Hollow vessel of thresholds, the Pumpkin (Cucurbita pepo) swells with the breath of transition. Born of earth and sunlight, it embodies the balance between plenty and decay, spirit and soil, the living and the remembered.
Round and radiant, the pumpkin carries with it the essence of in-between—neither fruit nor vegetable, neither wholly earthbound nor entirely ethereal. It swells beneath the waning sun of autumn, a symbol of abundance and decay, threshold and transformation.
Modern Symbolism The pumpkin resides in the liminal space—between life and death, harvest and dormancy, feast and famine. Once carved to ward off wandering spirits, now it brightens doorsteps as a sign of welcome and warmth. It is the emblem of endings that promise renewal.
Medicine and Healing Beyond its folkloric glow, the pumpkin nourishes and soothes. Long used to support digestion, ease inflammation, and strengthen immunity and skin, it offers quiet medicine for the body’s rhythms. Yet, as with all potent things, balance is key: too much can unsettle the system or interfere with certain medications. Respect, always, is part of the ritual.
Stories of Folklore Across cultures, the pumpkin’s lore ripens with the strange and sacred:
In Ukraine, to receive a pumpkin is to decline a proposal—a gentle, if symbolic, rejection.
Among Serbian Roma, pumpkins left too long may stir and rise again as vampires.
In Mayan myth, it represents the triumph of life over death.
Throughout Eastern Europe, it guards against misfortune and ill intent.
A Final Thought The pumpkin is a vessel of thresholds—a reminder that the line between protection and peril, feast and famine, life and death is thinner than we think. Within its hollow heart, it holds both shadow and sustenance. To honor the pumpkin is to honor the power of the in-between.
Learn more about my upcoming novel, Miranda’s Garden, where plants whisper of transformation, and every seed holds a story.
Photo by Pixabay: https://www.pexels.com/photo/plants-under-starry-sky-355887/
I’ve been talking and writing recently about a state of mind in which I find myself. I’m not usually so forthcoming about the inner workings of my mind and soul, but lately I’m moved to shed a little light on this thing we call burnout.
First, let me say that yes—burnout exists. But I also think the term has been stretched so thin it now covers just about anything outside the ordinary rhythms of human life.
Sure, some of what we’re feeling right now is collective grief. We’ve been living under the constant hum of political and social trauma. Add to that the exhaustion of trying to navigate support systems that are falling faster than autumn leaves. And rising costs. And day-to-day threats we’ve never seen before.
Of course people are weary. How could they not be?
But I also think there’s something else happening. Something deeper. And no, not everyone will want to hear this—and that’s okay. The right people will. Eventually, we’ll find each other.
Here’s what I think:
“Burnout” has become a great big blanket term for a dozen different states of being. It’s lost its meaning. I’ve used it myself recently, mostly to explain to anyone wondering why I’ve been… a little quieter.
I’m attending fewer gatherings—online and off.
I’m saying less.
I’m engaging less.
I’m tolerating less. (And if you know me, you might be thinking, “What—so now you tolerate nothing?” You might be right.)
I’m backing out of commitments.
I’m questioning assumptions people make about me.
But the truth is: I’m not “burned out.”
I’m molting. I’m shedding. I’m deep in a process that feels a whole lot more like spiritual ascension than collapse.
Because here’s the thing: what we often call burnout is actually the death rattle of an old self.
It’s not about “bad boundaries” or “failing to rest more.” (Spare me the quartz-crystal pep talk or the link to your coaching program, please, so you can share with me all the ways I’ve failed myself as a sensitive person.)
It’s what happens when your spirit has simply outgrown the scaffolding of your current life—and starts shaking the walls to break free.
This isn’t exhaustion. It’s initiation. The mind calls it burnout, but the soul calls it becoming.
And here’s the part most people don’t talk about: This isn’t a one-and-done experience. It’s not some singular dark night of the soul that you survive and then check off your spiritual bingo card.
