The Winter Solstice
Life does not move in a straight line, but unfolds in cycles. Pauses, setbacks, and returns are not failures; they are necessary phases of renewal. Day returns to night, growth returns to rest, activity settles back into stillness.
Returning is the motion of the Tao
Tao Te Ching, 40
But beyond self-care and the ability to (really) listen, the practice of doing nothing has something broader to offer us: an antidote to the rhetoric of growth.
In the context of health and ecology, things that grow unchecked are often considered parasitic or cancerous.
Yet we inhabit a culture that privileges novelty and growth over the cyclical and the regenerative.
Jenny Odell, How To Do Nothing
When we recognize that spring and summer always lead to autumn and winter, in our own lives we will perhaps resist the times of releasing and resting that come to us. Winter invites me to rest and contemplation, to making time for quiet walks in the few hours of light.
The God of winter invites me into a healing rhythm of rest and renewal, of deep listening in the midst of stillness, of trusting the seeds sprouting deep within that have been planted.
Christine Valters Paintner
Life has its own rhythm. Our task is not to control it, but to engage fully with what is present.
When effort is needed, effort will appear.
When effortlessness becomes essential, it will assert itself.
You need not push life about.
Just flow with it and give yourself completely to the task of the present moment,
which is the dying now to the now. For living is dying.
Without death life cannot be.
Nisargadatta Maharaj, 20th‑century Indian teacher of nondualism
Windows teach us to be transparent, to allow the flow of light both in and out. How very challenging it is to be like a clear window, especially in difficult situations. We are asked not to force or to add anything extra to the events, to allow light to emerge, and to trust that it will. That kind of transparency requires letting go of our agenda. It requires a willingness, an unguarded presence. To be transparent as a window is to welcome the unknown, to allow the unexpected, and to find light in all that is familiar.
Gunilla Norris, Becoming Bread: Meditations on Loving and Transformation
There is a Tibetan saying: ‘When things are difficult, then let yourself be happy.’
Otherwise, if happiness is relying on others or the environment or your surroundings, it’s not possible.
Like an ocean, the waves always move but underneath, it always remains calm. We have that ability as well.
On an intellectual level, we may see things as desperate, difficult. But underneath, at the emotional level, you can keep calm.
The Dalai Lama
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