KnotWork Myth & Storytelling

Marisa Goudy

On KnotWork, we explore the mythology and folklore of Ireland, and beyond. Episodes begin with a story, followed by a deep dive conversation about how this age-old tale still resonates today. Our guests include oral storytellers, writers, artists, musicians, and spiritual leaders. Occasionally, in our Myth Workers and Culture Makers series, our guest offers a song, a meditation, or another bit of creative magic. We talk about what it means to live a myth-inspired life. These conversations explore our relationship to land and to identity, particularly related to what it means to be Irish and a member of the Irish diaspora. Whether you’re drawn to Celtic culture or the mysteries that linger at ancient sacred sites, or whether you just like a good story and expansive conversation, you’re in the right place. Welcome. Fáilte. Your host is Marisa Goudy, author of The Sovereignty Knot: A Woman’s Way to Freedom, Power, Love, and Magic. She is a myth worker, a story healer, a writing coach who lives on the lands of the Lenape people (New York’s Hudson Valley). She holds an MA in Irish literature from University College Dublin.

  1. The Village Beyond The Dunes | S7 Ep9

    2d ago

    The Village Beyond The Dunes | S7 Ep9

    It's the middle of the night. A wealthy woman sits alone by the fire, carding wool, when the first knock comes at the door. Open! Open! I am the Witch of One Horn! This is the opening of The Twelve Horned Women,” from Lady Jane Wilde's folklore collection Ancient Legends of Ireland. It’s one of several stories that Marisa weaves together in our latest full-length Turas episode, The Village Beyond the Dunes, available exclusively to paid members of Myth Workers' Hearth over on Substack. The Twelve Horned Women come down from Sliabh na mBan, the Mountain of Women in Co. Tipperary. They take over the woman’s house and make impossible demands. These witches from the Otherworld nearly get away with murder. But here's the question that haunts this story: were they invaders, or were they reclaiming what was always theirs? In the full Turas episode, Marisa explores how stories like this one teach us about community: its magic, its failures, its longing, and its wounds. From Tír na mBan to Avalon to a deserted village on Achill Island, The Village Beyond the Dunes walks the terrain of everything we've lost, everything we've dreamed, and everything that might still be possible. Join Myth Workers' Hearth to access the full episode and the complete Turas series. www.mythworkers.com KnotWork Myth & Storytelling is hosted by Marisa Goudy. New public episodes are released each week. WORK WITH MARISA 1:1 Writing Coaching: If you are working on a novel, a memoir, or you’re seeking to weave the mythic perspective into your creative work, book a free consultation with Marisa. Learn more at www.marisagoudy.comLearn about our global writing communities, the Authors' Knot: www.marisagoudy.com/writing-groupsFollow the show on Substack, Instagram, and Facebook. Music by Beth Sweeney and Billy Hardy: billyandbeth.com PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW Love KnotWork Storytelling? Your financial contribution helps me pay the amazing team that puts this show together. As a paid Myth Workers' Hearth subscriber, you'll have access to Turas and be invited to our monthly Myth Workers' Hearth Gatherings.

    9 min
  2. Choosing the Mystery with Perdita Finn | S7 Ep8

    Jun 18

    Choosing the Mystery with Perdita Finn | S7 Ep8

    Our Story The rosary has long been used to shame women and restrain sexuality, but what if it is actually the umbilical cord that connects us to The Mother? When the rosary emerged in the 11th or 12th century, the Church offered a narrative that began with Eve’s sin and ended with apocalypse. Ordinary women were living and telling a different story. Theirs was a story that was expressed in a great circle, not in a straight line of patriarchal history. Perdita Finna unfolds the mysteries of the rosary, reclaiming the prayers and practice as an act of power. What if, all along, the beads are a story of women’s empowerment that’s been hidden in plain sight? Our Guest Perdita Finn is the author of Take Back the Magic: Conversations with the Unseen World, Mothers of Magic: Summoning the Wisdom of Our Ancestors, and with her husband Clark Strand The Way of the Rose: The Radical Path of the Divine Feminine Hidden in the Rosary. She teaches popular workshops on connecting and collaborating with both the dead and the animate everything. She lives with her family in the moss-filled shadows of the Catskill Mountains. Joining Perdita’s free class coming up on June 25 at 8:30 PM ET. Register now for Long Story of Your Soul WORK WITH MARISA 1:1 Writing Coaching: If you are working on a novel, a memoir, or you’re seeking to weave the mythic perspective into your creative work, book a free consultation with Marisa. Learn more at www.marisagoudy.comLearn about our global writing communities, the Authors' Knot: www.marisagoudy.com/writing-groupsFollow the show on Substack, Instagram, and Facebook. Music by Beth Sweeney and Billy Hardy: billyandbeth.com PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW Love KnotWork Storytelling? Your financial contribution helps me pay the amazing team that puts this show together. As a paid Myth Workers' Hearth subscriber, you'll have access to Turas and be invited to our monthly Myth Workers' Hearth Gatherings. Subscribe to Myth Workers' Hearth: www.mythworkers.com

