Seasonality and Tending to Our Becoming

We're back! This episode touches on what it means to be with our seasonality of soul and explores the importance of acknowledging what is happening in the present moment. With the growing climate of uncertainty and discomfort, Chloe Lionheart describes how to tend to our becoming and increase our self-compassion. Themes of burnout, radical honesty, emotional regulation, and hustle culture can be found in this episode. Please subscribe, share, and leave a review!

https://www.downwithmydemons.com/

To connect with Chloe Lionheart:
Email: chloe@downwithmydemons.com

Resources:
To find Lindsay Mack's "Tarot for the Wild Soul Podcast"
https://www.tarotforthewildsoul.com/about-the-podcast

"Wild Geese" by Mary Oliver

Find a therapist through:
www.psychologytoday.com

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Transcript

🎵 Hello, hello! What's up, everybody? This is your host, Chloe Lionheart, and you are listening to The Down With My Demons podcast. Welcome back. So glad to be here with you. It's been over a little over a year, and I'm just so glad to be here with you. I've missed you all. I've been thinking about you, and I hope you're doing all right. This is a particularly squirrely time that we're in, and part of me feels like that is too juvenile of a word even to describe what is unfolding, but that is the word I'm going to use for this moment just with that, you know, awareness that it's so much more than that for so many of us. The topic today is seasonality, and when I say seasonal, you know, you might think of like the actual seasons of the year, fall, winter, spring, summer, but we, as earth beings, also are in seasonal cycles. We move through seasons of our being. We are moving through our own evolution and growth. growing all the time. I most recently have been moving through many iterations and seasons of grief. I have been moving through the seasons of being and completing elements of being a student. I've also just been a human, learning how to be a human and continuously coming to the conclusion that no one has any idea what they're doing. And then I forget and then I try to white knuckle figure everything out and then I remember that no one knows what they're doing and so I let go again. And it's this dance that we do. And seasonality I want to talk about because in such a fast paced world that we're in right now, where technology is a bigger component than it's ever been. And it moves faster than we've ever seen. And there's a lot of good, good aspects of this, right? So when our computers are working faster, that's helpful for a lot of areas of our life, or that's great for industry, it is helping us to move forward with innovations, there are plenty of positive things to progress in a technological world, right? So yes, and that is a thing. And the and is that we're also beings on this earth. We are a part of this earth. Everyone that has ever lived has been here. And to our knowledge, I guess, wink, wink, UFO files, or UAP files. But our human selves are a part and connected to the nature that we are on the ground that we are on every day all the time. And so it's not just the trees that are going through the seasons. It's not just the weather. It's not just the bears hibernating, or squirrels gathering food in preparation, or all the little baby deer being born in the springtime, and the the rutting, you know, of animals. We have a soul seasonality to us. And it's really difficult. I have found personally to navigate being in a vast paced technological time, while also being a human in this natural world. And so much of me has struggled. with wanting to meet the pace of technology and wanted to match the hustle of what I felt was being required of me and to be an active participant in late stage capitalism and to, you know, try to succeed in this world to be free and like to meet my goals and my dreams and we were raised, especially in this country of the North America, to hustle for what we have and to have more and to meet these unattainable not natural goals and levels of function. And there is a moment. that we may or may not come to where that stops being sustainable entirely and in those moments where we are called to winter into ourselves and to be more introspective and to take time away and to rest can we show up for that or and obviously there's a spectrum of experience here right or are we doubling down on our hustle or are we making excuses as to why there is no reason that we could ever rest or are the systems around us actually oppressing us in such a way that if we were to rest at all that actually means that we no longer get to survive do we actually just run ourselves into the ground and i don't remember the phrase but there's a notion that you don't want to wait to hear the message that you need to rest too late because life has a way of forcing it upon you if you don't do it yourself have you ever experienced that where you got a message about something and then you didn't do anything about it and it kept being like hey you know hey you might need a rest hey this is your body talking you gotta just take it easy here you're pushing it hey you're pushing it and then you get super sick that's life in your body's way and just that is the natural flow of being like that's stop no not sustainable you don't get to carry on now you're sick and you can't move and you're sleeping constantly for a few days those are those types of seasons so we are seasonal beings whether we are intentional about it or like conscientious of it we're moving through cycles we're moving through lessons whether we like it or not what is it to just show up what does it mean to be with what is and trust that we're actually not failing the season that we're in has a lesson for us can we pause for just a moment to hear it or to see it or to witness it or to acknowledge that it's there a