The Menstruality Podcast

What does it really take to be a visionary leader? And how can menstrual cycle awareness support us to face the challenges and stretch that leadership always brings?In today's episode we share excerpts from our Menstruality Leadership Lab - a free, four-day online leadership training exploring how the hidden powers of the menstrual cycle and menopause can help us lead sustainably, with heart, integrity and wisdom.Red School co-founder Alexandra shares her biggest leadership challenge and how cycle awareness has helped her to cultivate one of many menstruality leadership skills to meet it: the art of pacing.We also hear clips from Alexandra and Sjanie's conversations with our special guests, four women who have boldly stepped forward to live their Calling; medicine woman Asha Frost, author and activist Amisha Ghadiali, folk singer and period preacher Lucy Peach and School of Movement Medicine co-founder Susannah Darling Khan, including;- How Asha handled critical feedback when her work went viral. - How Amisha faces the faces the challenge of making a steady living as a visionary.- What made Lucy become a period preacher- How Susannah handled the most embarrassing moment of her leadership journey.---Register for the Menstruality Leadership lab for free at: www.redschool.net/lab---Registration is now open for our 2023 Menstruality Leadership Programme. You can take your seat here: www.menstrualityleadership.com---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolAsha Frost: https://www.instagram.com/asha.frostAmisha Ghadiali: https://www.instagram.com/amishaghadiali/Lucy Peach: https://www.instagram.com/lucyspeaches/Susannah Darling Khan: https://www.instagram.com/susannahdarlingkhan/

After giving birth to her son Fulano in 2003, Latham Thomas set out on a mission to help women reclaim birth. A graduate of Columbia University & The Institute for Integrative Nutrition, Latham is a maternity lifestyle maven, world renown wellness leader and master birth doula on the vanguard of transforming the wellness movement. She has been named one of Oprah’s Super Soul 100.I experienced Latham as a weaver of profound threads of wisdom… we journeyed from her sacred menstrual practices, to exploring radical self care as a cultural act of resistance in a world that aims to turn us away from our bodies, to how she is supporting her doula students to reclaim their ancient, ancestral technologies and birth wisdom, and so much more. We explore:The multiple layers of Latham’s menstrual cycle awareness through constant dialogue with her body and how she ‘insources’ solutions when she bleeds.How Latham’s ancestors appeared at her birth and what facilitated this deeply sacred moment, including the safe space created by her midwife, partner and best friend. How Latham is bringing forth her ancestral birth wisdom and helping her doula trainees to recall and reclaim the memory of their African ancestral technologies that are lodged in their tissues, so they can become wisdom keepers.---Join us for our upcoming free, online Menstruality Leadership lab, March 7th - 10th: www.redschool.net/lab---Our final waves of applications will open soon for our 2023 Menstruality Leadership Programme. Find out more at: www.menstrualityleadership.com---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolLatham Thomas: @glowmaven - https://www.instagram.com/glowmaven

In today's episode Red School's founders, Sjanie an Alexandra reveal intimate stories about their current leadership edges and how their menstrual cycle awareness and conscious menopause is skilling them up to face them in a sustainable way.The leadership challenges include;- How to manage a sensitive nervous system when you have a demanding to do list.- How to navigate the inner critic attacks that inevitable come when you have both big visions and human limitations.- We also share about our upcoming free, online Menstruality Leadership Lab from March 7-10 - join us at: www.redschool.net/lab---Our final wave of applications opens soon for our Menstruality Leadership Programme - the world’s first leadership training designed for trailblazers, change-makers, nurturers and creatives to realise your full authority and leadership through the power of the menstrual cycle.You can explore the programme here: www.menstrualityleadership.com We begin on March 31st. Applications close on March 22nd, and as a Leadership lab participant, you can save £200 when you apply before midnight on March 13th, using the code LEADERSHIP. ---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.school

