I wish more people understood seasons.

Right now, as I write this, my life is in the middle of an autumn. It has nothing to do with the weather outside in the northern hemisphere; the similarity is only coincidence, but the lesson is the same.

Understanding autumn means I know that sometimes, we need to shed certain things - even ones that may have brought us life, very recently. At times, what was once vital can become a liability. An impediment. A danger.

But the falling away, of all that, is not all that happens. Many things become ready to harvest, in an autumn.

Understanding autumn means knowing that what comes next is winter.

I understand winter, too.

Winter isn't about barren, lifeless isolation.

Winter is about drawing inwards, shrouding ourselves in protection and stillness, to spend time strengthening what lives at our deepest core.

And after winter, comes spring - the chance for that renewed inner vigor to re-emerge and once again assert itself in the form of life outgrowing old limits.

The patterns and cycles of change, in all life, are so much easier to bear with grace... when we understand seasons.