The Menstruality Podcast - 130: 100 Ways that Cycle Awareness Transforms Your Life: Part One (Alexandra & Sjanie)

Episode Date: January 25, 2024

It walks us home to our own natural rhythms. It keeps us close to what truly matters to us. It’s a innate self esteem builder. It even prepares us for menopause…Menstrual (and lunar) cycle awareness are a huge game-changer, and powerful spiritual practices for our wild times. But the truth is that most of us live in cultures that value productivity over rest and profit over health - so we all need inspiration to stay committed to our personal cyclical rebellion. That’s why today’s Menstruality Podcast episode is devoted to all the ways that menstrual cycle awareness can transform our lives. (And ok, we may not have quite reached 100, but we easily could have given a couple more hours!) We explore:How cycle awareness helps us to pace our our bodies, energies and unique nervous systems, rather than allowing the culture around us to dictate who we have to be. When we lean into our own cyclical experience we help to deshame the menstrual cycle and menopause, and instead dignify and honour them as powerful sources of wisdom.  Cycle awareness as a foundational wellness practice, bringing soothing and ease, and helping us clarify and hold our boundaries.---Receive our free video training: Love Your Cycle, Discover the Power of Menstrual Cycle Awareness to Revolutionise Your Life - www.redschool.net/love---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email [e-mail]---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolSophie Jane Hardy: @sophie.jane.hardy - https://www.instagram.com/sophie.jane.hardy

Welcome to the Menstruality Podcast, where we share inspiring conversations about the power of menstrual cycle awareness and conscious menopause. This podcast is brought to you by Red School, where we're training the menstruality leaders of the future. I'm your host, Sophie Jane Hardy, and I'll be joined often by Red School's founders, Alexandra and Sharni, as well as an inspiring group of pioneers, activists, changemakers and creatives to explore how you can unashamedly claim the power of the menstrual cycle to activate your unique form of leadership for yourself, your community and the world. Hey there, welcome back to the Menstruality Podcast. Our episode today is devoted to all of the different ways that menstrual cycle awareness or lunar cycle awareness, if you don't have a menstrual cycle currently, can transform our

lives. And okay, we might not quite have reached 100 but we might well get there in our part two next week we look at how cycle awareness walks us home to our own natural rhythms how it keeps us close to what really matters to us how it's a natural builder of self-esteem and how it even prepares us for the great initiation of menopause and so much more. And before we get started we have an invitation for you. We would love, love, love to hear your stories of how menstrual cycle awareness or working with the lunar cycle has transformed your life. Maybe it would be through your health your emotional experience your creativity your sense of purpose your calling your relationships we'd love to hear what called you

to begin practicing cycle awareness and where are you at now so please write them into me at sophie at redschool.net that's sophie atredschool.net so that we can include them in next week's episode. Okay, so let's get started with Alexandra and Sharni, 100 Ways That Cycle Awareness Transforms Your Life, Part 1. Alexandra Pope and Sharni Hugo-Willitz, welcome back to the menstruality podcast. It feels like it's been a while. Thank you Sophie Jane. Yeah, this is the first conversation we've had this year and we're going to talk about the bedrock of everything that we do, which is menstrual cycle awareness and why it's such an amazing practice, what might

be getting in the way and yeah, why we all need to double down and recommit to our practice this year, because it's going to change everything, everything, everything, everything. Before we start, let's do a quick cycle check-in. Where are you both at? I'm day 16 and I'm post ovulation. I'm still in my inner summer, but there are whiffs of the inner autumn. And I was reflecting this morning how I used to feel this kind of drop or this a bit of a shock actually when I landed in my inner autumn it used to be very confronting and quite quite a kind of disturbing day either very heightened irritability or real kind of emotional overwhelm the air you know my sense of smell has gotten better so I'm like kind of sniffing the autumn air and that means I can really follow

where I know I'm going it's like I get the cues earlier now, and that means I have started slowing down today. I've started sort of softening and kind of pulling back a little bit in myself. Yesterday I was proper cocker spaniel, just full blown. You were indeed. I was so on, so on on so on so and over everything and and yeah i mean it was nothing i couldn't do yesterday um and so it's kind of easy to get swept up in that because it's very um intoxicating it's such a good feeling to feel so good and to have so

