Oct 26, 2021
What does it mean to be resilient?
How does one overcome tough challenges and yet continue to inspire?
On today’s podcast, we hear from Aleka Artemis Munroe, who lives with serious physical disabilites.
A member of Twelve in Twelve 2021, Aleka discusses her struggles with her body, and shares the tools she uses to get through that include mindfulness, acceptance, creativity, and an incredible sense of humor.
She is the creator of Compasspoints: maxims for clearing the chaos in our cages, and is finishing her beautiful book, I Am Water, an allegorical photography and poetry story about life’s obstacles and the flow of it all.
Take a listen to Aleka and learn how she twists through her many plot twists.
Bio:
Aleka Artemis Munroe has always needed to express herself with words. At age 10, as her father forced his narcissistic interpretation of reality on his family, she began photographing with her Papou’s Brownie camera, recording reality and writing poems expressing her perspective. Aleka’s linguistics and foreign languages education etched words into her soul. After careers in banking, training, then teaching, and raising a theatrical and musical family where words were essential tools, her fifties hit hard with the chaos of a failed adoption and multiplying autoimmune illness. Her creative and comedic family and friends, and prayer, pulled her through. Aleka believes God gives us the strength to get through pain, sorrow and suffering, to live, love, laugh, and especially to reach out to others who are struggling to choose between despair and courage, connection and disconnection. Mindfulness training sparked a renewal of using photography and words to envision alternate interpretations of scenes in her limited physical world with her camera lens and lyrical mediations. This developed into Compasspoints: maxims for clearing the chaos in our cages. Aleka is finishing a photographic book entitled “I am Water”, an allegorical tale of being the water that constantly flows on toward the unknown of the ocean, despite the obstacles in its path.
Check out @AlekaArtemisAuthorPhotographer on Instagram