Spring is Springing! Letting Go & Moving Forward
It is officially spring, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen the collective more ready for it than we seem to be this year. This past Saturday, articles about the spring equinox seemed to pop up everywhere. Some told us to get outside in the fresh air, plant things, eat fresh foods. Some encouraged literal spring cleaning: organize a closet, mop the floors. And then there were those that put all of our future dreams on spring’s shoulders, billing it as the beginning of a new year, a day to signal the return of hope.
From a post-COVID sense of time, New Year’s Day feels like a lifetime ago, and didn’t really herald in the fresh start we have all been so hungry for. Winter came with its own set of trials, and a need for continued vigilance at a time when we were already running on empty. By now, we could all use a little hope. We’re tired, ready to put the trials of 2020 behind us and move forward into something lighter, brighter, different.
I don’t know about you, but I’m so over it!!!! Bring on spring.
Fortunately, over the past few months we seem to be slowly but surely cleaning things up, and regaining a sense of vision towards the future. So how do we move into this new season (both literal and figurative) with optimism, while at the same time embracing the wisdom we’ve gained over past seasons?
Many of us have spent the past year focused on safety and survival, and getting through in one piece. (Hopefully you also found opportunities for growth, personal development, or even just deeper rest than you may normally be able to enjoy, but regardless, we were all constrained by the realities of the environment around us.) And in order to get through days that are colored by a strange combination of chaotic uncertainty coupled with daily monotony, you may have developed some coping mechanisms that are no longer really serving you right now.
Ways of coping can show up different ways for different people. Coping could look like a rigid self-care routine; or throwing out self-care altogether. Deciding that moving toward goals doesn’t matter and just living for daily fun; or making work your only focus since you don’t have access to fun, anyway. Getting addicted to TikTok, or getting addicted to the news. Maybe you’ve named your sourdough starter and now have daily conversations; or maybe you’ve become phone buddies with friends you thought you’d never talk to again. Or maybe you tasted a little bit of each extreme along the way.
No matter how you’ve been coping, I think it’s important to acknowledge how we’ve been changed by these events. Some of these coping mechanisms may have opened you up to really great new ways of caring for yourself, or expressing your creativity, or maintaining your relationships. They may have shown you what you want to prioritize in your life moving forward, or what you absolutely never need to try again! (Maybe knitting/veganism/ Zoom happy hours aren’t for you- at least now you know, and you didn’t really miss out on anything else while you were trying it out.)
So before you spring forward, take a moment to reflect on where you’ve been, what you did, and how you’ve changed. While most of us are probably more than ready to throw 2020 out and never look back, I can almost guarantee that you got some really important gifts, or at the very least lessons, too. Don’t let those be forgotten.
“There is very little difference between burying and planting.”
Clear on what you gained? Ok, NOW it’s time to start letting things go!! Those coping mechanisms you’ve developed? Consider changing some of them up. It can be easy to operate on autopilot, especially after prolonged periods of stress. Once we’ve found habits and behaviors that help us cope, we might stick to them religiously, even when the circumstances that led us to creating them in the first place have changed. An important part of regulating our nervous system back to a state of open engagement lies in keeping just enough of our routine to stay grounded, while loosening our grip enough to open ourselves up to the new unknown.
The changing of the seasons is a natural time to undertake any shift. Our bodies really ARE asking for different foods and exercise patterns. Our brains ARE ready for new stimulation and cognitive challenges.
So yes, get outside. Clean out that closet. Write down some goals, dreams, wishes and then start going after them. Let in the new. Spring encourages us to move toward fresh possibilities. Just remember that all of those fresh flowers bloom from plants with grounded roots, nourished by last year’s fallen leaves.