Spring Equinox: the time to create new beginnings

Saturday, March 20th is the Spring Equinox and the first day of spring. The Spring Equinox is celebrated by Native Americans and other earth-based spiritual traditions by doing ceremonies and rituals. The idea is to connect with what is naturally occurring with the earth and nature. You can then draw on that energy to create movement and change within yourself.

Spring Equinox is represented in the east in the Native American Medicine Wheel in the tradition that I was taught. It is the time of birth and new beginnings. Plants are sprouting and animals are giving birth. It is the perfect time to plant seeds for the coming year.

We can plant seed for our lives as well. This is accomplished by becoming clear in your intent of what you want to create for yourself this coming year. Expressing your intent through prayer, thought, journaling, or meditation plants the seeds for your new life to grow.

This happens energetically at the spiritual level in that the power of your intent or thought focus will actually create and open the doorway for the thing that you want for yourself. This is some of what The Secret and the Law of Attraction talk about. The Secret talks about the law of attraction having three steps to attract what you want to yourself: asking, believing, and receiving. Spring is the perfect time for asking and believing.

At the physical level, focusing on your intent and what you want helps you do what is needed to create it and then to recognize it when it presents itself to you.

Spring is in the air. Make sure you take the time to clarify and express your intention for the coming year. The energy to do so is all around you.

Nature and the Natural State of Being

The Native American Medicine Wheel could be called the "wheel of life." It shows the natural cycles of life. It uses the things in nature like the change in the seasons to teach how life works. The "East" on the Medicine Wheel represents springtime when there is birth, blooming, and new beginnings.

The I Ching, an ancient Chinese text, states, "Man (and Woman) is as at the height of wisdom when all that he (or she) does is as self-evident as what nature does."

Life has a way that it creates and unfolds things- a "natural state of being." If we step out of our contrived world and tune into the natural way that things work, we can access what we want. Our intention and actions would resonate with the natural state of being, and the things we want would naturally unfold.

It's not that life does not want us to have the things that we want. We have just been going about it in a way that has no place to plug in to the natural state of being. Our culture is no longer in tune with this natural state. In this sense, it is lost.

This is the value of using the Medicine Wheel, meditating, and connecting with nature. These things can teach us how the the natural state of being works, so we can align ourselves with it. We can then resonate with it and unfold the things that we want for ourselves. We can dance with all of creation.

It takes a while to get used to it. It will not feel like it is on our terms. This can be a bit frustrating at first, because we are used to wanting things on our terms.

So next time you want to create something, go observe nature. It can teach you how you can unfold it in conjunction with the natural state of being.

Maybe there is something else that you came here to do

We have come here for a reason. Maybe we chose to come here at this time to accomplish some specific things. Maybe have some unique gifts to offer the world at this time. Maybe offering those gifts will teach us things that we need to learn to grow and evolve.

Maybe you did not just come here to take up space. Maybe you did not come here to just take what the world offers you. Maybe there is something beyond finding a career, getting married, raising a family, traveling, and hanging out with your grandkids. Not that these things are not awesome things to experience... But maybe there is something else that you came here to do.

The Hindu and Buddhist traditions speak of your "dharma." It means different things in different traditions and contexts. One aspect of Dharma refers to what you came here to do. It suggests you came to this life to accomplish some things at this time.

Native Americans speak of your "medicine". This may be some gift of healing or leadership that gets unlocked during a vision or your life experiences. I like to think of it as the natural uplifting effect you have on others when your heart is open.

Finding your dharma or your medicine(s) and acting on it is spiritually fulfilling. It gives you a sense of purpose.

So look around. It is an important time to be alive. The world and the people and things in it are having some serious challenges right now. They desperately need you and what you have to offer. Your specific spiritual gifts, talents, experience, and wisdom are just perfect for something the world needs right now.

Are you going to do it? It won't be the same without you.

