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Winter: Some Magic of Liminal Spaces

I’ve grown up in what feels like two different worlds. I’m originally from Washington State, where there are only an average of 75 days of sunshine a year, with the rest of the year being full of drizzling rains. We moved to the exact opposite climate in Texas during my teenage years—in this area of Texas we only get about 75 days of rain and the sun shines the rest of the year. Where I live in Texas, the winters are very gothic—the trees lose all their leaves, our plants, grasses, and flowers die or go into a dormancy phase. Growing up in the PNW, I was not used to everything dying off in the winter. Where I am from in WA, it is always luscious and vibrant. The grass is always green, with towering evergreens surrounding, and fungi of all types decorating the forest, with moss slowly consuming the trees, rocks, and old buildings.



It is so lush and beautiful because there are perpetual rain puddles scattered throughout the lands from the excessive rain. The fog rolls beautifully through these lands, but you only have a handful of sunny days sprinkled throughout the year. Picture Forks Washington from Twilight—I am not from that town, but parts of the movie were shot near my hometown so you get the idea of the type of ecological setting I grew up in. So, for years I struggled with the winter here in Texas. “If only we got more snow here, maybe I would enjoy the winters more” I would think to myself as a teenager. I missed the evergreens holding me through the winter. However, the older I’ve gotten the more I appreciate the dormancy and death phase of winter I experience here in North Texas—the more lessons I have gained from this liminal season. 


Spring and summer in Texas are full of birds singing, cicadas buzzing, and other creatures adding to the song of Mother Earth. The winters are much more quiet----there is a bareness an almost empty quality to how quiet it becomes. There is a great contrast in the liveliness of the seasons here. The first blossoms of spring bring so much joy after the bare winter. The first rain brings dry beige fields back into a harmonious green hue. I’ve grown to love the buzzing of cicadas on the hot sticky summer evenings. There is something about the songs of the cicadas that now brings me home---leaving a deep reverence for the life that flourishes during our abundant seasons and the quieting that occurs during the colder months when the songs are gone. The quiet Texas winters have become a celebration of a death cycle for me—a relishing in the abundance from the following summer, a deep rest of knowing the abundance will return before I can believe it.


I’ve been allowing myself to sit with gratitude in this liminal space of winter, knowing this part of the cycle can only last so long; that the death of the following summer has to come to bring the next abundant season; relishing in the Be Here Now energy that Ram Dass writes of. Liminal spaces are thresholds; transitions; opportunities for space holding before the new cycle has begun. Liminal spaces can be uncomfortable or bring us great medicine---that is the great paradox and the magic hidden within.


For the luscious symphony of summer cannot arrive if there isn’t a quieting through the winter ❤︎




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©2023-2025 SANCTUARY FOR SPIRIT is a folk religion temple that gives education and support in the old folk and ancestral healing ways. We honor the ways of nurturing the mind, the body, and the spirit through spiritual medicine and do not give allopathic medical advice. We advise all to always consult with their personal medical doctor for medical advice. May you be blessed upon your healing journey.

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