Winter Solstice has me turning inwards this month. I’m enjoying the comfort of staying indoors, closing the curtains early to keep the house cosy, soaking in both the rich darkness and the clear winter sunlight when I can.
I’m tuning in to my bones, my expanding heart, the ebb and flow of my inner fluidity. What’s my body telling me? It feels natural to follow the darkness and sleep longer, to take small rests throughout the day, to move slowly with strength and intent, to feel things deeply and cry freely.
Solstice is a beautiful time to pause and reflect: who am I? how did I get where I am now? how have my experiences changed me? Not for the purpose of finding all the answers and solving everything so we can carry on and move forward. But for the joy of feeling the effort of hard work, noticing the growth and the mistakes, and how life is shaping us.
I learnt a new word recently, reflexivity. In psychological terms it refers to pursuing self awareness in order to understand how we might intentionally or unintentionally affect others. More than reflecting on our actions, it means questioning and acknowledging our own attitudes, prejudices, motivations and ways of thinking that impact all our interactions. With the human and non-human world.
May we all develop more reflexivity.
These long dark nights can also leave us feeling lonely, confined and a little lost. Liz Gilbert’s letter about disappointment really struck a chord this week…
Come with us into a cathedral of grandeur — into the vast, quiet, sacred, infinitely beautiful space that is your heart. It is a magnificent heart. What it took to build that heart is years and years of disappointment. Each stone in that cathedral was quarried from a mountain of hurt. Each tiny pane of color in the vast stained glass windows was a moment of loneliness, a feeling of abandonment.
Your disappointments, my love, have not closed down your heart, but created it — forced it to mature and expand.
Liz Gilbert, Letters from Love
I’m leaning in to my inner world of imagination and stories for comfort and companionship. Reading lots. Watching some excellent tv shows. Gazing at art. Letting things come close in. Feeling the world as small and near to my heart. Noticing how intimately we are all connected and impacted by each other.
This Renoir painting pulled me in when I visited the NGV last week… I could feel the spiral of the dance moving their bodies in toward each other. The heat of where they are touching, their shared breath, and the resonance of the music that moves through them from head to toe.
I’m still dancing with them in this inner world of colour and light and warmth…
Inspiration for this season:
Exercise for bone strength at any age or stage
Menopause self care bringing consciousness and compassion
Restoring your heart a day of being deeply held
Much love,
Emily
