winter solstice

These past two years I've backed away from rituals and goal setting for obvious reasons, and am tentatively opening up to these practices again.

This morning I wrote down eight things I'm ready to let go of and eight things I wish to invite in. I burnt the first pile in the garden, watching as each piece of paper became a fragile shadow of itself.  The second pile I carried to a favourite sycamore tree in Scarthin wood. I told the tree my intentions one by one, carefully folding each piece of paper and placing it within the tree trunk for safe keeping. 

The tree can shelter my intentions and let them breathe within the wood. Lets see what 2022 brings.

sycamore

I walked to this tree on the shortest day of the year last December, and found myself standing by its side on the longest day this June. I'd not planned to do this, but found I'd measured a half turn of the Earth by my pilgrimages on foot to this tree, a sycamore.