Igniting Your Inner Fire: Welcome to SoulFire Sisters
Hi, I’m Doctor Mary Newstrom.
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And I’m Dawn Morningstar, welcome to Soul Fire Sisters, a sacred space where we ignite women’s inner fire, awaken their truth, and share soulful conversations that inspire, heal, and empower.
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Each episode we dive deep into themes of self discovery, intuition, feminine wisdom, and spiritual growth, guided by raw stories, fierce honesty, and a shared desire to live boldly and authentically.
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Whether you’re on a healing journey, seeking deeper connection, or ready to rise in your power, you are not alone.
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Dawn Morningstar, which is her given name, has been a Women’s Self Empowerment Coach for 37 years, is the award-winning author of Venerable Women, Transform Ourself.
Transform the World is a former radio talk show host, a podcast host, Ted X Speaker, the creator of Radiant Face 18 and Co founder of New World Women.
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Doctor Mary Newstrom is an internationally known shamanic teacher, a spiritual minister, and a keynote speaker.
She founded Zenith High LLC and created Spirit Flower, a shamanic study program for women.
She’s committed to helping women and men develop a strong sense of purpose as they examine and understand how to stand clearly in their power.
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Welcome to the sisterhood, Your soul showed up for a reason.
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Welcome back, Soul Fire sisters.
I’m so glad you’re here.
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Before we dive in, let’s just arrive.
Take one slow breath with us and through the nose and outlet your body.
Remember that you have permission to slow down.
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That breath, that’s exactly what today’s episode is about.
Because we live in a culture that rewards constant output.
Can you relate to that?
The hustle, the consistency, the showing up in the same way every day, forever.
And sisters, that is not how we are built.
Speaker 1
No, not even close.
Why Women Are Natural Cycle Keepers, Not Sufferers
Today we’re talking about feminine cycles, the rhythms that live inside us and all around us, and what becomes possible when we stop fighting them and start flowing with them instead.
Speaker 1
Oh, yeah.
And let’s start here and really talk about everything in nature, moves and cycles.
And here in Minnesota, we understand that, too, with the seasons.
We understand that the seasons really highlight that.
But the moon, when you’re traveling and you’re at the ocean, the tides and even our breath, even the cells in your body are in constant rhythm.
And yet we have built, built a system around us, entire economies around the idea that humans should perform all the basically all the time now 24/7, yeah.
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They.
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Put same energy every single day, all the time, being being accessible 24/7, it’s just pretty incredible.
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And for women especially, that’s been like truly exhausting because our bodies literally operate on a cyclical schedule.
Whether you’re menstruating, in perimenopause, post menopause, your hormones, your energy, your tuition, intuition, tuition and intuition, your creativity, they all move in waves.
Speaker 1
Totally, totally.
And in a it, in an earth based traditions, this is not seen as a weakness or inconvenience.
It’s actually just how it is.
It’s a profound attunement.
It’s understanding it because it’s going to happen even if you understand it or not.
And so women are just natural with cycle keepers.
And we carry the memory of the seasons in our body and the flow and the tide just naturally.
Speaker 2
I love that carrying the memory of seasons in our bodies.
Cycle keepers, not cycle sufferers.
I think we suffer when we are not in flow with cycles.
We, you know, we’re not cycle managed.
We are keepers of this information that is, you know, buried in our bones.
Really.
Speaker 1
Well, and I think the real dilemma too is when we struggle is when we’re trying to go against those cycles, you know, to constantly maybe being on the go and things like that.
What I’ve seen in my work with the, the work that I do as counselling or the shamanic practice is that women begin to understand the rhythms and when they do, they’re just much more in harmony with themselves and the other people.
And they, there’s an understanding that we need days, that we maybe need to be alone or we don’t want to push through times where we need rest.
And it it and it just brings us much more into an authentic, authentic self understanding that.
Speaker 2
Exactly.
Exactly.
Which honestly, it’s the foundation of everything we teach in New World Women.
You know, New World Women is really for spiritually mature women.
And what does that mean?
That means women who are really aware of these cycles and the way that living in harmony with them really does make a huge difference in our lives.
And this is true in my coaching work as well.
Women who are trying to show up the same way every day, the same energy, the same output, the same voice, often feel like they’re failing and what they’re actually doing is ignoring their own intelligence.
When they do that, I’m reminded of Don Miguel Ruiz for agreements where one of them is always do your best and in the always do your best.
Some days my best is going to be better than other days, right?
Even one hour to the next.
So we just have to realize that our bodies are in a rhythm as well.
