Let Go and Grow

Rhonda Wilson

Sep 30

7 min read

Updated: Oct 1

We are never finished with becoming

Happy Autumn, Friends!

There are certain patterns we can find comfort in, even while everything around us continues to change. The seasons are one of those patterns. Summer gives way to autumn. The days shorten. The air cools. The trees begin their annual practice of letting go.

“Life is flux.” — Heraclitus

And somehow, change always seems to arrive right on time.

There is something beautiful about noticing what the changing seasons bring up within us.

For some, autumn arrives with excitement: cooler temperatures, changing leaves, cozy sweater weather, warm drinks and meals around the table or fire pit. For others, shorter days, longer nights and the approaching cold can bring a little anxiety or sadness.

Whatever autumn brings up for us, perhaps we don’t have to immediately decide what it means.

Maybe we can simply sit with it.

Notice it.

Allow it to be.

And perhaps, after we’ve given ourselves time to notice, we can begin to recognize what we are ready to release, what we are still holding onto, and what might quietly be asking for room to begin.

Letting Go for Growth

The past month or so has given me so many opportunities to witness both beginnings and endings.

For families with children in school, we’ve ridden the wave from summer trips and vacations straight into the bubbling shoreline of back-to-school activities. Perhaps you are the student beginning something new. Maybe you’ve entered the empty-nest years and are now watching your children’s children experience life for the first time, carrying with you a little more wisdom and patience than before.

And then there are all the other beginnings and endings that don’t fit neatly onto a calendar.

Over the past several weeks, I’ve had the privilege of celebrating two friend’s marriage as they begin a new chapter of love in their 50s.

I’ve watched children walk bravely into new classrooms and experiences.

I’ve watched my own work begin to change and take on new, yet familiar, shapes.

And I’ve also sat alongside grief.

Recently, I accompanied my sister to a celebration of life for one of her closest friends. As we gathered with people she has known since high school, and others we’ve known together for more than 20 years, I found myself thinking about the strange nature of time.

Twenty years can contain so much life.

And looking backward, somehow it can also feel incredibly fleeting.

We talked about memories.

We remembered stories.

And I realized that some of the sweetest memories we shared happened without a camera anywhere nearby.

It wasn’t documented.

There wasn’t a post.

We were simply present.

I’ve been noticing this same sweetness in much of my time with Hope. More often than not, we’re so deeply immersed in the moment that I have to remind myself to reach for the phone if I want to capture a photo.

And there’s something precious about that.

It’s time that doesn’t need to be explained or shared with anyone outside of it. In that space, I can let go of the need to post, share or perform and simply allow whatever blossoms, blossom.

All of this letting go and blossoming happens in tandem.

Perhaps the trees have been reminding us of that all along.

They release what has completed its season while simultaneously preparing for what comes next.

We can quietly let things go and prepare for the growth that exists on the other side of winter.

We can root down and take stock of the seeds we’ve harvested from a full season of life.

And sometimes, we can plant something entirely new.

Allow Yourself to Be a Beginner

For Hope and me, that recently meant ballet.

Yes. Both of us.

Hope began baby ballet, and at 47 years old, I walked into my first adult beginner ballet class. We were both beginners on the same day, but our beginnings looked very different. For Hope, beginning meant being brave enough to take one little step at a time.

Parents aren’t permitted in the classroom area, and understandably, my two-year-old wasn’t particularly interested in walking down an unfamiliar hallway with unfamiliar people toward a room she’d never seen before.

So we didn’t force her.

With some brilliant encouragement from my sister, it became a game.

Little by little, Hope inched her way down the hallway until she was close enough to peek into the classroom. Eventually, she allowed one of the older ballerinas to take her hand.

And by the time class was over?

The little girl who didn’t want to walk down the hallway was happily exploring the other classrooms, meeting teachers and smiling from ear to ear.

I couldn’t help but think:

We cannot be forced to begin.

We have to approach the edges between what we know and don’t know one tiny step at a time.

And sometimes we simply need someone beside us who makes the unknown feel safe enough to explore.

A couple of short hours later, it was my turn.

The fear I carried looked different from Hope’s.

I wasn’t afraid of the hallway.

I was afraid of standing out, and not in a good way.

I walked into the studio wondering whether everyone would immediately know that I had absolutely no idea what I was doing.

And then something wonderful happened.

I discovered I wasn’t the only beginner.

Our mixed-level class included people like me who had never taken ballet, dancers returning after studying as children, and more experienced dancers who gave me a glimpse of what years of practice might look like.

Instead of someone else’s experience making me feel inadequate, I began to see it as evidence of what is possible.

But then I actually had to dance.

Oh, for the love of all that is holy.

I haven’t had to take multiple steps followed by a leap into the air in YEARS.

YEARS.

Forget coordination. Forget balance.

It all went out the window, and I felt like a newborn deer trying to get my feet and legs underneath me.

Lord bless the other dancers, who were so encouraging and cheered us newbies on.

There was such a powerful lesson in those moments.

Feeling awkward didn’t mean I was failing.

Feeling nervous didn’t mean I wasn’t ready.

And not knowing what I was doing didn’t mean I didn’t belong in the room.

For years, I have asked my yoga students to walk into unfamiliar spaces and trust me.

“Come as you are.”

“Listen to your body.”

“Modify when you need to.”

“Comparison is the thief of joy.”

Suddenly, here I was being asked to practice all the things I’ve spent years teaching.

The irony was not lost on me.

I’m hardly in “peak” condition. After years of rehab and recovery, there are days when I feel as though I’m living in a body aged beyond my actual years. My body is a version of itself I hardly recognize.

Even looking in the mirror as we danced, I had to remember that I was there to love on myself.

To strengthen the parts of me that need strengthening.

To soften the spaces where I need softening.

I had forgotten how much I love learning new ways to move my body.

How much I love being a student.

And somewhere between barre work, unfamiliar combinations, trying to coordinate my arms, legs and feet, and laughing at myself while “leaping like a newborn deer” across the studio, something shifted.

I walked into that room wondering whether I would fit in or belong.

I walked out thinking:

I can learn this.

We Are Never Finished Becoming

Maybe that is one of the greatest gifts of allowing ourselves to become beginners again.

We tend to organize life into an imaginary progression where youth is for beginnings, middle age is for maintaining what we’ve built, and later in life we’re supposed to spend our time looking backward.

But life doesn’t actually work that way.

People fall in love again.

Someone picks up a paintbrush after decades away.

Someone returns to something they once loved as a child.

A two-year-old puts on ballet shoes for the first time.

And her mother puts them on for the first time, too.

Life continues to ask us to begin, even while it asks us to release.

Maybe living fully means continuing to find the edges of what we know and remaining curious about what might exist just beyond them.

Children do this naturally. Their entire world is an exploration of those edges.

As adults, we have the ability to arrange our lives around what we already know. We become comfortable with being competent.

But perhaps there is something waiting for us beyond the known, in the spaces where we allow ourselves to be new at something again.

As we move into this next season, I want to encourage you to take the leap, uncoordinated and wobbly if need be.

Know that you’ll be in good company.

And maybe your next beginning involves movement, flowers, creative arts or simply learning something new.

If so, I’d love to invite you to join me for one of my upcoming autumn events. And at our November gathering, there may even be a little taste of something new.

Upcoming Events

Sunday, October 18 at 9:30 AM Petals & Poses Cana Vineyards & Winery

Sunday, November 15 at 10:00 AM Petals & Poses Kalero Vineyard

November will include a little creative surprise and a glimpse of something new to come.

There is no age at which we are finished becoming.

See you on the mat, Friends.

With love, Rhonda