    54 min
  3. A Tale of Two Poets with Kate Chadbourne | S7 Ep7

    Jun 11

    A Tale of Two Poets with Kate Chadbourne | S7 Ep7

    This episode is a medieval Irish permission slip for every creative who has ever felt too raw, too unformed, or too messy to call themselves a writer. It’s for anyone whose inner critic has tried to kill the emerging work before it could grow. OUR STORY From the Book of Leinster (c. 1160): a strange, silent boy who hasn't spoken in fourteen years. A blacksmith father who knows how to protect what isn't ready yet. And the chief poet of Ireland, who recognizes genius before anyone else does — and has to decide what to do about it. OUR GUEST Kate Chadbourne is a storyteller, singer, harper, and poet, professor of Irish language and folklore, and founder of The Celtic Wisdom School. Her debut novel, The Poet on the Train, was published in 2025. Find her at https://www.katechadbourne.com/. She tells stories each week over on YouTube @katechadbournebard IN THIS EPISODE: The Irish proverb (or seanfhocail) Bíonn gach tosú lag. Every beginning is weak. You contain both poets. Amergin, the instinctual, unschooled self and Athairne, the credentialed institutional self are both necessary. The danger is when one swings an ax at the other.Feel for the bruise. Pick up your poem like an apple and find where the energy has gone soft — then ask every part to rise to the aliveness of the best part.Put a flower on your house. Blátham — I bloom, I flourish. Making beauty for its own sake, even a sticker in a journal no one will ever see, is the practice.Completing something changes you. Kate shares the moment midway through writing her novel when the inner Athairne told her to stop. She kept going. Finishing, by your own standards, for yourself, is its own transformation.Write with Amergin, revise with Athairne. Kate and Marisa's upgrade on Hemingway's "write drunk, edit sober."Father Dineen's Foclóir Gaedhilge agus Béarla The Poet on the Train by Kate Chadbourne WORK WITH MARISA 1:1 Writing Coaching: If you are working on a novel, a memoir, or you’re seeking to weave the mythic perspective into your creative work, book a free consultation with Marisa. Learn more at www.marisagoudy.comLearn about our global writing communities, the Authors' Knot: www.marisagoudy.com/writing-groupsFollow the show on Substack, Instagram, and Facebook. Music by Beth Sweeney and Billy Hardy: billyandbeth.com PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW Love KnotWork Storytelling? Your financial contribution helps me pay the amazing team that puts this show together. As a paid Myth Workers' Hearth subscriber, you'll have access to Turas and be invited to our monthly Myth Workers' Hearth Gatherings. Subscribe to Myth Workers' Hearth: www.mythworkers.com

