Rising Rooted

Building new old traditions, imperfectly.

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There seems to be a spiritual hunger in many people I know.

I feel it in myself, too.

Perhaps it comes from living in a world that asks us to move faster than our bodies can sustain. Perhaps it comes from feeling disconnected from the land, from one another, or from the traditions that once helped people make meaning from the turning of the year.

As I’ve explored ecospirituality and depth psychology, and as I’ve wrestled with questions of ancestry and decolonization, I have found myself wondering about the traditions that once shaped my ancestors’ lives. What rhythms guided them? What stories helped them make meaning? What rituals marked the passing of time?

I have more questions than answers, and more gaps than certainty. I think that this uncertainty is part of the journey.

Over the years, I have found myself drawn toward the Wheel of the Year—not as a historical reconstruction or a perfect spiritual system, but as a way of reclaiming rhythm.

The Purpose of Ritual Is Not Perfection

If I’m being honest, I miss more celebrations than I remember.

I have thought about celebrating the solstice far more times than I have actually celebrated it. In my mind, I imagine beautiful gatherings, handmade decorations, meaningful rituals, and carefully prepared meals. Then life happens. I forget. I remember three days later. I light a candle and laugh at myself.

I have come to believe that this counts.

Because the purpose of ritual isn’t perfection. It is remembering.

Why I Keep Returning to Cyclical Time

One of the greatest gifts of the Wheel of the Year has been helping me step outside the linear understanding of time that dominates modern life.

Our culture tends to treat life as though we are climbing a ladder. We are supposed to constantly improve, constantly produce, constantly move forward with a steady and reliable output. But bodies do not work that way. Neither does grief. Neither does healing. Neither does creativity.

Neither does life itself.

Understanding time as cyclical has helped me come to terms with endings, with rest, and even with death itself. It has softened some of my anxiety around productivity and helped me reclaim a more compassionate relationship with my body and its changing capacities.

Growth, I think, looks much more like a spiral than a ladder. We revisit themes. We return to familiar questions. We encounter old wounds from new vantage points. Endings become beginnings.

Perhaps the goal is not to arrive somewhere, but to learn how to move with the rhythms of life itself.

This idea has become important enough to me that it forms the backbone of an upcoming Foxfire School offering called A Year of Rhythm. The whole premise is simple: what if we stopped trying to force ourselves into linear growth and instead learned to move with the rhythms of the body, the seasons, and the wider world?

A Quick Note on History and Humility

The modern Wheel of the Year is a contemporary neo-pagan framework that weaves together older seasonal festivals, particularly from Celtic traditions, with the solstices and equinoxes. Though many of its roots are ancient, the wheel itself is not a perfectly preserved historical system.

That feels important to acknowledge.

I am not trying to reconstruct European ideas, nor am I claiming expertise in Celtic traditions. Nor am I attempting to borrow from Indigenous traditions that are not mine. Though I deeply value and learn from the teachings and seasonal frameworks of the land where I live, I try to approach traditions outside my own with humility, relationship, and respect.

For me, this practice is less about historical accuracy and more about cultivating relationship—with the land I inhabit, with my ancestral roots, and with the larger story of the cosmos.

It is simply one framework among many that helps me pay attention.

Learning the Rhythm of Light and Dark

If the full Wheel of the Year feels overwhelming, I want to offer permission to begin very simply.

Begin with two.

Living in Canada, I have come to experience the year as two broad seasons. There is the dark season, which for me stretches roughly from October through March, and the light season, which runs from April through September. Of course, your seasons may look different depending on where you live, and I think that is part of the beauty of seasonal living. These rhythms are meant to emerge in relationship with the land beneath your feet.

The Dark Season (October–March)

The dark season invites me inward.

It is a season of roots and dreams, of grief and mystery, of slower rhythms and quieter pleasures. It is a season for books, soups, candles, long conversations, and learning to trust that things are still happening beneath the surface.

Winter has taught me that dormancy is not the same thing as death. Not everything needs to bloom all the time.

The Light Season (April–September)

The light season carries a different energy.

It pulls me outward and back into relationship with the world. It is a season of gardens and gatherings, of embodiment and participation, of swimming and bare feet and noticing how much easier it is to say yes to life when the sun lingers longer.

There is creativity in this season, and movement, and a certain kind of joy that asks to be shared.

Honestly, if this is all you ever do—if you simply begin to notice the difference between the light and dark seasons and allow yourself to move with them—I think that is enough.

Noticing the Great Turning Points

Once I became familiar with the broader rhythm of light and dark, I naturally began noticing the larger hinges of the year.

