
Beyond Safety, painting by Dr. Semerit Strachan
About the Festival
A Message from our Sacred ECHOES of the Well Sisterhood


“While we might feel small, separate, and all alone, our people have never been more tightly tethered. The question’s not if we will weather this unknown, but how we will weather the unknown together.”
~ The Miracle of Morning by Amanda Gorman

Beyond Safety, painting by Dr. Semerit Strachan
About the Festival
A Message from the Sacred ECHOES of the Well Sisterhood


“While we might feel small, separate, and all alone, our people have never been more tightly tethered. The question’s not if we will weather this unknown, but how we will weather the unknown together.”
~ The Miracle of Morning by Amanda Gorman
Festival Media
Opening, Interviews with the Presenters, and Closing
This overview of the ECHOES of Your Sacred Well Festival is provided to allow you to learn more about the powHER-packed Festival, which spanned two days. You are invited to witness each Presenters’ gifts as they prepare to share their teachings.
Festival Overview – Day One
Originally recorded May 6, 2023
Festival Overview – Day Two
Originally recorded May 7, 2023
Celebration and Dance Party
Enjoy the Festival on Your Own Time
For those who would like to see each Presenters full presentation, we are offering access to all of the replays. In addition, many Presenters have provided a free gift for you as their Thank You for your patronage. Access the recordings and gifts – available for 3 months – all for just $37!
Shiloh – I need that blurb here about how the money goes to help the ICF support the programs and events of the Museum and employ women. I can’t find it, and you know me – I’m just blunt. Can you write the blurb so it’s in proper Musea-speak? Thank you!
Festival Media
Opening, Interviews with the Presenters, and Closing
This overview of the ECHOES of Your Sacred Well Festival is provided to allow you to learn more about the powHER-packed Festival, which spanned two days. You are invited to witness each Presenters’ gifts as they prepare to share their teachings.
Festival Overview – Day One
Originally recorded on May 6, 2023
Festival Overview – Day Two
Originally recorded on May 7, 2023
Celebration and Dance Party
Enjoy the Festival on Your Own Time
For those who would like to see each Presenters full presentation, we are offering access to all of the replays. In addition, many Presenters have provided a free gift for you as their Thank You for your patronage. Access the recordings and gifts – available for 3 months – all for just $37!
Shiloh – I need that blurb here about how the money goes to help the ICF support the programs and events of the Museum and employ women. I can’t find it, and you know me – I’m just blunt. Can you write the blurb so it’s in proper Musea-speak? Thank you!
Presenters
We invite you to explore information about each Presenter, including a brief bio and synopsis of their presentation.

About Anasuya Isaacs
Mystic Midwife, Conscious Channel for MotherGod & the Black Madonna, Spiritual Counselor, Writer and Painter. Anasuya combines her many gifts into healing experiences that shift grief, trauma, and shame. She facilitates experiential programs that ignite the sacred alchemy between theater, poetry, song and art to transmute trauma and systemic oppression in several countries.
The Black Madonna
Exploring The Black Madonna through sacred images as the continuation of the “Great Mother,” the Feminine Face of God, who has been worshipped for over 60,000 years all around the world. We will be also be exploring how She is alive and in what ways establishing a relationship with our Divine Mother could bless every area of our lives now.

About Dr. Cheryl Boudreaux
Cheryl is a certified Holistic Healer and Crystal Master and is attuned in Reiki. She is a Red Thread Guide and a member of the Journeywoman Guild. Cheryl finds joy in photography, art, existential knowledge and mystical spiritual pursuits. Her passion is bringing together various areas of interest in an artsy, esoteric fantasy novel composed of prose and pictures – “We are Beings of Light and Dark: A Philosophical and Spiritual Exploration of the Meaning of Life”.
Big Ideas and Writing: Being in the Flow of Self-Expression
A session for those who often have big ideas and feel like poetry is not their most expressive way of communicating ideas. Participants need to bring a pen or sharpie and a journal. You will be guided to experience a kind of imaginative cultural anthropology in which you learn the art of flowing or freely expressing what you imagine, see, hear and think onto paper.

