Whether we are aware of it or not we are affected by the change of the seasons. People so often comment about the weather when they meet one another. Rather than just dismissing this as meaningless chit chat, perhaps it is an acknowledgement of how much we are influenced by the natural rhythms of our world. We are animated by the cycles of light. The lengthening of the days as the world turns toward summer, the peak of bright night-time light around the full moon. We are also affected by the power of the dark. The longer nights that help us retreat into ourselves in winter, the unlit dark night of the new moon that allows our plans to gestate.
In her beautiful book, Dancing with the Seasons, author Juliet Batten invites us to cycle around with the year, to awaken and grow, flower open and expand, bring things to fruition and release them, before deepening, lying fallow and gestating. Tuning into graces and powers of the seasons could deeply support us, inspiring and invigorating the rhythms of our own lives. Perhaps less well known are the subtle rhythms of the moon phases. The more delicate light of the moon exerts a pull on the oceans and on our inner tides. Harnessing these waves of energy could mobilise our responsiveness, rippling through our moods and feelings, to guide our intuitively sensed choices. Both the sun and the moon’s rhythms support us to embrace life’s inevitable changes.
These are not new ideas. In traditional cultures worldwide participation in the great round of life was an integrated part of culture. The colonisation and decimation of indigenous cultures globally created a tragic loss of this way of life. In the 1960’s the Deep Ecology movement began to explore these ancient wisdoms as a living philosophy, drawing upon ideas from Taoism, Buddhism, and western existentialism.
How to bring these ancient wisdoms and practices into contemporary life?
Creating meaningful personal rituals that align with the seasons and the phases of the moon can deeply support the richness of your life and your inner experiences. You can find the resonances between what is happening in your personal process and the environment you live in. This gives you a sense of connection, grounding your internal world and empowering your psychological growth. The orbits of your patterns can be held by the cycles of nature. To participate in your place on the land with the other beings that live alongside you, is to become part of the creative process of the Earth. Creating a life embedded within the ecology of all life, one of reciprocity with all living things, deeply affirms you.
Set yourself some aspirations in the spring, purify and ignite your deepest passions in the storm season of early summer, let go something that no longer serves you in the time of falling leaves, take time out to
In Australia we don’t really have a four-season composition to the wheel of the year but there is definitely a pattern. Perhaps attune yourself to how it happens in your locality. Is the season of the dry cold, followed by the season of the dry bright, that then turns into the season of afternoon storms? Check out my Personalised Packages for individual support with this, and my Workshop Schedule to see the next time I am offering Creating Personal Ritual
More resources
Pagaian Cosmology https://pagaian.org/
Juliet Batten https://www.julietbatten.co.nz/
David Abram https://wildethics.org/