It’s a recurring cycle in the evolution of a human being. We molt. We grow. We molt again. It’s not regression. It’s renewal. It doesn’t mean you’re “behind.” It means you’re alive.
Yes, it’s messy. You might want to torch your calendar and start a commune in the woods. You might sleep too much (is that even possible?) or feel allergic to other people’s expectations—or to other people, period.
That’s not failure. That’s your nervous system trying to keep up with your evolution. That’s your soul integrating the alchemy.
So no—I’m not burned out. I’m not “in trouble.” I’m transmuting. Metamorphosing. Reconstituting in a cosmic kind of way.
I’m in the alchemical fire, burning off what no longer fits. And when I come out the other side, I won’t be the same.
And after all is said and done, you might still like me. And you might not.
And that will be okay.
Whips cape over shoulder and wanders off into the woods…
I’ve been staring out the window a lot lately, staying prone, even sleeping more than usual. At first, I thought it was just the change of the season and my body’s dislike of Pacific Northwest winters—which, despite what the calendar says, last from October through May.
Today, it’s raining. There’s a tree outside my window swaying in the wind, its leaves dripping with the inevitability of the next several months. My body has slowed to match the rhythm of the season, but there’s more going on. I can tell.
I use the word “burnout” because I want to be understood—being understood matters deeply to me. I use the word “burnout” because I know people will understand it to mean profound emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion.
The word is spoken and discussed so often these days that I wonder if it’s lost some of its meaning. I wonder if it’s too easily shrugged off—by those who find themselves in the middle of it and by those who surround them. But it’s a serious condition, one that can impact well-being, productivity, and overall health.
For this reason, I’m not taking it lightly.
I’ve been here before. A few times. That’s what happens to us sensitive souls who live in a world not made for us, a world that doesn’t often accept our need for serenity, solitude, and rest.
But the truth is, when you’re delicately wired—when you live with chronic illness, when you’re neurodivergent, when you inhabit a world with sharp edges, toxins, and more stimuli than your nervous system can handle, not to mention the insanity of a wannabe dictator in the White House—your body, mind, and soul eventually say: enough.
They sit down and say “no” with all the vehemence of an angry, stubborn two-year-old plopping down on the floor in the middle of a busy mall during the holidays and refusing to move.
They say: Listen to me. Pay attention to me.
I’m paying attention. I’m taking it seriously. I’m paying attention. But I’m also not thinking of it as “burnout.”
Instead, I think of it as a kind of return. An ascension of sorts.
I’m stepping back. I’m purging—mostly obligations. And stacks and stacks of papers with scribbled reminders and lists of all the things I need to do (or thought I did).
While going through one of those stacks, I found a line I had written down months ago: plateau of latent potential.
It’s like my subconscious knew (of course it did) long before my just-do-it brain had caught up. I read those words, and I knew:
I’ve been sitting on yet another plateau of latent potential for too long. Once again, I had become so automated in my day-to-day life—doing what had worked once—that I hadn’t recognized that I’d outgrown myself.
This is why I call it ascension. It’s a time to rise. It’s a time to pull myself up and over the ledge to the next level of life. But first, I need to rest.
And I’m using this rest period to reflect and remember—to literally re-call everything that makes me, me.
One thing I love about aging is that because I’ve done this before—more than once—I know that I’ll come out the other side better, clearer, stronger.
And something wiser than my day-to-day cognitive knowing—maybe my own inner wisdom, maybe the Universe—is saying, All right… You’ve gotten too comfortable doing the same old thing. There’s more for you to do in this world.
So off I go, stepping back, reflecting, and purging—energy and activities—so I can come back around to myself. Only better.
In the Wise Woman tradition, the spiral represents ascension. We circle back over and over, yet each time, we never meet ourselves where we were before. Each revisit is a lift upward—to more awareness, more ability, more mastery.
While this ride can be uncomfortable, I find it beautiful. It lets me know that I’m still on my path, still open to growing, still moving toward the thriving existence I envision.
