Tea and Light for Winter Solstice is a nurturing practice

Prepare a nutritious brew and light your space with candlelight! Just what’s delightful in colder weather, darker skies, and times when your energy is flagging a bit.

In this season, five words are a mantra you could try: Stillness. Light. Enough Heat. Nurture. Well-being.

Ancient wisdom says that rather than brace against the cold, I might use this time to fortify my being, my whole self, mind and body. It says that I need this time to cultivate health.

Kinder than discipline, and more positive than pointing at faults, “cultivating health” is almost like the yogic practice of meeting a challenge. Cultivating health is indeed something you might do in adverse weather seasons to strengthen your body. And your resolve.

Before learning about this ancient wisdom, I saw Winter as part fun, part inactivity, part shivering from the cold! The thing is, seasons have their ways with us humans. We get sick easily, we get depressed, we change our plans. All because of the whims of a season and its clouds and storms. Thus seasons tend to get the better of my moods and my health, if I let them.

But it turns out that Winter solstice itself is my ally as the cold season advances.

As my ally, it helps me turn to the rituals of lifestyle that nurture, fortify, and invigorate me. The life-giving light and heat that sustains my mind-body in any weather is available right here. Inside me. All I have to do is pay attention, and take notes.

Tea and Light for Winter Solstice

Invigorating and Healthful Rituals, plus Recipe

1: Massage your head in the morning. 2: Massage your feet at night. 3: Make a nourishing and warming tonic to drink.

4: Share the idea of these rituals with someone!

See below for the Tea Recipe. It’s easy and fun. And more important, it is delicious!

Tonic Tea Recipe

Use this recipe to make a tonic tea. Add spices to boiled water and infuse with tea and milk additions. A tonic brewed this way concentrates on the ealthful, adaptogenic herb known as Holy Basil for health and vitality. Brewing aromatic spices is nurturing in itself!

Benefits of Tonic Tea

In those moments of savoring the tea, meditate on what matters to you. Examine your physical and emotional self. Without judgement, set intentions for any changes you wish to make. Write down these intentions as a guide. This is you, in your best moment, your light in the world.

Tonic Tea Ingredients:

Fresh ginger, cinnamon sticks, and cloves are delicious whole spices to add to your tonic tea. See below for more spice ideas!

1 cinnamon stick, cut in half

1/8 – 1/4” fresh ginger, sliced thin

2 cups water or half-water and half plant milk

2 clove buds

2 green Cardamom pods

1 Medjool date

2 herbal tea bags : Tulsi tea (Holy Basil tea) is especially good.

Method for Brewing Tonic Tea

To brew it: Place water in a pan and bring to a boil. Turn down heat to simmer and add ginger and ½ cinnamon stick and plant milk if using. Add clove buds. Cover and simmer on low for 15 minutes. Add herbal tea, turn off heat, cover, and allow to steep for 3-5 minutes.

To Serve: Strain, retaining the plant material. Enjoy this refreshing, slightly rich tonic tea. Make another cup of tea with the reserved spices plus a fresh herbal tea bag.

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Tip: Interesting spices to consider include: Coriander seeds, Peppercorns, Dried Chilis, Angelica root, Dried Orange Peels, Yuzu, Saffron.

Adding a Medjool date per cup to the simmering water brings sweetness to the tea, so you don’t need sugar. If you still need more sweetener, honey is a good choice stirred into the finished tea. But I bet you won’t need it!

Infuse Your Day with Tea and Light!

This recipe page is for information only and is not intended as treatment for any condition.