New Year’s blessings & reflections

January 4, 2017

Dearest ones,

A new year has begun. Everywhere I look and listen, people are speaking of new beginnings, new year’s intentions and resolutions. I enjoy the energy and momentum I sense in this, the hope and courage too, and yet, when I touch in with my true me… I realize I’m actually not quite ready for new beginnings in an outward sense.  

Around me, nature is very quiet at this time of the year, encouraging me to reflect, to incubate and listen. 

How are you feeling? 

I invite you to tune in to that. Not to what others are saying or expecting, but just that. You. To stop. To listen. To allow yourself to be, before diving into the next becoming.

Whether you’re ready to plunge into a new year with vigour, or rest a while longer in the ‘in-between’, or simply carry on, I’d like to share a couple reflections to accompany you. 

 Winter in the northern hemisphere has just begun. The season invites me to stop. 

To settle into Stillness. To curl up and rest. To hibernate, at least a little. 

To get so quiet that I can listen for and hear if anything I am not expecting may arise. Out of the Stillness. 

And so I choose to see all of January as the ‘in-between’, the prolonged stretch of a stopping-while-listening-for-new-beginnings, offering more time for reflection, contemplation, rest, and trusting that the energy will rise of its own accord, without forcing or willing it, when the Stillness has had enough space and time.

 

Years ago, when I was just a few weeks pregnant with our daughter, Adonia, I went to a 10-day Vipassana retreat during which everyone is silent for the entire time. One of my clearest memories was how hesitant I felt to start speaking again at the end of the ten days. The Silence had been both a challenge and a safe place. Speaking struck me as the easiest place to mess up, to bring egoic, reactive patterns back to the interactive space. The quiet invited me to untangle myself from those conditioned patterns. To stop. And start up again with greater awareness and care.

I did end up speaking again :)  Messing up, learning and growing all the while. 

This January 1st, and in the ensuing few days, I have had a similar experience. Marking a new year as a new slate, the start of renewed possibility and potential, I have been watching myself more closely throughout the first day, and the second and third, and now the fourth, catching the moments I slide with greater precision, while recognizing that no matter the intention, I will slide, I will mess up. And I will get back up and keep going.

I made it through day one with nary a reaction, impatience or doubt. Day two and beyond, I sprinkled with more unconsciousness. Living includes learning. I can’t stay in the purity of Silence.

So, here’s to taking the plunge into Life, over and over again, renewing our faith that we can grow our consciousness, our capacity for love and kindness every day, while forgiving ourselves and making good when we miss the mark.

It’s that lifelong dynamic between reaching for the stars, for we are noble, while curling into the earth, for we are also humble. Stretching and challenging ourselves AND offering ourselves kindness and compassion as we make our way onward, along this human adventure.

Let us welcome the new year as an opportunity to do both with renewed attention!

 

I wish you a most blessed new year. 

I pray we wake up as a humanity to the incredible Beauty, Goodness, and Truth we are at our core. I pray we find our way and that in 2017 we light up the world, kindling the fire in our midst that never dies away.

I wish you well.  

I look forward to our journey together – be this in my capacity as counselor, parenting coach, parenting course facilitator, friend, colleague, sister, fellow traveller.

Thank you for you!

With all my love,    

                           Miriam