I’m not just here to sell you metal designs. Sure, seeing my art out in the world would be a dream come true, and I want nothing more than to see it expanding with life and vitality as others enjoy and share it. But the artist within me is starving for something much deeper than a transaction. It's a longing to become more expressive in the wild, beautiful, vibrant woman I have always been, but with love and acceptance now—and I want other women to want, fight, and find that within themselves too. Whether with other women or with ourselves, it is good medicine.
Since January, I have been slowly reading the book Women Who Run With Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Ph.D., and I strongly recommend buying a copy if you are on the journey of finding your wild woman within. It is a book that I will return to regularly for its deep reminders on listening to my intuition and growing in my individuality. Yesterday, as I read a chapter at a family campout, this quote on medicine stuck out to me and has now become one of my favorites:
“Hold out for the right medicine. You will recognize it because it makes your life stronger rather than weaker.”
The wild woman within us is that “right medicine,” and expanding the knowledge of who we are, who we want to be, and finding our voice is not only how we find her, but how we bring life and vitality to her in our expressions.
Finding Room to Expand
About three months ago, I, unfortunately, and with much frustration, fractured both of my ankles while bouldering indoors. Bouldering had become a new adventure I shared with my teen son and husband. After years of no weight training and due to navigating osteoporosis—which happened after being post-menopausal for 12 years following a hysterectomy as part of my breast cancer treatment (my type of cancer loved my estrogen!)—I was on a mission to get back to building my bones. This double break definitely threw a huge wrench in my plans, not only fitness-wise, but for my goals and plans for the new year.
But I’m a big believer in finding a way to grow in any experience.
Though my sudden immobility felt like I had been placed in a cage, it forced me to slow down and look at myself in new ways, reconnect with the woman I’ve always wanted to be, reflect, and reset how I wanted to show up in the world. It reminded me to expand, to take up more space in this world, and to reclaim my voice.
Rooted in the Struggle
This is really hard for me to speak about, but like the archetypal story of the "ugly duckling" referenced in Women Who Run With Wolves, I have always felt like the misfit in the room. I was bullied for my height and for having features that now, as women, we might pay top dollar for, including my lips. Whether because of social isolation or hearing it from direct family members, I’ve always felt too odd, too silly, too much, too different, too difficult, and too much of whatever mainstream American or Utah LDS culture tried to force out of me as a woman.
And though it has taken many lessons from my body—ones that I am truly grateful for, from breast cancer to my recent ankle fractures—my intuition and consciousness of who I am has grown stronger and stronger. Now in my early 40s, I am better able to see all of the versions of myself I’ve been over these four decades. I am better able to have love, empathy, and grace towards myself in these reflections, even when I know that I had a lot to learn and to change to show up as the woman I want to be today, and for as long as I am on this beautiful earth.
These versions of myself have challenged me and have helped me grow deep roots in my journey of expression. Don’t we all want and deserve to feel rooted in our expression? To reflect not in shame, but in the understanding that there are great lessons in our bodies and in this earth if we only slow down enough to listen.
The question is: can we become who we want to be in all our beauty, love, and acceptance of ourselves and our journeys, even in our messiness, without accepting the many facets of our expressive identities? And can true, liberating expression truly come without struggles? Personally, I have learned to not fight the struggles that I know are now inevitable in this thing we call life. Would I love it if life were always smooth, never with a hiccup, bump in the road, or frustration because I can’t control the outcome? I no longer think I would say yes to that question. I am most proud of who I have become and the goals I have achieved following a lesson that has come from struggle, because it has allowed me to root out deeper in my expression. As Dr. Estés writes:
"The scars of our past are not things to hide, they are proof of our resilience. To love a woman is to learn to love her instinctual nature, her wildness, and her scars."
It’s the most difficult moments in life that remind us who we are and who we want to be. Struggles can remind us of our humanity, to feel our emotions, to remember our resilience, and to reinvigorate our will to live. And expression is to live fully. In that, it can channel a desire to take hold of what we can control and work to set in place the life we want for ourselves.