About Vanita Chauhan
Accountant (CPA exam in process) Permaculturist, (Sustainable Living Design Systems), Visionary Painting in Soil Biology and Cosmos (in progress). Medical Professional, specialising in Addiction Recovery. Over 20 Years of A to Z Healing ARTS Studies, specializing in Sound and Distance Healing.
7 Energetic Systems and Healing Practices
Journey through the 7 Chakra Energetic System. Painting, meditation, breathwork, drumming, crystal bowl sound healing, and ecstatic trance dancing. (5 minutes per chakra = 35 mins and 5 min introduction).

About Isabelle Stark
Isabelle Guzman-Stark, she has been a minister of Spiritual Science for 15 years, she enjoys teaching and helping women to connect with their spirituality, their bodies, their sensuality. She facilitates women’s circle. She is a bilingual woman and her roots are Venezuelan, and dancing to the beat of the drums is her signature. She is a intuitive healer, holistic herbalist and loves gardening. She is a curandera and uses her psychic gifts to guide others to find their path. She specializes on interfaith weddings, ceremonies and tarot readings.
Embracing Our Sensuality through Dance
We as women have forgotten our true essence. Come, dance and allow your body to flow and be NATURAL! Let your body move, let your body talk, let yourself feel what your body is craving for. Can you listen to her? Do you know in which language she speaks?. Sensuality is about connecting to your physical-spiritual senses, to your skin, to your aura, to the bones of your bones, to the hands of your Grandmother and to the womb of the ancestors. Would you reawaken what has been dormant? In dancing your sensuality, you will experience movement, music and touch to release what doesn’t serve you and remember what has been lost. NO DANCING EXPERIENCE IS NECESSARY. Your body knows how to remember. Sensuality restores your inner calling as a woman.

About Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates
Author, Artist, Educator, Coach – Weaver of Wisdom… Sumaiyah is the Executive Director of the MUSEA Intentional Creativity Foundation and one of the Member Engagement Team Leaders for the Sacred ECHOES of the Well sisterhood. She uses the art form of weaving to interlace the threads of her BEing into the Fabric of Her Life. Sumaiyah teaches how to apply the principles of Intentional Creativity to many different art forms, weaving its healing salve into all aspects of life.
Weaving Ancestral Wisdom
Weaving Ancestral Wisdom is a journey through the history of weaving in the African diaspora (more specifically, Ghana) and its connection to the storytelling of the people of that area. The colors they chose, the patterns they create, the unspoken language in color/shape/symbol, the care taken to weave the cloth – all of these tell the story of those peoples. In Intentional Creativity, we also tell our stories through our art. Let’s take a look at the art form of weaving and how it can be both a practice in Intentional Creativity and a meditation practice. How can we keep this “unspoken” storytelling tradition alive? How can we tell our stories through weaving the fabric of our life?

About Dr. Semerit Strachan
Semerit is the co-founder and Elder facilitator of the Sacred ECHOES of the Well Circle. Since 2013, she has grown and been nourished in Intentional Creativity. Semerit is an Elder in the African community in Minneapolis, MN, and worked nationally and internationally as a medical doctor for 40 years prior to her retirement in 2018. As a Life Coach and artist, her passion lies in facilitating women—particularly of African heritage—to access their Soul dreams through painting, drawing, movement and reconnecting to cultural symbols.
Just Doodle It!
Your Art Is Oxygen: Just Doodle It! is an opportunity to discover the secret powers of doodling—something you may remember doing as a child. Something that is as natural as breathing. Many people find themselves mindlessly drawing lines, figures, patterns in margins or on scraps of paper while on the phone, while bored at meetings, or while thinking on a challenge. In this presentation, we will experience three ways to intentionally bring an inquiry to the doodling process, get the logical mind out of the way, receive answers from the doodle. You will leave this session having glimpsed the wisdom deep within yourself, knowing that you are loved and feeling you are never alone.

