Cyclicity is a Superpower
and a few other things I've learned from menstrual cycle awareness
I realise I’ve not written much here about what has come to be a large part of my work and life: menstrual cycle awareness. Cycle awareness is a way of understanding and embodying the menstrual cycle as a biological rhythm comprised of distinct phases and energies that women naturally move through. As a practice it allows us to connect to ourselves as innately rhythmic beings, part of a larger cycle (or circle) of life all around us. To me, it is an utterly unique combination of somatic practice, energetic work, community healing, shadow integration, personal therapy and spiritual journey. There’s nothing quite like it. It holds me together in a deep, deep way, especially when life gets rough.
When I mention cycle awareness to people, a lot of the time they think it’s about raising awareness of the menstrual cycle—the fact that women menstruate, products they should use during the bleed, or some kind of sex education about conception and contraception. While these are important areas of discussion and education, cycle awareness is so much more than this. It’s discovering an embodied wisdom about who you are and how you change as you move through your cycle. This is why its teachings ripple out into so many other dimensions of life and healing work.
Cyclicity is at the heart of who we are, how our bodies work, and how nature functions. Whether or not you menstruate, I hope the following ideas resonate with you, and help you get in touch with your cyclical nature.
If this is something you want to explore further, consider joining my upcoming Menstrual Cycle Awareness program (starts Aug 22). Four weeks of in-depth group coaching on how to live in alignment with your own cycle, drawing from dimensions of life as diverse as intuitive eating, cyclical movement, biorhythms and nervous system regulation. More details at the end of this post, via the button below (links to Instagram), or send me a message.
(1) cyclicity is a superpower
We live in a linear world, and so we sometimes forget that we are cyclical beings. Cycles govern everything about us, from the rhythm of our breathing and heartbeat, to our brain waves, to the way we sleep and wake, to our hormonal rhythms, and much more...
In this moment as you are reading, can you sense where you are in the cycle of day and night? The seasonal cycle of the year? The cycle of your life? The cycle of your breathing? The cycle of the month (moon/menstrual)? Which cycle do you feel most connected to right now? Which is the one where you can land and find belonging?
Being part of a cycle is how the life process unfolds and moves forward. This is why recognizing your place in the cycle can be healing in and of itself, because it reorients you to the direction that your life force wants to go. I cannot describe the comfort it has given me to be able to see and sense parts of my life in their own cycles, especially when things are falling apart or in disarray. Dissolution is, after all, part of the cycle of birth and death that all living forces go through in order to exist. When we recognize cyclicity, we accept the decay, knowing that it leads to the birth of something new.
Cyclicity connects us back to nature and the wider web of life, because we are part of the natural world and we express its qualities innately. The way nature does things has sustained life for millennia—and so, aligning with our cycliclity is a way to tap into the life-giving power of nature. It makes life easier, and energy more available, simply because it’s in us already.
Honouring cyclicity means:
going with the flow and timing of nature, and of your body, instead of overriding yourself to meet external or unnatural demands
accepting fluctuations in energy and mood as normal parts of life, instead of forcing yourself to be the same all the time
trusting that if we let ourselves feel low for a while, we will come back up to a high automatically and spontaneously
One of the principles and paradoxes of life is that opposites create each other. When we allow ourselves to go down, be low, look in—this, in turn, evokes the part of us that takes us high, pushes us onward, or looks outward. In my own case, cycle awareness has allowed me to embrace my introverted side fully enough that my extroversion has space to emerge too. On another level, its also shown me again and again that dips in energy are inevitably followed by upswings, as long as I surrender and cooperate with what my body is asking of me.
(2) circle > line
The shape of a circle is inclusive, whereas the shape of a line is divisive. All points on a circle are the same, whereas each point on a line is different. Both forms delineate space, but in different ways, and therefore create a different relationship between the elements they define.
I’ve heard it said that this is why indigenous cultures sit in circle—because it creates a space of equality where everyone is seen and held together. Over time in my own teaching career, I’ve moved from more grid-like layouts (sometimes even with the teacher being elevated on a stage, ie. a clear ‘line’ between teacher and student) to more communal, circular layouts; and I find I enjoy the latter much more now.
