Here be Dragons: Transition Times, Facing the Unknown

SoulCollage(R) Card: Taming the Dragon 

“The human spirit is capable of an endless number of extraordinary feats. It is a dragon slayer, animating its presence within our being to challenge images and thoughts that arise from the depths of our darkness, intent upon reshaping how we see the landscape of our life.” -  Carolyn Myss

A few years ago, I took a class called Dark Gifts. I was intrigued by the title and ready to face my fear of writing the true stories of my childhood with a dysfunctional (but loving) family. I knew it was going to be scary, even though I had previously written a book of poems called “Little Mother”, and dived deeply in my journal for many years. But I also knew there was treasure to be uncovered in that dark cave.

At each transition point in my life, it seems, the dragons raise their heads and blast me with “thou shalt not pass here” messages. I am a brave and curious soul, usually, not reckless, not Game of Thrones kind of adventurer, but eager to understand my own processes and move onward and upward. Still, after the dizzying mid-life transition at menopause, I felt a bit weak in the knees, a bit less sure of myself, so this course beckoned to me.

Here’s the thing about dragons – what I found out when I asked it why I couldn’t pass (in a guided meditation), is that there was no good reason – and when I imagined my little girl self singing it a lullaby, the dragon actually lowered its hoary head and let me come closer. The tears that flowed from my eyes melted some of my own armour, showing me the true nature of courage; by allowing myself to be vulnerable, as Brene Brown says, more courage began to flow. It felt like a pivotal moment. (I’m still working on those childhood stories).

What I’m discovering with my creative practice of SoulCollage® is that the first step, after creating a safe space to play/work in, is to call in my allies and guides for help in facing the dragons. I have made several Protector cards, Wise Elder and Earth Mother cards, cards that feel nurturing and loving and accepting. I also have a few warrior cards, and a ferocious Mountain Lion who stands guard and protects my boundaries. Now I also know that my innocent girl child has a light and power that can fight the dark.

SoulCollage(R) Card: Mountain Lion Protector 

In the workshop I’m offering this weekend, called Darkness to Light, Navigating Transitions, we are going to name and claim our dragons, the boogeymen who say – Stop! You can’t go forward! There be dragons here!  And we will also find and name our allies. We have all been through many transitions in our lives, but in the face of the current transition or challenge, we sometimes forget the skills and tools we learned the last time around. For instance, most of us have survived a lot of challenges: we made it through adolescence, challenging relationships, illnesses, loss of a loved one, or a job change – but when we are in the middle of it, it feels just as scary every time to face the unknown, to be uncertain of the future. I remember Joan Borysenko describing it in a workshop on Change as being in the hallway, with one door closed and the other one not opened yet.  It’s normal to feel uneasy about what is not seen yet, and unknown.

SoulCollage(R) Card: Goddess Blessing Child with Sun and Water

This is why we need to call in our allies. We also need to name our challengers, pull the dragons out of the dark and ask them to speak to us, ask them: what is the treasure you are guarding? What gift do you have for me? What can I give you in return? There is always a gift in the darkness; hiding in the shadows is our gold.

Writing this article, I came across this powerful piece called Meeting the Dragon, by Robert Holden:  “’On the path of bliss you will meet a dragon. On the dragon there are many scales. Every one of them says ‘Thou Shalt Not’," said [Joseph] Campbell. The dragon may take many forms. For instance, a person who discourages you, who says “You can’t” and “You shan’t.” When I was 20 years old, I worked at a BBC radio station for the summer. I loved it. On my last day, the station manager asked to meet me. It was a short meeting. He told me I shouldn’t pursue my interest in radio as I didn’t have the personality or the talent for it. I burst into tears in front of him. What he said sounded like the truth; not just an opinion. This month marked the start of my ninth year hosting my Shift Happens! radio show for Hay House Radio. Not every “Thou Shalt Not” is true.

The dragon is, essentially, an inner experience. It’s often a self-doubt, a judgment, or a belief that breathes fire at you. One of my dragons is the “inner critic” that would roar at me when I sat before the blank page. Over the years, I learned to tame this dragon. Initially, I did everything I could to avoid it, to outrun it, to heal it, and to slay it. One day, I had a revelation. It struck me that the “inner critic” had never been published! I was released. The inner critic still roars at me from time to time, but it has no fire.”

