We Can Learn from the Dark

2020.

I mean.

I just.

Weeks have gone on forever. Months have flown by. And the year itself has felt interminable.

For all the reasons you know. All the fear and death and grief and terror and shock and shock again…you know the reasons. 2020. The hits have just kept coming.

And on top of it all, the December holidays. They shouldn’t feel like more “hits,” but they can, especially when we just cannot DO all the things that we’d love to be doing, and we’re trying to figure out new ways to manage, to parent, to keep kids happy and well, to be in relationships, not to be isolated…well, again, you know.

Even during this time of “social distance” — really especially during this time, we need to feel connected to our own hearts, to the Divine, and to other beings. 

Even when most of our shopping is done online or in the crafts of our own hands, the deep character of the often-beloved, often-dreaded December holiday season can be obscured by fretful shopping, messy cookie making, and mandatory cooking. It is that frenzy that is another dis-ease of this season. Advent, Chanukah, Yule, Christmas, Kwanzaa…none of these holidays demand frenetic activity. Yet, the quality of this time of year tends to be frantic, even in this strange, strange year. We tend to feel the push and pull of conflicting obligations, like the desire to find ways to spend meaningful time with family, even as we find some of our family challenging. 

But as the light grows dim we naturally want to join our other mammal siblings in rest and renewal, a kind of hibernation, a retreat, as it were. Especially in times of uncertainty and unrest. 

Not everything is uncertain. 

Some things remain.

Gaia, Earth, makes Her way around Sol, our brilliant, yellow sun, each year. Each year they come close together in our winter, but in the Northern Hemisphere, that closeness is accompanied by the slanting light and the deep darkness of the solstice.

The solstice remains a time that, no matter the frenzy and fear around us, we are welcomed into the dance of Gaia and Sol. We are welcomed into the seeming slowing of time as the days shorten. This dance is for us, in our blink-of-an-eye lives, an eternal thing. An eternal dance, so many long ages in Gaia’s slow spin. As we are part of Her, not merely residents in some sort of terrestrial neighborhood, so we are invited to attend to the seasons, however they show up where we are in this blue-green ball of which we are a part. 

And this year, in order to do that, we will go deep into our own hearts. Deep into stillness. Deep into listening. Deep.

“The Great Above Calls to the Great Below” 

This year, we will make our way into the Underworld, with the help of an ancient myth that is a profound teaching I have studied over the last 20 years. Not merely the Labyrinth, turning in and in and in toward the Center and back out into the world. But down and down into the Underworld, House of Shadows, into a place where we can learn to see in the dark and from which we can be reborn into new understanding. 

We will not have a splash of flashy presentations or lots of notes to take, just the time we’ve spent together as we have the last five years. A PDF for you to make notes (if you like) or doodle on. Time between each of four Zoom gatherings to think and to process. To nap and take a walk. To lunch and to sing. To take care of obligations that simply could not be set aside. No special effects. Just sharing and being together and going on a journey, together and alone.

And during our gatherings, an invitation to come in your pyjamas. To knit and share the sweet rhythm of your rocking chair. To lounge in bend with the light off, staying in the dim of an overcast day. To keep your video off and to be with us that way. To dip in and out. To do exactly what you need to do to have a day of gentle, gentle, gentleness.

As you know, there is no magic panacea for peace and communion with other beings. God/dess knows we haven’t seen much of that in 2020. Not even at the time of year when the holidays are supposed to be life giving and joyful. Peace on Earth and in our hearts, we are told. Light faithfully shared will get us through a dark time, we are told. The Light of life is returning, we are told. Community sustains us, we are told. 

These are the things–love, joy, hope, peace, light, communion with one another–our hearts require, aren’t they? Our hearts do not require the grasping, pressure, terror, and anxiety this year has heaped on us. 

This season calls for attention, for anticipation, for rest.