“When fallowness strikes, it is important to place it in the context of the creative cycle. After the period of conception – an exciting period during which we sparkle with ideas – comes the time of gathering and preparation, when things get moving. This is followed by a period of growth, which cannot be hurried, and then by the moment of ripeness, when the idea must manifest or the project get off the ground. This is followed by a time of enjoyment and appreciation when we can share our manifest idea or plan with others. Then we must let our idea go to make its ways through the world. After all that has happened, we come to the time of fallowness.
To honor our own creative cycle and patterns, we must respect this period and learn to be as empty and receptive as we can. After any birth and manifestation, we are too tired to immediately reconceive: we need this time of rest when we lie as fallow as the unplowed field that the farmer sets aside for several seasons to regain its fertility. Let us honour our fallowness, our uncreating emptiness, by cutting ourselves some slack and giving mind and heart time to recover their former savour in a new season. Fallowness is the ground of our conception: when the soil is ready, the seed will fall and germinate.”
From The Celtic Spirit: Daily Meditations for the Turning Year by Caitlin Matthews
Chorlton Unitarians 