Women Who Run with the Wolves
Ninth Chapter: Sealskin, Soulskin
TBD, March 2026, MST
In Seal Skin, Soul Skin, Clarissa Pinkola Estés offers one of her most poignant teachings on the loss and recovery of the instinctual self. Through the ancient selkie myth, we explore what happens when a woman’s “soul skin”, her deep intuitive knowing, creativity, sensuality, and inner wildness, is hidden, taken, or forgotten in the name of love, belonging, or duty. This chapter speaks tenderly to those who have adapted too far from their own nature and now feel a quiet ache, restlessness, or grief without a clear name.
In this session, we’ll reflect on the psychic cost of living too long without our soul skin, and the courage it takes to reclaim it. Together, we’ll explore themes of exile and return, the slow erosion of vitality, and the sacred necessity of going back to what is essential, even when it disrupts the life we’ve built. This chapter is about remembering who you were before you learned to stay, shrink, or forget, and about the deep healing that comes when a woman chooses to return to herself.
You’re warmly invited to join the ongoing Women Who Run with the Wolves book club on Insight Timer, whether you’re reading for the first time, returning to a beloved chapter, or listening with your body as much as your mind.
Reflection Questions
The Selkie Tale of Sealskin, Soulskin
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Where in your life do you sense a quiet longing, restlessness, or grief that may be pointing to a part of you that has been set aside or hidden?
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What has served as your “soul skin” in the past? Those activities, rhythms, or ways of being that once made you feel alive, intuitive, and whole?
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In what ways might love, responsibility, or adaptation have slowly pulled you away from your instinctual nature rather than overtly taken it?
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What signs, physical, emotional, or spiritual, tell you when you are living without your soul skin for too long?
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What fears arise when you imagine reclaiming what is essential to you, even if it disrupts the life you’ve carefully built?
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What would honoring your soul skin look like in small, realistic ways right now, without needing to abandon your commitments or identity?
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If you trusted that returning to yourself is not a betrayal of others, but an act of integrity, what might you choose differently?
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What does “going back to the sea” symbolize for you at this stage of your life: rest, truth, solitude, creativity, freedom, or something else entirely?