Showing Up Whole

Embracing the Solstice; Reigniting Your Inner Light

• Christina Fletcher • Season 4 • Episode 24

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This holiday season, many of us find ourselves reflecting on shifts within our lives, our traditions, and even the world around us.
 In this episode, Christina delves into the themes of change, growth, and the powerful light within us that can guide us through darker times. 
Drawing from personal experiences, timeless stories, and seasonal reflections, this episode invites you to pause, honor the solstice, and connect to your inner light. Christina shares practical insights on balancing holiday pressures with presence, fostering appreciation, and embracing small joys as we prepare for the New Year.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

  • Why this holiday season might feel “off” and how to honor the shifts in our world and traditions.
  • The significance of the winter solstice and how it invites us to celebrate the light within.
  • Reflections on balance, generosity, and the energy of giving.
  • How to differentiate between expansive energy that nourishes and constrictive energy that drains.
  • Simple practices to reignite your inner light, foster appreciation, and embrace small joys.
  • A powerful call to nurture your energy as you step into a bright, new year.

Take Action:

  1. Take a moment to sit with yourself this weekend. Breathe deeply and spark the light within you.
  2. Reflect on what nourishes your energy versus what constricts it as you prepare for the year ahead.
  3. Begin a nightly gratitude practice, even if it’s as simple as writing down one thing that brings you joy.
  4. Share this episode with someone who might need a reminder to slow down and reconnect with their light this season.
  5. Register for Christina's End of Year workshop CREATE AN INTENTIONAL NEW YEAR here. OR become a member of the ENERGY RESET CIRCLE and get access to the workshop for free! 


Christina Fletcher is a Spiritual Alignment coach, energy worker, author, speaker and host of the podcast Showing Up Whole.
She specialises in practical spirituality and integrating inner work with outer living, so you can get self development off of the hobby shelf and integrated as a powerful fuel to your life.

Through mindset, spiritual connection, intuitive guidance, manifestation, and mindfulness techniques Christina helps her clients overcome overwhelm and shame to find a place of flow, ease, and deep heart-centered connection.
Christina has been a spiritual alignment coach, healer and spiritually aware parent coach for 7 years and trained in Therapeutic Touch 8 years ago. She is also a meditation teacher and speaker.
For more information please visit her website www.spirituallyawareliving.com

Want to uncover where you need the most energy alignment?
Take her new Energy Alignment Quiz to identify which of your energetic worlds (mind, body, heart or spirit) needs aligning the most!

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Christina Fletcher:

Hi and welcome back to Showing Up Whole a place where we discuss alignment in mind, body, heart and spirit, in every aspect of our lives, and we're diving in to the blessed season of solstice. Here in the Northern Hemisphere, we're celebrating the winter solstice coming this weekend and, of course, if you are in the Southern Hemisphere, that will be the summer solstice. But today I want to dive in to the blessedness of this time. The difference of this time and how alignment is the message we're all receiving. Hi, welcome back.

Christina Fletcher:

You know you might have heard me talk about this over the last little while that it just doesn't feel very Christmassy right now and that a lot of people might say, well, that's just because of you know personally, so many changes have happened and my kids are older, et cetera. But the truth of the matter is, is anyone I speak to is feeling the exact same way? It feels like something has shifted in our universe and in that shift, nothing is quite the same as it was. I went live in Facebook yesterday and I was just saying you know, and that's okay, it's okay that things change, it's okay that things grow, it's okay that things expand. The trick is is to acknowledge that shift, to not bury it deep and try to force our way through, try to insist that things stay the same. It's a question of actually allowing evolvement, allowing expansion and exploring our role in it. What is our role in this growth and in this change of the universe and in the world itself? But more so too, how do we allow the season of the solstice to really fall deep within you? There's a lot to explore. It's a powerful time, and I mean when I say powerful time, I mean, yes, you know the current time that we live in, but I also mean that this season, this time of celebration, the holiday season, whichever holiday you celebrate, it is a time where outward expression is encouraged. That is what we have been taught.

Christina Fletcher:

That has been the theme for close to centuries. Most likely it's been the theme of giving, the theme of parties, the theme of connecting with those you love, the theme of putting up with people who you kind of just put up with, the theme of extending out. It's a fascinating thing, because I just went to my daughters and I decided to actually do something rather festive and rather goofy. So we popped over to the local cinema and we went to go see Muppet Christmas Carol, because you know why not. There's really good songs in that show and within that.