About Chatelle Jeram
Chatelle is a certified Intentional Creativity Coach & Teacher and an EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) Practitioner based in the United Kingdom. She is a Wellness Coach and a guide. Chatelle enjoys collaborating with others on their path of nurturing themselves and designing a life they love. She has chosen to not remain entwined in ancestral trauma and oppressive structures.
Joy in the Mundane
Joy in the mundane is for anyone who seeks and questions what is this life? Maybe you refer to it as a daily grind, drudgery, even enslavement. You might be questioning Why am I spending this precious life striving for my survival needs and scheduling when I can have fun? You might be confining the experience of feeling happiness and joy into neat boxes with lids on that go up on the shelf until it is deemed okay to open the box and feel the light uplift of joy. What if we can experience joy in simple acts of living? Setting the table, updating a spreadsheet, mopping the floor, waiting for the bus. With one piece of copy paper and a range of coloured markers, let’s experiment with bringing in colour and unexpected forms. Let’s invite delight to have a seat at the table as we create an experience with markers and paper! You will leave with a felt experience of joy in your body!

About Milagros Suriano-Rivera
Milagros Suriano-Rivera is a multi-media artist and Color of Woman Intentional Creativity® Teacher, as well as the Vice President of Programing for the Intentional Creativity Foundation. She has become a beloved presence ambassador of Intentional Creativity for MUSEA through her leadership in Hearth Tending for the community. As a multimedia artist she loves creating works in mixed-media, paper clay, and paper jewelry. Milagros has been showing up in true authenticity, holding space, witnessing, leading community circles, supporting our student body, as well as being a voice of inspiration for our Sacred ECHOES of the Well Women of Color Circle.

About Lauren Adorno-Weatherford
Lauren is an Afro Latina, a proud Puerto Rican rooted in the legacy of the African Diaspora. She hosts artist circles for black and brown women and is a Co-Founder and Elder facilitator with the Sacred ECHOES of the Well Circle. She considers her work Medicine for the Soul. International Travel, shamanism and creativity are her lifeline and sacred work. Currently she is living an intergenerational family life; bringing her mother and grandchildren to the canvas. Her deepest desire is to make her ancestors smile by leaving strong feminine
images as her legacy.

About Michelle LaForest Roberts
I am a Haitian-African American. I am a mother of four, step mother of one, a grandmother and great grandmother. I became an ordained Interfaith/Interspiritual Minister in 2012. My soul work is assisting women who have been repressed, oppressed, suppressed and depressed in becoming whole by tuning into their true nature and finding their voice. I am a Color of Women Teacher in Training, Red Thread Circle Guide in training and a student at Musea University. I am also a member of Sacred Echoes of the Well through Musea.
Poetic Promptings
During the summit, I plan to speak about why I love writing poetry, how I got started, how inspiration comes to me. I plan to read one or 2 of my poems and then invite participants to write their own either using mine as a prompt, whether it’s a word, a sentence or paragraph, or whatever they desire.

About Yannah Evans
My creativity was inspired by my grandmother who taught me how to crochet and embroider and my mother who taught me how to sew. In college, I took creative classes such as African mask making, batik, and Afro-Haitian dance. My most formal art training was the Color of Woman course with Shiloh Sophia. The experience has been most rewarding because it’s not only about art but also life. As a mental health advocate for black woman, it is my goal to bring art to disenfranchised communities.
Capturing Dreams Deferred
When you were a child, did you have dreams of doing big things or being important and special? Perhaps being a famous actor, dancer, a doctor, a fireperson, President of the United States, etc.? I know I did. What happened to those dreams? For many women those dreams have been deferred, put on the backburner, or totally discarded because life took over… marriage, kids, job, career and more. We will read the poem by Langston Hughes, “Harlem” also referred as “A Dream Deferred”, and assess how this poem is reflective of your life through metacognitive drawing. We will also focus on our hearts to hear answers from our inner self as to the dreams we can still bring to life.

About Paula deJoie
Paula was born and raised in Los Angeles, California and moved to Berkeley to attend University where she degreed in Fine Art and Law. Her art has always reflected both her personal history and her concerns with cultural/political issues. Now her major concern is to provide safe, sacred places for Elders to share their stories with words and pictures. She has used her Red Thread Guide training to lead such circles called My Telling. She has also created a deck of Ancestor Wisdom Healing Cards collaging vintage family photos and inspired by both of her beloved grandmothers.
Telling Our Stories
We as a community strive to be intentional in our relationship with life, to honor the flora, the fauna, the fungi, the water, the air, the minerals, stories, cultures, traditions and sacred places of the Many Lands in which we find our sense of place and practice Intentional Creativity. We acknowledge with humility and gratitude our interconnection, our place in the cycle, and our sacred responsibility of reciprocation, love, and respect towards our precious and beautiful home, the Earth and all beings.
Presenters
We invite you to explore information about each Presenter, including a brief bio and synopsis of their presentation.

