(Read Winter (1) first if you haven’t already!)

One of the things I have discovered in this winter season that has really helped me to slow down and renew my soul has been ‘Contemplative Prayer’. This is a type of meditation that can be practiced in many ways but my favourite approach is just to sit and be in silence, focusing on the presence of God. By choosing to engage in contemplative prayer daily, I created a regular space in my life where the only object was simply to be still, body, soul and spirit. Initially my thoughts, and sometimes my body too, felt resistant to being still but I chose to keep persevering, even when I felt uncomfortable in the silence. It was like I had forgotten how to stop and just be, my automatic reflex was to to just keep going, I realised I only felt comfortable when I was busy, but that began to change. As I returned to and rested in God’s presence everyday I slowly noticed a shift in my inner world, a stillness was beginning to grow. Peace beyond understanding was flowing from my spirit and beginning to permeate my soul, displacing my racing thoughts. My soul began to feel at rest throughout the day, not just during the time I spent in contemplative prayer. It was like I was remembering how to just be. 

As I look back I realise resting wasn’t really something I had been giving myself permission to do, physically or mentally, I felt that I ought to just keep going. Life just felt like an endless to-do list and I just kept looking ahead to the next thing, then the next thing. I never felt present and I wasn’t really enjoying my life, it just felt like I was rushing through it. If we don’t have moments of rest where we slow down and actually allow ourselves to feel how we are doing, but instead just keep ploughing ahead with the next thing on the schedule, then we will burn out. I could not sustain a life of doing as I had forgotten how to be and rest. To do we must first know how to be, otherwise we won’t know when to stop. Limits are a part of life, we weren’t designed to just keep going, like the trees we were also designed to need rest. 

In this wintertime I realised I had to cultivate rest deep within me that would enable me to move into spring. I needed to carry in my soul the wisdom that winter could reveal to me, the ability to slow down, rest and wait. Winter has shown me it’s okay to be in the in-between, that it’s okay to lay things down and stop. Instead of always being in a rush, always thinking of the next thing, I can pause in the moment and just be. I no longer feel in a constant hurry, I now take time to enjoy and delight in the world around me instead of just rushing past it. Winter has given me a new perspective, a slower and more grounded perspective, there will always be more things ‘to-do’ but I can now see the value of slowing down, resting and being present. I still look forward to spring and for the winter to fully pass, but I know that I will be able to enjoy spring all the more because of how this winter season has shaped me, however hard it has been to endure. 

“Some things you can’t know till you’re still
In the silence
Where your spinning thoughts slow down
In the stillness
Things have a way of working out”
House on a Hill – Amanda Lindsey Cook

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Winter is a season of waiting and it can be one of the hardest seasons to endure. When we experience a personal season of winter in our lives, the frozen and apparently barren landscape we find ourselves in leaves us hoping the relief of spring will come quickly. The repetition of the seasons surely teaches us that spring always comes, despite how foreboding the winter may seem. Yet however sure we are that winter will end, the wait can seem endless and it is easy to lose hope as we are left languishing in the cold. Although things look bleak, every season has its purpose and instead of just looking beyond winter toward spring, we can discover that winter can be a valuable period in our lives. 

Winter is an essential season in the life of a tree, it is a pause between all that was and all that will be. Winter is the in-between season – all the old autumn leaves have fallen to the ground but the new growth of spring is still yet to come. The trees laying down of their leaves has a purpose in the cycle of their lives, it’s a time for them to rest and get ready for what is to come, they have shed the old in preparation for the new.  But the new does not come straight away, the trees pause and rest during the cold, bitter months where it it toughest to survive. Although a tree in winter can look desolate from an outside perspective, a lot of what is happening is unseen, things aren’t necessarily desolate, just hidden. Beneath the surface there is growth, renewal, refreshing and preparation for all that is to come. Sometimes we need to experience a season of winter in our own lives as, like the trees, we also need time to rest and recuperate in the waiting. As the leaves on the trees fall to the ground for a season, we for seasons also have to lay things down and allow ourselves to slow down. As we slow down and take time to rest we can gain a different perspective as we allow ourselves time to just be. Winter is a season of being, rather than doing. Winter is not a busy but a quiet season, it’s not a time for planting or harvesting and the focus is not on what we are ‘producing’ with our lives, but it is an opportunity to cultivate life on the inside and prepare for what is to come.

Winter seasons can be a choice or they can be forced upon us. Often we won’t have to lay everything down at once, just certain areas of our lives, although that has certainly not been my experience. Winter’s fierce tempest struck my physical health with a shattering blow and I had to let the remaining fragments of my life hit the ground. My only option was to rest almost permanently as my body objected to any kind of output. I could no longer freely work, socialise or engage in ‘normal’ life. Life as I knew it had come to a grinding halt. Even though this physical rest had been forced upon me, I soon realised I was not really at rest as there was no rest within me. My thoughts still raced although my body could not, I felt on edge and over-thought every tiny thing and seemed to have no control over what went through my mind. I also felt deeply weary on the inside – worn down by the struggle of life. I desperately required refreshing internally as well as externally, it wasn‘t just my body that needing healing, but my soul too. My soul needed to remember how to rest and simply be and however harsh this winter season felt, it did provide an opportunity to do just that.

