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Seasonal Writing
Essays and reflections for living in relationship with the natural world.
A growing collection of writing on the Five Elements, folklore, mythology, astrology, and the changing seasons, tracing conversations between nature, psyche, culture, and the ways we live.
Balancing the Fire Element
When we talk about opening the heart, we often overlook the role of the Fire Element’s protectors. Like the Emperor in his palace, the Heart needs balance and care to rule with calm and strength. Explore how Inner and Outer Fire work in harmony, ensuring stability and joy in your practice
FIRE up your New Year
All elements guide us toward balance, but Fire is uniquely positioned to help us reflect and reset as we enter the new year. This post explores how FIRE can ignite resolutions that resonate with the heart, aligning us with our inner joy and purpose
The ‘Way’ is easy
Taoist teachings reveal that thoughts turn to things, urging purity of thought and heart to create a world that reflects goodness and clarity. As we nourish our hearts, life mirrors the best of what we can manifest in the outer world.
The Wood Element
Discover the influence of the Wood Element in coordinating movement and grace. From daily actions to long-term goals, the Wood Element helps us plan, structure, and execute with precision. Learn how the Liver and gallbladder play a crucial role in guiding both physical and mental actions, aligning us with the rhythms of the universe.
Beltaine Energies
Beltaine is a time of vibrant growth and magic, where sunlight and water infuse the green world. This cross-quarter day connects us to the Faerie realms, bringing forth the possibility of transformation and expansion beyond the rational. Explore the fertile energies of spring through the lens of the Wood Element.
Spring Growth
As Spring gains momentum, we move like rising Yang from the family hearth outwards into the world. This post explores how the Wood Element and family influence personal growth, offering us the tools for evolution and individuation.
Understanding Yin Yang
From the protective shell of Winter’s Yin to Spring’s vulnerable Yang, we transition into new growth. This seasonal shift teaches us to embrace the phases of Becoming, where vulnerability and exposure are vital lessons in creating something great.
Crone meets Maiden
As Winter and Spring approach their seasonal frontiers, we meet the merger of Spring’s youth and Winter’s experience. This is the cusp of great potential, where the Crone and Maiden greet each other in anticipation of the changes ahead.
Harnessing the Power of Wind
Wind blows over vast periods of time, shaping the landscape and bringing great change. Like a subtle force steadily applied, wind clears stagnation, aligning us with nature and the wisdom of the Tao.
Navigating Spring's Growth and Change
Springs’ palpable limitlessness leaves us either drowning in a sea of possibilities yet unable to grasp even one, or floating above it all trusting that the current knows its way home.
Discover how the Wood Element helps navigate this energy, transforming limitations into opportunities for growth and transformation.
From Water to Wood
At this seasonal crossover, we meet Wind’s gentle persistence and unrelenting influence. Like a long rope, Wind helps us draw from the deep well of Water within, guiding us to replenishment and inner clarity.
Late Winter Light
Late winter reminds us that completion is the beginning of renewal. As winter’s light wanes, we are called to remain vigilant and attentive, preparing for the creative energy of spring while grounded in winter’s wisdom.
Living Five Element Theory
Increasingly we are navigating polarities, times where ordinary people are profoundly divided, angrily waving rakes and insults at their neighbours, or running indoors to avoid conflict. Its easy to step into the rhetoric of one side or another because it requires very little of us, however when we do that we miss the value that lies in our contrast, the beauty and expansion of a differing perspective, and the strengthening of the whole of a community when we open to the ideas of another.