    43 min
  4. Island Consciousness | S7 Ep6

    Jun 4

    Island Consciousness | S7 Ep6

    OUR STORY The shoreline is a threshold. When we stand at the place where the ocean meets the land, we know we’re standing in between the worlds. In this preview of S7 Ep6, Marisa tells the story of King Canute, the Anglo-Danish king whose famous confrontation with the tide has been misread for centuries. His real message–about faith and hubris and our relationship to the power of the elements–turns out to be more urgent now than it ever was. But the Canute story is just the doorway. The full Turas episode is a guided journey along the shorelines of the imagination and your own beloved countries. We explore the art of arrival and the power of liminality, and question what it means to truly inhabit a place rather than just pass through it. The extended episode includes three writing prompts which invite you to explore your own history of arrivals, and your relationship with change and erosion. This is the work that happens at Myth Workers' Hearth. Every Turas episode is built for the listener who wants to go deeper — into the myth, into the land, and into their own story. Hear the teaser on KnotWork Myth & Storytelling: KnotWorkStorytelling.com The full episode is waiting for you when you upgrade your subscription to the Myth Workers' Hearth: mythworkers.com WORK WITH MARISA 1:1 Writing Coaching: If you are working on a novel, a memoir, or you’re seeking to weave the mythic perspective into your creative work, book a free consultation with Marisa. Learn more at www.marisagoudy.comLearn about our global writing communities, the Authors' Knot: www.marisagoudy.com/writing-groupsFollow the show on Substack, Instagram, and Facebook. Music by Beth Sweeney and Billy Hardy: billyandbeth.com PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW Love KnotWork Storytelling? Your financial contribution helps me pay the amazing team that puts this show together. As a paid Myth Workers' Hearth subscriber, you'll have access to Turas and be invited to our monthly Myth Workers' Hearth Gatherings. Subscribe to Myth Workers' Hearth: www.mythworkers.com

    7 min
  5. Sex, Drugs, and Rock & Roll: Cú Chullain, the Outsider by Peter Wucherpfennig | S7 Ep5

    May 28

    Sex, Drugs, and Rock & Roll: Cú Chullain, the Outsider by Peter Wucherpfennig | S7 Ep5

    OUR STORY Cú Chullain is Ireland’s most renowned mythological hero, and his story comes what’s seen as the greatest of Irish epics, the Táin Bo Cualigne. And yet, we’ve never told his story on KnotWork. Clearly we were waiting for the right storyteller. In this episode, Peter Wucherpfennig offers an outsider perspective on Cú Chullain’s early life told through a modern frame: a young Phil Lynnot, front man of the iconic 70s band Thin Lizzy conjures the elements of myth. You’ll also hear WB Yeats’s "An Irish Airman Foresees His Death." OUR GUEST Peter Wucherpfennig is a German harpist and storyteller based in Darmstadt. After graduating in 1986, he completed fifteen months of compulsory service in the Bundeswehr before training as a nurse — a path that would prove unexpectedly resonant with the warrior myths he would later carry as a storyteller. He has worked in intensive care units since 1991. In the mid-nineties he picked up the harp and found himself in the company of Scottish storytellers. He gave his first public performance as a harpist and storyteller in 1996 (his word: disastrous) and has spent the years since traveling between the worlds of the hospital, the workers' council, and his own calling as a bard. IN THIS EPISODE Cú Chulainn is remembered as the greatest hero of the Irish epic, the Táin Bó Cúailnge, and was a powerful inspiration during the 1916 Easter Rising. Peter imagines him as the outcast hero.The power of the mentor: just as Cú Chulainn found Scáthach, as an adult, Peter was adopted by a landlady who said "you are my third son." Such relationships open an entirely different world.The significance of the island apart. Whether it's Tír na nÓg or Scáthach's island fortress, this isn’t a place to stay forever, but is a place to gather new tools. What does it mean to seek out those threshold spaces in our own lives?The power of fellowship. Peter and Marisa remember meeting at the Bard Summer School on Clare Island in County Mayo. WORK WITH MARISA 1:1 Writing Coaching: If you are working on a novel, a memoir, or you’re seeking to weave the mythic perspective into your creative work, book a free consultation with Marisa. Learn more at www.marisagoudy.comLearn about our global writing communities, the Authors' Knot: www.marisagoudy.com/writing-groupsFollow the show on Substack, Instagram, and Facebook. Music by Beth Sweeney and Billy Hardy: billyandbeth.com PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW Love KnotWork Storytelling? Your financial contribution helps me pay the amazing team that puts this show together. As a paid Myth Workers' Hearth subscriber, you'll have access to Turas and be invited to our monthly Myth Workers' Hearth Gatherings. Subscribe to Myth Workers' Hearth: www.mythworkers.com

