Sense of Soul - Honoring the Cycles of the Feminine

Episode Date: May 27, 2022

Today on Sense of Soul Podcast, we have with us Elizabeth Gould, she received a BA in Art History from Stanford University, and worked in the Old Masters art world in New York City for several years. After obtaining an MS in Education from S.U.N.Y., she became a rites of passage educator for girls and women, and the director of a non-profit committed to positive menstrual and menopausal education and awareness. She is the author of The Well of Truth, which grew organically out of her two decades of experience as a mother, teacher, and menstrual activist as well as her love of mythology, goddess traditions, and the moon. Devoted to finding the magic and beauty hidden in daily life, she is thrilled to be part of the rising chorus of voices reclaiming and celebrating the wisdom of the Feminine. The Well of Truth is her first book available June 14, 2022, it’s the story of a woman on a journey of self discovery. Through the telling of significant moments in her adult life, the heroine, Grace, garners insight and inspiration from mythic figures who skilfully guide her in creating a meaningful and authentic life for herself. The book is filled with reflections on feminine wisdom, power, and agency.  https://www.elizabethagouldstories.com Some resources and inspiration for Red Tents: https://www.redtentmovie.com/blog/categories/red-tents-in-every-neighborhood https://redtentdirectory.com/ The Red Web Foundation is also a wonderful online resource for information. https://www.theredweb.org Hilarious video:  First Moon Party https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEcZmT0fiNM Suggested reading for girls:  “A Diva’s Guide to Getting Your Period” by DeAnna L’am “Cycling: A Guide to Menstruation” Laura Szumowski https://www.amightygirl.com/blog?p=11614 Ritual ideas for first period: https://www.drnorthrup.com/celebrating-a-girls-first-period/ Visit us at www.mysenseofsoul.com Join our Sense of Soul Patreon!! Our community of seekers and lightworkers who get exclusive discounts, live events like SOS Sacred Circles, ad free episodes and more. You can also listen to Shanna’s new mini series, about the Goddess Sophia! Sign up today and help support our podcast. As a member of any level you get 50% off Shanna’s Soul Immersion Healing Experience! https://www.patreon.com/senseofsoul

Welcome to the Sense of Soul podcast. We are your hosts, Shanna and Mandy. Grab your coffee, open your mind, heart and soul. It's time to awaken. Today we have with us Elizabeth Gold. She is a rites of passage educator for girls and women and is the director of a nonprofit committed to positive menstrual and menopausal education and awareness. She is the author of The Well of Truth, which organically grew out of her two decades of experience as a mother, teacher, and menstrual activist, as well as her love for mythology, goddess traditions, and the moon. Devoted to finding her magic and beauty hidden in daily life, she is thrilled to be a part of the rising chorus of voices reclaiming and celebrating

the wisdom of the divine feminine. And we are so happy to have her with us. Look how beautiful you are, Elizabeth. Because I have an exciting date today with you two ladies. Well, you are gorgeous. Where do you live? I live in New Zealand. So the sun is going to come up during our, so you'll see probably the colors change. Good morning. Oh, good morning. Thank you.

And for you, it's what, noon? Yeah. Great. it's what noon yeah great and just before we get started I just had to ask is there a birthday happening to somebody I know you're Taurus is someone have a birthday around now both of Mandy just had one in mind yeah all right well I have my beeswax candle lit just to say, I appreciate what you're bringing into the world. This podcast is so lovely and so inspiring and it's such courageous work that you're doing. And I know that it's touching so many people. And so I just really want to thank you for all you're doing. This is the time, this is the time, you know, it's all coming together. Women rising, no one having to do it

alone. We can find each other and be strong. I wish I could share with you guys what I just created because I just finished my very first episode on the divine feminine and just got done reading this most beautiful, powerful form. It talks about just that. It's called the rise of the Divine Feminine, the subtitle. The title is The Age of Aquarius.

Wow. Yeah, it's beautiful. So I mean, literally right before we got on, it's a beautiful poem. I'll send it to you. I'll send it to you. That would be lovely. There's a lot flowing. It's watery days and fire.

Yeah, yeah. The fire, the rise, right? So it's a time of balance and unification. Right. And Elizabeth, we have been booked out with three guests a week. But when you came across, Shanna and I knew we had to have you on faster

because Shanna's been receiving so much beautiful messages. And then I would add in little tidbits that I was getting and then she puts the puzzle together. But she's been really diving deep into these downloads, channels, messages, whatever you want to call them, on the triple goddess and the divine and Sophia. So she wanted to talk to you immediately. So we are so excited to have you on the sense of soul podcast today. And I'm going through menopause. Yeah. I was teaching a great key class this morning and literally I saw my face turn bright red during the, and I was like, wow. I can actually physically see my face, what it looked like. So I'll probably have another hot flash.

I wore layers. You wear the tank top with the cardigans usually is what I got on. Yeah, okay. Yeah, I have mine underneath too. You got to. Because you never know when you're going to have a power surge, you know, that you're just like, and you know what else I just discovered recently is that my legal name is Shannon. My family's both sides Catholic, and I never got my confirmation.

