“The winter solstice has always been special to me as a barren darkness that gives birth to a verdant future beyond imagination, a time of pain and withdrawal that produces something joyfully inconceivable, like a monarch butterfly masterfully extracting itself from the confines of its cocoon, bursting forth into unexpected glory.” – Gary Zukav

December 21, also known as Winter Solstice, is the shortest day of year marked by the darkness that engulfs it. With it comes a reflection of rebirth and revelation…an opportunity for cleansing. A chance to let your soul laugh and let your heart sing.

Winter solstice is a time to acknowledge the darkness, while not allowing it to overcome you.

It is a time to cling to hope, or realize hope for the first time.

“The Winter Solstice is the time of ending and beginning, a powerful time — a time to contemplate your immortality. A time to forgive, to be forgiven, and to make a fresh start. A time to awaken.” – Frederick Lenz

Darkness has a starring role in the history of storytelling. It represents the haunting of dark secrets, and hidden truths. Life can not thrive in the darkness, nothing grows during the midnight hours. The earth and her inhabitants are asleep in the shadows of winter, unaware of what is going on around them.

The 2017 Winter Solstice is a unique one according to astrologers, as this dark day also aligns with the end of Mercury retrograde, and the first day the sun (ruler of the Zodiac system) exits Sagittarius (an adventurous, impulsive sign) and enters Capricorn (a steady sign linked to power, the patriarchy, the law).

To many, it echos chaos moving into hopelessness.

And while even I can experience this and  be drawn to the shadow side of life, overcome with the struggles and pain of it, I sit here in the early morning hours, with darkness surrounding me, yet I can see the dawn coming on the horizon. It is breaking apart the darkness revealing that not all is lost. That what is sleeping will once again awaken. That what is unseen will be revealed.

To lose hope represents succumbing to total despair. The Winter Solstice reminds me that this darkness is part of the rhythm of life, but it is not, nor will ever be where the story ends.

“In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.” – Albert Camus