    58 min
  6. We Are the Grandchildren of the Selkies Who Stayed | S7 Ep4

    May 21

    We Are the Grandchildren of the Selkies Who Stayed | S7 Ep4

    OUR STORY The selkie story is one of the most enduring tales in the Celtic imagination. A woman caught between two worlds, a stolen skin, and the impossible choice between the sea and the shore. But what if the story doesn't end when she slips beneath the waves? What if it lives on in her descendants, in us? Hear the myth on KnotWork Myth & Storytelling: KnotWorkStorytelling.com or wherever you listen to podcasts. The full Turas episode is available exclusively to paid subscribers of Myth Workers’ Hearth on Substack. When you're ready to go deeper, the full meaning of the story is waiting at Myth Workers' Hearth: mythworkers.com WORK WITH MARISA 1:1 Writing Coaching: If you are working on a novel, a memoir, or you’re seeking to weave the mythic perspective into your creative work, book a free consultation with Marisa. Learn more at www.marisagoudy.comLearn about our global writing communities, the Authors' Knot: www.marisagoudy.com/writing-groupsFollow the show on Substack, Instagram, and Facebook. Music by Beth Sweeney and Billy Hardy: billyandbeth.com PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW Love KnotWork Storytelling? Your financial contribution helps me pay the amazing team that puts this show together. As a paid Myth Workers' Hearth subscriber, you'll have access to Turas and be invited to our monthly Myth Workers' Hearth Gatherings. Subscribe to Myth Workers' Hearth: www.mythworkers.com

    8 min
  7. The Silver Wheel with Jen Murphy | S7 Ep3

    May 14

    The Silver Wheel with Jen Murphy | S7 Ep3

    OUR STORY Jen Murphy tells us the core tales Fourth Branch of the Mabinogi, the great epic of Welsh mythology, beginning with King Math and his Goewin, his “virgin footholder” and concluding with the story of Arianrhod. Jen concludes her telling with Blodeuwedd, who you met in S7 Ep 1. OUR GUEST Jen Murphy is an Irish mythologist, anthropologist and founder of The Celtic Creatives. A Dubliner born and bred, from the time she could talk, Jen's grandmother Frances O'Sullivan filled her ears with tales from Irish myth and folklore, fuelling a now 40-year fascination with the stories of her lineage. Jen's apprenticeship to following her soul's breadcrumbs has guided her formal studies in Medieval Irish and Celtic Studies, Anthropology, and Jungian Psychology. Jen supports people to remember that they have a shining soul, to dream Celtic spirituality into their modern lives by making the Celtic soul a living aesthetic—centring the soul in the everyday experience of life—through mythwork, dreamwork, and the body. Find her on Instagram @celticreatives and at https://celticcreatives.substack.com, https://www.celticcreatives.com/ IN THIS EPISODE How stories choose their tellers - Jen had prepared a different tale entirely, and then this telling of Arianrhod insisted on being toldJen takes us on a beautiful tour of the moon's monthly cycle as a map of our own becomingArianrhod as living initiator: Jen maps the three refusals: name, arms, marriage - onto her own creative journey toward the Sunset Journal, a ritual practice rooted in beginning the day at duskReclaiming the night: Jen gives up the 5am productivity myth and discovers that creating by moonlight, as a confirmed night-owl, born just before the winter solstice is simply becoming more of her natureJen's Sunset Journal is launching by Lúnasa (harvest season). Be the first to know when it’s available: https://www.celticcreatives.com/sunset WORK WITH MARISA 1:1 Writing Coaching: If you are working on a spiritual memoir, or are a wellness professional or creative entrepreneur who wants to use stories to build your business, book a free consultation with Marisa. Learn more at www.marisagoudy.comLearn about our global writing communities, the Authors' Knot: www.marisagoudy.com/writing-groupsFollow the show on Substack, Instagram, and Facebook. Music by Beth Sweeney and Billy Hardy: billyandbeth.com PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW Love KnotWork Storytelling? Your financial contribution helps me pay the amazing team that puts this show together. As a paid Myth Workers' Hearth subscriber, you'll have access to Turas and be invited to our monthly Myth Workers' Hearth Gatherings. Subscribe to Myth Workers' Hearth: www.mythworkers.com

