Recently, I’ve been feeling disconnected from my inner goddess due to some high stress from work and study. She used to speak to me regularly during meditation, but I haven’t heard from her in a while.
I really miss her, and I feel a strong desire to go deeper and reconnect with her. Interestingly, many Cycle Harmony friends expressed a similar desire in our most recent survey.
So I thought I’d explore and write about the menstrual rituals from different cultures. Perhaps they’ll give us both some insights on how to connect with our inner goddess from within.
In this post, I’ll share how Yurok women, the native Californians, use their “moontime” to tap into their inner wisdom and spiritual power.
The Ancient Taboo
According to traditional “Indian Law,” a menstruating woman is highly polluting and will contaminate the family house and food supply if she comes into contact with either.
So in the old days, a menstrual hut was built near the main house for a family’s menstruating women. They went into seclusion in the menstrual hut for 10 days during and after their flow, cooking and eating their own food, all by themselves.
A Spiritual Practice
The enlightened women of the Yurok tribe created a different interpretation of this rather disempowering law, however. And they taught their daughters a new way of utilizing the solitude during their moontime. According to the Yurok…
- A menstrual woman should isolate herself because this is the time when she is at the height of her powers.
- This time should not be wasted in mundane tasks and social distractions, nor should one’s concentration be broken by concerns with the opposite sex.
- Rather, all of a woman’s energy should be applied in concentrated meditation to find out the purpose of her life, and toward the accumulation of spiritual energy – going into herself and making herself stronger.
- The menstrual blood serves to purify a woman, preparing her for spiritual accomplishment.
The Moontime Rituals
In the Yurok tradition, a woman uses a comb-like implement to scratch her body as an aid to help focus her full attention on her body. It’s a natural, spontaneous, yet fully conscious and intentional practice.
There is also a “Sacred Moontime Pond” where in the old days women went to bathe and to perform rituals at the new moon – when they were all menstruating together. From there, they also brought special firewood back for use in the menstrual hut.
Some girls performed these rites only at the time of their first menstruation, but most went to the pond every month until menopause.
It’s also said that if a woman got out of sync with the moon and with the other women in the village, she could get back in sync by sitting in the moonlight and talking to the moon, asking it to balance her…
Food for Thought
It’s such a precious gift to be able to find a time of solitude to connect with our spirit, purify, and make ourselves stronger.
No doubt, this is quite a challenge in our busy and crowded modern cultures.
But I long for such time, and such space, to connect with my inner goddess and with other women. How about you?
This post is written based on the findings of anthropologist Thomas Buckley during his field visits to Yurok villages in Northern California in 1976. For further reading, check out his book Blood Magic: The Anthropology of Menstruation
Hi Jing! I’m curious, where did you get the information about the Ancient Taboo that you detail here? By Indians do you mean Indians or Native Americans? 10 days is very long and I have never heard of this before. Also, it’s probable that some reports of notions of pollution among Native Americans were actually misunderstandings by Victorian anthropologists. There are many other Native American tribal groups who had similar practices to the Yurok. As you probably know the Navajo still practice a wonderful initiation for girls at puberty called the Kinaalda. (Details in Her Blood Is Gold.) Thank you for highlighting a positive perspective on menstruation in your work. Love and blessings, Lara
Hi Lara, nice to hear from you! I learned this from the book Blood Magic: the Anthropology of Menstruation. It’s a compilation of studies from various anthropologists on cultures from different parts of the world. I believe the Yurok women are native Americans. It’s interesting to see different sides of the story about menstruation among Native American women. As a culture, I wish to experience and hear more positive stories about menstruation. And how lucky that we get to create it 😉 Hope all is well with you. Love and blessings to you too!
Leslie, thank you for your support, as always. I feel truly blessed to be part of a generation of women awakening to the power of menstruation – reviving the connection between our menstrual cycles and the natural cycles of life. And this has been your work for the past 30 years. Thank you!!
Vild, I’m glad to hear that our online forum has made a difference to you. It has been my intention to provide a space where we can share and connect – to remind us that we’re never alone on our journeys. I always appreciate your wonderful contributions to our community!
Thank you Jing for this wonderful post and reminder that the Goddess lives in all of us. The menstrual cycle has been revered as a sacred cycle in the past – and that knowledge and wisdom needs to be revived. And you are lighting the way.
Jing – what a wonderful sacred post and so very needed to remind us of the power and the glory of menstruation. The paramenstrum is indeed a very powerful phase of the cycle, that unfortunately, women have been taught to be afraid of.
On the other hand, hormone imbalance is so common that drops in hormone levels prior to menstruation is a very slippery slope for so many women – especially those who do not understand the process.
Women were revered as Goddesses many moons ago because of the menstrual cycles connection with other natural cycles of the universe. It is time to reclaim this knowledge and wisdom. And you are guiding us Jing. Thank you for lighting the way.
Thank you Jing, for posting this beautiful example of menstrual rituals! I also appreciate the two sides of the story – it’s so nice to hear the women’s story at last! I absolutely agree, spaces for reconnecting with our inner goddess and other women are really important for us, and can be hard to find. Having this online forum has really made a difference to me – thank you and all our other sisters out there.