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Contributed by Barbara Taylor

As we near the end of the annual Gregorian calendar we enter many celebrations that span cultural and religious lines: Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza, and Winter Solstice to name a few. While these celebrations differ in their history and traditions there is in all an aspect of ceremony that focuses on light. In the darkness, let there be light!

Winter solstice, for example, literally heralds the return of the light. Today, at 9:47 a.m. on the western coast of the continental United States the earth’s axial tilt is farthest away from the sun. In light terms, this is the shortest day of the year. From now until mid-June of 2010, our days will gradually get longer and the sun will incrementally rise in its daily path across the sky.

In the midst of the more commercial tangents of our seasonal celebrations we can easily forget about this turning of the seasons in the natural world that surrounds us. The solstices themselves transcend religious ideology: they are simply astronomical facts. Unlike our forebears, we no longer participate in—or pay much attention to—the cyclic interaction between the earth and the heavens. D. H. Lawrence lamented this fact many decades ago:

“Oh, what a catastrophe, what a maiming of love when it was made a personal, merely personal feeling, taken away from the rising and setting of the sun, and cut off from the magic connection of the solstice and equinox! This is what is the matter with us, we are bleeding at the roots, because we are cut off from the earth and sun and stars, and love is a grinning mockery, because, poor blossom, we plucked it from its stem on the tree of Life, and expected it to keep on blooming in our civilized vase on the table.”

This week, while doing some de-cluttering work in my studio space, I came upon a cardboard merchandise tag I saved from approximately two years ago. It’s a promotional tag from a Christmas advertising campaign launched that year by one of largest popular lingerie chains in the US. I recall exactly why I decided to hang on to it. I was shocked at the theme of the campaign, which was etched in bold letters and silver ink: “Give me everything I want and nothing I need.”

I cannot guess what D. H. Lawrence would say about this slogan, but I’m fairly certain he would see it as an equal catastrophe.

Richard Heinberg, in his 1993 book Celebrate the Solstice: Honoring the Earth’s Seasonal Rhythms through Festival and Ceremony, expresses our split from the natural world in this way:

“Now, we seem to be interested only in our human business. We rarely look up at the night sky, and we tend to observe a sunrise or sunset with only casual interest. Meanwhile, human society creaks and groans under the weight of violence, injustice, overpopulation, poverty, and greed. And our ties with nature are strained nearly to the breaking point from water and air pollution, the destruction of the ozone layer, global warming, species extinctions, and deforestation. Could there be a connection between our ignorance of the seasonal festivals and our loss or relatedness with one another and with the Earth?”

As we give ourselves a break from “our human business” to gather with family and friends this Holiday Season, let us give thanks for the light that literally creates our days and symbolically informs our consciousness as living, breathing, and loving human beings.

Whatever the challenges you have encountered this year, consider the ways in which your circumstances have helped you to grow as a person. Whatever your traditions at this particular time of year, I invite you to take a moment to pause and contemplate your place in the cosmos; to acknowledge and appreciate this turning of the seasons from the dark of winter into the growing light of spring.

When you light a candle in your living room or plug in the lights on the Christmas tree this week, remember and express gratitude for the light in all its myriad shapes and forms.

With our best wishes for the Season

All of us at Upside to the Downturn would like to take this opportunity to say “thank you” for your participation in our growing community.

We’ll be taking a little break from the column until the New Year. However, in the interim, we will be busy behind the scenes creating a new website to introduce a new “Upside Life” community experience.

Stay tuned!!  We are very excited about where we are headed for 2010 and beyond and look forward to your continued support and engagement.

Warmest regards,

The Team at Upside to the Downturn