personal story I have burnt out many times since going back to school because I was pushing it. I was not taking any days off at some times, I was working constantly, I wasn't sleeping very much, I was pushing it, pushing it, pushing it, pushing it, pushing it and I would start to just like unravel and then something like if I didn't take a break, I didn't take a vacation, I didn't take time, I didn't integrate my self-practices and thought I don't have time for my self-practices, I don't have time to take care of myself, I'm busy hustling, I have to survive, a lot of fear in that. I was so afraid to stop and actually tend to myself because what happens if I stop and then I just totally crumble and dissolve and can't start again and then I'm fucked? What happens if I give myself like a shred of time and I lose that momentum and I never start again? We've been prioritizing the hustle over our actual beingness. We weren't born to hustle, we were born to be, to exist, to suck the marrow out of this life, not to be totally cliche or anything. What happens if we tend to our becoming, we turn towards, it's effing scary. Trust is scary. Trusting ourselves is scary and if we haven't ever done that before, it's especially scary because we don't have the experience to show us that it'll be alright. Even if you screw up, chances are it'll get figured out. out eventually it'll get righted in some way or the lessons that you learn from that will be as so valuable that there was something to it there was some karmic plan there was something that was really potent for us to learn man it's scary out here a lot of us are losing our rights and there's a lot of uncertainty i know a lot of us are really really struggling to just like get through the day and not feel so hopeless and down and overwhelmed with things that are happening and that unknown of what is to come and the fear that we could lose our lives or our livelihood or our you know way of being at any of our freedoms just it's so much uncertainty to hold when we already feel really uncomfortable and so I you know bow to you those of you that are like fuck you Chloe I don't have time to tend to myself I don't get to do that and I hear you and I see you really with you so for the last three years I have been grinding in a doctoral program every month homework so many papers to write flying to school once a month paying for dog care paying to travel paying for books working not not working because I couldn't after losing a I couldn't do anything I was I mean totally incapacitated which I will be recording an episode on grief because grief and I are very close old friends and grief deserves such a seat at the table next to me and is forever sitting next to me walking with me and I actually really appreciate grief for that and everything it teaches me it's the mentor that is constantly next to me but I've been grinding and in this culture that taught me that I don't get to slow down and stop I have to continue grinding grinding grinding and that that was just the way and all of us praising each other for like making it through and doing all the things and being parents and working at the same time and doing unpaid work that is pretty emotionally and spiritually and physically rigorous and taxing on top of doing our homework and trying to then be a friend to people or be a family member be in relation at all or have any self-care of any kind and it took my grief for me to slow down and then when I was done with my coursework I was actually incredibly concerned about my physical health having pushed that hard for that long. I was so worried that it was then gonna take me a really long time to actually heal from that experience and there was certainly damage done. Like that was a huge sacrificial experience that I had the privilege to participate in and I chose to engage with. Because of other dreams and goals that I have and the ways that I want to show up in the world and it's worth it to me in that way and I am now paying the price of that and my life fell apart and also got just like very heavy. And there's a very important element of this that I want to name which is I wasn't taking responsibility for tending to myself and as a result of that I wasn't able to honor myself or anybody else around me in the way that they deserved in the way that we deserved and that it is not our responsibilities that have to come first. It's actually the opposite. It's extremely important that we take care of ourselves to the best of our abilities. Because that is the only way that we can survive this moment and achieve the life that we want and to show up in the ways that we have to and need to and get to for others and ourselves. And I have found over my life that skipping steps in this process of our becoming is actually just like a huge waste of time even though it doesn't feel that way in the moment. It's a bit the turtle in the hair story parable whatever where the rabbit or the hair is like racing through the race but doesn't finish first because the turtle takes its time and ends up winning the race. Turtle doesn't have to backtrack it doesn't have to think about something again it's just. being present with that moment as it is one step in front of the other, that feels very seasonal to me. Can we be with the seasons of our becoming in the present moment? This is not the easiest question. Can we? Probably. Is it something we want to do? Probably not all the time. Is it valuable? Yeah. The way that I see it is that any time I've ever cut corners or tried to cut corners with feeling something or learning a lesson or being in something, I was going to have to repeat it and do it all over again anyway. So now I'm at this place where I'm like, all right, I'm just going to be really in it and like fully do it and go through it and feel it. And I don't mean to be so vague, I guess. let's use grief as an example. I had to fully