Dissolving...

This is not the first podcast I imagined releasing. But it is the one that’s here. Winter. Chrysalis. The hard work of reimagining during the death stage of year.

But I guess that makes sense – rewilding (whatever that is ;-) is bound to be messy, imperfect, real. So welcome to the Rewilding Wonder PODCAST!

Back in December, I meant to share about the still-point of winter, of gracefully slowing down, of taking time off of having to prove ourselves or earn our keep…

I wrote an epic piece about it, had grand plans to also release it as a podcast, and then soon would start offering my movement rituals¹ again – a chrysalis space for us to embrace winter’s dismantling and dreaming time together.

And then blammo, ka-pow, ker-fuuuck – I got derailed by an injury – all my plans and travels put on firm hold. I got to eat my own earlier words about winter’s dismemberment. I had to get simple. Accept my limitations. Humbling shit. Living my own philosophy.

And now here we are, having just [barely?] survived January, and just one short, stark month of February before perhaps we will start feeling the stirring of spring’s seeds. And if we’re lucky, the sparks of possibility reigniting?

At least that is the hope, every year, as the cycles turn…

Today is Imbolc, where we take notice of the light returning and start meditating on seeds.

Even still, we are deep in the belly of winter.

So in this time while I am still healing (and reeling), rather than drumming, singing, and leading a Chrysalis movement ritual (which I’d honestly still love to do), I’m taking this dark, inward time to simply approach my own inner process as a chrysalis.

All that is to say, I am deep in the goo.

It’s fashionable, of course, to focus on those incredible imaginal cells, and to dream about the butterflies we might become.

What’s highly unfashionable is to actually sit in the discomfort of the goo. To admit that we know fucking nothing.² To allow ourselves to disintegrate, to trust that everything that dies and falls away will either return, or wasn’t ours to begin with.

I’m reminded of a line from the I Ching: “If you lose your horse, do not run after it,” lest it spook and keep running further and further away. It then assures: “If it is one’s own horse, one can safely let it go; it will come back of its own accord.”³

Can we cultivate that degree of trust? A horse is a majestic and wild thing, I can see why letting one go would feel terrifying…

My friend, I’ll offer you a few prompts – these are the discomfiting but useful questions I’ve had to ask myself in order to help my mind stop fighting the winter that simply is:

1. What have I had to let go of (or at least put on pause) this winter that I didn’t want to? Can I make peace with this? (Do I have any choice?)

2. What am I still clinging to that I’m too terrified to let fall, even for a moment, even though something in me knows I should?

3. What uncomfortable nudges or whispers do I hear when I finally get still or quiet enough to let them crack through?⁴

In this way, I am tending the goo…

Softening, trusting. Grieving when necessary. Oh tender heart, to be ever so human. Frail. Mortal. Flawed, for sure. I offered my tears and prayers to the land today, at the meeting place between trickling stream and snowpacked soil…

But it’s not all death and loss and pain this winter season, this slowing time of injury, this harrowing and heartbreaking time on Earth. I can still walk the land or neighborhood freely. Birds still call to their friends. The Colorado sun shines even after snow. And even in the darkness of the soul journey, sometimes I find glimmers of light, like those tenaciously twinkling stars in the sky. So I remember to return to one more prompt:

• 4. Amidst all the fallen death and debris, do any bright seeds catch my eye? Small jewels of possibility worth nurturing?

(Oh do catch them! Like stars falling like raindrops, catch one on your tongue!)

But I am careful not to rush these tender seeds – it’s enough for now simply to hold them! I am merely the ground, receiving them.

It’s also true that some seeds need to be cracked open by freeze or fire or digestion in a bird’s belly. So perhaps we can be heartened in remembering that some kinds of pressure or ordeal might be helpful in the long run. Easier said than done. But seeds – carrying imaginal intelligence like the caterpillar’s cells – have the wisdom to bear with it, and to wait… …until the soil is warm enough, the moisture level right, and there is enough light.⁵

May we – like the seeds and the butterfly-to-be – remember patience, and trust in our innate imaginal intelligence.

For now, may we fearlessly allow ourselves a season – or at least moments this season – to be nothing, for all our hopes and dreams to be swallowed by the earth, to be held, simply held – in the stillness, in the dark, in the cave of our messy, dismembered, ooey gooey winter chrysalises.

For this is how we are renewed, purified, cooked in fire and ice, digested by earth – every year. May we have the courage to dissolve. To let go. To drop down. To be still. To listen. To fucking pause. To trust.

A poem…

This narrow passage

Remember to be gentle
Patient
It is February
You still live in the mystery
Winter’s deep
Let life surprise you…
when it’s ready

Rest your thinking brain
Let loose its reins
For wandering into
earth’s crevices
Amidst tendrils
of barely spring new

It is stark
Barren
Let yourself be cast
into the dark
The quiet cave
where your song
is the only company needed

We’re all just making it through
this narrow passage
Tend small things –
birds, houseplants, soul –
with tender care⁶

Thank you for taking the time to be here with me today!

May your heart be wild and free. May you find small wonders every day. And may you find your way home…to this beautiful place.

1. These strange and beautiful things: flightbehaviormusic.com/the-moving-soul

2. I feel I am channeling my inner McCall Erickson in these words – not just the swearing, lol, but the very essence of what I’m saying (she’s the queen of these sorts of death/rebirth processes). And I’m thrilled to let you know that she is newly here on Substack! Please check out her Terrible, Beautiful Truth

3. Hexagram 38, first line

4. I’m loving this recent piece from David Whyte that relates to this prompt. These lines are everything: “Anxiety is the mask that truth wears when we refuse to stop and uncover its face. Anxiety is the disembodied state I feel when I pretend to put things right by worrying about them instead of truly conversing with them.”

5. Okay, granted, if you’re hard core, you might already be planting seeds…indoors. Some flower growers start as early as January. And I personally like to start pepper plants mid-February, though I have friends who have already started theirs!

6. Originally published at flightbehaviormusic.com/poetry/this-narrow-passage, 28 Feb 2023. Written in the southern New Mexico desert