Christina Fletcher:

You know, christmas Carol is always such a fascinating thing because you watch this man go from small and the energy of holding on so constrictive of energy, so groveling and so constrained, and then, through understanding, connection with other people, you watch as that unfurls, you watch as he becomes more open-hearted, you watch as he becomes more intent on kindness and loving. However, my daughters and I were talking about this afterwards and we were saying how interesting it was, how the expression of giving was such a major theme. You know, suddenly he was giving all of this money to everyone and suddenly he was giving all of these gifts and suddenly he was supporting, and suddenly he was giving all of these gifts and suddenly he was supporting, and suddenly he was easily putting himself into a position where that would become the expected norm. So, rather than out of consideration, out of loving, kindness, out of empathy and connection, instead it would become an expectation and, quite frankly, a weight. They really need a Christmas carol too, but it's a fascinating thing to explore how balance is often missed in these types of storytellings and in the traditions that we keep.

Christina Fletcher:

What comes as an initial sense of magic or initial sense of awe or an initial sense of warmth and joy and flow can easily get constricted. I remember when I was in college I had a friend who quite honestly hated Christmas and I remember he used to always say but if I want to give a gift, I'll just give a gift. If I want to feel that spark of something, then I will initiate that and I will do that. And I remember my argument was yes, but do we Like, do we, do we actually feel that forward flow motion? And quite honestly, I think we do. We actually feel that flow, forward flow motion? And quite honestly, I think we do, or at least I would like to think that we do. However, that also doesn't mean that we shouldn't be honoring and celebrating the seasons and we shouldn't be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. It's solstice and as someone who never used to celebrate solstice, didn't grow up celebrating the solstice and am still actually only building a relationship with solstice, I will say that I believe it's becoming more and more important. I will say that I believe it's becoming more and more important.

Christina Fletcher:

Winter solstice celebrates and honors the longest night. It celebrates the darkest night of the year. It celebrates and honors the light that is within you. It brings together so many of the festivities that you look at, the different religious traditions that come in at this time, the different ways we express this time of year it all comes down to light. Light in a dark world.

Christina Fletcher:

You speak to a lot of people this year and, quite honestly, people are feeling like the world is rather dark. There's a sense of confusion, a sense of struggling to find ground, struggling to find where to put your feet, and yet something shifts, doesn't it? When you remember the light within yourself and then, when you join that light with the light of others, something else occurs again. Something else occurs again as I sit here, totally not feeling Christmassy, getting ready to decorate a tree, finally, on the 19th of December, and watching my family as, quite frankly, they're all older and everyone is finding new ways of connection and I watch my own personal resonance, my own personal understanding or new understanding of what this season can bring. I find myself, too, asking if there's been something I've been missing throughout my own personal traditions.

Christina Fletcher:

One of my very favorite traditions of this year is to hang up an angel that I made personally for my husband's and my very first Christmas, I literally grabbed a scrap of ribbon and wrapped some canvas around a bubble maker and I embroidered a few eyes and I found some metal disc of some kind as a halo and and it's a very rough little angel. But it was our first apartment and it seemed right to honor our first Christmas. And here we are now in the UK and that little angel has traveled with us. This is her 23rd Christmas and I am looking forward to putting her up in her place of honor. And as I tell that to you, I can feel myself smiling and I can feel myself lean into a fondness, a sense of openness, a sense of ease, a sense of relief, a sense of spaciousness. Now, on the flip side of that, my son just phoned me and he was very stressed because he's trying to do his Christmas shopping and he hates shopping. He hates Christmas shopping and he hates shopping in general, and he called me up saying that life was just too stressful and it was too much.

Christina Fletcher:

I guess what I'm leaning into is a solstice where we actually draw a line in the sand and allow a shift. Sand and allow a shift. What would it take for you to allow a shift, to truly let go of the things that don't work, the things that don't resonate, and yet lean into a newness of the things that do. And not only lean into the newness of the things that do, but rather relish them. There is something powerful and expansive in the moving forward flow of loving your life, and I don't mean loving the story of your life or the roles of your life. Rather, I mean allowing your life moment to sink into your heart space and resonate there, to be savored there, to find presence there, to actually so deeply appreciate a moment or some element of your experience that it just makes you buzz with deep appreciation, with deep appreciation. And then, as you allow that joy because that's what it is to just flow from you, you can feel the expansiveness extend and as it extends, it flows over others. Feel that within yourself and then immediately switch to the pressures you might have been feeling over this season.

