The Menstruality Podcast - 176. Why We’re Taking a Sabbatical - and How You Can Too! (Alexandra & Sjanie)

Episode Date: December 12, 2024

Guided by the wisdom of deep rest at menstruation, Alexandra and Sjanie do a 'Big Bleed' retreat for Red School every year, a kind of short sabbatical. Even though Red School is a big eco-system, with a community of 1000s of people and a whole team taking care of many different pieces, they take the bold leadership move of pressing pause on it all, to allow for deep rest, and new inspiration. In last year’s winter Big Bleed, they had a big realisation - that they are both feeling called to take a much longer sabbatical, for three reasons. Firstly, because Sjanie is heading towards the end of her menstruating years and wants to plan for a year of menopause sabbatical. Secondly, because Alexandra is heading towards her mid-seventies and is ready to change the pace after the intense creativity of the past few years, and lastly because they want to start passing on the legacy of the menstruality work they teach at Red School.  So today we explore the inspiration behind this sabbatical, how they are preparing for it, the impact it is going to have for Red School, and how you can take your own sabbatical too. We explore:Alexandra’s passionate desire for each of us to make the most of every single bleed we have as a mini sabbatical where we have an opportunity to enter altered states of consciousness - and the sobering truth that we only each get on average 451 cycles in our lifetimes!Why we must be disruptive and carve out time for real rest, because relentless productivity is addictive, it’s celebrated and to our egos it’s much safer to stay the same and keep trucking along. How Sjanie feels as she plans for her menopause sabbatical, and the challenge of having no idea what she and her Calling will look and feel like on the other side. ---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 podcast. Thank you so much for tuning in and listening today. I hope you're doing well. So today we're talking about sabbatical. Guided by the wisdom of rest and menstruation, Alexandra and Sharni do this beautiful,

what they call a big bleed for Red School every year. It's a kind of retreat or a short sabbatical in the winter and the summer. So even though Red School is this big ecosystem now, a community of thousands of people, a whole team taking care of lots of different pieces, they take this bold leadership move of pressing pause on all of it to allow for deep rest and then new inspiration to arise. And in last year's

winter big bleed, they actually had a big realization that they're both feeling called to take a much longer sabbatical for three reasons. Firstly, because Sharni is heading towards the end of her menstruating years now and wants to plan for a year of menopause sabbatical. Secondly, because Alexandra is heading towards her mid-70s and is ready to change the pace after this intense creativity over the past few years. And lastly, because they want to start passing on the legacy of the menstruality work that they teach at Red School, which is part of this, as you'll hear in the conversation today. So in the conversation, we look at the inspiration behind their sabbatical,

how they're preparing for it, and the impact it's going to have for Red School, and how you can take your own sabbatical too. Lots of practical ideas and guidance. And bear with us at the beginning, we almost started to enter our own little sabbatical when we went totally off piste and discovered a whole new way to do a cycle check-in through the lens of what piece of music we feel like on our cycle day. So I hope you enjoy that, hope you enjoy the whole episode, why we're taking a sabbatical and how you can too with Alexandra and Sharni. Well, good morning, you two. How are you both doing today? Let's do our cycle check-in. Who feels like kicking us off, Alexandra? So it's day 27 of the moon cycle and we are getting closer and closer to the dark moon

and I, it's so interesting, I don't have anything to say about myself. How refreshing. I suppose it's a quality of just presence, isn't it? I have to be paced and measured and I feel more see-through and certainly more sensitive. I mean, those are all some things, but I actually don't. I feel the kind of a nothingness, but not a bad nothingness. Well, you were talking about it before we started recording. You were saying that these days in your life you show up and you go right let's go into the unknown and see what happens that is my favorite favoritest favoritest way of operating i find it utterly thrilling and not hair raising not scary it's a moment of on the doorstep

absolutely that means i'm on my toes but it feels like this adventure that I'm going on I'm in the sort of sweet spot in some ways it feels like a really important post-menopause power I think so actually Sophie and I have to say it's always been with me this one it's just more and more prevalent because I always used to just love improvisation I I used to say if I was a piece of music you know if I was a particular type of music I would be improvised jazz what kind of music would you be Johnny oh no you were gonna ask me that I'll go if I if I was a piece of music today I would just be a big bass drum beat like because I can feel even though I'm on day 25 and I feel like I'm not gonna bleed for a few days I just feel very called into the void I just feel like I'm being called in deeply

language is sort of leaving me as a facility and a capacity I don't really feel like talking to anybody apart from you two I always feel like talking to you too but yeah I'm feeling like deep and dark and mulchy that is so good I think I think you might be organizing me a bit because the what you're describing honestly i feel like i'm being sucked into something which is good for the conversation we're having very good for this great boys did that give you a moment to figure out what music you are well yes then i heard your question slightly differently after you answered which is not just what piece of music am i full stop stop, but what piece of music am I today, which is a much easier question to answer.

