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[0:13} Introduction: Winter Solstice, Poetry, and Personal Reflections
Aloha and welcome to Your Heart magic and illuminating space where psychology spirituality and heart wisdom meet. Here's your host, Dr. BethAnne Kapansky. Wright, the clinical psychologist with a mystic mind.
Hello, hi, everybody. Welcome to Your Heart magic. This is Dr. BethAnne Kapansky Wright and this is our special Solstice episode. This podcast is coming out on the day of winter solstice and I thought it would be fun to do a storytelling episode where I share some poetry and passages from some of my books and unpublished writings and speak a little bit of the story behind them and some personal reflections.
All of these have a winter theme I live on Kauai Now I grew up in Alaska, as many of you know. So this time of year has always marked Winter Solstice for me, but I recognize that there might be listeners who are in the southern hemisphere.
So happy summer solstice to you if so. And thank you for joining me in this winter episode. I am if nothing else, and Alaska girl at heart even though I live on the island now. And so this time of year always makes me think of the darkness but also the pristine beauty that comes from living in Alaska where there is so much of a sort of like midnight sky, it can look like velvet.
And when there's snow on the ground, it just lights things up in a way that is a little bit magical. And I found growing up in Alaska that sometimes we have to dig a little bit to find the beauty in the wintertime- metaphor for life, right? Because sometimes in life we have to dig in order to find the beauty and see the joy that's right in front of us.
[2:22] Passage #1: A Raven Night
And the first poem that I want to share it is a poem it's called Raven night. And this is very much inspired by winter time and Alaska. So I will read it first and then share a few thoughts on it. Raven night. I would like to be a friend and the darkness a herald of hope and the black of Arabian Night to stand tall underneath a starless sky and shine bright with the stars and my eyes.
I would like to take this Love I hold inside, tossed it out in careless care filled fistfuls. Let it be my greatest currency. Let it defy the labels that put us in our place. Let it become my construct whose only bounds is grace. I would like to rest upon the frozen of the earth. Put my heart and hibernation till it's no longer weary from care. Let winter sleep become my absolution.
My resolution, my reconciliation from the grief that still lingers there. But the moon has begun to wax again. tilts her darker face towards snow spilled sky and tells me sleeping beauty must wake from the cold. Learn to be the spark the flame the fire that shows the way back to the light.
I would like to shine into the shadows Be The Change for better ways. Take it all into me even as I let it all go spill myself out across a wanting land. Be everyone and everything is IMU and you are me this connection we all are Can't you hear it thrumming thirsting for loving light beneath the cold cheek of a hope filled raven that night.
There are poems that I don't think I could rewrite now if I tried pieces of writing that happened during certain times in life where I had a alchemy of inspiration brought on by circumstances and who I understood myself as at the time and those things kind of mixed together into this alga nation of these word pictures. And Raven Night very much feels like one of those kinds of poems. I
t was written during November of 2016. Might have been early December it was right after right kind of Around Thanksgiving going into December time. And that time, in that particular year is the year I'd lost my brother.
[5:08] Grief, Loss & Beauty After a Brother's Death and Time of Change
So I was going into my first holiday season without him. And I was still very much processing my grief, and working through just learning to live with loss and learning to live with love, right? Because that's what loss is, it is sort of love turned inside out or upside down and trying to figure out how do we go on living and loving this person who's no longer with us and work with the ache that we feel inside. It was also written in the aftermath of the 2016 election in the United States of America.
And there was so much upheaval happening in our country at this time, and so much hate and divisions that I was seeing, I had some real grave concerns and sadness and sorrow for the direction I was seeing things going, and the hatred and discord that I was just seeing between people where we had forgotten how to treat each other with kindness and dignity and humanity.
And this was also written the my last one turn Alaska, I knew that we were moving to Hawaii in the summer of 2017. And so there was this interesting mix of this is the last time you will have to survive an Alaskan winter I use the word survive, I had almost 40 of them. And it is beautiful as they are. It's definitely tough this time of year, if you are prone to seasonal affective disorder, and the darkness can get really harsh, the conditions can be hard.