We’re welcoming back Bethany Webster, the author of “Discovering The Inner Mother”.  She’s considered to be the global expert on healing the “Mother Wound” - something we all inherit to varying degrees living in a patriarchal society. Bethany was a guest at our Wise Power Retreat, where she spoke about healing the Mother Wound during menopause.In our conversation today, we look at the Mother Wound through a menstrual cycle awareness lens, exploring how it shows up throughout our inner seasons, and how each phase of the cycle can support specific aspects of healing.We explore:Why it’s so hard for us to take care of ourselves, the role the Mother Wound plays in this, and how inner spring (pre-ovulation) teaches us to mother ourselves and build trust with our inner child.What we learned from our mothers about whether it’s ok to shine and how inner summer (ovulation) can help us unravel our capacity to be seen and loved for who we really are. The power of boundaries when it comes to healing the Mother Wound, and how our premenstrual power can support us to claim the honest truth about our limits and what we need. ---Join the waiting list for our 2023 Menstruality Leadership Programme - you can apply here: www.menstrualityleadership.com---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolBethany Webster: @themotherwound - https://www.instagram.com/themotherwound

Menstruation and menopause awaken us to our deep selves, but to do that, they ask that we pull away from the world, stop and rest. The trouble is that rest can be a great challenge for most if us given the momentum at work in our world today. If you struggle to ‘just let go’ and rest when you bleed, or during the unfolding of your menopause process, this episode is for you. We explore:How our inner critics get in the way of rest (come to our Harness Your Inner Critic workshop on Feb 14th if you need support with this). There are inner barriers to rest, and there are also cultural, systemic barriers, particularly for marginalised communities; including people of colour, the LGBTQ+ community, and people living with a disability.Three powers of menstruality that can help us to get more rest: interoception and the art of restedness, and making small shifts. Join the waiting list for our 2023 Menstruality Leadership Programme - you can apply here: www.menstrualityleadership.com---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.school

This conversation moved me deeply. Teacher and writer Krista O’Reilly Davi-Digui explores what it is to be a brave and beautiful human in progress, particularly in the messy middle of life, and especially living inside a grief and trauma illiterate culture. In 2019, when Krista was in the midst of the ‘Quickening’ of perimenopause she lost her son Jairus to suicide. In this conversation, she shares generously about the inner winter of her grief journey, how it intersected with her menopause experience, and how she is now moving into the second spring of menopause, choosing to say yes to life in it’s fullness, not knowing what tomorrow holds…We explore:How grief leaves no room for bullshit - particularly in the menopause, stripping away all pretence, people pleasing and masks. How to make peace and develop resilience through the mess of heartache, struggle, and exhaustion of grief. The necessity of having our pain witnessed - Krista shares how to find the community you need to survive the darkest times of grief, sometimes in unexpected places. (And how to hold boundaries when your existing community isn’t offering the support you need). ---You can now order our new book! Wise Power: Discover the Liberating Power of Menopause to Awaken Authority, Purpose and Belonging here: https://www.wisepowerbook.com---Join the waiting list for our 2023 Menstruality Leadership Programme here: www.menstrualityleadership.com---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolKrista O’Reilly Davi-Digui: @a_life_in_progress - https://www.instagram.com/a_life_in_progress

This bonus episode is the next in our ‘Wise Power Retreat’ series where Alexandra is interviewing people about what menopause revealed and awakened in them. Alexandra and Lara have been working alongside each other in this field for over 30 years. Dr Lara Owen is an author, teacher, researcher, consultant, mentor and an expert on the culture, politics and organisation of the menstrual cycle and menopause. She wrote one of the first books to be published about the power of the menstrual cycle, Her Blood is Gold, and is one of the leading lights in the field of menstrual and menopause education, sharing from an incredible wealth of personal experience, as well as academic research. We explore:How Lara worked with her intuition in menopause (including following the impulse to move herself to the south of France for a three year menopause retreat!).How Lara moved with her menopausal grief at not having had children and how she made sense of her story, and embraced the gifts of her adventurous and creative life without children. How Lara’s radical educational and cultural work around the menstrual cycle and menopause evolved during her menopause transition, leading to her new masters-level course is designed to develop your understanding of menstruation today in the contexts of business, feminism, health, law, politics, popular culture, sustainability, spirituality, sport, technology, and wellbeing.You can now order our new book! Wise Power: Discover the Liberating Power of Menopause to Awaken Authority, Purpose and Belonging here: https://www.wisepowerbook.com---Registration is now open for our Menstruality Leadership Programme: menstrualityleadership.com---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolLara Owen: www.laraowen.com

