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Welcome to "No F**ks Given," where we redefine menopause as a superpower. Hosted by Holly Lamb, a women's health coach, who is navigating early menopause. This podcast offers empowering guidance on women's health and navigating perimenopause with confidence. From nutrition tips to fitness advice and mindfulness practices, we cover it all. But here's the twist: it's all about embracing your most authentic, unapologetic self. We're here to help you reclaim your power, say goodbye to societal norms, and live life on your own terms—no f**ks given. Welcome to the revolution!
Holly Lamb (00:01.422)
Hello and welcome to the next episode of the No Fucks Given podcast with me, your host, Holly Lamb. This week's episode is all about deep rest. So in today's fast paced world, deep rest often gets overlooked and even stigmatized as laziness. And I want to challenge these cultural norms and explore the vital importance of deep rest, especially in the context of perimenopause.
I want to dive into the hustle culture and the social media pressures that contribute to the devaluation of rest.
and why reclaiming it is essential for our wellbeing going forward. There's such potential for transformative deep rest to spark creativity and to foster your personal growth. So join me and I want to extend the invitation to you to embrace deep unapologetic rest and share your experiences with me.
Holly Lamb (01:25.294)
So as I touched on in the introduction, there seems to be a lot of negativity around deep rest and how it is somewhat frowned upon for you to take any kind of time away for yourself and just to do nothing. Like how often do you actually do nothing? Yes, we might sit on our phones, we might sit and watch TV, but...
Is there ever a time where you would just sit and be with yourself and be with your thoughts? Because there's very few people that do that. And actually there is amazing insights and magic that happens when you do that. I mean, how often have you been laid on the city or in bed, got up late and your partner was like, oh, you've been lazy, you're so lazy. And it's these...
that go into our subconscious that get ingrained in there and then deep rest is looked upon as something negative and something that we shouldn't do. But actually it's one of the most.
Holly Lamb (02:45.198)
loving and compassionate things that you can do for yourself and especially going into perimenopause, it's something that we need to be doing more of.
Holly Lamb (03:03.182)
in the world that we live in at the moment.
Holly Lamb (03:08.174)
productivity and busyness is glorified and looked upon as something that we should be doing all the time. If we're not working hard, then we won't achieve what we want to achieve, well, that's just complete nonsense. We achieve more when we are fully rested, fully in our own power and have had time for ourselves because I've done it before where...
I could be sit at my desk all week and I won't be getting anything done because I'll be distracted, I'll be doing other things. I won't sit and do what's required. And actually now I've got to the point where I can do a lot of the things that I need to do for that week in a couple of days because I sit down and I prioritize what I need to do and I can get it done rather than taking all week.
to do something you can probably do in one day. And that kind of comes down to learning more about me, learning how I work. So I'm a projector in human design, which means I look at things in a different way to most people and I can find systems and things to get shit done quicker, basically. So for me, taking time and taking rest has become integral.
for me in order for me to thrive and for my business to thrive. Because when I first started the hustle culture of you must be working all the time, you must be doing this in order to achieve your goals is just crap. And especially as women, we live in a cyclical body compared to men. So honoring the different phases of our cycle.
also comes down to this as well. So there's going to be the time of your inner autumn and your inner winter. And especially when you're on your period to be taking time to take a step back and rest. Because if we don't take that rest there, then we're going to pay for it later down the line. Cause I've done it before. I've worked through my period when I know I should have been taking time for me. And then it gets to ovulation and I'm absolutely shattered because I didn't take that time for deep rest.
Holly Lamb (05:28.238)
for going inwards and for just taking time for me. So I think we need to look at the way that society has glorified busyness and productivity and change that narrative to say, look, I can still get all my work done in a shorter space of time if I'm able to rest and take time for myself.
Holly Lamb (06:04.142)
So then relating this back to perimenopause and rest. So as we head through into perimenopause and beyond, rest has to become an integral part of our being because due to the fluctuations in hormones, our stress levels are rising, our cortisol is rising, and the way we handle stress has changed and we're not able to handle it in the same way as our bodies did when we were back in our 20s and our early 30s. So.
taking rest and taking time for yourself is a non -negotiable. So this is where self -care comes in. This is where taking time for you, even if it's just an hour a week to start with, you have to start to prioritize rest. Otherwise, you're gonna get to that point where you are just gonna burn out. You're just gonna reach that point where,
you literally cannot give any more because you've come to the end and...
your body gives up the ghost. And I don't, I want any woman to ever get to that point because we shouldn't have to ever get to that point because we should listen to our body, listen to our intuition, listen to what it's trying to tell us and honor it, which is really difficult when we live in this fast pace, hustle culture. But this is why coming back to practicing menstrual cycle awareness,
allows you to lean into deep rest and allows you to prioritize it and learn how to do it. Because it's so difficult for so many women because they're so used to being on the go. They're so used to being the rushing woman, but in perimenopause, you just can't do that anymore.
Holly Lamb (08:39.278)
So just to dive a little bit deeper into perimenopause and why we aren't able to manage stress as well as we could. So I'm just gonna talk about the different hormones and how they kind of affect you. So there's your endocrine glands, they're organs that produce your hormones. And there's a team called the HPA axis, that's your adrenal team.
and that includes your hypothalamus, your pituitary and the endocrine glands known as your adrenals. So this team produces cortisol and that gives you the energy and mental clarity during times of stress. Now there is another team called the HPO access, which is your sex hormone team. That's also made up of the hypothalamus, pituitary,
Holly Lamb (09:37.614)
There's another team though, that's your sex hormone team called the HPO axis. And that's also made up of your hypothalamus, your pituitary and the endocrine glands, which would be your ovaries. So the HPO axis team controls the production of estrogen, progesterone and testosterone. So what happens when you enter perimenopause? The HPO axis team slows down.
