Winter Solstice: Rituals to Empower Your Spirit
Estimated reading time 6 minutes | Song: Have A Talk With God by Stevie Wonder
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Just a reminder, I am not a content creator, this is my actual life I am living and choosing to share from. Yes, I have training and certifications under my belt but I know this work intimately because it is not only what I do but how I live. As winter is preparing to come and the pushes, urges and force of consumerism of capitalization increases, this is a great time to reinforce community bonds and recharge our individual spirit.
In my workshop, Every Day as Ritual, I shared how in the grand scheme of things participating in ritual (dinacharya) (daily) requires us to slow down. As Elder Malidoma Patrice Some shared, “ritual cannot be done at the speed in which the industrialized world wants us to operate.” He goes on to share in his book, Ritual: Power, Healing and Community that we owe to the collective cosmos our contribution to this world, we owe it and cannot complete it if we are not in ritual first to ourselves and then to the collective. This is one of the many ways we can begin to really practice collective care, daily ritual for self and it extending out to others.
Winter Foods of Ayurveda
In Ayurveda and herbalism, the winter season is a time to ground and nourish our bodies to counteract the cold. The weather outside in most climates (even in the Southern part of the U.S.) is cold, windy and dry, a brewing combination for dehydration. One way to practice being in ritual (as an extension of mindfulness) is to drink tea. Now drinking tea has to be just as intentional with which herbs as any other time of year as this is not only what will be most accessible to us but also what will allow us to receive the most benefits for this time.
Teas like Golden Milk or Chai contain ginger, cinnamon, tulsi, licorice and warm the body and aid in immunity, while turmeric, ashwagandha and black pepper are anti-inflammatory and adaptogenic to support our stress levels and nervous system. If ever, I am unable to make fresh golden milk at home, I enjoy Paavani Ayurveda’s Golden Milk or I swing by Dutch Bros (thanks to my sister) and get a Chai with oatmilk.
As we watch or witness nature in winter, we notice by now most of the leaves or branches that were going to fall off have already done so and if you know anything about growing food, winter is a time where plants and trees conserve its energy (brahmacharya anyone) by releasing the leaves so it doesn't extend energy there and instead shifts the energy to the root systems. This means winter is a great time not only for us to harvest roots for medicine but also for food. Great root vegetable to eat in this time are sweet potatoes (my fav, especially in pie), carrots and beets. I’m such a texture person so for me, if my beets aren't juiced, I have to roast them and add a little olive oil and crumbled feta. Chefs kiss. Don’t forget in winter, although you want to stay hydrated, you will want to reduce cold, raw and iced food and drink items so you don’t increase Vata or Kapha imbalances.
Sleep and Rest
My favorite time of day is rising before the sun but my second favorite part of the day is easily, Golden Hour. Golden Hour is referred to as the time when the sun is warm and not quite set for the evening and it peeks in and sheds golden and warm lighting into the home space. Depending on when the sun sets, this time of day is typically when I begin to kick off my family's evening rituals. For me, this starts by lighting incense in rooms and then heading to the kitchen to begin preparing for dinner. After we finish dinner together, the kitchen is cleaned and everyone is headed into their spaces, the rituals surrounding sleep begin and these are my favorite.
Did you know 43.5% Black Americans report short sleep duration? Now often our connection to sleep and rest are conflicted in a land where we are often labeled as lazy and where our elders often said things like, “I will sleep when I’m dead”. Sleep is an important factor to our health and sleep health is just as important in yoga and ayurveda. As a caregiver, my husband is one of the many Americans that has a sleeping disorder and has more nights of interrupted sleep than a full solid 8 hours. This means in our house, we rely HEAVILY on bedtime routines for proper sleep.
We accomplish this (and it took us some time) by setting alarms to support us. The evening alarms look like having dinner eaten and cleaned up by 7pm. All electronic devices turned off and no less than an hour and a half before bed, in fact we do not even sleep with them in our rooms typically. This is even more of a challenge living off-grid because we are in a tinier space. The energy from phones and laptops or other electronic devices even if powered off is enough to stimulate the brain into action mode, versus rest mode. And because I listened to the cues of my mother growing up, we do not EVER do televisions in our bedrooms. We only have them in mutual shared spaces. This does not mean we do not have late nights or the young people don’t stay up at times trying to be on devices, we are just very intentional about their roles in our lives and that what happens behind those digital screens is NOT reality.
There are times we have to utilize additional support for rest, like Sleepy Time tea (what I grew up with) and Traditional Medicinals tea, or Sleep 3. We wind down by showering or taking a long warm or hot bath to rinse off the day and visualize it going down the drain and completing it with warmed oils to rub the body down with. NOW, in Ayurveda it is recommended to use warm sesame seed oil, but seed oils are typically known for inflammation even if topical so we use this tridoshic ayurveda oil instead and layer it up as much as our skin needs with a good shea, coco or mango butter, by this point we are ready for bed and all is calm for rest.
Side note: I was really really focused on learning my sleep patterns and how I could best optimize the sleep I was getting when the young people were younger and I used the Pillow App to support me. This app works by monitoring from your device (this is what I did and let the phone sit on my nightstand) or you can wear a smart watch device and allow it to track your sleep patterns there. I hate to sleep feeling constricted so I wear literally next to nothing outside of a hair wrap and stud earrings to bed, but this option may work for you. The Pillow App will even record it size clips of your sleep to hear how you are restless or snore, for me it caught when our neighbors house caught fire 3 years ago and the smoke and heat were coming to our house. That was how great the quality was.
Communal Gathering
Whether you celebrate Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa or no holidays at all, winter is always a time where folks in and out of our community find comfort in coming together. Sometimes there is a cause at the center but often no cause is needed and there is still healing that will take place by physically being together and being seen in shared spaces. For some being in family spaces can bring up old wounds and trauma so finding ways to be with friends and chosen family can be as loving and supportive as birth families.
You are welcome to join me and the community on Sunday, January 5th, 2025 at 11am at the Ancestral Grounds on James Island. This class is themed Imani, or faith for the last day of Kwanzaa and will begin with creating a communal altar for the ancestors with herbs, flowers and fruits. If you plan to join us, please consider wearing all white if that is available to you. Can’t quite make it, join me at Yoloha Yoga Studio on Sunday, January 10th, 2025 at 1pm for Be Still. This is a restorative yoga class where we are practicing being present and still in our bodies while the rest does the work. This is a practice of decolonization when we are actively countering what dominant culture is asking us to do in the middle of winter with a new calendar, be busy.