At a time when so much of our relationship to time itself has become tipsy-turvy, finding ways to honor and celebrate the ways the seasons shift and change can feel both deeply ancient and quite new; bringing awareness to both the speed of change and to experiences of groundedness/stability; grieving and opening ourselves to new possibilities. 

In a moment when the Atomic Society just moved the Doomsday Clock closer to midnight (their press release read: "The 2025 Clock time signals that the world is on a course of unprecedented risk and that continuing on the current path is a form of madness,") might attention to the seasons be some kind of small way of attuning to sanity? 

Between the questions my clients are asking me and the questions that have arisen in this years circular time, I'm really curious - would you like to be part of some kind of regular rhythm with me this year that engages in deepening into these cycles, collective sensemaking, and strengthening your capacity to help other people work with time? To experiment with what kinds of temporalities might enable regenerative calendars and other anticipatory forms of reckoning with time?

I aim to make sure any offering I do is really attuned to what you actually want, so please do let me know if some kind of larger container around working with time would be enticing and supportive. To do so just respond to this email and let me know you are curious about this.

Imbolc (and with it st brigids day) is part of the Celtic Wheel of the Year. If you've been following our work for a while, you know  I'm not a big fan of taking any calendar - including the Celtic Wheel of the Year! - and universalizing it. I want to support local ecologies, direct community experience, and traditional knowledge in informing temporal practices that have local dimensions as well as global capacities.  I could go on and on about this, but basically, I want theory - whether that be for social science, theology, business practices, rituals, or calendar systems, that arise from practices that are attuned to particular places, not just universal-ness. (And I think practices need to be informed by appropriate theories/theologies/cosmovisions.) The nuance of local bio-cultures is critical for us to attend to: especially as it is changing.  Afterall, the work before us is not only about individuals becoming more connected to Earth (critical) and being able to hear our own soul's path (also critical); it is about attending to, engaging with, and increasing our ability to respond to shifting ecological landscapes and finding ways to craft eco-cultures that need to emerge, regardless of what else is going on. (So one of my 1-1 clients and I are using a traditional Japanese calendar for our call schedule, as they live in Japan. We are experimenting with how the ancient wisdom therein can support our contemporary conversations). 

That said, the Celtic Wheel of the Year does have many seasonal aspects that resonate with where I live in the northeast. And so with some caution, and with a lot of awareness, I engage with the Wheel of the Year, as well as with other calendar systems. Honestly, I see it as part of a stepping stone towards a regenerative liturgical calendar that meshes with the bio-cultures of where I am - something that I am actively in the process of engaging with, alongside others. 

Part of my longer practice has been weekly seasonal check-in calls with other women who are in a similar bio-culture as am I. Our multi-year, collective noticing has been instrumental in helping me hear the shifting of the seasons better. So too is studying calendar systems, doing regular deep dives into the nature of time and our relationship to it, engaging with long historical cycles, spiritual cycles, life-ritual-cycles, liminal time, multidimensional time, fantastic time, circular time practices (both lunar and solar), having times of tracking and also of not tracking different kinds of somatic and productivity cycles, engaging with my Indigenous partners and colleagues and noticing what they are noticing, and working directly with the land and waters where I am (including attending to stories from people who have grown up here... unlike me.)   Doing this for many years strengthens my ability to help people like you on your journey into ReMembering and ReEnchanting your own relationship with the seasons - and a myriad of other cycles, including bigger cycles of legacies and inheritances. 

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For those of you who are interested, here are a few words about Imbolc and St. Brigid and this time of Thresholds, which so often falls right next to Lunar New Year (which is now - Welcome, Year of the Snake!)  ....

Imbolc: Feb 1 is the cross holiday between Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox; one of the 8 points on the Wheel of the Year, the Celtic calendar system tracking the earth's cycle around the sun.

It is the time when, some say, the seed orients itself underground.

In Ireland, it is often  seen to be the first Day of Spring.

In Ireland in 2024, it became St Brigid's Day. She is the first female Saint to be given a public holiday in the country.

And St Brigid is so cool.

There are those who say that she was born at the moment that the sun's first light touched the earth on the first of February.

She is the one who stands guard at the Threshold. There are many kinds of thresholds, not least between Winter and Spring. Perhaps one of the most important is the threshold between pre-Christian Celtic ways of life and Christian ways of life.

Brigid was a Celtic Goddess, connected with the people of the Oak (the Druids), and the Oak and its groves remain important for her today. She was also part of the transition to Christianity. She is the triple Goddess of Fire: the fire of inspiration; the fire of health and fertility, and the fire of metalworking.

Some refer to her as an "everything" goddess/Saint, as she was a blacksmith and fierce warrior; devoted mother and superb midwife; lover of Christ and attuned to the Old Ways; She who is returns; goddess of flame and of wells/springs and of hospitality; she is the keeper of livestock, known for being accompanied by a (often white but sometimes red) cow, her creamy butter, rich dairy, and sweet beer/mead. The woman founded a monastery, which for centuries gathered pilgrims from all over Europe to experience Her wells/waters, fires, mosses, stones, and the way that some places and people connect, and that energy remains there.   In the fifteenth century, when monasteries lost favor, hers was demolished.

Since 2008, people have gathered in Kildare and other parts of Ireland to celebrate her; through walks/pilgrimages to sacred sites; festivals (there will be a festival on Feb 1 in Kildare this Sat); to craft the Brigid Cross; to feast and give to the poor; to sing songs, to dance.

She's having quite a resurgence, which is a sign of great hope. I want to lift up the work of an old colleague of mine, Shannon Smith, who has been going to visit the women of Kildare, and building relationships amongst those who remember many of the old ways for 11 years, and is part of larger movements to help bring back her memory and to honor the waters. Here's some resources she shared with me. 

And please do let me know some of your favorite poems and songs and stories about this lady of the threshold!

And do join us for our online gathering if you are looking for a place to gather online. I myself will also be doing some painting on Saturday, and possibly baking an irish oatmeal bread, and maybe visiting a local dairy that I am friends with, and to say hello to some cows, and pray.

Blessings of the threshold upon you -

Sara Jolena