Lauren McCourt: Finding Shelter in the Wild Hart
Lauren McCourt, founder of Wild Hart Rituals, did not set out to build a brand. She set out to survive. The turning point came with the birth of her son. What should have been a time of joy was layered with physical trauma and an emotional
Lauren McCourt, founder of Wild Hart Rituals, did not set out to build a brand. She set out to survive. The turning point came with the birth of her son. What should have been a time of joy was layered with physical trauma and an emotional reckoning she could no longer postpone. “I remember thinking, ‘Just hold it together,’” she reflects, “but a darkness eventually caught up to me.”
Like many women, Lauren found herself trying to maintain an image of composure while quietly unravelling. She eventually reached a crossroads: abandon her life entirely, or seek help. She chose therapy, a decision that became the foundation for everything that followed. It was her therapist who first suggested journaling, but when Lauren went looking for one, she felt a profound disconnect. Everything felt prescriptive, repetitive, or subtly shaming if you couldn’t keep up.
“It’s about understanding yourself enough to go deeper.”
At the same time, her healing journey expanded beyond talk therapy into embodied practices like trauma-informed yoga. For years, Lauren had lived with chronic pain, trying physiotherapy, chiropractic care and medical interventions with limited relief. It was only when she learned to listen to her body that something truly shifted. “That was the biggest surprise for me,” she says. “Realising my body wasn’t broken—it was communicating.” Raised in a corporate, logic-driven world, Lauren had believed problems were meant to be fixed. She was discovering instead that healing is relational, cyclical and deeply personal.
From this gap between what was needed and what was available, *The Wild Hart Year* emerged. Designed as a 12-month guided journal, it gently weaves therapy-informed prompts with seasonal rhythms and nervous-system practices. Crucially, it is undated, allowing readers to move intuitively through chapters on boundaries, grief, motherhood and rest without pressure or self-criticism. “This isn’t about finishing the year ‘healed’,” Lauren explains. “It’s about understanding yourself enough to go deeper.”
The journal’s ethos is mirrored in its illustrations, created by Lauren’s sister-in-law, which depict women of different ages and body types with softness and honesty. Since its release, Lauren has also developed ritual kits and a facilitator programme for yoga teachers and retreat leaders, responding to the frustration of journaling being offered as an afterthought. Her work is a quiet invitation to reclaim writing as one of our most accessible healing tools. In a culture obsessed with quick fixes, *The Wild Hart Year* offers something rarer: permission to move at the pace of your own nervous system, and to trust that healing, like nature, unfolds in its own time.