Fall news

The fall colors here in the Laurentians have been so incredibly vibrant, as if this year's summer heat was still lodged in the trees and colored them much more red and orange than I have seen before. It's a beautiful leaving present for me as I prepare to move to my new home close to Hemmingford, about an hour South of Montreal. It's an unsettling time, a time of many unknowns. A time where emotions can well up quite powerfully as a whole way of life comes to an end and morphs into a new form: from living by myself to sharing the new home with my dear friend Wendy, from being sheltered by the forest to living in a much more open landscape, from all that is well-known, familiar and reassuring to a life that is essentially unknown in its details and how it will all fall into place. Even though I trust this new turn that life is taking, it doesn't mean I move through it unrattled and unaffected. And at the same time, whatever happens, whatever gets thrown up, is simply food for learning, letting go, and expanding.

Fall is the season of letting go. Are you allowing yourself to move with life's losses, with life's unpredictable twists and turns? Or are you resisting them, fighting, struggling, holding on? Let the trees inspire you as they let go of their leaves. Life's timing is not always our own -- the winds come when they do, and they will blow away the leaves of your life whether you're ready to let them go or not. Winter brings rest and inner movement, spring new outer movement, and summer great flourishing and ripening. What a beautiful rhythm our lives unfold in!

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