The Winter Solstice Of Our Culture

My heart is moved by all I cannot save:
so much has been destroyed

I have to cast my lot with those
who age after age, perversely,

with no extraordinary power,
reconstitute the world.

—Adrienne Rich (1929–2012)

Here in the northern hemisphere, we moved into the seasonal Winter Water Phase on November 15th.  With the recent election, culturally we just passed the winter solstice of our era, the midway point of the Winter/Water Phase.  As those of us who live in northern climates know, it is a long slog from the longest night to the first sprouts in spring.

This diagram is deceptively simple and deeply profound.  It describes the energies that give rise to the life cycles of creation.  Everything has a life cycle—birth, maturation, decline, and death/rebirth.  This is true whether it is a garden over the course of a year, a dinner party over the course of an evening, a human life over the course of roughly 80 years, a 24-hour day, or an era over the course of a few hundred years.  This life cycle can be described in terms of the Taoist Five Phases of our chart, which helps locate us in the life cycle of our culture.  Looking back at history, we see the rise and fall of the Middle Ages giving way to the rise and fall of the Renaissance, giving way to the rise and fall of the Enlightenment, giving way to the rise and fall of the Industrial Age, and so on.  Each arc overlaps the previous.  The overlap occurs in the late winter/water phase of death and rebirth.  Locating ourselves in the life cycle of our era helps ground us in realistic expectations of what is possible in the liminal time where the old structures that were meant to hold and support us are crumbling and the new ones haven’t come into reality. And since we are in the Winter/Water phase of an era lasting a few hundred years, it could take decades to get to spring.

The Winter/Water phase of the life cycle is the death and rebirth phase.  In nature, winter is the time when all the energy is withdrawn from the solar collecting work of summer, the foliage has died, and the work of winter dormancy is happening underground.  By the winter solstice, all the beautiful structures (foliage) produced by spring and summer have died and gone to compost.  And then we have the long cold months of resting underground, gathering the potential energy, the magical ingredients for the alchemy of spring.

Similarly, our political, social, and cultural structures that did the work which produced the rise and maturation of our era are collapsing and dying.  The political structures and cultural institutions that held and protected us are overwhelmed by the torrent of chaos and upheaval, leaving us feeling disoriented, anxious, and on the edge of despair.  It is easy to feel increasingly stressed and lost with the continuous news of the growing darkness in the world.

I planted daffodils the day after the election.  Bulbs have always made me feel hopeful.  In my garden, I have planted thousands of bulbs over the years, and it is not uncommon to accidentally disturb someone’s slumber when digging.  Right now, underground daffodils have white sprouts emerging from the tops.  We don’t see them, but they are busy resting, gathering the potential energy and the daffodil magic they will need when the energies of the sun returns and creates the conditions that signal them to reach skyward.  This is deep, crucial work. Without it, there will be no blooms in spring.

Photo: Penbay Pilot

As we watch our political, social, cultural, and environmental norms, systems, and structures rapidly collapsing in the coming years, it is going to feel increasingly chaotic and scary.  It is going to feel a little crazy making.  It is helpful to know where we are in the Five Phase cycle of life because then we know where to look in Nature for what is ancient, True, and unchanging, which can nourish and sustain us we look for signs of spring.  We can create islands of sanity amidst the chaos, where joy, love, and hope are alive and well.  Remember the daffodils underground gathering potential and magic for future sprouting.  They are our teachers here. And remember, it is futile to go looking for daffodils blooming in January.

The old Taoists left us a map that we can use to locate ourselves in the bigger movements of Life.  They also left us a list of correspondences that go with each of the phases as the map key.  When we think of winter, we think of cold dry air, snow, evergreens, holly, hot chocolate, and snuggling up by the fire with a good book.  These are “correspondences.” They describe how we respond to the energies of Winter/Water.  The old Taoists kept going with that list to be more specific about the body/mind/spirit manifestations of the phases as a guide for keeping ourselves in line with the normal movements of nature as the original wellness plan. Basically, they are the healthy human response to the Winter/Water phase energies that would be the equivalent of a little white sprout if you were a daffodil.  This can serve as a guidebook about how to care for yourselves and your loved ones until the spring of a new era appears, which may take a while.