much energy and so much to give and so much love and be so with it. But yeah, I have learned not to let myself kind of expect that I'm going to be the same the next day. And I sure as hell am not the same today so yes I'm feeling the sniff of autumn and I kind of call to begin the process of slowing down because it takes time to slow down it can't be done you know in an instant oh it's beautiful to hear you share and it's already making me think of one of the great reasons to practice menstrual cycle awareness is that it allows us to be who we are on any given day or it opens up the gateway for us to recognize who we are actually on that day and to let that be different to who we were the day before and I was just thinking in the meeting that we had yesterday when you were zooming around being a cocker spaniel being excited and exuberant

about everything and I I'm on day 27 today and 26 yesterday obviously so I'm in the void now just before I bleed you know I'm navigating the uncertainty because I my period could come tomorrow it could come in four days I've got lots of things going on in my life. Am I going to be able to rest? I'm in that whole negotiation, but just slowing down inside. But yesterday I was actually crying at the start of that meeting, not because of anything you did, but just because my heart felt so tender and I was really touched by some grief really by things that are happening in the world and you were being you exuberant joyful sensitive to where I was and I was just letting tears fall down my face and there we were in a meeting together because of cycle awareness able

to just honor ourselves and and and I didn't have to pull myself up out of myself to become a Labrador to your Cocker Spaniel which would have been very exhausting I could just let myself be you know Eeyore and and I didn't have to forego my joy yes yeah that's so moving hearing that i'm just feeling it all afresh the power of being able to be just so open about our cycles and to not see for instance for you uh you know we didn't you know where you were when we're not sort of up to par which is you know a dialogue you could have had with yourself you would have been judging yourself and not recognizing that the place not being able to be in the place you're in but also not valuing the what the place you are in can bring to the conversation we are having so I remember yesterday how sensitive you were because we were thinking about our five-year

plan and this year you know all the things we want to do and the marketing of it and you you were you know we were like you know looking down on the top of it going yeah yeah it's looking great but you were inside there going you know you were feeling the reality of what some of those moves might demand and yeah and you know feeling you know a little bit of overwhelm and going and and you brought us in and you brought us to land in in the reality of negotiating this so it's really important that that yeah the place you were in contributed it wasn't oh Sophie's not up to par today and we'll just let her kind of sit quietly in the corner yeah I really want to second that because for anybody who is in a partnership a relationship or in a team or in a community, this is where cycle awareness really benefits not just us,

but everyone and the kind of greater, the greater goods that we're, you know, that we're serving, for example, at Red School, you know, we have a unified vision. And us all being in different places is all contributing to that. And I really felt yesterday, Sophie, and I was so appreciative of you when I looked back on the day because of the sensitivity you brought, I felt you were holding the perspective of, which is a very easy perspective to forget, is that some days we don't have capacity and some days we aren't capable in that worldly sort of way.

And so when we're making plans, we really need to factor that in. We can't make a plan thinking that every day we'll be able to do whatever it takes because some days we won't so we need space in the plan to allow for the fact that we're going to have days where we just need to you know topple over curl in bed and let go. And if the plan is so full on that there's no space for that, then how do we get to be cyclical beings? I mean, this is something that we really have to learn and practice at Red School because we do need to plan. And yet we need to plan in accordance with the fact that we're cyclical. that sometimes means superhero days and that sometimes means like I'm going to be I'm going to be just hanging out here days so I feel you brought that

perspective which in my kind of summer energy place I really everything is possible and you reminded me that no sometimes things are not possible so So that was really beautiful. And it was like our organization, our team was being paced by your nervous system. And that's, you know, we often talk with menstrual cycle awareness is like we're pacing our most vulnerable part, we're pacing our slowest part. In that meeting, you were holding that place for all of us. Can you say a bit more about this for people who maybe haven't come across this idea of pacing? Could you just unpack it a bit? What it means that we were pacing my nervous system? Yeah. Well, I'm going to answer this in a slightly diverted way by saying right now if i was pacing

this conversation i would um come to alexandra to hear her cycle check-in yes because because there's something about bringing presence to where we're at. That is the be all and end all when it comes to pacing, that kind of checking in with the condition that we're in in any given moment. And that's the ground of pacing. So, so on that note, Alexandra, how are you today? How am i today um i am of course cycling with the moon because i don't have a cycle anymore and it's of course much more subtle except around particularly uh the dark new moon which is where it's been the last you you know, seven days ago.

