In so many stories and fables that shape us, cold and snow, the closing in of the light — these have deep psychological as much as physical reality. This is “wintering,” as the English writer Katherine May illuminates in her beautiful, meditative book of that title — at once a season of the natural world, a respite our bodies require, and a state of mind. Krista first spoke with Katherine in midwinter 2020, and their conversation continues to offer a helpful container for our pandemic time: as one vast, extended, communal experience of wintering. As 2021 draws to a close — still with so much to metabolize and to carry, with an aching need for replenishment — Katherine May opens up exactly what so many have needed to hear, but haven’t known how to name.
Katherine May is an author of fiction and memoir whose titles include Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times, The Electricity of Every Living Thing, and Burning Out. She is also the editor of an anthology of essays about motherhood, called The Best, Most Awful Job.
Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.
This show originally aired in January, 2021.
[Unedited] Latanya Sweeney with Krista Tippett
Matthew Sanford – The Body's Grace
Baratunde Thurston — How to Be a Social Creative
Reid Hoffman — AI, and What It Means to Be (More) Human
Kerry Washington — Acting as a Devotional Practice
Kate Bowler — On Being in a Body
Kate Bowler — A Blessing for the Life You Didn't Choose
A New Season of On Being Is Coming
"Love is still the only revenge. It grows each time the earth is set on fire."
From Poetry Unbound: Benjamin Gucciardi — The Rungs
Patronage and Love: On Being's Becoming
Vivek Murthy — To Be a Healer
Vivek Murthy — A Meditation for Moments of Despair, and To Feel Less Alone
[Unedited] Vivek Murthy with Krista Tippett
Barbara Brown Taylor — “This Hunger for Holiness”
[Unedited] Barbara Brown Taylor with Krista Tippett
Ruth Wilson Gilmore — “Where life is precious, life is precious.”
Janine Benyus — Biomimicry, an Operating Manual for Earthlings
Rick Rubin — Magic, Everyday Mystery, and Getting Creative
Isabel Wilkerson — "We all know in our bones that things are harder than they have to be."
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