Walk with Ber-Henda Williams: Remembering Our Natural Ways of Being

Aug 4

What happens when we begin to see our lives through the rhythms of living systems instead of the expectations of modern culture?

In this wide-ranging walking conversation, Susan and Ber-Henda Williams explore seasons, leadership, legacy, awe, intuition, and the forgotten milestones that once helped communities honor every stage of life.

Show Notes

Some conversations begin with a destination. Others begin with curiosity.

This walk with Ber-Henda Williams became an exploration of what we've forgotten about being human.

Together, Susan and Ber-Henda reflect on the seasons of a human life, the cultural stories that shape how we value youth, productivity, and achievement, and what might change if we honored life's natural milestones with the same care previous generations once did.

Along the way, they explore leadership through the lens of living systems, the dynamic relationship between the masculine and feminine, the importance of awe, and the role community plays in helping us remember who we are.

One unexpected thread emerges around intuition. Rather than viewing intuition as a rare gift, the conversation invites a different possibility: if we are nature, perhaps intuition is one of our oldest capacities—something we haven't lost so much as forgotten how to hear.

Rather than offering conclusions, this conversation invites us to slow down, notice the patterns around us, and wonder what becomes possible when we live more in rhythm with the living world.

Key Themes

Living in rhythm with the seasons of life
Leadership through the lens of living systems
Honoring human milestones and rites of passage
Materialism and our natural ways of being
Awe as a practice of attention
Intuition as a natural human capacity
Community, belonging, and cultural healing
Legacy and the slow work of mountain building

Key Takeaways

Nature offers a different model for leadership and human flourishing.
Every stage of life carries wisdom worth honoring.
Awe often emerges when we slow down enough to notice.
Intuition may be less about acquiring something new and more about remembering what has always been present.
Legacy is built over time through the lives we touch.

"If we are nature, how could we not have intuition?"

Connect with Guest

Ber-Henda Williams is a womanist cultural strategist, storyteller, and convener whose work centers placemaking, storytelling, and communal care. She is the founder of Culture Shifters Unite and creates spaces where people can gather, reflect, and imagine new possibilities together.

Website: https://www.ber-hendawilliams.com

Resources Mentioned

Hagitude — Sharon Blackie
The NeverEnding Story
Priya Parker's work on gathering
Tricia Hersey and The Nap Ministry

Reflection Prompt

What part of your life is asking to be honored as a season rather than solved as a problem?

Prefer to read? Full transcipt below

Susan:
Well, hello, Ber-Henda. How are you today?
Ber-Henda:
I'm doing well. How are you?
Susan:
I'm good. We're here amidst summer in the Northern Hemisphere. The sun is out, it's warm outside, and from that perspective I don't have any complaints. I love the heat. I love the heat and the humidity. I'm one of those people.
Ber-Henda:
I don't like the snow, so I won't complain about this at all.
Susan:
I'm glad you're here today. I'm glad you were open to this. I've been playing around with a different kind of conversation for ROOTED—having conversations with people like yourself who coach, consult, and work in spaces that intersect with many of the questions I'm exploring. Nature is going to come up whether we intend it to or not.
For those who may not know you, how did you become the person who shows up in the world today?