Sjanie’s period came very early last month. She suddenly found herself bleeding on day 12 and the experience was akin to a zen meditation master slapping their student on the back when they’ve momentarily gone unconscious.She was reminded that there is a wild intelligence within her that was outside of her control, and was invited to dance with the mystery and yield to something bigger.This is one way that the menstrual cycle offers us a way into a radical kind of leadership. The reality that we don’t control it reminds us that we belong to something greater. If we can receive this belonging, our bleed can fill us with goodness, love, and rightness - a source of great power. That’s why giving time to yourself at menstruation is positively dangerous! It will change your consciousness. It will awaken you to what life wants from you…In this episode, we explore:How we understand the term Feminine Leadership, and how the menstrual cycle leads us to it. The specific leadership powers that awaken at menstruation, including clarity about our purpose, an embodied experience of love and belonging, as well as expanded states of consciousness.A key next step for you, if you want to activate more of the power of menstruation in your life. Earlybird registration is now open for our 2023 Menstruality Leadership Programme - you can apply here: www.menstrualityleadership.com---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.school

Our guest today is someone we’ve been wanting to interview for a while. She has inspired 1000s of people to find their way of doing less inside a culture that so often pushes us to do more. Kate Northrup is an entrepreneur, mother and bestselling author of Do Less: A Revolutionary Approach to Time Management for Ambitious Women. Her book centers menstrual cycle awareness as a secret productivity superpower that’s always been there, but you just didn’t know you had...After giving birth to her first child, Kate felt profoundly out of control for the first time in her life. Her period came back when she was 13 months old and she felt safe for the first time since her birth. It held her through post-partum anxiety and insomnia and her menstrual cycle served her as a life-raft that healed her in a profound way. In our conversation we explore:Kate’s Summer sabbatical, how she worked with the voices of doubt and the amazing fruits that it yielded (including her best year ever in business). The real necessity of lowering our standards (here’s to piles of laundry and dry shampoo) and asking for help (usually people feel honoured when we do) so that we can get the rest we need. How to get rest as a working mama, and source our enoughness from a deep well within us. Kate asks: “what if you didn’t need to do or earn another damn thing, in order to be the shit?!”Registration is now open 2023 Menstruality Leadership Programme - you can apply here: www.menstrualityleadership.com---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @redschool - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolKate Northrup: @katenorthrup - https://www.instagram.com/katenorthrup/?hl=en

For many years Karen, the founder of ‘Daring to Rest’ experienced severe panic attacks. It wasn’t until she started a deep rest practice that she learned how to meet her anxiety with grace and she hasn’t had a panic attack since. During her menopause process, this devoted practice of rest enabled her to clearly feel her ‘no’ and ‘yes’ in her body, process the rage arising and listen for what she needed to navigate this almighty transition. In our conversation today we explore:How rest at menopause helps us to manage the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual challenges that can show up in menopause, including hot flushes, insomnia, low energy, brain fog, anxiety, grief, and rage.How rest enables us to feel the ‘No’ of menopause in our bodies, so that we can pay attention to it, act on it, and in doing so, make way for our next level ‘yes’.Why rest is non-negotiable while we’re navigating the death and a rebirth initiation of menopause, and how to actually get it, even amidst the responsibilities of our lives (and the key is dropping any ideas of perfection). ---Registration for our 2022 Menstruality Leadership Programme will open again soon. You can check it out and join the waiting list here: https://www.redschool.net/menstruality-leadership-programme-2022---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email info@redschool.net---Social media:Red School: @red.school (https://www.instagram.com/red.school)Karen Brody: @karen_brody (https://www.instagram.com/karen_brody)