I was out for a walk yesterday, the sun was shining and the temperature was cold. There was a small amount of snow and frost on the ground where the sun had not reached. It was a fresh day and I was glad to be outside.
At one point in the walk, we walked past a man made hill with a structure on the top. The winter sun had melted all the snow on one side, but when we walked up past the other side it was cold, frosty and snowy. A complete contrast.
It was a pretty impressive moment to see both sides. It looks as though one side of the hill is staying in winter whilst the other side was ready to move on and grow as spring approaches. The hill was in contrast – two seasons at the same time. This made me think we are not just one sided with one emotion. We can hold two states at once.
This contrast doesn’t affect the hill, it is nature and it was allowing it to be both warm and cold, light and dark. Yet why are we always striving to be one or the other. We want to be only one thing or think we should only be one. In reality, we can be both light and dark, happy and sad, motivated and unmotivated. You can be in opposites particularly if you are going through a period of change or growth.
Why do we put pressure on ourselves to only feel one thing. We think we should be motivated 100% when we set new goals, in the real world it is ok to not want to get out of bed on a rainy morning to run 5k, our motivation is still there but our warm bed wins over a cold rainy day.
If we are feeling stressed about work the contrast is we could be feeling calm when we are at home. We can be in two emotional states at once, side by side, yet we treat mixed emotions as if they both can’t be happening at the same time, when actually it is part of being human.
Looking at the hill we feel we have to be neatly packaged into being one thing or the other, consistent and linear when in fact our lives don’t work that way. We can be excited but anxious, scared but curious, hopeful and uncertain.
If you think of a season and moving into the next, sometimes there is a mix of both whilst the season begins and ends and just like the hill whilst one side is warming up and facing the sun, the other side might still be in the dark away from the light and the new things to come. It doesn’t make it wrong, it is as nature intended.
We seem to put pressure on ourselves to be one thing or another and have one emotion at a time we can either be happy or sad, we shouldn’t be both. But you can be. Usually if we are having a bad day, not everything is the day is terrible. We might class it as a bad day but infact many positives came from it.
The hill shows us we can be both at once. You can feel both happy and sad, or angry and calm. Nothing is static, our emotions are moving constantly and we may feel up one minute and down the next. That is ok. You need to feel your feelings.
Thinking of the hill, why not allow the sunny side of you to shine and at the same time allow the snowy side of you to shimmer.
If you feel pulled in different directions right now by your emotions and mental state perhaps this is a reminder to you that you don’t need to fit perfectly into one. Just notice where you are right now. What feels warm and sunny and what still feels cold or unresolved. Be at peace with each state and let your mind be patient without rushing to move on from one or get to the other.
Just like the hill, you are allowed to be a place where two seasons meet.
This hill isn’t special but the photos taken minutes apart really resonated with me. It reminded me we are human and like nature we can be in two states of mind or two seasons at the same time. If a hill can hold two seasons without apology, perhaps we can allow ourselves to hold two feelings without judgement.
Have a great week, look after both sides of you.
Love Emma xx
Wellbeing with Relaxing Lavender 