Gather. Root. Nourish.
As we move deeper into autumn, we enter the season of the harvest.
The Harvest Moon (closest to the Autumnal Equinox) has traditionally been a time of gathering. It carries the energy of abundance, completion, gratitude, and preparation: gathering what has grown, preserving what will nourish us, and appreciating what this season has brought to fruition.
What are you harvesting?
Perhaps you have potted plants now offering their final fruits. Or maybe you accomplished personal or professional goals this summer that are worthy of celebration. Perhaps as you look back over the summer, you see cherished memories made with friends and family, lingering over watermelon slices.
Whether it’s in the garden, the dining room, or the boardroom, every type of harvesting requires discernment. What do you want to gather – and what can fall away? What are the fruits of your labors? What do you want to bring with you moving forward into Autumn, and what do you need to let go of? What deserves your YES and your NO?
You don’t need to sit down with a spreadsheet to answer these questions. Turn first to the wisdom of your body.
The quiet signals you’ve learned to ignore. The YES that feels expansive and enlivening. The NO that gently nudges us to stop. In this Harvest season, take time to come home to yourself.
Your body already knows
Many of us, especially women, have been taught to look outside ourselves for the answers. What does the doctor say? What does the expert recommend? What does my family need? What should I be doing? What is everyone else doing?
There is nothing inherently wrong with receiving information, guidance, or support. Being open to learning is beautiful. But we need to be mindful: Who gets to say YES and NO, in our lives?
When we’ve spent years following other people’s prescriptions—whether about our health, our relationships, or our work—it can take time to even recognize what our own YES and NO feel like, let alone to act on them.
Sometimes the signals are unmistakable. Sometimes they’re soft and subtle. They can differ from woman to woman and from season to season of our lives.
Your body’s YES might feel like electricity, warmth, opening, expanding, aliveness. You might get an image of a little girl jumping up and down with glee, right at your solar plexus. You might feel simply … calm.
A NO might feel like contraction, heaviness, nausea, tension, withdrawal. It could feel like subtle agitation. You might get a subtle image of someone shaking their head, “nu-uh.”
Your body’s signals may be a full-body experience … or just a little nudge. A full-throated answer … or a whisper.
The more you tune into your body’s wisdom, the more you’ll discover. The faster you’ll get the message. Soon, your body won’t have to shout to get your attention. You’ll be amazed at how your self-trust will deepen. Not only is this the taproot of wisdom, it’s a powerful way to heal your relationship with yourself.
Learning to hear and honor your body’s signals is a practice of sovereignty.
The difference between your YES and someone else’s
Years ago, when my children were young, I had a ritual. Once they were all down for a nap, I would sit down with a bag of Mint Milano cookies … and eat the entire bag.
I knew I was exhausted. I knew the cookies felt like a treat. There was even a certain mindfulness to it: I’m tired. This is something nice I’m giving myself. It felt like a whole-body YES.
Until one day, I realized: this might be a YES … but it wasn’t mine! It was actually my mother’s YES. I had watched my mother use food in much the same way when I was a child.
Once this dawned on me, things shifted immediately. The very next day, I didn’t need the cookies anymore. I was interested in something much more important than the crunchy, minty sweetness: I wanted to connect with my own YES.
I got more curious. Not in a rushed way – reverently. Slowly, I began recognizing the things in my life that had felt like YES – but actually weren’t. They were either NO’s or someone else’s YESes.
The pot my college friends were smoking that made me a little paranoid – that was a NO for me. The boyfriend my body kept rejecting – all of my friends knew he was a NO before I did, but overnight, I finally admitted it. I had been overriding my body’s signals.
Sometimes we inherit our YESES and NOS from our mothers, our families, our communities, our partners, or our culture. We absorb what we’re supposed to want, what we’re supposed to tolerate, what we’re supposed to eat, how we’re supposed to live.
And because we’ve lived with those patterns for so long, they can feel like us. Until we slow down and examine them.
Your YES can change
This is important, too: Your body’s YES and NO are allowed to change. Something can be a genuine YES for you at one point in your life and become a NO later. That doesn’t mean you were wrong before.
Maybe chocolate really was something your body needed – or something that brought comfort – during a particular season. Maybe a certain food, relationship, practice, or way of living served a purpose at the time … and then you changed.
As you became more nourished, more resourced, more connected to yourself, your body began asking for something different. Your YES evolved. That’s not wrong – that’s life.
This is part of coming into your power: you don’t have to make your body commit to an answer forever. You can listen again. And again.
But discovering your YES and NO is only the beginning. Eventually, we have to learn to speak them. This is where sovereignty gets real.
It is one thing to know, privately, I don’t want this. It is another thing to say no to the person who expects you to say yes.
It is one thing to feel, This is what my body needs. It is another thing to act on that knowing when an authority figure tells you something different.
And this is especially important as we think about health creation. When we begin moving out of the paradigm of simply following a system of health care and toward actively participating in the creation of our own health, we will encounter many external voices. Doctors. Experts. Protocols. Systems. People who genuinely want to help us. And people who are simply accustomed to being obeyed.