This piece spoke to me personally, because I studied Radio & TV Arts for one year at university, but gave it up, thinking I was not the competitive type of person it took to make it. These days, I have the chutzpah that I didn't have at age 19.

While some people express and explore through words, others use images or dance, breathwork or yoga or any other expressive art to feel the fear, find their strength and glide around the dragons. No matter which modality you use, one thing I’m sure of, your spirit has more power in it than you know. Reclaim your inner resources, your inner wisdom and find your playful spirit of resilience. Perhaps you won't slay the dragon, but have a conversation with it. Use your intuition, your imagination, and most of all, use imagery and symbolism, the language of the soul, to get to the bottom of your treasure.

And of course, if it feels too overwhelming and difficult, consult a professional who can help you face your fears and move forward.

There may be dragons here, but there also be Transformation and Healing!

Playfully yours in creativity, 

Jennifer

Art Collage: Warrior Monk Flies down the Path with Eagle 

7 Stages of Descent Menopause

7 stages of the descent at menopause

Based on the story of Inanna, and her descent through 7 gates to the Underworld, where she is transformed. She is looked upon with the eye of death by her sister Erishkegal, then is revived with the water and earth of life by her assistant and friend Ninshubar. In my experience, what seems like the end is only the beginning of a new phase of life. This is my personal version, and an exercise I give to women in the Heroine's Journey at Mid-Life class.

I share this with you so you may have hope!

7 stages of descent (what do you give up?)

I gave up my will to volunteer all my free time (and postponing my own work)

I gave up multitasking  - unable to do it anymore without breaking something, brain is in a pea-soup fog.

My defensive armour is too heavy, especially around my shoulders. It must come off!  (acupuncture, physiotherapy, osteopath helped, seeing a counsellor helped peel off the scales)

I have lost my ability to mother and take care of everyone else -  I am exhausted and in bed at 8:30 pm. Even the plants are too demanding. Get rid of them!

My libido has disappeared and the desire for sex has gone underground

When I broke my leg skiing,  I was forced to learn how to ask for help. I feel my muscles are mush, liquefied, I am losing wrist strength and muscle mass.

7 gifts I reclaim (what learnings do you return with?)

I surrender and let go. I have no vision for the future, only questions.

I realize my limits. I need rest and downtime, less striving and pushing myself so hard.

I find my voice, the power to say no and the power to choose what is right for me

I claim the power to stand my ground and stay rooted in my truth

My sexuality blossoms, I allow, I receive, I enjoy pleasure

I release the rescuer self in me, and that has freed up my energy for my own work.

I allow time for creative loafing, creativity in all its forms, evolving and moving, staying curious.

If you want to read more about the journey through menopause, see The Tao of Turning Fifty, What Every Woman in Her Forties needs to Know (linked on my website).

namaste,

jennifer

Soulcollage card: East, Rebirth, 

Reawakening

Resources for Heroines at Mid-Life

Her Journey: Books and Resources for the Heroine’s Quest at Mid-life

A Woman’s Journey to God, Joan Borysenko

Animal Speak by Ted Andrews  (animal totems and descriptions)

Archetypes, A beginner's guide to your inner-net, by Caroline Myss www.archetypes.com

Circle of Stones, Woman’s Journey to Herself, Judith Duerk

**Goddesses in Older Women, Jean Shinoda Bolen. A Jungian psychologist

Descent to the Goddess, A Way of Initiation for Women, psychologist Sylvia Brinton Perera. (Explores the myth and symbolism of Inanna in great detail.)

Inanna, a retelling of the Inanna myth by Kim Echlin, with illustrations, a Story book

Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth, her Stories & Hymns from Sumer, Wolkstein & Kramer

I am a Woman Finding my Voice, Janet F. Quinn

I Will Not Die an Unlived Life --by Dawna Markova

Listening to Midlife: Turning your Crisis into a Quest, Mark Gerzon

Persephone Rising, Awakening the Heroine Within, Carol S. Pearson

SoulCollage Evolving, Seena Frost

The Heroine's Journey by Maureen Murdock, (and workbook)

Visual Journaling, Going Deeper than Words, Barbara Ganim & Susan Fox

Woman at the Edge of Two Worlds, Lynn V. Andrews (menopause as spiritual quest)