I thought you were trying to get me to encapsulate my entire identity in a genre of music. Yeah, I'm day 18 today. And there's a definite kind of shift in the quality of my energy today. And it's a very welcome shift from, I don't know, having had a lot of outward focused energy and being very future orientated and very in the mode of creating and doing and in a kind of performance energy. I don't mean that in a negative sort of inauthentic way, but in that kind of energy of engaging and connecting and responding. And today it just feels like that performing self has dropped away like my social self has fallen away and I've fallen back into myself into this much more real deep true place is a zone I really like to operate in

maybe you're a Leonard Cohen song then yes so I was thinking you know who are some of the the singers who speak like sing such like soulful real music that just takes you right into the core of what life is as a human being yeah something like that we went to a Nick Cave concert recently together maybe in your arms that the last song he did yes today you are in your arms live with Nick Cave in the O2 arena in London yeah there was something about that moment when he was singing I remember him looking up and I felt like he looked me directly in my eyes. And there was just this invitation into love.

Just hit me deep. Yeah. And hey, if anyone knows anyone who knows Nick Cave, we really want to interview him on the podcast. Yes. About the creative process. Because yes, and how menstruality if any if any non-menstruating person can can get into it isn't it Kate

so to our topic for today we're speaking about sabbatical why you're taking about sabbatical, why you're taking a sabbatical, how we can all take a sabbatical, why we should take sabbaticals too. Can we just start by hearing how you understand sabbatical, how you define it, what is a sabbatical to you? As you were asking the question, Sophie, I was actually just very conscious of the word Sabbath and the Sabbath being the time of stepping away from mundane life to connect with the sacred. So, you know, that is the kind of deepest sense of Sabbath for me and how I understand that word too. And it is that. It is a stepping away from mundane life, from the sort of engagement with the material world

and the sense of purpose and focus and doing and, you know, agendas and all that. It is to step away from all that doing and engagement and to stop. It is to rest. And, you know, it really encapsulates what happens winter, the season of the winter. You are stopping, yes, obviously season of the winter, you are stopping. Yes, obviously in that original meaning to connect with something like,

you know, the divine, the sacred. But what you're doing in that act of stopping is you are allowing your psyche to, and your body, I mean, the whole of you, to kind of undo itself, to rest, to restore. But I'm just sort of with this extraordinary act of stopping momentum and simply taking space from that. And in that act, you open up a spaciousness around you. And it's like when you're in that doing mode, you've got very particular glasses on, almost like blinkers really you know and really you take that off and then you you kind of open up this wide-angled lens within yourself and um take it

you can take in so much more when you step back like that and stop the momentum. And, of course, the initial feeling of stopping may not be comfortable. There's an emptiness there because your whole identity is tied up with doing. Of course, this gets echoed, you know, because menopause is this great sabbatical, and that's the initial feeling of menopause. It's like, oh, you know, the end. Nothing. Who am I oh you know the end nothing who am i you know so there's you you've really got to that's just how it is normal it's quite healthy it's what happens and then as you let go as you step back then something else starts to get to work within you so So it's like you're, I think of Sabbath as a way of,

Sabbath as a way of recovering more of yourself. Because you get into kind of a very narrow thing when you're in that momentum. So you're opening everything up and it's like you're really feeling and discovering yourself and in that rest it's like you're um i want to say uh you're fertilizing your your in your psyche your inner the inner soil of you is like you're just you're letting it all rest and letting it all kind of all that reparation stuff you know all

the stuff that happens in winter with the soil that i love to talk about all that reparations going on in your psyche and you're creating this new soil in your being for something new to emerge i mean i find it i love the process of stepping back and having space, even just momentarily how it opens up, of psychically or you know in your emotional body your creative being um you are just it's like you're flinging the doors open to something else and um really you're you're opening the door to something new. And that door opening, I mentioned, you know, connection to the divine. But another way of talking about it is it's like you're checking back in with the deep meaning of your life, your calling. Now, you know, postmenopauseause i feel like my calling is sort of right

