Editor’s Choice: April Favorites
Dare to Bloom. Live in Your Power. Let the Season Transform You.
April is the month of controlled chaos and unexpected blooms. Of rain one hour and golden light the next. Of the world reminding us that beauty and uncertainty are not opposites. They are, in fact, the same invitation.
Here is what is nourishing us this month - body, mind, and soul.
COOKBOOK OF THE MONTH
My New Roots - Sarah Britton
If there is one cookbook that genuinely understands the intelligence of eating with the seasons, it is this one.
Sarah Britton's approach to plant-forward cooking is grounded in a deep love for ingredients at their peak. Her spring chapter is extraordinary. Asparagus, radishes, peas, fresh herbs, edible flowers. Recipes that look like the season feels: alive, colourful, and full of possibility.
Why we love it this month: it meets April exactly where it is. Seasonal cooking is the oldest and most intuitive way to nourish the body. The ingredients available now are exactly what your cells are asking for after winter. Trust the calendar. Trust Sarah.
FOOD BLOG Worth bookmarking
Chia seeds are among the most impressive foods in the plant world. Nobody celebrates them quite like this blog. This month we are pointing you straight to the chia pudding recipes, particularly the strawberry version. Those berries. That colour. That effortless combination of beauty and nourishment in a jar.
Bookmark it. Make it on a Sunday. Thank us later.
WATCHING and Thinking
How to Change Your Mind on Netflix
Michael Pollan's documentary series is extraordinary. It will make you thinking for a long time.
The documentary explores the science, history, and deeply human experience of psychedelics - psilocybin, MDMA, LSD, mescaline - with rigour, humility, and genuine curiosity. The research on psilocybin-assisted therapy for depression, anxiety, and end-of-life distress is among the most compelling in modern psychiatry right now, and Pollan presents it without sensationalism and without dismissiveness.
I will be honest with you: I have done two psilocybin journeys myself. Both with intention, proper preparation, the right setting, and a trained guide. And both changed something real in me.
The first journey carried the theme of beauty. What I saw was genuinely magical. Underneath the stunning imagery was a warm, loving voice that guided me through the whole experience. At one point it told me with great clarity, to stop obsessing about my health. That I was perfectly well. That the obsessing itself was the problem. I laughed when I remembered it afterward. And then I sat with it for a long time.
The second journey taught me something I return to often: when I step out of my own way, magic happens. Its theme was rebirth and the power of women. There was a moment - a long, resonant om in the playlist - where I saw that sound as a column of light with a woman at its centre. And then Elena Brower's voice came through the speakers, in a spoken word piece by Above and Beyond, and I understood that I was moving through something. A shedding. A beginning. A re-birth.
What struck me most was this: it was very clear that women are the future. That living in our full power - not performing it, not apologising for it, not editing ourselves down to fit - is one of the most important things we can do right now. For ourselves. And as a model for every younger woman watching how we move through the world.
It took courage to do both journeys. Real courage. Especially for someone who carries anxiety - surrendering control, trusting the process, allowing whatever needs to surface to surface - that is its own act of daring to bloom. I plan to repeat this practice once a year, with the same care and intention.
If you are curious: watch the series first. Then read. Then, if it calls you, explore with proper guidance. This is not a casual recommendation. It is an invitation to explore.
BOOK on the Nightstand
Women Who Run With the Wolves - Clarissa Pinkola Estés
Some books find you at exactly the right moment. This is one of them. If you have already read it, April is the month to return to it.
Estés writes about the wild woman archetype: the instinctual, untamed, deeply knowing feminine nature that lives in every woman and that modern life works very hard to domesticate. Her writing is part mythology, part psychology, part call to arms. It is rich and layered and asks to be read slowly.
April invitation: read one chapter. Just one. And ask yourself what part of your wild nature has been waiting for permission to come forward.
PODCAST of the Month
Tara Brach - Letting Go of Controlling: The Path to Freedom (Parts 1 and 2)
This two-part series is, in our view, helpful to cope with day to day challenges, with well yes the fact that life does what life wants.
Tara explores how our chronic need to control - our thoughts, our feelings, other people's perceptions of us, outcomes we cannot actually determine - cuts us off from the very presence and aliveness we are seeking. She maps four domains of controlling: clinging to thoughts, resisting feelings, holding tight to beliefs, and armoring the heart. And she offers a path through each of them with the particular combination of Buddhist wisdom and Western psychology that makes her voice so singular.
For an April themed around courage and letting go of the bud, this is essential listening.
MEDIATIONS we are loving
Self-Healing Meditation - Selena Lael on Insight Timer
You are powerful. You are light.
Selena guides you through a deeply restorative practice for mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual uplifting. It is the kind of meditation that reminds you of things you already know but have somehow forgotten to feel.
Keep it in your morning rotation this month.
MOVEMENT of the Month
Some things do not change. And some things do not need to.
The Class is my constant - my every week, often every day, non-negotiable. I return to it because it keeps delivering. Because it keeps asking more of me.
