I’m so glad you’re here. I have an amazing guest for you today! Crystal Cockerham is a spiritual mentor, a certified red tent facilitator, and also an author. We are going to talk about what that means and why that can open your mind to a whole new possibility for your life.

I’m sure there are a lot of people out there who have never heard of a red tent facilitator. Now, I myself have read the book, which was incredible, and I highly recommend anyone out there to read The Red Tent.

The Red Tent

The red tent is often referred to as moon lodges or moon circles. They are a means for women to reclaim their divine feminine energy and nature and embrace that goddess within, if you will. And so when you, when you study global cultures around the world, one thing in common with especially agricultural societies, and I I’m talking like as far back as you possibly can go, what you find is that there are these things that become known as the red tent or the moon lodge. And what that means is, you know, us ladies, we, when we initiate into womanhood, we enter into this cycle. Where every month, we go through what I like to refer to as a shamanic death.

The woman’s cycle of a woman’s menstruation is the same as the cycle of the moon. And so in these agricultural societies, when ladies were on their moon flow, during their moon flow, they would go to the tent or the moon lodge, and they would be there for a period of days. And you know, anyone who has sisters or daughters, and you’ve lived together, you know, those cycles also sync up. So this was a community-wide time during which the men and the children would take on the daily duties, and they would care for the women. 

Now when women are going through their menstrual cycle, they’re expected to not only go about business in their usual way, but we serve so many people in so many ways, whether that be a spouse or a partner or our kids, or you know, people at our jobs. And we don’t take any special time during those cycles. And, you know, there’s not a lot of celebration when a girl comes into womanhood, nor is there any acknowledgment of when you’re going through that cycle or once you pass through it and into the menopause.

There’s almost shame around it. Young girls want to hide the fact that they’re menstruating. They don’t want anyone to know about it. And menopause has become sort of this, oh, you’re going downhill. You know, you’re no longer young. You’re no longer as valuable. And I, with a society valuing not just femininity, but procreation and fertility, that’s what makes our society. Without it, we don’t have children. We don’t, we don’t keep growing, and we would completely die out and become extinct. And it’s so sad that we’ve gotten so far away.

I would really like to speak to a woman being celebrated when she steps into womanhood, but also the sadness and the looking down upon, again, as you enter into the moon phase.

This is all in our bodies. So there’s really something to be celebrated. 

I believe there’s so much power in coming together.