So I was like this is it BethAnne like this is this is your last Alaskan winter. And I had this mix of just grief and appreciation of the beauty. And I call it this space that I moved into after losing Brent, the grace space. And I stayed in it for quite a time and the grace space was almost this transcendent space. It was this overarching awareness where I was really in touch with how brief life is, and how fast it can change in a blink. And I didn't take anything for granted in those immediate months after losing him. I was very awake, I was very alive, I was very much in my grief.
But at the same time it was so clarifying. And it gave me such an appreciation for the spark of my life, and really engaged me with the question Who am I becoming? And am I living the life that I meant to live? So that poem is just a reflection of the beauty of the Alaskan winter, the grief that was there over my brother, the grief that was there over what was happening in our country and kind of happening in the world. The grief that was there over how hard life is but then also like this intense beauty right?
And the harshness there was this absolute beauty of the beauty of nature and winter time, the beauty of love which shines so much brighter. I think when it's contrasted with grief, you know, show somebody hatred and you put love or kindness next to that. And your appreciation for somebody's ability to hold love to hold kindness to hold light to hold space for somebody else become so heightened. So there was this just juxtaposition of energies.
And I was really hoping to capture that in that poem. And that brings me to the next piece that I want to share which actually was written in December of 2016. It was written the day before Solstice that year.
[9:06] Passage #2: The Bells
So this is just about a month later. And I'm going to read it first and then fill in the background on this. I actually pulled this off of an old blog on my sunshine and winter blog. It's the only place I ever published it. And it's called the bells.
I will miss the bells. All the beautiful bells from the cathedrals of Germany that have rang out through the passage of our trip.
We ran to the sound the bells this morning, way up high and the pine swept hills of the Black Forest on the edge of Freiburg one day before winter solstice and between the mist and the trees and the old and the mystery. It was ethereal. I find it bittersweet to be sitting here high on a hill overlooking the city.
With just one and a half days left. This trip was ugly left something a mayor notion months ago, a reality the last 14 days and today was finally the day I felt the magic. Not that there haven't been other forms of magic on this trip. And visioning a dream in your mind and seeing it through to fruition is its own kind of magic. So are the wonders of new sights and sounds and scenes.
So is hot cider at the Christkindl markets. But that part of me, that part who lives her face to the sky, listens to the trees, lays on the land and feels the steady beat and this place, that part who sometimes starts to see beyond as what's in front of me fades and everything becomes a dance of lights, and all I can see is the gossamer strands of grace, linking everything up in this space, a sea of souls on a passage towards love. That part of me has been mostly silent this trip, sometimes even matters a spirit need a break. And the mind's eye needs a rest.
And it's important to ground and just be in the moment. Keep your eyes and wits before you instead of walking around with your head in the clouds. We ran in the clouds today, through thick, thick mist in giant groves and trees so high and wise and old. That all I felt was peace and calm when I laid my hands on them and whispered Thank you.
As I ran I thought about life back in Anchorage with only five and a half months until we leave for kawaii everything is about to change. It's almost overwhelming. So much work so much stress. So many goodbyes to people I adore and love that are going to break my heart all over. And yet I know if I could go yesterday I would.
I must become this bigger person. This bigger heart and soul and a land that is said to be one of the most magical and spiritual of all, I have to be in a place where I can curl into the sea and breathe the wind and sit with the sun and be one with love. I have to be in a place where the veil is thinner. And the shaman and me can stop hiding and step more fully into the space of herself. I have to go. It's become a necessity not a choice. I can feel it thrumming in every cell of my being. I don't know what's waiting there. I just know it's calling me home.
We can be no more no less than who we're called to be in this life. I know where my heart leads, I just have to continue to find the courage to follow it. This trip was the gift of a break from the reality as I know it, a different kind of reality of cobblestone streets, and a strange language and getting lost and new discoveries and Valve fulfillment in countryside cities and mountains and schnitzel in Germany.
And now it's return to reality. Which means despite all the very practical task of living and arranging a move, it is time to lift my face to the sky and listen to beyond. It's time now they tell me it's finally time. I can feel it back in in so quiet for most of the trip. So present on this day where I feel my soul began to stir. Feel the familiar pulse and ring have my call, feel my heart intermingle with everything and everyone until I begin to forget where I end and where they began.
