Most of us were taught about our periods as something to manage and hide. We learned about tampons and pads, and maybe we learned about not getting pregnant. What we rarely learned is that the menstrual cycle has four distinct phases, each with its own hormonal pattern, its own energy, and its own gifts. Understanding those phases changes how you relate to your body and your time.
This guide walks through the four menstrual cycle phases through the lens of the inner seasons: winter, spring, summer and autumn. The seasons analogy is not just poetic. It is a practical map that helps you live with your cycle instead of fighting it, whether you are tracking for fertility reasons, learning to manage your energy better, or healing from chronic pain or other forms of suffering tied to the cycle.
Quick answer: The menstrual cycle has four phases that mirror the seasons of the year: the inner winter (menstrual phase), the inner spring (pre-ovulation), the inner summer (ovulation and the high-fertility window), and the inner autumn (the luteal or premenstrual phase). Each season has its own hormonal pattern, energy level and ideal self-care. Learning to live with these inner seasons, through curiosity and tracking, is a beautiful and very practical practice.
Lifestyle matters for fertility. A BMC Public Health study found that women with 4–5 healthy habits had a 59% lower risk of infertility.
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takes 3 minutes to completeThe cycle is not just the period. It is a continuous loop of hormonal changes that shape your energy, your mood, your social capacity and your needs across roughly a month. Menstrual cycle awareness means learning about all the phases of that loop, not only the days you bleed.
Three groups of women tend to find this work especially valuable:
If the cycle itself is still new territory for you, meet your menstrual cycle is a useful primer before going deeper into the seasons.
Think about the seasons of the year. Winter is cold and dark. Nature goes underground and dies, and there is a quiet death within nature that allows for replenishment and for new life to emerge. The same pattern moves through the menstrual cycle. Hormones rise and fall, energy peaks and recedes, and each phase asks something different of you. The inner seasons map gives you a language for what is happening inside your body and a framework for responding to it well.
This content is for educational purposes only. It has been reviewed for scientific accuracy, but it does not constitute medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always consult a qualified healthcare professional regarding medical questions or fertility treatment decisions.
Reviewed for scientific accuracy by: Dr. Mona Bungum
Last reviewed: May 2026
Lifestyle matters for fertility. A BMC Public Health study found that women with 4–5 healthy habits had a 59% lower risk of infertility.
Fill out the questionnaire, and get a personalised, holistic and evidence-based programme tailored to you.
takes 3 minutes to completeThere are four inner seasons:
Each one is explored below.
The inner winter is the menstrual phase of the cycle. The sex hormones oestrogen and progesterone are at their lowest, and that hormonal low has knock-on effects on how you feel. Energy is generally lower. You may feel more tired and more vulnerable. You may want to be alone, to go into your own inner winter cave. All of this is a very normal thing to feel.
The teaching of the inner winter is to go with the energy, not resist it. Practice self-care. Take rest where you can. Go easy on yourself. Lower your standards on work and housework. Let yourself be comfortable. Lean into your self-care and into rest.
If you want a gentle, cycle-aligned movement practice for these days, fertility yoga for the menstruation winter is designed for exactly this energy.
After the inner winter of your cycle, you come into the inner spring phase. This is also known as the pre-ovulation stage, the stage before ovulation. Oestrogen is just starting to rise, and you can feel it. After your period, your energy returns. You feel more capacity for socialising. You may have more interest in going back to the gym or working out.
This is the phase where it is important to learn how to navigate your energy. If you push yourself too much after menstruation, especially if you are someone who has a lot of pain and suffering during your cycle, you can actually burn out halfway through. Pacing yourself in the spring is one of the most useful skills the inner seasons framework teaches. The energy is real, but it is the beginning of a rise, not the peak. Spend some of it, and save some of it.
Fertility yoga for the follicular phase is calibrated for this rising energy, balancing movement and restraint so you do not overspend.
The inner summer is the high-fertility time of the cycle. This is where fertility is at its highest, oestrogen is at its peak, and generally speaking you have more energy and more capacity for other people's needs.
This is the time to let yourself go and live life. Be out in the world. Enjoy yourself. Take risks. Say yes to things. Connect with people. Enjoy being in your body. Sensuality, exercise, movement, creativity, all of these belong to the inner summer.
For movement that matches this peak, fertility yoga for the ovulation phase is structured to meet your body where it is when energy and fertility are both at their highest.
After the summer, you come into the autumn of your cycle, the luteal phase or the premenstrual phase. The hormone progesterone starts to increase and oestrogen starts to decrease. There is a kind of swap-over in hormones, and some people can feel tired when that happens, or suddenly very moody. All of this is normal.
