Appreciate and acknowledge the phase of life you are in

Often this time of year, there are lots of posts on social media about big goals and kicking the year off with a strong start. Many of those messages contain a subtle (or not so subtle) tone of “if you’re not all in and ready to go, there’s something wrong with you“. And yet, you might find yourself in a place where you are not sure you are all ready to go.

These messages are not accurate. Not everyone is excited at the start of a new year. And nor do you need to be, because let’s be honest, New Year’s Day, is just another day in the year, like any other, and nothing significantly changes between one minute before midnight on December 31^st and one minute after midnight on January 1^st.

Today, I want to share some ancient wisdom with you, contained in the Vedas. The Vedas are a large body of religious texts originating in ancient India. Composed in Vedic Sanskrit, the texts constitute the oldest layer of Sanskrit literature and the oldest scriptures of Hinduism. According to the Vedas there are only three states of nature: Creation, Maintenance, and Destruction. And since you are a part of nature, these universal laws also apply to you. Each stage is valuable and necessary. One is not better than the other.

Winter is often considered the season of destruction where what dies off provides fertile soil for Spring’s creation. Summer then is moving into maintenance where the sprouts from Spring get extended life. Finally, Fall invites the next phase of Winter’s destruction. The amazing thing about these universal laws is that not only Nature moves through these phases, but you do too. And you will move through all of them time and again.

My father used to say that we think differently every five to six years. And my lived experience has me believing that he had a point, because every few years, I think differently, what I value most in life is different, and what I care about or yearn for changes as I change and mature. And my sense is the reason this is so, is because we keep moving through destruction, into creation, and then maintenance, and then back into destruction. We complete one chapter of our lives, and then begin another. At times, we are just in a chapter, fully immersed in the maintenance of that specific chapter of our lives.

When you think about a new year, it might serve you to slow down and consider what phase or state of nature you’re in, because the phase you’re in determines your reaction to the start o the New Year. If 2024 represents a season of expansion or creation for you – in other words, if you find yourself in the Spring of Creation right now – you will most probably feel inspired, energised, and excited to create new things and to set big goals for yourself this year. You might want to continue to build on what you started and there might be a natural flow of excitement, enthusiasm, and inspiration occurring for you.

If you are in phase of maintenance, you might feel less excited about creating new things. You might want to be close to what you’ve already created. You might have a yearning for slowing down and savouring. I have clients this year who have shared that they simply want to slow down, take a break, savour what they have. They are not feeling inspired right now to set new goals or to take action on new things. That is fine. It’s not a requirement that we always feel ready to set new goals and immediately jump into action. So, if you are in a slower start to the year, give yourself some grace, knowing that when the time comes, you will enter a new phase.

You might be kicking off this year in a state of turmoil where a lot of things are ending or completing, and there is an air of destruction and/or reinvention. And depending on whether you are currently in destruction or reinvention, you might be excited about the new year, or you might not be. Something that can happen when you find yourself in this state of destruction, is that you might feel a lot of pressure to reinvent yourself, while you are still grieving the loss you are experiencing. Putting pressure on yourself to be done with the grief already, doesn’t serve you. If this is you, it’s ok to slow down. In fact, it serves you to slow down, and really let yourself have your grief. Wanting to move on from grief, before you are really ready to do so, is a form of spiritual bypass. It doesn’t serve you.

So, dear reader, consider for a moment, what state of nature are you currently in? If you know you’re in a phase of destruction — which can be challenging and even painful — know, you won’t be in this place forever. You will cycle into creation again. And it may take time.

I recently completed Tosha Silver’s beautiful book, It’s Not Your Money: How to Live Fully from Divine Abundance and she shares that oftentimes we need to purge and clean first to make space for new things to come into our lives. Thus, destruction is oftentimes necessary to create space in our lives for creation to begin. The very act of letting go, clearing out, cleansing, purging, decluttering, is an invitation to Life to bring us new beginnings and new experiences. And this phase of destruction can be painful, because as human beings, we tend to experience loss quite intensely. We tend to care more about what might be lost, than what might be gained, received, or revealed, and that can keep us stuck sometimes.

My encouragement is that if you find yourself in a stage of life where you are walking through many completions, consider how these completions are rituals of letting go and making space. Consider how you might utilise the learnings from this stage, as fertile soil for something new to be created. And as I have shared, it doesn’t serve you to rush through a completion. You want to take the time to really learn from the completion and truly honour it, before moving into creating something new. If there is grief here, can you let yourself meet the grief? Can you allow yourself to visit with grief for a while? Grief is but love in its rawest and purest forms, and it has so much to teach us about what we truly love.

If it would be helpful to share what season you’re in, reply and let me know. Naming it and claiming it is a powerful way to release any stigma and/or invite in greater enthusiasm and peace — depending on which phase you’re in.

I’m sending love and light ahead for you being even more the real you than ever before in 2024, and more in acceptance of the natural ebb and flow of life!