The Wisdom Of Life Seasons: How To Embrace The Season You’re In

Inside: An overview of a rich and powerful practice that allows us to glean from the wisdom of our four life seasons and embrace the season we’re in. I’ve included simple ways to start practicing along with Seasonal Living resource recommendations.

I started cycle tracking at 34 years old, initially to help me regulate my mood and emotions in the days just before my period. From there, my practice expanded as I became more attuned to my own rhythms and cycles. Some things seem more obvious from my current vantage point, but they were not back then.

I noticed, for instance, that late September every year, my body and spirit would begin to grieve as I approached my parents’ death dates, well before my brain registered the dates. I recognized that grey skies made me feel a sense of impending doom – sounds dramatic but that is how it felt; I was so sensitive to shifting light.

I realized that as a Highly Sensitive Person, and homeschooling parent, in order for me to thrive I had to guard at least two ‘stay-at-home-days’ each week. I figured out why each Monday morning I’d awake with a sense of urgency and anxiety. I loved Monday mornings but felt a pressure to check off an entire week’s to-do’s in one day.

And I began looking to nature for wisdom that would carry me through the ups and downs of life. When life felt dark, I could hold onto the truth that spring always comes again. I could honour that I was more comfortable in the routine and calm of Autumn than in the busyness and lack of structure that summer brought.

As I navigated the different life seasons, I notice how I was growing and becoming and I scanned the natural environment for beauty – and always found it – whatever season I was in. I found hope in the Waxwings and learned about trust in deep winter.

THE GOAL OF A SEASONAL LIVING PRACTICE

The goal of a seasonal living practice is not to complicate life. It’s to simplify it – even though at first glance this all may sound noisy and complicated.

The goal is to help you realize that you do not have to hustle, conform, or sacrifice your health and wellbeing trying to measure up to anyone else’s standards. You no longer need to accept a life that leaves you exhausted, incredibly anxious, and feeling never good enough.

Instead, you can choose to lay down self-judgment, chronic comparison, and quiet the voice of your mean inner critic, and learn a sustainable, soul-honouring and empowering way of being in your body and life.

This means, that a seasonal living practice will help you:

• Befriend your True Self instead of living stuck in comparison and self-judgment;
• Honour your unique wiring through rhythms and practices that support you in building the life you desire;
• Make space for your deep work and for guilt-free rest, creativity and pleasure;
• Build resilience, feel strong and empowered, and build the muscle of scanning for the beauty and wisdom in every season, even the hardest of them.

The psyches and souls of women also have their own cycles and seasons of doing and solitude, running and staying, being involved and being removed, questions and resting, creating and incubating, being of the world and returning to the soul-place.

Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés

The wisdom of life seasons: Attuning to our inner and outer seasons

The way I teach and practice Seasonal Living is multi-layered. This post will offer a brief overview of a rich and powerful practice. My book (spring 2025) is written according to the seasons and I look forward to sharing it with you!

Seasonal Living is a sustainable and compassionate way of being in our bodies and lives, and a very practical tool, that supports us in befriending our True Selves, honouring our wiring, and showing up fully to life in every season – the light and fun, the dark and scary, and everything in-between.

The graphic below reflects the core concepts and seasonal framework of my coaching and education work. I’ve added some life cycle notes at the corners. This is not a rigid one-size-fits-all structure. It’s offered as a gentle, flexible guide to use with lots of freedom and listening inward. I believe you are the expert on your own life so take what serves you and leave the rest.

Each season, both inner season and outer season, has a set of characteristics, gifts (ex. the excitement we feel in spring after a long winter), and potential for struggle (ex winter conditions that make life harsh or scary). My relationship to the seasons is, naturally, informed by the geography and climate of where I live and my experience of four very distinct seasons.

Because we live in different corners of the world, and will have a different experience with the four seasons based on climate and geography, the best starting point is to focus on our common denominators. The lunar cycle or the menstrual cycle for people who menstruate are, I believe, the best way to get in touch with the inner and outer seasons.

RELATED: How to meet and befriend your True Self as you cycle through the seasons of your life.

the wisdom of seasonal living: attune to your Inner seasons and outer seasons

1. We might use Seasonal Living in a very practical way to help life feel simpler or easier by attuning to our Outer Seasons . We can learn about our cycles, rhythms and patterns of energy, mood, creativity, productivity, tendency to engage outwardly or reflect inwardly, or libido, and so on, across the day, month, year. And we can be more mindful of our local environments.

• We could use it to get curious about a health issue we’re having: horrific PMS, disrupted sleep, or hot flashes, for example.
• We could use the information we glean to work smarter not harder: if we notice that in autumn and winter seasons (monthly, yearly) we tend to do our best writing while in spring and summer seasons we like to engage outwardly via podcasts, collaborations and social media, we can plan our calendar accordingly.
• We need to rest: we can pay attention to the times of day, month, year when we need more rest or spaciousness and plan ahead: school holidays, grief dates, special celebrations, kids moving home from uni, etc, instead of believing that we should show up the same throughout the year.
• We can tune into what foods are in season or shift our schedule and activities to take advantage of the season at hand.

2. We might also turn to Seasonal Living as a psycho-emotional-spiritual guide to help us know what to expect in or name what we’re experiencing in our Inner Seasons. We learn that there is beauty and wisdom to be mined in every season.

• It can help us feel connected to others and seen and heard as we navigate perimenopause, menopause, and post-menopause.
• It can help us feel less isolated or “wrong” in our grief, rage, or pain in a grief and trauma-illiterate society.
• It can teach us about liminal spaces – the space between no longer and not yet – and releasing urgency.
• It can help make sense of waxing and waning energy, (im)patience for BS, ability to produce or perform, even fear or the volume level of the inner critic. We often feel like something is ‘wrong’ because no one is talking about these things, when really we’re doing important healing and freedom work.