And I'm one with love once more. I stand in the main square listening to the cathedral bells ring, it's sunset, losing myself and the swirling masses, losing myself in the wonder of it all. Lifting my face to the sky and swirling up up up as if birds have tied ribbons around my soul and are drawing it into the light. Losing myself and the Beyond and wondering how do others not see it as right here. This other world, so much love just on the other side. And all we have to do is pause, feel our purpose of heart and listen. I stand there and let the tears stream down my face magic.
[14:34] Spiritual Awakening and Personal Growth After Loss
When Brent died, some unexpected things came out of the woodwork and a couple of those things were friends of hers that I wasn't in touch with. They were friends that he'd met in the online gaming world which he was into and had developed connections through that. In some of those connections became really close friends to him they talked regularly and so after He passed, I became aware that he had a couple of friends he made in Germany.
And you know, they really loved him. And were really grieved and completely shocked to hear of his passing. And they must have said at some point in our exchanges, because I was so touched by their love for him that we corresponded a little bit, and they must have said, We'd really like to meet you someday. And somehow that became a thing. Like Brent had wanted to go to Germany. Least he told them that I had not heard about this dream of his but, you know, I didn't know there's a lot of things I didn't know about him. And that was one of them. And he'd said, I'm gonna come meet you someday. And he wasn't able to fulfill that.
So it became like this quest for me that I was going to go meet them, them and one other friend in Washington, that he was really close to. And both, I met all of them. That was one of my tasks and kind of odyssey of loss. And so we plan this trip to Germany, and it was just such a huge trip. For us. I've been abroad a little bit, but it's not something I do regularly. And it was so beautiful, the way the trip came about, it came about through like saving money. And I inherited my brother's old Durango. So I sold the car that I had, and like that ended up paying for the trip, or at least, you know, purchasing tickets or something really substantial.
And so like, I remember, when I made this promise, I thought, oh my gosh, we've got like this big move coming up, how in the world am I going to, like make this happen. And then it was so synchronistic it's like it all lined up. And you know, somehow it became available. And we found ourself in Germany, and I didn't have a big agenda for that trip, it was we're gonna go meet these people. And then I guess explore this, this countryside.
And we did and kind of went city to city booking places on hotel.com. And having this like grand exploration, and it was one of those things that if you are a big planner for trips, I probably would have like, the way that I traveled would have made you like tear out your hair. But if you were very much into like, let's, let's see what we see and be open to an adventure, it was an adventure. And we ended up in Freiburg for this last little bit of the trip.
And I remember being at some, like super fancy hotel that booking.com Or one of those places had some screaming deal, you know, not the place I'd normally go for, but it was like oh my gosh, like how can we not, you know, go do this, it's the cost of something that would be a lot less lesser, usually, you know, and so we're up and they had these bells in the square that were ringing.
And I felt this stirring, you know, in my soul and had one of those moments of appreciation of just like really seeing the journey, the journey of 2016 The journey of like, what am I doing in Freiburg, you know, I'd met his friends at that point. And we, you know, had our beautiful moment, and we've gone on with the trip. And I was like This life is so incredible.
[18:04] The Gifts in Grief & The Courage to Change
A year ago, I wouldn't have guessed any of these things would happen. And I would have been devastated if I knew what was coming for me. And yet I've survived this horrible loss, and made it through the worst of that storm. And some of the gifts are starting to come from it.
And Germany was one of those gifts. And I was also in this really anticipatory place because I knew we had this major move coming up. And again, there was something about traveling through this last Christmas and knowing like I'm on the cusp of change, and I was mindfully setting out for reinvention. And then when I read that piece, I chose it today because I felt like it spoke to a time in my life, that it's easier to read it than to speak it I captured something in those words that even I forgotten about.
And that was the intensity of having the spiritual calling. And having something like pressing against me pressing inside saying, you have to expand, you have to step into something bigger and I didn't know what it was. I just knew that it was waiting for me on kawaii and I can tell you now that my sense of this whole journey is that yes, there's been many gifts moving here. But part of the expansion was about the gift of just completely disrupting shaking up my life, living someplace radically different than Alaska, like busting me out of all my old rolls and patterns. I think there is a lot of spiritual light that can be found on certain spaces in this land.