Ber-Henda:
How many hours do we have?
My name is Ber-Henda Williams, and I'm a womanist cultural strategist and convener. I'm the founder of Culture Shifters Unite, a womanist multimedia platform that centers placemaking, storytelling, and communal care.
We do this through media—through my podcast, Soul-Led Leader, for those who live and work from the soul, through The Ber-Henda Williams Show, where empathy meets power and voices spark change, and through gatherings that feel like stepping into your girlfriend's living room. I love creating spaces for intergenerational conversations because I believe that's part of the feminine way.
What brought me to this work?
Grief and loss.
Susan:
You're hitting right in a season for me. Grief and loss has been a recurring theme lately as I've been processing a lot of my own.
Before we go there, though, I don't want to lose the three areas you mentioned because each one could become its own conversation.
Can you repeat them?
Ber-Henda:
Storytelling, placemaking, and communal care.
Susan:
I have no doubt we'll touch on all three.
Let's begin with storytelling.
I'm curious—what have you been noticing lately?
You know how sometimes certain ideas or patterns just keep showing up?
A Season of Formation
Ber-Henda:
It's funny you ask that. It almost feels like you've been listening in on my morning meditation.
I'm a pattern recognizer by nature. I'm deeply drawn to archetypes, mythology, folklore, legend—Joseph Campbell's work, The Hero with a Thousand Faces—all of that fascinates me.
I also spend time with numerology because I believe numbers give us information.
Lately, though, I've been paying close attention to my dreams.
I've cultivated a framework for understanding them because I have recurring dreams that always return to my formative years. I call this dreamscape The Mother District.
My dreams often take me back to ancestors, early childhood, particular neighborhoods in Detroit, my great-great-aunt's house, the church where I was baptized, schools, places of learning.
As I sat with them, I found myself asking:
What is this trying to teach me?
Why do I keep returning here?
I realized I'm in a season of formation.
Susan:
I love that you used the word season because I was just about to ask.
If your life were a season, what would it be?
Formation sounds like winter to me.
Would you say you're in winter? Or spring? Or somewhere in between?
Ber-Henda:
I'd say the winter arc.
Susan:
So...slower.
Underground.
Trusting that restoration is happening, even when it looks like nothing is.
One of the things I think about every winter is how easy it is to assume nothing is happening.
And yet there's so much happening beneath the surface.
Ber-Henda:
Exactly.
There's so much happening below the surface.
I think winter is one of the hardest seasons for many of us, especially here in the Northern Hemisphere, where seasonal affective disorder is real.
Sometimes it feels like you're riding the Willy Wonka elevator—it goes up, sideways, down, every direction imaginable.
Within a single day—or even a single hour—you can move through every emotion.
I think it's important to normalize that.
Especially for what I call mountain people.
Some people are rivers.
They move quickly.
Their current is fast.
There's nothing wrong with that.
But mountain people...
Mountain people are deeply interested in legacy.
They're fascinated by ancient cultures and civilizations—especially feminine cultures.
How did they survive famine?
War?
Collapse?
How did women preserve life with so little?
When I think about my own lineage, my grandmother was born in a field.
Her mother returned to work almost immediately.
There was no prenatal care.
No postpartum care.
How did they endure?
What sustained them?
Those are the questions that keep calling me.
Mountain people develop more slowly.
And I think we've been hypnotized by a culture that speeds everything up.
Social media gives us the illusion that growth is immediate.
But we're rarely witnessing real process.
And process...
Process is the messy middle.
Formation asks different questions.
Who am I?
What do I truly believe?
What do I value?
As a cultural architect, convener, and custodian, I believe part of my responsibility is to archive.
Not simply to tell stories—
but to tell the truth.
And sometimes that means bringing together people who might never otherwise cross paths.
Because lived experience crosses every path.

Seasons of Change
Susan:
There are so many directions we could take this conversation.
As I listen to you describe the season you're in, I realize I'm filtering it through the season I'm in, too.
My children are moving from being completely dependent on me to becoming independent adults. That changes our relationship. It's a transformation.
And then, layered on top of that, it feels like the world itself is moving through some kind of transformation—awkward, confusing, even frightening at times.
I often think about the caterpillar inside the chrysalis. It's dark. It's messy. The caterpillar is trying to remain what it has always been, even as everything is changing.
I wonder about the interplay between those two transformations—the collective one and the deeply personal one.
Sometimes we feel like we're the only ones in the middle of change, when in reality so many of us are.
That makes me appreciate the spaces you're creating for people to gather.
Ber-Henda:
I think being in conversation with one another is essential.
And I think telling the truth is equally important.
The hour we're living in can feel very dark. When I look at the last century alone, I see movement after movement after movement. Today we're witnessing multiple genocides across the globe, and I hope we don't become so desensitized that we become paralyzed.
There's a movie I'd love for all of us to revisit: The NeverEnding Story.
Remember how Fantasia and the "real world" begin to overlap? Bastion looks into a mirror and realizes another dimension exists.
The wolf—the emissary of The Nothing—explains that fear and chaos make people easier to manipulate.
When we're afraid, our nervous systems become dysregulated.
We don't make good decisions.
Fear combined with grief, trauma, anger, racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, ageism—all of it creates conditions where we lose ourselves.
I saw an article recently that described Madonna as becoming a mirror for our own ageism.
That struck me.
Whatever you think of Madonna, she's had an extraordinary career spanning generations.
Yet so much of the conversation isn't about her accomplishments.
It's about her age.
What story does that tell about us?
As a cultural architect, those are the questions I care about.
What story are we telling?
What are we projecting onto one another?
Because I think we're projecting our own fears, anxieties, and grief.
I'm not particularly interested in celebrity culture. We tend to build people up only to tear them down.
What interests me is this:
If we can come back to ourselves—to our roots—I believe we can begin healing these divides.
We can bridge feminism and womanism.
We can recognize that LGBTQIA+ people are our family.
They belong to us, and we belong to them.
When injustice appears, I find it fascinating that, throughout history, justice has often been personified as feminine—from Ma'at in ancient Egypt to Lady Justice outside our courthouses today.