So it's about day seven of the moon. And I was laughing to myself this morning thinking, I get an echo of what happens, used to happen for me at menstruation, where I used to get so freaking high and deep and cosmic and just be channeling all sorts of things which is sort of what's been happening um for me but i don't have the holding that the bleed gives you the bleed will really bring you into a kind of a bubble that kind of really slows you down and i have to do that slowing right down very very deliberately and choicefully because i don't have menstruation pulling me down and in but i still get the incredible

kind of opening so i have felt so like a channel um but not awfully grounded so the last two or three days has been this huge amount of sort of inner work of me um being able to um just sort of stay soothed and pacing pacing my actual energy and um yeah last night i i realized i was overcooked and i had to do some serious talking to myself but i'm rather proud of myself this morning that i've kind of put myself right i'm so i'm actually feeling i have that i just have a good sort of relaxed happy easy energy with myself and um and feeling this um just feeling very alive to this work is of all that's been coming to me yeah so yeah it's good so i'm not feeling quite so untethered this morning as I have been you know I could sort of talk in tongues and things you know when I get that sort of it's funny really funny that's um

actually your story of the last seven days is such a beautiful example of pacing and menstrual cycle awareness or failing to pace on occasion yeah well that's what pacing is this is not showing success it's like uh it's a practice pacing is a practice so you know menstrual cycle awareness is the practice of pacing your body and being. That's quite a good definition of menstrual cycle. Yeah, it is, isn't it? It all comes down to this thing of pacing and in a way, deconditioning ourselves from moving at the pace of our mind and moving at the pace of our culture and reconditioning ourselves to the intelligence of our menstrual cycle and learning to, well, firstly, hear that intelligence,

that's the awareness piece. And then secondly, to trust that intelligence. And actually, that part is hard. It's like that part comes with time. But the trusting of it is, you know, once you've noticed what you've noticed, like Alexandra noticed that she was overcooked, then she was able to tend to herself in a way that kind of brought her back to herself. So we could say that pacing is actually this practice of coming back to yourself. It's this practice of coming home to yourself again and again and again and again. So we, actually, Alexandra, it was you yesterday

who coined this new phrase, menstrual cycle awareness is a practice of presence. And I thought, mm-hmm. You're developing a habit of presence. That was the phrase. Sorry, I misquoted you. A habit of presence. That is so good.

A habit of presence.'s what you that sustains you when you step off the cliff at menopause you've got in your being this habit of presence that then allows you to not be completely bamboozled by menopause yeah that's one of the gifts of menstrual cycle awareness which we should just state up front is that it prepares you for the great initiation of menopause uh in a way that nothing else can so yes this habit of presence and actually we you um you landed that phrase alexandra yesterday when we were doing this workshop with our graduates community, the Hive, we call the community the Hive. And I just I love how evocative that name is,

because it is so the atmosphere of this community. And there is so much honey that is happening. Well, you know, speaking of honey, and reason that the the way i came to that phrase was actually someone's experience of um she said she's coming into menopause it was one of our grads and she just shared uh a particular phrase about she's on i think day 111 now without a bleed so she's clearly um casting off from the shore of you know menstrual of the menstrual cycle life and it was a phrase she used about uh i can't haven't got the exact words but something like each day feeling like a prayer her cycle check-in because she would still check in with herself even though it's you know 100 she'd check in with herself and it was like a prayer and her words touched me so

much and it it sort of triggered this whole insight and almost it was like a revelation of actually that's what's meant to be happening uh that is that cycle awareness develops this habit of presence so that you are really in and with yourself it's it's it's training you up to be totally in and with yourself but also it has this quality of um dignity i could feel and that instead of slamming into menopause or crashing and burning and she there will be challenge it's an initiation but that she is alive and present to herself but she's also holding this energy of dignity with herself and it's that that word dignity that sort of went with that word presence that was so felt oh my god yes that's our birthright that's what's supposed that's how we get to turn menopause into this um proper spiritual awakening that it is

actually and that's what's trying to happen for everybody yeah yeah i really um love that example because it shows in a way where we're being led through our practice of cycle awareness and that capacity to develop a habit of presence with oneself in the unknown, which she is, you know, her cycle isn't rhythmic. It isn't predictable. That's the muscle we're all growing, you know, this power of presence. presence and I also want to sort of step us back a little bit because when we start menstrual cycle awareness particularly if we have the good grace of starting to practice menstrual cycle awareness when we're young you know when we're in our 20s the the sort of first half of the menstruality journey offers us most often,