When you live in or on a line, there can only be movement in one dimension—you’re either moving forwards, or backwards. Isn’t that how we feel about our lives sometimes? Can you sense how much pressure this mindset creates? (Not to mention the inevitable question: where’s the endpoint and what lies after it?)
When you live in or on a circle, movement is simply movement—you go forward and backward at the same time, and you often end where you began, albeit changed by the experience. All points on a circle can be seen by all other points, so everything is included and nothing is excluded. This principle applies equally to our inner world, populated by a multiplicity of selves, and our outer world.
The hardest part of being linear, to me, is the fact that at some point the line ends and there’s nothing there to catch you. You fall off the edge into nothingness, or so it seems. In a circle, there may still be an ending, or a pause, or a gap—but there is always something else waiting to pick you up. In other words, cyclicity reminds us that life is ongoing, even when we are confronted with death.
Within the menstrual cycle, menstruation is the phase that brings us into the liminal space between life and death, outside of time and space. The bleed is a time of heightened awareness, of being on the threshold, not quite here and not quite there. It is the end of the old cycle, which is shed literally through blood and body fluid, and the beginning of a new cycle, as the ovaries (and with them, our hormones and energy) begin to grow a new egg (or possibility).
(3) all parts of yourself are worthy and needed
I mentioned above that cycle awareness is a kind of shadow integration and personal therapy. This is because the natural fluctuations within each cycle bring us face-to-face with different energies and parts of ourselves, that we then learn to meet and accommodate. Some of my own parts include:
the superwoman, who carries all the loads and manages everything
the sassy one, who doesn’t take BS and knows her boundaries
the soft one, who wants to be held tenderly and taken care of
the hermit, who wants to run away from the world and be left alone for a while
the queen, who knows what she’s worth and how to reign over her life
the artist, who finds joy in creating and sharing her gifts with the world
the broken one, who is still (and always) healing from the pain of life
the playful one, who likes to joke around, try new things and have a good time
the caring one, who soothes hurts and nurtures life all around
the sensual one, who loves feeling joyfully alive in her body
the geek, who pursues knowledge and grows in the process
the party animal, who loves to socialise and connect with others
the wild one, who can’t abide rules and restrictions of any kind
All of these facets of yourself (and any others that you discover) are valid and important ways that you experience life and the world. Becoming cycle-aware means recognizing when a certain part shows up, and taking responsibility for it: not shutting it out, or making it conform, or repressing it until it inevitably blows up in yours or someone else’s face.
There is a prevailing narrative about the menstrual cycle that says it makes women unpredictable, unreliable, inconsistent, moody, impossible to understand… This narrative arises from a limited perspective, which believes that health and sanity lie in being the same way all the time. (And that if you aren’t, you should make yourself.)
The healthiest people (or egos) are able to ebb and flow with the dance of their inner parts in a way that allows for spontaneity and improvisation, but is still sane and makes sense. Health and wholeness are not about being consistent—which eventually leads to stagnation rather than growth—but about discovering and integrating more and more of yourself as you live.
On an even deeper level, cyclicity reminds us to expand our perspectives and get in touch with the larger self (or no-self) that is the holding ground for all these different parts. What is the hidden constant behind the rising and falling of the sun, the wax and wane of the moon, or the turning of the seasons? That same force is what we touch through this practice, by leaning in to change however it manifests, and trusting that we are held by something greater as we cycle and evolve.
I hope you enjoyed some of these insights. Let me know in the comments what stood out to you.
And for those who may be interested, here are the details of the program:
“The shape of a circle is inclusive, whereas the shape of a line is divisive. “
Seemingly so simple and yet so essential and wise. You are right on with this course. Thank you!
Good awareness of the limits of "linear". The etymological root of the word “rule” is “reg-, move or direct in a straight line, rule.” So there's linear thinking and Reichs, the German word for “empire,” meaning “kingdom, realm, state,” also, “riches” and known more colloquially as “the ruling class.” This is the very aim of empires/rulers, to keep you in line, while they hoard the loot. Also i find the spiral a helpful pattern for navigating cycles.