How to Use a Snowstorm for Spiritual Practice
There’s a snowstorm coming to large portions of the East Coast of the United States this weekend.
The kind that shuts things down for a few days. The kind that cancels plans and sends everyone scrambling to “prepare.” Here at the Good Knight Castle in Beltsville, Maryland, we’re expecting several inches—and several days of quiet.
But what if, instead of treating this as an inconvenience to survive, we approached it as an opportunity for spiritual practice? What if a few days snowed in is exactly what our souls have been asking for—a forced pause, a chance to deepen your spiritual practice without the usual distractions of daily life?
Here’s how to turn a snowstorm into a spiritual retreat at home.
Let Your Body Remember How to Breathe
When was the last time you took a full, deep breath that wasn’t attached to stress or anxiety?
Being snowed in gives you permission to slow down your nervous system. Try this: Sit somewhere you can see the snow falling. Watch the flakes drift down—they’re in no hurry. Now breathe with that same unhurried quality. Inhale for four counts. Hold for four. Exhale for six. Repeat until your shoulders drop and your jaw unclenches.
Do this throughout the day. Not as a task to check off, but as a coming home to yourself.
Clear Out the Old to Welcome the New
Snow has this beautiful quality of covering everything, making the world feel fresh and new. You can create that same energy inside your home.
Pick one area—a closet, a drawer, a shelf you’ve been avoiding. Not because you “should,” but because clearing physical space clears energetic space. As you sort through old clothes, expired vitamins, papers you no longer need, ask yourself: Does this still serve who I’m becoming?
Let go of what no longer fits. Make room for what wants to arrive.
This isn’t spring cleaning. This is winter releasing, making space for the new growth that’s still underground but already stirring.
Cook Something Nourishing
There’s something deeply grounding about cooking when you have nowhere to rush off to. Make soup. Bake bread. Chop vegetables slowly, mindfully. Let the kitchen fill with good smells.
This is deep alchemy: taking simple ingredients and transforming them into nourishment. It’s magic we take for granted in our rush-through-everything culture. As you cook, practice presence. Feel the texture of the vegetables. Notice the colors. Taste as you go. Cook as ritual, as meditation, as an act of love for your body.
Watch (But Don’t Binge) Spiritual Content
Yes, this is a good time to watch that documentary you’ve been meaning to see. Or that workshop recording. Or those talks from teachers who inspire you.
But here’s the line: Are you consuming content to genuinely learn and grow, or are you numbing out Watch one thing mindfully. Take notes. Journal about what resonates. Then step away and integrate. The spiritual path isn’t about how much content you consume. It’s about how deeply you digest what you’re taking in.
Go Outside and Actually Experience the Snow
Bundle up and go out in it if you are able to. Walk slowly. Feel the cold on your face. Notice how quiet everything becomes when snow is falling—how it muffles sound, how the world feels held in stillness.
If you’re able, lie down and make a snow angel. Build a snowman. Have a snowball fight with yourself.
Exercise your body, yes—but more importantly, exercise your capacity for wonder. We forget how to play. We forget how to be delighted by simple things. Snow gives us permission to remember.
Notice Your Mind Wanting to Be Busy
This is the hard one.
At some point during your snow day, you’ll feel restless. Your mind will start making lists of “productive” things you should be doing. You’ll reach for your phone, for a project, for anything to fill the space.
Notice that impulse. Don’t judge it. Just see it.
Ah, there’s my mind, wanting to be busy. There’s my nervous system, uncomfortable with rest.
And then gently, with compassion, choose to let yourself rest anyway. Rest isn’t laziness. Rest is resistance to a culture that wants to extract productivity from every moment of your life. Rest is radical. Rest is spiritual practice.
The Gift of Forced Stillness
We live in a world that rarely gives us permission to stop. We have to justify rest, defend downtime, apologize for not being constantly available and productive.
But snow doesn’t care about your schedule. It falls anyway. It stops everything anyway. And in that stopping, in that forced stillness, there’s an invitation.
An invitation to remember that you are a human being, not a human doing.
An invitation to reconnect with yourself, with your body, with the quiet voice of your intuition that gets drowned out in the rush of normal life. An invitation to simply be here, now, in this moment, which is the only moment you ever actually have.
What Will You Do With Your Snow Day?
Maybe you’ll do all of these things. Maybe you’ll do none of them. Maybe you’ll just sit by the window and watch the snow fall and let that be enough. Whatever you choose, choose it consciously. Choose it as an act of self-love, not obligation.
When the snow begins falling, the world will begin slowing down to match the pace.
Pause with it and truly enjoy the gift of a retreat at home if you can.
Dr. Mara Linaberger is Secretary of the Board of Directors at The Good Knight Network. She believes in the spiritual power of unexpected pauses.
