The wisdom messenger

In this episode, I interview Kate Codrington and we discuss the changes of consciousness during menopause.

Kate is a mentor, author, speaker, and artist with 30+ years as a therapist. Her book Second Spring: The Self-Care Guide to Menopause was named among NYT's top seven menopause books. She mentors those in perimenopause individually and in groups, guides nature-based Yoga Nidra, hosts "Life - An Inside Job" podcast, and creates textile art.

We explore the natural inward journey that often conflicts with society's expectations, Kate's seasonal framework for understanding our life changes, and practical wisdom for navigating this transformative time.

• The Consciousness Shift: Kate explains how perimenopause creates a natural inward focus, making external demands increasingly exhausting and disconnecting.
• Cultural Context: Discussion of how patriarchal narratives conflict with women's natural needs during this transition.
• Seasonal Framework: Kate introduces her seasonal map for understanding different life stages, including the concept of a "second spring" post-menopause.
• Practical Support: Insights on how women can honor their changing needs while balancing multiple responsibilities.
• HRT Considerations: Balanced perspective on hormone therapy as one possible tool, with recommendations for mindful implementation and tracking.
• Post-Menopause Purpose: Exploration of how this life stage often brings stronger connection to earth, community service, and clarified values.

"Perimenopause is characterised by a shift towards an internal focus, with the outside world becoming unappealing and exhausting. There's a deep need for space, connection with the earth, and intimacy with oneself."

"The post-menopausal stage often brings a stronger connection to the earth and a desire to serve the community. It's like entering a second spring with renewed purpose and clarity."

You can find Kate at

• katecodrington.co.uk
• @kate_codrington

Music by Olivier Messager

In this insightful conversation, midwife and lactation consultant Alison Shaloe shares her 30-year journey supporting women through pregnancy and birth. She discusses her work at the Sacred Fertility and Birth Sanctuary and offers a refreshing perspective on how childbirth can be approached as a transcendent, empowering experience rather than a medical event.

Key Highlights:

1. A Spiritual Awakening: Alison reveals her personal challenges with cesarean births and breastfeeding that led to specializing in tongue-tie support, and how Reiki opened her to spiritual dimensions of birth, including the ability to hear messages from babies.
2. Breaking Through Dogma: Alison discusses the challenges of speaking about spiritual aspects of birth in a society dominated by scientific dogma and fear, sharing how her book evolved from clinical focus to include channelled information from spirit babies.
3. Altered States of Consciousness: Our conversation explores how women naturally enter altered states during labour—a necessary surrender that's rarely taught in midwifery education but is essential to the birth process.
4. Patriarchal Systems in Birth: Alison highlights how current birth practices often reflect patriarchal attitudes that interrupt women's natural birthing processes, from computerized systems to unnecessary interventions that disempower women.
5. Honouring Women Through Ritual: The importance of ceremonies like "mother blessing" and "closing the bones" is discussed as essential cultural practices that honour women's journey into motherhood and support significant life transitions.
6. Creating Sacred Birth Spaces: Alison shares her vision for birth environments that honour the spiritual and emotional connection between mother and baby, emphasizing the need for privacy, respect, and gentle first moments after birth.

You can find Alison on her website

https://alisonshaloe.com/

Music by my brother Olivier Messager

Highlights from episode

In this insightful conversation, business coach Caroline Leon shares her journey and philosophy of ethical business practices. She discusses how she helps coaches, healers, and teachers build sustainable businesses without resorting to manipulative marketing tactics. With years of experience transitioning from corporate work to conscious business coaching, Caroline offers a refreshing perspective on how business can be both profitable and aligned with personal values.

Key Highlights:

You can find Caroline on her website https://carolineleon.com/

Jeff is a percussionist, composer, recording engineer, researcher, and adult living with ADHD. Jeff is the Director of the Strong Institute - an auditory brain stimulation research organization - and Brain Stim Audio - an interactive brain stimulation music site. He has written 8 books and published dozens of research articles about music and the brain, particularly as it applies to autism and ADHD.

