This time of year we celebrate the season of light with Hanukkah and Christmas as well as experience the quiet reflection time of Winter Solstice. This year is even more special since we have the rare opportunity to experience a full moon AND a total lunar eclipse on Winter Solstice.
The Details:
According to NASA, the lunar eclipse begins on
Tuesday morning, Dec. 21st, at 1:33 am Eastern Time (Monday, Dec. 20th, at 10:33 pm Pacific Time).
At that time, Earth’s shadow will appear as a dark-red bite at the edge of the lunar disk. It takes about an hour for the “bite” to expand and swallow the entire Moon. Totality commences at 02:41 am EST (11:41 pm PST) and lasts for 72 minutes.
If you’re planning to dash out for only one quick look - it is December, after all - choose this moment: 03:17 am EST (17 minutes past midnight PST). That’s when the Moon will be in deepest shadow, displaying the most fantastic shades of coppery red.
How rare is this?
Geoff Chester of the US Naval Observatory inspected a list of eclipses going back 2000 years. “Since Year 1, I can only find one previous instance of an eclipse matching the same calendar date as the solstice, and that is DEC 21, 1638 ” says Chester. “Fortunately we won’t have to wait 372 years for the next one…DEC 21, 2094”
What is Winter Solstice?
Winter Solstice is the longest night of the year and metaphorically offers us an opportunity to reflect on our own darkness, our own shadow.
Poetry:
One, One, One
The lamps are different,
But the Light is the same.
So many garish lamps in the dying brain’s lamp shop,
Forget about them.
Concentrate on essence, concentrate on Light.
In lucid bliss, calmly smoking off its own holy fire,
The Light strains toward you from all things,
All people, all possible permutations of good, evil, thought, passion.
The lamps are different,
But the Light is the same.
One matter, one enerty, one Light, one Light-mind,
Endlessly emanating all things.
One turning and burning diamond,
One, one, one,
Ground yourself, strip yourself down,
To blind loving silence.
Stay there, until you see
You are gazing at the Light
With its own ageless eyes.
~Rumi
Wine of Divine Grace is Limitless
All limits come only from the faults of the cup
Moonlight floods the whole sky
From horizon to horizon
How much it can fill your room
Depends on its windows
Grant a great dignity my friend
To the cup of your life
Love has designed it to hold its eternal wine
~Rumi
Ritual: Observe your life with compassion. Ask yourself what shadows (self-limiting beliefs, behaviors that dim your light, negative thought patterns, energy leaks, unclear boundaries, etc..) you are ready to release and transform. Write them on a piece of paper and burn them to symbolically transform the dark into the light.
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