The Menstruality Podcast - 216. How to Manage the Emotional Heat of Menopause (Alexandra & Sjanie)

Episode Date: October 9, 2025

Menopause is an immense life event, a great initiation. Not only is it a complete hormonal shift in the landscape of your overall health, it’s also a psycho-spiritual transformation, which can bring with it a huge emotional rollercoaster.Rage, grief, emptiness, exposure, hurt, anxiety - they can all create a sense of groundlessness in menopause, to the extent that many of us feel that we simply don’t know ourselves any more. This emotional heat can include a sense of despair - you had a sense of what you were about, who you were, what was important to you, and suddenly it all fell away, leaving you questioning the meaning of pretty much everything.Today we’re exploring how to navigate the emotional heat of menopause through the lens of honest and vulnerable stories from the Red School community and Sjanie’s own personal emotional rollercoaster in the run up to menopause.We explore:Alexandra’s personal experience of moments of existential terror that can arise in menopause.How trauma can show up in menopause, and a reframe for when you feel like you’re unravelling and it feels like you’re going mad. What happened when Alexandra experienced her most vivid memory of incandescent menopause rage in the car park under the library. ---Register for our free three-day menopause event: How Menopause Awakens Your Power on October 21st-23rd---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 Sharny, 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, welcome to the menstruality podcast. Today we're talking about menopause, which is an immense

life event. Alexander and shiny see it as a great initiation. Not only is it, a complete hormonal shift in the landscape of your overall health. It's also a psycho-spiritual transformation, which can bring with it a huge emotional roller coaster, rage, grief, emptiness, exposure, hurt, anxiety. They can all create a sense of groundlessness in menopause to the extent that many of us feel that we simply don't know ourselves anymore. And in this conversation today, we're exploring how to navigate this emotional heat of menopause.

through the lens of these honest and vulnerable and very generously shared stories from the Red School community as well as Shani's own personal emotional journey in the run-up to menopause. We look at Alexandra's personal experience of moments of existential terror that can arise in menopause and what happened when Alexandra experienced her most vivid memory of incandescent menopause rage in the car park under the library. let's get started with how to navigate the emotional heat of menopause. Hey, let's start with our cycle check-in like we always do. I'm on day 21 here. I'm just feeling very, let's get to business today. I just want to go and I really want to get into this conversation. So I notice I'm a bit like an animal chomping at the bit.

I always feel like my voice goes down a couple of notes and I feel quite serious and yeah, let's get going. That's my vibe today. Sounds good to me, Sophie. How about you? How about you two? Well, I am a number of things. I was just noticed, I was thinking about my,

I was going, oh, I've got brain strain today. I am a little weary. because we're coming to the end of, you know, our working sort of, well, I don't know what you call it term. Semester, yeah. Semester. And I have, so I'm, you know, I'm in that latter part of the cycle, you know, the cycle of work we're in.

And it's trying to finish everything. And the fact that my energy is, you know, halfway out. Well, I'm sort of halfway out the door in spirit because I can sniff the holiday coming on the horizon, you know, you can sense it coming. So part of me is already there. And another part of me is not there because we have a lot of stuff to do. So, yeah, there's a bit of weariness in me.

But I'm feeling kind of, it's also the waning moon, which I like. I like this phase of the cycle. It feels more kind of chilled for me and less intense. And I feel connected to myself. And just, I feel the kind of okayness with myself, actually, like trucking along. I'm trucking along. And I'm also excited to be doing this podcast because menopause, I just, I get it more and more now. And I get the importance of our hamps of menopause, you know, for where I'm at now in my 70s, you know.

