I don't know about you, but I'm a little bit sad that we've moved our clocks forward. Even though it's still cold out our long nights are over. Now for awhile it's dark in the morning with more light in the evening. I've been content with our early nights. Mid-winter always seems like going back to a simpler life which, as we know, is not a step backwards. A step inwards perhaps but not backwards. Winter is the quiet season; more solitude, that thread that unites us with our inner world. The season of short days is the time to work on our projects. I took up a long-dormant knitting project and am just hours away from finishing. I enrolled in a knitting class to get it just right.
Longer nights have also given us more time to keep company with ourselves and those we live with. Kids love an early bath, books and jammies. The meditation class I finished encouraged us to be more compassionate companions, as if we ourselves are someone we are fond of and wish to inspire. Practicing that gentleness has been the best of winter projects.
The contentment of long nights is such a soft, generous idea. It's a word that conjures up a mix of joy and peace, the kind we might get from an early night to bed with the one we love most. What's great about contentment is that it is possible every day. We don't need to wait for one of those special dream-come-true days. It's right here where we are, sitting and being fully in the grace of what surrounds us and lives inside us now. Accepting the past, living for today, and hoping for tomorrow.
Well now, that isn't confined to a season, is it? By the time we get used to the dark mornings they'll be gone; the sun will be up before the alarm rings. We'll have longer days to find something wonderful in the ordinary. To let our curious, accepting, non-judging, kind selves do their thing. If we could harmonize our mind, body and spirit with the cold beauty of winter, what can't we do in Spring?
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| Snow-covered Rosemary in Bloom |
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