I always understood The Winter Solstice to mark the shortest day in the year, which of course is technically correct. However, the celebration of Solstice is not to celebrate the shortest Day but the celebrate the longest night.
In a recent article published in Nature Mental Health evidence shows that not only are we physiologically wired to benefit from synchronsing with daylight, we also benefit by allowing ourselves time in natural darkness, i.e. avoiding artificial light on dark evenings. The review concludes that excessive artificial light exposure has a detrimental effect on our mental health. Dr Huberman explains that this indicates that we have a physiological need for natural darkness as well as for natural light. Ancient wisdom often uses analogies from nature to deliver a message or teaching, and the life-cycle of the seed continues to provide the perfect analogy for navigation through the winter months. Envisioning ourselves as seeds, we understand the need to be buried, in complete darkness, in order to sprout.
Your soul seed, each year, has the opportunity to grow anew. Not to change or become different, but to come back to the essence of what it is, of who you are and start again from this place. A sycamore seed for example can find many places to fall, it can be carried long distances by wind or forest animals before it lands and finds its way below soil. When it grows it may discover it’s in an open space and can stretch and expand and create its own eco-system. Or it may have landed in a shaded forest where staying small is an act of survival. But this undergrowth sycamore is still connected to the whole, science verifying that the larger trees that occupying the skyline and canopy direct food and sustenance to those in its shade through its root system and mycelia. The Sycamore in the shade experiences a life of feeling supported by it’s elders and sheltered from the elements. The Sycamore out on its own has a completely different life experience. Yet they are both still sycamores from seed.
And so each winter we acknowledge the coming of the darkness and we dive deep into ourselves to reconnect with our seedy-nature 😉
- In the darkness you can identify deeper strengths, the ones that endure and possibly have endured a lifetime if not more.
- Then you start to choose with intention the environment (life circumstances) that will best support the expression of your truest strengths.
- Repeat Each Year: It can take a few laps around the calendar to get your life’s environment working for you.
- Remember, a sycamore will still be a sycamore, even if your environment is unhealthy, getting buried in the dessert will not turn you into a cactus.
- You choose each year to make tweaks and changes in the life around you and attract in the circumstances that give you the best chance to shine.
At this time, when turning attention inward, we go deep, into our origin to connect to our soul seeds. You may have to drop through layers of mental, emotional or physical discomfort to arrive at the source beneath. At this level beneath there is no correcting or fixing that needs to be done, at this level your soul is perfect and at peace. You can embrace the darkness with full acceptance that no matter how the environment shapes you through life, you will still be you at source.
The fern and the horsetail are two plants that have not evolved through the eons of earths existence. The conclusion is that they have not needed to evolve to survive. The question this begs is what are the individual integral characteristics of these plants that have caused the species to survive without needing to change.
At this time of year we are encouraged to go deep and face our strengths! Identify those characteristics that exist in you, possibly in common with your family and your ancestors. Those characteristics that have endured through the generations and have been born again in you.
At the Solstice fire we transmute those strengths, which may actually be vulnerabilities, and direct them with intention into the year ahead. Later as you move through the belly of Imbolc you will start to recognise how situations have manifested to reflect your essence back at you. You will recognise the power you have to create the environment you choose to shine in.
For this Solstice, which of your innate characteristics would you like to forge into your energetic future so that the life you attract reflects the essence that you are?
