Looking at these roses in my apartment the other day, I began to think about seasons and what blooming looks like while in a dry or winter season. No flowers bloom all year long, but what about people? Winter for me has become a metaphorical season, a season where growth feels stagnant and my days feel mostly dark and cold. While the summer months of heat and sun do bring most people, including myself, a sense of renewal and joy, I think the cold front can sweep through at any time and when it does, it often feels like the season may never change. It often feels like you may be stuck in winter forever.
I recently heard a song by Hillsong Worship called Seasons and I'm not sure that any lyrics have ever been more relevant or time specific than these were for me.
"Like the frost on a rose
Winter comes for us all
Oh how nature acquaints us
With the nature of patience
Like a seed in the snow
I’ve been buried to grow
For Your promise is loyal
From seed to sequoia
I can see the promise
I can see the future
You’re the God of seasons
I’m just in the winter"
These lyrics spoke straight to my soul. They named the feelings of disappointment and pain in the waiting that for so long I have been so scared to say out loud. I feel like I often try to mask these winter seasons with "good things". The "if I just focus on the good, the bad can't exist" mentality. But that truly isn't the case. Sadness and happiness can co-exist. We can experience pain and healing simultaneously. The feeling of disappointment doesn't mean that we lack hope. This is where I have been, in the push and pull, the dreaded 5pm feels like 10pm and it's too cold to get out of bed season of winter. I know the seeds have been planted and maybe somewhere underneath the soil the growth is beginning, but the surface feels hard and cold. Desolate. It feels like many days of waiting for the harvest to sprout and long nights of disappointment when it doesn't.
To be quite honest, I am not sure if this post will be helpful in terms of action steps to take when you're feeling this way. To be quite honest, I am still working through how to deal with this season myself. I think the point of sharing all of this is that I want others to know that if you're here, if this is your winter, eventually, you will bloom. I want you to know that while the expectations of the things you desire and pray for are good, the disappointment of the expectations not being met is so real and it hurts.
You are not alone and it certainly is no reflection on you or what you deserve. Before every harvest there are long seasons of work put into preparing the soil, planting the seeds, tending the crops. These seasons and this work is diligent, it takes time. In these moments of waiting, be patient with yourself. There will be hard days, probably even more than there will be good days. This doesn't mean you are broken. It doesn't mean that you need to do more. It means that your season is coming. It isn't here yet and it may not be for a while, but it is coming. The cold will come. The old will fall away and then one day, the sun will shine again. You will be new. You will bloom.