unless there are health conditions and, you know, there can be factors that affect this, but most often it offers us this very predictable pattern and rhythm. So it's like the training wheels for this habit of presence. You kind of get educated on what your, which is charting your cycle and paying attention, like doing this, tuning in with yourself, getting present with how you are on any given day. As this is the kind of first piece, really, this is what connects you to your cycle and connects you to yourself. And what happens when you do that every day, you start to discover your pattern, your rhythm of power,

your kind of signature tune and what you need in these different inner seasons as we talk about. And then you can kind of start to organize your life according to that and that's a lovely thing to do that is such an empowering first step when it comes to cycle awareness is putting your menstrual cycle days in your diary knowing when your period is due, knowing what inner season you're going to be in in any given week, and then planning ahead to really suit your cycle. It's such an act of agency. It's so empowering. And it's so fascinating too. I remember when I first began,

I committed to 13 months of tracking and I had the round cycle charts that are included in our Love Your Cycle course now. So there's a little space for you to put the day and then just space for maybe like three or four words, really. Or sometimes I'd expand out and write little essays on the side because I was having a big day and I remember the feeling of like I was an explorer in brand new terrain or in like a foreign country that I was discovering for the first time going wow okay so hang on I do have the same kind of very painful emotional meltdown and it's pretty much always around day 21 22 23 24 oh and I do have this surge of energy, you know, a few days after I bleed and just seeing month after month, starting to note the patterns and then be able to, well, go into step two, I think is where is, yeah, of being able to kind of plan my life a bit around these

patterns and, you know, know when, okay, probably won't put that really big meeting if I can possibly put it on day 18 instead of 24 it's gonna go differently um yeah yeah it's such a fascinating adventure isn't it and and it's all inside us we don't have to make it up it's right here for the for the for the grabbing you know it's right there for us to just like you said yeah exactly it is such a journey of adventure and discovery that goes on and on and on there are so many layers to this discovery I mean I discover new things about my cycle and myself and this pattern on and on and on and And we often hear from people, Sophie, just what you're saying, when you start out tracking your cycle

and paying attention and sort of doing these charts so you can compare and look at the significant pattern, you realize, this is what people say to us, oh, like how much of what you experience is actually cyclical? You know, we think it's random. For example, I used to get a cold sore, like at the same time every month, right before bleeding.

It was cyclical. And on and on and on the list goes. It's really fascinating to see that and have that revealed to you and to get to know yourself in that way yeah you you're getting to know yourself and and there's a sort of magic that gets to work which I marvel at every time when I hear people talking about their experience which is that there's a sort of quiet, it's like an act of self-love, actually. You're really honouring yourself. And it's actually, I want to say, a natural self-esteem builder.

You know, because years ago now, I remember having a conversation with a woman and she had been practising cycle awareness for a while, you know, the way that we'd been teaching. And she said, I've discovered all these things about my inner water. And I said, I'd love to hear. And then she paused for a moment and she said, yes, I'd like to tell you, but I'm on day. And it was towards the end of the cycle. She says, I don't feel like, you know, just putting out at the moment.

I just want to be very quiet. And I never forget that conversation. She just had no qualms about just taking care of her boundaries. It was just very dignified. I said, no, I'd love to but you know this isn't the moment and it's that honoring of our energies and and being able to assert our boundaries instead of you know imagine you have to be perfectly on and relating that is so radical And it builds soothing and ease into our systems. You know, what I want to say is you feel easier in yourself.

You will have more energy. Your nervous system will feel less jangled. And it's extraordinary i mean it is just such a foundational wellness practice that costs nothing i'd like to track what we've said so far because this is moving fast because it's a conversation with you two about menstrual cycle awareness and it's your whole life purpose but I would just like to track this because it feels important to harvest and this is probably my inner autumn woman speaking right now my day

27 woman so I've tracked nine things that we've named already. That menstrual cycle awareness helps us to be ourselves exactly as we are. Number two, it doesn't just benefit us, it actually benefits everyone around us, this coming home to ourselves. Number three, it allows us to pace our own body, our own energy, how we actually are, rather than letting the culture around us dictate who we have to be. Four, it builds this habit of presence and dignifying our own experience. And dignifying always feels like such an important word for the work that we do at red school this that's what it all comes down to is it's a dignifying of our experience which actually does does a lot of work to de-shame you know to take the shame out of this because there's still so much shame and taboo around around the cycle five it's preparing us for the great initiation of menopause