In this enlightening conversation, we explore the intersection of drumming, neuroscience, and alternative healing practices. Our discussion covers a wide range of topics, from Jeff's personal journey with ADHD to the neurological benefits of drumming, and from ancient shamanic practices to modern applications of rhythm-based therapies.

Highlights:

You can find Jeff at at

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Find out more about Sophie here

The introduction music is by my talented brother, Olivier Messager.

Instagram @olivier_messager

A spiritual guide dedicated to women's empowerment, Rachael facilitates circles, workshops and healing sessions. From menarche to menopause, she creates sacred spaces honouring life's transitions. Based in West Wales surrounded by nature, her multifaceted work helps others awaken to their authentic power.

In this interview we cover a wide range of topics centred around empowering women, embracing self-care, exploring spiritual practices, and finding healing through various modalities. We discussed the importance of cultural rituals, women's circles, and reclaiming practices like drumming that have historically been taken away from women. We emphasise the need for continuous self-reflection when engaging in these practices. Rachael shares personal experiences with struggles like addiction, cancer, and finding purpose through helping others. This conversation also focuses on the significance of energy management, self-care practices, and celebrating women's achievements.

Highlight Points:

Find out more about Sophie here

The introduction music is by my talented brother, Olivier Messager.

Instagram @olivier_messager

As a visionary, and inspired by Layne Redmond's Mob of Angels, she created Moonrise: Daughters of an Ancient Pulse and DrumRise! The Art of Women's Drumming, where women experienced transformation through sisterhood, by sharing the drum with one another and in the greater community.  Women, Rhythm & Ritual and The Tambourine Path are recent incarnations of her ancient future wisdom teachings.  With her husband and partner in all things, Jeff Hanna, she's co-owner of The Rhythm Inlet and The Ukulele Place music retail stores and teaching studios (which morphed in 2022). 

Barbara's been sharing the joys of rhythm and movement, hand-drumming and dance, in her award-winning programs full-time for 30 years, and has facilitated hundreds of groups and thousands of people, of all ages, abilities and challenges, in over 400 venues and in 13 states. She also teaches online.

In this episode we have wide-ranging discussion covering various topics related to drumming, music, dance, education, cultural traditions, and empowering women. We explore the therapeutic benefits of participatory rhythm and movement practices across different cultures. We also discussed Sophie's upcoming book project, share resources and wisdom from influential figures like Lane, and delved into the complexities of respectfully sharing cultural knowledge. Throughout our conversation, we exchange insights from our experiences and highlight the value of collaboration in drumming.

Highlights include:

Can you listen to the episode on Spotify, Youtube, or Apple Podcast

You can find Barbara at

Like this podcast? Leave me a review.

Find out more about Sophie here

The introduction music is by my talented brother, Olivier Messager.

Instagram ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@olivier_messager⁠⁠⁠⁠

In this Episode I interview Melonie Syrett. Melonie, known as The Drum Woman, creates commissioned and channelled drums, leads drum circles and conventions, holds drum birthing workshops and retreats, teaches facilitator training, and guides drum-based sacred site expeditions. 

In this episode, we explore the transformative power of drumming for empowerment and self-expression, particularly for women. Melonie shares her inspirational journey from teaching to professional drum-making and facilitating. We delve into Melonie's perspectives on drum circles as judgment-free spaces for presence, community, and personal growth. 

Melonie, known as The drum woman, was called to drumming in 2012. Though she didn't realise it then, the drums came into her life to create positive change for herself and others. She left her career as a primary school teacher in 2017 to fully embrace the path of drumming she felt drawn to. Now Melonie creates commissioned and channelled drums, leads drum circles and conventions, holds drum birthing workshops and retreats, teaches facilitator training, and guides drum-based sacred site expeditions. 

We have a wide-ranging conversation about the significance of drumming, especially for female empowerment and self-expression. We discuss Melonie's journey from teaching to becoming a full-time drum maker, facilitator and organiser of drumming events. The challenges of career transitions were explored, as well as the importance of balancing work with menstrual cycles. They talked about Melonie's experiences organising a major women's drumming convention and her plans for more events. The transformative power of drum circles was emphasised as a space for judgement-free self-expression and personal growth.

