The Birth of Light
Today we are on the other side of darkest darkness, edging our way once again slowly into a rhythm defined by a predominance of light, however thin that margin of majority may be. Life on earth depends on such small and sometimes barely discernible margins, most of them operating below the threshold of our awareness.
The celestial weight has shifted, and earthly life must follow. We, of course, are implicated in earthly life so something in us must also be recalibrating now that the sun has been reborn into its own lengthening of light.
In many traditional cultures the winter solstice is seen as the day the sun dies and is reborn. It is fitting, then, that this important date takes place while the Sun is in the sign of Sagittarius, which has everything to do with the touching of two worlds. As I’ve written in the past, this sign is signified by a centaur, which is a man with a horses’s body. It’s symbol alone tells us of a union of sorts: between animal instincts and human intelligence, and between spiritual ideals and material reality. The conjoining of these apparently divergent phenomena necessitate a birth. In the coming together of what might appear as opposites, something new is created which requires the attributes of both.
Perhaps the first birth that took place on this earth was that of light. And we experience this birth anew each morning as the sun emerges from the womb of night, his head cresting over the eastern horizon to birth a new day. Traditionally the sunrise is seen as a very tenuous moment, with the sun’s success in entering the day not necessarily guaranteed. Prayers were offered on his behalf, and encouragement, so that he might have the strength to free himself from the weight of night.
A part of us is in the process now, in one way or another, and we may also require prayer and encouragement to successfully traverse this seam of Time. I think of the winter solstice as the lowest point on the trampoline bounce, when the feet have swung so low as to almost touch the ground. There is one short moment of pause before the momentum begins to move in the upward direction. But if you don’t have the context for the swings in movement (if you don’t realize you are on a trampoline, or on an earth whose cycles have a gigantic impact on your internal experience) then you can feel like you’re at an unnatural all-time low. But you are supposed to be. As the cycles become more conscious you can actually plan these swings and shifts into your life so that you don’t have to feel like a crazy person being thrown around by forces that seem to be outside of your control. You can begin to cooperate with the cycles and even enjoy them.
But for now, for today, consider what you will do with the gift of light. And don’t throw away the gems that were made in the pressure cooker of night. Now is when their multifaceted beauty can begin to be seen in the reflection of the sun’s rays.