There are signs all around that the season is changing. The days are longer, the birds are singing and in some places even the daffodils are braving the weather. 

But what if you can’t feel the same sense of new life? A number of people have been expressing to me the challenge of finding the energy to enjoy the coming of spring.

It’s not the same for us humans, is it? This year especially, we have been desperately deprived of light and sunshine and yet we have been getting up in the dark, dressing for the weather and then going out into it .

 Now while the plants and many animals are rejoicing that their hibernation is over, we still need to draw from within ourselves the energy that allows up to join in the celebration.

There is within each of us a power that is independent of the seasons. At its most basic (but vital), it is the power of homeostasis, the way our bodies maintain us in a state of equilibrium despite the changes in the outer world.

And there is a deeper power of our “creative, human strength” to quote Michael Hedley Burton in his book of poems, Seasons of the Soul:

“And it is only through creative, human strength

that clashing chaos of a world gone mad

with forming, fashioning love,

can gradually be filled.”

So maybe it is by loving that we can find a path towards the outbreath of summer: 

Loving “this world gone mad”.

Loving ourselves in all our hesitation, depression or exhaustion.

Loving the burgeoning of life around us even when it highlights our inability to grow new leaves ourselves.

May you find the inner warmth and strength to blossom into this new season.

Many thanks to Karin Miller for the photo