**Women’s Intuition, Paula Jeeves. “By nature, we women are highly intuitive.”

Marion Woodman, Jungian analyst on the Conscious Feminine, Books & Articles at https://mwoodmanfoundation.org/

Wisdom is Feminine

”Wisdom is a woman, a crone, a goddess, and a feminine archetype. In Greek mythology she is a barely personified Metis, swallowed by Zeus. In the Bible she is a hidden Sophia, the goddess who became an abstract and ungendered concept. Wisdom may be found at twilight where the three roads meet as Hecate, or in the hearth fire as Hestia. She may be the invisible Shekinah who enters the Jewish home for the meal that begins the Sabbath. She was once the Celtic goddess Cerridwen. She is Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of wisdom and Erda in Richard Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelung.”

~ Goddesses in Older Women, Jean Shinoda Bolen.

Writing down the body or The Story I tell myself is....

Ever since my first creative writing class and an exercise called the Taboo Journal, I have been fascinated with the power of memory held in the body, and the way our stories define us. The story I tell myself is, as one well known psychologist and author puts it. I have stored memories, hurts, traumas, griefs, and blocked energy in my shoulders, my belly, my ovaries, my pelvic area, my broken wrist and strained right knee and god knows where else. Clarissa Pinkola Estes has a quote somewhere that wherever we press on the flesh of the body, a memory surfaces....Healing through writing has always been an important tool for me.

As a writer and facilitator, this has led me to lead workshops using journaling prompts to write the body, and have a conversation with body parts that want me to shine a light on their neglected story. In one exercise, I named one breast Famine and the other Abundance and wrote a poem for each.

I had a dialogue with my vagina about what colour the wall paper in her room was, and what kind of furniture would be in there (red velvet, of course!). When I broke my right knee skiing, just on the cusp of menopause and a roiling mid-life transition, it gave me permission to take a lot of quiet time for thinking and writing about the connection between my body and my mind. I wanted to know why I broke my knee, was it significant? Was it a symbol for me needing to stand up for myself and ask for help when overwhelmed? At the same time, Louise Hay’s book and a few others came to my attention – giving me a kind of lexicon of the body-mind connection. A key resource was Dr Northrup’s exploration of the female body in Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom.

Mid-life brought up some more intense body wisdom and learnings. I was mothering two hormonal teen age children, while facing my own menopausal angst, as well as writing, teaching and volunteering to organize events. One particular project had become too large and unmanageable, but I didn’t know how to step down without looking unreliable and disappointing the others. My shoulders and upper back began to ache so badly that every night I needed a heating pad to fall sleep. When I finally made the decision to step down, my body aches disappeared. This happened at least twice, when I was over-committed to outside projects.  I began to pay attention and listen to my body more earnestly.

Recently I’ve been taking some online writing courses specifically centered on healing and releasing old family shadows. It has been very enlightening, to learn how the trauma and pain in one generation can get passed down to the next, until we become aware of it and break the cycle. Another course used the Hero’s Journey as an outline, and urged me to enter the cave of old griefs and hurts, and face the Dragon guarding my treasures and dialogue with him. During that five day class, I wondered at the marvelous ways my body was humming, buzzing, aching and releasing. Energy was moving, just by answering journal prompts and using my imagination to enter that dark cave of old beliefs about my “story”. Reading Women’s Intuition has further bolstered my faith in the embodied guidance and wisdom from within. (https://www.amazon.ca/Womens-Intuition-Unlocking-Wisdom-Body-ebook/dp/B00466HMJG)

The story I tell myself is....This is my old story: I was brought up the eldest of eight children (born in 10 years), in a Catholic family, and became the responsible one, the Mother’s Helper or Little Mother, out of necessity. My mother was alcoholic, and I stepped in to help out, putting a certain burden on my shoulders at an early age. This lead to a pattern of valuing myself externally in my life – the need to always feel productive, purposeful, and valuable by giving and doing, and almost never allowing myself to rest. My body had to force me to stop sometimes.  I look back now, and see that in my twenties I had become addicted to the high of self-less service in my spiritual life, finding great satisfaction (but also exhaustion and stress) in being always on call, evenings, weekends, and whenever there was a need. It was for a good cause but my body craved rest and a more balanced lifestyle. Once I got married, I threw myself into studying, going back to school full time, being an A student (overachiever that I am), then having two babies while doing my Master’s degree over several years.

