Name: Keli Denise

Menopause phase: Post Menopause (8 years)

Place you call home: St. Louis, MO

What you’re creating: I am creating a sacred space for creating connection and building community through conscious conversations and storytelling

Age: 52 (this month – December) 🙂

1. Rituals can be deeply personal. What is one personal practice you’ve adopted to embrace the transitions of menopause and growing older?

Gratitude is a ritual that has deepened most recently. As soon as I wake up each day, I am saying thank you. Not in a robotic mundane way. I genuinely say thank you from my heartspace that often leads to tears. To be chosen to express the Divine in a way only I can is such an honor.

2. Have you redefined beauty as you’ve aged? If so, how? Do any of your rituals support this definition? 

I haven’t really redefined beauty as I have aged. However, I have embraced my beauty. It was difficult for me in a different time and space in my life. I am now in a place in my life that only what I determine for me is right and true. Meaning, I no longer care what others think about me, how they feel or what they have to say about me. And, I’ve learned, people really aren’t that invested as we seem to believe they are LOL

3. Is there a particular practice—whether it’s movement, meditation, or something else—that has become essential to your well-being in this current stage of your life? 

Meditation and my quiet time is paramount for me. I’ve been in the space of meditating for 14 years; however, after my father’s transition in November 2023, it’s been more of a foundation and as a result, that is how my gratitude deepened. 

4. What role does your community or your sista circle play in your menopausal and aging experience, and do you share any rituals with other women that support this journey? 

This journey had been solely a lone experience until I literally found more Black women on my social media platform of Instagram within the last couple of years, that has been a healing balm for me. I was four years post “pause” when I realized that I was menopausal let alone “post”. 

5. What does the concept of sacredness mean to you as you age, and do you honor this stage of life through any special rituals?

Sacredness means a lot to me. It’s the Divine presence within and all around me and me being able to express it in any and every way I can. Gratitude again, would be my main ritual. It really is my reason – to be able to wake up each day is a blessing and then, to be able to tap in the Divine reservoir of infinite potentials and possibilities is a gift. I don’t have to be here; I get to be here and I’m so grateful 

6. Looking back on your pre-menopausal years, is there anything you wish you had known or done differently to prepare for this transition? How does this wisdom shape your rituals now?

Yes, I wish I would have known what to expect even if it were little things – such as the possibility of gaining weight (a lot), craving sugar and foods that I hadn’t eaten in years. The possibilities of experiencing food sensitivities. The change in the body’s overall composition and disposition. The moodiness, rage and anger. Also, overwhelming sadness that I didn’t know was possible. I held on to the notion, I would be 55 like my mother told me. By the time I realized what I was experiencing, she had already transitioned and I didn’t know that I was post at 43

7. How do you personally define well-aging, and how do your daily rituals reflect that definition?

Well-aging to me is simply living life to the fullest and not allowing a number nor society dictate what is going on with me or my body. My mother was big on saying, “Age ain’t nothing but a number”. So, with that, I didn’t hold on to the concept of getting old or aging – which is why it was a shock when I realized, I was menopausal. I will say, I had trepidation about 40 at around 37 and 38, however by 39, I was so excited for the new journey. 

I truly believe, my overall youthful spirit is what helps me and of course my gratitude and overall Divine Alignment with Spirit

8. Everyday Rituals: Share one ritual for each of the following, that you’ve not shared above:

Daily Ritual: Gratitude

Weekly Ritual: Going out to listen to music

Monthly Ritual: Massage

Yearly Ritual: Every year on my personal new year, I have a word or action to embody – this year 51 was creative expression – that will be shown on my new year in December (actually, you have some of those pictures attached 🙂 )

Connect with Keli, HERE