On Winter, Water, and the Root Beneath All Growth
When you hold a seed in your hand, it looks still. Closed. Ordinary. Yet inside is a blueprint for forests, flowers, nourishment, medicine.
And when that seed meets soil, the very first thing it does is not grow upward.
It does not rush to show its leaves or reach toward the sun.
It grows a root.
Quietly. Invisibly. Downward — into darkness, moisture, nourishment.
Only when it finds water, stability, minerals, safety — only then can it rise.
There is something deeply human in that.
Winter whispers the same truth.
The Season of the Root —Why Winter Asks Us to Go Inward
According to Chinese Medicine, winter belongs to the Water Element, the domain of the Kidneys and Bladder, our deepest storehouse of life-force (Jing).
It’s the season of rest, reflection, conserving energy, and nourishing the quiet flame within.
In Shiatsu and Meridian theory, the kidney channel runs deep along the inner legs — from the soles of the feet up into the core of the body.
When this meridian is nourished:
- we feel grounded rather than scattered
- we sleep deeper
- fear softens into trust
- the nervous system settles
- creativity stirs again — slowly, like sap in a tree
This is not the time for pushing, forcing or blooming.
It’s the time for coming back to the root — to what feeds us.
Cacao & Sound — Medicine for Deep Winter
Ceremonial Cacao is known in Amazonian traditions as a gentle heart-teacher.
Not a stimulant — a soft opener.
She warms the body, increases blood flow, and invites us to feel instead of think.
Combined with Sound Bath— bowls, gong, drum, voice — the effect is primal.
Sound travels where words cannot.
Vibration meets the water in the body, meeting fascia, organs, bone, emotion —
and begins sound-based nervous-system healing from the inside out.
As the drum calls the heartbeat of Earth, as bowls shimmer through the kidney field, as breath slows…
the body remembers how to rest.
How to root.
How to receive.
Why This Practice Matters in Mid December
In the middle of December, we are often pulled outward — plans, gifts, events, decisions.
But nature is doing the opposite.
Bears are sleeping. Trees are bare. Seeds are hidden in soil, preparing quietly.
The wisest thing we can do right now is what the seed does.
Root down.
Drink nourishment.
Stop trying to bloom.
Our upcoming session is built exactly for that —
Yin Yoga for the Kidney/Bladder meridians + Cacao + Sound Healing
A space to soften the spine like water, melt into long-held poses, and let sound unwind the fascia.
A place to remember your inner winter — the cave, the soil, the seed.
When the root is nourished, growth becomes effortless in spring.
Try This at Home — A One-Minute Root Practice
Sit or stand with bare feet on the ground.
Take a slow breath in through your nose.
On the exhale, imagine roots growing from your feet into the earth —
thick, dark, steady, like winter trees.
Now ask yourself gently:
What nourishes my roots right now — not my goals, not my future self — but me, today?
Notice what arises without judgement.
Often the answer surprises us.
Sometimes it’s rest.
Sometimes water.
Sometimes saying no. Sometimes saying yes.
Sometimes just placing a warm hand on the belly.
This moment of awareness is the aha —
rooting begins with listening.
A Warm Invitation
If your body is calling for stillness, for warmth, for inner nourishment,
you’re welcome to join us for this winter gathering —
to rest like the seed rests,
to be held like soil holds the seed,
to root before rising.
Because sound-based nervous-system healing, Yin Yoga, and Cacao are more than practices —
they are a remembering.
A remembering that the deepest growth begins in the dark.
With love,
Aya 🤍