Here we are… the month of…September.
Soon the leaves will be changing and starting to fall. The air will turn crisp and cool, the days shorter and the nights longer. All to often we welcome Fall as a reprieve from the heat of a long summer. This year however; I find myself looking forward… to hibernation.
I feel like I have grown so much this year…yet at the same time, I have felt a lot of personal exposure and resistance.
It has left me feeling a bit like a resistance band (the kind you exercise with). I grow in legnth…stretch my horizons to see and do new things I never thought I would do. Then… with the slightest distraction I lose my focus and find myself snapping back to what was. The cycle repeats itself…over and over and over… many times over I find myself feeling defeated.
I have begun to notice however that upon each “snap back” to the elastic memory of what was, the snap and power of the band begins to weaken. This realization has made me believe I am not a hopeless cause, doomed to repeat pattern after pattern. I actually believe that the programming is starting to falter…fade out and fall to the wayside of my life. Each stretch of my imagination has allowed me to create a new today with the possibilities of endless options for my tomorrows.
The pretty amazing result of all this stretch and release is that we have weakened the past programming we keep snapping back to. With each stretch we have broken some of the fibers in the elastic band that snaps us back into that place. We have inadvertently created a new snap back position. All the while this was happening we believed that we were falling backwards to where we were, when in reality, by allowing ourselves those moments of stretching we have actually grown. We have begun to created a new yesterday each day we have allowed ourselves to expand.
This still seems funny to me since so often consciously we try to change and expand and then curse ourselves later for falling back into old patterns. But… are we really falling completely back? I don’t believe we are! I believe we are still creating a new tomorrow for ourselves, sure…it may take A LOT longer to create the change we are desiring…but…we are still creating it.
Back to this talk of hibernation I am looking forward to. I see fall as a time to prepare ourselves for hibernation. Gather up all our insight…all our projects and ideas. Take everything we have been contemplating…everything we have allowed ourselves to stretch into and throw them in a giant pile!
I picture this pile of possibilities in a big tepee. In the center of this tepee is a warm crackling fire. Sitting around the perimeter of the tepee are you and your elders…your spirit guides, your higherself…your guardian angels…and animal totems. Once hibernation starts (winter) you sit with each offering, each experience. You hold it up, inspect it…and assess the possibility with your highest good in mind. After you have had a chance to really absorb it your elders step in and give you their insight and perspective (remember everything is about perspective). This process goes on and on through out the winter till you are ready to awaken in the spring. I mean really AWAKEN…. sigh… yep. this is what I am looking forward to.
I really love the warm comforting image of sitting in a circle…looking at all the new possibilities I have been presented with, while feeling the warmth of the fire crackling before me. Feels like the perfect place for my spiritual journey (yours may be where ever you are led) surrounded by love and comfort in beauty of a native american Tepee.. or perhaps in quiet meditation surrounded by trees. Where ever you are led…go there, take the time to sit with all that you have gathered since the first of the year. Lay it all out and see how or if they fit together (like a giant jigsaw puzzle).
I would like to add a final thought. I am being guided to ask you all to take some time and
embrace the squirrel this fall. Look at what insights he has to offer you. Observe the tenacity and exuberance he emits in his actions and take heed. Gather all that you can, all that interests you and prepare for introspection, practice, growth and examination. I wish you all a beautiful hibernation.
Namaste~