However, your body still needs sex hormones. So this is when the HPA axis team starts to take over. However, if you think this team has already been working overtime for years, managing the physical and emotional stresses that you've been under, this is when the perimenopausal madness can begin. So once the handover happens, your sex hormones decline quickly.
and that can leave you feeling anxious, depressed, lacking sex drive, unable to sleep, and you kind of feel like you're losing your mind. So this is why deep rest in perimenopause is just vital because if you're not giving your body time to calm down and to take time out,
this is when you're going to experience burnout. And this is why self care and rest becomes such a vital part of your daily practice when trying to navigate perimenopause. So it's not just a case of, oh, we need to take more time for ourselves. It's actually a necessity in order to protect your body and to protect your mind. And also if losing weight is a goal, then keeping that cortisol level down,
and those insulin levels down is vital. And by doing the deep rest, that is one part of being able to keep those levels down and that in turn helps you to lose weight.
Holly Lamb (12:06.414)
overcoming the stigma of deep rest, I think will be a very long -term struggle with the society that we live in, the hustle culture, the you must work more to earn more, which is just not correct. And that takes time, but we do that by each honoring our bodies. And you might think, how can I do anything? How can one person do anything? Well,
If you start to implement the practices of honoring your body and practicing deep rest, and then you talk to your friend about it, or you talk to your daughter or whoever you talk to your sister and they start doing it as well, then what happens is it creates this ripple effect out into the world. And that's how big change happens. The power of the feminine has been lost over the years and
The way we can do that is by tuning into our bodies, practicing menstrual cycle awareness, bringing harmony back into our bodies, practicing the rest at times when we need it, and then telling other people and other women about this practice. That is how the change happens. And I feel like it is slowly starting to happen. The menstruality leadership program that I'm doing, all of the women on there honor their bodies.
And if we all tell one person about this, then that's how that ripple effect comes out. And I just want to overcome and help other women overcome the stigma of listening to your body and taking time out for yourself. And in perimenopause, it's the number one thing that you should be doing above all. So kind of practical tips in order to help you achieve this is,
start small. Don't be like, right, I'm just going to take a week off and I'm going to hibernate. I mean, if you want to do that, that's great. If you can do that, that's great. But little steps is how you achieve the goals that you want to achieve. So start small by maybe an hour a week. If you've got a family, if you've got a partner, you can speak to them about it and explain to them what you need and why you need it. So talking to your partner, which...
Holly Lamb (14:32.974)
is something I would highly encourage anyway about how you're feeling, especially through this transition as it can be quite difficult for a lot of women. But if you're able to speak to your partner and explain, look, I need time out for me. If you can do this, if you can make dinner for me one night, I just need an hour away. You can take yourself off for a bath. You can take yourself off for a massage, a coffee, a walk. It doesn't have to cost anything. It can be free. You can just take yourself off, but...
Starting small and doing that would be a fantastic place to start.
Holly Lamb (15:12.174)
Next, if you're not already practicing menstrual cycle awareness, practice menstrual cycle awareness. So this is tapping into the different energies, the different themes and the different parts of your cycle. You can still do this even if you don't have a regular menstrual cycle. And if you don't have one at all, you can use the moon cycles. So practicing that and understanding the...
different energies and different points in your cycle will help you to realize when you need to take time for yourself and when you need to practice that rest. So usually for most women, it's the lead up to your period. So the inner autumn and the inner winter. So a few days leading up to your period and then the day of your bleed, if you're able to take time for yourself then that's a really nourishing thing to do and just being with the feelings.
And by understanding where you are in your cycle and by practicing mental cycle awareness, you can weave in deep rest and your body and your mind will thank you for it.
Holly Lamb (16:35.854)
For me personally, practicing deep rest has been a game changer. Like I sometimes will wake up, I will journal and then I will just sit and be in bed for a while, get a cup of coffee, whatever it is and just sit and be with yourself and your thoughts because actually in these times, especially in an autumn, in a winter when you're more connected to your intuition,
This is a perfect time to do this because this is when you can get real downloads and you can get real insight into your life, into your work, whatever it is. If you're struggling with a problem, it's a really good time to just sit and intuition comes to you or just start writing. And you would be amazed at what comes out, but this only happens in stillness. And this only happens when you're honoring your body and you're practicing.
that deep rest. So for me, it's been transformative and there's such power in this work if you can really lean into it and we can start to overcome the stigma and not buy into the hustle culture that we currently live in.
So my invitation to you would be to embark on a journey of deep rest. And I would love to hear your experiences of this as well. So what's one thing you can do this week in order to practice deep rest?
Holly Lamb (18:20.974)
just one hour, an hour this week that you can take time for you just to be with you and not do anything. I would absolutely love you to share your experiences with me, DM me on Instagram, let me know what you've been doing, let me know how you've been getting on. And it's just so important that we try and rewrite the narrative around rest and reclaiming the power.
I'm reclaiming the value that is in this work. And if you feel like that's something you haven't got a clue how to practice, then I encourage you to come and speak to me and we can work one -to -one together. I can help you navigate perimenopause with all the tools and knowledge that I have that I've used to help me just feel better in myself to help me to...
navigate this next phase that's come early for me, but I use it as such a power that I want every woman to be able to experience that as well. There's going to be hard days, I totally understand, but with the tools and the knowledge that I have, I want to help you be able to guide you through this next phase. So if you want to come and work with me, DM me on Instagram, and we can have a chat about how that would work.
Thank you so much for joining me on this week's episode and I will see you next week.