Bringing up two children, born twenty months apart, was a wonderfully fulfilling role to play, and at the same time I was studying creative writing, teaching part-time and working on a master’s thesis, which became the book, Little Mother. I needed to explore motherhood: my mother’s alcoholism, my childhood, and my own birth journal while I was pregnant. I wrote poems about breastfeeding, sex, and the mothering overload. Writing the body was a life-saver, once again, and it helped me make order out of chaos. But becoming a mother was also my Waterloo. My wolf-mother instincts had been awakened, my hearing and eyesight were keener than ever. My nervous system went into overdrive; it was hard to sleep, hard to share the parenting roles when babies only want their mommies, even with a willing partner. That brought me to therapy, where the psychologist kindly said, you have taken on another mothering job with teaching. I was trying to be the perfect mom, you know how it goes. I ran up against my own human limitations, and more body wisdom.

Menopause, that other womanly rite of passage, threw my body into hormonal chaos and sent my heart and mind onto a rough rollercoaster of ups and downs, highs and lows. Some days, I felt like I was going crazy – shrieking at my kids about crumbs on the counter. Mild depression swung me on a hook for a while. I was saved again by the writing. I started a blog, interviewed other women to find out if it was the same for everyone, researched and read a ton of books, and finally wrote my own, The Tao of Turning Fifty. Since then, I’ve given lectures on the mid-life transition and written a few hundred blog posts and articles. (http://msmenopause.blogspot.ca/)

My life has been a search of that mysterious answer or clue to what ails me....for instance, a frozen shoulder, shortly after my book came out, prevented me from working on the computer for any length of time. It took five years of journaling, osteopathic treatments, shamanic journeying and finally I felt I got to the bottom of that shoulder issue.  I was in a workshop exploring the Inanna myth and down in the underworld meeting Erishkegal when I realized that the pain in my upper back was from the good girl archetype tightly wedged between my shoulder blades! Some very simple exercises from a physiotherapist helped me strengthen the back muscles. Now I sit at a desk with better ergonomics, and a good height for the keyboard. Plus, my adorable shitzu Mollie forces me to get up and take walks, and take a break from the computer regularly.

After the wild mid-life transition, in my sixties, my continuing curiosity led me to take classes to help find my inner child artist. I have rediscovered a love of artistic expression with SoulCollage and Art Journaling and once again, been catapulted back into the body, into the wild joy a child’s body feels while finger painting, drawing, or cutting up bits of images and pasting them onto cardboard. Time does not exist when I am in creative flow, and I stop feeling those aches and pains. I am grateful for the wise body guidance I receive, when I listen to it, and I want to commit to staying close to its wisdom every day.

Your story has a surprise beginning says this collage from my art journal, with a naked woman riding a white horse, facing backwards. Yes, it is a surprising rewrite. For instance, I have loved singing and music all my life. Where was that in my old story? The story I tell myself now is different from the one I have been telling myself all these years: eldest daughter, little mother with an absent mother, carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. I have found my joy in the magical child, the story teller, the little girl who sings to the flowers, la petite fille qui chantait aux fleurs.

Embodied wisdom, the body’s wisdom, is still something I am exploring. Creativity and Flow have become my go-too therapies. When I am stuck in the writing, I immerse myself in making collage, in playing with images instead of words. I am learning to speak the body’s language – it uses imagery, metaphor and symbols. Myths and the imagination emerge from the collective unconscious, as Jung taught, in the same symbolic language that speaks to us through dreams, in poetry and art, in our body’s intuitive knowing... Now I know that anything is possible.

See my website at www.jenniferboire.com for a free excerpt of the book, The Tao of Turning Fifty, and to register for my latest class offering, Her Journey, the Heroine’s Quest at Mid-Life.

MENOPAUSE POEMS: Rose Hips

Rose hips

In yoga class, surrounded by three walls of mirrors

I cannot avoid seeing my hips

49-year-old bulging handles

their wideness sinks at the wrong spot.

The truth about my hips: I find them

sturdy looking, square front on

but sideways they spread like sponges, abundant

woman fat, spread thickly like butter on sliced bread

or a baguette bulging in the oven.

Bone on bone cracks,

when I raise my legs, lying flat.

Soak those achy, creaky, un-oiled hinges

in salt foam waves,

And let my rose hips rise

like Aphrodite out of the sea.

