September is here, and can’t you just feel the changing of the seasons in the air?
But I wonder, how do you actually feel about this coming season? Perhaps you are more than ready for a change, or perhaps you just aren’t quite ready for the summer to be over just yet…
To be honest, I often struggle with the approaching fall. I am more of a summer person, you see. I just love the sociability that the warmer weather brings; the BBQs, beer gardens, beach trips, and picnics… the way that all the neighborhood kids play our on our street by day, and the way we gather around the fire pit with friends in the garden by night.
So right now I am clinging onto the last moments of summer with all that I have, and trying to wrangle every last moment of goodness from it that I can!
Perhaps I’d feel differently if I lived in a warmer climate, but the problem is that our British summers are just so short, and always feel gone far too soon…
Suddenly September arrives, and gone are those long, warm summer nights, replaced seemingly overnight by days that are darker, nights that are longer, skies that are greyer, and weather that is colder – all the early warning signs of the long and lingering winter months ahead.
As a Brit, I struggle to enjoy the seasonal shift back towards this wintertime, and if I could choose to live in summer all the time, I probably would! But the fact is that I really can’t spend more than half of every year feeling negative or wishing that I could be somewhere else – ideally somewhere hot and with a beach!
But as the years go on, I am slowly getting better at learning to accept every season in nature as a necessary and needed part of life.
A time for everything
One of very my favorite passages in the Bible is Ecclesiastes 3, a fairly well-known piece of poetry which is all about the different metaphorical seasons of life that we can each encounter with the passing of time; seasons of birth and seasons of death, seasons to plant and seasons to uproot, seasons of hurting and seasons of healing, seasons of joy and seasons of despair…
But right in the very opening refrains of this beautiful passage is this reminder that everything in life has its time and its place.
“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens.” (Ecclesiastes 3:1)
Of course, there are seasons of life that we all love to be in; seasons of breakthrough, celebration, and joy – but surely this promise about there being a time for everything, is just as true for the more challenging seasons as well?
Without some moments of sadness, how would we fully enjoy those moments of joy? Without some moments of difficulty, how would we ever learn to overcome? And without some seasons of loss, how well would we truly appreciate all that we have?
Although the fall may not be my favorite season, I am learning that every season has its times and its purpose; and although not every season feels as enjoyable as the next, I do believe that there is growth and learning to be found from it all.
What the fall is teaching me
There’s a famous quote from an unknown source that I see posted on social media a lot around this time of year and it says this:
“The trees are about to show us how lovely it is to let the dead things go.”
I think this is so true. But the act of letting old things go is often much easier said than done – especially when it comes to trying to hold on to old memories, hopes, dreams, or to the people and things that we love. Change can be really hard on our human hearts, can’t it?
But just as nature’s seasonal shifts keep making space for the dead things to fall to the ground and die so that something new can begin to bud up and grow, isn’t this also often so true in our lives? Sometimes we need to let go of those things that are no longer serving us or bearing any fruit.
There is a time and a purpose for every season because every season prepares the way for the next one… and then the one that comes after that. And in that respect, every season is a gift from God. Even the seasons of life that feel the hardest.
What season of life are you in?
I wonder what kind of life season you are in right now. For many of us, myself included, this present season is one of transitioning from the summer break, back into a more normal routine and pace of life around school and work. For many more of us, this season is one of uncertainty too, as the impact of the coronavirus pandemic continues to unfold.
But for me, this is also a season of waiting too; waiting to get pregnant or not get pregnant again, waiting for a conclusion to our three-year battle to have a second child, and waiting to finally be able to move onto a totally new chapter of our lives…
Some seasonal changes can’t come quick enough, can they?
It probably goes without saying that this particular season of infertility in my life hasn’t been an easy one. It’s just been laced with so much loss and grief.
But right in the midst of this season filled with waiting and longing for what’s next, each seasonal change within nature has become a kind of gift to me – a sort of reminder etched by God into nature itself that nothing lasts forever. Every season is finite. Everything has a beginning and an end, and He promises to make everything beautiful again in time.
Getting through hard seasons
In the meantime, I have decided to embrace the changing seasons and to focus on all that’s good in the passing of summer to winter. Because isn’t this the best way to get through any season in life that we don’t like?
Instead of resisting it, resenting it, or wasting our time complaining about our circumstances or wishing we could be somewhere else, what if we actually look for the goodness and proactively seek out the joy?
For me, that looks like really focusing in on all the things that I do like about the fall, rather than dwelling on what feels ‘over’ or ‘left behind’
This is an updated edition of a post originally published on Anna Kettle
Featured Image by Harold Wijnholds on Unsplash
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