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Contemplating Autumn -
Nurturing the Nurturer
By Vanessa Fountain
Kaya WCSS Community,
I love Autumn. I love that the heat has finally broken, and I can get out into my beloved garden. Not only is it cooler but the soil is still warm making it the perfect time to get plants into the ground and established. It is the time of the year when I like to stop and notice the “state of affairs” in my garden. What has grown well, what hasn’t done so well, what is struggling (perhaps in the wrong place) and what is thriving and in abundance.
The thing with noticing is that you need to make time to be still.
Summer’s outward expression of action thankfully gives way to a quiet introspection. My favourite way to do this is to brew a cup of coffee and take a leisurely meditative meander around the garden or perhaps to pull up a chair and just notice from different vantage points how this outward expression of the inner life has fared.
After I have become still and noticed I begin the contemplative process of gathering the leaves that have fallen. Like thoughts in the mind, I watch the leaves that the trees are ready to let go off. The trees don’t struggle with the letting go, they don’t agonise over the letting go, they just let go. Nature doesn’t hold onto the story; I like her reminders.
And like our experiences nothing goes to waste, the leaves become a rich compost for tomorrow’s growth.
Now I clean up. What hasn’t survived, what was too water thirsty, what took too much. I’m thankful for all the adventures in the garden and pragmatic in my approach to cleaning up. I look at what may need pruning. What is doing well but not growing in the direction I want to go. Where is energy being spent but the shade not being provided. I thank the bough or branch and carefully harvest and freeze the billets for future green wood carving projects.
It is time to lay down the layers of green waste (I am thankful my local supermarket that daily fills up a 20 litre bag of lettuce and cabbage leaves otherwise bound for landfill, for my chickens and the garden). Layers of manure and pea straw from my dear farmer in York and the beds are ready to be carried through the winter and into spring.
This is the time when I love to plant bulbs, the ultimate expression of faith, hope and trusting in a beautiful future.
Pop them in and forget. Its always a lovely surprise in winter and spring. And now my favourite bit. Another cup of coffee and I like to acknowledge all that I have achieved.
Where I have struggled, what hasn’t worked, what fills my heart with joy, peace, and love - I make plans for more joy, peace, and love in my life.
Autumn is, as are all our seasons an outward expression of an inner process.
It is in autumn that we can take stock, to slow down and move from a more social way of being to a more inner experience of the self.
This journey of introspection culminates at midwinter when we gather as a community and walk the spiral, recognising the inner light at the centre, at the heart of our being and our Earth and begin the outward journey into the world again.
I love the wisdom that surrounds and supports us. In Noongar wisdom this is the season of Djeran, and it is the time when one would check the shelter for leaks and perhaps, if necessary, even rebuild the home. What a wonderful picture of the body, the ultimate home.
How are we fairing, what toll have the seasons, life, “living with Covid”, taken and how can we support ourselves.
This is the time to notice, to clean up, to prune back from activities that drain rather than sustain us. How can we prepare our shelter so that it is a cocoon to shelter and protect us in our sacred time of introspection and transformation?
I love noticing the red flower gums and other red flowering plants at this time of year. It makes me smile. At this time of year when we go in and take stock, nature gives us red. In Ayurvedic wisdom (the sister science to yoga), red is the colour we associated with Muladhara, the base chakra. The chakra of grounding, of stability, of home, and security. It is also Vata season. The season when we can feel the dry, light, cold, rough, mobile, subtle energies of mother nature. We may feel an emptiness, and our minds may desperately seek busyness as we are invited to go within. But nature always has a remedy close at hand.
The healing balm is to ground down, slow down, recreate your home, your cocoon, and allow time to be in nature every day.
Walking, yoga, gardening, and swimming in the ocean are what I like to do. I really love my early morning swim in the ocean. It stops the chatter of the mind in its tracks (cold water will do that), and I am present to what is and the opportunity to go within, to go home, to reconnect, and realign.
What ever your favourite things to do in autumn are, I hope you can make time to stop, to notice, to take inventory, to clean up, to prune back, and make a nurturing cocoon full of warmth, stillness, and love for yourself. What a beautiful gift of modelling for our children.