and holding us through the years of changing cycles that can run up to menopause that we call quickening six it gives us a predictable pattern after time after time tracking predictable pattern and rhythm where we can really get to know ourselves and what our rhythms are like and see how cyclical we are seven it's building self-love eight it's helping us honor our boundaries and nine it's a foundational wellness practice that's bringing soothing and ease into our systems so I love that we're only really halfway through this conversation and there's already we can get to a hundred just before we carry on because of course there's so much more to say it feels important to name some of the resistances that might come up for people around this practice because let's face it it's not like

many people can go into their workplace and and enter a five-year planning meeting crying and saying that their heart feels very tender and for that to be welcome you know that is not the world that we yet live in it's changing it's coming but you know I want to recognize the privilege I have here to be in a cycle aware workplace and boy do we need to create more cycle aware workplaces but you know maybe maybe people might be thinking yeah yeah it sounds good good, but I really want to make a difference in my life, so I'm going to have to do something big to turn this around. Whereas really what we're saying is actually these incremental moments of checking in and coming back to yourself are what creates big change. I really come from a history of believing that it takes something big to make a difference. For me, the power, and I would go so far as to say almost all the power,

lies in the subtle, in the incremental, in the small. That kind of homeopathic dose that has profound effect or you know that knowing that when a butterfly flaps its wings in one part of the world that ripple effect is a tsunami a tsunami in another part of the world you know it's that it's that that I have really really really learned. So I know for myself, whenever I stand on the brink of a big challenge, like something in my life that's really difficult or really not working, my kind of default is to go, okay, I've got to do something radical here. And almost always the thing that begins to turn the tide is taking one small step and then another small step and just kind of consistently taking the small steps and menstrual cycle awareness is exactly that like

one of the beautiful things about it is you don't need to have more time in your life to be able to practice menstrual cycle awareness it's not another thing you have to do it is what's already happening inside of you and the very subtle but hugely powerful act of paying attention to that will completely reorder your body, your being, and your life. What it does is it creates much more coherence in your system. And the more coherent you are, the more effective and efficient you are. An incoherent system is a chaotic system um so it's just it's the royal route to really bringing more coherence to you to who you are to yourself and then it's like there's more of you that that's present and aligned with yourself. And that presence allows for real clarity and intentionality.

Now, you know, Shani and I are all about creating big things in the world. You know, we're not shrinking violets with little small goals. We have massive goals. We are unashamed. We're very ambitious. And we're both actually probably worker bees, aren't we? We're both, you know, we can both be really hardworking and so on. But if you've only got that sort of one gear of,

I haven't got time to do all that i've just got to do do do um what you're doing with that one gear you have is you're wearing yourself out you're going against yourself so you're outside of yourself and when you're outside of yourself then you're not coherent you're less efficient blah blah blah you know you lose you also lose lose the heart of why you're doing what you're doing. You lose the meaning of what you're about. So the thing about cycle awareness is in keeping you connected to yourself, you're staying close to what's important to you, what's meaningful for you. So it keeps you more on track with yourself because it is easy to get carried away with things and kind of lose yourself you know goodness knows i've done that um but the

yes cycle awareness brings you back to helping you to stay with both caring for your physicality nervous system energy because without that you're stuffed let me tell you just in case you haven't noticed but equally it's keeping you in the river of what you're actually about and that is priceless having that connection because it keeps you aligned and the other thing i really want to emphasize here is that it i always think of the each phase you know each in a season of the menstrual cycle is its own set of powers you know we talk about the powers of each phase and if if you're only operating in that one gear which is really that sort of summer energy of just managing and controlling the world you're losing out on a whole other lot of you know sets of powers that you can draw on that are vital for creating or manifesting something in in the world it's like you're a one

note wonder whereas when you're practicing menstrual cycle awareness you've got all these other different resources that you're drawing on that just bring your what you're wanting to manifest just brings it into a whole new level of reality and realness and achievement achievement. I'm going to pause the podcast for a moment to share a little bit more about our menstruality leadership program. Now is a really great time to step in if you're feeling cold because our special early bird price ends in a week from now. One of the things I most love about this program is how it's flipping the script about the menstrual cycle of menopause. For centuries within our culture, the menstrual cycle has been denied, rejected, demonised, shamed. And we've been led to believe that it's a limitation or a weakness that we've got to overcome in order to succeed in the world. The menstruality leadership program is designed and created to help you embody the extraordinary truth that the menstrual cycle and