I knew that Shannon was Irish Gaelic. And so I look it up and it actually means the possessor of wisdom. And then there's a story behind it. And the story is, is that the goddess Shannon was searching for the hidden wisdom. And she was searching down the well. And unfortunately, she died searching for the hidden wisdom down the well. And unfortunately she died searching for the hidden wisdom down the well. And I said, well, this Shannon is not going to do that because I may go down many wells, especially with Sophia. I just think that's so crazy that my name actually means what I'm going through. And then your, your book came through the well of truth which is interesting because I have found that that has

become my new truth that's amazing Shannon going down the well like any good Celtic story there's this sense of the life the death and the rebirth and we always remember that we're part of this natural cycle so that even though it may appear that she died she did not oh my need to rest out with the rest of the story then well actually you have it in you and I mean that this book was written because it was taking stories that I know stories from real life and saying huh what would it be if if I looked, for instance, childbirth? I had a pretty intense experience. What would it look like if I really tapped in deeper into the wisdom that was behind me and around me, holding me through this initiation?

And so you get to write the story of Shannon. You're writing it right now with your life. Yeah. Part of what I believe this Feminine Rising time is about is that we're reclaiming our stories, however they are. And then we can write the ending. I think Brene Brown said something about that. When you own your story, you get to write the way it goes. You know, there's something in there that we have our own agency around how our life goes forward.

I'm going to throw something out there really fast because I don't want every man that is listening right now to shut this off. Can you explain, Elizabeth, how this episode would be beneficial for a man to continue listening to. Absolutely. Thank you so much for clarifying that because when often in the things that I, my work has been doing menstrual and menopausal advocacy and activism, and that work centers around people that have uteruses, and there's a particular biological experience that's in that. However, we all have masculine, feminine energies within us. And the more that we can relate to, understand these diverse qualities that we all hold, the better. And so I am grateful for the men who are listening in and opening themselves to finding that bridge more to the feminine in the same way that for women finding a way back to themselves, because we have not throughout history, particularly in our cultural setting,

been given the very basic tools to know ourselves, knowing how our biology works. And so there's, so for everyone, there's a benefit, the more that we all are self-aware and conscious of our bodies and of each other. So welcome to all the male identifying beings who are here on this podcast. Thanks for being here. Yeah. And you know, I just, the reason I wanted to ask was because I knew you were going to have a beautiful answer like that, but some people might just shut it off immediately. I had a beautiful conversation with my husband recently because I've been like going where

I have periods and then I don't have periods. And then he hears a lot about the feminine energy. And he actually, I found out, knows a little bit more about my menstrual period than I probably do. Wow. That's amazing. Because we just started talking about it and he was talking about like symptoms and the way he can see me shift during it. And he actually knows the timing of it better than I do. It was really interesting to know that he even stops to think about that. Right. Well, he's in sync in that he notices the nuances. And as part of this process of women getting to know ourselves and our cycles, it sounds to me like you may be

dipping your toes into the realm of perimenopause. We're taught that there's just one thing and it's menopause can be up to 10 years prior to the absolute cessation of your moon blood that you experience in the heat kind of micro changes of moods and different fluctuations. So he may be onto something, you know, I wanted to ask you, now that we are, we're able to talk about this, because of course, my mother never even talked to me about my period, you know, let's talk about how things were in the past and how we came to where we are today. Because I don't think that we talk enough about how much women were repressed and why, you know, you may see a woman becoming a

feminist because there's almost like this need to stand your ground, use your voice. And sometimes that becomes very masculine even. So, you know, it's like, we haven't found the balance yet, you know, between where we were and maybe where we're at. And so can you talk about that? Because I know a little bit, you know, I mean, just doing some ancestry work, thinking about, I mean, all women in the Bible were either whores or virgins and, you know, nothing in between. That movie, The Red Tent, really shows the power of, I don't know if you've ever read that book or saw the movie, but Dinah was an amazing story. Right. It's a very powerful point you make that, you know, how to move forward in using the feminine qualities and meeting the masculine without just completely shifting over into more of a masculine realm, how to do it in a woman's way. And, you know,

over the years, I've done quite a bit of research about this very question. And in all earth-based traditions in the world, throughout history, there's been such a reverence and respect for women as the creatrix, as not only the bringer of actual life, having the capacity to give birth, but also our ability to create worlds, to create environments, to create a thriving community. So, you know, we have these powers of nurturance and creating harmony and love and connecting to the natural world that are so inherent in our bodies. And we have those same cycles that connect us to the rhythms of the natural world. And, you know, over time with, you know, there are many different reasons, but I think with the rise of a more masculine, hyper-masculine culture, that the feminine way has been denigrated. And so we're trying to find our way back to that.

