous days of your life. Let's do everything to beautify it and sanctify it and just make it so, so rich.
And then after I completed my training, I was actually tipped off by my teacher, my spiritual teacher, who said, I feel like you're not going to start taking on birth clients straight away. There's something more that life wants to show you that no doula school is teaching. And it's, it's going to be seemingly unrelated.
But please, please, please, I promise you wherever life leads you next, it is absolutely 100% related to birth work. So please just trust the process. Like you might get a job at a fruit shop and you're thinking, what am I doing here? Like, I've just trained as a birth doula.
Like, she said, please just trust the process because there's something that life wants to show you. And fast forward to a couple of months later, I was in a, I wasn't living in Australia, I was living in Berlin, but I had a relationship in the UK. And the relationship was, I was really struggling and suffering in Berlin.
And my boyfriend at the time said, maybe you need to go back home. Like, maybe you're not meant to be there. Like, maybe, you know.
So we were looking at breaking up, everything's changing. So I was just moving through some big emotions. And dance is my personal prayer and personal meditation.
So dance is my personal prayer and meditation. So I was in his bedroom for like an hour, just rolling around the floor, just being in my body, just letting all of the feels move through me. And he was, he wasn't there.
And then he came upstairs and opened the door and saw that I was dancing. And he was
like, you're dancing? I was like, can I stay and watch? And I was like, yeah, sure. You know, I didn't, I didn't think anything of it because, I mean, he was a, he was a DJ and I'm just like an untrained dancer, but totally a dancer in my mind.
You know, I'm like, I'm a dancer. You're a dancer. So I like, I've spent my, we spent our relationship on dance floors and he's seen me dance plenty, but that was different.
That wasn't me dancing at a, you know, at a festival or at a party. That was just me rolling around on the floor, just deep in my sensuality, not trying to be sexy, but just like in the feels, just moving my body. But I'd never shown that to anyone before.
And when he came in, I just felt like all of my presence shifted and I was no longer in my body. I was totally in my head and I got stiff and I felt awkward and I forgot what I do usually. And I'm like, ah, how do I, I've lost my flow.
Like I was just hyper aware that I was being watched. And I, you know, so all these questions came up, like, what is he thinking right now? Do I look like I'm trying to be something like, and, and I just clocked this disembodiment and I was like, oh, okay. I've, I'm not in my body right now.
I'm totally in my head. Okay. I've got more to, I've got more to learn.
It gets a bit noisy here. That's fine. I was just going to pause so that it can cut out.
Um, so I was like, because I had this idea to do dance workshops for pregnant women to prepare for birth, to help them practice getting out of their minds and into their bodies or what is your body asking you to do now? What feels good right now? And, um, I thought, oh, well, if I want to offer the medicine of dance, then I've got to walk my talk and I'm not there yet. So I just had this.....
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