Spring, Spiritual Emergence, and the Soul’s Awakening
There’s a specific kind of aliveness that returns to me in spring—something old and sacred, something I didn’t even know I’d been missing until the first burst of plum blossoms catches me off guard. Every year, it feels like a resurrection.
The air changes, and so do I.
Spring has always been my favorite season. Not because it’s easy, but because it’s honest. It reminds me that rebirth isn’t clean or polished. It’s messy, brave, and full of trembling beauty. Things bloom even when the skies are still grey. Life begins again before it’s entirely ready.
Depth psychotherapy is a lot like this.
In the early stages of the work, people come in carrying the weight of winter. Inner winters—depression, grief, burnout, spiritual emptiness. Life has stopped making sense, or maybe it’s just lost its spark. There’s a sense of being underground, of things going dormant.
But as Jung reminds us, “In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order.” The psyche, like the earth, is always preparing for rebirth beneath the surface.
Sometimes what looks like stagnation is actually incubation.
And then, slowly, in therapy, something begins to stir.
Maybe a dream cracks open something long buried. Maybe a memory comes with tears that feel oddly hopeful. Maybe the client begins to say “I want more,” even if they don’t yet know what that “more” is.
This is spring energy: the reemergence of the soul.
In myth, spring is often linked to stories of descent and return—of goddesses and gods who travel into the underworld and come back changed. Persephone, carried away by Hades, returns to the earth’s surface each spring, her arrival marked by blooms and warmth. But she’s no longer the innocent maiden. She’s initiated. She belongs to both worlds.
And I think that’s what true healing looks like—not a return to who we used to be, but a becoming.
Depth psychotherapy doesn’t offer quick fixes or tidy answers. It’s more like the slow unfolding of a flower that’s been waiting for the right season. We sit together in the darkness until the soul is ready to grow again. We wait with reverence, not rush.
Spring reminds me that this process isn’t linear. Just as the weather flips between sunshine and sudden downpours, our healing can move in spirals. One day full of clarity, the next full of doubt. But even in the regression, something is moving. Something is waking up.
To witness a person coming back to life is holy.
To see someone reconnect with their own inner spark—to watch their eyes light up with a sense of “this is who I really am”—feels like watching flowers bloom through the cracks of a sidewalk. It’s that miraculous.
I love this season because it reminds me of what’s possible. That we can come back from the dead. That we can bloom again, even after a long winter of the soul. That resurrection isn’t just a metaphor—it’s a psychological and spiritual truth.
If you feel like you’ve been underground, like something in you has been asleep or lost or long forgotten—know this: your spring will come. The soul knows the way back to the light.
And when you’re ready, I’d be honored to walk with you.
I offer spiritual counseling and emergence therapy in person in Oakland and online throughout California.