Seasons come and go. That is not a bad thing. That is how life works. In the natural world we transition into new seasons four times a year. They bleed into one another around the edges, but there is still a transition from one season to the next. It is a valuable thing to know what season you are in. You don’t want to be wearing your winter coat in summer. And you wouldn’t really want to strip down and go swimming in winter. We reserve particular clothes and actions for particular seasons.
What season are you in? What do you need for the season you are in?
Unlike the natural seasons, we don’t always know how long our seasons will last, or exactly what they will look like. We cannot always compare our season to someone else’s season, because often, different seasons can affect people differently. Winter in the northern region of New Zealand is very different from winter in the Canadian interior. Your winter may be quite different to someone else’s winter. Beware of concocting formulas for people to follow based on your subjective experience.
I wonder about how this impacts on families and communities. As we can be closely knit to people and be in different places and having different experiences all at once.
I have read the words of a wise person who told of the importance of being able to mourn with those who mourn and rejoice with those who rejoice. He shared this advice within the context of community. Community contains this intermingling of celebrating and grieving. And we can all be in completely different seasons at the same time. You have permission to mourn your difficulties and you also have permission to celebrate your victories.
The Northern and Southern hemispheres experience opposite seasons at the same time. It is summer in New Zealand right now. It would not be wise for me to pack my summer clothes into a suitcase and fly to northern Europe, and walk around in my summer clothes. Just like it would be unwise to try to live in someone else’s season. You have permission to be in your season. Rejoicing with those who rejoice does not mean that you pretend to be in that person’s season. Could it be possible to both acknowledge your season while acknowledging someone else’s season? It’s okay to admit the struggle and difficulties that you are facing and the pain that you are feeling, and then to turn and celebrate your friend in the joy and delight that they are feeling. This is possible. Although I haven’t yet mastered this precious art.
Until we can do this, people around us will hide their seasons from us. If I cannot mourn when you mourn, eventually you will stop mourning around me. And if I cannot rejoice when you rejoice, you will save your rejoicing for another time.
You are not defined by your season. Do not immediately interpret hard seasons as meaning that there is something wrong with you. Do not allow others to do that to you either. It is a season. It is not you. It is important to know who you are so that you don’t allow your season to define your identity.
Develop an understanding of seasons. Importantly, learn to respect the seasons that other people are in.
There is a balance of knowing which circumstances to accept and which ones to fight. Since not everything that happens to us is to be blindly accepted. I understand that. Don’t for one second think that I am advocating for the tolerance of abuse. Abuse is not a season.
It is hard being in a different season to those around you. I know. I constantly feel like I’m in a different season, a different person to many of those around me. But this does not excuse me to not respect my season, or your season.
Know yourself. Know your season. Know your needs in the season you are in.
Season image taken from weheartit.com
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” If I cannot mourn when you mourn, eventually you will stop mourning around me. And if I cannot rejoice when you rejoice, you will save your rejoicing for another time.”
This is so good, getting hold of what freedom is, where we can all “get to be” where we are, in the context of walking in family.
So good! I had been boxing empathy in to only weeping with those who are weeping, only going down into someone’s pit and sitting with them for a while in it to connect with them down there. I had forgotten about sharing the joy on the mountain tops – the rejoicing when others part as a huge part, the other half, of empathy. This has helped me recognise this! Thanks Niki!
Thanks Andy. I am learning that empathy applies to people on the mountain tops as well as the valleys too. I can get so focussed on the vulnerability of people in sharing their struggles and difficulties, I can forget that it can also require vulnerability for people to share their victories.