We Can Have Autumns
Growth and blooming are only possible if we take time for the autumns and winters of our lives.
I didn’t really want to go on my daily walk today. I could feel the to-do list on my shoulders when I jumped in the car after the morning drop-off. I wanted to label the walk I took up to my children’s classrooms at their school as the one for the day. Then, as I drove home, I heard something in me, say no, you need to do this.
Early on in parenting, it felt extremely easy to find myself placing to-do lists for the kids, work, and home far ahead of what I needed. It became easier to find myself lower and lower on the list in those early years. The space other things took up over me became larger and larger. Year after year, as they have grown, they have spread their wings more, and I have garnered an ability to open myself more to seeing and hearing my desires and needs. One of my priorities has become these daily quiet walks in nature. There are no earbuds, just the sound of my thoughts and nature, making space for hearing me. These walks are life-giving, but it is easy to fall into a pattern believing they don’t hold the value to me they do when a list of tasks begins to pile up.
I don’t regret going through these seasons of being less of a priority to myself. I believe there are times this happens when we are required to shift our attention to something or someone else. I would only regret it if it didn’t allow me to realign how I listen to myself and hadn’t used it to refine my inner sense of self or understand what really fills me, inspires me, and makes me my best self.
Taking this morning's walk, I felt a little wobbly in my head, and I assume this is why I wasn’t prioritizing it to begin with. There were many things floating around. There was insecurity about work, writing, upcoming projects, relationships, the state of the world, etc. I find my walks on Fridays can feel heavier than the others lately in a state of transition myself. I knew I needed just to use the walk to focus on hearing other conversations amongst the trees and land. So I listened to the mist collecting on the leaves and then dripping down. I watched the Blue Jays float in bright blues, contrasting against the yellows and oranges. I visited the trees I am most connected to on the land: The maple on the edge of the land and the white pine that stands in the valley. I let the land hold the things I didn’t want to discuss.
Somewhere amongst the trees and damp fields that are mixing their endings with beginnings, there was a sense that everything was a bit in this state of insecurity and change. The energy of the peak color of the trees erupts and speaks the truth that it is okay to be processing, unsure, taking risks, and needing time to yourself. The land around me simply reminded me to be in that moment and season. It showed me how wonderful it is to show up as I am. That coming here wobbly was just fine.
The walk left me feeling deeply energized, not in a summer or spring way, but in the way the trees are vibrant even as their energy recedes. A feeling of comfort in the grief, nostalgia, aches, and life transitions. A sense of belonging in the season I am in. It reminded me how vital it is to experience seasons of transition or rest or tending to the deepest parts of ourselves. The trees reminded me that we, too, need to shift our energy just like them.
Sometimes, that’s what I need more than an answer or lesson from the woods and fields. Sometimes, I just need to know it is okay to be in the season I am in, whether for the hour or months ahead. That we aren’t intended to be always blooming. Sometimes, we can just be in the middle of it all, which is beautiful, too.
This week, our paid subscribers took time to connect and learn how to navigate this season intentionally. This is just one awesome thing about being a paid subscriber.
You can jump in any time and get your Guide to Autumn and more emails from Through the Seasons each week to help bring thoughtfulness to navigating the seasons of nature and life.
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This week, I also shared these posts for subscribers:
Desiring Clear Endings - Seasonal Essay
The Necessity of the Pathless Woods - Last week’s free newsletter
10/20 Reflection - The Maple Amongst The Pines
There was this tree in a field on my drive through the country roads that connect all the towns and communities on this peninsula. A maple that shone against the dark green pines. It was bright red on the front edges, and as it filtered closer to the trunk, it was orange and then yellow. It struck me, and seeing it in that cornfield against the pines, I was moved to tears by it. How it stood alone there and raged in colors all its own. The pines stand as the stark contrast to this unreal tree.
Maybe the tree wasn’t as magical if it had been amongst the other maples. Maybe it wouldn’t have given off such an aura amongst a stand of other trees in similar hues, but there it was in this setting that made it feel rogue and like a rebel in showing who it was without fear.
The colors alone were beautiful, but I think for an instant I felt this connection to that tree standing there, shining like a beacon of what it is just to be yourself amongst a sea of others. To be the rebel. To be the one who trusted who they were and never questioned it. Maybe for some instant, I felt I needed that reminder to trust myself in the same way.
When transitioning in life, there is an unbelievable amount of vulnerability. An insane amount of insecurity in ourselves. This fall has been full of shifts for me, and I must be incredibly gentle. One moment, I feel the confidence of that tree, and another, the ground under me can wobble and shake in, trusting my instincts and intuition or being able to write and be vulnerable with the thoughts that flow into my head.
Watching that tree, though, I felt inspired and reminded to trust myself even when I felt like a raging red maple amongst the deep, dark green pines and browning corn fields. It reminded me how powerful it is when we own who we are and how it inspires others to do the same.
