The Quiet Season

Put your ear down next to your soul and listen hard.

Anne Sexton

As much as I miss the beauty and the color of my garden, there is a peacefulness to winter that I have come to appreciate these past several years.

It’s a quiet season to me. The subdued tones in nature speak to a sense of calm and hush in my own life. With little outside distraction or competition for my attention, I tend to turn inward this time of year. Which I don’t think of as a bad thing at all.

Right now I’m doing a lot more listening and a lot less asking. I’m spending some time discerning between my “wants” and my “needs”. I am learning that there is a big difference between the two.

If this feels like a quiet season for you and that makes you feel a little uncomfortable, I would just encourage you to sit with that uncomfortable feeling. I call it my soul, but whether you want to call it your ‘inner voice’ or your ‘authentic self’, my guess is that it is trying to tell you something. And from personal experience, whatever that is, you probably need to hear it.

Here’s the thing…this inner work is not for sissies. Listening to our souls sometimes mean exposing our greatest fears and vulnerabilities. Something we can spend a lifetime avoiding.

I also know this from personal experience.

But what I also know is that a quiet season is often the birthplace of personal growth. Hope lives here. And its voice is one that we can trust.

Love, Kelly