I'd love to ask you more about that, but I'm going to be boundaryed. You're going to be disciplined. We should have a whole conversation about that. We should. How about you? So I am day eight, and I always used to say day eight feeling great. And that is true now only in part. It's really fascinating to just kind of notice how my inner spring

experiences changed over the years. And now I'm approaching 49, my birthdays very soon. And thinking back to my sort of 20s and 30s and day 8 was just plain great. And I remember feeling the buffer of the inner spring and the innocence and, you know, the kind of arrogance actually. of it like it's great i'm great so so simple and um now here i am uh approaching menopause i'm not in menopause yet but i feel like i'm being titrated by menopause like i'm getting these waves and whiffs and dress rehearsal makes it sound really quite civilized and tidy. It's not that, but I'm definitely feeling menopause working me. And so I'm in the late autumn of my menstruating years.

So everything you know about the inner autumn. particularly the late autumn is very dominant for me. And that's kind of in the mix with this spring energy that I'm feeling this day eight energy. So there's a lot of contradiction going on because in one hand I am feeling a rise of energy. I'm feeling an optimism. I'm feeling good about myself, my life. And on the other hand, overall, my energy is a lot less. um my capacity is a lot less i feel much more um sensitive like a layer of skin that i've worn for most of

my life has been sort of stripped away and um there's a kind of rawness underneath and everything hurts things hurt so much more everything hurts so much more so much more so that sensitivity and vulnerability and the kind of depth place that that takes me to where which is not comfortable, you know, it's a depth place of what for much of my life has been unconscious. I'm now sitting right inside it. And the reason we keep things unconscious is because we don't like them. Yeah, so the parts of myself I don't like and the experiences of my life that I have rejected

or not made peace with or integrated or like gaping wounds right now. And so, yeah, there's just an intensity of feeling. And I mean, anyone who's in this place knows when life gets hard. And this is what's so funny, Sophie, is I'm describing my inner state, but like life is matching me and raising me. You know, it's like what's happening inside is happening outside as well. There's a lot of challenge, a lot of change, a lot of intensity, a lot of pressure.

So I've got the kind of outside happening and the inside, which creates an enormous amount of challenge and tension. And so what I was going to say, for anyone who's in this place, firstly, thank you for being with me. And we are not alone. There are many of us navigating these kind of edges of, in autumn of our lives. and what I know about this place

is that our best selves are not necessarily leading the show because we are so much more vulnerable to stress and we don't metabolize it in the way that we do when we're younger our stress personality is like often running the show and that's not usually our best self so I'm having to learn a lot of humility and a lot of kindness because yeah I'm I said to you this is face plant city because I'm just you know falling face first often and yeah and having to get a hold of myself and practice presence again and again and again like that's you know

that's the order of the day and it's a tall order in the current climate oh yeah and still you're laughing this is one of your great skills in life shiny you stay laughing no matter what's going on and in your laughter i was thinking of this meme that i've seen on instagram which is about this phase of life and there's a woman on a zip line and she sets off on the zip line really happy and then it kind of stops, she falls off, lands in the mud, and also her pants get ripped off at the same time, like her trousers get ripped up. She's just lying there flailing in the mud,

and it's like, this is midlife, or this is like your 14th. I can't remember what the type is. That's what I'm thinking. Yeah, there's definitely a cosmic humor that's, I'm very connected to because, oh my goodness, it's just, yeah, it's a saving grace. Grace does keep showing up for me, And one of the ways it shows up for me

is in seeing the funny side of it all. I'm just loving that phrase grace is showing up. As you're talking, you know, this conversation we're having today is about the emotional heat of menopause and how to manage it. And as you're talking, Shania, it feels like you're saying that the emotional heat

starts to build slowly in, say, the second half of the 40s or in its different ages for different people, in that autumn, the late autumn of the menstruating years, the emotional heat is amping up for the moment of menopause. Is that what you're feeling? Yeah, exactly. I mean, I think because cyclical knowledge has been lost, we often think it's like you're not in menopause and you're in menopause,

you know, there's no heat and then there's heat, but it's a graduation, it's cyclical, it's a titration that's happening. and I've been really with this sort of analogy of labour because this is how it feels to me. With labour, the kind of the contractions start off slowly and in a way that's what I'm feeling. I'm feeling these waves, these contractions of emotional heat but there's time in between to catch my breath

and I have a cycle that is still kind of bringing me reprieve and buffer and holding and still are moving through the seasons, the inner seasons. But these waves of heat are coming harder and faster. And at some point, there will be no time to catch one's breath. At some point, it will all just be the heat. It will just be heat. And that's like the menopause initiation when you're just in. Would you agree, Alexandra?

