Hello Lovelies! I’m currently on vacay with my family at our home in North Carolina for the Thanksgiving holiday, and I’m so full of gratitude for the beauty that surrounds me every time I come down here. Usually, our house is rented out during the holidays, but I made sure that we would be able to come down this year. Since the leaves have fallen, we can see the mountains from our patio doors. The sun comes up right there behind the dark raised peaks in the outskirts of the Smoky Mountains… it’s breathtaking to see. Usually, we come down here in the summer, because that’s motorcycle season and the riding down here is some of the best in the country (Tail of the Dragon is only 30 minutes from our house!), but the trees are so full of green luscious leaves that you cannot see the mountains behind our property. I woke up and looked outside and was inspired by the cycles this place goes through, which, as always, reflects our own inner cycles.
Take a moment and close your eyes. Take 3 deep breaths. And then come back… I’ll be right here waiting for you!
What do you notice about your breath? How does your chest and belly move with the inhale? And with the exhale? How does your body respond to the inhale or the exhale? Do this exercise again while thinking about those questions.
Breathing is one of our body’s amazing functions that we go through the day thinking very little about. When I was in nursing school, the day we talked about the respiratory system, I cried at the beauty and wonder of such a crucial system to our survival. An adult takes about 20,000 breaths a day, a continuous cycle of inhalation and exhalation, of active intake and surrendered release. When you put this as a visual, it’s like a dot moving along a circle… it goes around the top half during the inhalation and swings around the bottom half during the exhalation. A beautiful dance of expansion and release.
This is only one example of the natural Physical Cycles of our body. Through both my scientific and spiritual lens, I see our external and internal systems and cycles as following two patterns: Solar Cycles and Lunar Cycles. If you look around nature, everything follows patterns. This is evident in ALL of nature, including our bodies (which is a part of nature), plants, animals, the oceans, and the seasons… they all follow the natural patterns set by our two predominant heavenly bodies: the Sun and the Moon. Both the sun and the moon have natural cycles… both are different, but their patterns dance together in such an exquisite waltz that when you actually start to pay attention and tune into their Unique Songs, your life becomes forever changed.
Story Time!
Y’all know I love to share stories! :D This is a “which came first: the chicken or the egg?” story for me, because I honestly cannot recall what started my fascination with cycles, or how I started to see the patterns everywhere I looked. I stepped into my Witch Power in 2019, the first year I started nursing school. I basically was having Awakenings and Rememberings sitting in Anatomy and Physiology class… I’d hear about the complex workings of a cell or the beautiful dance of our kidneys and I’d be just about jumping out of my chair, looking around at everyone, and wanting to shout, “Does ANYONE ELSE see this???? It’s so fucking beautiful! It’s like looking at the face of GOD!!” Naturally, I did not actually get up and say these things (although my best friend at the time did catch me with tears in my eyes a couple of times)… but my Soul was ON FIRE with the desire to know more about this Universe.
In my off time, I started researching Wicca and old Celtic beliefs (that is my ancestral heritage), and found a beautiful book at the second-hand store called “The Magical Year” by Danu Forest. This book was all about the Solar equinoxes, solstices, and cross-quarter holidays… 8 in total. Now, I did not end up converting to Wicca… I prefer to stick in the realm of non-organized religion as far as my beliefs go… but I DID fall in love with one strong concept I learned through those studies: Life is a dance of the Sun and the Moon. In Wicca and some other witch traditions, they call the Solar holy days “Sabbats” and the Lunar holy days (the full moons) the “Esbats.”
I celebrated my first Sabbat in August 2019, with Lammas… the first harvest holiday and a cross-quarter day halfway between the Summer Solstice and the Autumn Equinox. It was so special to me; it was like coming home. Shortly after, I also started paying attention to the moon cycles, an activity that Dan and I bonded over when we met the next month.
Interestingly enough, “Dan Dan the Farmer Man” as he was named by my other partner at the time (if y’all didn’t know I was polyamorous yet… you do now!), turned out to be instrumental in the solidification of my new cyclical living. Since I’ve lived in a city my whole life, I didn’t pay too much attention to the seasons beyond being warm or cold and having to adjust my clothes accordingly. Because Dan had been a farmer his whole life, he lived and breathed the cycles of the Sun as expressed through the seasons. Now, he’s not a witch nor does he follow any pagan beliefs, but he naturally developed a deep inner knowing about the seasons through his work.