The rhythm of day is the rhythm of fire, the tiny flame, dawn of the dawn, birds rubbing their beaks together to make a spark of morning, the roaring teenage fire of noon, the mature fire of afternoon, and on, on, the sun walks on, to the low heart-fire of evening, grandfather fire and grandmother ash.

Jay Griffiths, Savage Grace: A Journey in Wildness

4 Life Seasons: 6 cycles or rhythms we can pay attention to

Winter, spring, summer, and autumn each bring strengths and challenges. There are no good or bad or seasons – just more and less comfortable, seasons that feel incredibly hard, and those that feel easier and lighter.

Read through my brief overview of 6 cycles and rhythms that I use and recommend we pay attention to as we learn to honour our wiring and show up fully to life in every season.

I’ve offered some brief ideas about how to work with your outer seasons. Note that the goal is never just to track cycles or patterns or gather information – though self-awareness must be the starting point. We always want to look for the practical application so that we can begin to practice imperfect action as we build purposeful lives that feel like home.

1-2. daily/weekly rhythm

• Test /build sustainable rhythms that honour your wiring: take into account a chronic illness, if you an HSP, etc..
• Notice if time blocking or batching like-energy-tasks makes sense for you to support energy (physical/emotional) management.
• Track your sleep cycles / if needed test morning cortisol.
• Pause throughout the day to listen inward: name the emotions you’re experiencing, what you’re feeling (body sensations), what thoughts/stories are circling in your mind?

3. lunar cycle

• Track your menstrual cycle and ‘symptoms’.
• And/or try lunar tracking.
• Proactively block out time for rest in your day, week, month, year; notice your resistance to rest.
• As you move through the different seasons of each month, notice which types of activities light-you up and those that drain you.

4. year/local environment And Community

• Once a year spend time visioning and goal or intention setting for the year ahead; check in every 3-6 mos. At your yearly visioning session, listen inward for a guiding mantra for the year, name 3-5 words that express how you want to feel.
• At least quarterly check in to name what you want to release and receive / what do you need more of or less of? What have you picked up that isn’t yours to carry?
• What foods are in season; consider buying from local farmers or growing your own, even if it’s a pot of herbs. Pause throughout the day to listen inward: name the emotions you’re experiencing, what you’re feeling (body sensations), what thoughts/stories are circling in your mind?
• What do you need to feel mind-body healthy and what could you do to lean more fully into this season (ex twinkly lights or light lamp in winter, quality rain gear in spring)?

5-6. live with freedom, health and joy as you move through your inner and outer life seasons

Though I’ve been using this framework in my work from the start, and I created seasonal journals, I haven’t written much about the how-to. I’ve preferred to teach it and model it with my clients and Brave + Beautiful Community members. Here are four ways to go deeper into this learning and practice:

• 52 Mondays: Seasonal Mindfulness Journals
• Show Up Afraid Workshop: a seasonal approach
• Join the Brave and Beautiful Community

When people are dying, it is easy for them to recognize that every minute, every breath counts. But the truth is, death is always with us, integral to life itself. Everything is constantly changing. Nothing is permanent. This idea can both frighten and inspire us. Yet if we listen closely, the message we hear is: Don’t wait.

Frank Ostaseski

further resources to support different layers of seasonal living

I’ve included referral links below so you can check out the following resources for yourself. This list is in no way exhaustive – I’ve offered a sampling of resources for you.

I’ve created a very personalized approach to seasonal living through the years that I use in my life and work. I feel passionate about it. And also, I’m deeply grateful to all the other women exploring, teaching, and sharing vulnerably from their own experiences and unique perspectives.

Way back at the start it was difficult to source the information I wanted and needed but conversations around women’s hormone health, cycle tracking, and seasonal living (in different forms) are easier access to these days.

This book about the Feminine Life Cycle and whatever else I could get my hands on related to female archetypes, life cycles, and mythology fed (and feed) me. I think I’d like to be a mythologist in another lifetime! A couple second-hand books I’ve recently purchased include this book (looks like it was more recently republished) and this book. Both relate to women over 50.

I just bought this book from Christine Walters Paintner, offered from a spiritual/religious perspective. It includes exploration of Ancestral Time and Cosmic time that I haven’t found elsewhere.

A couple male writers who have made an impact on my relationship to self and life speak to winter seasons indirectly: Parker J. Palmer speaks to the dark night of the soul and Michael Meade writes of renewal in times of loss.

Alissa Vitti was one of the first people I found talking about menstrual tracking way back when I was studying in holistic health. Kate Codrington also has a fabulous new book related to menopause. Sara Avant Stover’s first book offers a seasonal approach to wellbeing.

Nicole Gulotta and Anna Lovind published lovely books that relate to our cycles of creativity.

My Seasonal Mindfulness Journals offer an easy and accessible way to build a practice of both attuning inward and leaning into the outward season you’re in. Dr. Ezzie Spencer offers a book about Lunar Tracking that I frequently recommend and use myself. And I contributed to this anthology which explores what it can look like to seek out slow living and embrace a life steeped in intentionality.

Ayurveda and Chinese Medicine continue to inspire and teach me a great deal about our relationship to the natural world and attuning to our unique needs as we move through different seasons of life.

Seasonal Living is also about our interconnectedness to each other and to the land. The words of Robin Wall Kimmerer and Asha Frost, in her new book, offer Indigenous wisdom to invite us into a deeper connection and relationship to the earth and our local environment.

Krista xo