Winter is officially here. Oh, I know, according to the calendar it came on December 21st, but where I live here in the northeast, winter really starts to take hold in January. That's when the cold comes to stay and that four letter word "snow" is mentioned almost on a daily basis. The bears, bees, snakes, and other warm weather animals have gone into hibernation, and those birds that don't handle cold weather well have already migrated to warmer climates. But, what happens to the trees in winter? It's not like they can pull up roots and move to Florida until spring. What happens to the trees?
Trees, like bears, go into a kind of hibernation, or dormancy. It all really starts in the fall when they drop their leaves and focus their energy on maintaining their health rather than on growth. They maintain their existence by channeling all their energy and nutrition into maintaining only the "essential systems" that they need to survive until spring. Smart idea, Mother Nature.
I like to think that the bears and the trees aren't the only ones who can benefit from the idea of hibernation. Early humans took their signals from what nature showed them, from the behavior of their animal and plant neighbors, and started getting ready in the fall, storing up food and fuel to last them through the winter where they could be found in caves or homes built of logs or other natural materials. So what did they do all winter? They planned. They learned. They told the young ones stories about their ancestors, or tales designed to teach them about those things that would help them to grow into strong, decent members of the community or tribe, things like commitment, integrity, selflessness, responsibility, and the skills they would need to survive. So, in a way, hibernation time was a time of growth.
Thousands of years later, we humans can also take a page from Mother Nature's textbook and use the winter months, not to hibernate (although when it's a -21 degree windchill, that sounds pretty good to me), but to learn and to grow. We can take this time to take a long look at what is no longer working for us, find what we can use in it's place, take stock of where we are and where we want to be in our lives, and our place in the community at large. I'm not talking about making New Year's Resolutions, although using this time to re-evaluate our diets, our exercise - or lack of it - and our livelihoods would be a good use of the time. I'm suggesting that we use this time to conserve our energy by redirecting it from the daily grind of appointments and work, and channeling it into our bodies, our minds, and our hearts. I'm saying that, like the trees, we focus on what's truly necessary for us to not only survive, but to grow. If the trees can go from dormant, dead-looking branches, to beautiful blossoms and bountiful new leaves in the spring, what can we humans create by focusing on what's truly important in our lives? We can create lives that are not only beautiful, but truly worth living.
And so it is.
