It’s happening. Today is the official transition where we say bye to Summer and hello to a calmer, cooler Fall season.
Don’t freak out – it’s really an amazing thing. Just look at what nature is teaching us about how natural it is to allow this change.
We don’t see trees gripping onto their leaves; instead we see the ease of what happens when nature just releases the decaying leaves and trusts that it is making space for more abundance next Spring.
Fall is all about allowing.
It’s all about the evolution, and letting the cycle just happen. No gripping. No attachment. No stagnancy. Just an easy letting go of what we know will come back to us.
Naturally, we need to ask ourselves too, what can we start shedding? It’s time for us to allow it to happen so we can be lighter and free of all we have accumulated that weighs us down. We can streamline our lifestyles to feed us with only the energies and practices that our bodies are craving at this time of year.
Eastern medicine recognizes ‘holding on’ as a sort of accumulation of toxins and redundant energies in our bodies that can translate into emotional and physical stagnancy. Grief, the emotion associated with negative feelings towards ‘loss’ and separation, manifests in our lungs. If you’re one of the many people who has gotten a cold this month, now’s the time to start releasing what you’re scared of saying goodbye to from earlier on in the year.
It’s when we fight the transitions and defy the natural cycles that we suffer. Because the change in itself is really a nourishing thing. We have the opportunity to welcome the needed relief from hot, stifling summer air and perspiration, and fill ourselves up with fresh autumn air and let in a little more inspiration.
Physically, you can totally do a cleanse to release toxins you’ve been storing. But I challenge you to go deeper; inspire a little deeper.
What else are you really attaching to? What is blocking you from inspiring, or breathing in, this freshness all the way down into your lungs and every space of your being?
A lot of the time, both our physical and emotional attachments stem from our ego. A place where actions and desires are based on a false idea that we are not good enough right where we are, right now.
Let go of that. Release the idea that you are anything but perfect right now.
Maybe that means letting go of the need to fulfil an image of yourself that must go to a super-body-pump-core-sculpt-power gym class every day to feel ‘healthy’. Or letting go of the need to adhere to a non-gluten-allergy-but-gluten-free diet all the time just to feel like you don’t totally abandon your bikini body this winter. Or letting go of the desire to cling on to relationships with people that may no longer be beneficial to you.
Let’s face it, September has been a little bit of a reality check for most of us. It’s that weird time where we know we have to get grounded back into our daily lives but also fight to maintain that fiery active superwoman / superman drive that allowed to work and play so hard this summer.
We can make things easier by streamlining aspects of our lifestyle, and only allowing those that serve us this fall to remain. It’s time to check in and make sure our resolutions are coming from a place of truth, not convention.
Releasing old beliefs and habits can be as effortless as nature shows us, if we let it. But it can be difficult to identify what is really hurting our evolution, because a lot of the time we can be addicted to the most seemingly ‘healthy’ things. All addictions stem from this need to fill ourselves with something we feel lacking. That’s when we stumble. Because the only way to really fill this illusory ‘void’ is through awareness that we are actually whole. Then we can start living in accordance to our freedom, not our fears.
Look back to summer, when you were more carefree and turned on by fun than structure. What routines did you find yourself abandoning the easiest? Maybe its time to release those things that were not sustainable or conducive to your freedom. Control is a transitory thing. Let it pass when it needs to. Ask yourself how you can find alternative ways of maintaining structure without compromising your freedom. So you can flow lightly into the next seasonal chapter.
The days are getting shorter, and the nights are getting longer. As the season progresses, it becomes our responsibility to not only respect the darker, calmer energy, but create light in our lives and others’ through celebrations of what nourishes us and through letting go of what weighs us down.
So let’s choose to fill our days with more celebrations as we approach the holidays.
Let eating be a celebration of nourishment, not a complicated practice of austerity.
Let exercise be a celebration of movement and release, not a a painful, tense chore.
Let relationships be a celebration of love and giving, not conflict and drama.
Thank you, trees, for inspiring us! So we can say yes to new air, freshness and lightness and make space for the juiciness that’s on its way back to us in the Spring.