In my work with girls, I'm always, it kind of breaks my heart to see how many women or girls that have their first, you know, menses, they think they're dying. They don't even know what it is. And I think, wow, that's such a disservice to women. And it's such a taboo in our culture and viewed as something dirty and shameful. That's just not okay. You know, the time has come now where we can share information and bolster each other up and realize that no, this isn't something that makes us less than. This is actually the source of our feminine power. And how can we embrace that instead of feeling like, oh, it makes me less than women being repressed for that. It's kind of like we're in this moment of the earth-based cultures,

the indigenous cultures meets this, you know, hyper-masculine Western culture. And there's this moment where we're going to have to have a conversation that's honoring and respecting not only women, but the earth. We can't treat the earth this way. This is our home. Mother is the heart of the earth. We can't treat the earth this way. This is our home. Mother is the heart of the home. And so there's some things that we're in the middle of and very much what you're thinking about and working with is right at the center of that. When you were talking, I was thinking about

how I always go back to authenticity and sharing, because I think that I say this over and over and over, but that it's the gateway to human connection. And so I think that what you're seeing right now is that a lot of women and men are becoming more vulnerable and authentic and sharing. And when you share your experiences, it opens up a way for us women to really connect about topics that used to be like, you don't talk about it, like how Shanna was raised. I was not raised that way. My mom set me aside and, you know, spent a whole few hours with me explaining, you know, what my period was going to be like, what it was going to look like. The symptoms showed me different pads versus tampons. And she really prepared me and checked on me and explained it to me. I wouldn't say it was from a place of beauty. It was more from just a very knowledgeable matter of fact, loving I'm here for you, but not, I didn't get a sense of dirtiness. I did for some reason, always attach your period with just sex and birth for some reason. But going back to what I was trying to say is I think that

people speaking up and being more vulnerable is really opening up this shift to be able to talk about these things. Yeah. Like how did we go from like, I don't know if the red tent was a real thing. I I'm assuming it was based on something real, you know? So how did we go from, you know, joining together as women and the sisterhood of having to go away from the world to have our periods, to have babies and all this, to having it be shame and not talking about it. Well, Mandy's mom, that was amazing. Go Dana. My aunt gave me my first tampon and it was an OB. Oh, I mean, like, what do you do with that? You know, I mean, I sat there and read the directions and then just was like, screw it. I'm not swimming. But you know, it was

like in that movie, it really was a beautiful thing. It wasn't just about the period. It became like Mandy said, the sharing, the space that I feel like went absent though for many. And maybe it was because men became very fearful of any woman who had intuition, power, healing abilities. They freaking burned them off the stake for, you know, hundreds of years. And so it's just, it's amazing how you see like the progression of women and then you see it stalled and then now it's like coming back full force. Absolutely. Absolutely. And in recent news, we have setbacks, you know, there's this dance, but there is the power is growing. You know, there's a movement called the red tent movement. I don't know if you're familiar with that. Oh, but Mandy and I were about to make one. We were like, we're going to get a red tent. Oh, it is such a fabulous thing. I've done that

many times. And really the general idea is you create like a womb space, you know, with red fabrics and you can do whatever you want, but it's just almost like a sensual in the way that, you know, that's cozy and warm and you have candlelight if you wish or lovely things to eat and very honest conversation. It's a kind of a soft nurturing place. It can be. And so there's this kind of this little grassroots movement around the world. You can Google it. I think it's called the Red Tent Movement. And then there's something else called Red Tents in Every Neighborhood. And, you know, really promoting this idea of women, you know, come together in a real heart connected way. And this is our way of serving the world and

healing. I thought about the red when you were saying that, you know, the color of our period is red and red is that getting rooted. And I've never sat there and thought to myself while I was experiencing my period, wow, this is a time I should take right now to really get rerouted with mother earth and to get rooted. I've always looked at it as more like my period. I felt a little more unstable. So, you know, bringing awareness to it now, maybe I can honor it in that rootful way. Right. And that would be a wonderful way just because it's connecting us back to our nature and the earth. And there's no coincidence that the word month comes from the word moon. And as the moon does its journey, and I know you're both moon worshipers like I am,

you know, there's all of these different phases, and that's corresponding generally with a woman's menstrual cycle, that you're going through every different phase, and certainly we feel that of, you know, some days you're feeling like this, some days you're feeling like that, and there's the whole range, and when we can align ourselves with this is how it works in the natural world you know things grow and they diminish and then they come back again and so that there's this kind of soul breathing that happens through this that makes us part of everything yes we definitely shanna is a moon lover as well I just can't seem to stay awake past 10 o'clock lately. Sometimes the moon's in the sky earlier. I was going to say just recently, I discovered,

you know, the moon cycles and how it relates to not just your period, but to the stages of a woman, you know, being that triple goddess. And it's so funny. If you look up in the dictionary, what a crone is, do you know that it says an ugly hag, an old, ugly hag? I mean, who wrote the dictionary? Mr. Webster. Okay. Oh no, I don't trust anything I read anymore. When I look up like the dictionary, I mean, if you look up self-love, it says selfish. I mean, we have to rewrite and amend many things because the crone is when you get your crown. It is, you know, the wisdom. You are becoming into your divine feminine.

