The autumn to winter transition
An essay on the energetics of this seasonal in-between
Today is the last day of autumn, and as we prepare to experience the longest night, I am reminded of our energy capacities during this last day of transition.
If we look back at summer, our bodies can sustain a greater amount of energy expenditure for work and play alike. Often we forget to rest amidst the excitement the season brings. Then comes autumn, where you’d think you’ll make time to slow down; however, the season also often is faster paced than we would imagine.
When I think of our ancestors, they had to harvest food and prepare it for winter, and lastly store it. This takes a very long time, and it’s manual labour intensive. To me, it feels very much like we’ve carried this energy over into today with different things keeping us in go-go-go mode. It often feels if it’s not one thing it’s another. School starts. Extracurricular activities need to be planned. Schedules need to be remade. On the work front, many businesses might experience their fiscal year-end. Or there is a last push to implement projects before the end of the year. Most of all, for businesses, it’s their busiest time of the year in terms of sales.
For many of us, energetically, we rarely can come to a natural winding down, or bring things to completion. Instead, it is the birth of the new. New schedules, new marketing plans, and the hum of productivity is always felt underneath it all.
New doesn’t belong in autumn. If we have not honoured bringing the cycle of business or personal rhythms to a steady unwinding, we will feel the clash between our energy capacity and what seems to be “asked” of us by the state of life.
As the nights become longer so does our natural need for more sleep, a slower but steadier pace, and the need for more built-in periods of rest.
Late autumn is a period of evaluation. Mother Earth shows us that this is where plants prepare for winter. The animal kingdom does this as well. In the modern times, part of this preparation means reconnecting with a sense of what projects or ways of being need to be brought to completion, what worked well, what didn’t and what needs to be composted.
In the busyness, there’s not a lot of time to dedicate contemplation for this process. Worse still, the hectic pace pulls us away from the present moment as our minds become consumed with tasks needing completion. This alone sets the stage for us to operate out of default and not from a place of awareness for what our bodies and minds need.
To honour the longest night, the best thing we can bring to the forefront is that it’s okay to slow down and initially plan our downtime in our calendars until we come to our natural rhythm.
As we are going into winter, the invitation is to not plan downtime for the sake of downtime. In our modern world, this often leads to patterns of dissociation or numbing such as watching TV, the endless scroll, or overeating.
We must not forget what happened during the entire cycle of the previous year. Before we can truly enter the deepest nurture point of the darkness, the void, or the symbolic womb of the Great Mother, we must do it consciously.
Take the time to do an inventory.
What needs to come to completion?
What needs to be adjusted?
What needs to rise?
As the transition between autumn and winter happens, bring these questions to the forefront of your being. You’ll need them to fully experience the medicine of winter.
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from the underworld with love,