Yes, I think that's actually a really good way of describing it, that you do rounds of something that are titrating you is a good word. I was going to say, toning you up for something. It's kind of layers of work you do. Each round, you do another layer of discovery of yourself. And then in that way, when you touch the deepest core, and there is a core, ultimately, you come to, you have, you have, you've done some work, you've done preparation for that, and you can meet it. There's a readiness in your being. That's the best way I can put it. Of course, it's, I also want to say, menopause is very singular. to each of us. And I think it always comes back to the individual to anoint for themselves where they feel they are at. And sometimes it's not until later down the track that you suddenly

see the shape and pattern of it. But having observed it over time and particularly pacing Shanie's process, who has someone who has really worked with a cycle, it's becoming clearer to me now. This analogy of the labour pains, I think it's a really good one. And you haven't had a child, Alexandra, and I'm wondering if there's something in your life that is similar to that labour analogy that you could compare to menopause, like a different psychospiritual physiological process. It's an interesting question. I would speak about it just in terms of mini rounds of what we call the five phases of menopause. It's like you do mini versions of them.

I mean, when you're in it, there's nothing mini about it. I also believe it is very particular to the individual and the level of resourcing you have as well. So I don't want to be too prescriptive or descriptive about it. Yeah. And we are going to get to speaking about resourcing later, like how to manage this. Yes. And I also want to drop in that you mentioned the five phases of menopause there. And that is the backbone of the course that is coming up. The menopause, the great awakening course, is a guided journey through these five phases of menopause. So if that's something you're interested in exploring, it's a great, I hear from the women have done it that it is a very great adventure to take.

it is yeah yeah and so if you want yet in menopause just you know following on from what alexander was saying it's really helpful to know about these five phases because they are the five phases of initiation and you are going through many rounds of these in the lead up to menopause so i i know for myself i am drawing guidance from understanding that map understanding their territory and understanding what the necessities are for each of those phases. I, as difficult as I'm finding this experience, I also feel held because of that knowledge and because of that context. So I really recommend it if you're sort of in your mid to late 40s as well, get in menopause.

Yeah, something that I see around is something that really fans the flames of the emotional heat is the lack of context for it, like this feeling of this, I'm going mad, there's something wrong with me. But should we start to name what we mean by the emotional heat, like really tease out what are the different emotions we're talking about here? What do women and folks tend to experience as this emotional heat? yes sophie well you know top of the list is i'd say anger and rage sometimes murderous incandescent rage and then loss grief

emptiness kind of the sort of opposite of that this kind of huge charge and then there's this oh and exposure to a lot of hurt and grief that comes through. Anxiety is something that's very strong and a real sense of groundlessness of just not knowing yourself anymore and just a complete loss of meaning.

You know, you've had a sense of what you're about, who you are what's important and that's that keeps us going that you know gets us up every morning and suddenly that can fall away and everything you do feels meaningless or pointless or hopeless that's the other thing a feeling of hopelessness and i think then accompanying that can come despair um for some and and This is a strong word, but I'm going to use it because there can be a moment where there is an experience of terror sometimes because of the loss of ground and the loss of meaning that has kind of held you together when that goes.