Autumn in nature is a preparation time for winter. The leaves are shedding, the days are getting shorter, there is less light and more darkness. The same is happening inside your body. You are starting to have a drop in energy, and you may notice yourself needing more space, more sleep, and more food, because women have higher calorie requirements during this phase.
The self-care question in the inner autumn is: how can I take care of myself, and how can I look after my emotions too? How can I learn to be okay with saying no to things? If you suffer with your cycle or with your premenstrual phase, it is a good time to prepare. That can look like batch cooking some food, cleaning your house, changing the sheets on your bed, or asking for help and saying yes to offers of help. All of these are small, practical ways to manage your energy and your time a little better, and to be kind to yourself.
Because the hormonal swap from oestrogen to progesterone is so central to the inner autumn, this is also the phase where many women start exploring nutritional support. Seed cycling for hormone balance is one option women often look into here. For cycle-aligned movement that meets the lower-energy reality of these days, fertility yoga in the luteal phase is calibrated for the inner autumn.
The inner seasons are a beautiful map and analogy that we can orient ourselves in. The way to come into relationship with that map is through curiosity and through tracking your cycle.
You can track using an app or, as many women prefer, using a journal. Get really curious about what is happening in your body physically, what is happening mentally, and what is happening emotionally. Notice the shifts. Write down what you observe without judgment.
It is good to track for three to six months. That is roughly the timescale you need to really get to know yourself through the lens of the seasons. Single cycles can be noisy. A few cycles of attention start to show you the pattern. Over time you begin to understand who you are, what your needs are in each phase, and how to connect to your own cyclicality.
For a deeper look at the mind-body side of this practice, fertility tracking covers how to track in a way that supports rather than drains you.
The four menstrual cycle phases are the menstrual phase (inner winter), the pre-ovulation or follicular phase (inner spring), the ovulation phase (inner summer), and the luteal or premenstrual phase (inner autumn). Each phase has its own hormonal pattern, energy and ideal self-care.
Menstrual cycle awareness is the practice of learning about all the different stages of the cycle, not just your period. It teaches you to recognise how your body, energy, mood and needs shift across the four phases, and how to live and work in a way that supports each phase rather than fighting it.
During the inner winter, oestrogen and progesterone are at their lowest. Energy is generally lower, and you may feel more tired, vulnerable or in need of solitude. The teaching of this phase is to go with that energy: rest, lower your standards on day-to-day demands, lean into self-care, and let yourself be comfortable.
That rise in energy comes from oestrogen beginning to climb again in the inner spring or pre-ovulation phase. You may feel more like socialising, exercising or going back to the gym. The key is to pace yourself, especially if your cycle tends to cause pain or suffering, because pushing too hard in the spring can cause you to burn out halfway through the cycle.
In the inner summer, oestrogen is at its highest and you are in the high-fertility window of the cycle. Energy is at its peak and you generally have more capacity for other people's needs. This is the time to be out in the world, take risks, say yes to things, and enjoy sensuality, movement and creativity.
In the inner autumn, progesterone increases and oestrogen decreases. Some women feel tired or suddenly moody as that hormonal swap happens. Energy is dropping, you may need more space, more sleep and more food, and the inner autumn is a preparation phase for the inner winter that follows.
Treat the inner autumn as a preparation time. Batch cook some food, get on top of the house, change the sheets on your bed, ask for help and say yes to offers of help. Learn to be okay with saying no to things that do not fit the energy of this phase. Small, practical acts of preparation make the inner winter much gentler when it arrives.
You can track using an app or a journal. The most important thing is curiosity: notice what is happening physically, mentally and emotionally as you move through the phases. Tracking for three to six months gives you enough data to start seeing your own pattern through the lens of the seasons.
Three to six months is a useful window. Single cycles can be noisy and inconsistent. A few cycles of consistent attention start to show you the underlying pattern, and from there you begin to understand who you are, what you need in each phase, and how to live with your cyclicality.
Yes. If you suffer with your cycle in some way, the inner seasons framework gives you both a map for what is happening and a set of phase-specific self-care practices. The inner autumn in particular becomes a structured preparation time, which can take some of the sharpness out of the inner winter that follows.
The menstrual cycle phases are not just biology. Lived through the lens of the inner seasons, they become a practical guide for how to spend your energy, look after yourself, and stay in honest relationship with your body across the month. The framework asks very little of you: curiosity, a way to track, and a willingness to go with each season rather than against it.
If this is new, start small. Pick one phase that you suspect you push through hardest and try a single act of season-aligned self-care this cycle. The map is beautiful and the practice is gentle. Enjoy getting to know yourself through it.
