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Menopause: Women's Third Rite of Passage

Season #4

Episode Summary

In this episode of Awaken Your Power, Keri talks with Maree Lipschitz—speaker, facilitator, writer, and lifelong spiritual seeker—about the radical cultural power of female rites of passage. Drawing from decades of work with girls and women at puberty, motherhood, and menopause, Marie shares how ceremony and ritual can transform these transitions from private struggles into publicly honored initiations.

Together, Keri and Maree explore how reclaiming these rites of passage doesn’t just support individual women—it quietly undermines patriarchal, capitalist norms and invites an entirely different model of wisdom, leadership, and community.

In This Episode, We Explore:

  • How Marie went from industrial chemist studying oxytocin to a facilitator of deeply embodied female rites of passage.

  • Why menarche, motherhood, and menopause are spiritual rites—not just biological events.

  • What Maree learned when no one honored her own transition into motherhood, and how that sparked her work designing ceremonies for new mothers.

  • Examples of rites of passage from Indigenous and traditional cultures (from four-day dances to 40 days of post-birth seclusion) and what our modern world has lost by abandoning them.

  • Why post-menopausal women have historically been the wisdom-keepers—and how longer lifespans are creating an unprecedented wave of potential elder leadership.

  • How patriarchy harms both women and men, by over-valuing masculine forms of power and shutting down emotion, intuition, and vulnerability.

  • The quiet but radical difference between “helping women succeed in the current system” vs. using ritual to question and reshape the system itself.

  • The idea that all rites of passage are embodied and why public witnessing, truth-telling, and blessing are essential parts of any initiation.

  • Practical, everyday ways to reclaim ceremony:

    • Marking first periods, first heartbreaks, significant birthdays, and other turning points.

    • Simple rituals you can create at home for yourself or loved ones.

  • How denying rites of passage pushes teens (and adults) to self-initiate through risk-taking, numbing, or self-destructive choices.

  • What it means to move from “midlife crisis” to midlife transformation, with ritual as a container.

  • Maree's reframing of the Triple Goddess:

    • Maiden → Menarche and emerging sexuality

    • Mother → Nurturer (whether or not you have biological children)

    • Menopause → The Alchemist, with Crone/Elder emerging more fully around 70+

  • The deep stigma and falsehoods we must unlearn about menopause, including the belief that women lose their value once fertility ends.

  • Why Maree encourages women to track their cycles (and perimenopausal symptoms) as an act of power and a practical tool when seeking support.

  • A simple, beautiful story of how she honored her last period with candles, a bath, and a love letter to her body.

Key Takeaways

  • If culture doesn’t provide initiation, we will seek it anyway—often through risky, unconscious, or harmful paths.

  • Ceremony doesn’t have to be elaborate. Simple + sincere + witnessed can be life-changing.

  • We are living in a rare moment in history where large numbers of post-menopausal women have the health, resources, and desire to lead.

  • Bringing sacredness to the mundane—a birthday, a breakup, a final period—can reshape how we see ourselves and each other.

  • Tracking your cycle and symptoms is not just “data”; it’s a way of claiming your authority over your own body and story.

About Maree Lipschitz

Maree Lipschitz is a speaker, facilitator, and writer specializing in female rites of passage. A former industrial chemist, she spent a decade working in corporate and tertiary education before becoming a mother in 1995—an experience that radically altered her path.

For the past 20+ years, Maree has facilitated:

  • Puberty workshops for pre-teen girls and their mothers

  • Rites-of-passage programs for teenage girls

  • Menopause and perimenopause workshops for women

Her work centers on menarche, motherhood, and menopause as profound spiritual initiations. Marie is currently writing her book, Menarche, Motherhood and Menopause: A Woman’s Journey Through Life, weaving memoir, archetypal psychology, and decades of facilitation experience.

Connect with Maree