Fertile
with Emma Cannon
Episode 2, Women’s Rituals Series
Women’s Rituals with Emma Cannon
I’m excited to introduce you to yet another inspirational woman. This time we will be chatting to Emma Cannon - a women’s health expert who specialises in fertility, a master acupuncturist, founder of the Emma Cannon Clinic, a mentor and speaker.
With over 25 years in clinical practice, her techniques sit between Eastern and Western healing.
With the second season of A NEW MND, dedicated to the feminine energy, we will be discussing the topic of fertility, the natural female menstrual cycle and how we can be in tune with ourselves and with nature as women.
About Emma
One of the pivotal moments that defined Emma’s career and life is when she went to San Francisco in the early 90s. The energy then she said reminded her of how things are feeling now and as they were in the 60s too - a lot of turbulence.
With lot’s of changes in the air at the time, she was very lucky to have sat amongst people like Ram Dass (also known as Baba Ram Dass, was an American spiritual teacher, guru of modern yoga, psychologist, and author). As she listened to him speak about spirituality who was one of the first westerners to bring Eastern ideas and philosophies to the west, her young mind soaked up all this stuff that later was going to be the basis for her life’s work. He talked a lot about yoga and meditation, which was then completely unknown to most westerners. She then came back to London full of these ideas. which really set the foundation for her career path and finally led her to study Chinese medicine.
What would you say being fertile really means?
It’s a big question and it’s going to mean different things to different people, which is the point of Emma’s approach. She looks at all the ingredients of everyone who comes to her that make up their life and she puts them under a spotlight. From a scientific angle, all the way through the relationships, food and any stresses that may be impacting their lives. It’s a very broad 360 degrees approach.
In the last 10 years there’s actually been quite a big emphasis on diet, for example. Obviously a healthy diet is really important, but there is a shadow side to that also. What she means by that is this idea that we’ve created of ‘I am never enough’ and the notion of “I eat a perfect diet and I am still not fertile or happy“ there is something deeply wrong in that. “For me”, says Emma, “that’s not being fertile”.
She continues in saying that over the past 20 years she’s noticed that it’s those women who think they have the healthiest diets, are actually the ones whose relationship with food isn’t in fact healthy. Fertile to her is someone who eats healthy but isn’t obsessed with it and has a balanced approach to it. That can mean very different things of course.
This barren thinking she believes to be rooted in a lie that we have been fed that “it’s not enough”. For example, “if someone else is winning, we’re loosing” or “there’s only that many jobs around”, ‘immigrants are taking our jobs” etc.
This lack of thinking makes us feel deeply unsafe and unhappy and doesn’t cultivate that idea of the reciprocal nature of life. if it’s fertile and abundant there is a reciprocal nature. If we look after the earth, create fertile soil and keep the air quality good then the earth will be abundant to us. Natures gives back.
“As mother earth becomes less fertile so do we. We are all so interconnected.”
Let’s look at statistics:
One in seven 7 have difficulties conceiving. 40% of infertility is due to male factor, 40% is due to female infertility and 20% is a combination. In women under 40 more than 8 out of 10 couples will conceive within one year if they have regular intercourse and 9 out of 10 within 2 years.
What’s really interesting in relation to these statistics is the women make it mostly about themselves (blaming themselves) and start panicking within three months. So what’s happening is that the problem lies in the meaning that we attach to things.
How can we use our menstruation as a way of tuning into a (more) balanced lifestyle?
Our menstrual cycle as women is the only outward sign that we have for our fertility, for starters. Getting to know your menstrual cycle can provide you with huge amount of information. It’s a great way of documenting your health and any changes that are happening.
Understanding that you have an ebb and flow can provide you with compassion to yourself through that. Emma went on to saying that she thinks that the cyclical nature of the earth, of us, of the moon is a really beautiful thing for women to connect to.
On a philosophical level things change constantly. Sometimes we feel really sexy, sometimes we feel really quiet and frumpy and that’s OK. When we tune into it, it tells us when to rest, when to be creative, when to take action, when to move forward, etc. It’s in the subtleties that we can learn so much about ourselves,
Why we struggle with menopause in the western world so much is because we have an unrealistic expectation of what we should achieve. We simply can’t expect to be able to do the same activities that we used to in our teens or early twenties… It’s not a realistic expectation!
From a Chinese medicine perspective Emma tells us that a lot about a women’s mental and physical health can be understood just by looking at a women’s cycle.
She’s a very wise teacher, an inner compass that we (women) have been born with.
“I believe it’s possible to build a more fertile and abundant world for ourselves and future generations. We are not part of nature; we are nature.”
Resources
TED talk:
It’s about time we valued being fertile - watch here
Emma is the author of five books including the best-selling The Baby Making Bible. Her fifth book, FERTILE, was published by Vermillion in March 2017.
Other books/authors Emma recommends:
The Web That Has No Weaver by Ted Kaptchuk
Quantum Revelation by Joe Dispenza
When The Body Says No by Gabor Maté
[support your local book shops by ordering here]
To listen to the full interview with Emma and curated tracklist themed around fertility and abundance, click here!
[00:00:13] Tam introduces episode 2
[00:02:18] Songs for Abundance
[00:09:56] Isabelle and Tam chat to Emma
[01:09:15] Songs for Abundance
[01:11:54] Episode wrap-up and preview for next season
[01:13:40] Meditation guided by Tam
[01:21:14] Songs for Abundance
Follow Emma:
For more information on fertility, to book a consultation, to find her books and stay up to date on her work head to her website. You can also follow Emma on Instagram.
Track list:
American Dream by Jakatta, Dave Lee
Come Into My Life by Joyce Sims
Good Life by Inner City
One Fine Day by Jakatta
Pacific State by 808 State
Glue by Bicep
I Am The Black Gold Of The Sun by Nuyorican Soul, Jocelyn Brown
Hayling by FC Kahuna
Want You In My Soul by Lovebirds
Point of View by DB Boulevard
Territory by The Blaze
Petit Prince Du Macadam by Folamour
Baby by Four Tet
