Focus on Menopause
Woman is a miracle of Nature, a force to be reckoned with. She is the being that lives and gives life. This is the ultimate expression of gratitude and beautiful relationship with life.
As nothing in Nature goes unnoticed this giving and receiving has consequences. Our mothers of old knew this wisdom, of which we have been robbed in modern times. But not all is lost. It is just a matter of remembering. Just as we women effortlessly remember how to create life this wisdom is also in our blood, more precisely in our wombs.
Womb is the woman’s ultimate guide, the sage and the adviser. We just need to see her for what she is. She guides girls and women through three stages of life. Menopause is just the last initiation. So, what is the menopause from the spiritual point of view? To know this, we must take a journey through woman’s whole life.
Childhood
A girl is born with all her eggs containing all the secret memories of human existence. She alone can be the Mother of the World once she is ready. She lives free, wild and wondrous learning to survive and support herself. She learns to love and care for herself and for others. This is her training for her fist initiation, her first period. As the Moon grows and wanes, so does the girl’s spirit. Eventually, when she is ready the day of her initiation arrives. She then embarks on her journey as a woman. She is introduced to the changing forces of Nature and her task is to learn how to work with it each month. She lives this change and learns how to harness the power of it. She still remembers how to be a wonderous child. This is joy of life.
Womanhood
As she matures a young woman at this stage gains wisdom of changeable forces in Nature and within herself, she masters the complex art of continuous change. She discovers passion and love but also rage and destructive forces within her. She gets to know her loving self, the caring, but also her fierce protective self. This also has a purpose as nothing in the web of Life is wasteful. She is training herself to look after her young and play the part of their entire Universe the day they are born. For that she must be strong.
Her initiation is a childbirth, if she decides to have one. Pregnancy takes a young woman through the ultimate changing process. No male of the species undergoes such transformation. It is a powerful process in which forces of life itself are harnessed to the full. The childbirth, her second initiation, is the crown. It is the mastering of life and death in a single process. This is power.
Menopause
By the time woman has reached this stage she has collected a lot of wisdom, but not all has been revealed! The knowledge, yet deeper awaits. Menopause in the modern World is not spoken about – a nuisance most women do not look forward to. Many of the ‘symptoms’ are medical terms and women have forgotten what they are for. Our ancestral mothers knew the gold that is to be found in the depth of the initiation here. They worked with it and benefited not just themselves but their entire communities. The elders, the midwives, the healers and advisers all reached this wisdom. They mastered elements of life, their own blood, the element of fire and the power of the natural cycles. They also knew the power of the knowledge they held, the usage of intuition, bringing up children and were ready to master the final mystery, the death herself.
Menopause, just like pregnancy, can be very difficult, but it is not an illness. Menopausal ‘symptoms’ are in fact hurdles on this journey and they are there to teach, enlighten and be overcome. Woman is built to sail through this storm and she will endure with patience. Everything passes, even the menopause. The harder the journey the more valuable the gifts at the end of it. Menopausal woman has travelled a long way, fought many battles, conquered many of her own demons, she knows happiness and knows sorrows, she has gained and healed many wounds, seen many friends and many foes, she has lost and she has won, and here she is forging her final sword. She is conquering her fear of life and ultimately her fear of death. This is just the last womanhood battle that will ultimately be won.
Menopausal ‘symptoms’ are signs that a woman is not living in accordance to her own power. In other words she might have never given herself time to consider who and what she is, how far she has come, how she lives her life and how she looks after herself. Menopause, just as pregnancy, asks for a special treatment. Better nutrition, exercise, dealing with any stress and ultimately taking time to find out what is the true nature of her own life. Menopausal woman is a wild and seasoned heroine of her own epic story. In this chapter she dares to be weak, but weakness is not for the faint hearted! With all the wisdom that she has gained, in this part of her story she will finally allow herself to use it. In other words, she pays attention to what she needs, what she wishes and why she is on this planet. After looking after everyone else this is her time. The time is the key. Time to go deep into herself and be honest about who she is and what she truly needs. There is someone she needs yet to become. She needs to finally stop and meet herself. This is the knowledge of self. Woman is never alone in the abundant Universe. Nature is her true ally. She has provided everything any woman might need. If a modern woman could just remember this. There is a plant for every state of a living woman, therefore there are many for menopause.
So where do I start, you might ask. The force and life in nature is present at all times. Everywhere. Sit in the nature and with nature. Speak. Be angry. Be sad. Allow your pain to be verbalised. Be honest. Confess. Make peace with your needs. Ask. Then just wait and listen. The answers will be provided. Mother Nature loves women. They are the vibrant, living expression of her own self.
Menopausal woman is a still the same miracle of Nature. She has never ceased to be one. This is the final blooming even if it does not look or feel like that. In her weakness she is the most powerful, has most knowledge and is most useful to the web of life whether she has reproduced or not. It is this experience that is the goal. It is seeing it as a journey and not as a crisis that is the key. Going through it and embracing it not because, but despite the nature of it! This is the wisdom of the menopause. This is an extract from Billie’s forthcoming new book.