Latest / Healing Her Story with Riva Jean-Paul / Moon Phases & Feminine Power: Your Weekly Cycle Sync - New Moon, Winter, Menstruation: Rest, Reflect, & Renew

Transcript

Moon Phases & Feminine Power: Your Weekly Cycle Sync - New Moon, Winter, Menstruation: Rest, Reflect, & Renew · Healing Her Story with Riva Jean-Paul

• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the Healing Her Story Podcast.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: My name is Reva Jean-Paul.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a trauma-informed somatic practitioner, menstrual psycho coach, interdisciplinary artist, and host for your show.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Today we are going to be syncing up with the new moon.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm very excited to be tapping into this new moon.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: Working with the new moon is a wonderful and powerful way to cultivate more feminine energy.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: And it also can really help us to create more harmony and sustainability in our very fast-paced and busy world.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Before we explore the new moon energy and how to work with it, let's take a minute of silence.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: In this minute of silence, you are encouraged and invited to tend into, tune into, excuse me, your inner world, and maybe allowing the breath to support you in doing that.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: Taking a moment here to notice where you are in your inner rhythm.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: How is your body feeling today?
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: How is your mind feeling today?
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: How is your heart feeling today?
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: Taking that minute of silence now.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: I find in these moments of pause, even if it's just brief pause, it can give me a lot of clarity and insight as to where I want to focus my energy.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: And that is exactly what the new moon does for us.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: It gives us this opportunity to check in, to feel into what is alive in our hearts, in our bodies, and we can set intentions to work with that aliveness or to follow that aliveness over the next four weeks.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: And so if you haven't yet, this new moon, I invite you to take a little bit of time and to take a little bit of space to sense into what is wanting to move through you, what is wanting to be expressed through you.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_01: To support you in doing that, I have a new moon breathwork meditation over on Insight Timer, and you can find the link for that in the show notes.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: This new moon is in the sign of Taurus, and this is a very earthy energy that is inviting us even more to slow down and to connect with the body.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: I find the new moon to be a very important moment during the cycle.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: It is this sacred space of rest, of reflection, and of planting seeds.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: This time is associated with the season of winter.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's associated with the menstruation or the bleeding time.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: And through the lens of traditional Chinese medicine, it's associated with the sea with uh the element of water.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: And again, this new moon happened on Saturday or Sunday, depending on where you are in the world.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: And we are talking about the week of April 28th.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: However, please note that whenever you may land in this episode, this information is timeless and is something that you can carry with you and refer back to in your cyclical journey.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: Allowing yourself through that process to reconnect with your natural rhythm and with the feminine wisdom that lives inside of you.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: Culturally, we are conditioned to push and produce all month long.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_01: We would be burnt out, the plants would be burnt out, the earth would be dried out.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: The night time, the darkness, which is the new moon, is essential.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: And without it, we really wouldn't be able to sustain life.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's interesting to think about that analogy and how that is perhaps expressed through yourself.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: The sun representing the more masculine energy that is about achieving and doing and accomplishing.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: And the feminine energy being the yin energy, being the nighttime, being the new moon, is this opposite end of the spectrum where we are invited to be and rest and care and flow.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: To work with the new moon, besides creating space and time to be still, to rest, to reflect, and to get clear on your intentions, you can commit to or perhaps feel into something that you maybe want to start.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Whether that be a new habit or a new routine or perhaps a new focus for your healing and personal growth journey.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: This is the time to begin.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: To begin this process.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: You can start by maybe clearing space mentally, perhaps that's physically and in your environment.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: I myself just did a big smoke clearing today and decluttered a few corners and cleared out some things out of the fridge and swept my front porch.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: And as I was doing that, I held the intention in my heart of creating room for the new.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: I have a couple of new projects that I'll be starting this week, new uh new creative projects.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'm also moving into sort of the second phase of a big creative project that I've been working on for the past couple of months and will reach its full fruition in the summer months.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: And at the time that this is being recorded, we are in the season of spring.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: So there is this sense of newness and forward momentum.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: This is the first part of the year where we have not been in a retrograde, where a planet has not been in retrograde.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so, again, you really, as we've talked about in previous episodes, you really might be feeling this fresh energy coming in.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: It can be helpful to journal or perhaps uh write down what you're wanting to focus on.