I wish that I would have wanted to learn like this when I was in high school. Exactly. No, but it is true. And that's part of our creative process here is that we are reframing, we are reshaping the narrative and that to be a woman who's post-menopausal and more of the elder phase, that yes, you're a sovereign being, you have been through so much of life, and you wear the crown proudly, you're not an old, ugly old hag, which by the way, I looked into that word and hag in old English means a grove of trees, like trees that grow in a ring. So yeah, so it's like this sacred growth. And that to me feels more in alignment with, you know, being a postmenopausal woman. Beautiful. So let's talk about your book, because your book is very, very unique to me. When I read

about it, and correct me if I'm wrong, you went back and looked at some pain and some places in your life and some experiences that you had and really tried to pull out the feminine magic that was there that maybe you didn't know at the time. And then in your book, you talk about these experiences and today you're able to find that magic daily. Yes. Very well said. Thank you. It's loosely autobiographical, this book, but, but, but, you know, for me to write it, it felt most authentic to anchor it in feeling senses, experiences that I have had to kind of be able to hold it and then to play with it in a way where would the divine feminine show up and so I just kind of had to make a space and say anybody want to show up and help walk this character through this initiation that she's in so that she can come to it like a better understanding of herself or maybe not so much like why why did this happen to me? But how can I

use every experience of my life as springboard for my growth? And because the more that I'm tuned in and switched into myself, the more able I am to actually hold the light and help another sister along the way. So there's that sense of like, yeah, this is the time to do that and to find that wellspring that's within the true feminine. And some of these stories really came from this yearning that I had about living in a culture where there's, we have rites of passage, and you mentioned confirmation earlier that there's, you know, we have in some religious traditions, these quinceanera or bar mitzvah and confirmation ways to kind of anchor a young person in community. We also have rituals and rites like birthdays or graduations, wedding days, but somehow ones that really

acknowledge a woman's experience, like going through childbirth, like, oh, wow, going through a divorce, how deeply devastating that can be, you know, to have your children become teenagers a woman's life, some bigger than others. And how can those kind of be put together in an honoring way and how to acknowledge this tremendous journey that we are on as women that maybe don't get acknowledged. So as a mom, whose daughter is getting ready to go off to college. And I feel deeper about this one than I did with my son and not say I love them any different. It's just, I have a bond with my daughter. That's pretty amazing. And how could I honor that as a female? How could I honor this death and this transition that we're both getting ready to make? Well, I would say, first of all, is just feel it. Feel all the feelings around it, because they're just indication of the depth of your love.

You know, there's so much. And also that passing this transition of her stepping into her womanhood and knowing that she has her own journey to take it's bittersweet it's bittersweet and in that kind of letting her go on her way also means that now you can pick up the thread on your journey as well so it's kind of like there's a letting go and then it's like oh and now I have to keep going in my own way. And so there's a lot of excitement you hold a piece of it and acknowledge the connection in whatever way spoken words or or through listening to music or holding each other whatever it is just taking a

moment to acknowledge that deep soulful connection that will never go away and holding the ends of the thread and then what we we do is hold the middle of the thread over like a flame and so it breaks and then you each have a piece of the red thread and you know put it on your wrist or your ankle or whatever some to remember it and then at some point it will fall off and that too is perhaps a healing when that day comes when you're okay I'm gonna cry oh my god it's beautiful that's so beautiful and it's also very simple so this is like an invitation and encouragement for women it doesn't have to be that but whatever way that you can bring the sacred ritual life into your world, that's really the magic. That's the magic of daily life is how can we be part of this bigger thing? And once

again, it doesn't have to be super fancy and overblown. It's simple, simple is best. I love the rituals and you're right. We have rituals around birthdays and graduations and all these things, Christmas, which Jesus wasn't even born in Christmas. You know, we have all these different things. His name wasn't Jesus. It was Joshua. But I mean, we have all of these different, you know, rituals. They are rituals.

And yet these very everyday things that are happening to everybody every day, we aren't honoring them and giving them a ritual. So I love, love what you just suggested to Mandy and her daughter. That is like absolutely freaking beautiful. Bridget Finklair, she wrote the book, The Red Dress. And she also teaches the Pista Sophia and the Keys of Enoch. She and her friends, they didn't have a specific ritual to do. When they all were going through menopause, you know, they got together. They went to a beach. They sat around the fire and talked about when they first started their periods and all this stuff.

And then one of them had some red wine and they poured it all over themselves. You know, they didn't really know what they were doing. They were just going with it. And she said it was so beautiful and she felt so very connected to her sisters and to, you know, the change in her life. And yeah, it was, I just was like, that is so important to do. I just see the importance of these smaller rituals that we can do just to the everyday stuff that we're going through. Absolutely. I love that one about the red wine. And the fun thing is, is that if you use what you have because that's also a woman's way you know you're resourceful we got a bottle of red wine let's go and uh and and you

know we're we're constantly creating that's what we do it's so so you just and when you get a group together different people there's this collaboration that happens and you make something. Isn't that fabulous? I love it. And you made this book and this was your first book. How did that feel putting out your very first book? Oh, I'm still pinch pinch. You know, I never, it was definitely a prompting from the divine to me, you know, like, Hey, write this down. Like, this is what's coming through. So in so many ways I feel like I wrote this. It wrote me, it came to me. And,

and I know both of you are very in touch with the channel that you are, that it feels very much like that for me. And so I am just. Yeah. I can just see how proud you are. And I feel like what Shanna just said, honoring these tiny moments is like the basis of what you're trying to say through this book. Tell us about the cover. I am just a fan of the beauty way. You know, if something is beautiful, it just goes right into my heart. And that can be something in the natural world. It can be a stone, it can be a piece of food, you know, there's all these different ways that beauty is. But I actually didn't make the cover that the publisher did.

