Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times

I coincidentally read this book while on a leave of absence from work for a new hip - my own little wintering period. I think that made the book hit different, but even then I had a hard time staying with it. It’s a beautiful book but not one that grips me. To each their own. It definitely makes you stop and think about how where you live, how you grow up can dictate how you see the seasons. Most importantly, it reminds us to stay in the here and now as much as possible and create patterns/rituals that help you track the passage of time. If you create that rhythm and always have a milestone to look forward to, you are less likely to get depressed. I did like how the author used different cultures, snow, bees and robins to highlight aspects of how we all approach the winter. Change is inevitable, the way we react to it is all we can control.

REALLY enjoyed this one. It's helped me to be kinder to myself during this difficult time. KEY QUOTES: “Plants and animals don’t fight the winter; they don’t pretend it’s not happening and attempt to carry on living the same lives that they lived in the summer. They prepare. They adapt. They perform extraordinary acts of metamorphosis to get them through. Winter is a time of withdrawing from the world, maximising scant resources, carrying out acts of brutal efficiency and vanishing from sight; but that’s where the transformation occurs. Winter is not the death of the life cycle, but its crucible.” ― Katherine May, Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult "Wintering is the active acceptance of sadness. It is the practice of allowing ourselves to feel it as a need. It is the courage to stare down the worst parts of our experience and to commit to healing them the best we can. Wintering is a moment of intuition, our true needs felt keenly as a knife.” ― Katherine May, Wintering: The power of rest and retreat in difficult times “We have seasons when we flourish and seasons when the leaves fall from us, revealing our bare bones. Given time, they grow again.” ― Katherine May, Wintering: The power of rest and Retreat in Difficult Times

I enjoyed this book and think it has a powerful message on the necessity of rest in our world's obsession with being over-worked. I appreciate her vulnerability and frankness that unfolds through her shared life struggles and mental darkness. She also highlights other cultures and how they tackle their own demons, especially during the dark times of the year. For me, as a born-n-raised Alaskan, some of her winter experiences would not have been as profound or life-reflecting, but I recognize that I was raised to embrace winter beyond what most people have endured. With that said, I recommend this book and hope to also find my own version of life-wintering.

A lovely book about coping with not only the cold weather of Winter but with problems and issues of times when our personal lives seem to be in Winter.

This book would be hard to read if you are not familiar with sadness, grief, depression, loss. May beautiful describes the pain while explaining these periods are sobering necessary cycles of life.