Most women only think of menopause in terms of annoyances like hot flashes and yet another sign of getting older. For the most part, menopause is seen as a medical “condition”, focusing on our “deficient” hormones.
Furthermore, most of us don’t have a place where we can share our experiences with other women, learning from others’ experiences and having our own stories witnessed.
At best this leads to a “muscle through” approach where you just hope to land quickly on the other side. At worst this leaves many women with a sense of dread, frustration and alienation that creates a deep drag on your sense of joy, possibility, and even self.
Yet there's a different possibility: that menopause can be a springboard into the agency and authenticity you've been searching for.
Join me for a 6 week collective journey based on the revolutionary new book Wild Power: Discover the Liberating Power of Menopause to Awaken Authority, Purpose and Belonging by Alexandra Pope and Sjanie Hugo-Wurlitzer.
Already know you want in? Click here to sign up!
What if, instead of looking at menopause as a "deficiency disease" to be treated with hormones so that you "stay youthful", you could embrace this process (because it is a process) as an invitation to reconnect to the most essential aspects of who you are?
What if, when approached mindfully and shared with others, menopause can also be a catalyst for healing, growth and owning your power.
This is the perspective that underlies the 2022 book Wise Power, from Alexandra Pope and Sjanie Hugo-Wurlitzer. And it's the framework that undergirds much of my own approach to midlife and all things menopause. It's an inherently optimistic view. One rooted in women's lived experiences as cyclic beings.
It is an orientation that returns to us to ownership of our bodies and agency over how we experience the second half of our lives.
It's time for the old paradigm to go the way of everything else that is currently passing away. The world needs our embodied leadership. Yesterday!
So let's flip the old narrative together, shall we?
What I'm envisioning is a series of sessions that I call Sacred Circles, where we will gather to talk about what the book has sparked within us. This is not so much about me talking at you, but about the opportunity to come together with other deep thinking, deep feeling women to explore new possibilities and reclaim this essential rite of passage as a sacred journey into your Wise Woman years.
We will use the book as our guide, witness and sharing as our way, with some creative process and other resources to deepen the experience.
Sure, you can just read the book on your own. And if you're not going to take this journey with us, please, please do! It is brilliant and beautiful.
But if you're anything like me, those good intentions often flounder. Personally I have a massive stack of books to read, but not always enough bandwidth to get to them. It's so easy to get stuck in resistance, or to just be either too busy or too distracted to get to them. And to actually finish them.
In this journey you'll be carried by the energy of the circle, which will help you maintain your momentum.
More importantly, I know from my experience as both a participant and a facilitator of women's circles for over 25 years that there is something deeply profound and truly magical that can happen when women gather for open sharing and heartfelt conversation.
And frankly, I feel like we have been muddling through this menopausal journey on our own for long enough.
This journey is for women at any age or stage of the menopausal journey:
Generally speaking, it's for women who are comfortable with - or at least open to - deep dives into matters that are often not discussed in "polite company". Like menstruation and menopause. And for women who want to live a different, better experience of menopause than their mothers' had, embracing the profound potential of this essential aspect of our lives.
In short, this Journey is for women who are interested in healing and wholing into their fully adult empowered selves, and in discovering how menstruation and menopause can play a pivotal role in this process.
The Journey will be hosted within my private, free online community, Midlife Evolutionaries.
We will meet via Zoom for 6 weeks. Each session will be 60-90 minutes.
Prior to each session we will all read a portion of the book, then come together to share our reactions and reflections, thoughts and experiences. This size of this Circle will be limited to ensure that it feels intimate enough and to provide enough time. Additionally, there will be the opportunity to have a Listening Partner that you meet with on your own to take the work even deeper.
Finally, because it's based within the Mighty Network community, we will have a private space for sharing outside of scheduled sessions. This works much like the Facebook groups with which many of you are familiar except there are no ads, no distractions, no mining of your posts for targeted marketing.
The first session will be held Sunday, February 26th at 3:00 Eastern (click here to convert for your time zone).
Here are the nuts and bolts:
Six Sundays, February 26 - April 2
3:00m-4:30pm Eastern (click here to convert for your time zone)
Online on Zoom
Recommend registration by Wednesday, February 22nd to allow time for reading
$249
Limited to 18 women
All sessions will be recorded and available in our private group portal if you can't make all of them
Check your local library for the book, or purchase it online
Details about the reading schedule and how to connect will be sent by email as well as available in the circle portal.
Space is limited to 18 women, and registration closes Feb 22nd
Registration happens within Midlife Evolutionaries, so if you are not already a member you will be prompted to create an account
Strange as it may seem, I've been interested in the menstrual cycle and menopause since my early 20s! Grad school found me presenting at the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research while my friends attended the far more commonplace meetings of the Gerontological Society of America or The Society Research in Child Development. As my career morphed over time into women's wellness, these issues were always in the background.
Then, in January of 2012, I was introduced to the work of Alexandra Pope. My body was literally quivering with excitement and a felt resonance, and reading her words literally made me cry. Because she lives in the UK, we arranged her first foray into taking on a virtual apprentice, and I was mentored by her for 6 months in her Woman's Quest exploration of "menstruality".
Now, finally, her work on menopause is out and I can't wait to bring my experience as a Creative Depth Coach and Midlife Mentor to this opportunity to immerse ourselves in this revolutionary work.