Tag Archives: solstice

Transition Time

December 20, 2018Community, Culture, Meditation, Yoga and Spirituality, Nature, Sustainability & Environmentcan-bordoi, catalunya, christmas, meditation, midwinter, new year, satish-kumar, solstice, transformation, transition, yulelivinginthefuture

I’m not sure if I’m a fan of Christmas but I do love fairy lights and I love bringing red plants like cyclamen and poinsettia into my home at this time of year. In folk lore, cyclamen is said to increase self esteem, love and protection. It has a brightness that speaks of happiness and hope. I love how Yuletide can conjure an air of enchantment, bringing magic to the mundane, but this mystical awakening is available every day, when I am able to slow down enough to let nature speak. This year, after a bumper harvest , I can also add threads of red hot chili peppers to the decorations!

Seasonal Reading

I have the privilage to be spending winter solstice in the company of Satish Kumar, whose new book Elegant Simplicity I recommend to you. He is visiting Can Bordoi, an eco-educational project in rural Catalunya and as in ancient times, we will gather to celebrate the wisdom in the cycle of the seasons and the return of the light after midwinter. Some other enchanting books that would make wonderful seasonal reading include Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, Time to Think by Nancy Kline, Soulcraft by Bill Plotkin and Kith by Jay Griffiths.

New Year Inquiry

As well as the warmth of cosy fireside and roasting chestnuts, I do feel internal pressure from a few too many social events. It’s lovely to connect with friends and family, but winter also signals a turning inward, a pause in time and space inviting reflection. There is some agitation, too, when I am asked to “set intentions” and while I’ve no doubt that making single-pointed wishes can be successful, I wonder, how can I leave space for the unexpected? The magical? The divine? When I loosen the grip on my wishes, I feel a welcome sense of leaning back, relaxation and even relief. Do I have to “get” everything I want during the coming year? What if I don’t know what I want?

Since arriving in Spain three years ago, I’ve felt a lot less clear about where life is taking me. This is very challenging! Turbulent political situations make future plans uncertain and our ecological landscape portends disaster. My spiritual practice has slowed to a kind of paso a paso approach, but what a delight it can be to live in the slow lane. The hard work of renovating our small casita home is almost complete and increasingly, I just want to remain really still and let life come to me.

In establishing a way of being that destroys neither us nor the earth we on which we depend, a transition has to be made. So many of us, like the earth, are running on empty. Over ten years of the Living in the Future project, we’ve told many stories involving outer transition – towards affordable, sustainable homes and vibrant communities. But outer transition is inevitably accompanied by inner transition and as well as enjoying stories about ecovillages and low impact living, I thrive on deep work around inner transformation.

New from Living in the Future in 2019

In an attempt to help facilitate this inner shift, in 2019 you can expect online group meditations from Living in the Future, offering support and community for the inner journey. We also have an upcoming book publication which straddles this inner/outer divide. If you have time over the holy days, take some personal space to discover our existing guided meditations on Insight Timer and for a unique Solstice celebration, I invite you to join our little group on the beach in Spain!

Wishing you all a Happy Yuletide and a Peaceful New Year.
with love,

Helen and the Living in the Future Team

PS. Use the YULE18 to claim 50% off Living in the Future online films.

Winter Solstice – Create your own Ritual!

December 21, 2017Community, Meditation, Yoga and Spirituality, Naturelabyrinth, meditation, pause, solstice, still, stillness, winterlivinginthefuture

Yesterday on the beach, our little regular group of meditators came together to celebrate the winter solstice by walking a labyrinth. It was just a circle, really, drawn into the sand with the handle of a tennis racquet. It spiralled in to a centre space marked with a tumble of smooth grey stones. The lines were perhaps too close together. It required concentration and balance to stay between them. But maybe that was the point.
It didn’t take long for me to realise I had to slow down. In order to keep my balance, I had to ensure that my front foot was centered before lifting my back foot. My mind tried to race forward but the constraints of the labyrinth brought me back to my body. Feet connecting with sand. Legs brought back beneath my body instead of charging ahead. For once, the destination was not the focus of my walking. Rather, I was drawn to watch the space directly before me. To gather in my senses. To slow my breath. In my peripheral vision, I glimpsed my fellow meditators. Each one walked as slowly as me. Each deep in their own experience. Once we were inside the labyrinth, there was no turning back. We would walk until we reached the centre, the space where we would meet up. From time to time, we walked alongside each other. Me on my track and they on theirs. Apart and yet together. We did not look up. We did not look at each other. Yet the presence of the others accompanied me.
In one moment, I felt a huge sadness arise, as it often does at this time of year. Sadness for my ancestors no longer in this world. For my friends and family far away. The impulse was to walk faster. To rush through the sadness to a place which felt more comfortable. But the labyrinth would not allow me to rush, so I walked with my sadness, holding it gently. At another point, I glanced to the side, only to see the lines of the labyrinth smushed into the sand. A giggle rose in my throat and I laughed out loud at the way we mess up our lives. There was compassion for myself, for the others. We messed up, yes, but here we are. Still walking towards the centre.