you know they're with me all the time now but actually it's extraordinary to take time out to just really feel into it more it's and it's just it's so bloody creative what could come through really yeah so all that lovely rest and repair and so on but it is you're opening to a much bigger playing field of yourself your soul and um you are feeling into a deeper meaning for your life this is another way of talking about the sacred it's a way of also honoring the sacred that can get squeezed out in our mundane life as well and what um many cultures have built into them although i fear it has been lost a lot in our modern culture is these structures that create rhythm and have sabbath or sabbatical kind of planned in to the week or the year and that's I think really, really important because actually without there being kind of carved out dedicated time and space for it, we will always find ourselves getting occupied by the momentum of

doing. One, because it's addictive. Two, because it's celebrated and it's considered great if you're doing stuff. But also because to our ego, it's much safer to just stay the same and just to keep trucking along. Anytime we have to gear change or anytime there's an interruption to the sort of unconscious habituated momentum of one's life, it disturbs us, disrupts us and surfaces all the things that need tending to. So it's really wonderful to kind of have that built into family life and into the week and into the year and so on and this is you know why there's so much to say about this but the power of menstruality lies in the fact that each one of us has this structure, this architecture built into our bodies and beings that we don't have to wait for the culture or the calendar or anything else to declare it time to rest,

our bodies tell us when it's time to retreat, rest, and step out of life and take this kind of, it was beautiful the way you spoke about it, Alexandra, this very, very precious, very essential to life time where we refuel and where we deeply reconnect with our creativity and our deeper purpose and so on and so forth. So that's happening, of course, every menstrual month at menstruation. And the whole of the cycle process is built around that sabbatical. So, you know, the cycle brings you out of that in a good, healthy way that you can really integrate that experience and really helps you to land it in the world. And it also helps you to slow down and gear down and prepare for the next retreat.

So the whole cycle process is built around this, which kind of points to how necessary and important sabbaticals and retreats are. From a menstruality perspective, retreat at menstruation is what it's all about. It's what it's all about. And then, of course, in the bigger arc of our lives, built into our bodies is this ending of our menstruating years, which is of course menopause. And that too is built into our bodies.

We come to the end of our cycling years and there is, we're geared down in our forties and the autumn of our menstruating years. We go through that whole process. I'm really in it now of feeling like things need to slow down. We need to start clearing space. We need to start planning for the retreat that's wanting to happen at menopause. And then menopause actually slows us down. We lose energy, all kinds of things happen physically, mentally, and emotionally

to take us into this sabbatical space. It's like we are decommissioned from the momentum of our menstruating years at menopause. So it's very beautiful to see that arc too is you know we could say the um arc of menstruality the arc of our menstruating years is really built around this final sabbatical at menstruation i mean at menopause it isn't of course the final final sabbaticals the final final sabbatical is death yes you don't get to practice that one so consciously but yes there's this very very beautiful opportunity at menopause to uh lean into what your body is asking of you and to allow the power of rest at menopause, sabbatical at menopause to really, really do its work with you. Because all the things you said, Alexandra, about the power of sabbatical, you were speaking generally, but it's all amplified many fold when we rest at menstruation and when we rest at menopause

it's um what you've spoken about happens on steroids it's hugely significant and hugely powerful yes that's very very uh significant what you're saying because of course one can take a sabbatical at any time you know just you can choose to do it but to do it uh to take that space at menstruation or to really see menopause as a time as a sabbatical time in however modest a way you know truly um and just even holding it in your imagination um you've got just the power of stepping away but you've also got on your side uh what your menstruality is working you in so you know the the power of what menopause can deliver is just it is as shani said sabbath on steroids it's like a really

amplified experience of what a sabbath can give you in a very profound way. I can actually hear people listening to this going, like, that is, you know, nice, nice idea, but that is impossible. And, you know, we speak a lot to that in all our work. But the thing I want to say right now about that voice of impossibility is that that is actually the nature of taking a sabbatical is that it feels impossible. It really feels like a Herculean feat. Every time I've had a big bleed, which is what we call our menstrual sabbaticals it has felt impossible and I've often and it felt like I'm not going to pull it off and I've had to move mountains ask for help pull out all the stops and in a way that's part of the process of actually getting there it takes a lot of, a lot of valuing yourself,

valuing your needs, daring to stand for the power of this, which is a big ask in a culture that doesn't recognize how powerful rest is, how powerful sabbaticals, menstruation and menopause are. So we're having to really muster up a lot of inauthority, a lot of agency, a lot of determination, a lot of grit, because it does feel impossible. And later, we're going to tell you a story about the sabbaticals we've taken and the sabbatical we're going to take. And I will share a little bit of how impossible it feels to me right now. So, yeah, I just wanted to name that. That is part of the process. And I think it's actually part of the psycho-spiritual design