And so perhaps an activation of that light and some spiritual gifts that came through but I didn't know any of that then I could just feel this intensity in this urge and sometimes when I talk about spiritual awakenings on the podcast or spiritual call callings. Or we'll use a phrase like, well, the requirements of your soul kind of ask this of you or you have a soul calling, and soul callings are a very personal thing.
They are very insistent. And so even if other people don't understand why you're making the changes you're making when something's happening inside of you, and the voice of your higher self, your soul, your spiritual guide, just shining through and telling you, you have to do this. Like I had no choice at that point, I've kind of felt like something in me would die if I didn't go free it. And I had no idea how to go about doing that, except I knew I needed to go make this massive change.
And, you know, I kind of put my X on the map and said, Well, this is this is where this change is going to happen. And so reading that I have to smile, I wrote that in 2016. And sometimes when I read old pieces of writing, I'll think, well, if I could travel back in time, and tell myself then something that I know now maybe I couldn't give away the secrets. Maybe I couldn't tell her something that would change the future. You know, what would I tell her? And I think I would say stay with yourself, what you are feeling inside of you is very real.
Try and release expectations, it's not going to look at all the way that you think it will. Yes, there's a lot of spiritual light to be found on the island of kawaii there's also a lot of regular living and hard stuff and stress that's going to be found over there. Don't ever give up on yourself or your journey. But that what you gain in terms of your spiritual growth, what you gain in terms of your heart wisdom will be with this. So no matter how hard it gets, don't give up on yourself. And at that point in time, I didn't know any of the things that I knew. Now I just knew that I had this thing in my heart and I had to follow it.
And I was listening to these bells on Solstice and I've always found Solstice to be a really magical time. There's something about the longest night and the longest day. That sort of signifies to me this reflection of turning inward and evaluation and just being grateful and then celebrating the return to the light. And I love that as a metaphor for our journey in life because no matter how dark things get, and no matter how much we feel like we're losing our way or we are going through grief or hard period. If we stay with ourselves, we always return to a space of light when we stay in our heart wisdom.
[22:43] Passage #3: Grace Period
So this next piece that I want to read is called grace period. And this was written, gosh, maybe like a year later, and I was on kawaii by then brace descends on her household for the holiday season. My grief seems to have abated from the intensity I felt at the beginning of the month and that frees me up to embrace more joy. Winter Solstice through the New Year is the time of year I believe in laying aside burdens, and instead simply being an activist for coziness treats and blankets.
There is something about the pace of the days that lends itself to our own little island form of coziness, where we walk the dogs prior to sunset and then tuck into cheese trays and cookies watching movies while the rain falls outside and sky darkens. We create a new island tradition on Christmas Eve and go to the beach desk to watch the light turn all shades of sorbet.
Then come home to watch Muppets Christmas Carol, and make extra gooey cheddar mac and cheese, Empty Bowls and full bellies and Etcher. intermitted conversations about childhood traditions and favorite memories fill the space as Kermit sings in the background.
And I smile at her eclectic tree and realize I like the night before Christmas even better than Christmas, as it's a dusk of its own. The magical seam and the middle of anticipation and actuality. Where sugar plums bear good tidings of joy and possibilities are infinite.
We fall into a strange time work the week before New Year, not quite knowing what day it is. It is a week that feels like a hello and goodbye all at once. Another sweet and between of time the jelly within two buttery halfs of a biscuit there to complement and to savor with raspberry lace snaps and cherry candlelit glow and frosted raindrop reflections that lead to a quieting of the mind to prepare us for all that is to come and 2018
Because making it to a new year how With equals 365 new chances for Uncharted possibilities. I find myself reflecting and writing down all that transpired in 2017, and my crystallin dreams and wishes for 2018. We share our intentions and hopes for the year and I offer tobacco to the jungle trees and prayer, imagining those wishes pulled upwards on silver tips of angel wings with tangerine lanterns of hope.
So they may come to be. It is a period of pause, where new dreams new intentions and new beginnings are made. And even though I know that our better days are now because life is a gift and so each day is a new possibility we can never get back.