menopause are in fact actually highly potent, potentially liberating processes that can guide our health, vitality, creativity, leadership. If you are loving the conversation about menstrual cycle awareness and you want to take your practice to the next level, the menstruality leadership program is an amazing place to come and do that, to learn next level menstrual cycle awareness. I'm going to share a quick story from another one of our graduates. This is from Chloe Isidora, who is actually on the same menstrual leadership program as me so here's a little from her and then we'll get back into the conversation with Alexandra and Shani. The main thing I'm taking away from MLP is a deeper connection to myself a deeper understanding about myself the word that is coming is is power and Alexandra and Shani are

it makes me emotional because I feel like they are such incredible facilitators they are meticulous with the way that they hold space their space holding is impeccable you feel so held so supportive you feel their love and how much they want this for you that you feel their passion and as the course goes on they're both learning with us it's not like that they've got all the answers they're like having oh wow I didn't think about like that and it's so exciting because you feel like you're all in it together so it feels like what you're saying is the practice of menstrual cycle awareness gives us an opportunity to step out of this massive cultural momentum of inner summer ovulatory energy keep going keep producing keep doing um you know and us our media culture fuels this or like there's just always something to look at or to um we're just bombarded with messages all day it cycle awareness is is going hey hey there's there's three other ways there's three

other modes that our human culture has just basically largely forgotten about at the moment and there are powers within like the you know the phase that comes after the inner summer the inner autumn the breaking down the pre-menstrual phase there's great powers in the period around your period menstruation there's great powers as you emerge back into the world in inner spring pre-ovulation and it's giving you access to those three other modes of being and in that way it's just like fuel for the rebellion it's it's no it's the perfect thing to to lead this rebellion against this hustle culture this grind culture that's killing us all and our planet and we know it is you know it's serious and this is probably my favorite thing actually about mental cycle

awareness because i've always been an activist an environmental activist and this is where our little subtle day-to-day checking in with ourselves can actually become global shift it's a powerful act of rebellion isn't it yeah and it is this very subtle, quiet revolution going on of people deciding to rest for a little while or quietly pacing themselves. and then suddenly recognizing our limits and coming back in again. It just brings so much more, what I want to say, diversity in, actually. Because also the other thing to remember is in this do-do-do culture that not everyone has the constitution or the the nervous system kind of wiring to operate at that i couldn't i had a will oh i had a will that could do that but i didn't actually have you know a high sensitive and um that yeah it was quite foreign to me almost that world i was always amazed how people could do it actually um so it's it's you know that do do do energy suits a certain type of person

but not forever actually i was going to say i was going to say to a point because there is always a cost there's always a cost there's cost. So it's much more cyclical consciousness really awakens much more inclusivity, I want to say, actually, acceptance of different types of people, different energies, you know, different ways of being in the world. Because there are some people who are you know very kind of quiet and inner and need to go slowly and and there are others who are naturally out there you know like climbing Mount Everest or whatever metaphorical or literal and um yeah and that of course gets valorized that thing doesn't it it's it's like also breaking down ableism too you know that our world is really built for one kind of body or for certain kind

bodies that work in certain ways and yes when we bring a cyclical consciousness in there's more space for everyone and you know however people move and live and I'm also thinking of how the hustle culture puts extra labor on specific members of the culture like I'm thinking specifically the labor of of black women yeah and that that all of these systems need to be broken down and an embracing of this cyclical conscious consciousness that comes from the day to day practice of menstrual cycle awareness is embedding us all inside a consciousness that you know from that consciousness we can dismantle these systems because we're inhabiting a different atmosphere already. And we're living more relationally as well. That helps.

Yeah. I don't know what number we've come up to, but as Alexandra was speaking earlier and as I've been listening, I've just been ding, ding, ding, ding, like another 54 reasons or ways that menstrual cycle awareness um changes you and that last piece there around how it actually teaches us about our own nature and i want to bring in this word permission because menstrual cycle really gives us permission to um to to live our nature and therefore as we're saying is permission for others to be in the nature that they have and that all are needed so if we begin to value

as we've been saying diversity and that starts with us valuing the diversity within us um and um i i've really felt that over the years of practicing menstrual cycle awareness how i had one idea of who i was particularly as a young person you know somebody likes likes to do a lot and achieve a lot and so on. And actually, as I've been practicing cycle awareness, I've discovered this whole part of myself, somebody who likes to do very little. You know, I really am. I'm somebody who loves to just like hang around. Sit in a sauna. Sit in a sauna. I love to sit in a sauna for hours and days.