is that really we are asked to go above and beyond for this and it's in that going above and beyond that we kind of discover actually how much we want it and the reward of it is also greater somehow yeah yeah I'm feeling really moved as you're speaking because it's evoking my main memory I have of sabbatical in my life which was the four months before I did IVF to bring Artie here and what it's making me think of is yes there's agency and there's grit and there's also at the very heart of it um love and longing and those forces are so strong you know and I just longed for that little guy to get here and I just I I cleared everything away I had I kind of had like it was I was just down to the bare bones I had to and so I'm what it's making me think of is that, like, yes,

there's a way of listening in for that longing and that deep soul call inside and that that can also take us all the way. Oh, yes, absolutely. And, I mean, in a way, when it comes to menstruation, and I can't speak to menopause because I haven't been through it, when it comes to menstruation, that longing is born out of the little tastes we have of the power of menstruation.

When we give ourselves just a little bit of what we're so deeply longing for at menstruation, when we take little bit of what we're so deeply longing for at menstruation. When we take, you know, little pockets of rest, we start to feel what happens in us. And it's that that awakens that deep longing and that remembering of how powerful this is. So we're not talking about gritting your teeth kind of determination. We're talking about a determination that is really in service of something very powerful and profound that you've tasted. Yeah. I was speaking to a woman in our community

and she said, Sophie, I just cancelled something on my day one this month I just cancelled it I've never done it before it was amazing she said it was incredible what happened and that's how it starts right it's just the cancelling the one thing um yeah what you're saying is really triggering in me this that there is this huge imperative in our being within the menstrual cycle process for this space because of the power of it. What's actually coming to mind is when women get to menopause and they feel this outrageous, outrageous is one of the dominant things that they experience. I mean, that rage can be spoken about in all sorts of ways, and I do.

But at its deepest root for me, I feel it's just an utter indignation of soul because this profound knowing of the sacredness of menstruation which they probably have not been valued been able to value or learn known about but also the sacredness of menopause for what it is going to now this kind of sacred work that's at work in menopause their deep beings know this and now they're suddenly at menopause and there's no they're just expected to keep going the same as before this is deep imperative in us to to serve the sacred and that's the sabbath to step away from mundane life i honestly profoundly believe that and the more you taste it at menstruation as you said sunny the more you cannot not care for it yeah and you know the number of bleeds we have are limited and as time passes

and as we get older we will have less and less opportunities for this so it's finite um on average 451 in a lifetime in a lifetime yeah and many of the people listening to this are well their way through that so alexandra you were actually saying something very powerful about this yesterday yes this has actually really seized me in recent times. I'm actually feeling really fierce about this. I sort of feel like a fierce mama bear, and I can feel it rising in me now. And to all those of you who are still menstruating, I don't want you to miss the glory of another bleed. It is so extraordinary what menstruation, taking Sabbath at menstruation, just really taking that space, what menstruation can open you to, what menstruation gifts you. And it is, I mean, what it gifts you is these feelings of love

and belonging and connection and meaning, connection to something bigger. And it's free love. It is, you know, the bit that I really love about this is that you don't have to sweat. You don't have to have a fierce discipline and a fierce diet or, you know, to enter this altered state of consciousness. You only, and this word only is, you know, packed with meaning, folks. You only have to trust.

And I have that Mary Oliver poem going in my head, you know, the soft animal of your body. I can't remember the exact words now. But you only have to just trust those movements of your cycle, of your being. You know, as you're coming into menstruation, you feel how, you know, like Sophie, how you said you're feeling more in the void and less words and that you can literally love that and love that love how Oh, yeah, now I'm, I can feel I'm disengaging. And then you feel that moment where, oh, you just love to say no, it's it is like just a no, no, just it's there for you, you don't have to think about it, and can just stop and take that space for yourself, the doors to the inner temple open, you step onto the

holy ground of yourself and you feel the meaning of who you are the gift you hold what the world needs from you and you are filled with such a knowing and a an alignment and a love that then bolsters you as you go out into the world again and you get seduced by all the messages of the world about how you're supposed to be and do and all that shit you know um but to have drunk of this each month what happens is you find you cannot abandon yourself in the same way it actually is the food that is going that nourishes your life and particularly post-menopause. It is actually, it's preparing you ultimately for a real liberation of menopause.

And this has been given to you every month, and it breaks my heart that this, you know, I think we joked about this, you know, on banners at Times Square or across Sydney Harbour Bridge or Piccadilly Shows or wherever. This incredible message, menstruation is an altered state of consciousness, getting high on blood. That it is just...

