Ritual
This month’s meditation called for honoring the seasonal shift, to take the natural rhythms of the life as our great teacher. The in-between seasons of fall and spring call us to prepare for the more extreme seasons, the cold of winter and the summer sun. These months between, the liminal seasons, ask us to reflect and integrate before we jump into the “next task.”
I have been thinking a lot about being in flow and simplifying during this season of my life. I am craving slowness and ease, since this has been such a busy time of change for me. Getting married at the end of this month has been a joy to prepare for, so much focus on creating beautiful rituals to honor our love. Simultaneously, my soon-to-be-husband and I have bought a home and are working to flip the large yards into permaculture gardens (so incredibly difficult and fulfilling) and have both started new careers. It has been a lot. We are so grateful, but I crave to be “bored.”
On social media I have been exploring this with out community…how to be simple, present, grounded, curious, etc.. So many are messaging me and setting up 1:1 consults about these ideas, it seems we have really tapped into our communities zeitgeist. We know we deserve peace. In a culture of rush and next, how can we create peace in our own world, in our bodies, relationships, spirits, careers?
W.S. Merwin’s incredible “To The Light of September” has been a guide for us, as we continue to learn from and embody the liminal season, pausing and reflecting before we jump into the next task, the next season. Speaking to the season of fall, the poem ends with “you who are neither/ before nor after/ you who arrive/ with blue plums/ that have fallen through the night//perfect in the dew.” How incredible: you, this season, who is neither one or the other, but the thing that arrives quietly with the sweetness of nectar. This is the metaphor of what it *feels* like to slow down enough to see the between of moments, the subtlety of the moment so many will ignore when living a life of rush. Life may actually happen in the between times. What do you think?
Dr John and Julie Gottman spent over fifty years studying married couples. In this time, they developed revolutionary theories within relational psychology. One of their most well-known predictors of relational success is what they refer to as “small things often.” This refers to doing small things often to upkeep the relationship, versus bursts of affection or repair. This is a concept that I not only see the power of within relationships, but within all aspects of life…especially health.
So often, clients want to me to help with some radical diet or lifestyle change, but I encourage away from that idea due to my understanding of the psychology of change (hence, why we often stop a diet after a few months and have lapsed gym memberships). Behaviors that encourage wellness and vitality are daily, non-sexy, consistent, and small. We tend to want “quick fixes” because of our rush culture. But this is not how change happens. We need time to pause, reflect, then integrate. After this initial period, we must maintain. We must do “small things often.”
This month, I want you to pick one of the following “small” wellness rituals that you have either been inconsistent with in the past, or feel called to do but have just not yet implemented, or know you should be doing but have made various excuses not to do. But just pick one. Then, be consistent with it, every single day, for the rest of the month. See what happens, pay attention to this time of transition in your body/mind. Notice resistance, notice flow.
Upon waking, drink 8-12 ounces of room temperature, filtered water with a squeeze of lemon.
In the morning, before work or interaction, dedicate 10 minutes to breathing exercises and meditation.
Eat a vibrantly colored vegetable with at least one meal (and eat it before the rest of the meal to help with blood sugar balance).
Daily, walk or engage in exercise/body movement for 30 minutes.
Every morning, within thirty minutes of waking and before using a screen, get sunlight in eyes (ie, go be outside, ideal if you can stand barefoot on earth).
Before bed, write out 3-5 areas of gratitude for that day, on paper versus using a screen.
Be good,
Amanda
September Vino, Verse, and Vinyl:
Vino: Barbera
Verse: “A Thing Shared” MFK Fisher
Vinyl: “I Deserve Rest”
