I Am the Rise & I Am the Fall – Navigating Personal, Seasonal Transition

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As this first new moon of autumn dawns and August draws to a close, we’re cast in the shadow of summer. The sun settles lower in the sky, a golden shadow creeps across the lands.

I know it, I feel it, I remember it in my bones. The moment that things come to pass. Time is up, the heat fades, opportunities dry up. The illusion of weathered longings drift away, desires long gone, dreams turn dry and brittle.

This is the moment – the moment I feel the grief of new journeys. Of what can no longer be and yet pulled forward by that which is bound to me, a wonder at what lies ahead of me.

I am the rise and I am the fall.

Caught in the middle of what has been and what’s to come. The fog rolls in as clarity slips away.

Some good things come easy, naturally so, some good things feel challenging, rightfully so. And then, there are the things that are meant to fall away. How do I know which it is?

Caught in contradictory paths. Entrapped in its web. As I sit in the middle, as I wait for things to unfurl. Is there pure pleasure to be found in this? Or do I need to let it go to know true bliss?

I am the rise and I am the fall.

A shadow that turns to autumn, quickly approaching. The shadow, it already calls to me, calls me inward, calls me onto my next inner journey. I know what’s to come. The season of shedding, releasing, of letting things fall away, composting, breaking down the old stories. A time to ask the questions of what to disband. When all is said and done, where will I land?

Yes, I know this moment. I remember it in my bones. Such is the paradox of the old stories, the old ways. To know which ones need to rot away and to know which ones serve as guides to a better way. To the old days I look, the old ways, the things that have grown faint, faded away. What will remain?

I am the rise and I am the fall.

Standing at the threshold of the rippling seas of change, rattled by uncertainty, gripped in resentment. Here we are again. A great transformation awaits on the other side of the stormy waters that lie ahead.

Yes, I remember these dark seas well and I am the steady captain of turbulent depths. Navigating the rise, navigating the fall, letting the waves of change swell over me. Readying myself for when this hits.

I am the rise and I am the fall.

Moving towards the balance of equinox, allowing the shortening days and lengthening nights to lull me into harmony. Drumming the depths for my own personal rhythm, my own inner balance, drumming, drumming, drumming.

All is not lost in the middle, the in-between, where I lie waiting. I find harmony at the midline of contradiction, beauty in the ambiguity. I am both who I have been and who I am not yet. Who I am now is both. Brought into balance by shadow and light.

I am the rise and I am the fall.

Moving away from the need to classify, the path that diverges is not what we see with the eye. Away the stale I shall flay, revealing a new way, for it is not that the old is dying so the new can be born. No, I am breaking down what is worn and lorn, so that I may be readorned. I am both who I have been and who I am not yet. Stitching and weaving them together, breathing new life into old ways.

I am the rise and I am the fall.

A sly look of my eye, a cackle of my inner wild, the call of my primal animal flesh – charging into turbulent seas and dark shadow, onto this next journey of my becoming. Towards this wild, creative life I go.

As this golden shadow creeps across the lands, casting us into darker days, I begin to feel cocooned, slowing down, becoming more still. Yet the movement doesn’t cease. When the clarity disappears, when the mist of obscurity moves in, still I am moving toward my next becoming. Across stormy seas and clouded skies, the rise and fall of turbulent depths, I am the weathered captain of this radiant inner journey.

I am the rise and I am the fall.

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