Folks, listen up i want you to feel that you have a right to this space because it is so glorious and i want you to find your one percent now to get more and more of it because i do not want you missing another cycle of what your blood can give you. Yeah. You know how I said the whole of the cycle is built around menstruation? It really is true that the power that erupts and awakens at menstruation, the whole of the menstrual cycle is serving that because when you dock into that,

it rewires your health, it brings healing, it taps you into your purpose, the source of creativity in your life. And it really like brings you into this whole other level of authority in your leadership. And on the menstrustruality Leadership Program, really actually in some ways,

everything we're teaching there, and we go through all the maps and we bring in lots of practices and inner skills, they're all designed to ultimately support you to be able to receive the power of menstruation. That's what it's ultimately all about. Because when that's in place, everything falls into place.

In you, in your life, we believe in the world. Restoration of that is everything. I'm going to take a short break in this conversation to let you know that there are only eight days left now to join the Menstruality Leadership Programme for 2025, if you'd like to be part of it. So the Menstruality Leadership Programme or the MLP as we often call it is for you if you want to immerse yourself in the power of the cycle for your own personal healing and development because you want to embark on a new menstruality inspired career and to be empowered to lead in all of your life and work roles

or because you feel called to study with alexandra and shani and be part of this incredible global cycle aware community that gathers around the program you can find out all about it and take your seat at menstrualityleadership.com and as shani is going to share about more later in this conversation if you're listening to this and you know that you'd like to study more deeply with Alexandra and Sharni there are just two opportunities left to start this journey by taking the menstruality leadership program this year or next year because it's a prerequisite for their new post-graduate apprenticeship but more about that later in the episode. Okay for now I'd love to share a story from one of our MLP graduates Nikki Berridge who's created

How Am I, a tech-based company bringing cycle awareness to young people, it's brilliant, since being part of the MLP. So we'll hear her story and then we'll get back to the conversation with Alexandra and Sharni. I just followed my intuition. I remember having this full body. Yes. And so I did the course and it's absolutely transformed my life. I cannot recommend it enough. I was a holistic health practitioner before so I was aware of deep listening and understanding oneself but this is a whole new level and I think anyone that menstruates should really do this and I think a key word for me is this leadership role. So we all really need to start finding that leadership quality within us.

I'm not saying that has to be a big thing. You know, you don't have to lead nations. You could just lead your family or your community or your friends or whatever you choose to do. But this leadership piece, I feel like the sort of tectonic plates of my being were almost worked and explored and held in the most exquisite intimacy it's just held me in my career since absolutely held me it's the rock behind me now it's absolutely life-changing and amazing and I would recommend it to anyone if If you're on the fence, do it and do it for yourself.

Start getting those boundaries and start putting yourself first. It's the biggest resource pool that I have ever done in my life. So beautiful. I feel like you've done an amazing job of painting the why for why we all need to take sabbaticals at menstruation at menopause so would you be able to walk us into

your story now of the sabbatical that you two are dreaming into and how that came about and what you're planning oh well maybe first to say say and we've spoken about this on a previous podcast, Alexandra and I stumbled into this tradition or this rhythm of taking a sabbatical twice a year together, a creative sabbatical really in service of this work and in service of red school and we've been having those in the summer around the summer solstice every year and then again in the winter around the winter solstice every year and it's either at alexandra's house or my house and it's a week together where we step out of work mode and and just kind of hang out together in the empty space and allow this process of doing nothing to take hold of us

and it always does as it really takes hold it's's quite extraordinary. So that's a little rhythm that we've created for ourselves, which has profoundly supported us. And, Alexandre, you were reminding me this morning before this conversation of how everything we've done has been guided. I mean, every step along the way with this work, the decisions we've made, and just the whole unfolding of our partnership and of Red School, it's all been a process of being guided.

We've had our own agendas, but ultimately life's agenda has won and has been the thing that we have referred to as being the wiser the wiser option yeah we take just we take instructions from the divine oh okay right yeah yeah yeah oh okay right yeah that does feel a bit like being an innocent cruising along and then life comes along and sort of drops something in the path ahead of you and you suddenly realize oh we're doing that now so that sort of brings us to the story of what happened at our big bleed at the winter solstice at the end of 2023. Let me set the scene. So Alexandra and I were tracking along just great. So we've been working together for 15 years and we have enough creative ideas to last us multiple lifetimes.

Honestly, we could just keep going and going and going. for this work and so committed to the vision we're holding of this work being everywhere that it's very easy for us just to like be held in that river of going and going and going. And I remember this big bleed at the inner winter because it was at your house, Alexandra, and I happened to be in the void of my cycle. And there was something about the space that we'd created that just opened something up in me, because what I'm remembering, it's a very kind of graphic memory of us sitting in your lounge, me in the void. And I was in such a deep void place where I could almost see the feelings in the air and the textures of the empty space. Everything was very matrix-like.