Christina Fletcher:

Imagine, on the flip side, your energy reaching, it's extending, it's pushing, it's stretching, it's trying to cover everyone's bases, it's understanding that if everyone else can be happy, then that's when you can drop. If everyone else's needs are met, that's when you can relax. If everybody else is finding balance, then once that then your job is done. Hold that energy for a moment. Feel the difference between allowing your energy to expand out, knowing that you will touch the lives of the people you need to, or feel called to, that your light will help people, even if you might not even realize it, and then flip it to the extended reaching energy of trying to catch all the bases and touch all the items on your to-do list and feel that stretching back and forth.

Christina Fletcher:

You know, on this podcast, a couple of times we've talked about the expansive energy and the constrictive energy and you know, going into the new year, I think it's vitally important to really become consciously aware of that what feels constrictive, what makes you feel tighter and what makes flow. Why am I talking about this on the solstice? Well, honestly, there's a number of reasons, because this is the beginning. This is the beginning of the season truly, and also the beginning of the end of the year, and I want you to have tools deep within you that are working, without your attention to them too much, so that you can be stretching and allowing and expanding into how you want to feel in the coming year. I'm going to give you a few more perceptions on that and a few more tricks and trades. Just let's take a pause. Let's take a break, and with that deep breath I'll be back just after this.

Christina Fletcher:

Are you tired of sifting through all of the tools and spiritual practices all on your own? The spiritual path can sometimes feel isolating, and yet it is your own unique journey that only you can take. But what if you could have a supportive, loving community with weekly focuses, uplifting and spiritually connecting meditations and energy healings at the very start of your week to support you on that journey? This is exactly what I provide for you in my Energy Reset Circle membership program. Every Sunday, members gather at 4 pm Eastern, 9 pm British Time for a weekly focus, a meditation and a group healing. No worries if you can't make it live, though, as the replay is sent out directly afterwards as well as stored in your member portal. You also get access to the loving chat on WhatsApp, where you can ask questions, vent or request space from the members there to be held for any challenges in your life. You even get free access to all of my workshops included in your membership and, starting in 2025, courses and extra videos will be added to the portal on a regular basis, so you can tap in when you really need to, gathering from all corners of the world and from all backgrounds.

Christina Fletcher:

The fundamental intention within the group is love and support. There's no judgment, no criticism. Advice is only shared when asked for. Rather, it's about your journey being fully supported. You will feel loved and cared for as you walk your path. The focuses, tools and practices I share are intentionally created to support your day-to-day. There's no pressure, no stress, just love. Currently, this magical place is actually only $27 a month, but as of early January, the cost is increased to $47 a month. Don't worry, if you join now, your price won't change. So come join us over at the Energy Reset Circle. Check the link in the show notes or come visit spirituallyawarelivingcom for more information. I hope to see you soon. Okay, so welcome back.

Christina Fletcher:

So let's just kind of recap. We're in the solstice season. It's finding the light within the dark and knowing that we do live in this. Some might say a dark time. Let's not put too fine a point on it, but it's a confusing time and it is a time of murkiness, and the things that were working are not working any longer. So what does that look like and how do we actually tie all of this together. We're slowing things down a little bit. So, rather than just saying, hey, it's a solstice, celebrate the light within yourself, right? I actually want you to shift to a space where you're reigniting the light within yourself, a space where you're reigniting the light within yourself. Take a moment sometime over this weekend to just sit with yourself and actually breathe deeply into a state of joy. We talked about acknowledging something that sparks that light within you and allowing it to not just go yeah done Instead letting it sink within you and grow so that you actually come to embody it.

Christina Fletcher:

In the Energy Reset Circle membership, we often do meditations based on energy flow. So you're visualizing the energy flowing down through you and imagining it touching all parts of you and flowing through all parts of your body, and then, after that, expanding out and flowing over all you love and all who need it. What I'm coming down to is the point that we have a season which is often focused on giving and extending energy, so your brain is programmed to think of it. As it doesn't matter how refueled I am, I need to find a resource to actually extend myself more. Other people need my light more than I do my light more than I do.

