#76: Wintering
The politics of rest and the power of cyclical time
Hello!
The Holiday Season is upon us. How are you holding up? I’m writing this post from my apartment in Stockholm. It’s 15:25 and dark. This part of Sweden is currently running on 6 hours and 25 minutes of daylight, and those minutes will continue to drop until we reach the Winter Solstice on Dec 22nd—the shortest day of the year, clocking in at 6 hours and 4 minutes. That’s 12 hours and 32 minutes shorter than the longest day of the year in June.
The Holidays are a challenging time for many. We’re under constant pressure to complete, consume, and celebrate. Time rarely feels on our side.
Still, I enjoy this time of year. Living in the Northern Hemisphere and experiencing all seasons, the winter weather challenges me to slow down. I can’t walk as quickly on icy roads; dark mornings pull me back into sleep. Nature imposes itself, and, for once, I yield.
But not willingly.
Internalised capitalism is a powerful resistor. The essayist Maria Popova sums it up well:
This cyclical nature of the seasons is counter to our dominant cultural narrative of self-improvement, with its ethos of linear progression toward states of ever-increasing flourishing.
“Human hibernation.” “Wintering.” These are some of the terms used to describe the quasi-animalistic desire to change behaviour in response to the season. Katherine May, who coined the term wintering with her book of the same name, encourages us to see hibernation as analogy rather than biology:
“Is this, then, our human version of hibernation: a thoughtful mode of being that’s profoundly restorative, brought about by the conditions of winter? Perhaps, but I prefer to see hibernation as a useful analogy rather than a biological imperative – after all, winter only comes to populations who live far from the equator; wintering is not a universal human experience.”
Not everyone experiences winter. Equally, not everyone can afford to winter either. Like the rider delivering dinner so you can have a restful night in. When are they supposed to hibernate?
This scenario is imaginary but plausible. It encapsulates, I think, what the critic Mark Fischer meant by capitalist realism: humans being so committed to capitalism’s inevitability that capitalism itself becomes invisible. One can choose to resist capitalism by prioritising rest (wintering), and still end up acting on that resistance through capitalism (gig economy food delivery.) In short, resisting capitalism with capitalism.
Why does this happen? Fischer, who draws from the Slovenian philosopher Žižek, argues it’s because capitalist ideology overvalues belief at the expense of behaviour:
“So long as we believe (in our hearts) that capitalism is bad, we are free to continue to participate in capitalist exchange.”
This statement stopped me in my tracks the first time I read it. It reminded me of an equally-provoking reflection from documentarian Adam Curtis in a 2017 interview with Adam Buxton:
“Do the liberals really want change? Because they’re living through a period of extraordinary privilege. […] Relatively speaking, it’s a very nice life. Do you really want change? Over the past ten years, liberal or left wing radical groups have come up and said, “We’re going to change the system” […] and then nothing happens.“
What kind of change do you want? Are you willing to go beyond just believing that you want it?
These are very confronting questions.
If you’re in a position to slow down over the Holidays, maybe now is the time to start facing them. One of my favourite writers,
, offers a gentle way in:“By following the simple stream of ancient feast days, I can locate myself as part of a larger humanity, and I can take time out from the craziness/illness of secular daily life with its non-stop mentality. We are not machines. We are human beings.”
While not religious, Winterson finds wisdom in Christmas and other religious rites. Like nature’s seasons, rituals are cyclical; they recur and allow us to step outside of linear time. When we step outside of linear time, we can create the emotional and psychological space for change:
“Christmas brings out the best and the worst in people. We are conscious of those less fortunate than ourselves. We try to get into the spirit of the season. Sometimes that means getting drunk with folks we don’t care about. Sometimes it means visiting family we don’t like. It is an expensive time, for the wallet and the heart - because more is asked of us.
I think that ‘more’ is a challenge worth meeting.
And it’s a double challenge. Outer worlds and inner worlds.
What can we do in response to the outside world? Can we help a neighbour? Buy food for Christmas dinner for someone who can’t afford it? Can we volunteer? What does our neighbourhood need? Is there a friend we have neglected? Is there a child who is lost the way you were lost? Remember that feeling? The grownups on the big planet and you wondering where you belonged? For many of us, Christmas triggers painful memories. We can’t go back in time, but we can help someone now - and when we do, we start to help the neglected parts of our own self.
And that’s an important thing to do at Christmas. If you could go back in time, what would you change? What would you do differently? Life is stuffed to the brim with second chances.”
I’m going to try and look for mine this winter. Will you?
References
🎧 Ep. 44 - Adam Curtis - The Adam Buxton Podcast
📚 Capitalist Realism: Is there no alternative? - Mark Fischer
📚 Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times - Katherine May, The Guardian
🗞️‘Human hibernation: the restoring effects of hiding away in winter’ Katherine May
🗞️ ‘Mid-week Musings 5: Christmas is coming!’ -
🗞️ ‘Wintering: Resilience, the Wisdom of Sadness, and How the Science of Trees Illuminates the Art of Self-Renewal Through Difficult Times’ - Maria Popova, The Marginalian
🗞️’2-2-2022: Candlemas’ - Jeanette Winterson: Mind Over Matter
This might be my last post of 2023. If yes, I’ll see you on the other side!
Thanks so much for reading,
Lauren