If you are new to this way of thinking, click here for the full piece on the Winter/Water Phase.

The yearly seasons will continue to turn. The seasons of our individual lives will progress as we age. The sun will rise and set. The tide will go in and out. But all of it will happen against the backdrop of a culture in its late Winter/Water phase.  We can enjoy a summer day in Maine, but it is a summer day in the context of a cultural winter.  This is different than a summer day 30 years ago in the sense that we have all been through a lot in the last few decades.  As a result of our collective traumas, the conversation at the Fourth of July picnics is not as light as it once was. There is an innocence lost on many levels.  It is an indication of where we are collectively and culturally on the Five Phase wheel.

We can use our understanding of the Five Phase energetics to help us better understand what is happening.  If we know we are enjoying a seasonal summer day in the context of a cultural winter, it will make more sense, and we can feel less crazy, less disappointed if the joy feels a bit muted.  Otherwise, without a conscious awareness of what is happening, you will do all the things you have traditionally done to enjoy that summer day—buy a watermelon, invite friends for a BBQ, shuck the corn—but it will all feel a little flat and unsatisfying.  And this will carry on throughout all the seasons… spring on winter, summer on winter, fall on winter, and right now, winter on winter. See if you can notice the effects of our cultural winter on your holiday festivities this year.

In this series of essays, I am hoping to offer you a way to consciously work with the current collective reality that will help you thrive despite the darkness and the storms of a cultural winter.  I want to help you to be like grass growing through a crack in the sidewalk—sturdy, tenacious and 100 percent its joyous grassy self.  We need that for ourselves, for our beloveds, and the Earth needs that from us as well. It will take a little extra care and attention just as going camping in winter requires much more care and attention to stay safe and enjoy the experience.

Applying The Five Phase Correspondences to Cultural Winter

You may recall from the blog post, “Winter and the Deep Dive into the Water Phase”, that the corresponding Winter/Water phase energy direction is a down-and-in contraction. This is the normal movement of the Water phase and it balances to the up-up expansion of Summer/Fire.  This down-and-in contractive energy will be added to our daily lives for quite some time.  We will have to find ways to elevate it or be dragged down and exhausted by it.  It’s like having a Debbie Downer at a party.  It is socially a heavy lift, and extra work for everyone there. This lift is going to take daily extra care and energy to balance the Debbie Downer that is our crisis of Nature and Culture, just to do our regular lives.  We will need to find joy in simple things and look to Nature for guidance on Wintering well.

The Challenge and Opportunity of Winter/Water Phase is storage, dormancy, rest, and gathering potential.  We observe in ourselves that in winter we like to take quiet, restful time indoors versus the extroversion of summer.  We can know that no matter the season of the year, at this point in time there is always the Winter/Water Phase descending energy of our era in the background.  This tells us to take extra care to rest deeply and protect our resources. Resources can mean the energy we have to get through our day, the energy we have for big projects or social situations, and it is also financial resources.  Our most valuable resource is our capacity to fully live into who we were born to be.  This is an idea that we will flush out as we go along here.

The Central Issue of the Winter/Water Phase is Willpower. This is the will, the energy to live into the fullest, most authentic, most noble version of ourselves.  This is the grass being great grass despite growing in a sidewalk crack. This willpower is the focus and energy you bring to your soul’s mission, your blueprint, to manifest your fullest potential.  Your purpose and mission are stored deep in your body/mind/spirit’s blueprint. Your blueprint is part DNA, part soul’s mission and part the Divine spark that brought you to life.  A human being’s blueprint is not different from that of an oak tree, for example.  In the way that a whole oak tree is stored in a tiny acorn, just waiting for the right conditions to come into being, the blueprint of all your potential is stored and waiting deep within you.  It is the Winter/Water phase that gives us access to our blueprints via the deep quiet rest of winter.   The rest in the Winter/Water phase lets us gather up all the resources we need to grow into the next phase of ourselves.  In a 24-hour cycle, the Water phase is the night and why it is important to be asleep by 10 p.m. and to sleep deeply. This is also why some of the most inspired brilliance comes to us in our sleep, or when we have a big decision we say, “let me sleep on it.” In this Winter/Water Phase of our culture, we can know that we need to dive deep and find what is true and real in each of us because that is where we will find guidance to navigate going forward.