Highlights Include

Can you listen to the episode on Spotify, Youtube, or Apple Podcast

You can find Melonie at

Like this podcast? Leave me a review.

Find out more about Sophie here

The introduction music is by my talented brother, Olivier Messager.

Instagram ⁠⁠⁠⁠@olivier_messager⁠⁠⁠

In this episode, I interview Hollie Hope. Hollie is a mother, grandmother and an integrative healing arts practitioner, intuitive oracle and master of sacred sound. She has been supporting the community for the last 17 years through releasing traumas and distortions we hold with ourselves and teaching others how to open and activate their spiritual gifts and embracing their own feminine sensual embodiment.

Through techniques cultivated through healing her own lifetime of trauma and abuse she offers wisdom how to incorporate sacred sound when healing the mind, the physical body and the emotional body to assist in activating the most potent parts of our own uniqueness and our own master healer within ourselves. 

In this episode, we explore Hollie’s journey into drumming as a sacred healing practice and its scientifically-backed benefits for stress relief, empowerment, emotional release, and trauma recovery, especially among women.

Highlights include:

Like this podcast? Leave me a review.

Find out more about Sophie here

The introduction music is by my talented brother, Olivier Messager.

Instagram ⁠⁠⁠@olivier_messager⁠⁠

In this episode I interview Alexia Leachman is a mindset coach, digital strategist, entrepreneur, author and speaker.

Alexia is the creator of Head Trash Clearance, a transformative healing method that emerged from her personal journey to overcome her extreme fear of pregnancy and childbirth (tokophobia). Her courageous efforts to heal herself during her pregnancy led Alexia to ditch her planned c-section for a remarkable home birth. She then focused on helping other women overcome their fears through her "Fear Free Childbirth" podcast, self-healing products and programs, and by developing her innovative Head Trash Clearance method. With her background in branding and passion for empowering people to heal anxiety, depression and OCD, Alexia aims to build a global mental health and resilience brand to make healing accessible, enjoyable and efficient.

In this episode, Alexia shares her journey in healing her fear of birth, how she started by helping others doing the same and then using her head trash clearance method to support people with their mindset, mental health, and increase their level of consciousness.

Key topics include: challenges within the Western medical system in treating mental health; the influence of parenting on children; Alexia's unique emotional mapping method; and her plans to launch a trauma-healing program.

After an unexpected pregnancy and miscarriage, Alexia developed a debilitating fear of childbirth (tokophobia). Though she created a self-help method, her midwife dismissed her anguish. By trusting her body and bonding with her baby, Alexia found freedom from her terror. She also questioned the overmedicalization of birth.

Alexia and Sophie challenged the growing technological influence over fertility and childbirth for neglecting personalized care. Though scheduled for an induction, Alexia achieved an intervention-free birth through advocacy. They considered life phases like motherhood potential openings for healing.

Seeking Alternative Treatment

Alexia shared an effective alternative technique she uses to treat deep-seated fears like tokophobia by shifting mindsets. They stressed meeting people where they are without judgment. They also debated ways to make therapy more accessible.

Importance of Conscious Parenting

Alexia asserted unconscious parenting can unintentionally harm children. She emphasized mindfully preparing for a baby with practices from her book “Fearless Birthing.”

Understanding Emotions
Alexia emphasized evaluating distress intensity by numbering it and learning self-soothing skills. Her “Mind-Body” method combined mantras, acupressure and visualization to release emotions.

Cataloguing Personal Growth

Alexia's “conker” model utilized concepts like a “trash ladder” to represent emotional maturation. These metaphors catalogue one’s journey from turbulence toward tranquility.

You can find Alexia at ⁠https://alexialeachman.com/ and @

Find out more about Sophie here

The introduction music is by my talented brother, Olivier Messager.

Instagram ⁠⁠@olivier_messager⁠⁠