I read a Substack article today that has been bouncing around my brain for a bit. The thesis of it is that capitalism and the structure of the workday, ie: expecting consistent productivity and output, is based on the hormonal cycles experienced by men (testosterone peaks in the morning, wanes throughout the day, resets at night). Because women’s biological cycles are not based on 24 hour periods, but 28 day periods, fitting into the expectation of consistent daily output is difficult.

As a woman with a uterus myself, I am very familiar with the 28 day menstrual cycle and the hormonal shifts therein. Now the article didn’t include any citations for the hormonal cycles of men and since I’m too lazy to look it up at the moment, we’ll take this with a grain of salt. The language of the article was not particularly inclusive given its rigid focus on hormones and biology. I am wary of any piece of writing that focuses so much on biology, especially of the human variety, but the reason I found this article of interest was its suggestion to follow a longer cycle in terms of productivity and output for work.

Loathe as I am to think about work outside of work hours, I think the idea can also be extended to creative work as well, so I will continue with this thread of thought for the moment.

The proposed cycle is a four week cycle, following the menstrual cycle and including seasonal cycles in the naming scheme. Week one, is “inner spring” where you’re getting curious and planning stuff out, making projections, etc. Week two is where you’re most productive (peak ovulation, you know) so this is your inner summer. Week three is inner fall so you’re more introspective and focus more on the details and perfectionism. This is the week where you start wrapping up. The final week, the week of your period, is a period of rest, hence, your inner winter. This is for reflection on what went well during this work cycle, what could have gone better, and slowly starting to plan for the next work cycle.

The seasonal nomenclature is easier to follow, given that knowledge of the inner workings of hormonal balances during menstrual cycles is less widespread, even among the half of the population affected by these balances (or lack thereof).

I do like the seasonal framework, I will say. It reminds me of another Substack I have read that maps the seasons more broadly onto work and not rigidly mapping them into a “female biology” interpretation of a two week SCRUM sprint.

The exact details of the framework are not the thing I want to focus on, though the details are intersting. What struck me was the idea that 1) I’m not alone in not being productive on a consistent, daily basis, which was nice and 2) that it might be possible to organize work in a way that is different from the current norm. It’s this experimental bend that I’m particularly intrigued by and I’ve been thinking about how I can implement that both into my day job and my artistic work.

Despite currently being on the second week of my menstrual cycle (the week where I’m allegedly supposed to be the most productive) I feel very much in my winter season, both in the four week framework and the general seasonal framework. I need rest, I’m not curious about anything, I just want to hibernate.

I’ve been feeling like this for a while and I think it’s perhaps because I might be burned out. Gasp! Who could have thought????

Instability at work is certainly not helping my motivation and the next few months are going to be difficult to say the least. The specter of unemployment makes my day job difficult and demoralizing, which makes my home life more difficult, which makes creative work impossible. So maybe that’s why I’m still noodling away on my night sky painting. I can just focus on painting each individual star as a white dot and not have to do any of the actual hard work of painting.

I don’t yet know what experimenting with my work is going to look like, but I am at least slightly motivated to figure out a more sustainable system. The booms and busts I’ve been experiencing are exhausting. Maybe for now I’ll focus more on my energy levels throughout the days, weeks, and months and try to work with that. We’ll see where that leads.