Harmonising your business using cycles: A guide to finding your flow

Working with your cycles

The world we live in has many cycles. Day turns to night and back to day again. The seasons ebb and flow in a beautiful rise and fall of nature. The moon goes around the earth in a (roughly) 29 days cycle. Planets orbit the sun. And if you’re a woman your menstrual cycle also goes around roughly every 29 days, not always that simple with women’s health but I won’t get into that.

And so, with each of these cycles we each have an individual physiological and psychological experience. Our energy and mood changes in line with them. Which can be a complex web of emotions and changes considering the number of different cycles influencing us.

This is an area I’ve been fascinated with since starting my business because I suddenly became acutely aware of how I live and work depending on what phase the moon is in, or whether I’m ovulating that week.

Because when you are a business owner and you must do ALL the stuff, then doing creative work when you’re at your most creative or going networking when you’re at your feeling more sociable is hugely rewarding to your output and your wellbeing.

I stopped beating myself up for not being able to write my blog when my creative output was low or being unable to strategise in the evening when I was tired.

I learned when my energy was highest during the day, moon cycle or woman cycle and started to plan my days around these times.

I can’t say I get it perfect because I can’t control when networking events are going to take place or even when my period is going to start, I’m not a regular 29 dayer.

But being flexible is useful so I can jump onto creative tasks when the time is right or being able to loosely plan when I’ll be feeling at my best to deliver masterclasses.

I first learned about this when reading Kate Northrup's Do Less.

The Power of Seasonal Cycles

Nature provides us with huge lessons in this area. We are part of nature, we ebb and flow in the same way and are influenced by the ebbs and flows of nature too.

Just like trees and plants we’re not designed to bloom all year. A tree will drop all it’s leaves and let go of what it doesn’t need during the winter so it can rest and rejuvenate ready to bloom again in spring.

So if you’re feeling pressure right now to create and produce and be ready with new ideas for the start of 2024, remember that the start of the seasonal year doesn’t begin until spring.

What can you do in your business and your marketing now to slow down, go inward, review and process and let go of what you don’t need ready for next year.

You don’t need to have all the answers now.

Winter is for rest and for reflecting on how far you’ve come. Our energy levels, creativity and motivation are low.

Spring is a time for rebirth, planting seeds, and birthing new ideas. Our creativity is at it’s highest.

Summer is when our energy is at our highest, we can live of the seeds we have sown and be visible with our new ideas.

Autumn we begin to slow down and complete unfinished projects.

Tailoring your marketing to the seasons

How can you plan your year to fit with the seasonal changes?

If you have new courses or programmes you want to launch, can you plan the process alongside the seasons?

Plan in Spring when you’re ideas are flowing, launch in Summer when you’re feeling a your best and wanting to be visible to sell, and deliver in

Autumn when the hard bit is over and the delivery is the easy bit.

You can also plan around the seasonal trends that your audience will be going through too.

Provide that much needed self-care in January, help them to birth ideas during spring or guide them on letting go during the autumn.

A fantastic resource to help with your business planning around the seasons is The 12 Questions from Jannine Barron. Jannine is an incredible intuitive coach and this session is something I come back to all the time when I need clarity on birthing and letting go of what no longer serves me.

Recognizing the Influence of Female Cycles

There has been some historical shifts over the time of humanity that has led to a disconnection with nature and our bodies.

I don’t know all the history, but I can point toJannine Barron’s Ted talk about intuition where she identifies three points in history that have influenced this.

Plato and Socrates debate about logic vs emotion – Logic won and thus was the foundation for academic institutions.
Patriarchy structures deciding that intuition was a feminine trait and therefore couldn’t be used by men.
Scientist Francis Bacon declaring that nature has no purpose and created the shift in a disconnection from nature.

In Lisa Lister’s books Witch and Self Sourcery Lisa talks about the old traditions of women before the witch hunts and the lost knowledge of the land.