When we reached the middle, first me, then the others, we held onto each other and huddled into the spot. The sun had emerged warmly from the morning clouds but the wind was from the mountains and you could smell and feel the snow on it. We stood still, pausing a moment as the solstice suggests that we do. Sol meaning “sun”and sistere “to stand still”. As the sun seems to pause in the sky, so we paused. Before the flurry of Christmas takes over, we paused.
Over some warming tea, we took some time together to reflect on the experience.
Maybe you can take some time to make your own solstice ritual? To walk slowly. To stand still. Before life sweeps you up again and carries you relentlessly on.

Solstice Meditation

December 20, 2016Meditation, Yoga and Spirituality, Uncategorizedmeditation, pause, peace, realx, slow-down, solstice, stillnesslivinginthefuture

At this solstice time of year, as that still point approaches when the sun seems to pause in the sky for a moment before turning about face toward the opposite end of the cycle, I, too, feel a deep need to pause. Over the past few days, I have felt a slowing down, a desire to disengage, to rest. In preparation for renewal, I grind to a halt, cancelling plans and staying home, staying put, staying still.

This year has been a tough one. Not just for me, but for many beings around this planet. On some level, we are all experiencing a shift. In awareness. In consciousness. In being. It can strike as a profound unease, rattling our bones and jangling our nerves, so that we wake in the night, bathed in sweat and worrying about the future. It may appear as anger or distress, a desperate call for attention. For someone, anyone, to notice our suffering and help bring about some sense of calm. It may manifest as argument or discussion, as we battle our neighbours and friends in wars of words, or worse.

The game playing out on the world’s stage is a bizarre one. One we barely recognise, unless we are versed in drama and intrigue. Which of course we all are. We just imagined that it was in the realm of fiction. Yet as the creative dystopias of our authors and playwrights become fact, there must be more we can do than stand and stare, wringing our hands in dismay?

May I make a suggestion? For a moment, friends, allow yourself to do nothing. Empower yourself to sit still. Prepare a space with invitations of comfort. A cushion. A blanket. Make your place warm and welcoming. A candle. A cup of tea. An inspiring image.

Relax, if you can. Feel your breath in your body. Come to know that as long as the breath is with you, there is hope. Follow your breath as it enters and leaves your body. Make it longer, easier. Notice when it pauses, and when it wants to rush. Let it be just as it is, but notice it. Listen to it. Listen too, to your mind as it chatters hither and thither, circling the matters of importance. Listen deeply, as if you are listening to the yearning of your heart.

Can you hear what your heart yearns for? Can you hear, beneath the clamour for attention and approval? Beneath the cry of pain or dismay? Beneath the agitation and the anxiety?

Sit still and listen deeply, and when you hear the call of your heart, set your navigation towards it. And then little by little, step by step, you will approach it, until one day, finally, you will arrive.

{Solstice- Derived from the Latin sol, “Sun,” and stitium, “stoppage,” as the Sun appears to stand still on the first day of winter.} Source: The Free Dictionary

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Midsummer Madness

July 5, 2016Community, Culture, Events, Nature, Politicsball-de-diables, brexit, buxton, catalunya, england, eu, europe, flash, jo-cox, midsummer, sant-pere-de-ribes, solstice, spain, teapot-parade, Wales., well-dressinglivinginthefuture

It’s midsummer and my world is the right way up. Well, sort of. When I lived in Australia, I could never get used to the seasons being out of place. Christmas on the beach, my September birthday in Spring and yes, June being the middle of winter. It just felt wrong. Now I’ve moved back to Europe the seasons are back in the right place, but in the aftermath of the recent UK referendum, the world seems to have gone stark raving mad. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare’s characters are victims of a mischievous energy that confuses lovers and makes an ass of an ordinary man. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the etymology of the name Puck is related to Old Norse puki (devil) and Welsh pwca (imp), but also has links to ‘unsettled’, like puke. Upon leaving the ‘civilised’ city and entering nature’s wilderness, our characters become disoriented and things appear not to be as they ought to be. The feeling is a little similar in this post-Brexit world. Somehow, the world has been changed, but nobody is yet sure exactly how. We only know that there is mischief afoot.
My midsummer celebrations began in Wales, where the weather was as un-Welsh as it is possible to be. I spent long, warm, sunny days in the beach with my friends and woke every day to blue skies. Bizarre. I was grateful for the opportunity to get out and walk in the cliffs, to swim in the chilly Bristol Channel and to partake of the odd barbecue, but it couldn’t last, of course, and by the time I was on my way north to visit an old school friend, it was cold and rainy. This did not dampen the spirits in Flash, where the residents of the highest town in England celebrated mid summer with a traditional blessing of the well.

