On the Verge of Spring: An Artist's practice for the slow season

The wintertime has long been a meaningful, slow time of year for me as an artist.

We need the ability to pause and allow the last season to integrate into our systems, to reflect on the year before, and to plant seeds of dreams for the coming months.

So much of our culture is based on continual movement and growth. It's not a sustainable way to live - we are like the nature around us and need a season to rest and compost before sending forth blooms again.

A cedar grove along the Dead River Basin - one of my favorite spots to walk with Pita

Learning how to slow down felt uncomfortable to me at first.

I was accustomed to the fast movement of working long days, the adrenaline of constantly having a lot to do, and the feeling of success or worthiness that I'd achieve after accomplishing things. These are all beautiful things, and I am a firm believer that there IS a time to move and work and grow and create.

But we need to learn how to be slow and worthy in the stillness, too.

Practices for the Slow Season:

Here are some of my favorite practices for navigating the slow season, and preparing the soil of my being for the next season of creativity

1. Long Walks in Nature

This is, perhaps, my all-time favorite (though I know I could say that about many things). Long walks in the woods bring me back to myself - breaths of deep air, the sunlight glittering through the trees...

Somatically, the bilateral movement of walking helps to regulate the nervous system, and getting the blood flowing in our veins is such a good way to create movement in our body on all layers of our being - physical, energetic, mental, and spiritual.

2. Journaling

This is another favorite. Words are a way to reflect back and create forward... what do you want to keep with you from last year? what is ready to grow, evolve, and change?

A few of my favorite journal prompts from this winter.

3. Creative art projects...that don't have to lead anywhere

   
   

The not leading anywhere part is important, especially for those of us who create for others, for our businesses, or to achieve something in our lives. Those are all great things, but when we are in a regenerative time of season, finding ways to create that don't require us to "produce" anything can tap us back into creativity as a source of inspiration, not pressure.

Get out a medium you haven't worked with in a while.

Try something completely new. Doodle. Sew. Stitch. See what happens.

4. Vision Boarding

   
   

What images resonate that you want to cultivate in the upcoming year? What dreams do you want to bring into reality?

A Niik Creative Co. vision board

I should note, too, that while "wintering" is a season that happens naturally here in the north, the cycles of growth and pause can happen any time of the year, and for any length of time. The intention is not to shame ourselves for being outside of this cycle, but to lean in and allow ourselves to complete each portion fully so that we may emerge more fully on the other side.

I hope that, in whatever way works for you, you're able to tap into some element of the wintering process to pause and reflect before the next part of the cycle.

With love,