The year is turning now. As promised, I added the second part of a two part reflection practice to assist you with fully embracing all that this darkening-before-the-light has to offer.
The idea here is to take some time to close up what for many of us has been a crazy year, and begin to turn towards next year with grace and grit. The practice of closing up — your day, week, month, year — gives rise to good beginnings. The practice of turning towards what is next by listening for your emerging future gives a very different flavor to our usual New Year's Resolutions. I’m confident that you will love this practice as much as I do. My wing women describe it as both gentle and powerful — there is both grace and grit here.
May the year ahead astonish us all with its beauty, truth, and goodness.
This practice will acquaint you with your inner Wisdom Council, which is a most wonderful and effective way to experience and get access to the fundamental capacities of grace and grit. The Wisdom Council is an archetypal ever-present inner "committee" that is always with you, and as you will discover when you engage these practices I’m sharing with you today, we all have one! (I can feel myself squirm a bit as I write these words for fear of sounding too woo woo, but please bear with me. What I’m offering here is a kick ass form of woo woo, and I don’t want you to miss out on account of that little niggledy voice of judgement in me.)
So, do you already have a practice or ritual way to close up the year and open to what is next? If not, I highly recommend it. If so, you already know how wonderful and beneficial it is, and you might want to try this.
Part One - Closing Up the Year
Download the Wisdom Council inquiry questions and then carve out a little uninterrupted time (+/- 30 minutes) to cozy up with a cup of tea to really take stock with the first part of this practice. Give it your full attention to facilitate closure to the year in a very remarkable way. Have your journal handy, or just some paper and a pencil will do. Free write into these questions by putting your pencil to the page and just write whatever comes up for a few minutes without lifting the pencil. Remind yourself that your responses are for your eyes only, unless you want to share with a trusted friend, companion, or spouse.
Part Two - Turning Towards the Next
Give yourself as much as a week, or as little as an hour, before picking up Part Two, wherein the Wisdom Council questions will have you look ahead with the clarity and compassion of the closure afforded you by of Part One.
Click here to download the questions in pdf format
Please feel free to be guided through the practice with the audio recordings below if you’d like.
(Be sure to Bookmark this page so that you can refer back to it easily later . . .)
Note: Wisdom Council inquiries are powerful stuff. Please let these questions, and your responses to them, penetrate your heart, mind, and will-to-act. Let them begin to do their work as the year turns and unfolds in the coming months.
No great thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen. - Epictetus
May the year ahead astonish us with all its beauty, truth and goodness!
Warmly, Lyedie
Putney, Vermont