Lessons From Our Breath; Shedding, Cycles, and the Power of the Crone

Last weekend I spent time in a quiet little town in Wyoming facilitating two night of ceremonial breathwork, a style of breathwork that supports the breather in building resiliency and adaptability in their nervous system and exploring expanded states of consciousness similar to a plant medicine ceremony.

Before the ceremony, the steward of the land we breathed on, her two daughters and I gathered sticks and stones, leaves and branches, feathers from a fallen owl, and one large weathered vertebrae to build an earth grid that would hold, guide and support the energy for the weekend. And it did. A mirror for the season; the slow crawl toward winter. A cradle of the feminine. An invitation into the unknown. Into feeling. Into our depths, into our darkness. An honoring of the energy of the archetype of the Crone. Detachment. Decay. Decomposition.

I’ve spent a fair amount of time post-ceremony noodling on some of the themes that arose; death and shedding, cycles and the power and mystery of the crone archetype and while these musings were born out of union with the breath, I feel they’re beautifully relevant regardless— so, take what you need and leave the rest.

Ceremony is a powerful portal. It is evocative, layered and a hefty invitation inward— a place so many of us often avoid.

As I reflect, I’m reminded, through all of the shares from the weekend, of the importance of remembering that illumination (thank you full moon energy) is a potent teacher. A wise and powerful guide— often uncomfortable. And paired with the wisdom of the crone, and the whispers of this season of shedding, we are empowered to release our attachments. Even if one tendril at a time.

The Crone invites us into the remembrance that, as humans, we are cyclical beings. We do not naturally stay stagnant. Just like nature we bloom and shed and die and are reborn into new versions of ourselves— if we allow it.

When our masculine and feminine energies—universal qualities inherent in all of us, not tied to gender—are in balance, we can bring the unconscious into consciousness, allowing awareness, illumination, and integration to occur. We can ferry the unconscious parts of us (old wounds, body memories, limiting beliefs, repressed emotions, or spiritual insights) into consciousness, allow awareness and illumination to take place, and then integrate them back into the body, metabolizing them (definition: to change into a form that can be used by your body), sourcing our experiences for the nutrients they offer and allowing the rest to be released back to the earth.

Death & decomposition are important parts of regeneration, but something that we are largely uncomfortable with in our culture. In our society we worship youth. We are expected to always be in motion, in vibrancy, in production. The linear mind rules. But even the trees shed their leaves in order to root deeper into the earth. Still, too, the Carrion birds are nourished by endings.

We are not separate. We too must release in order to expand. We must create space in our nervous system in order to hold more. Our capacity to be with what is uncomfortable is our capacity to be in connection; in joy, in depth, in intimacy— with all that is.

That is the invitation of the season. Of the crone. To embrace the unraveling. To honor the illumination. To hold sacred the revelation of what you’ve been holding. To release the need to ‘do’ and instead, allow yourself to be. To be with yourself. To be with what's true for you. And watch as it transforms.

Wishing you all sweetness in your system as you move deeper into the embrace of the crone, and your own process of illumination and integration.

~ Taren