Cyclical Living for the Soul Guide

The Power of Cyclical Living

What is your body whispering to you today? A lavender bath to melt your worries away? Feet bare upon the earth to ground your spirit? Wild swimming down a stream, or a taste of something new? Maybe it’s a longing to simply sit with your feelings, to embrace the blues, or perhaps it’s the call to speak out, take a stand, or allow yourself to stay a while longer in a moment of stillness. Soul care looks different in every season, and our nourishment and growth are sure to bloom when we learn to listen.

As women, our bodies’ homeostasis is change. We are dynamic rhythm in motion. Our hormones ebb and flow, carrying with them shifts in energy, mood, body temperature, and our natural drives.

While male bodies are more like evergreen trees, being driven by a consistent, 8 am-5 pm fuel of testosterone, replenished every 24 hours. Female bodies are more like the deciduous trees: seasonally, our leaves transform into a brilliant array of sunburst hues, all to let them go, give nourishment to the soil, and regenerate all over again. Except rather than over a year, this transformation gets condensed into our 28-day Womb Cycle. It’s a cycle of transformation, guiding us through phases of rest, growth, expression, and reflection.

Our cyclical nature is our superpower. When we embrace it, we can tune into the deeper wisdom within our bodies’ natural rhythms to design expansion in our lives, work, and soul growth.

 

Cyclical Bodies in a Non-Cyclical World

This constant internal change can feel challenging in a culture that demands consistency, productivity, and adherence to the 9-to-5, Monday-to-Friday workweek. Have you ever felt that pressure to keep pushing, keep grinding, and keep creating, even when your body is urging you to slow down? Know you’re not alone in this. That dissonance you feel likely comes from living in a world built for a different rhythm—yet, our inner hormone-cycling reality works on an alternate clock, urging us to design a different life structure, designed from the inside out, aligned with the natural ebb and flow of our hormonal cycles.

 

How Can the Cycle Nourish the Soul?

My embodied exploration and research into the womb journey, from menstruation to menopause, combined with my passion for self-growth, led me to the questions:

What if living in alignment with these inner cyclical seasons is nature’s way of guiding and transforming us?

If so, how could the Womb Cycle be a pathway to deeper and more expansive, soul growth for women? I invite you into these living questions through this blog today, and through your cycles to come.

 

The Soul Tree, Seasons, and Soul Growth

Just like the trees, I believe the nature of the soul is to grow and give.

To grow: The soul tree seeks to experience a vast buffet of life, stretching branches in all directions. The soul tree gathers all of these experiences, like leaves gathering sunray energy, fueling the soul tree with feedback on where it feels drawn to grow and where it doesn’t, plus the strength to grow past the known edges.

To give: The soul tree seeks to gather all of these experiences, all of this growth, and transform it into something fruitful—a legacy that will grow and give even as the soul tree is far beyond decomposed soil.

I can feel the way the seasons of my Womb Cycle guide me into this growing and giving, nurturing my “soul tree” along the journey.

But before going into this story journey of the cycle seasons, I want to note this this in an “archetypal cycle,” meaning it’s a framework, not a specific ever-true reality. Every woman has her own unique relationship and experience of her cycle. There is no normal.

 

Winter ~ Menstrual Phase

(Days 1-5ish, can last till day 7)

In order for our soul trees to grow and give to others, they first must be nourished. The menstrual Winter season is an invitation to root back into the soil and rest. Just as trees shed their leaves to make way for new growth, our bodies shed the old to prepare for renewal.

Rest is not just a luxury—it’s a necessity. Menstruation beckons us to slow down, to turn inward, and to listen to the quiet wisdom within. It’s in this stillness that we remember our inherent worth, separate from productivity or output. Rest reminds us that we are enough, simply by existing.

 

What the soul remembers when we allow rest:

I felt the potency of rest yesterday, as I took the day off to go into the woods, walk, and rest. It felt wrong at first. My mind urged, ‘How could you be doing nothing when we have all these goals and projects to attend to?’ Yet the dream-like state of my deeper menstruating mind told me otherwise. As I sat and literally did nothing near the spiraling river stream, I was restored to a sense of abundance—inner abundance. A reminder that my worth does not come from a what I make or what I give, rather, that worth and abundance just exists in my being. I imagine that is how queens felt, except rather than a throne of power, I was sitting on the inner throne of presence—and felt equally powerful. This feels like a universal soul lesson that many women face—the shift from scarcity to abundance, from not-enough-ness to “enoughness” not even being a question nor concept.

