Welcoming Winter

 I recently attended a day long retreat at Spirit Rock which focused on “Welcoming winter” – something most of us are not inclined to do!  The leader, Kate Munding, talked with us about how plants and animals do not resist winter.  They prepare for it, they align to its necessities and they become quiet or dormant.  She invited us to consider immersing ourselves into winter instead of resisting it.  Of course, this involved actually going outside into it!  And, even though I live in California, winters are still uncomfortable, cold and damp at times.  This happened to be one of those gray, cold, damp days.  She said we were going outside exactly BECAUSE it is cold and damp and gray – that is the point!  Can we learn to receive what is offered us?  Can we learn what it has to teach us?

We began by doing a walking meditation outside.  We were to pick a spot and stand and greet the small plot of land where we would take 10 small, slow steps in one direction and then turn and take 10 steps back and repeat.  We were invited to notice very carefully what we observed and sensed.  What did we smell and hear?  How was the cold on our face?   Could we sense each step as we took it.  Could we “kiss the earth with our feet” as Thich Nhat Hahn had recommended. 

I was surprised to see that there were dozens of tiny mushrooms growing in the grass.  And, here in Calif. unlike the rest of the country, winter is the season when things are green.  The air was cold.  But, for perhaps the first time ever, I experienced it as “embracing” and I welcomed it!  She encouraged us in our walking meditation to take “full body breaths” – to feel that your whole body is breathing – each pore pulling in the cold crisp air, and exhaling it throughout our whole body. 

It seems it is possible to experience  the winter as a welcome time.  A time to unfurl, to create sacred, slow space for yourself.  To allow yourself to be called back to yourself. 

I was reminded of the poet Jane Hirshfield’s wonderful poem, “A Cedary Fragrance”  I have heard her the say that all her poetry can be summed up in this one poem of hers. In her 20s, she studied and lived in a Zen monastery. As a monk. In the tradition of Zen, the monks arise at 3:45 AM and proceed to the meditation hall for many hours of meditation, interspersed with time for work and eating and walking etc. The particular monastery where she studied had no electricity. Windows had only screens in summer and plastic over them in winter. She talked about what drew her there was to experience life as simply as possible. She talked about being cold, hungry, uncomfortable, tired, etc. And, that the process of willingly living there for seven years gave her the opportunity to understand what it meant to “practice choosing to want the unwanted.” All of us in our everyday life are given “unwanteds” all the time. We have no choice. People die. We get ill. People get angry at us. Accidents happen. Imagine what it could be like, if we were to truly learn to “practice choosing to make the unwanted wanted.”

A Cedary Fragrance

Even now,

decades after,

I wash my face with cold water—

Not for discipline,

nor memory,

nor the icy, awakening slap,

but to practice choosing

to make the unwanted wanted.

--Jane Hirshfield

SMILE!

I have been thinking about smiling lately.  I’ve begun to look around and notice if people are smiling or not.  Mostly we are not!  If you look around a bus or a shopping center, a meeting or people walking on the street.  Mostly we are head down, meant for business. 

I have been reading this tiny book “Mindfulness on the Go” by Jan Chozen Bays.  In it she details dozens of little practices one might adopt to live a more mindful life.  We’ve all heard that smiling is good for us.  That it takes more muscles to frown than to smile.  Yet, I find that I catch myself not smiling a lot!  I have begun to notice people in my life who DO smile – who seem to have a default facial expression of a slight smile.  I find that it happens I like all of these people!  I’ve decided I want to smile more! 

There is a piece of me that resists this – that feels like it would be “fake” to smile.  But then it becomes a chicken and egg thing.  Do I smile because I am happy or does smiling help me to feel happy?  You’ll have to answer that for yourself.  There is a lot of research about smiling.  Babies do it inherently.  They don’t have to be taught.  Smiles are more or less contagious.  When I see someone else smiling, I am more inclined to smile myself.  And I ask myself, wouldn’t I rather go through life with a smile, than not? 

In this little book Bays suggests that for one week you “allow yourself to smile”… meaning just be aware of whether or not you are smiling.  (Like, for instance right now – can you let yourself smile while you read this?)  And when your awareness comes around, SMILE.  When you pass a mirror or a store window, check to see if you are smiling.  It doesn’t have to be a Cheshire cat grin – just a softening and a slight smile will count!  Or, you can pick something you do regularly, like switch on your computer, answer the phone, go through a doorway.  Try putting on a soft smile each time you do this – for a week.   Let’s see if we can put some more joy out into the world by this simple practice!!  Simple, yes.  Profound, perhaps!

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving brings all sorts of memories in its wake. 

All those meals with beloveds – no matter what. 

Always the turkey (except the one year when we were vegan and decided on Tofurky – but that’s another topic). 

Always Uncle B‘s pumpkin pie, and

Grandma Elaine’s special potatoes.

Always the ‘too much’ of it all and yet,

also the precarious pleasure of that fullness. 

That reliable togetherness where we remember

what it means to be human.  To belong. 

Even when the toddlers throw the food,

and the dog snatches a bite and even when

there are empty chairs, even when

it takes all day to prepare and is eaten in a half hour. 

It is all held in the frame of family. 

And it always ends, as it should,

with that same last sweet bite of pie.

Reminding us that we have come once again to this table

with our imperfect selves ---

yet there is a larger perfection that holds us here together.

            Thanksgiving 2025.