As a young adult living and skiing in the Rocky Mountains of Montana, winter for me was all about outdoor sports. I would have happily snowboarded year-round. In fact, most of the things I loved I wanted to do every day, forever, no matter the season. Work, too.

It wasn’t until I faced chronic illness that I began to appreciate my need for rest, for balance. Now I see the beauty of winter as a time to let the ground go fallow, to prepare for new growth. That going non-stop isn’t sustainable.

It’s officially Spring!

As you know, Tuesday was the equinox.  That’s the day when the Sun’s disk crosses the horizon directly to the East at dawn, setting 12 hours later directly to the West. Most latitudes experience almost equal amounts of daylight and darkness. Talk about balance.

It also marks the changing of the seasons. For us in the Northern hemisphere, Spring has sprung! Even if you’re still surrounded by snow, as is much of the US, we’ve technically moved into the new season. Bulbs, seedlings, shoots and sprouts, long at rest in the fallow ground, prepare to bloom.

Changing seasons create space for restoration.

Though at age 47 I’m more hen than spring chick, I feel like one of those fresh green shoots spouting after a long, cold, dark season. During a several-years long, figurative winter, I secreted away my deepest dreams and hopes. I was too sick to tend them.

But like tulips find a way to bloom through late spring snows, my dreams of vitality, of love, of one day leading nature retreats, all found a way to color my life, despite, or maybe because of, my illness. Could it be that I needed to go fallow? That my body needed me to stop sowing the seeds of productivity, to kill off the weeds of my will and busyness, to restore a more fertile setting for something new?

How does your garden grow?

As I’ve surrendered to my need for restoration, not only at night but also in seasons, new dreams have sprouted, too. As I look ahead to coming chapters, I now see opportunities abloom that the younger, more productive, willful me might never have noticed.

I take time out, on the regular, to get quiet and to feel into what new seedlings want to grow. Sometimes they’re so sweet and simple I can’t believe I haven’t already placed them in the sun and watered them. Others seem impossible but push up through cracks in the ice and concrete as I watch in amazement and appreciation.

I snowboard, mountain bike, and play outside with more vitality than I thought I’d ever enjoy again. Amazing guests choose to join me on retreat. Wonderful clients honor me with the opportunity to coach them through career, life, and health challenges. I foresee more writing and speaking, group programs and travel retreats, and other juicy collaborations ahead. A creative, flexible, and evolving career that I might never have cultivated grows around and in front of me.

What’s springing up in you?

What dreams and hopes have you kept hidden in shadow, under layers of snow, but want to grow within you or in your life?

I invite you to allow your mind to soften and your to-do list to go fallow, even if just for a moment, feel into your inner spring chick or green sprout, and turn your face to the sun.

Let me know what’s blooming in your world? I’d love to hear what secret dreams feel so improbable you might not have acknowledged them out loud, but seem to keep poking through your personal layers of snow and ice. Tell me everything.