Have you felt the change? The craving for cinnamon, a need for cozy sweaters, even the magic in the air as the leaves start to change and the air fills with a chill. Yeah, fall is finally here.
This is my favorite time of year. I think it’s because everything feels like pure magic from now through the holidays. I love cozying up on the couch, watching nature change around me, but most of all I love the permission to slow down.
Summer is always a high energy season. We’re playing outside filling up the long days with more things to do. But as we’re just about to reach out breaking point with too many activities the weather begins to change and we feel a calling to stay home, to light a candle, to rest and relax. And that’s the invitation I give you right now.
Our society loves to tell us to always be going, always be growing, and whatever you do, don’t ever stop. But when we look at nature, we see, that nothing can run that way forever. Instead, what if you ebbed and flowed with the seasons? Knowing that we all have cycles where creation, stagnation, and destruction perform–this is, after all, the cycle of all life.
Fall and early winter are a time of destruction. It’s the season where we shed that which no longer serves us just like we watch the trees shed the leaves that no longer serve them. We take inventory of where we are and notice the things that helped us grow and sustained us and everything that added stress or kept us from feeling our best. If a spring cleaning is about getting all the dust out of the house that’s accumulated over the winter, a fall cleaning is about removing all the excess that was brought in during your “busy season.”
This month, as you embrace all your favorite fall rituals–football season, halloween, Samhain, pumpkin spice everything, fireplaces and candles, a favorite blanket and a good book– also consider everything that’s been building up that no longer serves you. This could be a way of thinking, or an accumulation of stuff. It could be a work ethic or good habits that have turned bad. You know the areas of your life that you’d like to see change. What small steps can you take over the next month to help you create sacred rituals that serve you and help you to slow down? Here are just a few I’ve been doing to spark your imagination:
- Releasing my constant thoughts about money and tying that to my self worth. Instead I repeat the mantra “I am enough, I do enough, I have enough” and give the numbers over to the divine.
- Rediscovering my meditation practice in a way that works for me. Instead of feeling like I have to commit to 20-minutes a day, I’m making space for any amount of time that feels good in my body and leaving the guilt at the door.
- Recommitting to my yoga practice with a goal to flow 3 times a week (in any style that feels right in that moment–fast flows not required!)
- Taking over one meal a week from my husband to give him the gift of relaxing and to connect with the ingredients going into my body.
There is no right or wrong way to go about this. Think about what areas of your life you want to improve. Just choose one and then decide on one small step you can focus on this month to start working on that area of your life.
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