I love agenda-free time. I love just kind of cruising with whatever's happening. I mean, I really love it. and I didn't really know that part of myself yeah because it wasn't allowed to exist yeah exactly exactly yeah so so we're sort of also talking here a bit about de-shaming um as well because oftentimes you know we feel shame around kind of being lazy or doing nothing and menstrual cycle awareness is no no no there's a time and place for doing nothing and it's exactly right and good and as it should be and i always think of the trees here like they my cycle awareness practice has brought me closer to

the trees and the plants and everything else in the natural world and currently we're in winter and nothing is happening it's so completely different to my garden in the summertime and it was all buzzing and blooming and whoa and it completely impossible to keep on top of and now the plants have done sweet fa for like a month they're just chilling and it's I used to just pass that by I didn't even notice that was happening and menstrual cycle awareness has plugged me into this intelligence that is driving everything in the natural world it's only us the humans that think we know better when oh my goodness we don't that yeah it's okay to do nothing it's not even it's more than okay it's necessary and right and it's within the natural order of of things to do nothing I'm the same I didn't think I was allowed to do nothing

and I did actually have a bit of a grumbly moment with aid about this. So just to bring in another resistance or challenge to this, that we have to acknowledge that the people around us most likely are not going to get this for a good while. You know, how long I've been practicing cycle awareness for 13 years, AIDS been with me for eight of them. And still this weekend, you know, he really wanted to go to a party. I totally get it. But I said, you know, I'm probably going to be bleeding. Love, you're not going to be able to stay in bed all day on Sunday, nursing a hangover because I can't be with Artie all day on Sunday. I need some menstrual rest.

And he named it. He said, look, my inner teenager is really like, oh, your cycle is so inconvenient. He wouldn't mind me sharing this. But even he, knowing who I am, knowing how much I respect this and how important this is to me, it's really hard for him to get along with it because he doesn't have a menstrual cycle and he doesn't. It's much harder for him to get it. I just really want to come in here on this one I mean there's nothing convenient about the menstrual cycle about menstruation it's just so inconvenient and

Charlie and I have a running joke about it because of course I don't bleed anymore when her bleed comes around and and I think it was court wasn't it your husband who was sort of complaining that you were bleeding one time or something like that and I totally get it I totally get court's position you know I think I think you mean what are you Like, what? That was it? That was it? What? You're bleeding again? And I sometimes feel, what is it? And I really, I sort of felt into this one because it's quite amusing that, you know, I feel this kind of initial thing, oh, Sarnie's mean, that means. And it was like the sort of cultural patterning is you know the dominant tone here and what it is I really think this is what's going on and certainly I feel it for myself

which is that when someone you know when you're part of a team if you like and one person says they have to go that disturbs the team you know it's like oh they've gone they and they're doing a job a role and you know oh that means i've got to do something different so i it's that i am you know uncomfortable because suddenly i have to step up to do certain things and um you know and in in a part you know in a family and the two parties you know the parents um you know if the menstruator says oh i've got to go you know i've got to go lie down now i've got to go to bed the other one it's like it's left holding the baby literally and you know metaphorically and um if if you know if you're piggybacking off the other all the time,

suddenly you discover, no, you can't piggyback anymore. You've got to step up and take charge and make decisions. It's actually quite funny sometimes at Red School when Shani's bleeding, you might, you know, you've been bleeding. And I think there's been a time where it's just me left in Johnson French School. And it's always a little mild. It is a bit uh-oh, actually. And there's one part of me that goes, oh, holy shit, you know,

and these emails are coming in and there's technical questions. You know, Lauren's out of it too or something like this. And then there's this other part of me that's like, it's like Wild West country. It's like, okay, so if I'm in charge, I'll do it my way. And I know it's not always Sharni's way. You know, I do do things differently. It's like, what the hell? I'm going to just do it.

I'm going to make a decision here and decide. Sharni will just have to, you know, put up with it when she comes back. It's really funny. But there's this kind of Wild, it's like, wow, you know, put up with it when she comes back. It's really funny. But there's this kind of wild, it's like, wow, you know. But actually, what you're saying, Alexandra, I think you're voicing a fear that many of us have, which is that if we step away, our partners won't be able to do what we do.

