Dear friends old and new,
Ready or not, here comes a new calendar year…
This morning on my meditation cushion I felt such deep gratitude for this practice that invites me to come home to this moment and my own body and connect with the peace that holds it all; even what’s not peaceful. I’m so grateful to connect with the spacious presence that has no momentum when so much is moving so fast. At this time of year I am often reminded of zen teacher Cheri Huber’s statement: Self-hatred uses self-improvement as self-maintenance. All those attempts to change and improve ourselves that come at us from all directions at this time of year can invite subtle (or not so subtle) ways of rejecting ourselves. I’m welcoming 2025 with softness and as much kindness as possible for the self that I am and the self that you are. I’m grateful to be off the exhausting self-improvement treadmill. I’ll take vibrant connection instead. Connection and presence carry their own intelligence that might naturally lead to “improvement” through a radically different channel.
I recently saw a clip of beloved author Alice Walker talking about accepting oneself as we are. She said, “Be more like nature. More accepting of your right to be how you are and to express yourself. I always think of myself as a tree, basically, producing what it is that I produce. People complain, why do you do this, why don’t you do that, and I can only say, would you say that to a peach tree?”
May we enter the new year with ever deeper trust in our unique way of being, trust in our peach tree or oak tree or spruce tree selves, ever more dedicated to bringing our unique gifts forth to support the wellbeing of all. May we commit wholeheartedly to using whatever arises in our lives in support of deepening compassion and understanding, releasing self-absorption and the too-tight-shoe of hyperindividualism, and coming home to the vibrant truth of interbeing. If we do this, how can we go wrong?
I always appreciate the opportunity to begin again. I celebrate on the Solstice and again on the turning of the New Year. I’ll celebrate again with Chinese New Year on Jan. 29th, and then a few days later on Imbolc, when I feel the green world coming back to life, and yet again on Losar/Tibetan New Year, which falls on Fri, Feb 28, 2025 – Sun, Mar 2. As long as we’re still breathing, we have so many chances to shed old skins and begin again, and to celebrate this temporary aliveness. What a gift!
I return to these wise words from John O’Donohue again and again. Perhaps you wish to hold them near your cheek too. “There is an unseen life that dreams us. It knows our true direction and destiny. We can trust ourselves more than we realize and need have no fear of change.” That unseen life that dreams us is deeply woven with the ancestral realms, the generous and brilliant earth, and the Anima Mundi/ soul of the world. Even in such times as these, I wish us trust in life, including trust in the impulse we carry to envision and bring forth a more just and beautiful future. May that be a lantern we carry during dark times. May we enter the essential and humbling practice where the rubber meets the road: Bowing to what is, and finding the most life-giving relationship with it.
We send our heartfelt best wishes and all blessings your way for an auspicious new year.
As always, we send thanks for your making the world a more kind and soulful place. Thanks for reading this email and thanks for caring about our work in the world. We hope to share time with you in 2025. Below you’ll find several beautiful, encouraging, resourcing offerings from our hearts, a few of which are coming up very soon. We hope you find one or more you might like to join. We need each other, wise practices, imperfectionism, and like-hearted community more than ever.
Grateful,
Erin
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