@JenniferBoire

Menopausal Poetry Series

Because I love poetry, and there are so few poems about menopause out there, I have dug deep into my computer files and pulled out a series from over ten years ago when I was in the throes of it.

Here's one:

Three little pills and a Pomegranate

Muse on the table

are you food or drink?

Three little pills on my yellow placemat:

One clever red clover

renders me immune to restlessness,

cures insomnia.

Vitamin B mitigates “the change”,

Calcium Citrate coats the nerves,

protects the children from swinging

moods, banged doors.

Biting into a shiny red orb allowed

Persephone to see her mother half the year.

My prying fingers reveal a messy beehive

of oblong kernels.

Mouth puckers as crystal blobs,

nutty & tart, stain my fingers rouge.

Will it make me mortal to eat these seeds?

Already I have become human

in my daughter’s eyes.

I told Katie that her cat died.

Rocking in darkness

comforted us both.

Falling apart at mid-life

http://borislava33.deviantart.com/art/Falling-apart-525640004r

I remember weeping in the bathtub

I remember muscles soft like mush, a broken knee, walking with crutches

I remember healing in the sun-filled solarium in winter, listening to Yo Yo Ma

I remember falling apart

I remember  getting a frozen shoulder a few years later, after bursitis, and walking 2 large dogs every day; the acupuncturist said, can’t anybody else walk the dogs?

I remember tears, and playing lullabies to soothe myself to sleep

I remember daily naps, in the afternoon

I remember asking my daughter to tuck me in at 8:30 cause I couldn’t stay awake

I remember sleeping with a heating pad under my shoulders, intense pain

I remember backing out of many volunteer jobs because I could not handle the stress; And then my shoulders got better

I remember being disappointed in myself

I also remember how hard I tried to be good,  to be counted on, and reliable and how I felt ashamed of not seeing things through.

But my brain was mush, my legs were mush and I was in a fog, lying in pieces on the floor

I wrote poems about this, but nobody wanted to hear them

I could not hide my failing apartness, nor my wicked mood swings

I needed solitary confinement or a straitjacket, not to harm my children with all the yelling.

I yelled a lot, for no reason

As I said, the walls were not holding

It was a time of falling down

And ceasing to pick myself up.

It did not last forever. 

t just felt like it.

Jennifer Boire

The Heroine's Quest at Mid-Life

I am relishing this latest Creative Circle class, as we near the end of exploring our Heroine's quest or Journey. We have been journaling and making SoulCollage(R) cards each week, for seven weeks now.  Below is a card I made about meeting the Beast, and my brave-hearted little girl (lion-heart or Coeur de lion) who is leaping into the fray, small but mighty.

The mid-life journey (anywhere from mid-40's to mid-60's) has lead me on many inner adventures, and a few life changes too. Why do I look at it as a Heroic Quest? 

A woman's cyclical journey through life involves many transformations. She leaves behind one self to become another - from pre-puberty to teen, from maiden to mother, and at menopause, her body and hormones are changing once again. The Heroic Quest involves a separation from the old life, a descent into the abyss, a revelation or transformation, and a return. Most women go through this more than once! Even Joseph Campbell calls mothering a heroic task.

It takes courage to be a woman, but it also calls on the power of the Feminine. We can stride into the forest and wrestle the Beast or bears, but more often the strength that is needed is slower, more patient, as in labour and childbirth. 

A woman's strength comes from her center, from the wholeness of her being, and it demands her Presence, her intuitive knowing and response to what is needed. At menstruation, we learned to tune in and listen better to our own hormonal rhythms, our mood swings and emotional needs. At childbirth, we learn to surrender to the body and a baby coming out, and then to its needs for food and rest. 

At Menopause, we transform once more, and learn the big lesson of Descent and Return. We are on our way to becoming Elders. And the need for self-care becomes paramount, so we can better serve the young children, men and women coming up behind us. 

We can fight these rhythms of change, the seasons and cycles, and suffer being out of whack, out of tune with ourselves. Or we can listen to the inner rhythm, connect to body, mind and soul, giving ourselves that tender, gentle care we so lovingly lavish on others. 

That self-compassion and kindness, that gentle self-love goes a long way to healing the heroine's angsts and fears. Follow your intuition, and a pathway will open up in the dark woods. Follow your bliss, and don't let the dragons of fear paralyze you. 