And even if you have a strong faith, interestingly, a strong spiritual life, it can even feel like that abandons you. That doesn't hold water anymore. It just doesn't, doesn't speak or work or, and it goes. And so there is this kind of existential terror. And I actually remember that moment. And it wasn't, and it wasn't, I wasn't in it as an ongoing all the time, but it would come in moments and I'm glad it didn't just keep going going but I'd have these moments of real intensity. It was very strong. And what kind of thoughts would be happening in those moments of existential terror intensity? Well my biggest thought was God I've been abandoned by the gods, actually, because I think in my darkest times, you know, before that, because I had

suffered with a lot of extreme health stuff, and that can lead you to a place of complete meaninglessness. But I always had a sense of meaning, actually, and that for me was part of that spiritual sense, that there was something bigger at work, meaningful, that my life felt meaningful, and that I was held by a spiritual force, that there was a spiritual presence that was with me, you know, call it what you like. And that went. Yeah, and that's really now

when I suddenly got the shock of, oh shit, oh my God, this, that was the moment of awakening to grown-upness, you know, and the recognition of my not-grown-upness that I actually was in this somewhat naive relationship with, you know, spiritual life. Wow. How about the rage? Do you have a memory of incandescent murderous rape, menopause rage? I do. I'm two lovely stories. Well, I had this wonderful story I read.

It was a woman who wrote about menopause in the financial times of all places. This was a number of years ago, actually. A hoover of this cracked me up. And she was talking about, you know, all the emotions that come up at menopause. And then she said something like, words to the effect of, forget emotions.

There was only one emotion, rage. And I have a memory of, I'm in, I've tried to park my car in an underground car park. And there's a pillar. There's a fucking pillar. And I take it personally. It's like I knock into it. And then I'm so enraged.

I go back into reverse. And I knock into it even more strongly. I don't think that. It's almost like I put the. foot on the pedal I was so angry with the world and with my life

and I can remember it was the car park under, I think it was under the car park under Bondi Library in Sydney in Australia. The foundations of the library of the foundations of the library

were making it. So I'm imagining in a car park there's just all these marks on these pillars and you could just put next to them Mary age 52 and then Joan age 50 did the pillar survive it sounds like the pillar survived my car did tongue it right to yeah it was an expensive moment of anger and you know I have to say that is such a profound metaphor for menopause because often what happens with rage is that you know life's lives, but we get broken in the process of losing it.

The pillar was fine. Yeah. My car was very hurt, and I was stuck with a big bill. Oh, yeah, so rage. And when we hear it all the time, like, it's so prevalent in this phase of life. And also the grief that you mentioned, I feel like is one that comes around again and again and I'm so grateful because you put a post out in our Red School Community Hub to invite stories and shares and a few women and folks wrote back and I wanted to share one of those

stories now from Zoe because I think it goes a long way to describe a lot of the emotional heat that can happen and she said this past year has been indescribable may past marked one full year without a bleed stepping into the gateway of menopause trying to find some ground beneath my feet. The waves of transformation have been tumultuous. I feel turned inside out, upside down. I've barely held onto any part of myself that was. I've grieved and I'm still grieving for everything, the all of it. Lately I find myself grieving the loss of joy as I once knew it. It's not the same. Joy has alchemized within me into something wordless. I sometimes feel waves of awe, moments of loving connection, but not joy in the way it used to show.

show up. I miss it and I'm allowing that to be so. My capacity for things, people, places, spaces has dissolved. That's why I haven't been able to show up online unless it's one to one. Large groups feel overwhelming. I've had zero yearning to engage with life in the same way. I've needed to hide to shelter to protect this alchemization that's happening and in some ways protect others from me. My tolerance for bullshit has hit a whole new level. Truth spilled out before my mind has had a chance to catch my tongue. The anxiety coursing through my body and mind feels like I'm touching a live socket and keeping my finger there. I've wept for the world for humanity, for the devastation of this planet. I've wept for the smallest of things. Everything

I thought I knew about myself is up for questioning. That is a very, very, very powerful statement. I can hear many, many women, women's stories, folks stories in that, including some of my own. Yeah. Captures it all. The all of it. Yeah. Can we explore some of what's going on here? One of the things that you shared in your notes for this conversation was that, you know, there are big feelings happening here because this is a big life transition. Can we unpack that a bit? Yeah. So menopause is a massive life transition.