Navigating Your Energy Through Winter, Spring, Summer, and Autumn
Oh, absolutely.
And that’s a beautiful framework that maps out the there’s a beautiful framework that maps out the menstrual cycle or roughly 28 days of rhythm to The Four Seasons.
It’s it, it kind of connects everything.
And even if your cycle doesn’t follow the calendar perfectly or you’re not cycling in the traditional sense, this framework applies because we all move through inner seasons.
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Absolutely.
Tell us about some of these inner seasons, Mary.
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You know, I think that in that I think everyone’s going to be able to relate to it that with winter, which we’re just coming out of the but that’s A season, inter season of deep rest.
This is a time to go inward to reflect and dream.
But you know, even even when I have sometimes in the summer, we’re just talking about maybe going out of cycle here.
Sometimes in the summer I might close all my shades and take a break and need more of a reflection.
And so it’s just knowing, being in touch with your body, knowing that there’s going to be times you need to go deep in hibernation, which is more In Sync with our winter, and there’s other times that you’re going to be out there.
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Mm hmm.
And then Spring, what about that?
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Spring.
You know what’s new?
Energies are rising.
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That’s where we are now.
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Right.
Ideas being planted, curiosity’s alive.
Your body is literally building towards something.
This is a great time to start new projects, have an important conversation, and so you need to begin things.
And that’s perfect.
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Exactly.
Exactly.
So Mary, we’re going to stop right here for a second and I will let Sean know what we’re doing.
I am not seeing the record budding button showing up on my end.
Did you get that?
Speaker 1
I don’t know about for the last time I I did one time.
Speaker 2
OK.
So I’ll pick up with summer.
Hold on for one second, OK.
It is recording OK.
Usually on the smaller thumbnail it would show recording.
It doesn’t do that anymore.
I just wanted to make sure we weren’t doing all this with no with no recording.
So let’s see.
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We’re in the summer.
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Oh, I know that.
I just wanted to try to see if I could see the the the time stamp so I could let Sean know that we broke here.
OK, so, so summer, which I imagine Mary, is the phase most of us wish we could live in permanently.
I, I mean, I’ve heard a lot of people say that, but for me personally, I love autumn the best.
I don’t know what it is.
It’s something about autumn always feels like a new beginning to me, which is antithetical because most people it’s spring.
But I think that maybe we each resonate with a different season for, you know, for different reasons.
I know.
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I think, I think that’s, I think that’s exactly correct, because the fact that with I, I love autumn too, and you and and Don, you might like it as well because the changing of the colours, it’s very pretty out.
A lot of people like after the summer going into sweater time and sweatshirt time, but with summer coming out of a deep winter is always nice too and people do like to spend time with that.
I for listeners listening to this that are not in an area that has Four Seasons and I do know that we have listeners all over the country and world.
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That.
Speaker 1
This, this might be an interesting concept thinking.
Yeah, yeah.
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Yeah, we live it.
We live it fully right.
And I.
Speaker 1
And I, you know, I enjoy it.
I think it gives us, I’m so grateful that I am here.
I think it just gives me a greater respect for nature as well.
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Absolutely, absolutely OK.
Speaker 1
Well, you know, it really does.
Autumn, summer, spring, winter, whatever you like it really, I think honoring it and going with what your body’s telling you to do in autumn.
It, it the, the veil of the, the different dimensions is thinning.
That’s why of course we have, well, we have Halloween and emotions rise and the truth comes through and, and really that’s where we get to really kind of go deeper with our emotions as well.
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And.
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Relating it back to maybe the menstruation is that might be related back to more what people might call PMS or that that women are having something going on.
But that’s a powerful time with the thinning of the veil.
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Yeah, it really is what we have.
All Souls day and autumn and yeah, thinning of the veil for sure.
So instead of managing Autumn, we could be listening to it.
Speaker 1
Absolutely, absolutely.
What is it asking for you to release?
What is it asking you to how to connect?
Like go of that, you know it’s it.
And I’m going to equate it back to the trees, the ones that actually shed their Leafs, because not all of them do, but the ones that do, it’s like, well, what are they letting go of?
And, and we talked about this the previous podcast, is that once you let go of things, you’re making room for new things as well.
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It’s so true.
We forget that part sometimes.
You know, we can get so sad to see the leaves fall that we don’t realize that there’s another cycle happening and that there will be those new buds of leaves coming out, you know, in the following in the following year.
Reclaiming Wisdom: Maiden, Mother, Crone, and Beyond
So I want to zoom out for a minute, Mary, because because not every woman has a monthly cycle.