    1 hr
  8. The Invitation to Tir na mBan, the Land of Women | S7 Ep2

    May 7

    The Invitation to Tir na mBan, the Land of Women | S7 Ep2

    OUR STORY We’ve told the story of King Bran and the silver branch several times on KnotWork. This time, we the woman’s story, the story of the Bean Sídhe who speaks her fifty quatrains of poetry and invites us all across the sea to Tír na mBan, the Island of Women. ABOUT THE NEW SERIES: TURAS Turas, the Irish word for journey, is a paid subscriber series within KnotWork Myth & Storytelling. Each episode takes us deeper into the imaginal landscape of Tír na mBan, the Island of Women from Irish mythology. Every other week, through Samhain (early November), you’ll receive a story, an exploration of its modern echoes, and the invitation to further your own journey through writing prompts. Turas is available exclusively to paid subscribers of Myth Workers’ Hearth on Substack. Join us: www.mythworkers.com IN THIS EPISODE Tír na mBan is a matrifocal rather than matriarchal society. Riane Eisler’s Partnership Model and the distinction between dominator and partnership cultures.The bean sídhe as Otherworld messenger — not a harbinger of death, but a woman who moves between worlds and weaves the energy between them.The Amazons in contrast with the women of Tír na mBan. WRITING PROMPTS This is a story of invitation. To be invited somewhere new shows you a whole lot about the aperture of your own being. The Bean Sídhe is standing beside your dinner table and suggests you drop the fork, drop everything, and come. Feel into your first response. Then, feel further. How open or closed is your heart, your mind, your imagination?The Bean Sídhe invites us to the Otherworld, to a land without death or suffering, without laziness or drunkenness. She invites us to a place of song, color, abundance… That description is pretty open ended. What does your Otherworld look and feel like? Remember, it’s not about escape, it’s about relationship… this world and that world have something to offer each other.An Island of Women? What do you think… Perhaps that’s all the prompt you need. Or, try this: I told you my own story of censored desire, of silencing my own longing for matrifocal wisdom and women rooted knowledge. What desires are you too well-behaved to name, explore, inhabit? WORK WITH MARISA 1:1 Writing Coaching: If you are working on a spiritual memoir, or are a wellness professional or creative entrepreneur who wants to use stories to build your business, book a free consultation with Marisa. Learn more at www.marisagoudy.comLearn about our global writing communities, the Authors' Knot: www.marisagoudy.com/writing-groupsFollow the show on Substack, Instagram, and Facebook. Music by Beth Sweeney and Billy Hardy: billyandbeth.com PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SHOW Love KnotWork Storytelling? Your financial contribution helps me pay the amazing team that puts this show together. As a paid Myth Workers' Hearth subscriber, you'll have access to Turas and be invited to our monthly Myth Workers' Hearth Gatherings. Subscribe to Myth Workers' Hearth: www.mythworkers.com

    32 min
See All (130)

5
out of 5
28 Ratings

About

On KnotWork, we explore the mythology and folklore of Ireland, and beyond. Episodes begin with a story, followed by a deep dive conversation about how this age-old tale still resonates today. Our guests include oral storytellers, writers, artists, musicians, and spiritual leaders. Occasionally, in our Myth Workers and Culture Makers series, our guest offers a song, a meditation, or another bit of creative magic. We talk about what it means to live a myth-inspired life. These conversations explore our relationship to land and to identity, particularly related to what it means to be Irish and a member of the Irish diaspora. Whether you’re drawn to Celtic culture or the mysteries that linger at ancient sacred sites, or whether you just like a good story and expansive conversation, you’re in the right place. Welcome. Fáilte. Your host is Marisa Goudy, author of The Sovereignty Knot: A Woman’s Way to Freedom, Power, Love, and Magic. She is a myth worker, a story healer, a writing coach who lives on the lands of the Lenape people (New York’s Hudson Valley). She holds an MA in Irish literature from University College Dublin.

Information

  • Creator
    Marisa Goudy
  • Years Active
    2022 - 2026
  • Episodes
    130
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Copyright 2026 Marisa Goudy
  • Show Website
    KnotWork Myth & Storytelling

You Might Also Like