About Anasuya Isaacs
Mystic Midwife, Conscious Channel for MotherGod & the Black Madonna, Spiritual Counselor, Writer and Painter. Anasuya combines her many gifts into healing experiences that shift grief, trauma, and shame. She facilitates experiential programs that ignite the sacred alchemy between theater, poetry, song and art to transmute trauma and systemic oppression in several countries.
The Black Madonna
Exploring The Black Madonna through sacred images as the continuation of the “Great Mother,” the Feminine Face of God, who has been worshipped for over 60,000 years all around the world. We will be also be exploring how She is alive and in what ways establishing a relationship with our Divine Mother could bless every area of our lives now.

About Dr. Cheryl Boudreaux
Cheryl is a certified Holistic Healer and Crystal Master and is attuned in Reiki. She is a Red Thread Guide and a member of the Journeywoman Guild. Cheryl finds joy in photography, art, existential knowledge and mystical spiritual pursuits. Her passion is bringing together various areas of interest in an artsy, esoteric fantasy novel composed of prose and pictures – “We are Beings of Light and Dark: A Philosophical and Spiritual Exploration of the Meaning of Life”.
Big Ideas and Writing: Being in the Flow of Self-Expression
A session for those who often have big ideas and feel like poetry is not their most expressive way of communicating ideas. Participants need to bring a pen or sharpie and a journal. You will be guided to experience a kind of imaginative cultural anthropology in which you learn the art of flowing or freely expressing what you imagine, see, hear and think onto paper.

About Vanita Chauhan
Accountant (CPA exam in process) Permaculturist, (Sustainable Living Design Systems), Visionary Painting in Soil Biology and Cosmos (in progress). Medical Professional, specialising in Addiction Recovery. Over 20 Years of A to Z Healing ARTS Studies, specializing in Sound and Distance Healing.
7 Energetic Systems and Healing Practices
Journey through the 7 Chakra Energetic System. Painting, meditation, breathwork, drumming, crystal bowl sound healing, and ecstatic trance dancing.

About Isabelle Stark
Isabelle Guzman-Stark, she has been a minister of Spiritual Science for 15 years, she enjoys teaching and helping women to connect with their spirituality, their bodies, their sensuality. She facilitates women’s circle. She is a bilingual woman and her roots are Venezuelan, and dancing to the beat of the drums is her signature. She is a intuitive healer, holistic herbalist and loves gardening. She is a curandera and uses her psychic gifts to guide others to find their path. She specializes on interfaith weddings, ceremonies and tarot readings.
Embracing Our Sensuality through Dance
We as women have forgotten our true essence. Come, dance and allow your body to flow and be NATURAL! Let your body move, let your body talk, let yourself feel what your body is craving for. Can you listen to her? Do you know in which language she speaks?. Sensuality is about connecting to your physical-spiritual senses, to your skin, to your aura, to the bones of your bones, to the hands of your Grandmother and to the womb of the ancestors. Would you reawaken what has been dormant? In dancing your sensuality, you will experience movement, music and touch to release what doesn’t serve you and remember what has been lost. NO DANCING EXPERIENCE IS NECESSARY. Your body knows how to remember. Sensuality restores your inner calling as a woman.

About Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates
Author, Artist, Educator, Coach – Weaver of Wisdom… Sumaiyah is the Executive Director of the MUSEA Intentional Creativity Foundation and one of the Member Engagement Team Leaders for the Sacred ECHOES of the Well sisterhood. She uses the art form of weaving to interlace the threads of her BEing into the Fabric of Her Life. Sumaiyah teaches how to apply the principles of Intentional Creativity to many different art forms, weaving its healing salve into all aspects of life.
Weaving Ancestral Wisdom
Weaving Ancestral Wisdom is a journey through the history of weaving in the African diaspora (more specifically, Ghana) and its connection to the storytelling of the people of that area. The colors they chose, the patterns they create, the unspoken language in color/shape/symbol, the care taken to weave the cloth – all of these tell the story of those peoples. In Intentional Creativity, we also tell our stories through our art. Let’s take a look at the art form of weaving and how it can be both a practice in Intentional Creativity and a meditation practice. How can we keep this “unspoken” storytelling tradition alive? How can we tell our stories through weaving the fabric of our life?