But you know, they kind of drew on my interest in mythology. And when I was a girl, I loved the class in school that was like Greek and Roman myths, because also having grown up Catholic, I was so excited to see sort of the feminine face of God, like, oh, what is a goddess like? And so they chose this classical image with stars and a moon, because those things are important to me. It just makes me happy. And it's somewhat mystical because we're touching on that realm where it's, where's that 3D reality connect

with the liminal and the magical world. I know for myself and Mandy, when we did some ancestral work and we had discovered what the women in our families had gone through in these lineages prior to us. We just were so shocked. And then in awe of how much freedom we have today, I think it really brought reality to where we are today,

the most unbelievable stuff, but yet they became a strength within us, you know, because they are within us. How much did your ancestors or, you know, did you connect with your ancestors throughout this journey? Absolutely. The first story in the book is about a young heroine whose name is Grace and she finishes university and she's just at that moment like what do I do with my life and she has this deep desire to go to Scotland which is her ancestry there's a line where she says something about going to the land of her forebears she was hoping would give her a sense

of who she was and what she might become, you know, to feel grounded in place. Because so many of us aren't necessarily connected to where our bones are from. And so she goes on this trip and she gets to Scotland and she goes in search of this well of truth that someone tells her about. And so she goes to what's it going to say to me about my life? And I don't know if I'll be a spoiler alert, but, you know, she ends up finding the well and then she looks inside. She can't find her face and all she can see reflected is the natural world around her and that's this moment of like wow okay there's something bigger at play here so back to your initial question that for me too having gone on a similar quest back to my land of ancestry was to reconnect with something very

deep inside of me of you know where where am I from where am I going and certainly a connection to my mother line my mother and my grandmother and also seeing the things that were available to them or not available but in this, I actually have the wherewithal and all of the tools to be able to make a bridge and hold it out for my daughters and whoever's coming down the line. Yeah, Mandy and her family. I mean, they're very, you know, Mandy, very vulnerable. She speaks her truth. You know, she's always been a voice to be reckoned with. I mean, she's, you know, strong in in that way found one of her grandmas that actually had their tongue cut off as a punishment which doesn't surprise me in her lineage

this is the kind of stuff you know that happened unbelievable and in a way now that just by it seems to me that by doing the research and finding out things about ancestors, that's healing in itself. Just to put your attention on uncovering. Like I see what you went through. I know that you prayed for your future lineages and I am her and I'm free and I'm whole and I can speak and I can cuss and I can do whatever I want that's right Elizabeth you've worked with a lot of young girls a lot of women a lot of girls can you talk a little bit about you call yourself like a menstrual activist what does that look like the space you hold for them so often I will work with a group of girls. It can vary

as far as the ages, but imagine somewhat like a red tent. We create this environment. I like to work with girls often that haven't started their period yet in enculturating this sense of there's something very beautiful and powerful that happens in the female body. And, and I'm preparing myself for this. So in some ways, it's very similar to what your mother did with you, Mandy, there's a kind of imaginative, well, it's a showing, okay, this is what your body does, and this is what it looks like. And this is how you care for yourself. And done in a way that's kind of a little more symbolic and magical. I have this beautiful felted uterus that I use and that, you know, the ovaries have little jewels on them and they can kind of see like, what's the journey that

happens in the course of a month inside your body? And then what can you do to self-care? Because I feel that that is a really important piece. And I know that you talk a lot about self-care and how to support your physical embodiment on your show. And I feel that for a young girl to realize how to notice what you need, how to tune in, how to feed the feminine, how to nourish yourself is also a very important thing. So we talk a lot about like the moon, your moods can change and nothing's ever bad and wrong. But just notice when you need to withdraw like the moon or when you need to shine fully. So we do that. And then we also do a session with the moms,

which is fabulous because the moms come and they share pictures of when they were the same age as their daughters and maybe what they thought or what they wanted to be like when they grew up. There's this weaving of connection between the moms and daughters. And then we do a ritual, like a little ceremony that's about being on a journey. And the girls are at a certain stage of the journey and the mothers are the next phase. So it's kind of like this walk that we do through time. You know, we sing together. And then, of course, we have a fabulous feast. And chocolate is definitely the centerpiece.

So we just, we make it beautiful, fragrance, you know, essential oils and just all of these things that make you feel good. What's your address? Cause I'm sending my daughter to you. Just this morning, I told my son, I was bringing him to go work out. And I was like, man, your sister. I was like, we're just going to have to make a new rule not to talk in the morning. She's 10. She's getting a little acne here and there. And she's changing.

