Note #029
The Wisdom of Many Winters
Are you Slowing Down enough?
I’m living in an endless winter. We had our first snow on November 3rd this year. The backyard is buried under at least 3 feet of it. It’s beautiful. And it keeps on coming down.
My own picture, The Buddha in my Backyard
Spring will come. It always does. Then summer growth, which should be amazing this year after all the snow. And then the harvest season.
And then another winter.
I once heard a most magnificent phrase, “The Wisdom of Many Winters”. My good friend was teaching a Qi Gong class and explained that the kidneys hold fear. As the kidneys are toned, that fear is transmutted into the Wisdom of Many Winters.
I got goose bumps. How poetic! How profound.
How contextual.
If we have no idea how rough winters once were—the primitive nature of homes without central heating, no packaging to preserve food for months, a scanty harvest in the fall, so much snow that all sources of potential fuel were buried, illness and disease, lack of sanitation—the wisdom of many winters might mean nothing.
Winters were traditionally a time of reflection, and uncertainty. In rural living, a time to repair equipment, to read or study, to spend time with family. To get a lot of rest. (No time for these luxuries during the planting, growing, and harvesting times of year.)
This winter has allowed a deep immersion back into the natural rhythms of slowing down—way down, of measuring the amount of light against that of dark, of burrowing, of retreating. And of allowing wisdom to seep in and saturate my being.
Personal wisdom. Wisdom that not all will appreciate, or will even be interested in.
For those who might take an interest in the Wisdom of Many Winters, it’s an inner wisdom, one that percolates up to the surface of the conscious, knowing mind. It murmurs. It communicates without a voice. It’s as delicate as falling snow.
It lets us know that we are the Earth. That we are the seasons. That we are the trees and the mountains and the sun and the waters. We are composed of the very same stuff of the planet-water, oxygen, iron, calcium, magnesium, phosphorous, all those trace minerals and materials. We are that. We are not separate from this living Earth.
We Must Endure the Cycles
As such, we cycle. We must. We will have seasons of planting, seasons of growth, seasons of harvest, and seasons of rest. If we miss the resting season, not allowing ourselves to lie fallow, we will suffer a deficiency of nutrients, energy, and vitality. As we honor the natural state of rest, we replenish nutriment and allow for deep regeneration.
When the cold grip of winter eases and the winds of spring blow away the last vestiges of snow and ice, we will be rested. We will be ready.
Ready for what?
For whatever comes next.
For in the resting and lying fallow, we learn to ease our grip. We learn to soften around the edges. We come to a deep Wisdom of the Winters that assures us that we are not in charge. That, as much as we think we can manifest every last desire by simply sending out more energy to the universe (And btw, who knows what kind of forces are “out there” in the universe. They may not all have your best interest at heart.), the clear reality is, in fact, we are much like the trees and the rocks and the waters.
We are acted upon by nature. We are moved by God.
Is this to say we don’t have free will or choice, that we cannot affect our world?
No.
And.
The control we do have is an interior kind of control. It is our internal behaviors, and mostly our thoughts. We can get ahold of ourselves before speaking or acting so that we can live to our own Personal Standards. This internal control allows us to mind our manners, to speak our mind kindly, and to govern ourselves according to the Golden Rule.
And all this from slowing down, taking a snow day or two, or 17. From tuning in to the cycles and the seasons of the natural matrix of creation, we shift how we show up every day. We receive insights into the nature of the mind, the nature of the physical body, the nature of Being.
It is this wisdom that is gained as we lie fallow and relax into a deep, healing rest that permeates our being, at all levels—physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual. Our multi-dimensional self needs the wisdom that comes from regenerative down-time.
Three more weeks of winter are on the calendar. Will you allow yourself a little more rest each day? Can you turn off the smart part of your phone—the social media, the news, the entertainment and games? Can you spend a little more time repairing equipment, in this case your body? What would it feel like to connect a little more deeply in person, or even a phone call, with your cherished ones?
Is there a book that’s waiting on your night stand? Can you trade social media for your favorite story?
How will you spend these last precious weeks of winter and the potential for deep inner wisdom?
In his work On The Shortness of Life, Seneca offers these thoughts...
“It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements if it were all well invested. But when it is wasted in heedless luxury and spent on no good activity, we are forced at last by death’s final constraint to realize that it has passed away before we knew it was passing. So it is: we are not given a short life but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it… Life is long if you know how to use it.”
Let’s know how to use life. Let’s gather the wisdom that is there waiting in the winter silence and storm. Let’s not waste.
We all know, at some level, that this life is to be cherished—and to be put to good use. We all know we have something to offer, no matter how great or how humble. We all know we have in us our own Unique Genius.
Tune in to your knowing. Trust the voice of your Inner Wisdom. And maybe go to bed a little earlier tonight?
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All the love there is —
Molly
P.S. If you found this useful, please share! The more happier families we have, the better off we are a a world. ❤️