You are not meant to flourish in the depths of winter.
That’s the kind of beauty reserved for Spring.
Everything is still asleep.
Rest.
Nourish your mind, soul and body.
Soon we will spring to life again.
I’ve always found this season to be the harshest of teachers because of its deathly and motionless nature. Slowly I’m learning to love the beauty of wintering. Everything around us is asleep, calling us to retreat, turn inward in order to realign ourselves and prepare for the start of a new cycle. Become friendly with the grief of little deaths.
A project we no longer want to nurture to life, a relationship whose lessons we have now learned, the story we hear ourselves telling friends for the hundredth time about the way we’ve always been a certain way, successes we wanted that we can no longer envision. It all falls off - just like leaves on trees - if we are willing to face it.
There is another way to winter, a path I have taken many times over: to distract ourselves until the season inevitably fades and the birds start chirping outside our window again, calling us to start anew.
It has been my experience though, that the unwillingness to sit with your self catches up to you in brutal ways, the universes’ sharp edges making itself known.
I’ve taken the harder path this year, and it’s been so incredibly uncomfortable, which is how I know I’m growing. There is so much magic in that, it makes me smile at random moments throughout the day.
If you needed permission (or a push) to make the most of wintering, with about a month left until the Spring Equinox, now is your chance to sit in stillness and reflect softly.
What weeds will you gently eradicate from your garden?
Knowing that you can approach this like the ‘no-dig method’ in gardening - there need not be any anger in ripping out what is stealing your sustenance. When you gently block the weeds access to light they die and in turn, become the very thing that feeds you. It’s an opportunity to take stock of what surrounds you that is no longer serving you, take note of the lesson and release it so you can grow, and grow stronger.
What seeds do you want to plant now?
Knowing that this is not the time for big expansive life-altering ‘Action!’
It’s time to think and envision what you want your garden to look like this year, then go and - metaphorically - hand pick the seeds that will turn into those flowers.
A ping
A daydream
A nightdream
A brainstorm
A path to follow.
Don’t overthink and rationalise, but curiously and fearlessly follow where it takes you, as right or wrong, there will always be a lesson.
How will you nourish the soil you plant them in?
Knowing that you can’t do much if your own cup isn’t full.
How can you slowly prepare your mind, body and soul for what comes next?
For me it has meant, more than anything, confronting my shadows and learning to step through fears that had been holding me back for years. Setting new boundaries. Making a conscious effort to bring more joy into my days, so I don’t forget that life is meant to be lived, not just analysed.
Coming through on the other side of this, I still grieve the fact that I was holding the keys to my own prison for so many years. So I ask you, what do you need to do that helps you move forward? Hint: it's usually the thing you’ve been avoiding.
If you can steal yourselves some pockets of time regularly to figuratively look in the mirror, sit in the discomfort of it all and come up with the above answers, as Winter will soon fade into Spring and then Summer, you can reap what you have sown.
I promise, the reward will be all the sweeter.