This is your Quest, your Journey. And you will emerge brighter, better, stronger than before. The second half of life awaits you. Enter and Enjoy!

Musemother

www.jenniferboire.com

Five Gifts of Pro-Aging, by Marcia Newman,

Balboa Press, $11.99 US

Baby Boomers may have been at the forefront of many liberation movements, (and there are 78 million of us in the cohort) but currently, more and more women are succumbing to slavery of a different kind - to a youth-obsessed culture: dying our hair, injecting botox, nipping, tucking and otherwise refusing to accept looking our age.  Author Marcia Newman had her own aging crisis one day while looking in the mirror, and decided it was time to confront the fear of looking like her mother by letting her hair go gray.

Newman’s work as a psychologist had also convinced her that what women particularly need to do is to age consciously and comfortably, and her intention with this book is to provide some tools for a happier, more aware ageing process, mainly for women. Her chapters focus on the five gifts of the title: Authenticity, Self-healing (by allowing emotions to be felt), practicing the gift of Discernment, contacting our inner Wildness and Collaboration with others.

Newman provides journaling questions throughout the book, and a questionnaire to start off with, so the reader can assess and confront the fears about growing older, and also discover the ways we exhaust ourselves by taking care of Everything and Everybody. Part of learning a healthier conscious attitude towards aging is in learning not to feel guilty when it’s time to take care of ourselves. Living an authentic life, according to the author, means that sometimes others around you may be upset with your decisions, but healthy women are able to let go of the guilt. She offers tools to help women develop healthier instincts and boundaries and manage their own high expectations of themselves (and also release perfectionism and procrastination).

In The Gift of Discernment chapter, I especially liked her description of the exertion/exhaustion cycle-- how women love to keep busy, yet how this continuously drains our energy, because we never learn to use the brake, only the gas pedal. She suggests journaling, and asking the body for a dialogue, to check in and find out for instance, which warning signs you receive when you’re heading for an over-exertion/exhaustion cycle.  Two questions help the reader discern what their level of energy is:  what depletes you and what gives you time and space to come ‘home’ to yourself?

It’s time to get back in touch with our inner wildness, Newman says, stating that the inner Wild woman is weary from too many choices, too many electronic gadgets, and having to be pleasant and nice all the time. Her pro-aging consciousness promotes unplugging for half a day to get back in touch with nature, and finding a place that makes you feel at home, to let the mammalian side come out to play. More wildness includes allowing more time for erotic intimacy. She quotes Gail Sheehy, author of Sex and the Seasoned Woman, who describes the spicy, seasoned woman as one who wants to live a full and passionate life over 50, and won’t settle for less. 

Facing the limiting beliefs, the inner ‘dragon’ or negative naysayer, and taking steps to reduce its power over you, is crucial, according to Newman. She offers steps for allowing the inner howl to come out, and find creative joy again.

Bottom line in this book, ladies, is all about self-care. Newman rightly says that creative ideas will flow when we nurture our selves, and will also bring back more energy. Feeling more alive, less deadened, is the antidote to feeling ‘old’.  “The Universe will remind us when we go down a people-pleasing, passionless, dead-end road that we weren't in love with in the first place…..The gift of wildness will always help you find a new open road.”

The only small off note in this book is the last chapter, The Gift of Collaboration, where I felt the voice got a little preachy in that new-age way. I grow tired of reading about The Patriarchy, especially when it’s capitalized, even if I agree with her. We do live in an overly productive, always 100% on society, and  suffer from “the competitive game of compare and despair” as she calls it. I have watched one of the movies she recommends, The Burning Times, about the 50 years of European witch hunting and inquisitions, but I’m not sure why watching the list of movies she recommends will help us be more pro-aging. It was the only chapter that felt like a lecture instead of a helping hand.

Newman finishes on a high-note with some ‘feminine (heart-based) principles’ to foster collaborative learning and leadership and a Pro-Aging Women’s Credo.

“…we don’t buy into the old aging stereotypes nor endorse today’s youth worshiping…

We are responsible for our own wellness. …We are the lightworkers,

the peace bearers….We appreciate and nurture our chosen tribe

… We’ve always heard the cries of Mother Earth and are active participants in healing our planet.”