Exactly. Let's be real. How many of us, and I'm not particularly thinking of this in the context of you, Alexandra. I experienced this with my husband more around parenting particularly. But he can't do it as well as I can do it. They need me more. It's got to be me. This sense of if I step away, it'll all fall apart or it'll go wrong or it won't be as good as. I do think we all feel that on some level. So it's very easy to get

co-opted by there going, oh, but do you have to? And then that part of ourselves that thinks, oh, geez, actually, my child needs me more and they go okay well maybe no maybe I don't have to you know it's very easy to get caught by that it takes a lot of strength to like yeah it's so easy even in that conversation with Ed a voice in me was going oh Soph just let him go to the party. Just let him, as if this is about me being a nagging wife, just let him go. You'll be fine. It's just another month of pushing through. And I had to go and this, maybe our final point loves because we need to wrap up soon. Leadership. This is awakening leadership because that was a leadership moment for me. I heard the voices of

just override yourself, just push through, people please, you know, all my old patterns. And I had to claim myself in that moment and go, no, if I'm going to do what I need to do in the world, want to do in the world, long to do in the world, live my calling. I need to be rested. I'm going to take a stand for myself. And it's a little moment, but it's a huge moment as well, because that's a leadership moment. So when we talk about menstruality leadership, we're not saying, I mean, you might want to, we're not saying you're going to become the prime minister of England, although you might, I mean, please let want to, we're not saying you're going to become the Prime Minister of England, although you might. I mean, please let there be a cycle of Prime Minister. Please. That would be amazing.

But this is about you, your menstrual cycle awareness practice, calling you home to yourself so that you can step into whatever your leadership looks like. Yes, that's really the punchline of all this work for me, this awakening of what, you know, we use this word leadership, sort of interchangeably, almost with the word calling or, you know, your creative expression in the world, the thing that you are standing for what you've come to share or serve in the world and um the menstrual cycle is in cahoots with that it is trying to deliver you to that so every time you override yourself override your cycle override your needs um of course sometimes we have to on occasion i just want to sort of acknowledge that yeah yeah that's it but you're aware that you're doing it. And, you know, there's a kind of choicefulness in that.

But also cycle awareness will help you to do that less and less, to organize your life differently, so that you're coming into the river of yourself more and more and are able to hear what the deep calling is that you are about. I mean, that for me is the gift of gifts of menstrual cycle awareness this awakening to your leadership to who you truly are and what you've come to serve in the world what you're about and of course you know our menstruality leadership program is all about just that, how that happens, how we really learn to embody the full gifts

of what our cycle can deliver us to. Because it is, after all, a spiritual path and practice. Menstrual cycle awareness is a spiritual path and practice, awakening us to the essence of who we truly are and what we've come to serve in the world. Well, reluctantly, we'll wrap up here. But let's have a part two, because we didn't get to what we definitely wanted to talk about today, which is...

How to really practice menstrual cycle awareness and nor did we get to a hundred sophie we're going to get to a hundred ways that we're on a we're on a roll here yeah yeah we really just talked about the initial thing of getting started um the sort of what i call the tip of the iceberg of menstrual cycle awareness of just charting your cycle to get you to know you know your own rhythm pattern of energy and I'm starting to organize your life around that and um and that is where you absolutely have to begin um but we have more we have next what we call next level menstrual cycle yeah that what's below the tip of the iceberg yes what's below the waterline and that and it's this uh second level cycle

aware menstrual cycle awareness that's really um doing the work or you're doing the work of evolution you're doing the work of the spiritual work you're doing the work of evolution. You're doing the work of the spiritual work. You're doing the finding what your leadership is in the world and manifesting that. It's this much deeper, more engaged, initiatory stuff. And that prepares you, of course, for menopause as well. It's so exciting. I remember this feeling when I was in those first 13 months of going holy shit this is the way I can live this kind of feminine mystery that's been calling me okay this is how I do it it's through communing with this experience in my body

I remember the feeling of excitement and uh it's still totally with me okay let's go let's go into part two next week beautiful yeah thanks you too thank you Sophie it's always so much fun on these podcasts hey thank you for staying with us all the way through to the end we're going to carry on this conversation next week and we'll see if we can get to a hundred the ways that cycle awareness can transform our lives and then as i mentioned at the beginning of the conversation we would love to hear from you we want this podcast to become more and more a conversation back and forth between us. We would love to hear your stories about menstrual cycle awareness, where you were when you began this practice, what called you to it? Was it your health? Was it challenging cycles? Was it just a knowing of the wisdom that was here? And where you find yourself now, how the practice has helped to

transform your life. Please write your stories into me at sophie at redschool.net and we'll be sharing some of them in the conversation next week. Okay, I'll be with you again in a week's time and until then, keep living life according to your own brilliant rhythm.