just be present with every second of grief because I wasn't trying to do it that way ever again. I didn't want to repeat the intensity of those feelings ever again in that particular way and the not cutting corners of things gets them done faster. If you really want to move through something, if you're really struggling with something and it's really frustrating you, then stop avoiding it. The pushing it aside is the thing that makes it louder. The not being with it doesn't make it go away. It's just waiting, waiting and waiting and it's probably growing in intensity and it's probably becoming more buff and destructive in that way. To really be with your emotions in the moment, with like what's happening is a radical act in these times where we are required to be more than human in our every day. It's not sustainable and so I want to give you some tips or you know things that I've worked for me and others that I know and those I've worked with because I want to ground what I'm saying into like actual skills and things to do because shit is so overwhelming right now. Like I don't think we have time for me to be so like esoteric or like vague in what I'm saying. I want to really root you into your actual. physical body and being, so that you can use very real ways of navigating this. Because we deserve that in this moment, like we really, the rooting down into ourselves and into the ground is so important if we're going to make it through this, these moments of intensity. The first thing that I recommend and has been more transformative than I was expecting, like seems obvious, it's not obvious, it's crazy, is actually naming out loud what I am feeling and not saying you, you feel this or those one might feel, it's like no, no, no, take full responsibility, take full ownership of the thing in the moment. I am feeling anxious, that one I think is a good one to name out loud. You're sitting there and you're stewing and you're stewing and your mind's racing and your body's starting to feel yuck. Fucking name it. Like free it. And if doesn't resonate with you and your culture to say I am feeling, you could say I'm being visited by anxiety. I am being visited by overwhelm. I feel it here in my body. What do I need in this moment? I need to say what I'm scared of. I need to say what I'm worried about. I need to eat something. I gotta just stop what I'm doing right now and I gotta like walk around my house. I gotta like walk outside. I gotta just like take a break and take a nap. There's something crazy that happens in naming the emotions where the feeling lessens a little bit. And I think part of that is because you're showing up for yourself. You're like parenting yourself. When a baby or a young child is not able to communicate what they're feeling because they're just feeling for the first time. Like they're still learning what even those things are. It's our responsibility as parents or caregivers or beloved adults to intuit what that is and to give them that thing. So how can you show up for yourself in that way? I will wrap my arms around myself and hug myself and say I got you. I got you. I'm anxious. I'm worried that I'm going to fail at this thing. I'm worried that I'm not going to be enough. And I got you and I see you in that moment and I'm going to hold you and. I'm not abandoning you in that. I hear you. Talk to yourself like you would a little kid. What did you need to hear when you were a kid? What did you need? And look, we're not always going to know what we need in the moment, but when we try stuff out, it's a good way to learn. It's like you don't know you're gluten-free until you feel like shit after eating gluten, right? You got to try it out first. Figure it out. Another way is to figure out what you love. What do you love? And be honest and real with yourself, and please don't judge yourself about it because like damn, don't, just don't. I don't want to hear any excuses about your blah blah blah no you're worthy and great period you're good you deserve to trust yourself okay so what do you like sometimes i really like um laying in my bed and eating macaroni and cheese and watching for very long but it does like hit a little dopamine spike you know it is a little bit of self-medication feels like for a little bit and here's an idea about you know how to figure these things out what makes you feel proud of yourself or what makes you feel super just good in your body or more hopeful or optimistic or like you can breathe again after you do it what is that for you can be like exercise making art paying your bills do you pay a bill and you're like yeah electric bill you're welcome thanks for keeping those lights on nice love that good job self you freaking paid that you worked hard you paid that bill killed it yeah look at you go nailed it can you give yourself the validation can you like be your own hype person so what do you love figure that out one of the ways to know what you love or what's actually like really good for you is it's a little bit edgy it's a little bit edgy for me to tell you i love laying in my bed and eating macaroni and cheese and watching saturday cartoons you know that's a little edgy for me to admit it is a little edgy for me to practice sports that I love but they're like a little bit risky there is challenge in the things that we love there is some element of challenge and growth especially if they're good long-term choices for instance if you are an artist of any kind say you play guitar or you practice the drums there is a drive to get better at something when you have gotten a little bit better after practicing like you get a threshold of doing something that you love where you know if you practice more you're gonna be better at it and so there is a thirst to do the thing more to be better and there is an edge when you try something new and it's hard and that's really good for us That is a really great