 

(Part Two to follow soon…)

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”

‭‭James‬ ‭1:2-4‬ ‭NIV‬‬

When I first read this scripture I thought… really?? Do the words joy and trials really belong in the same sentence? I think not… I felt so far from joy and instead felt overwhelmingly disappointed in the midst of many ongoing trials. To say the least, I found this scripture a challenging read. But instead of just turning away from it and closing my heart, I sat with it and pondered it for a while.

I really began to focus on that very first word, Consider. I realised I wasn’t being asked to feel pure joy in trials (and that was a relief!) but instead to change my perspective; it was an invitation to change how I thought about my ongoing trials despite how I was feeling. Some days I feel a lot of negative emotions, particularly during setbacks, such as anger, annoyance, depression, disappointment and frustration, to name a few. I can’t just stop the feelings or decide to simply feel a different way. But I have realised I don’t have to stay and dwell in the negative emotions when they arise. I can’t choose my emotions but I can choose my thoughts and I realised that by changing my thoughts I could influence how I felt.

I have to choose to think that even though this may not feel good right now, I am able to look beyond this moment and see the good things happening inside me that’s the result of this hard season, that my character is being shaped for good in the process of these trials. And I have to keep choosing, even on the days where I feel I would much rather it all be over, than be mature! By choosing to see a positive outcome of my circumstances, despite how bad and hard it feels to be going through it, I began to feel more positive in my circumstances, although nothing on the outside had really changed. On some days I even managed to experience some joy in the midst of my trials, which had previously felt nearly impossible.

I’m choosing to try to adjust the way I think about trials and hard times, as I have realised the hard times aren’t going anywhere. Trials and tribulations will keep coming and coming, again and again, whether we like it or not… The season will change and look different but life is hard, whatever is going on in our lives. There will be good times, seasons of relief and peace, but winter always comes. If we can change the way we see and think about these seasons, we won’t be so thrown when they hit us, as we know they won’t take us out but will only make us stronger. This scripture in James suggests that we need to undergo trials and tribulations in order to become mature and complete. Most of us would say we want to be mature and complete but are we willing to walk through the trials to get there? We have to be able to see we need the good times and the bad times to become shaped and moulded, mature and complete, in order to receive all God has for us in this life.

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I just wanted to write something short about this book I am loving, She Is Free by Andi Andrew. I only recently heard of Andi Andrew after she appeared on Havilah Cunnington’s Online Empowerment Summit (which I’ve linked as it is a great resource on spiritual warfare). Out of all the people that were interviewed Andi’s story just really grabbed me and her book has been a real find. When I read a lot of the “self-help Christian” genre I can find myself forcing myself to read, I know they’re full of wisdom but I just generally love a good story & find them easier to read. However Andi’s book has a really light fresh feel yet is full of deep truth that is empowering me to walk in freedom and overall it is an enjoyable read. The chapters are a mix of general and specific chapters, a lot are titled “Freedom from …” (insert shame, anger, control etc). I found that even the chapters I thought might not be relevant to me ended up being relevant in some way and helped me too see things in myself that I had not been fully aware of. One thing I really like is that at the end of each chapter she has a section called “Walking in Freedom” which has practical steps for the reader to follow to allow the truth of that chapter to really begin to manifest tangibly in their own lives. I have only just finished this book but know already it won’t be long before I come back to it for another read. Overall I would really recommend this book to anyone who desires more freedom (who doesn’t?!), particularly in their mind and emotions.

 

 

Can’t getting started just be the hardest thing? It becomes this big deal, doing something for the first time. Well it does for me anyway because of this innate desire to be perfect at everything instantly which is the most impossible thing ever. Hence why I never succeeded at playing an instrument, because that is something that you just can’t be good at straight away, it takes effort and perseverance!  I just end up procrastinating or in the case of this blog I begin writing about 5 blog posts and never finish any of them because of this doubt that just hangs over me that what I do will not be good enough. That is such a lie, but it can feel like the truth in the moment.

So I decided I just have to do it. Write something. I just have to face the risk that I might be a terrible writer and my blog might be a failure. But I’ll never know if I never try. And it might turn out ok or even good. And my writing may develop over time to become good even if isn’t now. I don’t want to live afraid and never attempt anything, thwarted by my fear of failure before I have even begun.

In a podcast I listened to about 6 months ago (which I won’t go into details about) but they said “Give yourself permission to be a beginner”. So that is what I shall do.