Trust and Faith
How to Endure, Replenish and Survive
It is Winter, outside it's bitter cold with a barren landscape, the harsh darkness and quiet stillness can make this season relentlessly bleak. In January we are in the middle of Winter which brings us into the Water Element.
The energy of the Water element is around survival, will, determination, our genetic inheritance or life force, courage, trust, doubt, faith and wisdom. The emotion connected with this element is Fear, our ability to take appropriate risk and the ability to keep ourselves reassured.
Energetics of Fear
At this time of year we might be heightened to the energetics of the water element and the emotion of fear and become hypervigilant and anxious. We are alert and listening out for danger, our adrenaline brings out our fighting spirit, to stay alive. We are globally experiencing this very energy for what seems like the last twelve months. We have felt unsafe and insecure in the world we now inhabit and overwhelmed by numerous global crises, there has been much unprecedented chaos and change and it might feel very much like survival. It's interesting that we are experiencing the worsening global pandemic at the time of the water element, a time where our trust and faith may be tested.
Winter to Restore and Rebalance
Staying switched on in fight or flight mode helps us to dodge danger when it is presented to us, but becoming dominated by fear exhausts our reserves, damaging our vitality which will ultimately lead to illness. Winter is the time of maximum Yin, we are quiet and still, hibernating in sleep and rest whilst we restore our reserves for the year ahead. Every year we need Winter, where there is inactivity as energy contracts and is pulled within. Winter provides a great cleansing and rebalancing to the planet, seeds of great potential lie dormant, awaiting for the spring energy to prevail. In us, it provides the stillness we need, so we are able to connect with our divine plan for manifestation.
Lockdown and Hibernation
Being in Lockdown during Winter provides us a time to hibernate, like dormant seeds we restore and replenish our potential for the new year, whilst recovering our spent adrenalised energy. Having trust and faith quells our rampant fear, as it negates our overwhelm and anxiety in regards to our survival and our capacity to cope. Having trust is not just with another person but within our life overall. Trusting our capabilities to endure a long cold winter and overcome adversity whilst having faith that things will change and spring will come.
Building Trust and Faith
To help quieten doubts and fears we employ age-old methods of practice such as meditation, yoga, Qi Gong, Tai Chi, mindfulness and breath work, here we are able to connect with our hidden reserves which lay at our depths. It is in this place we are able to connect to something bigger than ourselves, as we flow within the river of life. We can experience this within nature, meditative practices, acupuncture, craniosacral therapy also religion or long standing traditions. Tuning into these universal energies provides us a depth of confidence, trust, reliance and optimism which can reassure us when our world can feel unsafe or uncertain.
Our secret to withstand and endure any Winter in our lives is to become as still as the trees and quiet as the wintry air and delve into our deep reserves and connect with our innate wisdom to merge into our healing watery river.