Living Winter when it is not Spring

I have been thinking about anticipation these days.

As I walk through the main shopping alleys of the Netherlands I notice that all shops are already selling out, on 70 percent discount or more, their Winter Collection and are starting to display the new Spring Collection. Nevertheless the weather outside their windows is still freezing, rainy and gray... And we start to live a Spring which is not yet there, and will only really come in approximately 2 months from now.

From here to the 21st of March we will be longing for a time that still is about to come, for something which is not yet reality. We will be wishing the days were already sunny, the flowers blossoming and the trees green, instead of, as Nature, preparing ourselves to leave this hibernating and introverted period, and being ready to enter a new cycle in our lives.

Anticipating what is yet to come prevents us to being present and appreciating what simply is and the beauty and fragile impermanence which resides in it. If only we would walk on the streets and parks of our cities and watched how slowly the trees and loans start to awaken and bring about a different quality of life in their systems. If only we would walk around in our own systems and slowly awaken ourselves to the different quality of life we are able to live and that is being called from us at this time, and only in this very now.

So when Spring comes we are not regretting what is no longer there. So when Spring comes we welcome it with our spirits fresh, our hearts open and ready to fully live what it IS.