sustainable practice of sorts. Here's another one. Do nothing. And be okay with it. Don't beat yourself up about it. Don't shoulda woulda could all over yourself. Just do nothing. If you gotta sit on your hands, sit on your hands. Take some deep breaths. Breathe into your nose. Breathe out through your nose. Do nothing and say, it's okay for me to do nothing. Usually if we give ourselves a moment, we'll figure something out. Or we will feel a little bit better. Or that was just a little break that we needed. The things that aren't as helpful. I guess my macaroni and cheese is pretty self-medicating, but other things that are more unhelpful and I think is a huge part of seasonality is can you avoid the impulse to do something that takes you out of the feeling right away? And can you do something that you know is that thing that you love that makes you feel better that you're going to be more proud of? And this turtle in the hair scenario of the hair is the one that's doing things impulsively and rushing. There's not as much depth to that experience. It's not integrated into the self. It's not rooted. You're not really learning a ton besides rushing. You're missing a lot of golden nuggets in that. So just one step at a time, one thing at a time. You cannot do all of the things at once. Just the thing that's in front of you. And if the thing is in front of you is crippling sadness. after you got your groceries and you're sitting there but the sadness creeps up don't just rush home or turn the car on and get out of there like say with it for a second just be with it don't skip the step be in that season of that moment what is calling to you to just be right now it's a lot easier to sustain ourselves and our energies when we show up for ourselves and just be in it and then I'm gonna stop and I do wonder if you gave yourself more of that present moment experience of letting yourself having it and naming it and showing up for yourself if because you'd move through it a lot faster because you're actually letting it move you're letting yourself have it you're being a little bit of like reparenting and self-validation and being responsible for what is present, for naming it, and then for doing the thing that you actually love instead of the thing that's going to take you out of the present moment right then and there. Look, this is a practice. This is not about mastery. We're all on this ride. We are all learning to swim in the changing tides. And sometimes we're going to feel like we're drowning and other times we're just going to be floating and chilling and feeling good or sitting on the shore and watching. Finding pockets of joy showing up to tend to your becoming is a radical act against a system and against a time that is pushing you out of yourself. You want to like fight the system then live. Dumbledore once said, it does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live. The dream I think is this fantasy of you know the hit we get from our impulsivity of wanting to rush through things like that is the the dream right we are pretending in this fantasy in this dream that it's not grounded that that is going to be the thing but we're forgetting to actually live and be present in that moment. If you look back on your life, what is it that you remember from your life? Is it the quick dopamine hit that you got? Is it like the quick thing you did that you did? impulsive thing that you remember? Or is it the moment where you overcame? Where you did the hard thing? Where you did the thing that made you proud of yourself? Where you took the step after step after step instead of rushing to the finish line? Maybe I'm wrong. That's, you know, I'm wrong all the time. Very distinct possibility. Maybe you're someone who really just loves the rush so much that you are cool being in the impulsivity and like you are a dopamine CEO and you are just mining the dopamine fields of instant gratification and that works for you. Great. Things that feel the best in this life are the things that you feel proud of and that you work hard for and that you let yourself have. And it's not lazy to show up for yourself and it's not lazy to do nothing if you are so burnt out that you can't show up for anybody in your life because that's gonna that's what's gonna happen you're gonna end up in a place where you just can't do anything and you can't lean in at all and you're so freaked out and the system is that we like first prioritize those responsibilities and then prioritize our self-care what if we flipped it and this is a notion I'm trying on right now in my life what if I prioritized all the things that I love first and that was my non-negotiable and then fit in my responsibilities into that what does that schedule look like at the end of the day we are responsible for ourselves there is no one coming to rescue us I've said this before bears repeating there is no one coming to rescue us you are the one riding up on the white horse in the moments where you show up for yourself you're that person that's you you're waiting for you you've been there for you all along how sweet is that how awesome and I understand that we are entering into a time where we are going to run the risk of being on some hyper extreme sides and I am not asking you to go it alone forever I'm not asking you to refuse the care and support from others I am simply acknowledging that without an understanding of how to tend to yourself and understanding the ways that you move through seasons of your life and finding where you feel your emotions, how they show up, the textures of them, when they show up, and what is helpful to do with them, how to take care of yourself. It's going to be really hard to communicate your needs to others. It's really hard to tell someone what you need for support or create and establish your boundaries of care without actually knowing and being clear about what those things