Madeline Dietrich - Unlock Pleasure

Dec 10, 2015

The Pleasure of Winter

Category | Pleasure & Nature,

This long extended fall has us fooled that winter will never come, but the cold in the air at night tells me it’s just around the corner. I revel in how each season has its own unique pleasures – a pleasure that is gleaned by the surrender to what is. The pleasure of winter for me is that it calls me inward.

Lately I’ve been pondering the difference between fall and winter. Fall is still so full of life, a harvest to be gathered, but winter in its very nature is still, barren and quiet. This can sound bleak, but there can be a lot of pleasure in beholding emptiness.

In the creative cycle we call it the creative void. This void is actually a very fertile place where all creation emerges from. It’s a necessary dwelling time to incubate what is to come. We’re invited to think like the seeds that will hibernate under the frozen snow in winter, but come March, will feel the warmth of the sun, the thaw and perk up their little buds. It’s the same for us.

Creative emptiness is about allowing, holding space, tuning into an emergent process that has its own rhythm and pace, unique to you, and to the spirit of what wants to be born.

As you sit in the midst of pre-winter and pre-holiday mode, will you consider making space for emptiness; space to rest and be still? What do you want to create in the new year? What might want to be birthed through you? Are there some quiet stirrings going on even now? Will you make space to listen?

I want to offer you a poem in preparation for the months ahead.