Christina Fletcher:

What needs to happen is actually a question of giving yourself the opportunity and the time the opportunity and the time to reignite your light before you expand it to others. Now you can reignite it, allow it to percolate a little bit, go and think about how you can support the people in your lives. You can be the act of loving, the act of being considerate, the act of being generous, the act of being empathic and surrounding others. That can be a refueling act as well. It also gives space for a circle of light, a circle of love. There is a beautiful exchange that you can get fueled from others, but it is a question of observing yourself and your light. It is a question of observing yourself and your light.

Christina Fletcher:

This is not a time to let your light grow dimmer. It's not a time to be burnt out. We actually don't have time to be burnt out anymore because the new year is coming and this new year is going to need your light. And I'm not saying that as pressure, but I am saying that as a call, a call to say take the time to foster your light, to infuse your light, to make sure that it is burning bright within you out into the dark. Make sure that it is burning bright within you. Out into the dark, but not because it's dark for others, but because you are light and it's actually most important that you are yourself.

Christina Fletcher:

In a lot of ways, the vocabulary that I'm changing or the trajectory that I'm changing is the idea that, instead of seeing it as your light is needed, so therefore find it instead, I actually want to shift it to become your light. Allow your light to grow brighter so that you become it. It will touch the lives of others. Allow your light to grow brighter so that you become it. It will touch the lives of others. You will find you are called to do things because it makes you feel expansive, it feels lighter. You will find connections that you feel yourself glowing even brighter. You will find experiences which feel better to do. You don't need to hunt them down first, sacrificing and spending the light that's within you. Instead, shift the focus to your inner light and allow it to radiate out, to your inner light and allow it to radiate out. So, yes, what does that mean?

Christina Fletcher:

Appreciation is a big one. I am definitely sitting to appreciate my angel. I'm also appreciating my family, who are now home, and I'm sitting looking at all of them in deep love and appreciation Appreciation and even writing a list of those every night. Yeah, it's a good habit to get into Also, small joys, small delights, small fondnesses. Allow yourself the moment of observing a bird flying in the tree, which is one of my very favorite things to do. Allow yourself the opportunity to observe the cloud formations. Take a few deep breaths. Give yourself tech-free moments where you truly don't look at any screens. Give yourself moments where you appreciate music. Enjoy being human. Spend time on your year.

Christina Fletcher:

I have to admit I did take a healthy bit of time yesterday working through the material for the end-of-year workshop, the Create an Intentional New Year workshop, and I observed myself as I walked through last year. I went through month by month, gathering the lessons that I learned, releasing a lot of things. I kept going back to it the more I asked myself the questions of the workshop. I would pop back to my initial vent out of the year and I would add more things as I got deeper and deeper and deeper into it and as I worked through it and I was working into my word of the year and working through the process that I have in order to discover that I realized that the feeling of expansion and openness and flow is what feels so vitally important right now.

Christina Fletcher:

I want to feel open to possibilities, not holding on to plans. I want to feel expansive in thought, heart and mind and energy, not feeling like I need to control all aspects of life, and it's a fascinating thing to create a shift within you that allows yourself to be, allows yourself to become, allow yourself to show up, not because your brain tells it a certain way and not because tradition tells you a certain way, and not because the world tells you a certain way, and not because the world tells you a certain way. You just show up and you follow the expanse of leaning forward, affirmative light, flowing, glowing, nudge. Is this episode about the solstice? Yes, because the solstice is a time of reigniting your light, that, no matter what's happened in your year, you drop into your heart space and you find the light within you. And as you drop into the light within you, you sigh and breathe deeply in, rather than asking, okay, what do I do with this light? Just let her shine, let your heart glow, give yourself the gift of being and then, over the next little while, the next couple of weeks. Allow that to become your default state and you'll find that, yes, 2025 is going to be a big year. It's going to be a powerful year. It's going to be a powerful year, but from that state of allowing your light and being your light, you're going to find a sense, greatest love and joy for the holiday season.

Christina Fletcher:

If you are interested in joining me for my end of year workshop, I highly recommend that you come on in. It takes place december 29th. We meet at 3 pm eastern, 8 pm, the gmt, and we are diving deep into the year. I will lead you through the exact process that I just went through. You will end up with a word of the year and a deep understanding of who you are for 2025. There is a replay if you can't make the live version, and I do recommend booking your tickets as soon as possible so that you know you are anchored into the intention already as it approaches. So, from my family to yours, I'm sending you all my love and light for a beautiful season and a powerful, aligned 2025.