ELEMENT: WATER
Quiet, contemplative, solitude, rest, slow, peaceful, sluggish, inward, introspection, pause, reflection, withdrawal, silence, focus, development, restoration, reverie
- Rest, dream, get in touch with inspiration
- Refine visions
- Clarify direction
- Restore energy
Don’t push too hard! Ask yourself what you can accomplish in a day, week, or month. Position rest as the central focus of your routine → “you’ll emerge from this season with more endurance for the working days ahead of you.”
Practices:
- Stillness
- Restorative Movement (yoga, winter walks)
- Bathing (relax breath, affirmations, sing songs, record visualizations, epsom salt, face massage)
- Sleep and dream
- Retreat (projects and/or processing)
- Meditation
- The mind is a joke that the Divine made for itself, of itself, a reflection pool where it can witness the humor of its own chaos that’s taken such strange shape.
- Breathwork
- Journal review
- Transfer ideas that seem important. Organize and archive
- Distill into themes, assignments, or goals to carry you into future seasons
- Research and read
- Editing
Reflection
“In stillness, we find the ability to listen deeply
to ourselves, the planet, and the many
voices that guide us in our practice.
Winter gives us the spaciousness
to contemplate all angles,
all details of what was, of what brought us to this point,
and now we choose what to muse
on, what to mull over and enrich.
Let yourself be present as you become
the vessel for new images, updated pathways,
versions of the future transforming in your mind’s eye.
What you once saw as solid shifts now
because you took the time to give it a different voice.
What you once knew to be your medium expands now
because you assigned it a new name.
This is the height of the experiment, all creative potential
gestating in infinite color, held within
the quiet world of self,
readying for a timely rebirth
according to whatever guidance you conjure.
Do this work with care, at a bear’s pace,
below the cover of ice, held
by the soothing silence of snow.”
Month by Month
December: travel as little as possible, ease into slower pace with care
Winter solstice: Ceremony and ritual, make a feast, set intentions
January: turn fully inward - height of winter experience
New Year: transition into solitude and self-reflection
February: month of great pause, stay devoted to heaviness of winter
Winter → spring: shift is erratic - stay gentle, take extra good care of yourself, be careful with daily plans, don’t push too hard or frost might come