There are times in our lives that are about rising and expanding out into the world, feeling purposeful, forming and crystallising our ideas and our identities…
…and times where it’s about the tide coming back in: questioning who we are, what we’re doing or how we’ve been operating, feeling like we’ve outgrown our lives and need to shed old skins. Times of disorientation where we dissolve identities, where life holds a magnifying glass over aspects within and around us that we had previously been too busy or distracted to pay attention to. We can feel like our usual anchors are no longer there, there’s nothing to hold on to and we might feel confused, untethered, anxious or even panicked. Will it ever end? What’s gone wrong?!
I imagine we all know what it is to have times where we’re descending into the underworld or the void.
This is the cycle of death and rebirth we all go through and it’s how we evolve and grow and become a mature human. Life is a series of ascents and descents, contractions and expansions.
Those of us that have been hit by serious illness, grief or have a womb that’s cycling or experience in the menopause journey, are probably be even more familiar with this.
And even though it’s an integral and archetypal aspect of the human experience, we have very little cultural understanding around this, which is one of the things that makes it hard to recognize, honour and navigate well.
By their very nature these times are challenging, but we make them so much harder than they need to be. Feeling like something has gone wrong means we can easily end up avoiding or trying to bypass these invitations to grow, that are so crucial for our development towards and into maturity.
So… how do we navigate these times well?
As being a student of descent is something I’ve been coming to know intimately over the past years, I felt inspired to share some reflections on what I consider essential tools for their navigation, and also a personal story from my past around the most intense experience of rising from the ashes that I’ve ever had.
#1 Can I become aware that this is a descent?
Although by their very nature, these times require us to let go of our minds trying to figure things out or fix things, having the awareness to recognise when we’re in a descent is so valuable! If we know that what is happening to us is part a cyclical pattern of life and an opportunity to ultimately grow, we can remember that nothing has gone wrong. Not easy in a Yin-phobic culture that values only the ascent.
To foster a culture that honours descent, we need a language in order describe it - part of the reason I like to write and speak about it! Being able to name what we are experiencing can bring relief and help normalise the experience.
#2 How can I trust?
Part of the initiatory nature of the descent and our hero’s journey ultimately towards rebirth, is that there will be moments where we feel head below water. Moments where it feels like it’s too much and we can’t go on. Moments where we lose hope or forget out trust. This is an essential part of it, and how we grow: we find the strength we didn’t know we had through being stretched. We must dig deep in order to find the gold that will always be waiting for us in the darkest corners.
And somewhere in the future, expansion waits for us, just as Spring always follows Winter. We will come out the other side, wiser and more connected to our essence and who we truly are.
Trust is our superpower in times of descent. Remembering that we’re currently being worked by life and its cyclical intelligence and that it won’t always be this way, can help us surrender to the process and bring a little relief.
#3 What am I being invited to surrender to?
I remember how at the end of my Saturn Returns just before I hit 30, I miscarried the baby I was carrying whilst simultaneously finding out that my boyfriend was having an affair with a friend.
I was consumed by a torment and a cellular grief that I had never known before and haven’t known since. The days after coming out of surgery and sitting in my room on my own, knowing that meanwhile he was experiencing the high of a fresh new love bubble, were unbearably miserable. I remember scrolling and scrolling the phone numbers stored in my phone, desperately trying to find someone I felt I could talk to but not finding anyone who felt right. And yet I couldn’t give up and kept trying, kept scrolling in an endless spiral of resistance.
Finally, I gave in. I was alone. There was no one who was going to be there for me and make things feel better. That was the moment I let myself die to the pain, let it swallow me and I utterly gave myself and surrendered to the process. This catalysed what I can only describe as a kind of ecstatic upwelling over the next days, a dragon like strength and resilience that equally, I had never experienced nor have since.
Looking back I can see how this was an initiation into womanhood for me, a painful yet important part of my journey where looking back I now see it as life before, and life after.
We’ve been taught that surrendering is weakness. This is a dangerous lie that creates immense imbalance within us and the world around us.
Even if our process is less dramatic than the one above, times of descent are invitations to practice the mantra “what is asking to be loved and surrendered to right now?”
I have found times of descent to also be potent gateways to our spiritual connection to life: an area which is easy to neglect in a world that’s obsessed with doing and exerting control (the opposite to the Yin skills of surrender and receptivity). When we come out of our ‘business as usual’ modes, we have the opportunity to slow down, and to drop into a deeper intimacy with life, so that we can actually let it in, listen, allow something greater than us to hold us and guide us.
#4 What are my guiding north stars?
My guiding north stars for much of my life have been largely unconscious driving forces and survival strategies, which began to no longer feel aligned in the last years. Recently, with the support of my mentor, Kate Codrington and a simple ritual, I honed in on four guiding north stars for this current chapter, which I can keep coming back to in moments of confusion and disorientation. Without them I was finding myself feeling somewhat paralysed within the chaos, and even though I have no idea what direction my life is heading in, they give me a direction to grow in.
If your usual goals or guiding north stars no longer feel aligned, or you are feeling in need of an anchor, what are the signs of life pointing you towards focusing on?
It can be anything that feels resonant for you and as simple as keep coming back to being present with and loving what is, to having a deep look at your foundation and changing your priorities to e.g honouring your own boundaries over putting others needs before yours.
You could commit to writing your guiding north stars down every morning for a period, or write them and take a photo and save it as your phone home screen or any other creative way to keep them alive.
#5 How can I feel more supported?
The journey of descent can be such a lonely and alienating one, and yet I really don’t think it needs to involve the suffering that it can so often entail. We live in a remarkable day and age where the internet means we have a wealth of resources at our finger tips, blogs (like this one!), books (check out Carly Mountain’s book Descent & Rising) or podcasts (e.g by Maya Luna). The knowledge of cycles and cyclical living offers an invitation to feel held within that greater intelligence, and although reaching out for help can feel daunting, people are more often than not, touched to know that you’d value their support. In any case, if a descent is something you are currently navigating, I hope you feel a little less alone through reading this.