This morning, I was like, are you a little tired this morning? She's like, no, are you? And I was just like, no, but I'm not in a bad mood and then my other daughter said well have a nice day and she's like not likely he's in hormone soup right now yeah Elizabeth I love what you're saying though as far as like with Shanna's story you know like she might not even know what a hormone is or what's going on. And like, we're taught these basics in school, just knowledge they're giving to us. We're not taught the discernment piece about dropping. I don't know. When you had said what happens with the body over 30 days, I was like, what happens? Wait, what? This really is what I think is true. Feminine empowerment is like knowing what your body does so that we can take care of our bodies in a way that's meaningful. Nourishing the feminine piece of you when you're

young, teaching them that. So I misunderstood because I had people like Madonna that I looked up to. So I thought nourishing the feminine was through my clothes and the outside of me. No one ever taught me how to nourish it from the inside. Wow. That's a great point. And that's a hallmark of the culture that we live in, that it's women are kept distracted, disconnected by it's about how you look. It's about your body. And you're going to be on the treadmill trying to get that perfect this or that, or the other thing, instead of tuning that out. So you can go inside where the real power is the power source so this is all kind of part of that bringing it back home and feeding that feminine way which can look like in this hyper masculine culture you know rest pause those kinds

of things could be like oh you're not being useful being useful. You're not being busy. We glorify busy in a way that's not helpful. Isn't there cultures that still, like when women are having their period, they don't do any, like they don't go to work and they do take that time for themselves and stuff like that? There are very few and far between, but, and then there are some that have taken that the respect for a woman during this time, you don't need to cook like this is time for you to rest when you're bleeding. But some of that's been taken into a new phase of you are banished during this time. This is not looking at it and look at it more as like a sabbatical for the month.

It's a sabbatical for the month. A sabbatical, yeah. If we had someone, a listener that is new to learning the moon cycles and how your period aligns with them. Two things. The first one would be become a out, finding the moon in the sky, make little notes, noticing how it changes from day to day, like just as a practice. And certainly under a full moon, try to get full moonlight on your body, you know, just going out and looking at if you can, if it's not a rainy day, but there's something about just making that connection with the actual moon that has transformative powers in it.

So that's one piece. As far as working with your cycle, there's so many great books out. And I'd be happy to send you a list of books, some that may work for girls or women, if that could be available to your listeners. I could do that. But find out about your body. It's fascinating. The female body is magnificent, what it's capable of. So just get curious. Get curious, you know?

So many women say that the only thing that they learned about their period in school was how not to get pregnant. Like that's the only piece that they were taught. And so it's like, oh, no, no, no. There's so much more that you have to do the look in yourself. Speaking of getting to know your body, I'm 46 years old. I've had three children and I just learned two weeks ago that I have a completely upside down uterus. How did I never know that? Like how did a doctor never, I mean, I always knew I had a tilted cervix. My placenta was always in the front versus the back.

But when I found out I had a completely tilted uterus, I was like, why would a doctor have not ever told me that? And it gave me food for thought, but like, it sucks that they know our insides, but we can't. I'm not a medical doctor, so I couldn't give you any advice on that, but that's an interesting picture. The work that we need to do is we can't really see it. There's a lot of kind of internal feeling that we do. Gwyneth Paltrow did that series and one of them was having women hold mirrors up to their vaginas and they were getting to know and see themselves. And

some of these women had never seen themselves before. I thought to myself, we're not taught to get to know that part of ourselves. And I could see my family, like a couple of my family members that were watching it cringe and like one left the room. But I hope that we can get to a space where we can, as mothers, teach our daughters, even like look at yourself, get to know you. It's part of you. Just even like, look at yourself, get to know you. It's part of you. Just like you would look at your hands. The natural, normal, healthy. Why do we

have to feel anything but proud and empowered by them? So this is part of the big shift we're in right now. Yeah. And we're all part of it. I'm assuming that you're seeing that girls are younger and younger as we are. And so at a mindset of a nine and 10 year old, like Shanna's daughter at 10 years old versus, I mean, I didn't get my period until I was 15. Are you, do you still think they have the mental capacity to understand and go through these rituals like they were when they were 15 versus nine with you or with their mother? Do you feel like it's appropriate because they're so young? They are young. And yet I sometimes find that the younger girls are more open than the older

ones. Like, oh, I'm 15. I know what I'm doing. That there's kind of this period when I was a school teacher, the fifth grade was that we called it the golden age, because there was this openness to magical, expansive thinking, and yet also very intellectually awake. I think once again, it's something like, you look at your daughter, what are the things that she's interested in and how you can kind of to her, how, you know, for a young girl that they may not understand all of these big things, but trust me, I think girls at every age love rituals and they love, you know, doing things in the company of women and just knowing that they're part of something bigger, part of this long lineage of

girls and women. And this is what they're stepping into, you know, and having that sort of mentorship holding on a soul level, you really can't go wrong. So is there a perimenstrual years as well? Because I do remember thinking, I think I started my period, I think I started my period I think I started my period you know and I did that for like a year and you know I actually started my period on some boy's bike when I was like and wait and the worst thing is is that my partner it's his best friend and they work together you know I've been waiting for it because other people had it and so I was like oh I'm gonna start I'm gonna start I had it. And so I was like, oh, I'm going to start. I'm going to start. I'm going to start. Absolutely. So, you know, the whole system, it practices. You know, nine years old, like the body starts practicing. The fact that you're actually seeing visual signs,

that that's definitely a tip off that the hormonal process has started. But, you know, you can definitely help her kind of understand like, oh, I'm feeling like this today. How to care for myself how can I make myself feel better when I'm just sort of out of sorts does that mean like going in my room and writing in my journal or taking a bath getting into water you kind of help guide her that way my son who's autistic I tell you every hair that came in on anywhere on him, he let us know. And I'm like, great.

