I sit at my window this morning, gazing down on the backyard. The trees there, limbs shorn of summertime leaves and silhouetted against the winter sky, have pulled their energy deep into their roots. They know it is time to rest, and rest they do. As is so often the case, the natural world leads by example. If we listen closely, we might even hear its whispered guidance. "Be still. The time for busyness has gone by, and the season for replenishment has come 'round again. Rest, dear one, rest."
In a recent Washington Post article, health psychologist Kari Leibowitz shares insights gained from having lived a year in Tromsø, Norway, a place where darkness reigns for a good part of the year. Located more than 300 kilometers above the Artic Circle, from December through February the sun offers only a few hours of indirect light each day as it skirts just below the horizon. Makes our nine and a half hours of daylight seem like a veritable feast, doesn't it?
Communities that live each year with months of polar night have developed practices that embrace darkness rather than fight against it. In Scandinavian countries, these are supported by an attitude that permeates the culture and is reflected in the languages of the region. Though the words hygge in Danish and koselig in Norwegian don't directly translate into English, both refer to a sense of coziness and comfort. Applied to polar night, they also reflect an essential first step in developing a friendly relationship with winter's darkness: acceptance.
"Many of us try to pretend nothing has changed when daylight ends earlier," Leibowitz writes." We stick to the same schedules and feel annoyed when we’re more tired, despite (knowing that) daylight influences our circadian rhythms and sleep patterns." And we lament the cold, bemoan the early dusk, and grumble about the restrictions winter places on our activities. Which, of course, doesn't warm, brighten, or free us one bit. In fact, such a stance merely makes the season a burden, rather than the blessing it could be.
How much wiser instead to yield to what is, looking for opportunities to welcome coziness and comfort into our wintertime lives. Nordic countries don't, after all, have a patent on hygee or koselig. Just more experience.
Leibowitz explains that indoor lighting is used quite intentionally in these cultures, suggesting that "the key to enjoying the darkness isn’t to banish it by turning on as many lights as possible, (but) to turn the lights down low and invite the darkness in." She encourages us to forgo overhead lights in favor of lamps, candlelight and, if possible, a fire in the hearth, and reports that Tromsø culture is permeated by a conscious use of lighting, with the glow of candlelight evidenced in both cafes and business meetings.
My husband and I have engaged in a particular Solstice ritual for the past decade or so. We refer to it as "the lighting of the chilis". Likely intended as Christmas tree decoration, our string of tiny bulbs encased in colorful chilis winds around the archway connecting living room to kitchen. Lit for the first time at twilight on the longest night of the year, we continue the practice until the Spring Equinox delivers us back into longer days.
In honor of hygee, we've now added a salt lamp and, for koselig, a string of delicate white fairy lights winding up the stairway railing. It feels quite nourishing to be immersed in a softer light. It calms and encourages us to, as Leibowitz writes, "embrace the season as an opportunity for quiet, contemplative pursuits." And in so doing, we are better able to open and perceive what our busyness so often masks.
These filled-to-the-gills lives of ours are just one infinitesimally small manifestation of that which is too immense for us to fully grasp, an essence that flows through everything just beneath our level of awareness. When we don't fill every available moment with doingness, we can welcome space into our lives and, in the process, become more spacious ourselves. And that opens us a bit more deeply to that boundless and eternal something from which all things flow and have their being.
This holiday season, we've spent more time being still~~reading, talking, and resting in silence. We've also been watching Peter Jackson's documentary on the making of the Beatles' Let It Be album. I hope John doesn't mind my paraphrase of the lyrics of one of his songs.
"Sounds of laughter, shades of life are ringing through my open ears, inciting and inviting me across the universe. Limitless undying love shines like a million suns, and calls me on and on across the universe."
When our souls are quieted and soothed, we become more permeable to that limitless undying love that shines like a million suns. And we're better able to respond to its call as it rings throughout the universe.
John's song ends with the chanting of Sanskrit words. Jai guru deva roughly translates as "I give thanks." What a lovely way to end a song~~and this offering. It is also a beautiful way to welcome a fresh new year.
Leia
You can find the Washington Post article here.