And we were just kind of hanging out and chatting and it dawned on me that we that we possibly weren't going to be able to carry on like this forever. I mean, it sounds funny to say, because of course, but it was one of those moments where it just hit me that there is a time limit to what we're doing. And that there is a time limit also to our partnership because Alexandra's in her 70s. I mean, I'm turning 48 tomorrow. But yeah, life is moving by and there's a time limit to that. And that we can't really keep on working in the way we have been forever and even as I tell that story now I can feel the grief that I feel at facing that hard cold reality yeah it's interesting when we're really in the river of creating things it's very much like

that inner summer energy we feel invincible and it feels like we can do this forever and there's just something about that turn of the cycle that sobers us to the fact of endings being real and starting to see the ending in sight. That's what happened, wasn't it, Alexandra? We suddenly saw, we'd never even considered an ending before, we suddenly saw that there's an end in sight for us. We sort of did the numbers. We went, hang on a minute, what do you reckon?

How long are you going to live, Pope? I don't know. Let's work this out. we sort of did the numbers we went hang on a minute you know what do you reckon how long are you going to live pope yeah how long are you gonna let's work this out you go again back to our usual source of comedy yes i die it's endless source of yeah i mean really we we did sort of do the numbers. We did. Yeah. You know, let's just be realistic about this.

I mean, the truth is, this is my work. This is my creativity. I think of myself as like an artist. And I think of how painters and my latest model is Bob Dylan, 83, you know, doing his tour to rival Taylor Swift, not quite as many, but I mean, you know, at 83, I'm going, bloody hell, Bob, if you could do it at 83, bring it on. And I think of conductors who, you know, in their 90s,

and they're still there conducting because they're doing their calling, their creativity, and this is my creativity. So it is what I love, and I am always doing it, but I will not be doing it. It's going to change. The work's going to change, the work's going to change, and I don't want to do it at the pace that I'm doing and et cetera, et cetera. Yes, I realized there needed to be some sort of change of gear.

What was also very sobering with us facing that was we also realized that we needed to start thinking about passing this work on because you know alexandra and i over the years that we've been working really naming and articulating this inner architecture of menstruality, we've landed such a vast body of knowledge that really addresses all the layers at which this work works us through the healing layer, through the creative layer, through the developmental layer, the spiritual spiritual layer and gone into all the depth and details of the whole journey from menarche to menopause the whole initiatory process of that we've uncovered all these maps that describe this process each menstrual month and the maps for the menopause initiation and there's so much that we have

landed and actually it's only alexandra and i that are holding this full body of knowledge now and what we realized was that we need to seriously start thinking about passing this on so that when Alexandra does pop her clogs and when I pop mine, that actually this work can live on beyond us, that there are people who are holding it in the way that we're holding it and have all the information and all the, you know, embodied knowing of it in the way that we do so that it can continue on and be taken on to future generations. Because we haven't done all this work this lifetime for it to die with us. You know, our vision is very much a vision for the future. And in some ways, we're just getting

started with this restoration of menstruality. we're just getting started with this restoration of menstruality we're just getting started with um creating cyclical consciousness again on our planet so um it needs to carry on beyond our lifetime so that was a very sobering thought and sort of really kicked the what's up the whatsy. And, you know, in many ways, you know, I've watched you since I've been really engaged with you, which is probably for like seven years. Something like that, Sophie.

Since the launch of Wild Power, 2017. Yeah. And then, you know, taking the program, which was the called the apprenticeship then which became the menstruality leadership program bringing it online you know all of that so I've watched you work to share an embodied knowledge of this with these menstruality leadership program graduates of which there's 584 and a wonderful new cohort forming for 2025 um and you know you've been you've had abby and jd and penny and jane the faculty the leadership mentors who are doing this beautiful work of um stewarding and midwifing and guiding the those on the

menstrual leadership program and from as I understand it when you were on this big bleed you realized oh actually there's there's the next level of study that needs to happen now and that all landed in this big bleed sabbatical moment right yeah that's really what landed is um because we have of course been passing on our work uh both in our courses and workshops and you know the team that we've been working with you mentioned the leadership mentors they've been growing alongside us and growing with this work as it has evolved. And many people have asked us for postgraduate study over the years.