Do you want to see? And I'm like, no, it's supposed to be there. And then I told his older brother, you need to have a talk with him. Which is always great to have that mentor lead that little sister, you know, whether it's an actual sister or if we just had this, you know, in our culture, just how beautiful that would be. I mean, hopefully one day, maybe Kinsley will take Mandy's youngest and say, Hey, listen, this is what you do, or this is what I did, you know, and that it's normal. Maybe if she ever gets over a grumpy phase. My daughter, Trenna, her friends would actually celebrate it. They would go to

dinner. Oh, that's beautiful. Wow. They would send each other like a little message and the moms now are celebrating it as well. They buy them like a cake and their favorite dinner. So Trenna had me find her favorite food and we celebrated it at dinner and they're buying them presents. Of course, they probably just want presents before we know it. They'll be getting huge. Oh yeah. She was 13. Okay. Well, yeah. I'm going to send you this link. There is a period products company. They make these little like commercial videos. And one was called like the first moon party and they had a magician they had like you know pin the tail on the uterus they had like bobbing for ovaries it is so hilarious but oh my god i love it you can't help but laugh and i think that's part of it's like there's the the reverence

but there's also like the levity and anything that you do at all that acknowledges them. And this process that like puts it in a positive light as opposed to like, oh, we don't talk about that. So I'm like, oh, this is bad. Elizabeth, do you know that the first time anyone ever talked about my breast was when I was in fifth grade. I went to someone's birthday party and it was that celebrity and they had a pool in there. She had an older brother and it was his friends and they were freshmen. And I remember one of the boys saying to me, Oh my God, you have bigger boobs than some freshmen. And I was like, I do? Like I didn't

even know. Yeah. That was, I'll never forget it. Speaking of boys, I was going to ask about men and fathers. You know, of course, I would never suggest or even ask, like, if a guy, if a man, if a father should do a ritual with his daughter when she gets his period. But I will say, my husband was kind of upset that he wasn't more part of some decisions that were made. He didn't want her using tampons. He wanted her using pads. He was upset that he wasn't part of knowing why we had that dinner that night. Like he had these things that it was almost like he wanted to, but he didn't want to. Maybe it just comes down to like at least having a conversation with them

because it's a big deal for them too. It is their child as well. That's true. I do believe though, that there is, there's a space for that female to female mother, daughter, or auntie, grandmother connection. That's, that's a deeply felt experience. I also think it's a beautiful thing for the father daughterdaughter relationship, but that's something different. So they can have their own ritual. For him, it was more of like a supportive thing. Like, how can I support her? What can I do? And to get her to a comfortable place where she says, hey, dad, I desperately need you to run to the store and grab me some product. And he will. But it's kind of teaching, hopefully, this open conversation to where I guess that the father and the will, but it's kind of teaching, hopefully this open conversation to where I guess that the father and the daughter, it's not uncomfortable for them. A beautiful thing that to have that to,

yeah, I remember just like, Oh, I just didn't want to have to ask my dad to stop by way home from work, you know, pick me up some pads. That should be just like any other thing. I'm curious, why do women's cycles end up being on the same page, usually when they're around each other for a long period of time? Isn't it fascinating? Well, I have to tell you that the answer is nobody knows. Nature. Nature, yeah. Several years back, I went to a gathering at the National Institute of Health in Washington and all the top doctors in the world were together talking about the first ever menstrual conference. And you ask a simple question and they all just said, we have no idea. There just hasn't been enough research done, which is also an interesting thing that menopause and there's just not a lot of research that's been done. something about our natural way is to kind of entrain and to have this sense of working together, which is very beautiful. There's many different hypotheses, but nobody really knows for sure.

At the beginning, you had mentioned the blood moon. First of all, what you meant by that symbolic meaning, you know, the moon represents feminine. The sun represents masculine. Talk about the blood moon. A lot of women do different rituals of self-care around that time. Moon blood, they're just different names for, there's so many different names for period, your menstrual cycle, a lot of like anecdotal names occurs the rag or some of the terrible ones in the past you know aunt flo's coming to town you know crimson tide i've never heard crimson tide that's freaking's freaking awesome. Riding the Red Pony. There's just so many of them. And so I really like to connect the menstrual cycle with the moon because as we talked about earlier, that there is a connection there. And so I often just call it moon time.

