In healing traditions throughout history, winter winds carry a soft message: slow down and listen. When the world grows quiet and the light begins to fade, something deep within us also starts to shift. The leaves fall, the air cools, the pulse of the Earth slows, and so must we. This descent into darkness is not a glitch in Nature’s perfect cycle. It’s a sacred seasonal invitation for our bodies, spirits, and minds to travel inward and surrender to rest, remember, and restoration.
According to many Indigenous traditions, this turning of the year is recognized not as an ending, but as a precious passage. The descent itself is medicine. Plants show us the way: they withdraw energy into their roots, conserving life beneath the soil until the Sun’s full blazes return. And so, we are invited to do the same. Soften your pace, tend to your inner landscape, and trust the regenerative intelligence of the dark.
In Ayurveda, this is the season of Vata and Kapha—Air and Earth. The qualities are cold, dry, and heavy, calling for warmth, nourishment, and routine to create steadiness throughout the seasons. On the other hand, Traditional Chinese Medicine teaches that winter belongs to the Water element and the kidneys, which are considered the seat of our ancestral essence. Now is the time to replenish jing, your overall vitality, by resting and conserving energy.
Seasonal Energetics + The Biology of Darkness
Indigenous Latin American cosmologies shed even more light on this cyclical wisdom. In the Andes, the dark months are honored as a time of reciprocity with Pachamama, when offerings are made to sustain the balance between humans and the natural world. In Mesoamerican traditions, darkness is often viewed as a symbol of gestation. The Earth Mother, Tonantzin, holds her children in the womb of winter, where the spirit may be renewed.
There’s no need to fear or resist the sacred descent. Instead, consider this an internal recalibration guided by the rhythms of Mother Earth. When we align our habits, diet, and plant-based rituals with these cycles, we strengthen our connection to both body and Earth.
While mythology speaks to the spirit of descent, biology gives it a body. As daylight shifts, many people naturally notice changes in their daily rhythms, sleep patterns, and overall energy. Winter often brings a slower pace and a pull toward quieter evenings, reflection, and more intentional rest. Across many traditions, this season is viewed as a time when inner life becomes richer, dreams feel more symbolic, and intuition has more space to speak. In this way, winter becomes a period of inwardness and creativity, where rest and reflection are part of the natural cycle.
Herbs, Oils + Spirit Tools for the Sacred Descent
Certain herbs have long been incorporated into seasonal rituals that honor the energetic shifts of winter. During the darker half of the year, when the body and mind naturally turn inward, plant allies are often woven into winter practices that invite steadiness, reflection, and a sense of inner support.
For holistic approaches to clarity, study, and seasonal steadiness, these particular herbs have long been valued in traditional systems of medicine:
Lion’s Mane is a functional mushroom often included in traditional tonics and teas used during periods of deep thought or creative work. Bacopa, a revered Ayurvedic herb, has been used for centuries during times of study, learning, and reflective practice.. Ginkgo, one of the oldest living tree species on Earth, is featured in traditional teas accompanying practices of presence and patient attention. Rhodiola is often used in cold-climate regions during demanding seasons as a grounding, fortifying plant. Gotu Kola has long been associated with meditation, grounding, and contemplative ritual. Together, these herbs form a constellation often used in seasons of concentrated work and inward exploration.
When the nights lengthen, herbs that encourage introspection and dreaming come forward.
Blue Lotus, used ceremonially across ancient cultures, including those of Mesoamerica and Egypt, has long been connected to dream-honoring and nighttime reflection. Passionflower has traditionally been included in evening rituals intended to calm the mind and soften its focus. Ashwagandha, a cornerstone of Ayurvedic rejuvenation, is historically used in seasons of restoration and grounding. Reishi, known in both Daoist and Indigenous traditions as a “spirit mushroom,” helps harmonize the heart and mind, encouraging peace within the darkness. Mugwort, a beloved herb revered by dreamers and healers across Latin America, Europe, and beyond, is deeply tied to dream traditions, intuitive arts, and night symbolism in various cultures.
When combined in formulas like our Dream Tea, these herbs can create a nightly ritual that honors the descent into rest, helping the body and spirit move gently between worlds.
Essential oils and ceremonial tools deepen this relationship with darkness. Rosemary’s crisp aroma has long been used in clarity-focused ritual spaces, while Frankincense brings its grounding, contemplative scent to ceremonial traditions. Lighting a candle, such as our new Protection Ritual Candle, can serve as a simple yet profound act of intention-setting. Shed a light among shadows, and be reminded that even in the descent, there is illumination.
As the natural world retreats underground, we too are invited to rest, reflect, and renew. Each of these plants and tools offers a way to connect with the restorative intelligence of the season, guided by the plant wisdom that has long supported humanity’s cyclical journeys through darkness and return to the light.
The Descent Archetypes: Mythic Mirrors For Our Inner Winter
Beyond the teachings of science and spirituality, myth can offer a different type of symbolic map for our inner lives. Descent stories from diverse cultures remind us that life moves in spirals, not straight lines. For instance, Persephone descends into the underworld each autumn, bringing winter’s stillness and returning each spring with renewal. Inanna, the Sumerian queen of heaven and earth, strips away every symbol of power as she journeys downward, surrendering to death before being reborn. And Coatlicue, the Aztec Earth Mother clothed in serpents, embodies the simultaneous forces of creation and destruction. In these myths, darkness is viewed as a form of preparation that allows transformation to take root.
Throughout Latin America, descent is believed to be part of a sacred spiral of regeneration. The underworld is the fertile soil of the psyche, where unprocessed emotions compost into wisdom. In herbalism, roots, barks, and seeds also concentrate their energy inward this time of year, storing vitality for what’s to come.
The dark half of the year mirrors our inner descent, or the confrontation with what Jung called “the shadow.” It’s the part of us that holds repressed emotion, grief, fear, or unexpressed power. Turning toward it is not easy, but it’s essential for integration. Read more here about integrating ancient Ayurvedic practices into your modern shadow work. This profound inner alchemy is a practice of remembrance. Every descent carries the seeds of rebirth.
Rooting Ourselves in the Dark as Resistance
The descent is a return to our roots. In a culture that glorifies constant output, choosing rest is both radical and ancestral. Rest is ceremonial. It’s how we sync our bodies with Earth’s pulse, allowing wisdom to root itself in stillness. When we rest, we resist the disconnection that comes from constant doing.
Plants do not bloom all year. They retreat, restore, and trust the rhythm of the unseen. To rest deeply during winter is to honor our kinship with them. Restoration is a sacred right, not a privilege. Lighting a candle, steeping tea, and journaling by moonlight are all modern rituals of remembrance.
Just as the plants trust the dark to do its quiet work, so can we. Let the herbs be your companions as you walk this inward path. Allow the candlelight to guide you as it once guided the ancestors. Darkness, after all, is not something to survive. This season invites us to metabolize our experiences, compost our grief, and cultivate new seeds of awareness.
