A woman's inner seasons
There is a cosmos within you as a woman, that ultimately holds the key to all your powers, and that is; your menstrual cycle.
A woman’s body is a complex system with constantly shifting moods and energy, which is due to the changes and fluctuations in our hormone patterns. It’s said that when you marry a woman, you are not marrying one person, you are marrying four. Because during a month, each woman go through four different phases and four different seasons which makes her shift and change.
The same way nature goes through different seasons, so do women. Our menstrual cycle contains all four seasons; spring, summer, fall and winter, and we experience all four of them each month. Each phase of your menstrual cycle represents these different seasons and each phase contains a set of specific psychological challenges, and if you acknowledge and meet this challenges, you’ll get a deeper understanding of yourself as a woman and how your inner world shifts and changes to the rhythms of our menstrual cycle.
What we call the inner seasons of the cycle, the phases of menstruation: the menstrual phase, the follicular phase, the ovulatory phase and the lutheal phase - reveal different aspects of who you are. This so you can enjoy an ongoing discovery of the different sides of yourself, personal qualities, talents, and strengths. The inner seasons are your guide to getting to know yourself. Their return every month, creates an opportunity for you to practise the powers of each one and as you understand the energies and signs of each phase, you’ll be able to tune in and sense where you’re at even if it’s different each month.
Embracing our menstrual cycle is an important step on our journey towards feminine embodiment and inner balance. It supports us in appreciating our sacred body temples, connecting us with the seasons of the earth, the wisdom of our wombs and the magic of the moon. By paying attention to our body's cues, we will get a deeper awareness of how it functions, allowing us to use the cycle to our advantage and to know how to treat our bodies throughout our cycle as our needs naturally changes with the different phases. Women do change throughout the menstrual month, but those changes do not equal unreliability or weakness, unlike what the patriarchy have always told us. In fact, having a menstrual cycle, and actually understanding and knowing it by being aware of it, gives a woman much more predictability around her moods and energy than someone without one. And it also gives her a wonderful capacity to work with change, the fact of life that so many of us resist. When she understands her shifts in mood, wants and needs, she is more in control of her own life. She knows herself. Rather than feeling as though she’s being thrashed around by an unpredictable storm, she is self-aware and able to navigate the stormy waters with more confidence and grace.
As you bring consciousness to and care for each season in turn, you restore the order of the cycle, your inner ecology, and with that create a feeling of greater ease and pleasure, which helps you understand and use your power.
If a woman pays attention to her cycle, she is further freeing herself from the chains of a patriarchal society that has abandoned the gentleness of feminine energy. She is reclaiming her right to unapologetically tend to the requests of her body from week to week. One week she may want to socialize, the next she will need more space. A woman who isn’t communicating with her body will say things like “I feel like I’m going crazy” whereas an empowered woman’s journey involves learning to love her cycle, and understand and accept where she’s at in that specific moment rather than denying its power – and it does have power whether we choose to embrace this truth or not. Because the fact is; you are not the same every day of the month. Not at all. As a woman, you are changing daily. Especially weekly, because your hormones fluctuates and changes. So instead of denying this fact and working against yourself and your natural rhythms, try to understand that there’s nothing wrong with you, you are simply just not a man, which this society is mainly built for. You are a powerhouse embodied within a female body and just because you feel like you can’t fit into what the masculine asks us to, understand just that, that’s the masculine! And you are the feminine which explains that there’s is absolutely nothing wrong with you, you are just built differently than men. It’s understandable why so many women feel lost and confused, because they are actually growing up in a society that’s not built for their wellbeing. The reality is that there aren’t something wrong with us, as women. It’s the patriarchal society we’re born and raised in, that values and honors the mascluine qualities over our feminine approach, that makes us feel misunderstood and separated from ourselves. You are not weak because you rest and take care of yourself, you are a woman, who embraces the soft and feminine sides of herself - like she is supposed to! Living in a patriarchal society shouldn’t stop us from cultivate the feminine, rather the opposite. This society desperately needs more feminine qualities. More rest, sleep, relaxation, pleasure, creativity, intuition, stillness, bliss, sensitivity, sustainability. Be the change. It starts with you.
The Inner Winter
A woman's inner winter is her menstrual phase, where she bleeds. It’s the yin part of our seasons, and a period in which we’re going inward as we naturally become more introverted. We’re feeling more tired and in need of rest, sleep and nourishment. Slowing down and taking care of yourself will naturally occur (if you let it and not just soldier through which we are taught to). It’s also a season filled with the most amazing resources such as the ability to experience expansive awareness and altered states of consciousness, presence and love. But to access these resources requires the sacred task of surrender. BUT; is it space for us, as women, to take a step back to rest and honor our bodies, on a monthly basis, in this society? No. The patriarchy is based on the masculine qualities like doing, success, work and competition. If a woman says she needs a couple of days off to replenish she’s most likely seen as weak. BUT IT’S NOT WEAK FOR GOD’S SAKE IT’S SENSITIVITY AND SOFTNESS AND A PART OF BEING A WOMAN. It’s the ability to restore, tune inward, be creative and intuitive - all feminine qualities which are just as important as the masculine qualities - if not more, in this imbalanced world where the masculine dominates. But there are new approaches coming; in Australia some companies are creating ‘women days’, where women can take a couple of days off each month. And one woman even got her monthly gym membership, consisting of 4 weeks in which she was paying for, to the price of 3, because 1 out of 4 weeks each month, she’s not using it anyway. Honor your inner winter. It’s a sacred time and honoring the female qualities will not only benefit women, but men too. Menstruation is the anchor of our menstrual cycle, it’s both the beginning and end of it. It’s the place where you root deeply into yourself and a way of detoxing and releasing for the female body. So support what is already happening. Let go, both physically and mentally. Release, repair and refuel.