The Emotions of the Winter/Water Phase are Calm and Confident versus Fearful and Anxious.

The Winter/Water Phase offers us calm, serene confidence that we have the resources we need (B/M/S) and are living a purposeful life.  This is true as long as we are able to keep up with processing all of life coming at us every day.  When life gets to be more than we can handle, we start to feel stressed, emotionally contracted and anxious. 

That contraction, the energy direction of Winter/Water, can create fear and anxiety about having the resources (emotional, time, financial, health, support, community etc.) to handle it all.  It triggers fears for safety, security  and ultimately survival which belong to the Winter/Water phase.  For most of human history, the question of surviving the winter was very real and we know that in our bones.  The collective fear of the future is one sign that we are culturally in Winter/Water.  We are all worried about making it through.  With consciousness, we can know that Winter/Water is about down-and-in energy, gathering resources, potential energy, wisdom and a little magic.  This points us to dive deep below the turbulence in the outer world and look to our inner resources stored deep within, look to the invaluable resource that is our beloveds, and lean into the magic that is love and connection.   When we can do this, we are able to utilize the energy that would be frittered away by anxiety to propel us forward to calmly unfold our best possible lives in the circumstances. Like grass being the best possible grass even when it is growing in a crack in a sidewalk. 

Wisdom

We generally associate wisdom with older people because it requires several components that just take time to acquire.  Old age is the Water Phase of life.  Wisdom is made up of the knowledge and experience that comes with having lived a while, the ability to dive deep in examination of oneself, and to approach life with compassion for yourself and others.  

When we live from Wisdom, decision making is a slow, deliberate process in which all the angles are considered.  You don’t have to be old to live from wisdom. You have to have the capacity to dive deep, and get quiet enough to connect with your blueprint, your soul, to know the way forward toward your highest potential. Wisdom arises from the place in us that is calm, serene, and confident.  It stays focused on what is truely important. It arises from our connection to our ancestors, who gave us much more than our eye color.  And, it arises from our soul’s mission.  There is a quality of dropping down-and-in to reflect, finding something of value to be brought back up and shared. Taking up a practice of daily meditation, making art, writing, or walking mindfully in Natutre are all ways to connect with our inner wisdom.

Because we are in a crisis of both Nature and Culture, there is an urgency for individuals to awaken to their soul’s mission and live in to it as fully as possible.  The Earth as a living spiritual being needs that from humanity, for we have lost our proper relationship to Her and the web of life.  There isn’t much we can do individually to end the climate crisis or political and cultural instability (body), or change anyone’s view of reality (mind), but there is much we can do on the level of the spirit.  Aligning ourselves with our soul’s mission, our authenticity, so that Spirit, the Great Mystery, the Divine can reveal itself into the world through the uniqueness of our blueprints is badly needed at this time.  It is an old idea that we are each a unique expression of the Divine and that we each have unique gifts to offer the world, especially when She is in crisis.  When we are moved to act from our authenticity, our soul’s mission, in connection with the Divine, we can be of service to the  Earth and the new era waiting to be born.  In this way, healing can make its way into the world.

With the dormant daffodil bulb as our teacher, we can navigate these cold, dark times by gathering the human equivalent of the deep magic the bulb is storing in winter to bloom in spring.  We are looking for what is human magic.  It is what is uniquely human, authentic, true and real to nourish our souls and care for our loved ones to be able to flourish given the constraints of our time.  A daffodil flourishing in winter is hunkered down, with a little white sprout, gathering potential for future growth.  In humans, this is simple human connection, kindness, love, gratitude, and caring that we extend to our family, friends and wider community.  It’s potluck suppers, a card to a struggling friend, cookies for a neighbor, or babysitting for some exhausted parents of young children. It is simple acts of kindness with great love.  This is our greatest gift to our struggling world.

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@resilience.and.joy