Tools for ending the year quietly + Holiday gift guide
Hello friend,
We are entering my very favourite time of the year. Not because of the holidays, per se, but because of the rituals, traditions, and routines I’ve built around turning inward as the calendar year closes and we arrive at the darkest day.
Shorter days, longer nights, and the quietude of the week between Christmas and New Years always offer me such an important pause to reflect and gather insight.
This year, François will be joining me on my annual silent self-retreat. I’ll be using the silence for meditation while F is returning to an old hobby of his - producing music. This won’t be our first silent retreat together, but I still find it so special to share it with my boo every time.
Since retreats are definitely not everybody’s jam, and even when they are, they’re not available or accessible to everyone, especially at this time of year, I’m continuing my other annual tradition of releasing my Rituals for Renewal. Many of you already know and love this (now 4 years long!) tradition. If you aren’t yet familiar, Rituals for Renewal is a 7-day email series that invites you to turn inward and become intentional as we flip the calendar to a new year. It will be available for my Patreon members, and this year it will also be available as a single purchase.
On that note, I hope everyone has a truly enlightening Winter Solstice and a calm and grounded holiday season. See you on the other side of this calendar year! In the meantime, I’ll leave you with a few tools and resources for turning inward.
Dawn
Rituals for Renewal, 7-day series.
This practice series is a 7-day online series with purposeful and realistic exercises to help you honor this past year and show up for the start of 2023 with reverence, perspective, and connection. Whether you have a lot or a little time to allocate to this series, it is designed to be impactful whatever your time investment.
For your information:
Emails will be scheduled to land in your inboxes from Monday December 27 to Sunday January 2 in the wee hours of the morning, with a preparatory email on Sunday, December 26.
Each day of the 7-day series will have a theme and you'll be invited to take part in some sort of exercise related to the day's theme (i.e. mostly writing or reflection exercises).
Zoom on Wednesday, January 4 8:00-9:00am ET to share about your experience
Free for members, $15 for non-members
Listen to my podcast.
ICYMI, season 3 of my podcast has launched and there are already a few episodes available for listen! Check it out via Anchor, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
There are currently close to 30 guided meditations on there, including:
Holiday gift guide.
The team at DM Meditation created a gift guide in the hopes that our tendency towards consuming at this time of year can at least support positive change. All of the artists, makers, and creators featured here were carefully selected based on their important contributions to the world we currently live in.
Dawned on me.
As a verb, dawn can mean “become clear” or “enter one's consciousness or emotions.” It’s in this spirit that I share with you some of the things that help me get clear in various ways. May it be the same for you, too.
Try.
Weekly Movie Dates are Keeping my Winter Blues at Bay
Tis the season for seasonal affective disorder. Rituals can help! Creating weekly rituals that centre ease, comfort, and joy give you something to look forward to each week that doesn’t require planning and effort!
Listen.
Life, Loss, and all Kinds of Love - Brene Brown in conversation with Attica and Tembi Locke
A note on self-compassion from Brene Brown herself: “The core of mental toughness is actually self-compassion … People who are mentally tough stay mentally tough because they don’t slip easily into shame or self-criticism or self-loathing.” This is an absolutely beautiful two-part conversation that I fully believe is worth a listen, especially as we enter the stress of the holidays and family togetherness time.
Read.
7 Tips to Stay Calm During the Busiest Time of the Year
I think it’s safe to assume you are familiar with the benefits of mindfulness if you’re following along with this newsletter. This is a time of year with a lot of different types of stress (hello emotional, financial, time, and work stress!) Mindfulness and meditation are tools and they are at your disposal when you need them. Here are a few quick tips for staying calm amidst the chaos.
Take in.
“True love does not ask you to change who you are. It simply invites you into a safe space where you can stop being who you are not.”
- Maryan Hasnaa
Reflect.
Walk through your entire day and document a detailed snapshot of your daily life. Next, do the same thing zooming out to the past week, month, and year. Sit with these mental snapshots and reflect on which parts you are grateful for, and which parts you hope to see shift or change. Envision a new snapshot for the upcoming year of your life.
Meditate.
We have a tendency to seek wisdom from our thoughts, but sometimes, it’s important to remember to tune into the body for all of its stored and inherent wisdom.
This 10-minute meditation called Tuning Into the Body’s Wisdom will invite kindness in as we practice returning over and over again to the most present sensations in our body. Tuning into the embodied experience of a phenomena - a sound, a thought, a sensation - can give us important insight into how we are feeling at any given moment.
Link appreciation: Jules Acree, Recommendo
