The In Between

Today, I noticed several leaves on the red maple trees beginning to change color, ever so slightly. I find this to be an encouraging sign…a harbinger that, day by day, autumn is approaching.

Autumn is the season when I feel a quickening within my spirit. My creative imagination is peaked and inspired as the daylight hours grow shorter. Fall’s arrival invites me to contemplate writing and stitching projects I intend to complete during the coming months.

I look forward to hanging an autumn wreath. I open my box of autumn treasures and begin to arrange acorns, velvet pumpkins, and spice-scented pot-pourri, into my living space.

The Celtic tradition reminds me that we have entered the season called, Lughnasadh, the “in between.” Summer is waning and Autumn has not yet arrived. I, too, feel in between.

I’ll soon celebrate my 76th birthday. I’m no longer “middle-aged,” and I don’t yet qualify as “elderly,” at least to my way of thinking. I’m choosing to embrace life’s season of in between with my whole heart and being.

Every day there’s an increasing quality of ineffable preciousness for life, calling me to simplify, distill, curate and archive my possessions, relationships, stories and particular ways of living and being. I believe this process of discerning what truly matters most, is a practice of soul-polishing.

So far, this is what I’m learning and affirming through my soul polishing experience:

My early morning ritual of making coffee, lighting a candle, journaling, and prayerful listening in silence centers me before I begin my work for the day. Morning sacred practice is essential to my well-being.

I need less: food, chatter, material possessions, and distraction of every kind.

I need more: spaciousness for my calendar, silence, time with beloveds and comfortable shoes.

Sheltering in place during the pandemic affirmed that my true nature is that of a cloistered contemplative.

The handcraft of slow-stitching lowers my blood pressure and satisfies my appetite for creative expression.

My increasing wrinkles are revealing the cartography of my life’s journey. I am choosing to embrace the mystery of what happens to the physical body as I grow older.

Birds are definitely God’s messengers.

The writings of the saints and mystics are a continual source of upliftment and inspiration.

Expressing compassion, kindness and forgiveness, as Jesus taught, are core to one’s humanity, but some days these qualities are challenging to offer.

The working title for the last book I will write (a spiritual memoir) is: The Geography of My Bones.

I feel a deepening connection with my ancestors with every passing day. Their wisdom travels on the ethers of love, across time and space to inform my dreams and waking thoughts.

We are born into the light of life and death returns us to the Light of infinite Love.  

I will share further revelations as they arise. Autumn’s arrival always carry me to a deeper place within. May this liminal season of “in between” bless your spirit and heart with soul-polishing insights and inspiration.