In the mist and the dark rains, as the short days and dark nights compose us, there is a call. A call to quiet, to sit and watch the shadows move. To invoke a stillness and deep listening.
In a wildness that has become near extinct – the wild within you. Repopulation is possible and readily accessible; its emergence requires solitude – the type that arrives when we settle into the discomfort of stillness.
The arrival of your discomfort should be a welcoming, it’s a signal that you’re on the path of your awakening. The skill you need is your own steadiness. A steadiness that arrives in the bursts of agitations that pulse within your body like the torrent of a flooding river. Let it sweep up and take you into your own wilderness. Into the rugged storms that bear down when we sit in the anxiety, the kind of inner disturbances that arrive when slowness settles in like fog on a November morning.
When your instinct to hibernate is strong, you must stay awake. We must tend to the season of cold and dark, so that our front doors don’t get buried behind the snow. The doors must be tended to, as they are the thresholds to our soul, the doorway to our wisdom.
This season is meant to awaken us to ourselves, not to what others tell us about who we are, but to begin the arduous journey to our own healing and discovery. In ways that allow us to courageously move beyond our own fears.
Strength is built through the exploration of self, while remaining connected to our families and communities. Although we need space to explore the wilderness of our mind and soul, we also require connection with others in order to find ourselves, heal tender places within and foster collective evolution.
Utilize this time of deep fall to nourish your discomfort, to not distract, to find minutes and hours of slow, even when unwillingness saturates your mind. Developing resilience in this territory will teach you in ways no single teacher could. Learning to shift from distracted reactions will stabilize you in ways that will transform your entire body and soul.
with love, Noelle