Women’s health has not been on the medical curriculum until very recently, and from what I can see is only being officially added to the curriculum in the UK in 2024.

In the book Workstyle, Alex and Lizzie write about the 200 year old working schedules, the good old 9-5 that are no longer relevant today and definitely don’t take into account any natural cycles.

My point is that there is a deep rooted history that has led us to this point, where we are only now getting back in touch with nature and cyclical living and how it’s going to help us thrive in a modern world.

And being in touch with how we work during these cycles will unlock how we can be in flow with ourselves and have a greater level of life life balance.

The importance of self awareness

All this leads us to this very important point that to be in touch with nature and ourselves and to live in this cyclical way we must have high levels of self awareness.

Something we’ve been taught not have. We’ve been programmed to not listen to ourselves and go along with whatever is distracting us the most.

But it requires a huge amount of self awareness to track our emotions, energy and motivation alongside these cycles.

But how can we begin on that journey? For me it's journaling.

Journalling ideas

I’ve journaled for years, the simplest way to begin journaling is to take note of thoughts, feelings, emotions and how that feels physically in your body.

Another easy one is each day to ask yourself:

What energised me today?
What drained me today?
What did I learn about myself today?

Over time you will start to notice patterns and useful information to guide you.

Creating a Supportive Work Environment

If you are a business owner and you employ others, even if that’s outsourcing to a Virtual Assistant, how can you create an inclusive workplace that acknowledges and accommodates female cycles?

Or if you work for yourself, being the best boss to yourself and creating these boundaries within your working day or environment.

Creating a workstyle that works for you.

The Impact of Astrological and Moon Cycles

The moon and the planets also give us another way to monitor our energy. If you’re menstrual cycle is a bit all over the place as is mine or if you don’t have a menstrual cycle, the moon is the next best thing.

The moon has a huge amount of energy and creates a physical change on the earth and on us. It moves the tides and has the ability to create higher or lower energy within us.

The moon has four stages to the cycle, much like the seasons or the menstrual cycle.

> Full moon

> Waning Moon

> New Moon

> Waxing Moon

The full moon is when the energy is at its highest. This coincides with summer energy or ovulation. It’s a time for socialising and visibility.

The Waning moon is when the energy starts to decrease and the energy moves away. This is a time for slowing and finishing projects.

The New Moon is when the energy is at its lowest. This is a time for rest and reflection.

The Waxing Moon is when the energy begins to rise and your creativity is at its fullest.

In the same way as you would with the seasons but on a monthly cycle, you can time your sales and launches during the full moon, your reflection time during the New Moon, your creative ideas such as blog writing during the Waxing or Full Moon, and completing any easy finishing off tasks during the Waning Moon.

Building a Business Calendar

To help you plan your time and activities you can create a personalised business calendar that incorporates seasonal, female, and astrological cycles.

On your yearly planner plot out all the moon phases for the year and roughly plot out your female cycle, I say roughly because for me it’s a month to month view.

Take into account the seasonal changes and how you can plan around these, and also how you can best serve your audience at these times.

Then think about your marketing, launches, programmes, 1:1 work, events etc all in line with your new planner.

View moon dates

Flexibility and Adaptability

The one thing patriachial work structures gave us was the inability to be flexible and go with the ebbs and flows of life.

Cycles can vary and won’t always follow the rules, so flexibility is important.

Sometimes my female cycle matches the moon cycle and when this happens I’m on fire!

Other times it doesn’t and there can be a huge push and pull.

So being kind to myself without judgement or guilt has been a big learning curve for me.

Conclusion

So remember be kind to yourself and others. Be flexible and go with the ebb and flow.

Learn when you are most energised and when you are not.

Consider all of nature externally and internally and plan accordingly.

Plot it out and plan your business around the cycles, keep experimenting until you feel aligned.

I’d love to hear your comments and discussions on how you’ve found success in synchronizing your work with cycles.

Resources

How I can help you

If you would like help with planning your marketing activities alongside the cycles of the year have a look at my planning and strategy packages.