Dr Sharon Blackie – Program Lead
Sharon is an award-winning writer, and an internationally recognised teacher with a professional background in psychology and mythology. Her unique approach to working with the mythic imagination, fairy tales and folklore highlights the insights these traditions can offer us into authentic and meaningful ways of being which are founded on a grounding in the native wisdom traditions of the West, and above all on cultivating deep and enduring relationships to the places we inhabit.
As well as writing four books of fiction and nonfiction, including the bestselling If Women Rose Rooted, her writing has appeared in several international media outlets, among them the Guardian, the Irish Times, and the Scotsman. Her books have been translated into several languages, and she has been interviewed by the BBC, US public radio and other broadcasters on her areas of expertise.
A life-changing and profoundly transformative journey through the Valley of the Shadow of Death at age 60, following a lymphoma diagnosis, has led her to focus her attention on elderhood as time of great flourishing, and on the ways in which we might navigate the journey with vitality, creativity and vision.