As creatives, as sensitives, as ever-evolving humans, I think it’s essential that we allow ourselves to behave like water. Ever flowing, ever changing, adjusting to every object, obstacle, and diversion we encounter.
Maybe that’s what burnout really is—a reminder to flow again. In the direction of a thriving existence.
My mom was a dancer. When she was in high school, she taught little kids. Her dream was to move to Chicago and study dance seriously. She wanted to perform for a living. But thanks to the times (and to the fact that she grew up in a tiny Midwestern town of 600 people where “artist” was not a viable vocation), that dream was deemed impractical. So she did what many young women did then: she got married. A year later, I arrived.
But her creativity didn’t disappear. It found other paths.
She became a seamstress and made many of my clothes—and all my dance costumes. Yes, I inherited her dancing bug and performed for a while when I was young. And on Saturday nights, our family went to the Legion Hall to listen to a local family band. And of course, we danced. A lot.
My grandmother—my mom’s mom, who lived next door for most of my early years—crocheted, painted, and crafted with an almost magical fervor.
Thanks to them, I was raised with the unspoken belief that making things was simply… how you lived. Dance, sewing, painting, gardening, cooking, furniture refinishing. Everything was an outlet.
Where my love of words came from, I’m not exactly sure. Maybe from my mom reading to me before I could speak. For all the dysfunction in my family (and there was plenty), one thing they got right was this: I was shown that creativity has many forms, and each one matters.
While I am a writer to my core, I move in and out of other mediums. Mostly painting, crochet, filmmaking, and collage. They calm me, center me, and drop me into a deeper state of mind where story and character can emerge and evolve. I never think of what some might call “stuck points” as writing problems because nothing about the creative process is a problem. It’s simply part of the natural rhythm of creating: pausing, sensing, listening.
During the pandemic, I started painting. Mostly small—5×7 pieces. Last year I attempted something bigger (24×36), and it’s now on its third incarnation. I think it’s finally becoming what it wants to be. That’s how it feels: becoming. As if the painting has its own instinct and I’m just following along. (Much like writing…)
I kept getting snagged because I thought I needed a different approach for a bigger canvas. Twice, I tried to reinvent my process. Twice, it fell flat. Then the wise, quiet part of my brain said, “Just do what you always do.” The moment I returned to my intuitive method, the painting began to take shape again. (I’ll share progress behind the Hidden Door (for paid subscribers) soon.)
I’m also crocheting again lately. There’s something about the counting, the rhythmic motion of the hook grasping the yarn, pulling through a loop… The way it all slowly becomes a functional, wearable or usable item that soothes me and clears my mind.
The psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi wrote about flow, the state where we’re deeply absorbed in an activity. Neural scientists like Barbara Oakley describe this as “diffuse mode,” the mental state where insight arises. Not when we force it, but when we allow the mind to shift gears.
This is why moving between creative mediums matters, I think. It expands us. It clears the channels. It keeps the subconscious alive.
As I always tell my students and clients: the creative impulse is our life force wanting to move up and out of us. When we stuff or ignore it, we suffer—physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually.
And this is why we MUST write. This is why we must create.
So I’m curious…
What other creative practices keep your imagination supple?
We’re fresh off the holiday blitz (and I can say that, as a person who doesn’t do much for the holidays, the shift in energy from it all STILL edges its way in to clutter up my life). And because the calendar has turned a page and we have a new number (year) to mark the passage of time, many are compelled to “do better.”
But I have a problem with that.
There’s nothing wrong with striving to improve both ourselves and our work, but it’s the exterior expectation that I think can be harmful.
So, if you find yourself in that place of drawing a line in the sand—once again—and declaring how your writing year will be different (read: better), here are a few tips to, maybe, help you readjust how your lovely writerly mind shows up.
This way of approaching the writing life—cyclical, honest, non-punitive—is how we work inside Alchemy of Writing.