Flash-well-dressing — Well-dressing at Flash, the highest town in England

A custom from medieval times which is said to be associated with the spread of the Black Death, it marks an acknowledgement of the importance of pure water and honours the local source. In Flash, the well was painstakingly decorated with flowers and following the small well-side ceremony, the village takes to the streets in the ‘teapot parade‘. Waving banners and marching alongside a giant papier-mâché teapot, the parade remembers the custom of helping those in need by sequestering funds in the household teapot. As I stood back to take a photograph of the whole scene, a woman spectator reminisced about watching this same spectacle as a child. Her family, she said, could be traced back 700 years in her father’s side and 300 years on her mother’s. Her strong Peak District accent dragged vowels long and clipped consonants short, making disappointed claims that the parade was not as it used to be, when it was an excuse to dress up and for women to get a new hat. I looked down at my jeans, still muddy from the morning’s yomp across muddy moors, and countered that it was great that they still kept the custom at all.

Flash-teapot-parade — Residents of Flash celebrate the annual well-dressing and ‘teapot’ parade

In the church, we sang hymns and listened as the vicar gave a reading. He chose the parable of the Good Samaritan where, if you have not heard it, a man who has been robbed and left for dead is ignored by first a priest and then a Levite. The third passer-by, a Samaritan, stops and helps the man, sequestering him at an inn at his personal expense. I had not heard the story read since my childhood, but I remembered being told that the Levite would have been a local person of the same Jewish faith, but that the word Samaritan meant that the person was an enemy, as the Jews and the Samaritans were not on good terms. In the light of the current refugee crisis and the recent violent death of Jo Cox, the tale gained a new poignant meaning, as parables are wont to do, having a timeless moral code embedded in their codex. Even the giant teapot seemed significant, being a symbol of friendliness and neighbourliness in this land where people love nothing better than a nice cup of tea and who rush to provide one at the slightest suggestion of distress. The vicar did not spell it out, but he did take the time to bless those who would be voting in the upcoming referendum.

Back in Spain, I joined in more mid-summer celebrations, but occasionally, the air fell sour with the shock and disbelief of Brits, Europeans, Australians and US citizens. In this atmosphere of multiculturalism and warm abrazos, no-one could understand why the UK wanted a divorce. In my local village of Sant Pere de Ribes, they gathered for the Ball de Diables, where children young and old dress up in devil costumes and hold aloft screaming fireworks in a crazy display of anarchic energy known as a correfoc. Their carnival re-animates the eternal dance between light and dark, between good and evil. Embedded in these ancient traditions is the knowledge that at certain times, we need to be mindful of the uncertainty of our world and of the possibility, always, that mischief will win us over if we only open the door for long enough to let it in.

Solstice

June 22, 2014Community, Events, Meditation, Yoga and SpiritualityAustralia, bonfire, collingwood childrens farm, holstfield, Melbourne, mid-winter, mulled wine, solstice, Wales., winterlivinginthefuture

It’s 21st June. That’s mid-summer, right? Well, not here in Australia. After a long, warm Autumn, the trees are finally starting to look a bit bare and the days have started to begin and end with a chill. Sure, we still get hours of sunshine, but there’s a blanket in the bed and from time to time, I even put the heater on.

Last Sunday, I spent some time at Murundaka housing co-op. We shared a meal and sat around a fire in the garden. When I came home, my clothes smelt of wood smoke and I knew that for me, this is what winter solstice conjures up. Fire and friendship. A paradigm-shift away from the commercialism of christmas, solstice is a pagan festival which links us firmly to the land, to the seasons and to each other.

At home in Wales, we needed a fire in winter to keep warm. To be honest, we often needed it in summer, too! My little forest hut in HoltsField relies on a wood burning stove for both radiators and hot water and it slaves away for more than six months a year. When my husband recently noticed chestnuts here in the shops, I hesitated to buy them. “We don’t have an open fire to cook them on!” “We could barbecue them?” he suggested.

Winter is short in Melbourne, but they like to “rug up” in scarves and woollens. They like to serve mulled wine in the bars and to complain about the cold. There are even ski resorts in the mountains and although it’s been slow coming this year, there are reports that the snow has finally arrived. In the weekend “Age” newspaper, there is an article on people who pack up their Melbourne homes and spend the season in the snow, where the local school opens just for the winter term to accommodate city children.

While we get ready for winter, my friends in the UK are basking in an early summer heat wave. “Scorchio!” says Jane at Lammas ecovillage in West Wales. When I Skype with the people who are living in my house, I see that the doors are flung wide open and, what’s that? Yes, the sky appears to be a beautiful shade of blue. I’m heading home for a holiday in a few weeks and I’ve asked them to save some Welsh sunshine for me. I’ll be swimming at beautiful Caswell Bay and I’m hoping to go and see my friend Xenia play fiddle in her band at the Green Man Festival in Glanusk. When I get back to Australia, Spring will already be starting to bloom and the scent of jasmine will waft through the streets as the sun creeps higher in the sky.

So I’m making the most of winter. I’m celebrating the solstice Melbourne-style. At Collingwood children’s farm, 4,000 people turn up to enjoy a lantern parade, hot chips and a huge bonfire. I sit happily in a muddy field and listen to the sound of drummers, a crackling fire and a thousand young children kept up past their bedtime. As the first stars appear in the darkened night sky, I find a moment to marvel at the balance of life, the wisdom of nature and the miracle of the returning seasons. Happy Solstice everyone.