If you have never tried it: The Class is what you get when aerobics meets spiritual practice. It is a workout for the body, yes - but also for the mind and for the soul. The shaking, the moving, the sounds you make that you did not know you needed to make are deep release. Stuck energy leaving the body. The nervous system remembering that it is safe to feel.
Some of the things said in The Class over the years have stayed with me. Take the lesson, drop the story. That one changed how I move through conflict. We have been editing ourselves for years - to fit in, to please, to be the good girls, to not upset people. It is time to stop editing ourselves and embrace our whole beautiful, wild selves. That one I am still working on. Gratefully.
How do we teach our bodies that it is okay to feel safe? That question deserves its own meditation.
Find your version of The Class. Find the movement that cracks something open rather than just burning calories.
SUPPLEMENT SPOTLIGHT
Creatine
The supplement most women have never considered. The one they probably should.
Creatine has long been associated with bodybuilders and athletes. That association has meant that one of the most well-researched and genuinely useful supplements available has been almost entirely absent from women's wellness conversations. That is changing, and the science driving that change is compelling.
Women naturally have 70 to 80% lower creatine stores than men. The body produces roughly half of what it needs and relies on diet - primarily red meat and seafood - for the rest, which means plant-forward eaters are particularly likely to be running low. And as estrogen levels shift in perimenopause and beyond, creatine metabolism changes in ways that make supplementation increasingly relevant.
The research tells a specific and interesting story. Creatine is stored not only in muscle but in the brain, where it supports energy metabolism. The brain accounts for 20% of the body's total energy expenditure despite comprising only 2% of its mass. Studies show that supplementation improves short-term memory, working memory, and cognitive processing speed, with effects that are particularly pronounced under conditions of stress and sleep deprivation. Women appear to be especially responsive to these cognitive benefits. Research also links creatine supplementation to improved mood and reduced depressive symptoms in women, with some studies suggesting this is connected to creatine's role in frontal lobe energy homeostasis, the exact part of the brain governing mood, attention, and cognition.
On the physical side: creatine combined with resistance training has been shown to preserve muscle mass, support bone mineral density, and reduce the risk of sarcopenia - the progressive muscle loss associated with ageing - in post-menopausal women. One Canadian study found that women supplementing with creatine during a resistance training programme lost 1.2% of femoral neck bone density over twelve months, compared to nearly 4% in the placebo group. These are meaningful numbers.
I have been taking creatine monohydrate daily (between 5 - 10 g per day) for over a year. The form matters: monohydrate is the most studied, most effective, and most affordable option. Five grams a day is the standard maintenance dose. No loading phase required. No drama. Just consistent, compounding support for the body and brain you are building for the long game.
Research note: Key studies referenced include Smith-Ryan et al. (2021), Creatine Supplementation in Women's Health: A Lifespan Perspective (PMC); Chilibeck et al., resistance training and bone density in post-menopausal women; and University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus research on creatine and cognition in women over 40.
BEAUTY RITUAL of the Month
Dry Brushing (we loved it in March and we are keeping it) followed by a Scented Bath
This is more than indulgence. It is biology dressed as pleasure.
Dry brushing - using a natural bristle brush on dry skin before bathing, always moving in long strokes toward the heart — stimulates lymphatic circulation, supports the body's drainage system, and leaves the skin with an extraordinary texture and glow. Five minutes. The effect is immediate and cumulative.
Follow it with a warm bath infused with your chosen aroma oils. Lavender for nervous system calming and sleep support. Rose or jasmine for the kind of softness that feels like self-permission. Eucalyptus or rosemary for clarity and invigoration. Choose what the moment is asking for.
The combination - lymphatic activation followed by warm, scented stillness - is one of the most complete acts of physical self-care available to you.
Light a candle. Take deep breaths. Relax.
DRINK for April
Hibiscus Iced Tea with Rose Water and Orange
Ruby red, floral, slightly tart, and genuinely beautiful in a glass.
Hibiscus is rich in anthocyanins - the same protective pigments found in berries — with well-documented benefits for cardiovascular health and blood pressure regulation. Studies have shown it can meaningfully lower systolic blood pressure in adults with mild hypertension. Rose water adds a delicate floral note and brings its own anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. A squeeze of fresh orange adds vitamin C and brightens the whole thing.
To make it: steep dried hibiscus flowers in hot water for five minutes, sweeten lightly with honey or maple syrup if desired, cool, add a splash of rose water and a squeeze of orange, and serve over ice. It photographs extraordinarily. It tastes like April.
The HWell Thread This Month
If March was momentum, April is courage.
The courage to bloom before you feel ready. To let go of control and discover what arrives in the space you create. To stop editing yourself down to a version that fits more comfortably into other people's expectations and to step, fully and unapologetically, into the wild and capable woman you actually are.
Women are the future as in a lived, embodied, daily practice of showing up in our full power - for ourselves first, and as a living example for every younger woman watching how we do it.
This month: take the lesson, drop the story. Stop editing. Start blooming.
The world is better for it.
💚 Gaby
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