Honouring the Body’s Intelligence in Perimenopause

For years, I was told not to hunch forward after an intense workout. “Stand up straight — open your chest, don’t collapse, you’re closing off your diaphragm.” And so, for a long time, I believed it. I stood tall, hands on hips, trying to override what my body instinctively wanted to do: fold forward, rest my hands on my knees, and breathe.

But lately, I’ve been asking myself a different kind of question — one that keeps coming up during this transitional time of life:

Are we going against the body’s wisdom when we override what feels natural?

And more specifically: what does honouring the body’s intelligence in perimenopause really look like?

Why We Hunch: The Intelligence Behind Instinctive Movement

As I began leading SIT (short interval training) sessions in my SoulSculpt classes, I found myself repeating the same cue I’d heard for years: “Lengthen your spine, don’t collapse, open your chest.” But something didn’t sit right. These were classes rooted in awareness, in softness and strength, in tuning inward. So why was I perpetuating a cue that didn’t feel fully aligned with that?

It got me curious. Why do so many athletes — marathon runners, HIIT practitioners, sprinters — instinctively hunch forward, elbows on knees, spine rounded, eyes down, right after giving it their all?

The answer is: because it works.

A 2019 study found that athletes who adopted this “hunched over” posture recovered more efficiently than those standing upright. It allowed their breath to deepen, their diaphragm to move freely, and their heart rate to slow. Their nervous systems were coming back into balance — not through conscious effort, but through a deeply intelligent, embodied reflex.

We so often treat the body as something to be fixed, improved, corrected — especially in the fitness world. But what if, especially during perimenopause, we could begin honouring the body’s intelligence instead of overriding it?

Honouring the Body’s Intelligence in Perimenopause

This is where everything started to shift for me.

Perimenopause is not a straight line. One day you feel strong and steady; the next, you’re overwhelmed by heat, fatigue, or a heart that won’t slow down. It’s messy, cyclical, unpredictable. But if we stop trying to force the body into a rigid structure and instead begin to listen — really listen — a whole new world opens up.

This is what led me to create SoulSculpt: a practice that doesn’t separate strength from softness, or structure from sensation. It’s not yoga, not Pilates, not traditional resistance training — and yet, it draws on the best of all three. It’s a somatic strength practice rooted in awareness, designed to evolve with you.

It’s about practising from the inside out.

Because honouring the body’s intelligence in perimenopause also means acknowledging that what your body needs today may not be what it needed yesterday. Some days you’ll crave heavy weights and explosive movement. Other days, your body will whisper, stay low, breathe deep, feel more.

And when you honour that voice — when you stop silencing it with "shoulds" and "musts" — that’s where real strength begins.

Letting Go of the Old Rules

The fitness industry is still largely shaped by a very linear, performance-driven model. Push harder. Stand taller. Look stronger. And while that can be motivating in some seasons of life, it often doesn’t support the internal, hormonal, emotional complexity of this one.

We’ve been trained — especially as women — to mistrust our instincts. To believe that nature needs correcting, that rest is weakness, that intuition is less valid than instruction.

But what if we are nature?

What if hunching over after a sprint is not collapse, but integration? What if skipping the weights today is not failure, but a radical form of listening? What if slowing down is not the opposite of strength, but its foundation?

This is the question at the core of SoulSculpt. I’m not here to be the expert on your body. I’m here to offer a pathway, a structure, a somatic invitation — so that you can meet yourself exactly where you are, and move from there.

The Feminine Way Forward

There is something deeply feminine about this approach — and I don’t mean soft or gentle (though it can be). I mean cyclical. Intuitive. Rooted in the body’s own rhythms.

For so long, we’ve trained as if our cycles, our fluctuations, our needs were inconveniences to be overcome. But the more I work with women in perimenopause, the more I see how vital it is to adapt, to let go of one-size-fits-all routines and come into relationship with our changing bodies.

In SoulSculpt, we might use weights one week and skip them the next. We might move fast or stay low and still. We always begin with awareness, with form, so we stay safe — and then we explore what wants to move.

Because honouring the body’s intelligence in perimenopause isn’t about never challenging yourself. It’s about discerning when challenge serves you — and when stillness does.

This Is the Work of Longevity

To build a strong, flexible, and responsive body in your 40s, 50s, and beyond — that’s the goal. Not to perform for a moment, but to sustain movement for a lifetime. To hike, dance, lift, surf, and stretch at 70, 80, 90 — not because you forced yourself through pain, but because you listened.

And when we listen, we stop needing the body to scream.

We move with her, not against her.

We sculpt strength not just in our muscles but in our nervous systems, our breath, our choices.

A Practice, Not a Prescription

If you take one thing from this post, let it be this:

You do not need to override your body to be strong. You do not need to abandon your instincts to be disciplined. You are allowed to train, to grow, to get stronger — and to do it in a way that respects your cycles, your sensations, your inner compass.

Try things. Play. Get it “wrong.” And then refine. That’s what SoulSculpt is — a practice. Not perfection. A rhythm, not a rulebook. A space where your body can speak and be heard.

Because strength built on listening is the kind that lasts.

Ready to begin your own journey of embodied strength and awareness?Explore SoulSculpt classes here — a new kind of movement designed for women in hormonal transition. Start where you are. Come as you are. Let your body lead.