We often feel pressured to go along with the flow, even when it’s at the expense of our instincts. In the face of those pressures, it is incredibly powerful to pause and honor our YES and NO.
The goal isn’t to reject all outside information. The goal is to stop abandoning your own knowing. You can listen. You can learn. You can ask questions. And then you can come back home to yourself and ask: What does my body say?
That is sovereignty. The courage to take the next best step.
You don’t have to know everything. You don’t have to have the entire path figured out. Sometimes sovereignty looks less like making one enormous life-changing decision and more like taking the next best step.
A small YES. Then another. Learning to cook one healthy meal for yourself. Trying something new. Noticing how your body responds. Paying attention to what nourishes you. Letting something go when you realize it no longer belongs.
This is how trust is built. One next best step at a time.
And the more you listen, the more you learn your body’s language. You begin to know the difference between I want this and I think I should want this. Between this nourishes me and this is what I’ve been told is good for me. Between I’m afraid and this is a NO. Between this is uncomfortable because it’s new and this is uncomfortable because it isn’t right for me.
This discernment is the beginning of self-trust. It is powerful, sister.
What happens when you honor yourself this way?
When you stop ignoring your own signals and begin trusting yourself, so much around you can shift.
Your children see a woman who honors herself. They learn that their own knowing matters.
Your partner encounters a woman who is actually present and participating, rather than someone who is constantly abandoning herself to keep everything running.
Your friends experience more authentic connection. Your family encounters boundaries that actually mean something. And your community feels what happens when women stop organizing their lives entirely around external expectations and begin building lives around what truly nourishes them.
Here’s the hard part most people don’t mention: not everyone will celebrate this change. Some people are accustomed to your YES. Your over-giving. Following the prescription they’ve laid out for you. When you begin listening to yourself, they may push back.
That doesn’t mean you’ve done something wrong. Sometimes, the relationships that aren’t meant to continue will naturally fall away. And the relationships that are meant to deepen will become stronger because you finally arrive in them as your whole self. You are no longer giving from self-abandonment. You are choosing from fullness.
Why this matters right now
Believe it or not, the holiday season is right around the corner. And the pressure begins long before the holidays themselves. Back-to-school transitions. Shopping. Family gatherings. Travel. Hosting. Emotional labor. Expectations. Spending. Planning. And an endless stream of messages telling us what we should be doing.
That’s why now is the perfect time to practice listening to your body’s wisdom. Not by adding another thing to your list. Not by beginning another complicated protocol. But by becoming curious about yourself. Feel your feet on the earth and ask yourself: What do I need?
If you can hear the YES in your body while life is relatively quiet, you will have something to return to when the world gets louder.
If you can’t hear yourself now, it becomes much harder when everyone else is asking something of you.
So begin here. Begin gently. Begin now.
A Harvest Moon Meditation: Finding Your Body’s YES and NO
This Harvest Moon, I invite you to gather something precious: your body’s own knowing.
Set aside a few quiet minutes. Get comfy – whether that means wrapping up in a blanket or simply settling gently into your chair.
You don’t need to solve anything. You don’t need to make any decisions. Just simply listen. Take one step closer to yourself and ask: what do YES and NO feel like, in my body?
Think back on something in your life that was an absolute, no doubt about it, full-on YES. It might have been a new relationship or leap in your career. Choosing a spiritual path. Or something tiny yet sacred. It should bring a smile to your face and a sense of celebration.
Now, hold this in your awareness and scan your body. What do you notice? What does a full-on YES feel like? Is there warmth? An image that comes to mind? Is any area of your body tingly? How does your wombspace feel? Are there colors, sounds, textures, movements, symbols? Some people notice a rocking front to back or clockwise.
Thank your body for showing you this.
Next, recall a time in your life when you said NO – and it was 100%, no doubt about it, the right call. Remember that choice point. Remember saying NO. How did that feel in your body? How does it feel right now, remembering it? Notice the textures. Some people experience this like a valve shutting off. Or a sense of closing in a contraction. Cold, metallic stillness. For me, it feels like the space around my body closes in. Is your body rocking side to side or swaying counter-clockwise? What somatic clues is your body sharing with you?
Thank your body for its willingness to share with you. Take a few notes for yourself so you can remember how your body likes to speak to you about YES and NO. Be open to noticing more signals, moving forward.
You have not solved your whole life. You’ve done something much more foundational. You’ve listened. This is the beginning … and the ground underneath every next step.
Gather what is yours
The Harvest Moon asks us to gather. So gather your knowing. Gather your YES. Gather your strength to say NO. Gather the courage to take your next best step.
And as we move deeper into autumn, remember that coming home to yourself isn’t a destination. It’s a practice.
Your precious body has been speaking all along. You don’t need another voice drowning that out – not even mine. You need to come home to yourself.
And from here … take your next best step.
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