Calendar of the Soul Week 46

52 Weeks of Steiner – Week 20  (This is part of a weekly serial started on Michaelmas 2023. To see the other entries, please see the post linked HERE and scroll down to the bottom for individual links)

The world is threatening to stun
The inborn forces of my soul;
Now, Memory, come forth
From spirit depths, enkindling light;
Invigorate my inward sight
Which only by the strength of will
Is able to sustain itself.

Rudolf Steiner, Calendar of the Soul

Do you read Steiner’s Calendar of the Soul? Here is the preface that explains it’s purpose:

The year has its own cycle of life. The human soul can follow in feeling this life of the year. And if the soul opens herself to the influences that thus speak to her week by week, this life with the year will lead her to a real finding of herself. She will feel powers growing up within her, that lend her new strength from within. She will see that such latent powers in herself need to be aroused by the interest that she brings to the world into which she has been born.

In this Calendar there is set down for each week a verse, suited to awake in the soul a fellow-consciousness of what is going on during this particular week of the whole cycle of world-life. The verse is intended to express the note sounded in the soul when she puts herself in unison with this moving life of the world. A healthy feeling of “at oneness” with the course of nature, and, arising thence, a vigorous “finding of oneself,” this is what is here intended, in the belief that, for the soul, some such inner accompaniment of the world’s path, as pursued in these verses, is a thing for which she harbours the longing, if she but rightly understand herself.

Rudolf Steiner, Translated by Mabel M. Cotterell, 1948

The first time I read through these verses week by week, I just carried them with me. I didn’t really put much effort in trying to de-code or understand them, beyond speaking what resonated with me to my mentor during my foundations studies. I carried them with me and let them work on me.

Now coming toward the end of my fifth year with the calendar, they speak differently to me. They are a gentle reminder, a nudge so to speak, to remember that I am nature, that I have a soul and spirit, that they can be honoured and developed by simply bringing consciousness to their cycles in the year.

This verse spoke really loudly to me, as I can feel the pull to start to “get busy”. I recognize it as a way to distract from the dullness of February, to look forward to all that the future can hold. I also take this verse as warning of what is to come. The world will soon (even though it doesn’t feel soon!) burst into life and it will be hard to keep from being distracted by the warm weather and bursting of colours. Both of these happenings will try and distract me from planting the seeds cultivated during the quieter winter months. In summer, we are all dreamy and up in the air, totally distracted, and if we aren’t careful, the dull days of February and bursting days of spring can have the same affect.

I feel the pull to plan and create and get out and go on field trips and be with friends, but I must remember that I must stay on course and not let myself become distracted or my reserve dulled through boredom. This is a very imporant time for home life and education, as those seeds we planted through the winter, whether they be seeds of healthy habits, seeds of knowledge, or seeds of interest, can so easily be forgotten as we search for a way out of the dullthe natural world stuns us with it’s beauty.

Memory is capitalized in this verse. Because it is more than just our every day memory. It is our spiritual or cosmic memory. A memory of what we were once connected to. We are calling on it to help invigorate or strengthen our resolve so that our will is able to endure this time where we would otherwise fall to distraction.

If you would like to learn more about The Calendar of the Soul, I’ve collected a few links from the Steiner Archives.

They now have a wonderful page that has various translations of each verse. I really enjoy reading the different translations. Sometimes just one different word used can open up a whole new meaning. You can find those on this page. https://rsarchive.org/COTS/

This page gives an introduction to the use or purpose of the calendar: https://rsarchive.org/COTS/About.html

This pages gives links to different books of translations: https://rsarchive.org/Articles/GA040/

The Anthroposophical Society in America posts PDFs of the dates adjusted to the current calendar year, as well as a few links to other sources for the calendar, which can be found at this link: https://anthroposophy.org/the-calendar-of-the-soul/

Until next time,
Marina