my secret to surviving menopause.

I discovered a powerful secret this weekend. If you are, like me, in the midst of menopause or other hormonal changes this secret might be important to you too.

These last two years have been quite a wave of changes. My body’s cycles are changing. My body temperature is changing, my ability to digest certain foods is changing and most of all I go through continuous cycles of change when it comes to how much energy I have available to me. I’ve even experienced high blood pressure at times. It’s been a journey of discovery as I try to adapt to these erratic changes and still have a normal life.

Normal life for me includes something called ecstatic dance. I have always been a dancer. My life and my growth have revolved around dance. Ecstatic dance is a process of moving through different rhythms that vary from slow, still or flowing to wild and chaotic and many places in between. The dance has always offered me a place to cleanse my soul, to heal my hurts, to express my creativity and embrace the unknown.

This weekend I attended a 5 Rhythms Wave workshop entitled Living Fully, Loving Deeply at a quaint little place downtown called the Portfolio Center with an amazingly beautiful teacher, Amara Pagano. I do these workshops a few times a year and always walk away knowing a bit more about myself. This was certainly no different. And yet…it was.

I have always been able to command my body to do what I wanted. I could toss myself about a dance floor with wild abandon and freedom of expression. I loved that about me because it gave my body a chance to release its inner woes and struggles and it provided me with insights and light and love in ways I could not get anywhere else. However, this weekend I was frustrated, my temperature was up, my blood pressure elevated, my hormones were rocking my world and I was constantly nauseous and feeling a bit dizzy. I kept pushing myself onto the dance floor tho in spite of my perceived limitations. It took several hours and much processing for the light to finally come on.

Here I was trying to find myself inside a wave of music with my own inner waves crashing against my shores. I kept trying to dance with my full self….after all…living fully and loving deeply as the workshop implied would require that from me…right? I would move through my limbs seeking fulfillment and expression and be met with limitation and resistance. Fortunately for me the teacher kept throwing us into situations to deal with our resistances. She would have us dance with them as if to tease them out of their dark places and shed light on them. She would set up scenarios for us to move through them as we saw the truth that lie within them. Or more clearly…the untruths…

The secret I discovered as I journeyed through my dance over the 14 hours spent on that dance floor was the secret of self acceptance. Not just to accept my conditions and limitations. Not to just simply say oh well…guess this is how it’s going to be from now on. Instead to dive deeply into a body full of resistance and discover who this women is.

This new woman. This 50 year old woman in this 50 year old body. Who is she? How might she dance? What expressions might she have? It was so much more than a surrender to my circumstances it was diving in to self discovery. Just how does she want to move? I found something quite amazing in that process, I found waves upon waves of self acceptance. And with that discovery an even bigger secret emerged… In those spaces of wild abandon on the many dance floors of my past there was this expression of my juiciness, my inner desires and collective waves of my emotions. I still found those available to me…but in such a different way. By slowing down within my experience, by giving attention to a new voice, a new movement, a new expression I found a part of me that was screaming to be set free. This wise and powerful woman demanded her place upon my life’s stage. Something in the shift, in the dance and the movement gave life to things lying dormant. My head cleared, maybe for the very first time. In fact my neck and head let go and moved more freely than ever before. My arms and legs found heights of movement that brought forth waves of emotion. I found myself crying tears of joy mixed with sadness over and over in the dance. Here she is. Me, this woman dancing as if she had never danced before. More alive in a way than the “maiden” that had poured her spirit out on to many, many dance floors.

So much is said about this transition of menopause. Collectively women seem to shun it and criticize its arrival. I can understand that. Its not much fun experiencing such a profound change. Its so much more than a body ceasing to bleed. Although unique I think for all of us there are those similar effects. Hot flashes, new aches and pains, changes in moods and desires. My experience has been challenging as well. Yet, in the midst of it I keep discovering the woman that I truly am. Past the hangups of my youth, accepting myself in my wisdom and character. Past the obsessions with what it looks like on the outside I can find a whole new world on the inside. A world ripe with clarity and passion and creativity that seemed unavailable to me before now. Although perceived, I’ve lost nothing. In fact, I’ve found something I’ve waited a lifetime to experience. ME.

I thank you Amara, I thank you Gabrielle, for the wisdom you bring me to keep recognizing myself in the dance. The teachers of this work, of this Wave, inspire me towards self acceptance. Thank you. May we meet upon many dance floors to come.