I get it now. Even as I got older and I said, cause I mean, it wasn't probably into my thirties that I really could feel all of it, you know, experiencing that these changes in me, I was too busy, I guess, and no one had ever brought awareness to it. But I, I mean, even ovulation, what became almost as painful sometimes as my period, I would even bleed a little bit. And of course I thought, oh my God, I have cancer. You know, all of those things like would have been nice to know. Absolutely. And you know what? One thing I learned, which I think is so funny is that there's a name for that ping feeling that you have when the ovary comes out of the sack. It's called

middle schmertz. What the rule? I used to get middle schmertz. What the real? It used to get middle schmertz. Middle schmertz. And- Hannah, I did not know that about you. I had middle schmertz so bad that my lymph node on the side of my vagina would swell up so bad. And I thought I had cancer.

My mom took me to the doctor and I could touch it and it would like move in it. Nice, nice. It was when I was ovulating, I could feel it still happens sometimes, just not as often, but I don't want to get on the COVID talk, but you know, I just want women to be aware because I had an OBG tell me two weeks ago that they are actually seeing differences in women's periods from getting the vaccine. So do your research. I don't know the answers. That's just what mine told me because mine has changed. I think the takeaway is getting

to know your own body and loving all of you, all of you, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Elizabeth, what do you hope that readers take away from your book? I hope that they take away a sense of, I'm not alone. The stories that are part of my life and that have it within me to see a more expanded vision, to share with other people, but often with women, these similar stories and to find strength in that because it's together, it's together that we're rising. And, and so I just want this to be like a drink of cool water or something absolutely like refreshing and revivifying for women to read. Yeah. Okay. I feel encouraged. My heart feels stronger that I can move forward in my life and bring what

I came to bring in this world. So that's our, that's our light. We're going to shine. I love that. You know, I want to share with you that you gave me something else today. You gifted me, you gifted me some hope around something. I've always told Shanna that I wish I was awakened when I was giving birth to my child. I wish I was more aware. I wish I was present, more present. I kept doing the, I wish, I wish, I wish for all, like at my wedding, I wish I was more present and tapped into my, you know, feminine energy. I wish. And today what you've shared with me is that I can still right now go back to those experiences and find that magic in it. That it's not just gone. It's not something I can't do. I can still do it. And for break that shit down.

The more that we can accept what has been and love ourselves through whatever it is, you know, that we are the heroines of our own lives and act accordingly. And there's no there's no need to wish we're doing the best we can at any given time. And it feels like particularly over the past few years with the pandemic and all that, women have really carried the lion's share of responsibilities, you know, home, career, family, all of these different pieces that we're just doing the best we can. We are where we are. And let's just honor that. Be proud of where we stand in the moment. And we don't need to keep beating ourselves up for not being enough. You are enough. We are worthy. We are here. We are powerful and strong. We have some work to do.

That was beautiful. Thank you so much. Where can everybody get your book? I'm assuming everywhere. I hope everywhere. I hope everywhere too. It will be published on June 14th. So it can be on all the major outlets. It can be found. You can also go to my website, which is elizabethagouldstories.com. And you can get it there.

We're hoping it's also in a lot of independent stores. And yeah. And if you get it and you like it, leave a review and that would be very helpful. I'm really being called right now to read this poem. Excellent. Because many of the things that you said are right here. So it's called The Rise of the Divine Feminine by Shashka Loon. It's time to get to work and bring all that is you, a feminine, to the planet. Gone are the days where we don't rock the boat for fear of reaction or retribution. Gone are the days of the martyrdom of our children and our spouse. Gone are the days where we put everyone before you and you are last. Gone are the days you are not honored for your compassion, your softness, your wisdom, your voice, your heart,

everything that you are naturally. Gone are the days we leave our feminine natures at the door to adopt more masculine ones. Gone are the days we are not honored for our moon cycle times, pregnancy, childbirth, postpartum, aging, menopause. Gone are the days that we look at other women as competition, as if the universe is not infinite, limitless, and abundant. Gone are the days we are oppressed, repressed, not heard, not praised, nor worshipped, not respected. Gone are the days you feel as if you are entitled to me without my permission. Gone are the days you touch me and take from me without my permission. Gone are the days of toxic femininity where we do not speak up and save other women despite our masculine counterparts. Gone are the days we are treated less than and unequal. Gone are the days

we don't rise as the powerful warrior goddesses that we are. Rise. Find the light within you. Find your superpower, your beauty in its natural state. You are feminine, you are divine, you are love, you are compassion, you are peace, you are healing. Don't be scared to shine your light the world needs you may it be so wow that was awesome oh my god i need to get that printed out and put into my daughter's album for her for graduation yeah elizabeth do you teach other women how to do what you do with these young girls? Because I feel like it's needed everywhere. I have done, but I've lately been thinking about putting together like a curriculum that people could access online.

So you are giving me yet another little nudge in that. Yeah, I was feeling it heavily. Like you had curriculum. I passed that curriculum. I would probably take your curriculum and the course so that I could teach girls this. Excellent. Yeah. Give me a moment. You're like, I just wrote a book. I need to rest. Oh, thank you. You've been such a pleasure. I just loved this conversation. It was so needed. Thank you so much. Thank you very much.

Thank you for the beautiful work you do. You too. Thank you. Welcome to the Sense of Soul podcast. We are your hosts, Shanna and Mandy. Grab your coffee, open your mind, heart, and soul. It's time to awaken.