The perfect time of year to let the things that no longer serve you die

The Native American Medicine Wheel is a powerful way to tune into the cycles of the earth and life. My tradition teaches that this time of year late winter or the northeast and late winter- the death of the old. It is the perfect time to let things in your life that no longer serve you die. This makes room for things to be born in the spring.

The north or mid-winter of the Medicine Wheel is the time of introspection- a time to reevaluate what is important to you. The prime time for this was the Winter solstice in late December and early January. Once we identify what is important to us at this time in our life, it is natural to consider the things in our life that serve or do not serve what is important to us.

If it is important to us, do we care enough about our lives to get out of our comfort zones let go of some things? Do we care enough to risk hurting some people's feelings and break some contracts we have with people that are no longer serve anyone? Do we care enough to walk through our resistance and fear to mean business with our life? We are here for such a short time.

It is not that the things we are letting go are bad- it is that they no longer serve us and what is important to us now. At a previous time in our life these things may have served us well. We may have needed them to get where we are now.

So... what no longer serves you? If you can let some things die, it will make room in your heart for something new. Letting the old die before the new has taken form is the ultimate act of faith.

Winter Solstice- a time for introspection

Today is the winter solstice and shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere. Due to the tilt in earth's axis, the sun is shining directly over the Tropic of Capricorn- its southern most point. Now the sun's migration changes direction and begins to move north again. Our days will start to get longer tomorrow.

In pagan and earth-based cultures, the Winter Solstice is a celebration of the feminine and the goddess. They celebrate this time of maximum darkness to awaken and acknowledge the unbridled power of the dark element in nature and themselves. The dark element represents the feminine, primal, yin, internal, rest, night, cool, dream, and receptive.

The Winter Solstice is when the dark element's dominance over the light element hits is peak and begins to wane. It surrenders to the light element. The I Ching, Hexagram 24- "Return/ The Turning Point (Wilhelm-Baynes translation) describes this, "The time of darkness is past. The winter solstice brings the victory of light." And later in the hexagram, "Therefore seven is the number of young light, and it arises when the number of six, the number of the great darkness, is increased by one. In this way the state of rest gives place to movement."

In one tradition of the Native American medicine wheel, Winter solstice represents the place of the north. It is a time of introspection for us to go inside and evaluate our life over the last year. It is our year's existential crisis where we soul-search what is truly important to us. We can then assess whether we have been living our life consistent with what is important to us. If not, it indicates that a change is necessary for the new year.

So what is most important to you? Is the way you are living your life in harmony with that? If not, it may be time for an adjustment or change for the new cycle. It is, after all, the perfect time of year to reinvent your life.

Completing Our Harvest

The Native American medicine wheel illustrates our cycles of life and growth throughout the year. The spring (or east) is a time of new beginnings, birth, and planting seeds. The summer (or south) is a time of activity, learning, and growth. The fall (or west) is the time of harvest, maturity, and completion. The winter (or north) is a time of introspection and death of the old- so something new can be born in the spring.

The beautiful fall weather we are experiencing in the Inland Northwest led me to reflect on the importance of this time of year. The fall harvest is the manifestation of the things we planted in the spring and nurtured during the summer. Doorways open up to us based on what we conceived earlier in the year. This is similar to what The Secret and "Law of Attraction" suggest when they speak of our thoughts creating our reality.

The fact that the things that we ask for often come in a form that is different from the way we pictured makes the fall harvest little trickier. We sometimes do not recognize what we have created for ourselves. At the beginning of the Autumn, we are often sorting out what our harvest is.

But by November it is time now to bring our harvest to completion. What are the missing pieces that we need to tie up for ourselves so that we can reap the most out of our harvest? How do the different elements of our harvest interlink? It is essential that we tie this up now- as it will be soon time to detach from the activity of our fall harvest so we can get an objective understanding of it during the introspective time of winter. Besides, completing it now allows just enough time to be thankful for it at Thanksgiving.