December 30, 2023—waning gibbous moon in Leo
Hello loves,
I’ve been deep in my blog archives reviewing and sorting, and came across a piece that seemed important to spruce up and share here. It’s definitely aligned with my promise to offer breathing space.
I’m also publishing it over on my blog, because why not?
Around this time of year
many of us engage in a ritual of reviewing the past 12 months. We celebrate our accomplishments, make note of what went well and what didn’t. We catalog (totally without guilt, I’m sure) those things left undone. Then, with list in hand, we gamely plan for the next 12 months: task lists, editorial calendars, marketing strategies, new eating plans, exercise routines, morning rituals, writing practices, and meditation commitments all blossom across the pristine pages of new planners.
Squeezing all this activity into a few weeks or days (!) at the end of the year always felt unnatural, to me. Add holiday chaos into the mix and the whole experience can tip over into “That was nuts!” territory. And, when I thought about it, the results of all that frantic effort just never seemed all that compelling or effective.
So, I started experimenting with a different approach about ten years ago.
Why talk about this again now? Because, there’s no time or energy to waste. As I mention in my website bio, life is precious and sometimes brief. We have a finite amount of mental, creative, and physical energy to expend and a lot of people, places, and projects that need our unique skills and insights. Also, who needs more frantic in their lives?
What drives us, historically speaking?
It appears that part of our urge to review and dream or plan arises from times when we were more deeply tied to the land through the rhythms of planting and harvesting.
My bones seem to remember that my ancient Western European ancestors also followed this pattern, though in their case they were taking stock of actual livestock.
“Samhain was one of the four main festivals of the Gaelic calendar, marking the last harvest and beginning of winter.[16] Traditionally, Samhain was a time to take stock of the herds and food supplies. Cattle were brought down to the winter pastures after six months in the higher summer pastures.[16] It was also the time to choose which animals would need to be slaughtered for the people to survive the winter.”1
In winter, when the dark and cold kept people more sedentary and indoors, dreaming and planning would have found their place. What crops to plant? When? In which field? This is why dreaming and planning seem natural at this time of year.
Acting like an evergreen
I—and you—are integral and important community members of the ecosystems we inhabit. We are human-being living systems in a symbiotic, mutually beneficial relationship with the larger living systems of trees, grasses, hawks and rivers outside our doors. Thinking like a living system changes how I approach my life. It means I try my best to live my life by natural rhythms, moving at the pace of my home ecosystem.
To do this, I pay attention to the ebb and flow of my energy and creativity and do my best to schedule tasks, meetings, and down time accordingly. I try to work with the pace of each season, riding waves of growth in the summer or easing into quiet rest and introspection in the winter.
Essentially, I'm following the natural rhythms of my body (personal living system) and of my environment (global living system) to make the most of the time I have.
For example, I’ve felt like reviewing is best done in autumn. It feels like I can match my own reviewing, purging and storing efforts with the rhythm of my ecosystem as leaves fall & seeds plant themselves. We, wild nature and I, are both stashing what’s important and sloughing what’s not, so we go well prepared into the gestating/planning rhythm of winter.
It’s so simple
In Autumn: harvest and gather. Review what’s been learned, gathered or accumulated during the spring and summer. Slough away extraneous ideas, beliefs, or actual stuff.
In Winter: dream, vision, tend idea seeds, gestate, make plans.
In Spring: move new ideas, your fresh self, the offspring of winter’s gestating and planning into the world. Announce new things. Implement new systems and ideas.
In Summer: dance, play, learn, connect, revel, drink deep of experience, tend flourishing projects, prune unhealthy or extraneous bits, surge with creativity, share, grow some more.
Back to Autumn for the next cycle.
Making this work for you
As with most things I share, this is a suggestion. Can you review or plan or birth projects at another time of year? Of course!
What’s most important is noticing both your personal and your ecosystem’s rhythms and then experimenting to find what works best for you.
I’d love to hear what you think.
With the deeper, slower, winter rhythm of this sacred, beautiful Place,
Tracie
Why not start off the new year writing with some friendly people?
Our first virtual Saturday Writing Circle of 2024 is happening on 6 January and we would love for you to join us! If you’d like to, contact me and ask to be added to the Saturday Writing Circle list.
Saturday Writing Circles are islands of respite and joyful, kind community and are also fee-free.
I have a deep commitment to making and supporting safe, honest spaces where people can gather and free their words. So, if someone is moved to occasionally donate a wee bit to help me pay the Zoom bill, groovy, but absolutely not necessary or expected.
A typical meeting begins with a gentle guided visualization, followed by two cycles of writing (catalyst quotes and prompts are offered) and (entirely optional) sharing.
Usually, we meet virtually on the 1st and 3rd Saturday every month from 10 am to 11:30 am EST (3-4:30 p.m. UTC).
Here’s our first quarter 2024 schedule:
January 6 & 20
February 3 & 17
March 2 & 16
If you’d like to join us, contact me and ask to be added to the Saturday Writing Circle list.
While I know it’s not the most academically approved source, this quote comes from this Wikipedia article.
This rhythm of beginning in Autumn really resonates with me. I miss your voice on the page and spoken aloud.
Love this refreshing take (and reminder) that we can conduct a ‘year end review’ at anytime of the year but the fall definitely makes god sense rhythmically speaking 😊👍🏼 I was feeling the energy for starting my review around my birthday which is in November, a good time in the fall to do the work of reviewing, taking stick and preparing for the new spring months ahead 👍🏼