Living in Expressive Color
Sometimes fighting for the life we want starts with expanding how we feel about ourselves. If we don’t feel that we deserve the life we dream up—if we don’t feel that dream deep in our bones and in the expression of who we are and want to be—then how will we ever obtain it? We won’t, and no one else will do it for us. We have got to want it so deeply that we acknowledge and find acceptance in the patience, perseverance, and the struggles that will be necessary to make that dream a reality. Nothing comes for free, and that which does rarely equates to the life we truly want. So when you think you are stuck, I hope you will plant a small seed for expression in your mind, heart, and soul. Touch the parts of you, both physically and mentally, that you have forgotten or hidden away, in all your gradients. For we are not living in black and white; we are living in expressive color.
I choose to live in my expressive color, beauty, and vibrancy, and I no longer care if that ruffles someone else's feathers.
I have lived too long not loving myself because it made other people uncomfortable—particularly other women. Expressing myself has often come with disdain from other women, including my own mothers; women who should have taught me a true sense of self-love and expression.
But looking back with clearer eyes, how could they teach me what they didn't know? How could they pass down permission if they themselves were never allowed to find expression in their own wild womanhood? They couldn't. And if I am being entirely honest with myself, I have to acknowledge that I, too, have had moments where I perpetuated the same harmful narratives. I have known jealousy. I have felt animosity. In my own unhealed spaces, I have taken part in the very rhetoric that divides us.
Burying my true self, and projecting that pain onto others, is a legacy I am actively fighting to stop with me.
My own daughter is 19 now, and the reality is that I’ve likely passed some of those unhealed pieces down to her along the way. We are human, and we make mistakes. But my deepest hope is that by actively creating a space of unconditional love, by letting her find her own fierce expression, and by giving each other the room to breathe and stumble, we are actively correcting those generational echoes together. Healing is a work in progress for both of us.
Like referenced in Women Who Run With Wolves, I have had to learn to mother the “unmothered” parts of myself. I have seen too often how the unmothered parts of ourselves as women can cast animosity, jealousy, disdain, and hatred towards another woman who is feeling love and joy towards herself.
Why do we do that as women?
We always want to blame the patriarchy for holding us back, and yes, there are absolutely things that still need to change and be corrected within those systems because there is deep healing that needs to be done. There are still too many spaces where women are treated as objects rather than whole beings. But as women, we can be really hurtful to each other, and I am over it. Most are not acting like "girls' girls," and that is why I am all for quality versus quantity when it comes to having female relationships in my life. I want to believe this will change, but will it?
Deep down, I don’t believe most women currently have the structural support or the internal tools to challenge the harmful narratives we actively take part in—the ones that try to quiet the vibrant expression of wild women who know themselves. So while I will fiercely stand entirely alone as a woman if I have to rather than silencing my inner wild woman just to be accepted, I choose to walk forward with empathy. We all need space to heal, to make mistakes, and to grow out of our own darkness at our own pace. We cannot invite women to reclaim their instinctual, wild nature if we do not also grant them the grace to be beautifully, messily human in the process.
Living the Path: Lessons in the Mirror
As I committed to wearing these earrings every single day this last week—through the grit of the studio, the heavy lifting of building my bones, and the routine of daily life—I found myself looking in the mirror and catching a glimpse of something else that routinely draws attention: my chest tattoo.
It's funny how many people have projected negative feelings or judgments onto this piece of beautiful ink. But to me, it is a living map of my family's resilience—beautifully brought to life by my best friend Micki (if you are local to Utah, you can find her work highlighted over on my Friends & Creators page). The center butterfly is me. The two outer butterflies are my children. And the intricate roses winding between us represent my husband.