And this conversation is for everyone on this call.
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Yeah, and absolutely.
The lunar cycle follows roughly the same 20 day arc and many women who are postmenopausal or whose cycle are shifted find that the moon becomes kind of an extended rhythm to the sink.
So keeping the keep that in mind, the moon is still affecting you and new moon as think of it as new new moon as winter dark inward and you know, seeding you and the full moon as summer illuminating full magnetic.
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I love that.
And then there are the larger cycles, the seasons of a year, the seasons of a life.
I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately, especially talking, you know, describing the spiritually mature woman.
It’s not necessarily about age, but it’s about a certain kind of, you know, being seasoned, so to speak.
And we we talk about the maiden, the mother.
And some people use the word Crone.
Some people use the word, the phrase wise women.
I think about this a lot in my work with women who are in their 40s, fifties, sixties, 70s.
There’s this cultural narrative that says this phase is some kind of a loss.
As a matter of fact, have you seen people when it’s their 40th birthday party?
They have like all these like black crepe paper and like rest in peace, like you’re dying because you’re 40, you know.
Oh my God, I since I turned 40, it has been the best years of my life.
I would never want to go back and do all of those earlier decades over again.
I enjoyed them for what they were, but I really came into my wisdom years once I turned 40.
And you know, what I see over and over again that’s true, is it’s actually an arrival when we come into ourselves and come into that spiritual maturity.
Speaker 1
I agree 100%.
I’ve also know some women who are claiming the title of sage and so yes, because Crone has a negative connotation, but wise woman sage, we don’t shrink and we really how we’re living is our medicine and our belief and we’re living authentically.
Speaker 2
Yeah, I mean, I don’t love the word Crone because you know me, I’m a word nerd and I don’t love the sound of the word.
But in a way, I almost want to reclaim it because it has also been distorted because it refers to an older woman.
And that kind of bothers me.
So in a way, just just to be rebellious, I want to say Crone.
But whatever word we use, we understand what we’re talking about, you know, And these cycles, this turning, it’s not decline.
It really is transformation.
Speaker 1
Absolutely.
And it actually, as we’re growing, becoming even more wise, we’re turning into wise women.
It’s really is giving us more insight in being able to understand more on a spiritual level to with our compassion to open up to the world.
It’s just it’s just really important that we honor these different cycles and understand them, knowing they’re really helping us become these strong, independent, wise women.
Speaker 2
Very beautifully said, Mary.
That’s so true.
And you know, if we go back to, and we’ve talked about this in several different ways over past episodes where we talk about the idea that there have been so many things that have, you know, been designed to control us as humans and as women.
And one of those things that has to do with control has to do with controlling the way we look at cycles.
Like, for example, you know, there should be thirteen months in a year and you know, every 28 days should be a new month.
It’s like all of these things were put into this kind of neat category or neat calendar when in fact they took us out of the rhythm with nature.
Yep, agree.
How Listening to Personal Rhythms Transforms Daily Life
OK, Hey, story time.
I know this big thing and we like it.
And this is where things get real.
So don’t tell us.
Is there a moment in your life when honoring your rhythm change something for you?
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Yeah, I mean, totally.
I was a person who always loved staying up really, really late.
I, I guess it was because, you know, when I had my children were younger, it’s like when they went to bed.
That was the only time I had to myself.
And, you know, on and on it goes.
But anyway, then I went and studied in India and I learned so much about like the proper times to be in alignment with cycles in regard to when we eat and when we sleep and things like that.
So you know, the cycles from 6:00 PM to 10:00 PM, that really is the time to wind down to limb, to dim the lights and prepare for sleep.
And this is the part that really makes a difference for us between 10:00 PM and 2:00 AM.
That’s when our restorative sleep and our digestion phase takes place.
What is really cool is if we don’t go to bed around 10:00, we get this second wind at 10:00 notice and see if that’s not true for you.
And that’s where you might even want to snack because your body’s like, oh, we’re getting this second wind and we need a little something to keep that going.
But following the cycles of the natural cycles for the body, when to eat, when to sleep and my perfect with it.
Absolutely not.
But I do pay attention to it and I do it as often as I possibly can.
And here’s what I’ve noticed.
If I am in bed by say 10, close to 10, and asleep pretty soon after that, I have a whole different day the next day than when I stay up until 11:30 or 12:00.
How about you, Mary?
Well, I.
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You know what I I’m just going to tack on to your story and then I’ll tell you a little bit about my story.
But I agree, it’s like it.
