20 Dec Winter solstice blessings!

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.

Sonnets to Orpheus II, 29

Into the dark we go, winter solstice, the longest night of the year approaches. It is a holy, sacred and terrible thing to be brought to the depths of our senses, feeling our way to the bottom of our lungs and belly and breath. We are hovering at the edge of time at the end of a decade, the edges are always where the intensity is the greatest, where the growth is the most apparent and where we are sorely tempted to throw in the the towel and run the other direction. How many of us will go willingly into into the dark open and willing to discover what lies in wait? What gifts are rising from the dark sea of our quiet exhale?

We are being unmade as the light dies, the old is breaking down in the vast night, the energy of death is all around us, for there can be no rebirth without it. Our shedding skins can be itchy and uncomfortable as they begin to shrug off of our bodies, but there is no rushing this process, it will take as long as it takes to reveal what lies beneath.

The great weaver invites us to grab her tread and let her unravel us. Let your ego shatter over and over again and when you are in a million broken pieces, turn back and find yourself standing there, like to lover you know yourself to be.

We are unmade, here, where the light dies and here to it will be reborn. It all comes from the same place, birth and death. Here we dive into the dark, bathe in the dark, drink the dark to become new, to remember our light.

Solstice is the most sacred and holy and terrible of times. May we greet it as such, humble to its grace and subtle power.

Solstice ritual

Seeds need the darkness to germinate. Use this dark time as an opportunity to plant seeds that you want to nurture in the new sun cycle. This is a time to dream, imagine, and feel into what you want to experience. What is of vital importance to you? What do you want to have more of? What are you no longer willing to give your energy to? Set aside some time to talk about them, paint them or write them, you may want to move them in your body or share them with the sky.

Everyone has there own style when it comes to communicating with their longing. However you connect in with your dreams, DO it. And when you feel complete, imagine it as an incredible and potent seed, imager this seed being planted by you loving hands deep into you psyche, deep into your heart of hearts, and cover it with the fecund soil of the darkness, trusting that it will germinate, and bloom in its time. This is an act of love and faith, and it reminds you the power you have to direct your attention in a way that serves your highest vision. You are worthy of this gift, you are loved.

May this winter solstice bring you into the bright fire of your heart,

All the blessings,

Jacqui