Shadow Lessons from Winter Solstice
How to embrace the challenging lessons of these shortest days
We had a big bonfire for the winter solstice on Sunday December 21. It combined work, ritual and community. We burned the pile of overgrown willows that we had been pulling up for the last few months to restore our land to be arable. That was the work task. We had the fire on the winter solstice, like happens in many places in Europe. Our neighbors really helped us, with their experience and tough work ethic and we had a nice potluck meal together, heated by the embers. Like the best rituals, it wasn’t separate from life, but one and the same thing. Work, community and ritual happening all at once.
The tradition of bonfires in Europe has reminded me of the power and importance of the winter solstice and the explore the shadow related to it. The bonfires, and other related rituals, appear to honor and pray for a return of the light, the longer days, spring and summer and harvest. This promise of what is to come, to ‘overcome the darkness,’ is presumably the reason that the catholic church decided to celebrate Christmas close to the solstice, to overwrite and replace ‘pagan’ (land-honoring) traditions, with another ritual of hope.
The days between the solstice (Dec 21) and January 6 are traditionally called “Raunächte” in Austria, which sounds like rough nights, but really means incense (Rauch) nights, because among many other traditions, homes were smudged with incense during this time. Apparently, these days were created when we went from a lunar calendar, in which the year has 354 days to a solar calendar with 365 days. There are many ‘superstitions’ about these days, including tasks to avoid.
They are the in-between time, following the shortest day and longest night. I’ve come across the term Twixtmas recently, to describe this time. I don’t know where that comes from, but it also expresses the in-between feeling during those days, which some consider to start with Christmas and end with the New Year.
One gift of this time is that another aspect of my Shadow has become clear to me. Now that I’ve seen it, I can’t unsee it. It’s a life-long pattern of anger. I learned it from my family of origin, but that is no excuse. I have perpetuated it, in words and actions and as I have been forced to recognize it, I look back over the years and decades and see how this has unconsciously ruled my life, while staying hidden. I have thought a lot about the Shadow, how it had influenced me, which led me to close my private practice 11 years ago. In retrospect, I feel these insights weren’t deep enough. They were superficial. Now, I have been forced to confront this pattern of anger and it’s horrifying to look at how it has controlled me for so long. It was hiding in plain sight.
The Shadow tries to hide and fights being revealed. That became very clear to me and has changed my view of my past. My ego has maintained a story, but that story was really written by the Shadow, by the patterns in my family of origin, by longer ancestral patterns, but mostly by myself, unconsciously reenacting. Now that story is exposed and my old sense of myself has crumbled. But, I feel I am ready. I’m ready for 2026, saying permanently goodbye to the old story of myself, ruled by this massive yet hidden Shadow. I’m ready to work, grow and transform.
Also....I'm in love with this sentence:
"Forgive yourself for not knowing earlier what only time could teach." ~ Ravi Shah
I have also been struggling with some shadow material that presented itself during this time. My judgment and how it's separated me from people. I also see how this pattern was created in the deep, dark past and has been a story I have also told myself. I love your honesty and transparency and want to just say how much we love you, your work, all that you do to help others. I hope your voice of self compassion is strong at this time while you are sorting out the feelings around the lurking issues of the past.