About Dr. Semerit Strachan
Semerit is the co-founder and Elder facilitator of the Sacred ECHOES of the Well Circle. Since 2013, she has grown and been nourished in Intentional Creativity. Semerit is an Elder in the African community in Minneapolis, MN, and worked nationally and internationally as a medical doctor for 40 years prior to her retirement in 2018. As a Life Coach and artist, her passion lies in facilitating women—particularly of African heritage—to access their Soul dreams through painting, drawing, movement and reconnecting to cultural symbols.
Just Doodle It!
Your Art Is Oxygen: Just Doodle It! is an opportunity to discover the secret powers of doodling—something you may remember doing as a child. Something that is as natural as breathing. Many people find themselves mindlessly drawing lines, figures, patterns in margins or on scraps of paper while on the phone, while bored at meetings, or while thinking on a challenge.
In this presentation, we will experience three ways to: intentionally bring an inquiry to the doodling process, get the logical mind out of the way, receive answers from the doodle. You will leave this session having glimpsed the wisdom deep within
yourself, knowing that you are loved and feeling you are never alone.

About Chatelle Jeram
Chatelle is a certified Intentional Creativity Coach & Teacher and an EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) Practitioner based in the United Kingdom. She is a Wellness Coach and a guide. Chatelle enjoys collaborating with others on their path of nurturing themselves and designing a life they love. She has chosen to not remain entwined in ancestral trauma and oppressive structures.
Joy in the Mundane
Joy in the mundane is for anyone who seeks and questions what is this life? Maybe you refer to it as a daily grind, drudgery, even enslavement. You might be questioning Why am I spending this precious life striving for my survival needs and scheduling when I can have fun? You might be confining the experience of feeling happiness and joy into neat boxes with lids on that go up on the shelf until it is deemed okay to open the box and feel the light uplift of joy. What if we can experience joy in simple acts of living? Setting the table, updating a spreadsheet, mopping the floor, waiting for the bus. With one piece of copy paper and a range of coloured markers, let’s experiment with bringing in colour and unexpected forms. Let’s invite delight to have a seat at the table as we create an experience with markers and paper! You will leave with a felt experience of joy in your body!

About Milagros Suriano-Rivera
Milagros Suriano-Rivera is a multi-media artist and Color of Woman Intentional Creativity® Teacher, as well as the Vice President of Programing for the Intentional Creativity Foundation. She has become a beloved presence ambassador of Intentional Creativity for MUSEA through her leadership in Hearth Tending for the community. As a multimedia artist she loves creating works in mixed-media, paper clay, and paper jewelry. Milagros has been showing up in true authenticity, holding space, witnessing, leading community circles, supporting our student body, as well as being a voice of inspiration for our Sacred ECHOES of the Well Women of Color Circle.

About Lauren Adorno-Weatherford
Lauren is an Afro Latina, a proud Puerto Rican rooted in the legacy of the African Diaspora. She hosts artist circles for black and brown women and is a Co-Founder and Elder facilitator with the Sacred ECHOES of the Well Circle. She considers her work Medicine for the Soul. International Travel, shamanism and creativity are her lifeline and sacred work. Currently she is living an intergenerational family life; bringing her mother and grandchildren to the canvas. Her deepest desire is to make her ancestors smile by leaving strong feminine
images as her legacy.