Honoring the Seasons of a Human Life
Susan:
Something you said connects to a question I've been exploring lately.
In the United States especially, we celebrate birthdays, weddings, and anniversaries.
Those are our milestones.
But because we're such a young nation—and because we've become disconnected from the cultures many of our ancestors came from—we've lost many of the rituals that once honored the seasons of a human life.
I've been reading Hagitude by Sharon Blackie, and she writes about the Celtic traditions that were lost through colonization.
In many cultures, when a girl began menstruating, there was a community celebration.
When she reached menopause, there was another.
Her role within the community shifted, and each stage was honored.
Without those rituals, it's no surprise we've come to value youth above almost everything else.
One of my favorite storytellers, Michael Meade, says we're becoming a nation of olders, not elders.
Ber-Henda:
That distinction gives me chills.
What you're describing is the erasure of indigeneity.
Whether we're talking about First Nations peoples here in North America or Celtic societies, there were rites of passage.
There were clear transitions into adulthood, partnership, parenthood, eldership.
Elders weren't simply older people.
They held a revered role within the community.
Among the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, for example, elder women—the clan mothers—helped determine whether the nation would go to war, how communities responded to famine, and how decisions were made.
Without those structures, we've lost something important.
It's one reason I think our culture feels as though it's nearing collapse.
We don't have clear initiations anymore.
At sixteen, we get a driver's license.
Proms become elaborate productions.
But then what?
What prepares us for the deeper transitions of life?
And honestly...
I don't think our culture knows how to be with death and dying, either.
Susan:
You're touching another question that's been alive for me.
As we're talking, I realize how much we tend to value the material.
Our accomplishments.
Our possessions.
The external markers of success.
But when we remember that humans are nature, we begin to see that we have our own natural cycles, our own seasons of becoming.
There's wisdom in honoring those rhythms instead of constantly measuring ourselves by what we've achieved.

Living in Rhythm
Susan:
I want to spend a few minutes here because I think this is a different conversation than I've had before on ROOTED.
We're talking about the feminine and about women, but I also want listeners to hear that we're not saying there's no place for the masculine.
As you've been talking, I've been thinking about balance.
When I picture the masculine and feminine, I often think of the yin and yang—there's space for all of it. There's space for doing and being, for strength and softness. We need all of it.
How do you think about those two energies?
Ber-Henda:
I come back to seasons.
I pay attention to what each season calls for—not just externally, but internally.
It may be summer outside, but what season am I in on the inside?
Traditionally, summer and spring are often associated with masculine energy, while autumn and winter are associated with feminine energy because they move more slowly and invite reflection.
I also want to acknowledge that not everyone identifies within those categories. That, too, is part of the conversation.
Even though I identify as a cisgender woman and present as feminine, I absolutely have a masculine side, and I don't think it should be suppressed.
For much of my life, though, I felt rewarded for the more masculine qualities because our culture celebrates conquering, relentless productivity, and the idea of "man versus nature."
I love an epic myth as much as anyone.
But where is the invitation to rest?
That's why I appreciate Tricia Hersey's work with The Nap Ministry.
Rest isn't self-indulgent.
It's revolutionary.
We've become so conditioned to equate productivity with worth that rest can feel almost irresponsible.
But every major accomplishment requires rest.
Even the sun sets.
The moon moves through phases.
It isn't full every night.
Nature is constantly showing us that rhythm is part of life.
The question is whether we're paying attention.
Susan:
My mind immediately went to something I heard recently.
Someone was talking about the difference between an oak tree and a reed growing by the river.
The oak is this incredible keystone species. It's strong, rooted, and provides life for so many other beings.
The reed, on the other hand, bends.
At first glance, it almost seems insignificant.
But when the storm comes, the oak can snap.
The reed bends with the wind and returns.
As I listened, I realized how often I identify with the oak.
Solid.
Rooted.
Dependable.
But maybe I need a little more reed in me.
Ber-Henda:
Exactly.
Bend so you don't break.
Storms are inevitable.
If we're too rigid, life will eventually break us.
There's a song by Beautiful Chorus called Be Like Water, and of course Bruce Lee said the same thing.
Be like water.
Everything in this life is temporary.
Everything is precious.
The tighter we cling, the harder it becomes to move with life.
I think our attachment to material things is one symptom of spending too little time in nature.
Especially in a place like Metro Detroit, where we're surrounded by concrete, we have to be intentional about seeking places where we can hear ourselves again.
If you can, find somewhere with poor cell reception.
Somewhere quiet.
Somewhere you can remember what silence sounds like.
Susan:
I did exactly that last week.
I spent two days camping by myself near Grass Lake.
The cell reception was terrible—which was actually wonderful.
I won't say it was silent, though.
There were bullfrogs.
I realized bullfrogs don't keep the steady rhythm that crickets do. They're wonderfully unpredictable.
And the fireflies...
They reminded me of my childhood.
The woods were filled with light.
It was one of those moments that filled me with awe.
Awe and Attention
Ber-Henda:
Let's stay with awe for a moment.
I don't know that enough of us experience it—or even know what evokes it.
For me, awe last week was a lavender latte.
Not because it was extraordinary, but because I was fully present while drinking it.
The warmth.
The lavender.
The gratitude.
Each sip invited me to slow down.
Susan:
I love that.
When I imagine a lavender latte, I think about opening.
My body softens.
My energy expands.
It feels spacious.
Ber-Henda:
Exactly.
And in a world that so often leaves us constricted, those moments matter.
Every day we're bombarded with heartbreaking headlines, conflict, and cruelty.
It's easy to carry all of that in our bodies.
But we also have the ability to pause.
To step outside.
To have meaningful conversations.
To read good books.
For me, this season is about formation.
But it's also about orientation.

Susan Bailey