Today I took a “power pause” for the Fall Equinox with Christine Arylo as part of her Feminine Super Power Year program. I connected in “virtual circle” with other women to reflect, release, realign and refocus for the upcoming season.
Release Comes Before the Reap
I love how aligned the nature seasons are with the Jewish calendar. With Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, I’ve been in reflection and release mode since the new moon. Sukkot, the harvest festival, begins tomorrow night.
For me, the past year has been heavy on the release. Last year I lost my grandpa; just last week I sold my home. Marketing and selling my home took so much of my energy over this past year; what remained I had to direct to my maintaining my health.
This meant that a lot of other things suffered: my real estate business, my business expansion to do more coaching and speaking, the program I’ve been trying to launch.
Our culture wants to promote the idea that we can do all the things if we only “manage time” better. But it’s not about time. It’s about energy. If we spend our energy without restoring it, we will burn out. I’ve learned this. The hard way.
The lesson about rest constantly presents itself in my life. I receive daily reminders about the need to back off and to avoid taking on too much.
What Am I Harvesting?
Despite knowing this, my inner critic was fierce with judgment about how much of my life fell through the cracks. I didn’t feel like I had much to “harvest.”
During the 2.5 m-hour gathering, we split up into smaller breakout groups to share our “harvest” with a partner.
I shared with my partner how my life right now feels like it’s in chaos — even if it’s one of my own making. The toll of the past couple of years has led to withering of relationships and a decline in my business. I am without a physical home. My office doesn’t feel like a safe space in which to create.
My partner reflected back to me a different story. She heard that I am harvesting the fruits of my commitment to my daily rituals — fitness, meditation, journaling, blogging, creating space — to maintain my health and wellness.
She heard that I am harvesting my creativity through my writing and stand-up comedy.
In my story, she heard that I am harvesting courageousness to step into a path to the unknown. I am harvesting deeper trust — in myself and in the divine — and inner strength.
She was able to see what I couldn’t see in the moment: that I am harvesting the tools and fruits of all the deep work I’ve done, and of my commitment to my rituals and practices.
I have cultivated practices that are so strong they are supporting me through a threshold of new growth and expansion, an immense chaotic shift.
The Standard Harvest
Truth be told, I know this—when I am connected to my truth. But in that moment I had gotten distracted by looking for the more typical harvest: the full program, the client waitlist, the steady income flow.
Those things will come, in their intended timing. I trust that this will happen, and so it will.
But these harvests aren’t what sustain us. Clients come and go. Money ebbs and flows. This is why each season we plant new seeds and birth new projects.
The Enduring Harvest
What sustains us is the enduring harvest: the tools we acquire and skills we develop, our inner strength, discipline, resilience, work ethic, commitment, compassion, and self-love.
As you take stock of your harvest, make sure to look for these. Without them, you haven’t really reaped much at all.
Love it? Hate it? What do you think? Don't hold back...