And so everything is going to change. And for that transition to happen, you've got to go through an ending, an undoing of the life that you have had. It's a transition that is happening physically, emotionally, and mentally and spiritually. It's happening on all levels. And the transition demands a huge amount of us. I mean, just the physical transformation our bodies go through demands a lot physically. And this undoing makes us vulnerable, more vulnerable.

And Shani's getting a taste of that now. She's getting titrations of that. And you described it so well earlier in your cycle checking, Shani, of things, the unconscious stuff now that's emerging. So we've been able to skate over a whole lot of stuff in our lives because we've got energy, because we've got energy for stuff. actually that really does come down to that actually almost and as physical energy um

gets depleted then we get to see really much deeper into ourselves on all sorts of levels so we are being exposed to ourselves at a much deeper level and uh that will bring up feelings because we're going to in that exposure so we see things about ourselves but we see things about ourselves but we see things about the world that we hadn't seen before we see things about like how we've put up with stuff it's extraordinary we just see through everything it's like the veils fall away and this needs to happen for the new to come you can't just layer over with the new consciousness you've got to undo and unwire one consciousness to then be rewired into a new consciousness.

And the consciousness we're moving into is a more expanded one, a more expanded knowing of things. So you're being undone and you're also stepping into a more expanded place. So can you hear the levels of vulnerability? You do not have buffering. And so you feel, you feel all that hasn't been felt in your life before.

When you describe that, Alexandra, I don't know, there's something about referencing the adolescence transition that makes it more graphic because we know when we're younger, we're moving from girlhood into women, the identity or consciousness of being a child into the identity and consciousness of becoming an adult. And a similar thing is happening here at menopause, but you're not moving from child to adulthood, but you're moving from the identity that you have formed in, through the life you've lived, the roles you've taken on, the ways that you have become habituated or managed your life's trauma and struggle,

you know, the survival patterns that have become sort of your identity. And whilst in many ways those things have kept you safe and allowed you to thrive or succeed or cope with life, they have their, it has its limits. And menopause comes along to, um, to really help you to step out of that identity and the limits that it has so that you can step into an identity that really holds more of the fullness of who you really are. And that's where that freedom piece comes in.

It's like you haven't really been living into your full self, into your full power, even as it may have worked for most of your life, you know, to a greater or less a degree. But it's, yeah, there's a whole lot of power, a whole lot of yourself that you haven't been able to inhabit. And that's what that breaking of identity is offering. I'm going to pause the conversation with Alexandra and Sharnie for, a moment to share two invitations with you. So it's World Menopause Awareness Month and all throughout

October we're sharing on social media about how to rewrite the cultural story of menopause. Then on October the 21st to the 23rd, Alexander and Sharnia hosting a free three-day online menopause event called How Menopause Awakens Your Power. There's already over 800 people from around the world have registered for this. They also have their online course coming up, Menopause the Great Awakener, which starts on October 31st, and you can register for both the free event and find out more about the course at Red Schoolmenopause.com. Here's a story from Virginia about her experience of Menopause the Great Awakener. She says it would be no exaggeration to say that it saved my life at the time. Although I wasn't able to attend any of the live meetings, I engaged

the lectures and the course materials and exercises very deeply and I felt like I was drinking from a deep well of clear water after wandering alone in the desert for far too long. Although I had very intentionally been holding my menopause with a great deal of self-respect and self-honouring of this transition, what I was very profoundly missing was the bigger container that this course provided for me. That container included the framework of holding menopause not only as a positive life experience, but as a profound and transformational initiatory process. That made all the difference for me and really helped me to orient my experience in an entirely new way. You can find out about menopause, the Great Awakener, at red schoolmenopause.com.

Feels like that brings in a whole other layer to the emotional heat because when we're talking about identity shifting. Identities are often shaped around relationships, key relationships or job or work life. Exactly. Those identities change. Then the relationships want to start to change and then there is a massive rub and all kinds of emotions come from. Yeah, the shifts that may need to happen in order for everything around you to get lined up with this new identity that you're growing into, I imagine. That's actually a good way of describing it, Sophie. I also just want to add here that what's happening is

you're actually waking up there's a waking up process going on in that undoing you're suddenly waking up to things at a much deeper level and then yeah everything that's in your sights

that's in your life then is up for question it's a waking up I really want to emphasize that because people feel like they're going mad. It really does feel like goodness and that there's something then wrong with you. And I think this is a terrifying thing. Particularly I want to say for women here because I think women were, you know, what's that word, not institutionalized, but in mental assignments.