So here I am, reminding myself to be me in all its raging colors, funky lines, or ways it feels it doesn’t fit the mold. It is more fun when we don’t.
*** These reflections are intended to help you see the truth from the land I hear throughout the week and spend time with it. Longer-form essays have moved to paid subscriptions on Wednesdays. ***
This section is intended to give you a way to look at this season every week. They are high-level ways to connect to the rhythms of your daily life.
Preparation
Everything around us is working to prepare for the incoming winter. The trees are going dormant. They run every bit of their energy from their limbs to their core and roots to rebuild for new growth. The birds are storing up for the winter ahead, along with the squirrels. The bears are preparing for hibernation. Everything around us in nature is prepping for the cold days.
I find myself doing the same as I clear the garden, lay new compost and mulch to protect the soil in winter, and plant what I hope to see emerge in the spring. I have a list of tasks that need completion before the ground freezes and the first snowstorm comes.
This practice of preparation is something we can and should also be doing with our bodies and minds. I share best practices for this season in my Autumn Guide, which is part of a paid subscription (get 20% off here). One of them is preparing for this shift. Here are a few ways you can be doing this over the coming weeks:
Shifting with the light: when the darkness comes in, shift to lowering the lights in the evening, lighting candles, and warming your space with this sort of light instead of overhead lights that can be intense. This will bring warmth visually to your space.
Removing screens: Setting times and parameters for screens is helpful, particularly in the evening. Since the incoming season of winter is about rest and rejuvenating ourselves, leaning into the darkness of the evenings can be helpful rather than countering it with artificial light. This means less time watching TV and more time reading a book or setting time to do a grounding and relaxed yin yoga, for instance. This will help your bed rest better in these months and weeks ahead.
Warming meals: focus on slow-cooked meals that can be ready to eat with little effort or take a little time if you want that practice. Either way, your meals should warm as the cooler days are here. Paid Subscribers, look for a call for soup recipes this weekend!
Eating in season: This is a great way to help your body. Many of the veggies we eat this time of year coming from local fields will deeply nourish us as we enter the colder months.
Getting outside: Begin now getting outside for walks or daily movement. This is why I love the garden because it gives me a daily task outside to get this time in no matter what. Getting outside right now will help your body adjust to the changing weather and temps.
These are just a few ways to prepare your body, mind, and soul for the upcoming season in the same way nature is doing.
Here are the things this week that I have been holding at the top of my mind and enjoying right now. Feel free to comment below anything you also love! I would love to hear in the comments. You all usually have some amazing things.
Reading: I have been slowly revisiting chapters of Braiding Sweetgrass, and it is still my favorite book, without a doubt. It amazes me how some books can meet us in different seasons in new ways.
Listening: Gregory Alan Isakov’s Songs for Octobers. It was the first album he ever released, and it is still my favorite, particularly this time of year. The songs Garden and Shining Offa You will always feel like some of my favorites.
Wearing: Living in the climate here, clothing that transitions and holds up to wear is important. I have this 3-in-1 parka from Patagonia, and I love that it is literally three different coats in 1. It is very warm for the super cold, snowy days, but the raincoat is long and trench-like to keep me dry, with room for layering underneath. It washes and wears well. I have used it for almost three years now. This is a great choice if you need a good parka that will move through the seasons. You can also look on Worn Wear for a similar one.
Doing: A lot of cooking, actually. It is so warming and nice. I don’t like doing a lot of dinner cooking in the evenings, so I kind of batch things in case we are busy or just want a low-key evening.
Thinking about: I have been thinking a ton about education lately, actually. Spending this fall teaching Middle Schoolers, I have felt the disservice we do to our young adolescents by not getting them outside throughout the day. Watching how the kids connect and engage from the classroom to get themselves into nature is wild. They lack focus and engagement when we do things in the classroom, and then when I move them out into the garden, they are engaged, talking, opening up, and becoming curious in just a few minutes. Nothing else changed by the setting. It is powerful to observe. These kids even talk about how lucky they are to spend time outside like this. It is sad that nature isn’t being a priority in public education.
Cooking: I saw this trick to avoid peeling butternut squash for sauces and soup by just cutting it in half and spooning out the seeds (save for yummy roasted snacks) and then dropping in garlic cloves, apple, and onion into the hole. Cover with oil and salt and flip over. Let roast at 425 for 20-30 minutes or until done. Then, it is ready to be blended with all that goodness. Holy smokes, it is good—the easiest way to make dinner.
Paying Attention: The endings. So many things feel like they are ending in various places and ways. Find I have to give room for the various feelings endings bring about, from sadness to longing to joy and excitement. There is a lot of mixing of things. I am sitting with that right now.
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