Our Story

This story, written by Marisa Goudy, is inspired by a piece simply named “A Story,” found in the Irish Schools’ Folklore Collection from the 1930s. It was collected by a student named Annie McLaughlin, as told by her father John Joe McLaughlin for St. Mary’s National School in Buncrana in County Donegal.

The original tale, found at Duchas.ie, offers a retelling of a traditional story of three women who have been disfigured by endless work, carding, spinning, and weaving wool. It’s the story of a “useless girl who lived happily ever after.”

In this version, Marisa imagines the scene in which the father, John Joe, tells the story to his daughter Annie. There really was a woollen mill in Donegal in the 1930s where they wove carpets for Buckingham Palace! In this retelling, details have been added to the original fairytale, which is an adaptation of a Brothers Grimm story.

Our Guest

Nicole Burgess is a clinically trained Soul-Led Leadership Coach for ambitious highly sensitive professional women leaders. She is also the host of Soulfilled Sisterhood podcast and founder of the Self-Care Summit: Improve Your Bottom Line and Your Personal Life. Over the last seventeen years she has coached, guided and collaborated with over a 1,000 women. She helps women end overwhelm and self-doubt, so they can lead with calm, confidence, and connection.

Learn more about Nicole on her website, nicoleburgesscoaching.com.

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Our Conversation

In addition to being a coach and a podcaster, Nicole is a weaver and handcrafts have long been part of her life. We call together these threads in our conversation:

• - The process of weaving itself and the modern attempts to bring back lost arts
• - What it means to be "useful" or "useless"
• - How we celebrate the time it takes to make something by hand now, but how this tedious work was a burden to women in the past
• - How to escape the projections of others; the only evil in this story are other people’s expectations
• - A story with an ambiguous ending in which the not-so-virtuous heroine was victorious
• - The way that modern, high-achieving women are troubled by similar outdated belief systems as are presented in the story
• - The power of “the stool” which appears repeatedly in the story: how to allow yourself to pause, and make a conscious decision from stillness rather than feeling we need to be constantly busy
• - Fiber and cloth offer a powerful set of metaphors, but we also celebrate the meditative practice of working with your hands. Contemporary research shows that dand crafting is a great way to deal with anxiety.
• - Fite fuaite: an Irish term meaning “interwoven or inextricably connected.” Manchán Magan, a teacher, broadcaster, and ambassador for the Irish language writes about the Irish words for weaving at making.ie
• - The final word from Nicole: trust the process, but also take your action steps

Our Music

Music on the show is by the...