Wintering….

I was listening to NPR’s The Takeaway this morning while running errands and there was this fabulous interview with Katherine May about her book, Wintering : The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times. She didn’t write this book with the pandemic in mind, but just that there are different seasons in our life and that rest is OK.

That is something I have been thinking about a lot since the pandemic hit and we’ve been mostly home since March 13, 2020. This picture is of a painted paper collage I did in April 2020 about how I was feeling - a cocoon. That moment of rest and new things manifesting themselves. This time has helped me learn to rest, to really just CTFD and be ok with a slower pace in life. I’m a person who tries to fit a week’s worth of progress into a day and this moment is teaching me to roll with it a little more. I still have my checklists and LOVE checking off those boxes, but I’m also working at being ok with the pause to see what filters out and what important things rise to the top.

One thing that has risen to the top is that I love to work with other dreamers and doers. Aura was founded to take the fifteen years of experience I have of “doing” in the nonprofit and arts education worlds and encourage others who want to impact their world through the arts and with their creative ideas. I love championing a good cause and will fight hard for those ideals of equity, arts education, creative expression and collaboration.

As we emerge from this pause, I want to hang on and savor this moment as bananas as it feels now. I want to know that we emerge from this cocooning time, this resting, this Wintering, and come away with a better sense of moving forward. The rest will help spur new ideas, new innovations, new goals and dreams.

I also look forward to spring after this time of Wintering.

photo credit : luke richardson from unsplash