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: You could also do one of my favorite practices, and I do find it to be a creative practice as well.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's called scripting.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: And while I'm not an expert in it, it's something that I weave into my practice regularly, and I'm happy to share a couple of the keys to the practice if you decide that you might like to explore it.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: Scripting involves writing a statement.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's an I am statement, and after the I am, you insert a feeling, a feeling in which you wish to embody in the cycle that you we that you are working with.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: After you have created the first half of the script, the I am grateful, for example, for the second half of the statement, you would use an action that is connected to how you are wanting to feel or perhaps what is happening in your life.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: So, for example, one of my scripts from last month, I'm looking at here on a whiteboard that I update every cycle, says, I am grateful being alive in my beautiful body.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: Perhaps being is not quite an action, but in my world I would consider it to be an action.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: Another one here that I've shared is I am committed showing up for my creative projects every day.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: And another one here, I am honored being a steward for the medicine that is trauma-informed menstrual cycle awareness.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_01: And the last one here that I'll share, I am lived into my unique rhythm, watching life mirror it back to me.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: So those are my scripts that I created from this previous cycle, and to put the cherry on top of your script here.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: The invitation is to write it in cursive, and that is where I find the creative practice really comes in.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: There's something about writing cursive that really invites us to be very present with what we are doing.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: Rather than rushing through, we are invited to slow down and ensure that we're making the right loops and the right lines that correspond with the letter that we're wanting to write.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so there is this extra engagement of perhaps the right brain as you are using the left brain to create the statement.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: So it's this beautiful dance between the right and the left sides of the brain, which also mirrors this beautiful connection between the masculine and the feminine, or maybe the yin and the yang.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: So that's an invitation for you to explore, perhaps maybe creating that script after the new moon breathwork meditation that you can find in the show notes.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: Some questions that you might have about working with the new moon.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: You might be wondering, what if I'm not bleeding right now?
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: That is perfectly okay.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, in the coming weeks, we have a guest episode that's going to be talking about what it means to bleed with the different phases.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: So if you are not lined up perfectly with the new moon, there is nothing wrong with you.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: It means it could mean that there is a certain focus that is maybe being expressed through the alignment of your moon cycle.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: Again, which we'll explore in that episode that'll be airing here very soon.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: So wherever you are, whether you bleed or not, you can definitely work with this new moon energy.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: You also might be wondering, how can working with a new moon help you in your day-to-day life?
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: How can setting intentions like this help you in your day-to-day life?
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: Well, when you begin to align with these natural rhythms, you begin to soften, you can begin to tap into your intuition.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: You can also begin to create more resilience because you are allowing these pockets of time for you to regenerate and restore your energy.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: And as you do that, you can create more harmony in this very fast-paced and busy, busy world.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: You also might be wondering, what if I'm not able to work with the new moon today?
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm got kiddos or work or other obligations to tend to and show up for.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the new moon energy can be felt and worked with up to three days before and up to three days after the new moon.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, I usually set my intentions towards the end of the new moon portal because I find that as the days go by, things begin to come up.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: This month was a little different, had uh lots of things come up in the days leading up to the new moon, which was very interesting.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so today, as I was um entering into this portal, I felt very clear about where I wanted to focus my energy.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I hope that you were able also to find that clarity as to where to focus your energy, because there are so many things pooling on our time and on our energy.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: And in this day and age, I believe it is of the utmost importance that we are so intentional with our time, because our time is one of our greatest resources, truly, and it's something that we can't get back once it's gone.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: Living in this way really allows me to make the best use of my time, and so that is your invitation here today as we begin to close this episode.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: I remind you that this is a practice, an ongoing practice, and I gently encourage you to trust in this process of contraction and expansion.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_01: Again, this is a wonderful time to begin again, to commit, to wipe the slate clean, to start over.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so taking note of what needs that restart in your life.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: Again, to support you through that, you can find a link for the breathwork meditation in the show notes.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_01: And in the meantime, I encourage you to take care of yourself and if you're able to, to take care of others.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: Bye for now.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: Look forward to connecting with you in the next episode.