I still can't help but wonder what will be in the year to come and yearn for better. And just like the seasons eaves, I realized this is another kind of magical seam and the middle of anticipation and actuality were all that lays unformed in our hearts began to take shape, where we create the steps of what will come to be in the dream space of golden hopes, and Carmine imaginings.
And we give ourselves over to life's possibilities. Both Potter and clay, where desire, creativity and Grace meet in the fold of the same.
[26:32] Grief, Letting Go & Living The Dream
I was very much in a space that first Christmas on kawaii of learning that, oh my goodness, dreaming a dream and putting a dream into action. And then living and experiencing your dream are all different phases to a dream. And a lot of times the reality doesn't always meet our expectation. And yet, there's all these gifts in that. And there's all these beautiful choice that can also be found in that. And there's so much growth that can be found in that.
And I was this mix of like, oh my gosh, we did it right like this last year I was in Germany on this adventure, grieving my brother and finding myself and this year I said I was going to do this thing. We did this thing. And having that moment of actualization and realization. And then that was intersecting with all this real life stuff. Because we were trying to figure out life over here and figure out things with living and money and housing.
And I had all these questions about my purpose and career path and my spirituality and I diagnosed our entire household. That would be both humans, two dogs. And actually the cat did great. But all of us with adjustment disorder, because you know, We'd only been on the island like six months by then. And like change moving is really hard, even if you relocate. And it's something amazing for you. When we go through that kind of psychological upheaval and shifts, it brings stuff up in us. And so it can be a move for the better.
And it doesn't mean that there won't be loss and grief there. And that was kind of hard for me too. Because when people would be like, how are you? I felt like I had to be like, Oh my gosh, it's great, Hawaii's amazing because I was trying to struggling to figure out my sadness. And then I had all this deferred grief for my brother all this stuff that I couldn't access that first Christmas. And I remember having like so much stuff come up.
And it was really hitting me of what was really hitting me that that Christmas is like wow, like I am going to watch my parents age and and pass and Brenton won't be there to see that with me. They celebrated their 49th wedding anniversary this year will be their 55th they're both both still with us. And it was that was a whole other grief and and of itself of like, Okay, wow. Now I'm an only child, you know, at midlife and I'm going to be walking this journey alone.
And you know, my husband's with me, but in terms of my nuclear family and kind of the four of us, I lost my counterpoint who knew all the stories and if Brent were here, I think he'd be like, Oh my gosh, my dad made it to 55 years, can you believe it? You know, and we'd probably do that bonding thing that you do, where maybe you share all these memories. And I don't have that. And so all of that was heading and so much grief was coming up.
And all of that was kind of commingled with the beauty of the holiday season and I am an advocate of joy. I you hear me talk about it all the time on your heart magic on the podcast. You know, I really believe that we have to look for the good.
And my poet's mind can't help but notice these little snippets of poetry that are tucked in the every day and so this whole piece was just kind of this entry intersection of all of that. And it makes me smile to look back at it now that was six or seven years ago. And there's been many Christmases sense and a lot of personal growth and evolution. But I've really enjoyed sharing the stories with you and these reflections from this point in my life.
[30:20] Passage #4: The Things That Come to Pass
So I want to close with one last piece today. It's a poem and it is a little bit of a celebration of things to come are kind of moving into the new year now. And this is called the things that come to pass.
Yesterday is still so close. I can almost hold it in my grasp. Its memories twined with soft feathers of fancy and nostalgia-laced filters, everything taking on a faded tent of quieter, gentler, lighter, kinder, there is this ache. If I stare at those memories too long, humble and paucity. They sit unsettled.
A skin remembered that doesn't quite suit yet as want to go away. They yearn to linger in the corners of my migrant mind, reminding me of the things that came to pass and the passage of these days.
I'd retraced those moments if I could relive repeat revive refeel. Sometimes I miss them, Miss when I miss ham, those songs of Auld Lang sign filled with bittersweet faces a times gone by an echoes of life's yesterday's, a person could get lost in such a place.
And since I wish to stay found, wished to rebake rejoice, rebirth, renew, wish to be in the times of this day, I finally say hello, I'll do then let those old friends pass on through for life wasn't meant to be loved and remembrance.
But through experience, the roads we've passed just that past. And as much as there is comfort in the hanging on the truth of letting go is the only truth that will give our hearts the space to be free. So we can be in the days of right now. Be present for what comes to pass, live and learn and love new memories.