They've all been like, right, we've done the menstruality leadership program. We really want to go on growing and developing these skills. And for years and years, we have said no. And it all made so much sense logically to do that. And yet there was no, the time was not right. And the creative impetus was not there. But really it was with this realization of an end in sight and the importance of training the menstruality leaders for the future, really growing people as menstruality facilitators, that this idea of running a postgraduate program for people who've done the menstruality leadership program, where they could be in a long-term apprenticeship with us

and really work to know this knowledge from the inside out. Because it is on one hand about us passing on the information, but actually much more than that. It's about bringing people deeper and deeper inside the process of menstruality within themselves so that they have an ongoing, I want to say informant, they have an ongoing informant within them that is helping them to evolve menstruality and helping them to bring voice to menstruality and share menstruality in the world. And of course, we do that on the Menstruality Leadership Program, but this is taking it to a

whole other level and really helping people to hone the menstruality facilitation skills, the dark arts, so that they can then pass this work on to others in its fullness. And there's a whole kind of another level of teaching to bring in. Yeah, and I think in terms of the reality that hit us, you know, if we did our calculations and so on, I think we felt really we have five more years of working together in the way that we have been. And there was something about having that five-year deadline that just started to organize us. It actually changed the trajectory of everything we thought we wanted to do at Red School. We had all kinds of plans of this and that, but this realization of actually there's an end in sight. We've got about five more years of

working in this way. And at that point, I want to be taking a menopause sabbatical. Alexandra wants to be taking a deep breath because she's been going for it. And then, you know, beyond that, we don't know. But what we do know is we need that pause. We need that sabbatical for all the reasons that we've said it's really important in terms of the creative arc of this work and of our personal process and of our partnership and all of that so the five-year plan was born I remember coming back to our team meetings and just saying okay so this is what's going to be happening now and it was such a messy process because I had come out of my own in the winter experience with all my ideas and

what needed to happen and that's it like when you're working together creatively and then life reorganizes things everyone it's messy it's difficult everyone's got to get on board really truly it completely rewires and reorganizes things. And it was like that very much for us. It suddenly brought this whole new landscape into view and set a new precedent for actually what we needed to do. And particularly this piece of the importance of passing the legacy of our work on. program was born to really take people who have trained as menstruality leaders and to go into a deep apprenticeship with them over a long period of time, two years, to really train them to be menstruality facilitators and for us to pass as much of the fullness of this work on that we can. And so we've started, I'm proud to say, we have started the first apprenticeship. We began that in September with a group of 40 willing menstruality leaders

who've all said yes to really stepping into that and holding the flame of this menstruality work going forward. Yeah. And our plan is to run this apprenticeship again in 2026. So if anyone's listening to this and you're feeling really called to step into this work in the way that we've described, we really encourage you to come to the Menstruality Leadership Program in 2025 or actually in 2026 because that is a prerequisite for joining the apprenticeship.

So if you want to do this full pathway with us before our five years is up, join the Menstruality Leadership Program, either this cohort coming or the next one in 2026. Yes. So this work is truly our life calling. And so, as I said earlier, I'm going to be like all these, you know, artists that keep going into their 90s.

Or into your 100s. Okay, it could be my 100s, couldn't it, Shani? Yes, certainly. I've got nothing to do with it. I'm just going to keep pulling you up from the grave and be like, one more time. Come on, Pope, you can do it. Prop me up from the grave and be like one more time come on pope you can do it prop me up in the seat

there we go again cracking jokes about death it's incredible isn't it um yeah so some you know we we've got these next five years of sort of working at the pace that we are working at to really land, you know, the fullness of something. And then we want to take this sabbatical and we basically are going, okay, over to you calling over to you universe, you know, what's, what's next, you know, how are you working us? And of course we just need to rest and need to rest and go offline and all that. And then things are going to happen. So if I speak for myself, I'm here in service of something.

And the something for me is this restoration of menstruality. It's the work of the feminine and the serving of cyclicity in the world. And as I get older and my body changes, it's like different capacities come online, too. I have a different kind of intelligence or a different kind of power that is coming through. And that requires a different way of working to serve that. You know, I can't do what I did in my 50s, but I can do something else.

And it will be in service of this work. So, you know, at some level, I'm always going to be doing this because it's just, that's the trouble with creativity. It never stops you. And there's so much I want to keep doing. It's so enlivening for me. But we have no idea how that's going to look.

And equally, Shani will be going through menopause. And actually, to be honest, I feel slightly nervous because I know how menopause can just go completely change everything. And my connection with Shani is so precious. It was so precious. I'm like, oh, do you really have to go for so long, Shani? You know, I'm kind of nervous. You really have to have a menopause.