About Michelle LaForest Roberts
I am a Haitian-African American. I am a mother of four, step mother of one, a grandmother and great grandmother. I became an ordained Interfaith/Interspiritual Minister in 2012. My soul work is assisting women who have been repressed, oppressed, suppressed and depressed in becoming whole by tuning into their true nature and finding their voice. I am a Color of Women Teacher in Training, Red Thread Circle Guide in training and a student at Musea University. I am also a member of Sacred Echoes of the Well through Musea.
Poetic Promptings
During the summit, I plan to speak about why I love writing poetry, how I got started, how inspiration comes to me. I plan to read one or 2 of my poems and then invite participants to write their own either using mine as a prompt, whether it’s a word, a sentence or paragraph, or whatever they desire.

About Yannah Evans
My creativity was inspired by my grandmother who taught me how to crochet and embroider and my mother who taught me how to sew. In college, I took creative classes such as African mask making, batik, and Afro-Haitian dance. My most formal art training was the Color of Woman course with Shiloh Sophia. The experience has been most rewarding because it’s not only about art but also life. As a mental health advocate for black woman, it is my goal to bring art to disenfranchised communities.
Capturing Dreams Deferred
When you were a child, did you have dreams of doing big things or being important and special? Perhaps being a famous actor, dancer, a doctor, a fireperson, President of the United States, etc.? I know I did. What happened to those dreams? For many women those dreams have been deferred, put on the backburner, or totally discarded because life took over… marriage, kids, job, career and more. We will read the poem by Langston Hughes, “Harlem” also referred as “A Dream Deferred”, and assess how this poem is reflective of your life through metacognitive drawing. We will also focus on our hearts to hear answers from our inner self as to the dreams we can still bring to life.

About Paula deJoie
Paula was born and raised in Los Angeles, California and moved to Berkeley to attend University where she degreed in Fine Art and Law. Her art has always reflected both her personal history and her concerns with cultural/political issues. Now her major concern is to provide safe, sacred places for Elders to share their stories with words and pictures. She has used her Red Thread Guide training to lead such circles called My Telling. She has also created a deck of Ancestor Wisdom Healing Cards collaging vintage family photos and inspired by both of her beloved grandmothers.
Telling Our Stories
Everyone has a unique story to tell. As a certified Red Thread Guide, I create sacred pathways to our Ancestors by sharing family photos, stories and painting techniques as used in my Ancestor Wisdom Healing Cards. In our My Telling circle, attendees will bring their own family photos and stories to share along with a few art supplies to collage. A materials list will be provided.
We as a community strive to be intentional in our relationship with life, to honor the flora, the fauna, the fungi, the water, the air, the minerals, stories, cultures, traditions and sacred places of the Many Lands in which we find our sense of place and practice Intentional Creativity. We acknowledge with humility and gratitude our interconnection, our place in the cycle, and our sacred responsibility of reciprocation, love, and respect towards our precious and beautiful home, the Earth and all beings.

Thank you for witnessing the Festival.
We invite you to leave your comments and reflections below!
Special thanks to:
Elders Semerit Strachan and Lauren Adorno-Weatherford for their vision and leadership of the Sacred ECHOES of the Well Sisterhood.
Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates for her leadership and dedication to the Festival.
Shiloh Sophia for her dedication to uplifting women of color and giving them a platform to speak their truth.
Festival Page Design and Concept
Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates, Director of Curatorial Design
Festival Virtual Presentation
Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates, Executive Director – MUSEA Intentional Creativity Foundation
Collaborative Curation
Elder Semerit Strachan
Elder Lauren Adorno-Weatherford
Promotion and Communications
Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates, Sarah Mardell, and Michelle Baldovin

Thank you for witnessing the Festival.
We invite you to leave your comments and reflections below!
Special thanks to:
Elders Semerit Strachan and Lauren Adorno-Weatherford for their vision and leadership of the Sacred ECHOES of the Well Sisterhood.
Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates for her leadership and dedication to the Festival.
Shiloh Sophia for her dedication to uplifting women of color and giving them a platform to speak their truth.
Festival Page Design and Concept
Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates, Director of Curatorial Design
Festival Virtual Presentation
Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates, Executive Director – MUSEA Intentional Creativity Foundation
Collaborative Curation
Elder Semerit Strachan
Elder Lauren Adorno-Weatherford
Promotion and Communications
Sumaiyah Wysdom Yates, Sarah Mardell, and Michelle Baldovin
Inspired to go on your own Medicine Painting journey with Shiloh Sophia?
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