Keywords: Inner connection, stillness, bliss, self-love, intimacy and union, visioning, inner guidance, restoration, peace and quiet, rest, alone time, sensitivity, wisdom, creativity, letting go, renewal, release, introversion, nourishment, quiet, detox, mentally woke, expansive awareness, presence.
The Inner Spring
A woman’s inner spring is her follicular phase, or the second phase of the menstrual cycle. Your inner spring is a place of becoming where you are in transition from the deep inner journey of inner winter and negotiating your way to the full expression of yourself in your inner summer. It’s a place to start fresh. A place where everything feels possible. As you feel the energy rises, you feel the inner ‘yes’, a yes to yourself and a yes to life. You are held in a world of possibility and hope, and have a natural motivation and focus. The inner spring asks you to keep an open and curious mind as there’s a desire and an increasing appetite to make reality out of the ideas and visions you received at menstruation. It’s the time to start new projects, do research, be creative and set new things to life for you to harvest and evalute later in the seasons. But make sure you’re still listening to yourself so you don’t overshoot and become overwhelmed. Remember, winter is a vulnerable space, and as you are transitioning into spring, you still carry that sacred space with you. The challenge is to learn how to hold space for that vulnerability in a culture that’s so driven. So even though your energy peaks, give yourself permission to emerge slowly from menstruation.
As you cherish yourself in this season of your cycle you’ll become more aware of the emerging sense of your true self in which helps you stand confident and present in the world. Look forward while still holding an eye inward, and enjoy the natural curiosity you are now given.
Keywords: Rebirth, renewal, curiosity, playfulness, imagination an possibility, focus, positivity, fresh-start, productive, focused, new ideas, thoughts and projects, independence, learning, strong, able to take on challenges, physically energized, concentration.
The Inner Summer
A woman’s inner summer is her ovulatory phase. As she ovulate, she’s by evolution more outgoing, juicy (and fertile) and extroverted. The inner summer is the ‘glamourous’ yang part of the menstrual cycle, where our energy peaks. While it lasts, you can be a powerhouse of productivity as well as a goddess taking part in sensual delights. During your inner summer you’ll embody the natural powers of mastery, outward focus, charm, high energy, pleasure and not to mention; «the doer», which is the aspect that is most acknowledged, valued and recognised as power in our culture as it’s what we normally think of as power and success - getting stuff done. Achieve. However, it sits in a continuum. It is made possible by all the ‘power’ work that has been done before - surrendering and slowing down during menstruation to reconnect and remember who you truly are; and the cherishing of your emerging self in the inner spring. This basically mans that if you’re not honoring yourself as you bleed, you won’t either find yourself in this high vibe creative and energetic place during your ovulation. It’s connected.
The inner summer invites you into the fullness of who you are, the liberated expression of your power. This phase shows you the power of being visible and standing tall in all your pride. You blossom, you fulfill yourself. (Which will look different for each person) It’s the time for scheduling adventures, meetings, creative work, dinners, lunches- everything active and fun. It’s also the time for seduction, sensations, pleasure and sensual desires as your sexual energy is naturally heightened.
Keywords: high energy, desire, sexual, outward and expressive, flirty, creative, playful, community-focused, social, relationship building, service, love-making, creating, gratitude, building, holding space for others, momentum is being added to the ideas and projects you began in spring phase.
The Inner Fall
A woman’s inner fall is her lutheal phase. It’s the last of the four phases in our menstrual cycle, where our progesterone peaks as a result of ovulation. The inner fall challenges you to grow up and take full responsibility for who you are. It shines light on what’s really important and where you’ve fallen short as you are demanded to hold the tension of the complexity of who you are, the light and the dark. Your shadow side is starting to awaken and the things you have neglected in yourself, the needs and feelings you’ve sidelined, breaks the surface for you to deal with. The power of ‘no’ is gold and available now. Use it to clarify what’s in and what’s out, so you can come back in the next round with more growth. The inner fall asks you to learn to root in your autenticity and align with your truth. To establish what’s working and what’s not. You can find yourself evaluating everything, yourself, your partner, your work, your life. For many, this season of the cycle is the most misunderstood because its powers like deep intuition and fierce and proactive energies, aren’t valued. Your instincts are sharper and you have heightened intuition and just «know» stuff. The psychic abilities during this season are often times mistaken for hysteria and paranoia, (but boys, she’s not paranoid, she’s just in tune) However, it’s easy to let your inner critic take control in this period as the inner fall is the ‘home’ of your inner critic. So be aware, who’s really talking? Is it truth? Or your ego? Do you need to make changes? Adjustments?
Your sacred task in this period is to meet this critic figure, while holding yourself. In other words, hang out with the discomfort long enough to be able to hear what your critic is saying; to be present with the emotions long enough that you can hear what’s real and what isn’t. This way you’re able to acknowledge whatever kernel of truth there is, while holding on to your own goodness and standing up to what’s not true in the critic’s words. And your reward for showing up and meeting this month after month? A fierce capacity to trust yourself and the life you are given. Wisdom. Stronger intuition. Brilliance.
Keywords: lower energy, evaluating, saying ‘no’, the critic, editing, holding tension, truth-speaking, completion, more space, moody, less focus and concentration, less coordinated, mentally creative, less physically active, heightened intuition, strategic, feel like harvesting fruits of the ideas and projects you've started.