Working with your cycle to gain more energy

Working with your Cycle for Graceful Business Success

NINA KHOO – SENSITIVE LEADERSHIP COACH

Master NLP Coach, Creative Visionary and champion of women, Nina works with sensitive female leaders to fully understand and harness the power of their highly sensitive trait.

Managing their overwhelm, self-doubt and energy levels, Nina’s clients let go of everything that keeps them small and invisible, developing true resilience so they can lead with confidence and integrity.

Website: www.ninakhoo.com

Business Success and Hormones?

When you think of being successful in business, would paying attention to your hormonal cycle ever occur to you?

I’m guessing that for most of us, it wouldn’t cross our minds.

Yet as a woman, you have a 28-35 day cycle which is very different to the male 24-hour cycle.

What does our society base its norms and expectations on? Unsurprisingly, it’s the male 24-hour cycle.

We’re all conditioned to get up, day after day, to study, work and live – on a daily 24-hour basis.

Is it any wonder so many women end up feeling exhausted and burnt-out?

How would it be if women did things differently so we could keep showing up in a way that was sustainable and healthy for us?

What would happen if we paid attention to our longer hormonal cycle, and started to match our personal and business activities with the energy of the phase of the cycle that we’re in?

If you’re no longer menstruating, you’re still going through a monthly cycle which tends to follow the phases of the moon, with the energy of that phase reflecting Nature’s seasons.

Once you understand which phase you’re in, you can batch the tasks that feel natural and easy for that phase – wherever possible.

We can’t always choose when we’re going to give that important presentation, or attend that crucial meeting, but if we understand how our cycle affects our energy and ability to show up fully for that task, we can start to plan our diaries accordingly.

Here are the four phases and the types of tasks to plan for each of them:

Follicular Phase/Waxing Quarter Moon/Spring – Plan & Initiate, Brainstorming, New Beginnings

Ovulation Phase/Full Moon/Summer – Connect & Be Visible, Collaborations, Communicate

Luteal Phase/Waning Quarter Moon/Autumn – Complete & Focus, Detailed Work, Finish Projects

Menstrual Phase/New Moon/Winter – Rest & Reflect, Evaluate, Research

Now not all of us follow this exactly. Some of us have a flipped cycle (I know I did), where I would menstruate during the Full Moon. But the cycle and its energetic patterns will still be there.

I invite you to pay attention to your cycle, and see whether you notice a pattern emerging. Does it take you 20 minutes to do something in one phase of your cycle and half a day at another?

As Kate Northrup (who I learnt about the four phases from, so eloquently says):

“It’s like having spent your whole life furiously paddling against a really strong current and suddenly realizing that all you needed to do to cover more ground was turn your canoe downstream and use your paddle to steer every now and again.”

Let’s teach this to our friends, our colleagues, our daughters, so all women can pay attention to their cycles and use them to work and live in a way that feels easy.

We’d get so much more done and still have time to snuggle under a blanket, reading a book.

With love,

Nina

PS. You can experience Nina’s work yourself at an upcoming workshop happening in Brighton on Sunday 27th April.

Find out more here.