Find yourself among things that speak of endings—beside fallen logs that host new ferns, in fields where harvested stalks stand like empty altars, or near water where leaves have begun their slow drift toward winter's rest. Let your body rest on earth that has received countless returnings, feeling the soft give of soil enriched by what has been released. Smell the sweet decay that feeds tomorrow's growth, taste the mineral breath of stones that hold the memory of mountains worn to dust.

Màthair na Talmhainn, banrigh a' bhàisMother of the Earth, queen of death

Agus banrigh na beathaAnd queen of life

Tha sinn a' tighinn thugadWe come to you

Aig àm a' leigeil mu sgaoilAt the time of letting go

A' sireadh do ghliceSeeking your wisdom

Mu dheidhinn crìoch agus tòiseachadhAbout ending and beginning

Breathe with deliberate awareness of the mortality in each breath—how the oxygen that sustains you was released by dying leaves, how the carbon you exhale will feed new growth, how your very aliveness participates in the endless exchange between form and formlessness. Feel death not as enemy but as the sacred partner that gives life its poignancy and meaning.

Today we walk with grieving and liberated—the sacred sorrow of release and the fierce freedom that comes when we stop clinging to what was never ours to keep.

Tha bròn agus saorsa nam anamGrief and freedom are in my soul

Mar dhà làmh aig an aon corpLike two hands of the same body

A' teagasg dhomhTeaching me

Mu dheidhinn leigeil mu sgaoilAbout letting go

Ann an dòigh naomhIn a sacred way

Picture yourself standing before a great tree whose leaves have begun their transformation—some still green with summer's memory, others touched with gold and crimson, a few already fallen to carpet the ground below. This is death's true face: not violent ending but graceful release, not failure but fulfillment, not loss but generous giving back to the source from which all things arise.

Feel the grief that rises like mist from deep waters—not just sorrow for what is dying now but the accumulated weight of all the deaths you've witnessed: relationships that ended, dreams that withered, versions of yourself that had to die so new ones could be born. Let it move through you like wind through branches, bending you but not breaking you.

Ach ann an gach bàsBut in every death

Tha saorsa air fhalachFreedom is hidden

Saorsa bho na ceanglaicheanFreedom from the bonds

A bha gar cumail sìosThat were holding us down

Now feel the liberation that death offers—not as escape but as homecoming, not as ending but as return to the vast spaciousness from which all forms emerge. Feel how every attachment you release makes you lighter, how every grip you loosen allows new possibilities to flow through the spaces your clenched fists once occupied.

Tha mi a' ionnsachadh bho na duilleaganI learn from the leaves

Mar a leigeas iad mu sgaoilHow they let go

Gun strì, gun eagalWithout struggle, without fear

Oir tha iad eòlachBecause they know

Air tilleadh dachaighAbout returning home

Descend into the earth's deepest chambers where all things eventually return—the bones of mountains, the dreams of forests, the tears of every creature that has ever loved and lost. Here in the composting darkness, the Mother reveals her most radical teaching: that death is not interruption but completion, not punishment but release, not the end of the story but the transformation that allows new stories to begin.

Feel how your own small deaths have prepared you for this moment—every time you've had to release a cherished identity, every goodbye that felt like dying, every moment when you discovered that who you thought you were was too small to contain who you were becoming. Each one was practice for the ultimate letting go that awaits every living thing.

Ann am bhàsIn death

Tha mi a' faighinn beathaI find life

Ann an leigeil mu sgaoilIn letting go

Tha mi a' faighinn grèimI find grasp

Air na tha dha-rìribh cudromachOn what truly matters

Let yourself become like autumn itself—not holding onto summer's warmth but embracing the beauty of transition, not mourning what is ending but celebrating what has been. Feel how grief and liberation dance together in your bones, teaching you that the deepest freedom comes not from getting what you want but from wanting what life gives you, including its endings.

Take a moment to contemplate:

What in your life is ready to die so that something new can be born, and how can you participate in this sacred release with the same grace that autumn brings to the dying of the year?

Màthair na Talmhainn, gabh ar n-ìobairtMother of the Earth, accept our offering

De na rudan nach fheum sinn tuilleadhOf the things we no longer need

Teagaisg dhuinn mar a bhàsaicheasTeach us how to die

Gus gum faod sinn beò a bhithSo that we may live

Le cridhe fosgailteWith open heart

Gu ruige ar n-ùine deireannachUntil our final time

Slàn leat, a bhàis chaoimhFarewell, gentle death

Slàn leat, a bheatha ùrFarewell, new life

Gus an coinnich sibh a-rithistUntil you meet again

Open your eyes slowly, feeling how death moves through you with every heartbeat that brings you closer to your final release, and how this knowledge makes every breath more precious, every moment more sacred, every connection more tender than it would be if you could keep them forever.