I mean, that's how we were dealt with when we were difficult in inverted commas. It's very dangerous to be mad, to look mad. And that's one message I really want to get across, that we have to hold onto this and to remind each other of this when we are feeling these, what feel like feelings that are out of all proportion. to the reality of life. Yeah, that's very well said, Alexandra. The thing of naming it as waking up is so powerful

because, well, when you said that, I realized that part of the identity we've been in has been a kind of numbing, an unconsciousness, an anaesthesia that has kept us safe, but has also kept us from really feeling. And so when we start to wake up through menopause, the waking up happens initially by the desensitization that happens and the depth of feeling that we then come in touch with, which can just feel all bad and wrong. what you said there about it being disproportionate in response to what's happening.

It's so helpful to remember that we're touching into past trauma and the way we react to something in the past, you might have had a more kind of contained and reasonable reaction to. Now it's hitting that place in you that is deeply unheld. and hurt and, you know, the small you. And so, yes, you're going to be feeling a massively disproportionate response. And that can feel like you're out of control or like you're going mad or like there's something wrong with you.

And people around you will tell you you're being unreasonable, ridiculous, you know, no one's going to look at you with sane eyes because you are. So we make other people uncomfortable because people don't know how to meet us. And also the other thing here, I think that's very powerful what you've just said there, Shani, about, you know, the anesthesia wearing off and you're feeling the depth of trauma, is that also you're seeing the trauma in the field or the problem in the field. It isn't actually, so there'll be your own personal stuff you're feeling it'll touch, and that will get catalyzed.

but also you sort of suddenly get more, you know, the challenge that's happening within the environment, within a relationship. And of course, you can't censor yourself in the same way. So you're going to speak and then you're going to be the option because you are disturbing. And I think that's why a lot of relationships don't survive. and menopause because and actually it's no judgment on that at all I want to be very clear about that but it's good to just understand

that you are touching into something deeper and it's just so important to keep holding onto that recognition that you're waking up and so you keep in reminding yourself you're destigmatizing something or you're respecting yourself, you're respecting the power of what you're undergoing. I love that you're pointing not just to the personal waking up that's happening, but to the

relational and also the collective waking up, Alexandra. because again, there is such madness in the world. I mean, if we were to really let ourselves feel the effect of the shit that's going on in the world, like we almost wouldn't be able to cope. But there's something about this initiatory landscape that actually allows you to start to feel more of that. And you've got less defenses against it. So, yeah, there's that whole collective waking up that happens, which is why those going through menopause are such a powerful powerhouse for activism

because they are not pushing it under the carpet anymore. And they're not sort of, yeah, trying to just sort of cope. They're actually really waking up to. And it feels important to name that none of this is understood or respected in our current cultural paradigm. Yeah, exactly. This is the other thing that's fueling the intensity of the feeling is that there is no respect for the, for menopause as a great initiation and that also,

that we are stepping into something post-menopause that is significant and powerful. We're actually seen as becoming less significant and less powerful and less kind of attractive and useful. And that is devastating to feel that. So no wonder then there is rage there too, you know, rage at that. So yes, the lack of recognition and respect for menopause is fueling this. There was a story from Becky in the community hub, which illustrates some of this too. She says, I'm currently a month into my menopause sabbatical, with immense gratitude to Alexandra for naming this and gifting the concept.

I'm astonished by the depths of my exhaustion, falling into a deep dreaming portal, recognizing a fundamental need to name the challenges I'm facing, a loss of confidence in my intellectual strengths, a spiritual crisis, and a recognition of hyper-independence which has closed off my sensuality, creativity, and ability to form personal close connections. I have a rage and anger at the depths of ignorance of feminine wisdom and intuition, perpetuated by capitalist, colonisation and patriarchy. I'm working through this. I'm in awe of what lies above and beneath these structures. If she's seeing something, it's a great description.

