Dancing Through Winter

I’ve really been struck by the depth and power of Winter this year as I’ve made my own way through this season and been alongside my friends and loved ones as they do the same. There seems to be a feeling about Winter that it is a negative time - the lack of light, the cold, the barren nature of it. I think this year it has been exacerbated by the onoing ongoingness of what’s happening in the World. Many people, myself included find this time of the year difficult and a challenge to live through.

Speaking for myself I find it an emotionally difficult time of the year. My first baby, who I miscarried, would have been due on 22nd December. There are many years where this doesn’t touch me emotionally. I am at peace that he was not meant to be born and I am glad that he is wherever he is doing whatever he is doing. This year was different. I felt it keenly and very sorely. I realised I had feelings of grief that had been trapped inside me for 17 years that needed to be felt and released. Whilst I completely accept that things were as they were, I felt grief for all the things I never got to do for him as his Mum - not giving him life, holding him, bringing him home, watching him grow. My Dad died on 23rd December and this anniversary ALWAYS hits me. I always miss him. I always feel sad. My Dad was the man that made everything OK for me and not having him here with me still feels wrong to me although again I completely understand that he is safe with my Mum and where he is meant to be. I feel him with me every day, continuing to cheer me on and encourage me. That doesn’t mean that this anniversary doesn’t hurt because it does.

I find Christmas highlights things that are painful to me. The fact that I am still single when I would dearly love a Beloved. That I don’t get to be with my kids for the whole day and that I don’t get to experience ‘family’ in the way I used to. Becoming single and leaving behind the nuclear family way of life was a decision that was right for me but it doesn’t mean that I don’t feel pain about it sometimes and Christmas highlights that.

This is how it is for me. I’m sure we all have our own triggers and difficulties around this time of year.

So how do we live through these difficult times? How can we resource ourselves when all is cold and dark and we feel alone?

All I can tell you is what helped me.

One thing I have done a lot this year and been able to keep doing through the seasons is dance. There is a Movement Medicine class up in Falkland Woods on a Sunday morning which I love (and would thoroughly recommend btw - see link at the bottom) and have attended from Summer, through Autumn and now through Winter. As we’ve danced through the seasons I’ve seen the outer landscape change. The trees are now bare. It feels cold, it takes longer to get warm and it takes skill and effort to keep warm.

It occurred to me that dancing outside in the Winter is really teaching me and giving me skills for life. I have learned how to resource myself for Winter dancing. I know exactly how many pairs of socks I need on, how many layers, exactly when to take off my gloves and scarf and when to put them back on again, that I need lip salve available and a tissue in the pocket of each layer. I am well resourced so I can cope with whatever happens for me physically in the dance. Winter learning then equals making sure we have the resources we need and that we need more of them over Winter. Taking this forward a further thought, next year I can maybe consciously conserve the inner resources I need so that when Winter comes and there’s that great big emotional outlay , I know I have enough to live through it.

Dancing through Winter has also allowed me to connect with the energy of this season and all that it has to offer. Yes it’s cold. Yes it’s dark. Yes it feels unrelenting at times. Yes everything is bare so there is not much to inspire the mind or body. Or so it seems. But there is healing energy if we look for it. If it’s cold we can keep ourselves close to the Spiritual Fire. We can light candles or our fireplaces if we have them and bathe in the fire energy of warmth and cleansing. We can allow the candlelight to illuminate the darkness and comfort and soothe us - not only in our physical life but in our inner world too. We can use the earlier nightfall and later daybreak to cosy in, have early nights and long lies that replenish our energy and allow us to invite healing. We can allow the bareness outside to inspire us - to take ourselves back to our barest state, trusting that new growth will always follow. This might mean allowing buried feelings to come up for release, letting ourselves feel our hurt and sadness, letting ourselves feel our aloneness - all the while knowing that in doing that we make space for the new. For the vital lightness of Spring to fill us when the times comes. We can let the Winter energy take us deeper into the energy of Mother Earth. We can burrow our roots down even deeper than we normally would and let ourselves be healed and held by our Great Mother. All is still warm at the centre of the Earth. Winter allows us the opportunity to reflect, replenish, restore and go deep. We don’t have to be out there and active, we can be quiet and still. With Christmas and New Year telling us to be sociable and ‘out there’ we can choose even just for a few minutes every day to plug into Winter and keep ourselves grounded.

Winter also shows us that no matter how cold and dark things get the light always returns. The Winter Solstice welcomes back the light. The first New Moon of the year shows us we can dream and vision and make wishes. We can have faith that although on the surface the ongoing ongoingess is still well….ongoing, underneath the surface seeds are calling in the nourishment of the Earth, they are preparing to sprout and grow and they will eventually show themselves - peeking out from the soil like little rays of hope. The seasons, the moon cycles, the months of the year are all reassuringly consistent. Ever evolving as we as individuals and as humankind are evolving. This can be a comfort to us and help us hold on that the light inside us as well as make the most of the dark.

The main thing about dancing through the Winter that I have learned is that it is a complete joy. It has been a complete joy to know I have the endurance, resilience and resourcefulness to do it. That I can move and warm my body even when common sense would say otherwise! That I can choose to do what I love and what makes me happy all the time regardless of how difficult external circumstances might be or feel. And most of all I have learned that instead of trying to force myself through life, fighting all the way, all I need to do is dance. All I need to do is move my body in whatever way feels right and I will heal. I can do this on the dancefloor and I can dance to the sacred rhythm of my own life and of the world. I can live this everyday. Even through Winter.

Lisa x

Dancing with Life - Catherine Wright If you want to find out more about Movement Medicine here is the link to my awesome teacher Catherine’s website.