The solstices and equinoxes are harder to miss. You can almost feel them approaching. The quality of the light changes. The air shifts. Something in the body seems to know that a transition is underway.

Winter Solstice — The Longest Night

Around December 21

The Winter Solstice marks the darkest day of the year. Here in Canada, winter has fully arrived by this point, and the landscape can feel harsh and inhospitable. Perhaps that is why this season has always felt to me like a time for warmth and connection.

This turning point reminds me that survival is not something we do alone. It is a season for gathering close, tending small lights, and trusting that the sun will slowly begin its return.

Reflection: What light is alive inside of me?

Spring Equinox — The Balance That Turns Toward Light

Around March 20

For a brief moment, day and night stand in balance. But the momentum has shifted.

The mud arrives. The snow begins to recede. Tiny hints of life emerge. Spring, at least where I live, feels awkward and hopeful all at once.

This season reminds me that growth rarely arrives in dramatic moments. More often, it comes quietly.

Reflection: What needs tending?

Summer Solstice — The Season of Fullness

Around June 20

The Summer Solstice brings the longest day of the year and marks the height of the light season.

The gardens are growing. The lakes are warm. People linger outside. There is a sense of abundance and participation in the air.

Summer reminds me that there comes a time to stop endlessly preparing and step into life more fully. To gather. To celebrate. To embody the wisdom cultivated during the darker months.

Reflection: How am I living what I know?

Autumn Equinox — Gathering In

Around September 22

Another moment of balance, though this time the world leans toward darkness.

Autumn Equinox always feels like harvest season to me. There is gratitude in the air, but also a quiet preparation. A sense that something is beginning to wind down and that the wheel is slowly turning inward once again.

There is beauty in this season, and perhaps a little melancholy too.

Reflection: What am I gathering in to sustain me through the dark?

Going Deeper Into the Wheel

I am solid with the light and dark seasons now. I feel the solstices and equinoxes approaching. The four cross-quarter festivals still surprise me. Often, I realize they have passed a few days later.

I’m learning that this counts too.

The full Wheel of the Year adds four mid-season festivals, often called the fire festivals. Historically, these have particularly strong roots in Celtic traditions. I’m still learning them, and I suspect I will be learning them for many years to come.

Samhain — Crossing the Threshold

Around October 31

Samhain marks the beginning of the dark season and has long been associated with ancestors, endings, grief, and the mystery of death. It feels like standing on a threshold, looking inward, and preparing to descend.

Reflection: What needs releasing?

Imbolc — The First Whisper of Spring

Around February 1

Here in Canada, the ground is still deeply frozen. Yet somehow, something has shifted.

Imbolc doesn’t feel like spring itself. It feels like possibility. Like the first subtle stirring beneath the snow.

Reflection: What wants to awaken?

Beltane — The Wild Pulse of Life

Around May 1

Beltane feels joyful to me. There is beauty and vitality in this season. Blossoms are opening. The world is coming alive again.

It is a season that reminds me that pleasure matters, and that joy deserves a place in our spiritual lives.

Reflection: What brings me alive?

Lughnasadh — The First Harvest

Around August 1

By August, something is beginning to ripen.

Lughnasadh invites gratitude for what has grown and honesty about what still requires tending. It asks us to notice what our efforts have produced and to celebrate the gifts that have emerged.

Reflection: What is coming to fruition?

Building New Old Traditions

I suspect many of us are trying to do this.

Not to recreate the lives of our ancestors. Not to perform spirituality. Not to appropriate traditions that are not ours.

But simply to build lives that feel rooted.

Lives that honour our bodies. Lives that acknowledge the turning of the seasons. Lives that leave room for mystery.

Perhaps this is the deepest wisdom cyclical time has offered me.

Not that I need to master every season or celebrate every festival. Not that I need to do things perfectly.

Lighting a candle counts. Watching the first snowfall counts. Having a bonfire counts. Making soup with friends counts. Missing the date entirely and remembering three days later counts. Taking a deep breath and noticing the sky counts.

The purpose of ritual isn’t performance.

It is relationship. It is remembering.

And perhaps that is what I am really trying to build here.

Not perfect traditions. Not historical certainty. Not a spiritual aesthetic.

Just a quieter, slower, more human way of moving through time.

One season at a time.

And if I forget?

Well, the wheel will come around again.

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If this spoke to something in you, there are a few paths you can follow from here:

Each door leads somewhere different. It is my hope that all of them lead back to you.

<3 Rachel