And beyond a glowing, knowing sense of abundance, sacred rest opens way for the soul to receive guidance and clarity—so that we may take action forward with more ease, grace, and flow over the coming cycle.

 

Spring ~ Follicular Phase

(Days 6-13ish, end bleed to ovulation)

Spring arrives with fresh, budding energy, urging us to explore new experiences, ease beyond edges, and take action on the inspirations and dreams brewing inside our souls. With Spring, comes a “beginner’s mind”—necessary and fruitful for the growth of the soul.

Spring is where I see the bulk of the edgy part of my growth journey coming up—the push beyond the comfort zone that sparks a cascade of change. The bleeding seasons will beckon me to take some big leaps or step into new parts of myself, like “public speaker” or “leader,” Spring gives me the energy to take the courageous steps, then I feel the ripples of myself recalibrating to new expanses of potential.

It’s easy to get stuck in our own status quo, looping habits, thought patterns, beliefs, all that forms our ego/identity. So, what if this was ritual to try something new, edgy, growth-full, every Spring? Imagine the leaps & bounds you would make as a soul.

 

Summer ~ Ovulatory Phase

(Days 13-19ish)

If Spring is the season for the soul tree to grow, then Summer is the season for the soul tree to give.

With more energy, more natural confidence, more gusto for life and connection to our gifts, ovulation becomes a fruitful opportunity for shining those soul gifts out into the world. This too can feel edgy, yet oh so fulfilling.

Our inner growth reflects into outer growth—expanding us into connection with our communities. With the heightened communication abilities of ovulation (a season of peak testosterone and estrogen), we can also easefully grow in collaboration, stepping into relationship dynamics that can be fruitful growing & giving spaces for your soul tree.

Here, is this summery radiance, your soul tree gets to blossom and fruit into the fullest expression that you came here to be.

 

Fall ~ Luteal Phase

(Days 20-28)

As Summer shifts to Fall, the radiance of colors emerges in our leaves and transformation begins. Let’s call these colors the full spectrum of human emotion and experience, from the darkest shadows to the most radiant light—each one needed to make up the full radiance.

We gather the leaves in piles, and as energizing hormones ebb down, we’re sent deep diving into this pile. The heap may feel endless, burrowing the soul into its shadowy places. We wonder if the feeling of this season will last forever. Those parts of us wanting to let go and hold on at the same time come to the surface. With the colors and shadows, Fall brings the invitation to meet them with the same ease as a falling leaf floating on the wind. And the more we let go, the more the soil (and soul) gets to be nourished with growth.

In the Fall phase, I often feel raw and exposed, like branches of the winter trees laid bare. It feels like I’m feeling the whole world. Last luteal, I cried upon seeing the fog rise over the mountains. I also cried at realizing how intensely my communication blocks and old stories have held me back in life. This phase invites me to confront the parts of myself that I’ve been holding onto, to feel deeply, and to allow myself to be transformed by what arises.

I’ve noticed that the more attention I give to this phase, the more easeful my menstrual Winter becomes, and I’ve heard that experience reflected in many other women as well. It’s as if the pre-shedding process we do in Fall nourishes the soil of a more easeful bleeding season in Winter. From this feeling, processing, transforming season of Luteal, we are delivered into our menstrual Winter season, giving our bodies the chance to somatically shed any shadows, any parts of us that are holding us back, the old stories, any lingering wounds, anything no longer serving our expansion.

 

And so we come full cycle, from rest to receiving, exploring and growing, blooming and giving, reflecting and transforming, back to shedding and resting again. Unfolding within is not only a journey of dancing hormones, but also the journey of a growing soul. Cycling with these seasons, the soul tree finds its most fulfilled expression, and its way back home.

 

Activating the Power of Your Womb Cycle

Living in alignment with your Womb Cycle inspires a wellspring of soul growth. Here are a few ways you can activate the gifts of each phase:

1. Create a “Soul Care” List: Write down restorative activities that nourish you during the menstrual phase (Winter).

2. Set New Intentions in Spring & Take a leap: Align your personal or career goals with the energy of the follicular phase (Spring) for optimal growth. Make it a ritual to take a leap every Spring season!

3. Share Your Gifts: Use the confidence and connection of the ovulatory phase (Summer) to step into sharing your gifts, skills, and purpose projects with your community.

4. Reflect and Release: Explore journaling, meditation, and/or mindful movement during the luteal phase (Fall) to process emotions and prepare for the next cycle.