Rebirth at Perimenopause

"While I was in the thick of perimenopause (23 years ago), all I remember thinking was I wanted to be put out to pasture, to be left alone, or to bury myself deep under the earth, not to die, but to renew.

I felt like I was living a Greek myth caught in some futuristic life in the 21st century, yet on the inside, being invited into a mythical underworld.

When I contemplate the meaning of these feelings, what I get is that one calling was for deep rest of the body. The other was for deep wisdom of the soul.

There was nothing I could do with my mind. It all had to be done to me, to my psyche. I had to allow it. It felt very archetypal. I wanted to paint, to write, to create, and for no one to ask anything of me.

Until about 200 years ago, many women did not live beyond 40. Women were often pregnant almost every year, and therefore were perhaps never confronted by how menopause manifested in their lives. Many others died in childbirth.

The wonders of modern medicine have prolonged our lives so that a woman can now live to twice that age or older. For those who do, the process of menopause is inescapable. The body ages. Fertility wanes and changes occur. A woman either handles it gracefully or it handles her. She can't ignore it. If she resists, the body catches up with her anyway. It can take her down into the deep waters of her own psyche into the underground of her life.

It unearths, it sheds. It renews... if she lets it."

(Excerpt from Chapter 6 Tantric Territory - Going in, Down and Through in Tantric Sex and Menopause, Practices for Spiritual and Sexual Renewal )

We live so much in the structure of a linear reality. Yet women live in cycles, even if we are unaware of it. Of course, there are hormonal changes at this midlife time, with fluctuations of estrogen and progesterone that cause this. Especially lower estrogen creates difficulty in stringing two thoughts together at times!

What I am curious about is how these natural biological changes affect the psyche and how to find meaning in the apparent fog of this time. 

The mind can no longer grasp or control, which leaves women in a curious place. If we resist, we create more tension in our bodies, more negativity in our minds, and more closure in our hearts. Which consequently has an impact on our relationships.

To me, this midlife stage is an inner pilgrimage. There's an invitation into the deeper waters of her feminine soul - that place that holds the mystery, the intelligence, the stories, the wisdom.

The question arises, 'What do I need right now?' Some have never asked that question of themselves. At this time, you cannot afford to NOT ask this question.

Because at Perimenopause, something is changing in the wind.  We are standing on the precipice of a death cycle. Not a physical death.

A falling away. An 'autumn' that invites a kind of shedding of all that takes energy - the leave-taking of stories, old patterns, old lifestyles, and immature ways of being.

It's In our resistance to the 'death', the falling of the leaves, we can run into trouble.

It's in surrendering, in non-resistance, that there is so much richness.

When something dies, it returns to the earth. It provides rich humous, rich soil for the next period of your life. Honour it. Cherish it. Good things are on their way. That's why it's a time to write, dance, move, create.

We can't live from the mind anymore. The desire to 'go to ground', to me, is about going to the body - we have lived too much out of our body.