"This is the solstice, the still point of the sun, its cusp and midnight, the year's threshold and unlocking, where the past lets go of and becomes the future; the place of caught breath, the door of a vanished house left ajar."
Speaking of caught breath, I found that last image especially luscious. It claimed me for a time and has stayed with me since. Another year has indeed vanished, but as all years do, it has left behind its gifts, a door ajar one among many.
Before we step through that door, though, it is wise to pause on its threshold to take stock of all that brought us here. To paraphrase Maya Angelou, we cannot know where we're going until we know where we've been. Whether we experienced 2023 as spacious or constricting, joyous or sorrow~filled, life~altering or humdrum—or more likely a swirling mix of these and other contrasts—it joined with us to create who we are today on the cusp of this new year.
Winter is a pause point, a time of rest. As the trees beyond our window tell us, this is not the time for bursting forth. It is time to hunker down, to drop into root. And for humans, it is also an ideal opportunity for reflection. The stillness of the season can assist us in metabolizing all we've experienced. It can help us recognize, too, the ways in which we used what came to us to grow our souls, for good or ill as free will ever allows. This is our birthright, the sacred art open to all conscious beings.
So drift back with me now. Rewind the tape that was 2023 until you stand once again in the winter of that year. See who you were then, what you knew or thought you knew, what was going well in your life and what challenged you, the hopes you carried and your fears. Now watch as time moves forward and the tape that was your life these past 12 months unfurls. See all you lived through as winter gave way to spring, as days lengthened into summer, as summer fell away into autumn, with days shortening and temperatures cooling to year's end.
Begin with your successes. What joys did you experience and how did you work skillfully with the difficulties or heartaches that came your way, turning them toward the good, using them to grow and to heal? Please be kind. Sometimes just keeping on is success enough.
Consider now the places you seemed to fall short, times you may not have lived your values as you would have liked. Be kind here as well. A human life is ever a process of becoming, often a two~steps~forward~one~back sort of thing, making self~forgiveness a necessary skill.
Over the next few hours or days, allow yourself the gift of further reflection. Recognize how you fared overall, but also note what may feel unfinished from the year just passed, sensing the ways available to you to reach further completion. This type of attention to what has been allows us to move forward less encumbered, able to engage more fully with what is yet to be. As any jogger will tell you, it is not wise to run on a full stomach. Nourishment needs to be digested in order to proceed with skill and with grace.
And yet...
In the realm of soulcraft, there are seldom discreet divisions between this and that. Assimilating and stepping forward usually occur in tandem. Even as we contemplate the past year, the next one has already begun and calls us to fully inhabit it. We return now to Atwood's metaphor. The walls of last year's house have grown porous. They are dissolving before our eyes. The past is letting go, unlocking itself in favor of the future that awaits.
Such is the way of life. It offers itself to us, but only for a moment. Some of its offerings may be ones we'd rather not have been given, but we can still see them as gifts, part of the raw material from which to craft ourselves. We take life's offerings, apply whatever wisdom we've accumulated over the course of a human life, reach deeply to summon the courage that every living thing is given in ample supply at birth, and add a dollop of ingenuity to meet what will come. And then we step forward.
The door of last year's vanishing house has indeed been left ajar. It is time now to step over that threshold and fully enter this new year. Step well, my friend, step well. I'll meet you on the other side.
With love and good wishes streaming your way,
Leia
For Atwood's full poem, Shapechangers in Winter, click here.
1 comment:
Your post is beautiful! With such gentleness and kind permission, you invited me to look back on my year. Mine has been particularly difficult--probably the most challenging of my almost-68 years. The events of the year have forced me to face difficult truths about myself and loved ones, take responsibility for choices I've made that have hurt others, and learn to live more in the present moment. All of that has been SO challenging, but I am grateful. Having worked through it (an ongoing process)--gone deep and excavated- I am more me. I wouldn't be where I am without the year's hard work and heartache. Your words kept reminding me to be kind to myself, and that is always helpful! Most of us are doing our best. We can look back and see our mistakes, but we can do that with self-compassion and self-forgiveness. For me, it's the only way to move forward.
Margaret Atwood's imagery took my breath away too! Just this one:
"...the door of a vanished house left ajar...''
I could sit with those words for a long time--as I will sit with your words, Leia. Thank you!
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