Patience and Presence

There is something about the beginning of September that gives me pause every year. I get a wave of rolling into the end of the year toward the holidays at lighting speed, followed by a wave of nostalgia as summer passes all too quickly.

My mind will start reeling with check lists, end of year plans, Q4 business strategies, holiday ideas (especially holiday gifting for horse girls) and all the DIY things I want to try but frankly do not have the time for at this stage of my life. 

It’s ironic to be having flashes of twinkling lights, festive dinners, and sweaters in pretty, bow finished boxes while we are in the midst of the hottest week of the year here in Santa Barbara, but that is the nature of this monkey mind equestrian apparel business owner.

I have learned that while each season brings change and choice, there are certain patterns to the year in my life that come up year after year as I continue to un peel my onion of becoming. I wrote this poem years ago which is a small section of my second book (not yet published!), about this same week and I wanted to share it here with you.

"There is a feeling of stillness that comes with waiting for the fall. A simultaneous coming and going. Like floating in suspension that neither pushes nor pulls. That neither rises nor falls. A pause, that lives in the free motion of nothing.

It is the same pause of the breath. The in between that links us to God. Where the heavens stream freely, wildly, clearly, into the earthly bodies that hold this combustible energy. Keeping it contained so we may remember the sheer life force of existence as it dances and collides within.

“Take me”, I tell the breath. 

“There is nothing to take”, she says. “You are already arrived.”

Arrival. In the place we most wish to be. Available to us in every moment. Going is no longer. Coming was never. For nothing else ever existed, but now. 

Waiting for the fall... has been like waiting for the winter, and the spring and the summer. This endless never enough-ness. The excuse to be tethered to something outside of myself. To be in existence somewhere outside of myself. 

But this year, the leaves shifted, and so did I. I watch them shimmer in the fading sun, their crispness meeting the bite of the cool changing air, one by one falling to the ground to recycle themselves as an offering of divine nourishment to the Earth that holds my once tender, nervous, and impatient feet. The ones ready to leave at a moment’s notice, for a mere taste of what I thought I so I deeply desired. 

In waiting for the fall, I cut the cords of my suspension, and I dropped with conscious choice, to be here. No more waiting. Commited, devoted, present, to each passing moment that now blends into eternity. To let myself come alive, in the ecstasy of existence. To be all that I have ever wanted, and to let myself have, all that I be.

There is nothing else, but this."

While there is so much to look forward and back to, I’m dropping in to slow down, to savor, and sink in the end of the warm, fruitful summer (and of course, treating myself to a few new items from our Fall collection, because there is nothing like the change in seasons that activates the feeling of needing an entirely new wardrobe- who’s with me?

As always, thank you for being here. This community is full of special, talented, wise and passionate women, and I'm grateful to be with you.

XX,

Hannah

Here are a few of my favorite pieces from the new collection that I'm adding to my personal closet as we transition into fall: