The mountain is silent this morning.
A soft ‘kiss’ of snow is falling outside, covering the land in an icy, moist white shawl.
It’s a delicate snow – like fine silk caressing the skin of the Earth.
Like frozen mist.
And this watery kiss is most needed in Colorado.
A short distance down the mountain, wildfires are blazing. The Winter season has been unusually dry and warm, leaving the land parched and prone to combust at the slightest spark.
It strikes me that this situation is an apt environmental mirror for the stressed being experienced in the social ecosystem too. Indeed, the two are inextricably linked.
Today is New Year’s Eve and we are approaching the end of 2021.
A year in which we were put to the test in terms of how we chose to respond and restory the challenges that unfolded around us at every level.
It was a relentless year where it seemed at times as though we would never get a break from the external pressure. Of course, this fed the internal pressures we experienced, and it became less about ‘what’ was happening out there and more about ‘how’ we each responded to it that mattered.
I don’t know anyone this year who has not yet been touched by the fires of fear and anger.
Nor by the sense of swirling confusion and anxiety that wild water brings.
I certainly was.
But there were times when I was able to lift above the seeming battlefield of my life and get a glimpse of a bigger pattern at play. Rare times when I would find peace and relax into a knowing that there was a bigger story playing out on the Earth.
The story of evolution?
Perhaps.
A friend reminded me this morning that the last European Renaissance was birthed amid a pandemic.
That made me smile.
As I have said many times, humans appear to need extreme pressure to evolve and transform.
Unless our home is burning down, we find multiple excuses to continue with the status quo and make uncomfortable and outgrown situations habitable.
Albeit unhealthy.
Unless we are at risk of being swept away in the flood of chaos, we rarely stop to consider how our personal and collective choices are fuelling our crisis.
So, on this eve of a new year, it seemed a good time to stop and contemplate how I was responding to my internal fire and water after the outer world reminded me of the power of these elemental forces.
As I reflect on 2021, there have been many times when I allowed myself to be consumed by the flames of my fears and downed in anxiety and depression of situations that seemed to be so far out of my control.
I burned for many nights, waking up in the darkness to the noise of my own fear stories.
I dissolved into the hopelessness of a world that appeared to be unfolding in sharp contrast to the beauty and unity I was aspiring to and dreaming of.
And yet, I also rose to the elevated states of fire and water.
I set fire to my fears, releasing them so I could feel elation and the warmth of an open, compassionate heart.
I released my expectations and drifted with the flow of my life, allowing myself to love, to feel and to embrace whatever and whoever showed up in my life.
I entered again and again into trust that there is an ancient more than human story playing out across our world and that we each have a vital role to play in its unfolding.
More than all of that, I surrendered completely into love.
Love of myself, my friends, my family, and my beloved.
Love of my work, my calling, and my destiny.
2022 when added together comes to 6 (2+2+2).
In numerology 6 is the number of love, community and responsibility.
The 6th card in any traditional tarot deck is The Lovers – it represents the internal marriage between polarities and opposites. Between masculine and feminine. Between light and dark.
My mother who is a skilled numerologist will tell you that the elements associated with 6 are fire and water. The union of opposites and the fusion of two different elements into a third mystical state.
There is much to say on this and if you are intrigued, you can find out more here (https://www.beyond-reach.co.uk/numerology).
I believe that we are all being invited to enter 2022 with the hearts cracked open to love and the sacred responsibility that comes with this.
To embrace seeming opposites and fuse polarities such as bad/good, light/dark, male/female within ourselves so that we can find unity and harmony in the outer world.
As within, so without as the ancient alchemists always say.
2022 is a year where we get to harness the power of fire and water in our lives and choose to embrace their higher transformative aspects.
So, I sit here on the mountain, watching the snow.
Being grateful for all I am and all that I have experienced.
And trusting that a new and love filled story is about to unfold.
Because I am surrendered to it.
Blessings on your New Year my friends.
May we all have wonderful adventures together as we move into the year of love in 2022.