are, the timeframe of your own experiences, and how to love you. you know, if we're loving people intuitively, of course, you know, there are things that we can assume someone needs, but we don't know. So it's like being that detective, being that first caregiver, being the first one to show up in the fan club of yourself to figure out some things so that you can then communicate those things to those around you. And be in that community and show up for each other and in that way, have a lot more compassion for the experience of others and increase your empathy. Speaking of community, there is a amazing person named Lindsey Mack who has a phenomenal life. The podcast I've been listening to for so many years now, this crazy, so many years, their podcast is called Tarot for the Wild Soul. Tarot like T A R O T Tarot for the Wild Soul podcast. They are an amazing person and practitioner and facilitator and guide and parent and honest feeler. They do themes for the month ahead and they just released their episode on the theme of December, which was enough. And they are so eloquent in the way that they unpack things. And so if you're looking for even more information and knowledge on this notion of like really being in our seasonality and showing up in this moment and this year to help us. get through this moment of uncertainty when there's so much uncertainty and overwhelm, I highly highly recommend listening to that episode. Even if you don't know anything about Tarot, their work is so grounded in intuitive knowledge and practices and bringing down information into this moment to offer and it is so lovely. So that episode is episode 275 and I'm gonna link it in the show notes and it's the theme of December. I also want to ground us into this notion of seasonality and showing up for ourselves as a radical act against the systems that oppress us in favor of our own becoming and tending to our becoming and also as a responsibility to our life and how we show up in responsibility to tend and care for those around us including our dreams and our future selves. the poem that I chose for this is called Wild Geese. It's a very famous poem by Mary Oliver. And so just settle yourself into your seat or wherever you are. If you're able to take a deep breath, let's do it together. Just in through the nose and hold it for a second. Get a last sip and let it go. Okay. It says Wild Geese by Mary Oliver. You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. Tell me about despair. Yours and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on. Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers. Meanwhile the wild geese high in the clean blue air are heading home again. Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese. Harsh and exciting over and over announcing your place in the family of things. I hope in these unknown times that we are able to see the illumination of our own soul and its world. worth and to look into the mirror and to see that small pure wonderful child of love inside of ourselves so wanting our attention and care and that we rise to the occasion to show up for ourselves in these times and to know that when our cup is full and we prioritize our well-being that our cup is able to overflow and to offer and spill into the cups of others around us and to inspire those that we come into contact with and to inspire the great movement of our being and becoming. and to have the grace and humility to witness ourselves in the beauty and the despair that is being human and that in that turning toward and that care and compassion that we show ourselves we raise the compassion that we feel for others and that inevitably spills out and into all areas of our life and that we see our grief and the moments of uncertainty as an opportunity to lean into the trust and to know that we have us if nothing else and that we got us we got you and historically knowing that even if it is not okay right now being with the not okayness is such a kindness and that softness is fuel and ammunition and it is strength in pulling that bow back and that tension that we feel is pulling and pulling and pulling us until we are ready and that when we have more clarity in our sitting with our being that the arrow of ourselves is true and straight as we are released with momentum into our lives with full gusto of soul and heart and that we soar across the sky i'm so grateful for you all thank you for being here and your compassion and patience and compassion for being you in this moment exactly as you are and for showing up to this singular time that we just spent together thank you for seeing me and seeing you and thank you for taking care of yourself I appreciate that may you be well may you know peace may you gift yourself the tenderness of your being thank you for being here to listen to the episode today this podcast is not meant to replace mental health care if you are seeking this type of aid I recommend psychology today calm to find a therapist suited to your needs search for your zip code or state and utilize filters to find someone within or outside of your insurance networks and to your exact specifications Thanks. If you are interested in receiving one-on-one support or want to stay updated with my offerings, you can find more information at www.downwithmydemons.com or email me directly at chloe at downwithmydemons.com. You can find episode references within the show notes. Because this show is solely produced, edited, and funded by me, the best way to support the show is to share it with those that you love and to leave a review on Apple Podcast or wherever you prefer to stream. Deep boughs of gratitude to all that you are, past versions of yourself, present iterations, and all that you are becoming. May you walk boldly, bravely, and with kindness for yourself and others. Be gentle with yourself. Being human is tough. I send you my warmth and care. Take it easy.