Wintering Well
The transformative power of wintering
Before I get started…
I am teaching a yoga class online as a bit of a one off! Monday 16th December 7:30pm. This 75 minute class will take you through a nourishing slow flow (beginners welcome) and a beautiful meditation. The theme will be Wintering. Discover a softer side of yourself as you move your body to draw inwards at this time of year. ❄️
A week ago I finished the book “Wintering” by
.It’s been hard to put into words how much this book has had an effect on me, but I am going to attempt to do so!
Interestingly when I googled reviews of the book this is the first one I read:
Reading this made me giggle. Whilst I have been through more than a tummy ache I also do realise I am coming from a very privileged perspective. It’s interesting because the sentiment here is the exact opposite of what I felt reading the book - I actually loved the fact that nothing huge or crazy happens in the book (although more than a tummy ache definitely does). It doesn’t have some big reveal or some disastrous story that turns good. It’s subtle and soft. Which is echoed in what I believe the whole message of the book is - that rest, simplicity and slowing down is essential for us to find our paths.
This week I was asked to write a short bio for a podcast I am on. I was thinking about the fact that when I am “selling” myself and my business, I often talk about the big moments in my life: burnout, being signed off work, divorce, moving to Bali etc… it’s these moments that seem the impressive ones and that people want to talk about. But as I am learning and growing more, I realise that what I love to help people with, and what I love to talk about, is so much more subtle than these experiences that supposedly define us. Which I think is partly why I love this book so much.
Her use of language around the human experience is so beautiful, so eloquent and so symbolic of what it is like to move through the regular ups and downs of life. When I say regular, I don’t mean to dismiss the pain of these more regular moments. I am hoping to explain why I think this is such a powerful book - we often feel that in order to have the right to speak about our story and the right to feel our pain, something dramatic has to have happened. When in actual fact, the more common events in our life need more words to be spoken to.
So let’s get into the book…
Wintering is about the transformative power of winter and darker times. It’s a deeply reflective book that uses the metaphor of winter to explore the tough, quiet seasons of life - those moments when we’re forced to slow down, step back, or endure hardship.
Even though it may go against everything we have ever known, the book explores the incredible alchemy that can happen when allowing ourselves to hold space for our “winters” without judgement or criticism.
Katherine May shares her personal experiences with burnout, illness, and loss, weaving them with stories from nature, literature, and different cultural traditions.
So many women I work with talk about being lost, overwhelmed, stuck, unsure of who they are… and the key themes of this book are part of the antidote to this. Unfortunately most of us have been led to believe that the antidote is to put pressure on ourselves to do more, to berate ourselves for not being enough, to strive to figure things out.
But what if the answer was the complete opposite. To surrender and let go.
5 key themes of the book that I loved
1. Embracing Life’s Cycles.
Life has seasons, just like nature, and winter is one of them. The book reminds us that times of retreat and rest are natural and necessary, even if society pressures us to always be “on.” Instead of resisting, if we lean into these slower periods they can bear more fruit than we might have ever imagined for ourselves. Nature is something for us to work with not against. The beauty here lies in this acceptance, rather than a constant feeling of guilt. It makes me think of the idea of really using the winter as a time to prioritise presence over productivity.
“Life meanders like a path through the woods. We have seasons when we flourish and seasons when the leaves fall from us, revealing our bare bones. Given time, they grow again.”
2. Rest and Self-Care.
Wintering is a time to prioritize rest and nourishment. It’s not about giving up but about slowing down so we can heal and grow. In fact if we don’t use this time to look within and reflect, we won’t be able to do the necessary work in order to create the change we so often want. The book encourages us to embrace self-compassion and do what feels nurturing, allowing for simplicity in our lives. It’s like a deep understanding that the magic is actually in the nothingness. Which again, obviously goes against so much of what we have been taught about the world. Embracing rest is a revolutionary and extremely brave act because we have to sit with the discomfort of doing less and the fear around what other people might think of us.
“Wintering is a time of withdrawing from the world, maximizing scant resources, carrying out acts of brutal efficiency and vanishing from sight; but that’s where the transformation occurs.”
3. The Power of Solitude.
Spending time alone isn’t something to fear but something to value. Solitude gives us space to reflect, process, and rediscover what’s most important to us. Katherine May sees solitude not as isolation but as an essential space for introspection and renewal during life’s “winter” seasons, ultimately helping us emerge as stronger and more authentic versions of ourselves. It’s like we can’t fully know ourselves unless we get quiet and spend time alone.
“There are gaps in the mesh of the everyday world, and sometimes they open up and you fall through them into Somewhere Else.”