I recommend reading this book and journaling along with it, as you face the monster in the mirror, and the received beliefs you carry inside you about aging. I also believe the second half of life can be as vital and passionate as the first half. Now, if I could only get used to seeing more gray in my hair…. yesterday I swear I saw my mother in the mirror!

Musemother

link to purchase the bookhttp://bookstore.balboapress.com

Menopause Mothers 10 Ways to Feed Your Soul

I have gathered the challenges and gifts at mid-life and menopause, and there are many. But as I listen to women who are still mothering, with children under their roofs and in their hair, I realize there is a great conflict that arises due to our 'late blooming' motherhood, or having children in our late 30's and early 40's.

They (children) still need our presence, but we feel uber-irritated by their constant demands. The world in general gets on our nerves, big time! We are ready for the Big Pause, but can't see how to do it.

At menopause, ladies, we are called to withdraw our over-caring of everyone else and go within, seek our authentic self, gifts and talents, and do some much needed reflecting on our life purpose. For this we need some down time.  But who will give it to us?

Susun Weed suggests a year's sabbatical for women at menopause, but that ain't happening when you've got kids at home. How to deal with this split in consciousness, and divided loyalties without dropping the ball on mothering, or on self-care?

Here are some practical  ways to soothe your soul and your need for creative introspection without feeling Guilty:

1. Find some like-minded women to share some deep talk with. Being seen and heard feeds your soul. You'll feel less crazy once you realize you are not alone, you are not the only one who is sleepless at night and hot flashing all day. Quit tearing your hair out, and let down your hair with your sistahs!

2. Release the Good Girl 'tude right now! Good mother, daughter, wife - we were trained for this from an early age, especially if you were born in the 50's. Give yourself permission to be SELF-FUL, not selfish. A little more self-compassion will go a long way. Do something JUST for YOU once a week, or once a day if you can swing it. When is the last time you bought yourself from roses? Repeat after me, I am worthy and deserving!

3. Practice peace - whether it's breathing, centering, meditation, yoga, chi gong, tai chi or a cup of herbal tea  - find some time to find your own rhythm and you will feed your soul's need for tranquility and silence. Just cut out one of those volunteer activities and make time for Peace.

4. Body work to release stress and get in touch with emotions. You need to feel to heal. Choose the modality that works for you - Reiki, massage, EFT, Rolfing, Shamanic journeying, talk therapy. Stress freezes our muscles, and when we bury our feelings, they end up Exploding in PMS - don't let the Bitch Goddess take over your life.  Dealing with feelings is healing!


5. Learn to RECEIVE: this is the hardest but the most rewarding thing on this list. OVERGIVING is our #1 downfall or trap, as women and mothers. Enlist the help of your family in daily tasks. Don't let the well go dry, or you'll have nothing but bitterness and resentment.  See #4: getting a massage is very nourishing, not just for your body and skin, but for your inner self who needs to fill up the well before she can give out again. Weekly would be good, monthly may be more realistic, but once a year is NOT enough.

6. Eject the Superwoman Mantle: learn how to say no, and ask for help. Takes practice, I know, but it's worth it. You cannot do it all alone. You are no longer capable of Multi-tasking, so give it up!

7. Embrace the end of Fertility- make peace with the end of your cycle. Face your fears of entering a new cycle. You're not old, but 50 is a meeting with mortality and a limited time frame. You can't mourn the empty nest yet, but you can celebrate the growing maturity of your kids, and realize how quickly the nest will be empty. Soon, now Mama, soon. Journal about it, and celebrate your Menopause with some cronies.

8. Get Creative: your new cycle involves creatively exploring that energy that used to go into making babies. Your energy is moving up and out of the womb center into your Heart, throat, Wisdom and Insight centers. Growing your intuitive powers and Dreams. Listening and Expressing this new found creativity is essential for your happiness. Find out what you LOVE to do, then Flow with it! Many women go back to school, or take pottery or piano classes, creative writing, SoulCollage(r), photography - what turns you on?

