9 min read
A few days more, and we’ve arrived at the December solstice. I love the solstices because they are turning points in time we experience collectively. The solstices also remind me of the duality of life on Earth. Existence reveals itself in dual form, always and everywhere. Read on and explore with me the message of the winter solstice.
Steady Path
How do the two annual solstices reflect the polar energies all creation consists of? To find answers, we must observe the relationship between the Earth and our star, the Sun.
Let’s start with some basics. From an Earth point of view, the Sun seems to move around the Earth. This path of the Sun is called ecliptic. Because the Earth is tilted (about 23.5 degrees), the relationship between the Earth and the Sun changes throughout the year. As the Sun and Earth do their dance, the daily amount of daylight increases and decreases on Earth, following a recurring annual pattern, which creates the seasons.
Four points on the ecliptic are most significant regarding the changing of the seasons, the two equinoxes, and the two solstices. The points of the equinoxes oppose one another on the ecliptic, as do the points of the solstices. At the equinoxes, we experience the beginning of spring and autumn. The solstices are the start of the summer and the winter season.
Balance and Extremes
Let’s get a bit more into the mechanics of the equinoxes and solstices. Due to the Earth’s axial tilt, the Sun’s path intersects with the celestial equator (Earth’s equator projected into space) twice a year. These events are called equinoxes, marking the two times of the year when daytime and nighttime are about equal in length around the globe. Astrologically speaking, the equinoxes are the Sun’s ingress into the 30° sections of the ecliptic we call Aries ♈ (March equinox) and Libra ♎ (September equinox).
One could divide the path of the Sun into two halves on each side of the equinoxes. One half is “going north,” the other is “going south.” The solstices occur when the Sun reaches the points on the ecliptic closest to north and south. This means when the Sun crosses one of those points, you experience the most or least daylight, depending on which hemisphere on Earth you are located.
Unlike the equinoxes, the solstices aren’t points of equal light and dark, but the points where the least and most light and dark mirror each other through the two hemispheres on our planet. When it is winter in the Northern Hemisphere, it is summer in the Southern Hemisphere, and vice versa.
The December solstice marks the point of least daylight in the Northern Hemisphere but most daylight in the Southern Hemisphere. From the point of the December solstice, the days get gradually longer in the Northern Hemisphere (where the dark reigns) and shorter in the Southern Hemisphere (where the light reigns) until the Sun intersects the celestial equator on the March equinox, and light and dark are equal for all people on Earth.
From the March equinox, circumstances change again. Now, the Northern Hemisphere experiences more light than dark, whereas the Southern Hemisphere gets more dark than light. This circumstance culminates at the June solstice. Astrologically speaking, the solstices are the ingress of the Sun into the signs of Cancer ♋ (June solstice) and Capricorn ♑ (December solstice).
The solstices indicate the meeting and coexistence of two complementing forces in their most developed state. They also imply two simultaneously existing realities.
During the equinoxes, day and night are nearly equal in length in not one hemisphere only but all around the globe. The equinoxes are balancing points. The solstices, on the other hand, are a shared experience of extremes in dual nature through the interplay of opposing amounts of light and dark in the two hemispheres.
Lost Connection
Isn’t it fascinating how nature points to the shared existence of unity and polarity? We can learn much about life by observing the perpetual and recurring changes of the seasons. I often ponder how different parts of life and our planet communicate with each other.
Humankind is amazed by how animals live using their instinct. Birds know when to build a nest, when to change location, when to hide, etc. Animals seem more in tune with the changing cycles of life than humans are in our day and age. We are not that dependable anymore on synching with our environment. Or are we? Even in our modern age of artificial light and the many possibilities to mitigate the harsh circumstances the weather throws at us, we are still part of our surroundings, part of nature. We share space with all life on planet Earth. No matter how far developed, we are interconnected with all creation.
What is the price for our advancement? What have we lost through our progress? Touch with the rhythm of life, touch with natural descent and ascent. In short, the ability to feel and read time! Our inability to retain and live a conscious connection to all parts of creation may eventually cause us to lose ourselves.
Rhythm
The more we develop our numbness toward sensing natural cycles, the farther we are from feeling the life force. LIFE on Earth is CYCLICAL. The Sun rises and sets as the Earth spins, creating day and night. The Moon’s gravitational pull generates the tides.