Do you need a break, really? You know, I am a little nervous because she could, you know, menopause goes, well, fuck this, you know, excuse me, everybody. It's like, I'm out of here, you know, and, you know, you kind of want to burn the house and, you know, I'll try to protect Red School folks, you know, but, you know, it's dangerous menopause. She might run off with the circus.

She could run off with the circus. Be the opening act for Nick Cave. She could indeed. You know, this is the thing. You know, anything is possible. So who knows, you know, if she's going to come back. What do you reckon, Sharni? Well, when you paint that picture of, like,

I can be the opening act for some big touring band i'm like okay yeah that that sounds yeah i mean it's true i'm actually very um conscious of the fact that i have no idea who i'm going to be on the other side of menopause and what that's going to look like in terms of my everyday life and where I put my energy but a lot like Alexandra the one thing I know is that I'm made for this work in one way shape or form I mean it's uh yeah it's that that is very clear to me and very um non-negotiable yeah and I I've had a very interesting experience with this knowing of the ending more consciously now, which is, of course, the ending of our partnership as it's been, but also the ending of my menstruating years,

me getting a bit more real about the fact that I am going to go through menopause. And here I am on the eve of my 48th birthday. And really, it's just been in the last couple of months that I have felt myself being ordered by menopause and, yeah, by my personal kind of process with menopause and one of the strong things that has been coming to me is to create space to really clear the decks and I was talking earlier about you know how it's part part of the process to feel the impossibility of that actually when I'm staring down the barrel of the gun and seeing this ending it I it seems impossible that Alexandra and. It does. And yet something is being galvanized in me, and I can feel the guidance for the next steps, that sort of iterative process of that, which I'm very, very grateful for because a bit like menstruation,

you don't want to slam into it because it's such a shock. If you haven't been creating space in the premenstrual or gearing down, and if you're unaware that it's coming and you're unaware of that shifting consciousness that's going to happen, it can completely sideswipe you. And that's why so many people in the void, you know, find themselves in terror or in very disturbed, disrupted states or doing things that are very reactive and destructive, actually. titrated with this awareness that I need to start creating space start handing over responsibilities start uh shifting gears yeah and and actually this is sort of in response to your joke about you know what will happen when I go through menopause Alexandra and the burn the house thing, you know. The thing that I've been very aware of is actually the things that I've created in my life that I love, that I've put all my energy and time and love into, including Red School, our partnership, our team team the work we've created i don't want to destroy that

um and so i'm very much with this question of how can i take care of what I've created so far in my life while stepping away and letting go yeah which is the question I'm living into each menstrual month now yeah yeah thank you Shani I feel like you've pointed like through in the telling of your story and in the painting the picture of the power and importance of sabbatical in our lives you've brought some really interesting and useful practical pieces of guidance forward about how we can all bring more of this sabbatical space in firstly to lean into our cycle awareness practice for those of us who are still cycling because our cycle is is guiding us and showing us and teaching us each month in this gearing down in the inner autumn and i love the term gearing down because that's exactly what it feels like from five to

four to three to two to one to ah turn off the ignition well you know the rest so lean into that lean into the cycle awareness practice and um for anyone who's like yes I want but I want more I want more of this I just like to point people to the episode we did about how to have a big bleed which is episode 157 I'll link to it in the podcast show notes page at redschool.net forward slash podcast. But that big bleed episode really walks through like why it's so hard to slow down, how to support the slowing down, what to do in that moment before, you know, when it feels impossible to slow down and then how to actually go about creating a big bleed experience for yourself so it's it's a very very rich episode yes and another episode which is echoing these themes and goes into a lot more depth and detail is episode 74 which is why

it's so hard to rest at menstruation and menopause. Yeah. So there's some resources for if you're inspired, I am, by these two talking about the power of this. Yeah. And thank you. It's been really, really supportive for me in the phase of the cycle I'm in right now when I really want to go with this gearing down process. And I can just imagine people listening and like, okay, what does my life look like over the next while? And how can I bring in more of this rest and sabbatical? So thank you both.

Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you, Sophie-Jane. Thanks for listening. Thanks for tuning in today. thank you for being with us until the end like i said there i hope that there's some gold that you're taking away from this conversation in the form of inspiration for you to take more rest and perhaps even your form of sabbatical somehow i want to share a reminder that there are eight days left now to join the menstruality leadership program for 2025. The doors are closing at midnight

on December the 21st and you can find out all about it at menstrualityleadership.com. You'll find a replay of a recent event that we did about what your future menstruality career and leadership could look like. You can find a recording of that there. Yeah, okay, that's it for this week. We'll be with you again next week. And until then, keep living life according to your own brilliant rhythm.