Dear sister,
For many unfortunate reasons, the menstrual cycle remains a place of mystery for a lot of women. The lack of education, the taboo placed upon it by society, and the dis-match that it has with the linear, fast-paced reality we live in, are only a few examples of why and how women are disconnected from their period.
In this blog, I am going to demystify what happens inside your body over, and over, and over again with each month of your menstrual cycle.
You will learn the main hormonal and energetic changes that occur in each of the four phases of your cycle and understand the true meaning of your cyclical nature.
Remember, this is your birthright.
THE FOUR PHASES OF YOUR MENSTRUAL CYCLE
By using nature’s language, you can look at your four menstrual phases as the four seasons - your inner seasons. Just like nature, we embody the same cyclical intelligence, in which our energy, life-force, and body functions, go through times of blooming and high energy (spring and summer) and through times of introspection and rest (autumn and winter).
With these rhythms, our body communicates to us that in order to be able to be in a place of creation, activity, and expression, it needs to regenerate itself, and it does this through a very intelligent hormonal orchestration.
This is my favorite way of connecting to my cycle, and the four phases of menstruation. It gives me such a perspective each month that passes and reminds me of my deep, innate connection to nature.
Let’s look at each of these beautiful inner seasons a little deeper.
INNER WINTER
This is your menstrual phase and it starts on the first day of bleeding. Just like winter, this is the most inward, internal phase and energy is at its lowest. As you bleed, you not only shed blood, but you also shed energy of what no longer serves you.
This is a time to rest, look inside, and be in the process of your letting go.
This is also a powerful time for receiving new seeds of ideas, revelations, and deep insight.
Unfortunately, our menstrual phase has not been supported by our society, and women have been left shamed, disconnected, uneducated, and unable to truly sink into the true energy that is our inner winter.
This phase of our cycle asks us to take it easy, rest, and, as much as possible, not schedule high-performance meetings or projects. As we rest and go inwards, we also recharge ourselves by drawing energy from our inner source of power to then bring it out into the world once we come out of winter and bloom into our next phase, inner Spring.
INNER SPRING
Also known as the Follicular phase, this phase starts the day after your last day of bleeding and lasts for 6 to 10 days.
Just like Spring, this is when we experience a sense of new beginnings, and the changes in our body make our energy rise. After the darkness of winter, your inner world is experiencing the first rays of sun and a sense of blossoming. This is a great time to visualize and plan your creative projects.
Hormonally, the body is experiencing the first rise in estrogen, which gives energy and stimulates the instinctual and intuitive part of the brain. It also stimulates the production of Follicle-stimulating hormones (FSH) which causes follicles in the ovaries to begin to mature, hence the sense of new beginnings… We are literally growing new eggs!
It can be very tempting, with this hormonal shift, to dive right into the world with full enthusiasm. While in this phase we feel fresh and ready to get out there, it also asks us to do it gently… as summer is yet to come!
INNER SUMMER
Here we are... it’s summertime! This is our Ovulatory phase and it lasts for 3 to 5 days.
In our inner spring, we began to stretch, feel the sun on our skin, smell the new blossoms and enjoy longer days.
Now, in our inner summer, we are at our full splendor. Our energy is high, we feel good, we feel open, and we want to be out and about enjoying this awesome season.
Hormonally, estrogen is at its peak and the body is at its most open, radiant, and vital time of the monthly cycle. By this point, one or two eggs in our ovaries have fully matured and we are now fertile!
Inner summer is the time to be expressive, go out on dates, make presentations and be outward. It’s a great time to put ourselves out into the world and share the gifts and insights we have gathered in the depths of our winter and prepared throughout the spring.
Once again, it is always good to monitor our energy as it can be easy to go in overdrive. It can be life-changing to learn to keep some energy for the shift of season and enter the Autumn feeling grounded and nourished.
INNER AUTUMN
Just like the seasons in nature, following inner summer, is inner Autumn, also known as the Luteal Phase and lasting between 10 to 14 days.
Energy starts to decline and it’s the beginning of introspection. This can be the most challenging time of the menstrual cycle as it brings a big shift from the high-energy, radiant summer, into what can feel like sudden darkness and decay…. It’s no coincidence that this is the phase most shamed, “hated” and misunderstood by our patriarchal society.
We have just opened ourselves and blossomed in our full beauty, and it is now time to shift gear and go inwards, look inside… see what worked, and what didn’t. It’s autumn, and although it can be hard to accept that summer is over, this inner season can offer major medicine when you learn how to work with it. It’s time to look at your shadows as they arise, this can be a deep time of healing.
This time of our cycle is characterized by a hormonal shift that brings progesterone into the system while experiencing a decline in estrogen. If you didn’t conceive, a process of disintegration happens inside the ovaries, which will then lead to the physical manifestation of blood in the next phase… when you are back in winter.
ROUND AND ROUND
This is it beautiful womb carriers… we cannot escape it, nor deny it. We are biologically designed to be cyclical. This is the nature of our bodies and the intelligence of our life-producing organism.
It seems almost impossible that this sacred and core function of our bodies as women has gone through such major trauma and oppression that we ourselves have become so disconnected from it.
But it’s not too late to reclaim the innate power that we hold within and educate ourselves and the people around us on how to redesign our lives to be better in sink with the real flow of nature itself, inside and out.
To help you begin your journey to reconnect to your cycle and the power of your womb, I’ve designed a beautiful Lunar Chart, completely free, where you can start keeping track of your inner seasons and get to know your own rhythms more intimately.
It comes with a Guidebook, which explains how to start and how to use the chart. To download it, simply click the link below and follow along.
Share this with your circle and stay tuned as I will be writing more in-depth blogs for each season, with tips on how to best connect and fully experience the magic of each of our monthly phases.
With love and devotion,
Gloria
