No time to sleep. This time is for you.

Darkness is encroaching into the day. The nights are growing for just a bit longer. Soon it will be the Winter Solstice, but the darkness won’t go poof! and suddenly be gone. The vibrancy, the light, of life is bookended by the lengthening shadows of dawn and dusk. 

Within the darkness from dusk to dawn is a chill that doesn’t quite leave even when the sun is high in the sky. Within that dark, I hear the chill whisper, “Listen. Pay attention. The time of harvest is through. No time to sleep. This time is for you.”

The trees are bare. I can hear without summer buffers or the crinkling of fall. Suddenly I see beyond the narrowness of a bountiful nature vision. Maybe you can, too. As the chill whispers through the skeleton trees, the sandman whispers, “Sleep.” We cannot give into this lullaby. We cannot sleep. Within the shortened days and the dark nights, the real work begins!

The coming winter is not a time of easy slumber. It is a time to blow upon the ember of our bravery. To light the dark and chase the chill. Time to dive deeply into the very center of our being. The chill and darkness are not something to escape. They are to be embraced as we waken our courage and resolve. 

It’s time to peer into the cracks and crevices of our soul to see what growth sprouts through. To gently take that growth into the palms of our soul. To speak to the growth and listen to what it shares. In the sharing we receive guidance of how to prune and tweak and shape the bonsai tree at our core. 

Like that tree, we grow slowly. We grow with a purpose. We are the master garden that looks beyond the now and envisions the dream of what we will be. This is not a time of only dreaming. We must act in ways that bring our dream closer and closer to being. 

The days are shorter, the dark is longer. Within the mystery of the coming winter, connect to the bonsai tree at your core and shape it into your dreams realized! 

Van Hurst, ms, is an intuitive-coach-catalyst. As a contemplative coach, she uses mindfulness practices and intuition tools to create strategies for navigating the mundane and extraordinary.The result of time with Van? Being the change you want to see in the world by creating a blueprint for your life through a deeper connection to your intuition and contemplative nature. 

Van is a professional speaker & author who weaves inner wisdom into all she touches. Her books are available @ www.wildefyrpress.com. Her most recent book, As Natural As Breathing: Being Intuitive, is available on Amazon. Contact Vanessa for life coaching, intuitive consultations, keynotes, and programs.

Website / LinkedIn Profile / Facebook / Twitter: @fyrserpent / ©2022

sauntering with your body, mind, spirit, & heart

Let’s saunter — a slow meandering from here to wherever the paths calls. Who knows where a saunter might lead? You may be asking, what is a saunter? A saunter for Robert A. Johnson is “to walk on the earth with reverence for its holiness.”

As I read this quote, I smiled. To saunter is to live contemplatively. Being contemplative is living in alignment with the Spirit. Each moment is spent focusing our attention on however and wherever the sacred shines. Let’s see how we saunter through the four aspects of self: body, mind, heart, and spirit. 

Sauntering with the Body

To saunter physically is to walk loose limbed. Putting one foot in front of the other. Roll from heel to toe placing all our weight on our forward foot before lifting the one in the back. Ongoing sauntering returns our center of balance to our core. 

Walking like this raises awareness of where we hold tension and what is not in alignment in our physical body. Through sauntering we rediscover the rhythm of our connection to the sacred. This flowing movement reminds us that our body is a vessel of the sacred.

Sauntering with the Mind

Yes, we can saunter with your mind! Another word for this kind of sauntering is non-attachment. We attend to what is going on in our mind  —  words, images, noisiness — while not holding on to the dandelion fluff of reaction. 

Sauntering is an engaged state of mind. It’s about not pushing away or holding onto our monologue. We watch as the fluff floats in our mind’s current. It lazily spins higher and higher, further and further away from our core. Through mindful sauntering we see the real in our life and live within that real.

Sauntering with the Heart

Our heart beats with emotions. Sauntering with our heart, we feel emotions poignantly, honestly, raw. Slipping into an emotion we feel it percolating; we are aware without judgment of our feelings. 

Within the saunter, an emotion is what it is — no more, no less. We acknowledge, feel, and surrender into the emotion. This non-attachment is freeing. To saunter is to rest within the 90-seconds life span of emotion. Being with the emotion as it enters our body, travels through the nervous system, and exits. And, yes, that takes about 90-seconds when we don’t hold on to an emotion!

Sauntering with the Spirit

Our spirit saunter-twines through the other aspects of our being — body, mind, and heart. This twining of spirit makes us whole. Our spirit, our sacred spark, touches all four aspects making us aware of our wounds. It ignites our core fire sealing the cracks of our woundedness. 

To spirit saunter is to connect our sacred spark to the All Spark. This connection threads through our being and then crosses our aura and saunter-twines with the energy of others and that of creation. In the spirit saunter, we recognize the sacred spark inherent in all. 

This saunter with the spirit (small s and capital S) brings us to wholeness — body, mind, spirit, and heart. The cool part? The more we saunter, the more healing we bring to our self and the world. 

Won’t you join me in the saunter? Be contemplative as you engage the whole of your life. You don’t have to accomplish all in this moment. To saunter, to live contemplative, happens one step at a time. 

 

Van Hurst, ms, is an intuitive-coach-catalyst. As a contemplative coach, she uses mindfulness practices and intuition tools to create strategies for navigating the mundane and extraordinary. The result of time with Van? Creating a blueprint for your life through a deeper connection to your intuition and contemplative nature. 

Van is a professional speaker & author who weaves inner wisdom into all she touches. Her books are available @ www.wildefyrpress.com. Her most recent book, As Natural As Breathing: Being Intuitive, is available on Amazon. Contact Vanessa for life coaching, intuitive consultations, keynotes, and programs.

Website / LinkedIn Profile / Facebook / Twitter: @fyrserpent / ©2022