September Soul
It’s the first week of September, which for many marks the beginning of autumn and the end of summer. In the U.S.A. the children are back in school, Labor day is past, football season is starting, the evenings and early mornings are getting cooler, a few leaves are in the process of changing color and the birds are starting to migrate. The apples, berries and other fruits and vegetables are being harvested and many are wondering how the summer season passed by so quickly. The ‘seasons of soul’ keep marching on.
For a variety of reasons, September is my favorite month and has been for as long as I can remember. Being raised in Michigan with the abundance of water, oak and maple trees, farms, gardens, family, four distinct seasons and a birth-day set the tone for me to be a soulful autumn lover. In so many ways, it speaks to my depths and beckons me into the wonder of transition and transformation. For me, it’s not a season of sadness but one of joy, celebration, reflection, contemplation and new beginnings.
Albert Camus, the French philosopher and Nobel Prize winner observed: “Autumn is a second spring where every leaf is a flower.” And as every flower, like every leaf lasts only a moment, I’m beginning to see how I, you, we too are like them. Another season passes, another moment is acknowledged and lost, another friendship ends and begins, another developmental stage is completed and another soulful insight is revealed. How are you processing this ongoing birthing, growing, maturing and dying in everything?
The older I get, after seven decades, the more I come to understand Nature’s rhythms and how they work together in an integral fashion. I’m also coming to observe and know how disconnected we humans of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries are from these natural rhythms and it grieves me. As I sit here at my desk looking out over the giant pines of the West and the sprawling growth of our cities, suburbs and industrial footprints, I wonder how long it will be before we wake up to our soulful connectivity.
What will it take for us to recognize the soulfulness in one another and the totality of creation? How much will we have to lose before we become aware of our divine nature and that of the whole created order? Where will we go and what will we do when there’s no room for the magic in the coloring leaves and the flowering trees? As a boy living at the edge of a small mid-western town, True Nature spoke to me in the flowers, the trees, the birds, streams and autumn leaves. What speaks to our children today?
September soul embraces the wonder of creation in all its forms, in all it’s comings and goings. It asks us to stop, look and listen for the silent music that pours forth every day in the many transitions taking place in this autumn season. It speaks of the many soulful engagements we can participate in with a different kind of knowing. In invites us into the ever present wonder of True Nature flowing in, around and through us all, every moment of every day. It calls us to Attention and Awareness. . .
As Socrates said: “The secret of change is to focus all your energy not on fighting the old but in building the new.” When the gentle wind sweeps over the fields, the lakes, the gardens and the trees; all nature smiles in the sunshine and the moonlight. When we awaken to the wonder of True Nature in ourselves and every other person, place, situation and thing, laughter is heard in the gentle breeze, the turning leaves and the psychic ease of being One with September Soul. Stop, look, listen. Hear the silent call.
- Give yourself the gift of ‘September Soul’ by giving attention this month to the change of season in your outer and……your inner environments. Slow down while everyone else is speeding up. Give care to your ‘soul’, your True Nature, your common union with the natural environment. Participate in ways that RELAX you. Notice the change!
- I’m looking out the window at a rabbit stretched out on the lawn munching grass, basking in the wonder of the day. True Nature is inviting us into this scene that’s filled with wonder, wisdom and wealth. It’s a teaching moment. We are One. Hmm. . . .
- As you wander through this wonder-filled month of September, remember to remember the breeze, the moonlight, the cooler nights, the changing scenery, the many things that have soul for you. Take note of how it feels to slow way down and relax into the heart of a moment. Open in ways that bring awe and wonder to you.
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