Life is like a dance expressing itself through push and pull. Life and death alternate naturally, as do motion and rest.
We often forget to honor and consciously live through times when rest would be most natural. One such time in the yearly cycle is announced by the winter solstice, the time in the Northern Hemisphere when the Sun reaches the lowest southernmost point on its path. Winter is here.
The Sun’s ingress into Capricorn, Saturn’s nocturnal sign, is a time of introspection. The dark phase of the year is calling us to a standstill and period of reflection. Rest. Is. Needed. You must pause. You are allowed and even expected to take a break, sleep, relax, and do nothing but BE.
Nature Calling
Before new life can be planted and eventually sprout, the soil has to be prepared first. Winter is that time of the year when we are naturally presented with the opportunity to slow down, look inward, and take inventory of the landscape of our souls.
The farther north you live, the more you are aware of the differences in the seasons because they are more pronounced compared to what you experience living at lower latitudes. Daylight affects your energy levels, your mind, and your mood. Here in Helsinki, at 60° latitude, you feel very different during the dark winter months, consisting of short days and long nights, compared to the bright summer months, when the days are long and the nights short.
But no matter where you live, the natural cycle of motion and rest presents itself everywhere. It is right in front of you. The question is, do you allow yourself to see it. How well can you read time? And how much do you understand the necessity of synching with natural cycles? Are you answering the winter solstice’s call for silence, stillness, and solitude?
Messages
Winter is not a time for rest only. Although extended periods of rest are vital in themselves and necessary for the body, soul, and mind to function, rest and silencing oneself are also requirements for understanding another gift winter offers. The dark time of the year is said to be particularly open to contact between the worlds. The veil is thin.
In the Germanic tradition, the nights between the old and the new year (called “Rauhnächte”) are regarded as the most potent for receiving messages and visits from the spirit realm. The exact starting and ending point of this mystical time depends on the region, but in most parts, it is considered to start at the winter solstice or Christmas and end around Epiphany.
The “Rauhnächte” may originate in the Germanic Moon calendar, which consists of twelve lunar months, making a 354-day year. The solar year consists of 365 days. That makes an eleven-day or twelve nights difference. These twelve nights are called “die zwölf magischen Nächte” or “die zwölf heiligen Nächte” in German (the twelve magic nights or the twelve holy nights) and are considered a “timeless time” when natural laws are suspended, the door to the Otherworld is wide open, and our ancestral connections experienced deeply.
Traditionally, the “Rauhnächte” is a time for gaining a glimpse of the year ahead through divination, oracles, tarot readings, and paying extra attention to your dreams and voices you may hear.
Besides invoking a mystical atmosphere, the liminal time between the years makes some of us cautious. Folklore knows that this is the time of spirits and demons. Animals might start to talk, and instead of love and happiness, the signs you receive might point to misfortune. You might also be captured by the “Wild Hunt.” Who knows what can happen during this time “outside of time!”
I wonder if the dreadful stories aren’t a means to keep us from using our natural abilities to converse with all that exists, seen and unseen. Once you feel your connection to every part of creation, as well as to the past, present, and future, your freedom to be and live grows.
Opportunity
Regardless of what goes on in your personal astrological cycles, winter is a time of collective reset. The Sun ends and starts a new cycle. We celebrate a new year arriving. The freezing temperatures and the long hours of the night call for a turn inward. It is time for contemplation. What does your inner world look like?
The Capricorn ingress is your opportunity to begin the new year by increasing your awareness of the rhythm of life and how it calls you to a mutual dance. And let me tell you, it will be a much smoother twirl if you recognize the moves that guide you through life. If you aren’t feeling the pull toward rest now, be aware the goat might push you to slow down!
I wish you a peaceful Winter Solstice and fluent moves in your dance with time through 2024, whatever style the new year might suggest, be it waltz, boogie-woogie, or cha-cha-cha!
Sindy 🕊️
Reading suggestion: Find more food for thought on the solstices, the sign of Capricorn, and the meaning of the polarity of light and dark in my writing Light and Dark — The Great Mother in Astrology, Tarot, and the Finnish Epic Kalevala (Aug 6, 2022).
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Featured image: Eva Michálková | Pixabay
Living in Cycles 