How do you mark the passage of time?

We count birthdays and perhaps the years we have survived past the death of a loved one. Maybe we eagerly look forward to completing a final exam or gearing up for a new project.

As collective communities we recognize the passage of seasons.  Human beings celebrate the Lunar New Year in early spring for example, the summer solstice, or the countdown to midnight on December 31st. 

This time of year, I remember the glow of Mid-Autumn Festival and my growing up years in Hong Kong.  There were lights, sounds and smells of this time in the City. Walking the smaller side streets of our neighborhood, I marveled at the richly colored lanterns hanging in many store fronts. Formed from artfully stretched cellophane the deep red and yellow-orange colors danced in the slightest breeze. Look a fish, round eyed rabbits, and occasionally a flying dragon! It was a special treat simply to stay out late with other children in the park, proudly and carefully handling our lighted prizes of the evening.  Years later I learned that the lanterns symbolized lighting a path to good fortune. 

The corner bakery coaxed us along with its constant lure of freshly baked dan-tat (egg tart) and sesame buns. In the weeks before Moon Festival there were special boxes of mooncakes too. I remember the first time I saw my dad cut a mooncake open to reveal a whole egg yolk in the center of the sweet bean paste. There was awe in me as he explained it was the “moon” inside the cake. Side note: 3-5-year-old humans are an excellent audience for magical reality!

How we celebrated Mid-Autumn evolved over time to meet changing needs and shifting priorities.  The constant was our reunion of family and friends (and food) aspect of the festival. The sounds of cooking and cleaning, chatter, debate and laughter remain interlaced in the memories of these late summer/early autumn gatherings.  I have to say that I come from people that do not need much of an excuse to gather and feast, but Moon Festival always felt special.  Today I realize that at this time of year it feels like there is truly a big shift happening all over the Earth.

Many of us are directly or indirectly connected to K-12 and university education where the feeling of “back to school” time is almost universal. Yet, now I’m talking about something with more depth.  In me there is a certain awareness that begins days after the “start” of school. It’s after the routine has been established. It feels like an energetic quickening. Let me explain through the lens of my own daily movement practice…

I get on my mat and there are usually 10 mins of movement and breath I go to automatically. I don’t think.  I simply start moving and focus my mind on my breath. Around that 10 min mark is where I sense the quickening.

Quickening- wuh?

I can distinctly hear or feel what my body desires. I can clearly follow the thread of strength or release that my body needs; I know deep in my bones to keep breathing and keep listening, I have faith I can see it through to the other side. 

What is this awareness?  It feels like I was fumbling in the dark until lights got turned on, or if I was trying to look out in blinding sunshine and then I found shade. It’s an expansive inner awareness. The mindful movement techniques I’ve been studying for the last two decades invite practitioners to take what we learn on the mat (so to speak) and apply it to our lives off the mat. 

Mid-Autumn is a time when we can see the days growing shorter, we can sense a coming chill in temperature.  The seasons do change.  I wonder if the quickening I sense in the air around this time of year is a reminder that indeed with the passage of harvest, time marches through autumn and eventually comes the quiet of winter. I wonder how the turning wheel of time plays in our minds and hearts.  

In our weekly conversations my dear friend Sharon Williams will occasionally use the phrase “that makes me feel some kind of way.”  I love that phrase because, in context, it can speak volumes on a topic. Out of context it is 100% neutral.  Could it be that the coming of winter makes us feel some kind of way?

I wonder if when we go through the motions of “back to school”, or when we prepare for the traditions of Mid-Autumn, we are giving ourselves a chance to attune.  Like the first 5-10 mins on the mat, to tune into our inner awareness. Then when we feel the quickening, we listen and breathe, and choose to keep listening and breathing, with faith we can follow the thread all the way through.

Let’s listen, breathe and keep moving. 

HAPPY MID-AUTUMN FESTIVAL!