Sun and Moon Mother: Our ally in liminal time

Landscape of Mothers maps to the Wheel of the Year, and this post solstice, post-flurry of celebration and gatherings, drops us into a liminal time. In the US we follow this quickly with a celebration of New Year's and getting on with our productivity as fast as we can, but nature doesn't skip this protracted down time. In the winter the shortest day is followed by the coldest part of winter. Darkness persists, even if the sunlight is on it's way back. The sky is still muted and soft, the cold snaps are real and deep, and life is still moving in the quietest and slowest of ways. 

This liminal time, between the lengthening of the days and the warmth it will eventually bring, is a recalibration time. We are invited to scale back, to tend to the things that are necessary, but no more and no less. 

Sun and Moon Mother is connected to Forest Mother through the mycelial network, the tending of the underground connections. In fact, Sun and Moon Mother's work is to nourish this network, which is how we are connected both to ourselves and others. It is the time of tending to our nervous system. The invitation is to slow down and rest, to be introspective, and to particularly notice what nourishes us.

Without taking this down time of winter, we become perpetual motion machines. It's easy to get busy pushing forward with what we have been doing. We forget to check in with ourselves, pausing to see if we're still headed where we want to go. Instead of using our energy to go after what we want, we often end up focusing on external expectations and demands. 

Where am I meeting other people's expectations rather than my own desires?

In the way of Sun and Moon Mother, I am not offering a Dionysian free-for-all, but instead a measured consideration of how to use the life-force energy allotted to me. 

What if I placed my desires inside of the context of my beloveds? What if I turned my attention to tending the mycelial network in order to fulfill my desire? How can I meet my own wants through tending rather than taking? And how does perceiving my desires through this lens change what I want? 

And last, but not least, how does Sun and Moon Mother deepen in me through this inquiry? What does it mean for my nervous system to be "regulated"? What needs to be in place for me to feel "regulated"?