Years ago, as a very young mother drowning in a deep, dark depression, my husband handed me a framed picture of roses with a quote that I still look at to this day:
“One of the most tragic things I know about human nature is that all of us tend to put off living. We are all dreaming of some magical rose garden over the horizon instead of enjoying the roses that are blooming outside our windows today.” — Dale Carnegie
In a world where it is so easy to quiet a woman down, my husband did the opposite. He loved me until I learned to love myself, never once holding me back. He helped me look outside the window and start living.
Butterflies and roses are the ultimate definition of resilience and expression—neither one blooms without a massive struggle against their own constraints. We hold so much power in how we treat the people we love; we can either create a living hell or a little piece of heaven on earth for each other. It is a messy, imperfect human journey to accept ourselves and create space for others to do the same, but hell if it isn’t worth trying. I want that expressive color for myself, my husband, my kids, and for every single woman or anyone else reading this.
Symbolism in the Studio: Reclaiming the Wild Woman
This is why reclaiming our inner Wild Woman archetype is so vital. She is the version of us that doesn't look to others for permission to exist, to expand, or to create. She knows that her value isn’t determined by how quietly she can sit in a pre-made mold.
When I finally sat down at my laser cutter to design again, this exact journey poured directly into the metal. I created the Expressive Leaf Mandala Earrings as a tangible reminder of this exact evolution. Look closely at the pattern—it captures the delicate, intricate veins of a forest canopy. To me, it represents how we quietly cultivate our strength deep beneath the surface, letting our roots grow strong during our darkest, most immobile struggles, before finally unfurling our unique patterns for the entire world to see.
Bring the Expression
We are not meant to live dimmed down or muted. This isn't just a poetic sentiment; it is a physiological truth. Decades of psychological data and neurological research on creative processing prove that transforming our internal struggles into tangible, creative expression actively rewires our nervous systems. Studies show that when we give a physical form to our unseen battles—whether through art like metalwork, writing, or movement—we actively reduce cortisol levels, move trauma out of the body, and reclaim our personal agency. Creative expression is quite literally physical medicine for a caged spirit.
But please, don't box yourself in. There are limitless ways to express your inner wild woman, and you do not have to stick to just one path. You don't have to do it perfectly. Hell, you can do it completely messy—but you have to do it. You will find your way simply through the act of trying.
Above all, remember to be fiercely empathetic with yourself on this journey. Healing is not a transformation that happens overnight; it is reclaimed one small, intentional step at a time. As you take control and put the effort into showing up for yourself, you will start to see the pieces of your life come together in beautiful, unexpected ways. But you have to be patient with the process. Give yourself the room to breathe, to stumble, and to grow.
Touch your bones, listen to your intuition, and hold out for the right medicine. Find the wild woman inside you, plant that small seed of expression, and let yourself bloom in full, brilliant color.
If you are a woman who—because of rigid social dynamics, religion, family structures, or cultural suppression—has felt muted, I hope you keep coming back to this space. If you, like me, have lost a core part of yourself and are on a fierce journey to reconnect with your soul, your wildness, and your sensuality, know that you are never walking alone. There will always be a place for you here.
You got this girl.
How does the invitation to reclaim your own wild expression show up in your life? Have you ever had to break out of a pre-made mold or push through the old rules to let your true voice breathe? Let’s talk about it in the comments below.
To carry this reminder with you on your own path, you can explore the Expressive Leaf Mandala Earrings right here in the studio shop. Don't forget to subscribe to The Studio Journal newsletter below to stay connected with our community.
Thank you for being here. See you on the beloved path.
Read Along With Me
I am slowly chewing my way through Women Who Run With Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés. If you’d like to pick up a copy and journey through it with me, you can find it here:
About the Artist
Bre is the metal artisan behind Via Amata Designs. Her true craft was forged through the fire of resilience, navigating heavy life chapters—from surviving childhood abuse to standing 12 years breast cancer-free and managing osteoporosis by lifting heavy.
Working alongside her husband as a maker family and inspired by her circle of strong women, she transforms industrial metals into intentional, hand-finished jewelry. Her work is rooted in sacred geometry and ancient symbols, built to serve as enduring talismans for your own beloved path.
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