Wintering Well
Winter invites us inward. In the quieter, darker months, life below the surface continues—roots strengthen, seeds rest, and unseen transformation begins. The slow dark of winter asks for a pause, a softening of attention, and careful listening for a longing within that wants to be held in the dark—something tender, emerging, not yet ready for the light. This seed asks only for rest, acknowledgement, and gentle tending—so that when spring arrives, growth becomes possible.
Thoughts have been circling around belonging lately and how this fundamental human need shapes so much of daily life. A deep longing exists to belong somewhere, to someone—to find your people, the place where value is felt, where thriving becomes possible, where home is known. This reflection arose through listening for longings—not material desires for more or better, but the deeper longings that sprout quietly like seeds and grow in beautiful, organic ways. These longings are rooted in heart and soul, connected to authenticity, and shape how gifts are offered to the world.
Belonging surfaced in a conversation this week, and the words that kept echoing were be-longings—be your longings. Just as love offered to the world is limited by love held for the self, belonging deepens only as longings are honoured. Belonging emerges through living from true being—not from ego or cultural conditioning, but from authenticity.
Winter becomes the season for listening for buried longings, the ones so quiet that stillness is required to hear their voice. We are offering a free online workshop on January 11th with practices for winter that support you to deepen into rest and reflection necessary for the new growth of spring.
Something for Your Heart
Winter of Listening
by David Whyte
No one but me by the fire,
my hands burning
red in the palms while
the night wind carries
everything away outside.
All this petty worry
while the great cloak
of the sky grows dark
and intense
round every living thing.
What is precious
inside us does not
care to be known
by the mind
in ways that diminish
its presence.
What we strive for
in perfection
is not what turns us
into the lit angel
we desire.
what disturbs
and then nourishes
has everything
we need.
What we hate
in ourselves
is what we cannot know
in ourselves but
what is true to the pattern
does not need
to be explained.
Inside everyone
is a great shout of joy
waiting to be born.
Even with the summer
so far off
I feel it grown in me
now and ready
to arrive in the world.
All those years
listening to those
who had
nothing to say.
All those years
forgetting
how everything
has its own voice
to make
itself heard.
All those years
forgetting
how easily
you can belong
to everything
simply by listening.
And the slow
difficulty
of remembering
how everything
is born from
an opposite
and miraculous
otherness.
Silence and winter
has led me to that
otherness.
So let this winter
of listening
be enough
for the new life
I must call my own.