[32:28] Reflection, Mindfulness & Gratitude for the Holiday Season
I think that this time of year for me is about reflection. And I will absolutely spend time before we move into 2024 sitting in my journal and I have a routine a thing that I do each year that I will write out each month.
And what happened, what do I remember any highs and the lows? What was the essence of January or February and there's no rhyme or reason for what I write. It's more just a kind of freeform thought of whatever wants to put itself on a page. And sometimes I'll make a list of everything that I accomplished this year.
For me that always feels really important because I can be so visionary and focused on like this bigger picture I sometimes forget to be present. So I've really worked hard on learning to celebrate small steps and small successes and being contented satisfied with that. You know, I always say we have to keep practicing gratitude. It's not our default.
And I think we have to practice contentment and all of those frequencies that help us be in a space of peace, at least I have to practice those and have to keep shifting my mind to that. It's how I stay in my own lane. It's how I stay in my heart. And it's easy for me to fall into a default space of stress or being too vision focused or future focused or focusing on what hasn't happened.
So I like to make a list and be like this happened. And you did this and you did this. And I usually like to write out these are the things I learned this year, like what were the big themes and how did I grow. And it's for me a way to psychologically synthesize the year. If there's anything that feels really unfinished, I might choose to do a little bit of work around that do some release, work, do some journaling work. I like to think about moving into a new year carrying the lessons and the wisdom earned, earned and learned.
Like that was a Freudian slip I meant to say learned but it's also if we've learned the wisdom, we've earned the wisdom. Carrying the wisdom earned and learned and kind of leaving behind the stuff that I don't want to carry with me so I can travel light and travel into it in a more integrated space. So that's my way of making that happen for myself. And of course it's inevitable in any reflection that there's longing there and there's aches
And, you know, I'm watching my parents age. And I'm reading these passages to you that I wrote, it feels like just a blink ago. And yet, that was seven years ago, seven Christmases ago. Time flies by so fast. And sometimes it's easy to have this wistful sense of either wanting to go back or I kind of I call it curl up into a memory, you know, if you could just sort of be in a moment and relive it, re experience it and really just take it into your heart. And we can't, we don't get to go back.
Our memories are a gift. You know, it means our mind is still functioning. Not everybody has that gift. And so our memories can help us to remember and to relive it in our mind and imagination. That presence is happening right now. And I like to think that the best of my memories, I take them and pour them into my heart, I tuck them into my heart, like a treasure chest in my heart, and that when I really want them, they're there. And I can pull them out and connect with this beautiful nostalgia.
But that's all it is, it is connection to remember and to honor what has already passed with the intention that I do that so that I can be more present so that I can appreciate so I can be grateful so I can remember how fast it goes. We remember so that we can live better. And we can honor what has come to pass and then turn our attention to the present and create the best that we know how with whatever we have to work with and the given moment.
And that's all of that is what this time of year is about for me. And obviously like celebration, and shark cooter retrace and all the fun festivities stuff too. I'm excited to check into some treats later this week and have some really just simple, easy things planned for the holidays. I'm all about keeping it simple these days. And I'm grateful and so grateful for everybody who joined me for this podcast today.
[37:05] Closing & Coming Up Next Week
Thank you so much for listening. Happy Solstice to you. Merry Christmas, happy Hanukkah, happy December. Blessings to you. Whatever you celebrate wherever you are in your path. Right now. I'm grateful for your presence in sending more Aloha from Hawaii. Coming up next week. It is our last episode before 2024.
So I'm going to end the year with an Energy Update from the Akashic records, what's coming in 2024 and a little bit of a recap and sensitization of what the year 2023 was about. And kind of where we're at spiritually right now, where we're at energetically and some of the messages coming through as we move into a new year, but we're not there yet. So for now, enjoy this next week.
Take good care of yourself. Take good care of your heart. Do whatever you need to honor the space of you. And whatever you celebrate or don't celebrate, just keep showing up. Keep listening to your heart and be well. Be Love. Be you and be magic.
You've been listening to your heart magic with Dr. BethAnne Kapansky Wright. Tune in next week for a new episode to support and empower your life