The alternative equinox prompt
We’ve just had an equinox — the time of the year when night and day are of equal length. Legend has it, you can balance an egg right-side up for a few hours on this day. If you’ve ever been a part of the pagan community, or read up on astrology, you know the general wisdom is to treat this time like the real start of the new year. The wisdom urges: if you botched all of your new year’s goals, now is the real time to get them going. Plant seeds. Start things anew.
If you’re in North America, this wisdom matches the planting season. NOW, after a long winter, is the time to plant seeds, they say. All of this is good advice. However, I’m going to give you an alternative perspective.
So much of personal development and spiritual studies roots in the capitalistic framework where it exists. It urges you to do more, buy more, and BE more. These recommendations to start new projects, plant new seeds, get things off the ground, are still rooted in productivity. And productivity is a cog in the machine of capitalism.
Instead of thinking about what project or goal you want to work on in the coming year, I want to urge you to do something else:
Sit and be with the notion that you are already perfect. You already have everything you need. This is triggering for many. Take note of your resistance. Take note of the thoughts that tell you this isn’t true.
Coming from this place of perfection, what is one part of you that you’d like to give more space to just be? I’ll give you a personal example. As I settle into my body with the idea that I already am everything I am meant to be, I just want to allow myself to have more fun. More fuck off time where I’m not pressured to produce or workout or do things that are “good” for me. I want the mundane to become rich with life, but that requires my attention, and so I want to settle into the present by having fun.
I hope this exercise is fun for you. I hope this new season gives you space to just be.