9. Recognize this is a Sacred Journey - a Heroine's Quest. Your life stages have brought you this far. How can you learn to see the symptoms of menopause as gifts? ie Fatigue is a message you need to rest more. Hot flashes are really just Power Surges. See the Soulful Woman website and listen to the Gold Tent for more about the gifts of Menopause: http://thesoulfulwoman.com.au/the-gold-tent/

10. Give yourself a break before you need a breakdown. REST is the most essential nutrient for the menopausal mom. As important as good nutrition and exercise. Your body is the vehicle - you can't pedal to the metal all the time. Take good care of you, and just lie down and rest, as often as needed. Write yourself a prescription for Self-Care. I will rest whenever I feel overwhelmed.

So try healing and feeling instead of yelling and freezing up, finding peace instead of feeding the frazzle. Anger and impatience are all symptoms that you are Doing Too Much and need to get away.

It's your time, baby, and even though Mothering is a challenge right now, you will get through this. It is temporary insanity, I promise you. I made it through without a huge bill for therapy, and my kids at 22 and 24 seem really well adjusted and are still speaking to me! And if you really feel like the straitjacket is calling you, get away on Retreat!

Take good care of you, darling, Mother Nature is begging you,
xxx
Musemother

Finding my Tribe at Mid-Life

What an amazing time this is! I don’t know if you follow astrology but there’s been a lot of planetary movement and eclipses, lots of opposing energies, lots of upheaval in the climate, in countries, and in our relationships.

But June is also that time of year when we celebrate graduations, and congratulate our kids on their talents and skills at end of year concerts. A time of ripening energies as another cycle ends, and a new season of Summer Solstice begins. It’s soon the end of my Creative Circle classes, the end of the Menopause Circle, and the beginning of a summer school with Ho Rites of Passage, where I will finish up a year-long training in ritual facilitation.

I feel especially grateful because both my children have grads this year, and last weekend was my 30^th wedding anniversary. Two of my sisters came to celebrate with the 100 or so guests, as we boogied to a 70’s theme and amazing music.

What I want to really celebrate is this new found tribe of women surrounding me, in many circles of all kinds. Last Saturday, I found myself on the dance floor with my sisters and closest  girl friends, and many others of our ‘tribe’. I can still see an image etched on my brain of us ‘sistah’s’ dancing to Papa Was A Rolling Stone (remember that one?)…right up close, in front of the band. It felt blissful - feelings of closeness, of friendship, and more than that, of support, and ‘we’ve got your back’. As well as the pure joy of dancing to live soulful music, thanks to Sonja Ball’s fantastic band.

I had done something uncharacteristic a few days before and asked for help in the party planning. So many friends gave us a hand, shopped with me at Costco, moved lawn furniture, put up lanterns, pasted on Peace signs; my daughter flew in from NYC to add garlands of flowers and psychedelic lamp shades to the décor, and for once, I accepted all this help and didn’t try to do it all myself. We were shopping and decorating for 3 days for this epic 70's party.

Maybe that’s why Dr Northrup’s newsletter today struck such a chord in me today: 

“The feminine is about standing for the highest in others versus worrying about competition. It’s finding your tribe of sisters who will be there for you—and support you when you cry, when you fall, when you need someone to help with a meal. It’s understanding that interdependence is more powerful than independence—that it’s a sign of strength, not weakness, to ask for help.

It means that it’s time to take the phrase “I should be able to do this myself” and transform it to “I really appreciate your assistance. It makes it so much easier.” And it’s time to allow others the privilege of giving to you—and for you to learn how to graciously receive.”

As I have a tendency to be a solitary, independent soul, this is a new learning for me. Some of us have been trained to do it all ourselves, to never show a sign of weakness, so this is good medicine for us. Time to celebrate our interdependence with all of creation. At a recent Sweat Lodge in May, I got in touch with my need for Mother Earth/Terre Mère, for grounding and sustenance. All my relations, we said, as we clambered into the heat on all fours. Yes, all plants, all animals, all humans, are my relations. I depend on them for my existence.

So that’s my invitation to you (and myself) this June, and for the whole summer season. 

How can you let down your guard, be less self-contained, ask for help? How can you begin to open up to the feminine art of receiving from others, getting support, not trying to Soldier On no matter what, (which often leads to bitter resentments and hurt feelings when no-one reads our minds). 

How can you open up to, and accept, your belonging in the tribe?

Have a wonderful summer, this incredible time of abundance and celebrations.

Thank you for being part of my tribe!

Musemother/Jennifer

Note:

Friday June 13^th: Creative Woman’s Soul Retreat, yoga/journaling/SoulCollage®. Registration has been filled.