I was FASCINATED by how Dan talked about the seasons and how farming worked with the Solar Cycle. We also talked a lot about the moon, and even our pup Luna was born on that Full Moon in September, known as the Harvest Moon. Actually, that’s how she got her name… and it fits so well.
I guess if I think about it, I had to become ready to see all these “Secrets” of Gaia. Of course, they aren’t secrets at all… the Goddess shares these truths with us ALWAYS. But up to that point, I hadn’t developed the Eyes to See, or the Ears to Hear, or Heart to Feel, all the amazing insights She wanted to share. I had been writing and doing inner work since my first Awakening in 2010 (read my full post about that experience HERE)… and I was now ready to work with these Nature energies in a deeper way.
So, the chicken or the egg… was it the learning in school about our body’s rhythms that brought more awareness… or was it the changes in my personal studies to nature’s cycles? They both happened around the same time… so who knows? But, what I DO know is this: I followed the breadcrumbs of inspiration that lit me up, and through that exploration, a deeper understanding of myself and the world around me.
Cycles on Cycles on Cycles
Life literally exists because of cycles. Life is defined as “the condition that distinguishes animals and plants from inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity, and continual change preceding death.” That condition is cyclical… all these functions defined are cycles existing within one another. Like Russian nesting dolls, each cycle lives within another, and yet another, to create the beautiful Dance of Life.
These cycles aren’t just physical either… because As Above, So Below. There are energetic cycles, emotional cycles, spiritual cycles… and others that I’m sure I’ve not discovered yet. Life is a continual spiral of unfolding potentiality and realization and back to potentiality again. Indeed, this cycle is the In and Out Breath of God/Goddess. And in pure divine magnificence, we are LIVING that Breathing in our very own bodies. I truly believe the more we tune into our own nesting dolls of cycles within our bodies, the more alive we will feel!
Read through this list of physical cycles our bodies experience. As you do, think about how you live through these cycles. Is there a cycle that interests you to learn more about? Is there one you’ve been ignoring?
Ultradian Cycles
- These cycles occur within our bodies multiple times a day and vary based on which cycle you choose to inspect. These cycles include blood pressure, body temperature, appetite, alertness, libido, digestion, and the repeating cycles within sleep (known as rapid eye movement or REM).
Solar Cycles
- The Circadian Rhythm – This is a physiological and behavioral cycle that takes place over 24 hours. This cycle primarily governs your sleep cycle. Humans generally are Diurnal… meaning that we naturally wake during the day and sleep at night (vices nocturnal, which we see with animals like owls and bats). The circadian rhythm, with its primary hormones of cortisol and melatonin, takes its lead from the Sun… but there is some emerging research that is showing that the Moon also plays a part in our circadian rhythms (see the article How the Moon Affects Our Sleep | Psychology Today).
- The Seasonal Cycle – Our bodies take cues from the length of daylight and the warmth of the temperature throughout the year. Our bodies generally like to play and be expressive in the summer and be sleepier and more inward during the winter. I believe that our Nature-ness drives this behavior… we used to live WITH and IN nature, as a part of it… not separate from it.
Lunar Cycles
- The Menstrual Cycle – While menstrual cycles can vary, they tend to follow the lunar blueprint in women and AFAB individuals who are not on birth control and do not have underlying health challenges such as Thyroid conditions or PCOS. The rhythmic movement of hormones creates the ability for reproduction as well as regulates mood, energy, libido, and metabolism.
Conclusion
There’s more I could say about cycles, but the point I want to make is this: we ALL are Cyclical Beings. And the constant push to ALWAYS BE ON: always turned on and ready for action, always rarin’ to show up at our job on Mondays, always creating, always producing, always going going going… it’s denying the other part of us. Which is, invariably, the resting/flow/reset part. Also known as the Divine Feminine energy. The Yin energy.
The more we live our lives out of balance, the more the world becomes out of balance. As Within, so Without right? As we build awareness about our Beings and Doings throughout the day, we can see how imbalanced we have become. And awareness is the first stepping stone to change.
Many blessings to you dear friend during this holiday season! Take some time to observe the cycles in your life, and start to see how they play a role in your life.
Much Love,
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