Reflections in the clean cold air.

There is something about shivering that always helps me focus. When you feel the cold, like metal clamping around your stomach, and your body starts to involuntarily shake, there is an awareness of your body that takes over. You start to see the shivering coming from a place in your body, not a locatable point, but an encompassing whole. Roots across your skin.

The shivers help you find it, draw out and reveal its path. And when you find it, you can work with it. You can focus your breath and concentrate, until you begin to slow the shuddering in your body. Until you make your body go still. Its an exercise in concentration.

In the cold, we tend to huddle into our bodies, making ourselves compacted in the hopes of staying just a little bit warmer. This works to a certain extent, you are tucking in all that energy and its warming you up. You push yourself more inward in the cold months both physically and mentally. It forces you to re-see your body as it folds inward to understand the shape of the shell you are creating.

And as you see your body and understand the center of your shivering, you start to direct yourself. You retain energy and start to find the directions you will take the year. From a tight seed to sky-seeking tree. Everything now leads to your own spring.