It's beautiful, it's beautifully summed up. Yeah, it's powerful, very powerful. Okay, so we are really naming that there's big stuff going on here. And we are not respected and supported in this. What do we do? I think one of the most important things is we can't wait for society to wake up as I've got to happen. We are the ones that are waking society up to the fact that this is significant.

And it's just so important that we fuel ourselves with knowledge about this transition. And that's what we've tried to do with our book Wise power is to give a naming of the great initiation, the spiritual undertaking you're going on and what's potentially at the other side for you and what needs to happen for you to go through that. And to kind of know, it's so important to have some kind of framework or holding that keeps reminding you because you're not going to get that from outside yourself

unless you have one or two really good allies and we'll come to that but just this knowledge and coming back to it over and over again will help to keep reminding you you're not going mad you're waking up there's something important going on but you've got to go through this valley of death first where you feel like you know it's over and you don't know what's ahead and you need support understanding for how to tend to yourself through that time of not knowing and what's needed for the new to emerge is really important alchemical work that you're doing and it's just so important to have instruction and to keep coming back to that and to keep coming back to the overall framing and to keep kind of location

hating yourself in that. This is absolutely the first thing that must happen, I feel, is resourcing yourself with knowledge. Really, the knowledge is immense in terms of the holding. And I'm just thinking about how, in our book, Wise Power, we've set this out amongst other things as a map. and really, as with all maps, you know, the map is not the territory, we know this, but what the map does is it orientates you again and again.

So each person is going to have their very own singular lived experience of this and will feel lost and will feel disorientated. but even within that lostness and disorientation, the map will help you to know that you're right on track. You know, there's something, yeah, there's something just about that that I think I would not want to go through this process without that. I mean, it's already helping you now. Oh, yeah, it's already helping me now, yeah.

And the map's not going to do the initiatory work for you. It's not going to save you. It's not going to be a literal guide. you know, in fact, it's going to absolutely fail you on that level when you're like, just where am I? What's happening? Tell me the map will not give you that. But it will give you the context, the orientation. And that counts for everything when you're in the dark. It counts for everything. It's like Alexandria, you often use that analogy of like the star in the night sky. and in a way this initiatory map of menopause is just that star you're still in the dark

you're still navigating the unknown but there is this little guiding light that's there yeah one of the other pieces that you name in terms of a resource for managing the emotional heat is to have allies, and I wanted to share this story from Naomi that I think a lot of listeners might relate to. She says, I am in rage right now. I'm really struggling with how the F, she's put four stars, so I'm assuming it's the F word, how the F to be around men, struggling to separate the toxic patriarchy from the men I love because it's in all of us and I feel toxic. I feel infected with hatred that I don't want in my body and doesn't effing belong to me. I want to be with a group of women in person who can really go to the places within me but I don't have the energy to

organise it or the money to pay someone else to hold it vicious circle. Can we talk about the importance of allies here when we're overwhelmed by the intensity? of it all. Oh, gosh. I think it's everything, actually, especially in that really intense time. We're in the undoing phase. And we need allies who are, who know the territory.

They could be in it themselves or they are post-menopause. ideally, I want everyone to have a post-menopause ally, because they also hold the framing, which is hard to hold when you're in it yourself. But having someone, anyone who is either in it or post-menopause, who can be with you. Now, you do not want to be fixed, or, you know, anyone to come up with platitudes or, you know, solutions. And we're very careful not to give solutions to your problems, share. It is that there is a place of holding, and I suppose remembering, because you both remember, you both know that this, This is initiatory and this is meaningful.