And, and actually the sleep experts, what I’ve heard is they do say you get your better sleep when you even even if you get the same number of sleep, it’s better if when you go to sleep early.
So everything you were saying is really, really true.
And fortunately I’m kind of wired that way.
I’d say I’m more of a morning person, but you know, I have my routine too and like to get up and stuff like that and have my coffee, tea, whatever.
What I want to share with my story I was thinking about this is I’m going to I already alluded to it in in, in a few minutes ago, but really it’s like I have noticed and it and it’s not fighting and it’s honouring it.
This is where I want to.
Why I want to highlight it again is.
Sometimes in the summer this is going to sound weird, but sometimes in the summer I if I’m outside a lot and it’s been bright and sunny or maybe I’m visiting someplace that has more intense sun, it’s like I feel like I need to come in and have some time inside away from the intense sunshine.
So almost like simulating a winter scene for a day where I popped all the drapes.
I might read, watch TV, whatever.
But my point is, is I don’t fight it.
It’s very rare.
I’d say it’s like maybe one time through the whole cycle of the summer.
But it’s honoring.
It’s honoring it.
I know my body needs something and it’s like I am honoring that and tapping into that makes.
Speaker 2
Sense it does make sense.
It really does.
And it sounds to me like what you’re practicing is awareness of what your body needs, when it needs it and you’re giving it to it.
And I think that’s really wonderful.
Three Questions to Unlock Your Body’s Innate Wisdom
Yeah, this week’s Soul Fire Spark is simple, and it might just change everything.
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And here it is for the next 7 days.
Keep a rhythm journal, or simply an awareness of the rhythm of your life.
You can make a few notes or even just be aware of it morning or evening, whatever works by asking yourself these three questions, OK?
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One What season am I in right now?
Winter, spring, summer, or.
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Autumn.
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Trust your gut.
You’ll know.
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Question two.
What does this season need from me?
Does it need rest or creation or connection or release?
What does this season need from me?
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And question three, what is one way I can honor that today?
Even something small, something secret for you.
And that might mean coming inside, pulling those drapes, watching TV, even if it’s a nice day outside.
Speaker 2
Yes, yes.
You know, this really ties back to something I was working on this morning with the women and spirituality team.
And we decided there was a little room that used to be used as a healing room with another group that used to be there.
And it’s a quiet room.
A lot of people don’t even know that it’s there.
And we’re going to use that room as like a womb where people can step away from the busyness of the conference and there’ll be a candle in there and some gentle music playing just to do exactly what you were saying, Mary, just step away from the busyness.
And whatever you decide to think about or journal about with the answers to those questions, you don’t need to share them with anyone and you don’t need to get it perfect.
The main thing is just start listening because your body has been speaking to you your whole life, and this week we’re just going to pay attention a little bit more.
Yeah.
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Your rhythm, your cycle, is not a problem to be solved.
It’s a wisdom to be followed.
Embrace Your Passion and Create a New World
That’s some juicy wisdom there, I’ll tell you.
Speaker 1
Hey by your sisters, we hope you’ve enjoyed this episode and oh we are so glad you’re here for season 2.
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Until we meet again.
Feel the fire in your soul and live from it.
Like really, live from the fire in your soul.
Speaker 1
Our world needs your passion, your gifts, your heart.
Don’t wait, lean in.
Do it now.
When whatever your it is, do it now.
That’s.
Speaker 2
For sure.
Hey, let’s create a new world for ourselves and for all the future generations.
Thank you, dear listeners, for sharing this sacred space with us today.
Soul Fire Sisters is lovingly created and produced by ME, Dawn Morningstar and Doctor Mary Newstrom with editing and publishing by Sean Fujo.
Speaker 1
This podcast is brought to you by Xenothai LLC, Spear Flow Shamanic Study Programs, New World Women and Radiate Face 18 and is featured on the New World Women Voices of Wisdom podcast.
Speaker 2
You can find all the ways to connect with us in the show notes.
Farewell for now and remember your soul Fire knows the way.
It really does it.
Speaker 1
Sure does.
Bye bye everyone.
Speaker 2
See you next time.
Speaker 1
Hey Soul Fire Sisters, we hope you’ve enjoyed this episode.
Please share Soul Fire Sisters with your friends.
Speaker 2
Until we meet again, reflect on the changes you want to make, feel the fire in your soul, and live from that fire.
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Our world needs your passion, your gifts, your heart.
Don’t wait, do it now.
Whatever your it is, do it now.
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Let’s use our power to create a world we actually want to live in, a loving new world for ourselves and for future generations.
We’ve got this.