Lessons From the Fall Tree

By. Anna Michelle

I never noticed how much I missed seasons until I had them again.

Time stagnated, living in an eternal summer. There was no difference between February and July. Everything was the same: sunshine, pool days, palm trees and everyone telling me that I should be happy because I live in paradise.

But it wasn't paradise.

Not when it is the same thing I lived every day.

Day after day. For weeks and months that turned into years and suddenly I was wondering where my life had gone and if I'd even accomplished anything. I felt bad for being down because the sun was shining and the world was beautiful but all around me things were falling apart and there were people out my window trying to take away everything I love.

Time seemed to both stagnate and move at lightning speed, those years in Florida. We did a lot, went through a lot, I lost and found myself so many times I'm not sure I really know who I am, but I do know who I'm not.

I felt out of touch with the natural rhythm of life and the world. I'd go to the woods and see the different animals, the different plants in bloom. My years weren't divided into spring, summer, fall and winter. They were divided into baby gator or grasshopper season at Oakland nature preserve, can't leave your house without sweating immediately time, Christmastime where we forced ourselves into sweaters and marveled at fake Disney World snow, and the time of year when our northern friends complained of real snow and cold and we posted obnoxious pictures of us at the pool on a February Tuesday basking in the sunshine.

Things changed, for sure, but I was so disconnected from it. I had to be so particular and intentional about seeing those changes. I had to go so far outside of my day to day life to realize that things were changing and the world was still spinning on its axis just like it was supposed to. But it was so hard to go outside of my bubble when I was sad and disconnected. It took so much effort and energy I just didn’t have in me as much as I wanted to. So the cycle would continue.

Nothing felt real. Nothing at all. It was just going through the motions, feeling guilty no matter if I were happy or sad. Calendar pages were turning but everything felt the same so eventually we stopped changing the calendar on the wall and it was November until we took the calendar down to move out the next August. Things were nice, things were good in a lot of ways, but it felt like I was a player in someone else's life going through the motions trying to be what other people thought I should be.

Everything was for someone else, to prove something else. I built a box made up from other people’s suggestions and tried to force myself into it.

Watching the seasons change has provided me with so much peace regarding the inner turmoil I always seem to find myself in.

This year, we moved to Massachusetts, and I immersed myself in being mindful of the way the natural world changed around me. I watched with wonder as the green faded from the leaves and they became speckled with red and yellow and orange. They weren't just one thing or another, they changed slowly and also all at once.

It reminded me that we don't have to just move from one thing to the next, we deserve transition time. We deserve to have speckles of all the things that make us, us all at the same time.

The leaves in October were unafraid to show all of their colors, all of the facets of who they are. The tree slowly shook them off, creating little piles of flames at its base holding on to the ones that still needed their moment to shine.

Then, the days grew shorter and the calendar changed from October to November (we flipped the calendar this time), and the leaves were no longer bright and brilliant. They were rust colored, dark reds and purples and browns, less golden colors in the backyard woods.

But they were still beautiful.

The days wore on and the tree was ready to shake the leaves off so the piles at the base darkened and grew. The tree turned bare and some people think it looks sad and dead, but I think it's just another form of the tree that is just as much a part of who it is as when it is lush and green in bloom in summer and brilliantly bright in fall. The tree stands there, ready to weather the storm. While we all bundle up, she shakes down the layers that are no longer serving her and stands tall and confident in who she is.

More than anything, it is a lesson in letting go. I think we talk a lot about letting go of things that hurt, that no longer serve us, that are negative in some way. All of that is important, true, but what about things that aren't bad but just don't resonate anymore? The dreams we had that changed along the pathway to achieving them. The goals we realized weren't what we wanted. The friends who have done no wrong but we don't have anything in common with anymore. 

I struggle with letting go in a variety of ways. I suck the life out of everything. I wait and I hang on with an iron fist until I'm shoved away or until I physically can't hang on anymore. I don't understand how to let go to make room for bigger things. Stripping away to rest and make room for new growth once spring comes around. I don't know how to live with empty space without desperately trying to fill it with things that don't fit. I look at it as a lack, like there must be something wrong with me.

If there is an empty space, I must fill it.

But then I look at the winter tree, still reaching toward the sky and standing tall even devoid of her beautiful leaves or springtime blooms. She doesn't rush to grow new green leaves before winter has thawed and she's processed the loss and created the space she needs. I would be the tree desperately clinging to the dead, brown leaves at the end of fall into winter even when the weight of the snow makes the leaves beg to be released. I wouldn't let them go until the buds of new leaves were there and then I'd shake them off violently begging them to get away because I don't need them anymore and they're crowding me.

My transitions are rough and abrupt and I cling to stuff until I really, really don't need it anymore and then I toss it to the side like it's garbage once I have new plans in place.

This is true of friendships, creative projects, life goals, anything. I haven't been able to just be, to move naturally, fluidly through the seasons of life.

Everything is a challenge. There is an immediacy to things. I feel like once I make a decision, I have to enact it right away or it is a failure or impossible or put on a shelf until I inevitably come back around to it. There is no space to let things unfold.

There are a handful of things I have circled around and around again and tried to come back to that really do feel right, but then I force them.

I  panic that I am not doing enough, that I will never get where I want to go then I get frazzled and frantic.

If I have a problem with a friend or someone, it becomes all-consuming: I want it fixed or I want it gone.

I pick apart everything. I am over critical and self sabotage myself before I can even get going.

But this fall since the move to Massachusetts has been different. I’ve watched the earth move slowly through these transitions and then woken up feeling like it was fleeting. I noticed some trees shook off their leaves by mid-October, and some held on until early December. Now in the early days of spring, some are eager to blossom and others will stay barren until May.

What I’ve learned is that it is okay to take your time, it is okay to move quickly. It is okay to change your pace based on your energy levels or the situation or circumstances. Nothing is the same, and you don’t have to do everything the same way.

The important thing is to be in tune. For me, that is nature. For you, that may be something else entirely, but whatever it is, connect to it. It is more powerful than you know.

Anna Michelle is a poet, writer, teacher, mother, storyteller and lover of anything woodsy and wordsy based outside of Boston, Massachusetts. Her poetry covers themes from heartbreak, addiction, familial relationships, depression and anxiety. She believes in living life out loud and writing from the heart. Through her work, she aims to create connection and community and help people see they are not alone in their struggles. Writing has been deeply therapeutic to her, and she hopes to empower others to use writing as a tool on their own healing journeys. We all have stories to tell if only we are brave enough to open our hearts and share them. She self-published her first poetry collection "Confines and Candlelight" on Amazon in fall 2018 and her second, "Views from the Valley" the following year. Her work has also been featured on elephantjournal.com, For Women Who Roar and yogagirl.com.