And that there's a place where you can just speak or shout or scream or cry. Where you can be uncensored and no one is going to manage you. it's about you finding your way through these feelings it's about you coming i don't know if coming through them is the right word although that's probably it but it's about you coming into them into them and sort of in that process there's some kind of alchemy that starts to happen where something in you is shifted shifts or changes and um it's just very wrong and it's about really meeting yourself in that rawness without any kind of judgment and to have an ally can be just one other person you know we talk about listening partnerships at red school and who can be witness and know and respect you or to have a circle and you know if there is a postman or who knows who know how to meet this with you that's kind of an added extra because they often will hold some

kind of energetic field or have one or two words that can be spoken that kind of hit the spot yeah i've got to say the format of a listening partnership is so helpful for this menopause transition It was the organization hand in hand that introduced me to listening partnerships for parenting. But just from what Alexandra's described there, having somebody whose job is not to help you, fix you, comment, suggest, but just to listen and witness, the depth of that medicine is extraordinary when you're navigating this waking up process, which is asking you to become more and more real with yourself.

and to feel more and more of who you are. Having that witnessed is part of that alchemical magic that happens. Your presence, you witnessing yourself and having someone else hold you and witness you in that is magic. Really magic. I want that for everyone, which is why it's something we include on the Great Awakener, because I really want that for everyone. And I just want to come to Naomi's comment at the end because of being so fatigued and just not having capacity or means now for, you know, reaching out to somebody.

And I've been thinking about this a lot about your story, Naomi. And I'm sort of imagining myself in that place. And I actually, I do want to suggest something. I'm suggesting it because it's something that I did which is that I actually I talked to I mean I talked to my journal and I let it rip through writing

which of course may not work for some people but I remember just fucking letting every piece of shit come out on the paper and tearing with my pen tearing through the paper. I was kind of talking to, you know, my biggest self, you know, through the journal. And I mean, at times I've talked to, you know, my wise self, from my very unwise self in this moment, you know, whatever works for you. But being able to get the rage out or the grief out or the anxiety.

out to just sometimes it's when it's just in us all the time but just finding some way of getting it out is a step it's not the same as having someone witness us and meet us in it but it is a something so I actually do want to suggest that as an idea I found I found doing it I came to is it a resting place or I came to I came through something, you know. I came through to some something. I don't want to say anything more. And also there's a free offering that you've created

so accessible to all in menopause that's coming up on the 21st, 22nd, 23rd of October where you will be surrounded by hundreds of others who are in the menopause process and then guided by you two. So that's also coming up and available. And I'll put the link to, well, actually the link to register will be red school.net forward slash menopause.

Thank you so much, you too. This has been such a rich conversation. And do you have any final words of wisdom as we close the conversations today or anything else you want to share? Yes. One very important thing I want to share is it can feel insurmountable your needs and what you want and you can just never get it all, but we have our 1% rule and just find 1% of something that you're really needing,

whatever it is, whatever, yes, whatever you're needing or craving, to find the 1% of that, because 1% is always possible and doable, and that gradually begets more. So our 1% rule is everything here in navigating the menopause change. If only you've known that when you were driving your car. I know.

You're going to have seen a 1% tap instead of the full car written off. I'm going to be laughing about that all day. How about you, Johnny? Yeah, I think the thing I want to add, which is something I'm learning. you know, the expression, when the shit hits the fan, I keep noticing again and again that when the shit hits the fan, the things to come back to are all the basics of basics of self-care, really.

Movement, eating well, breathing properly, you know, creating rhythm in my day. And so I really want to offer that to anybody who is deep in the heat to remember the power of the basics and to not forsake yourself in that way to keep taking care of yourself because that care counts for everything when you're meeting such enormous intensity. It's the foundation. So, yeah, and there again, the 1%, you know, just little things you can do to keep caring for yourself. Yeah. Thank you so much, you too.

See you next time. Thanks for being with us today. If you know someone that would benefit from this conversation, please forward it to them. And please come and register for the first. free three-day online menopause event, How Menopause Awakens Your Power, at red schoolmenopause.com. All right, that's it for this week. We'll be with you again in a couple of weeks' time. And until then, keep living life according to your own brilliant rhythm.