Autumn is my favorite time of year in Colorado. I love the crisp air, getting out on hikes in the mountains with friends (and wildlife!) and watching the aspens light up the mountainsides in a beautiful golden glow.
Something I love to do this time of year is to simply sit in a beautiful place in nature while the leaves dance to the ground around me.
Do you ever take time to just BE with nature? For most of my life, I’ve spent my time in nature trying to achieve something or get somewhere, like to the top of a 14er (what we lovingly call our 14,000+ ft mountains here in Colorado). It’s been mostly about DOING in nature and not so much about BEING in nature.
But this perimenopause season has asked for a lot of slowing down and with that has come the gift of depth and presence with the world around me.
The other day while I was breathing in the autumn colors at one of my favorite spots near my house, I got to thinking about the leaves that were falling at my feet and how they will soon become part of the soil that will nourish the tree that shed them.
Perimenopause is such a profound time of shedding our “leaves” …
Patterns that have kept us stuck
Relationships where we’ve abandoned ourselves
Beliefs that no longer serve who we’re becoming
Stories we inherited about who we’re supposed to be
Responsibilities that were never ours to carry
Identities that gave previous versions of ourselves purpose and meaning
Even physical belongings with energetic ties to our past
Some of these things we’re ready to put down. We’ve carried them for way too long and can finally feel how heavy they’ve become. And some of these things are parts of us that we love and that made us feel like ourselves. Letting go of those can be really hard.
For many of us there is a lot of letting go during this season, and because we are going through such a deep rewiring of our ways of relating with ourselves and the world, it can feel hard to know how to be with everything we’re letting go of.
Should we be grateful for the things we’re shedding?
Angry because they controlled our life for so many years?
Or maybe we feel grief because letting go of who we were can feel like a great loss, even if it’s what we know we need to do.
First of all, there’s no right or wrong answer. And your answer can be all of the above. Emotions don’t exist in a vacuum, and we can hold multitudes within us at once.
Whatever you’re feeling, I want to offer you an invitation.
First, simply notice and allow those feelings to be there. There’s no shame in feeling things that aren’t all love and light. Rage, resentment, sadness, grief, regret or anything else you may be feeling right now … it makes a lot of sense to have these feelings when you’re finally able to clearly see where you’ve been abandoning yourself or what you’re going to miss about the parts of yourself you’re letting go.
Something I’ve been noticing lately is that there’s a difference between what we FEEL about the things we’re shedding and the MEANING we attach to them.
Feelings move through the body. When we can simply sit with a feeling and let it be there without making it wrong, it usually shifts on its own. The urge to fight it or fix it often comes from the meaning we’ve attached to it.
The meaning is the story we tell ourselves about what we’re letting go of. Things like …
“I wasted so many years on that.”
“I should have known better.”
“That version of me was so wrong.”
“Why did I put up with that for so long?”
It makes sense that we’d go there. When we can finally see how something got in our way, it’s easy to decide it was bad or a mistake. And sometimes those stories sneak in and leave us feeling ashamed or regretful of who we used to be.
So the second part of the invitation is to let your feelings be exactly what they are, and get a little curious about the meaning. You can be furious about a pattern that ran your life for years and still question the story that it was all for nothing.
So take the time to notice and allow, and when you’re ready, I want to bring us back to the autumn tree. Bring all of your feelings with you.
Imagine that each falling leaf represents something you’re shedding. And how, just like the tree, what you’re shedding becomes part of the soil that enriches who you’re becoming.
Leaves don’t turn into soil overnight. Once they land on the ground, they get broken down by the rain and snow and all the bugs and fungi living on the forest floor. It’s messy. And that mess is how a leaf becomes soil. Your feelings are part of that process too. They are part of how the things you’re shedding break down and become the soil you grow from. And just like on the forest floor, it takes time.
The other thing is that trees don’t sort their leaves into good ones and bad ones before they let them go. Every leaf becomes soil. The parts of you that you’re relieved to leave behind and the parts you’re going to miss … they all become nutrients for who you’re becoming. Nothing you’re letting go of is wasted.
So the next time you’re outside this autumn, find a spot to sit for a few minutes and watch the leaves float down to the ground around you. Take a deep breath in and let yourself feel whatever is present.
Then ask, what am I shedding right now? And how can this become nutrients for who I am becoming?
You don’t need to have an answer yet. It’s ok to just sit with the question.
I’d love to hear from you.
What are you letting go of this season?
As our own “leaves” fall away in perimenopause, I believe we need spaces where we can be held through our shedding and becoming.
That’s why I’m SO excited to bring The Peri Portal to life! It’s a sacred circle for women waking up through perimenopause.
Our first Peri Portal gathering is happening Tuesday, November 10th from 6-8 pm in my living room in Longmont, Colorado, the day after the new moon. I would love to have you there!
Not local? Send me a message and let me know you’d love a virtual Peri Portal. If enough of us are interested, I’ll create one!
Hey , I’m Jessie May!
At 39, perimenopause turned my life upside down and eventually became an awakening I never saw coming. Now I guide women through the whole arc of this initiation, from sitting in the void of not knowing what’s next, to finding our voices as we emerge into who we’re becoming.
I love creating spaces where we can talk about what this time feels like with people who understand. Thanks for being here, I can’t wait to get to know you!