00:00:00 In this video, I want to teach you about the inner seasons of your menstrual cycle. So a lot of us learned in school that our periods were something that had to be managed and no one needed to know about it. And maybe we learned about tampons, about using pads. And maybe when we learned about our periods, we learned about not getting pregnant. and so what's lovely about menstrual cycle awareness is that we learn about all the and so what's lovely about menstrual cycle awareness is that we learn about all the different stages of the cycle and it's not just about your period and if you are someone who wants to connect more with your menstrual cycle for fertility reasons or you want to learn how
00:00:41 to manage your energy better with your cycle for your your energy or your health or maybe you're on a journey of healing from chronic pain or suffering in some way with the menstrual cycle learning about the seasons of your cycle and the different phases of your cycle is a beautiful thing to practice and it's also very practical really really helpful so I'm going is a beautiful thing to practice and it's also very practical really really helpful so I'm going to explain it to you so if you think about the seasons of the year the winter it's cold it's dark and nature goes underground and dies there's a death that happens within nature in order for it to be replenished and in order for new life to emerge and it's the same thing with the cycle
00:01:19 when we are in the menstrual phase of our cycle um the sex hormones estrogen and progesterone are at their lowest and that means that we have generally lower energy and we might feel more at their lowest and that means that we have generally lower energy and we might feel more tired and more vulnerable or maybe um we want to be alone and go into our own inner winter cave and that's a very normal thing to feel so the teaching of the inner winter is to encourage you to go with that, to go with the energy, to not resist it, to practice self-care, to take rest where you can, to go easy on yourself, to not have your standards so high in terms of, I don't know, work or housework or things, to let yourself be comfortable and to really lean in, leaning into,
00:01:57 work or housework or things, to let yourself be comfortable and to really lean in, leaning into, yeah, to your self-care and to rest. Then after the inner winter of your cycle, we come into the inner spring phase of the cycle and the inner spring that's also known as the pre-ovulation stage the stage before ovulation and that's when the hormone estrogen is just starting to rise so you might feel more energy again after having your period you might feel therefore more um capacity for socializing and maybe you have more interest in going back to the gym and working out capacity for socializing and maybe you have more interest in going back to the gym and working out and so that's where your energy is starting to pick up and it's important that we um learn how
00:02:41 of navigate that energy if we push ourselves too much after menstruation especially if you're someone who has a lot of pain and suffering we can actually burn out halfway through the cycle so it's important that we kind of pace ourselves from an energetic point of view in the spring after the spring we have the summer and the summer is the high fertile time of the cycle this is after the spring we have the summer and the summer is the high fertile time of the cycle this is where fertility is at its highest and the hormone oestrogen is at its highest and generally speaking we have more energy we have more capacity for other people's needs and so this would be the time to let yourself go and live life and be out in the world and enjoy yourself here take risks
00:03:19 say yes to things connect with people enjoy being in your body sensuality exercise movement all these all these things creativity as well and then as you come out of the summer we come into the these all these things creativity as well and then as you come out of the summer we come into the what's called the autumn of your cycle the luteal phase or the premenstrual phase and this is where the hormone progesterone starts to increase and oestrogen starts to decrease so there's a kind of a swap over in hormones and some people really can feel tired when that happens or maybe you feel suddenly very moody that's all very normal and similar to the autumn of the the seasons in the world autumn is preparing for winter so the leaves are shedding and the days are getting shorter
00:03:57 world autumn is preparing for winter so the leaves are shedding and the days are getting shorter there's less light and there's more darkness and it's a preparation time for winter so in terms of our self-care um yeah it's good to think about that that's happening inside of our bodies too we're starting to have this um drop in energy and you might notice yourself needing more space or more more more sleep or um maybe you need more food as well we have more requirements for more calories as well during this time as as women so asking ourselves how can we take care of ourselves calories as well during this time as as women so asking ourselves how can we take care of ourselves in our inner autumn how can we look after our emotions too um how can we learn to be okay with
00:04:40 saying no to things and if you are somebody who suffers um with your cycle in some way or with your premenstrual phase it is a good time to prepare for that so you might batch cook some food or you might clean your house and get your get your your change your sheets on your bed or you might ask for help or say yes to offers of help and finding all these little ways that we can you might ask for help or say yes to offers of help and finding all these little ways that we can practice managing our energy and managing our time a little bit better and being kind to ourselves so that's the the inner seasons of the cycle it's a beautiful map and analogy that we can orient ourselves in and and how do we come into relationship with that we come into relationship
00:05:18 with that through curiosity and through tracking our cycle so you can track using an app or I like to use a journal um you know and get really curious about what's happening in your body physically what's happening mentally what's happening emotionally and and start to track physically what's happening mentally what's happening emotionally and and start to track and it's good to maybe track for um three to six months you know really get get to know yourself through the lens of the seasons and then you start to understand who you are what your needs are and and and connect to that cyclicality a little bit more and so yeah enjoy that one Thank you.
