Sitting in a shadow (literally this time) at about 4pm today, I felt the time change and winter's onset sink into my bones. I remembered a friend telling me last week that the change of seasons really affects her, that she needs sunshine to find the motivation to get up and move about in an inspired way. I have a lot of friends who also feel like this, and I, too, have felt varying emotions with changes in the weather. Many of my New England relations have such very long and stark winters, I can't blame them for casting spells to bring the blossoms forth to enjoy for a few stinking months before it all begins again. How do you people do it?
I digress.
I thought a lot about productivity today, and it's seductive ("If you did me, you could check me off of your list.....") appeal. I am industrious by nature, so finishing something makes me feel reeeeeal good. Like so many lessons, I've had to make myself to sit still and allow the seasons to imprint upon me. You know, just to kick myself in the hindquarters some more. Slowing down and taking notice of details is easier than when I'm busy making hay as the sun shines, so I really don't mind the challenge. The details are what inspire me to birth new ideas, but I have to create space to notice them sometimes. Nuts.
If I set up my environment as I did today, tea on the nightstand, laptop on the lapdesk, chicken pot pie in my hands, legs snuggled under the sheets as the dark clouds threatened the sky, I can create the kind of being still (ish) that I enjoy when this season approaches.
Brandon took the kids to a birthday party and the house was unusually quiet. At one point, I pushed everything aside and closed my eyes in a mini-retreat. I popped awake with an idea or two, so I scratched them into my notebook in the half-light and dozed back out. It felt luxurious to be alone with an idea and not feel that fire to race into my studio and try to figure out how to execute it. To just lie there dreamily with it and let it tell me it's story in it's own voice.
Allowing, ahem! ALLOWING the season to direct me and discovering again that at this time of year it's okay to hang up my hat of movement once in a while left me...cozy. I think of my grandmother, abuzz in her garden all summer, then winding down to make sausage quietly in the kitchen as the seasons changed. I can see her sitting down in her chair under a lamp and sewing on a piece of a quilt.
It's as if the bright masculine sun retires for a while, and the darker feminine energies get a chance to come out and play. I enjoy the shift that plays out like this in so many different aspects of life. It felt almost ceremonious to cozy down like a Fox in my den with my tail around my nose, dreaming up the things that will itch to be manifested... next season.
Will you share about your coziest, comfiest, winter space? What does it smell like? What brings you comfort? What does it give you permission for?
