Sensing into Autmn: Venus Retrograde, Full Moon in Taurus and Shadow Work

The leaves are falling, the flowers are sleeping in their seeds, and we are turning inwards again on the wheel of the year. I flew to Geneva again for some seasonal work, leaving behind the golden mountains of home, and jetlag has given me some strange productive hours. There are many things I want to share, for the first time in a while, and I will try to weave them all together here.

Shining Light on Our Darker Places

Yesterday the Sun moved into Scorpio, shining light on our darker places, the obsessions we'd rather not have and the pain we would rather bury sometimes. But I've been there for a while; Venus has been retrograde for a few weeks and she's been bringing me events from the past to survey, times when I didn't feel good enough or loved enough. Tonight, at the Full Moon in Taurus, Venus will cross paths with the sun, forming one of the points of her star shaped movement through the sky and reflecting back to us the beauty of our wounds. I've been working with my shadow for a while now, since she first went retrograde at the beginning of October, and this time around she's brought to me an even deeper compassion for my darker places.

Existential Kink

A gentle place to start exploring the shadow is through the book by Robert Johnson, a Jungian thinker and analyst, Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the Psyche (1991). He explains what the shadow is in a reassuring way, from the perspective of its Jungian source; we all have one, it's okay, we can represent it for ourselves in concrete ways in the material world and rise above it's tendency to bite us back when we are least expecting it. I didn't begin with a gentle exploration of the shadow though; I jumped right in a few years ago with a practice I learned from Carolyn Elliot, in her course INFLUENCE, which she has coined Existential Kink, EK for short. This practice basically entails allowing your body to find its ecstasy through the fulfillment of desires it usually refuses, in a completely safe way and on its own terms. It's based on the premise that having is a sign of wanting and it turns around our tendency to feel like the victims of our lives. Allowing the body to relax into and enjoy the painful events of the past is liberating in a way that is hard to explain - you have to try it! It's probably best to hear Carolyn herself talk about it:

https://www.dreamfreedombeauty.com/witch-carolyn-elliott-on-shame-the-heroines-story-why-not-to-be-careful-what-you-wish-for-episode-54/

I think she's writing a book about it, so hopefully more people will have access to this powerfully transformative way of dealing with trauma. The practice has felt especially healing for me lately, so this Venus retrograde in Scorpio period that I was apprehensive about has actually been extremely liberating. I feel more free and accepting of the past then I ever have before, which is helping me be less troubled by the troubling events of our present, if that makes sense. There is a breath in, a breath out, and a real reaping of my introspective work, which has often been heavy and daunting, lasting for days if not for months sometimes. Phew. Shadow work pays off.

Not Blindly Giving Our Power Away

On the plane over I read another Robert Johnson book, Inner Gold: Understanding Psychological Projection (2008). This short book was also very healing, and I learned again the importance of recognizing when we are putting our gold into someone else's lap, and the need to be conscious about drawing our soul light back, standing in our own light when we can, and not blindly giving our power away because we don't want to or are unable to hold it. In the sky, in the dark, I held my light in my lap and cried, one step closer to accepting myself and my life's learning journey. I wrote this poem a few months ago, but it expresses this current calling back to myself of my desires:

So I'm calling all my desires back to myself,
Every one wanted and then refused.
Every cell, blood red, that went out to gather
Vampire-like, ill-used, I call back to myself.
Every body touched and hurt
in darkness, every sun that shown
on my desired one, every wish fulfilled or spurned
every one, I call back to myself, as one.

I think it's a spell. I suppose I cast it back then, and now, here I am living it. I'm grateful, a step closer to feeling my wholeness, which I sometimes forget is there.

Embodied Earthiness

The sensuousness of these experiences are brought to you thanks to this Full Moon in Taurus, where she shines ample and worthy, embodied earthiness. See if you can feel into any of the discomfort she might illuminate. It might appear in the form of frustration, anger or animosity towards yourself or others. She is conjunct Uranus at the moment too, so our feelings may feel especially electric, new, or charged. As you sound them, see if you can use this energy to shine a light in the darkness and bring a playfulness to your story, however challenging it may be.

Lunar Wisdom

Enjoy her healing light tonight! Some lunar wisdom I've enjoyed reading that moves in the same direction as this and might bring you even more healing introspection are:

Sabrina Monarch, at Monarch Astrology
Mystic Mama, at http://www.mysticmamma.com/astrology-full-moon-in-taurus-october-24th-2018/
and Anandashree Astrology, for a soothing Vedic take https://www.anandastrology.com/blog/full-moon-soak-it-up-ashwini-vedic-astrology

If you want more of my writing on the shadow journey, as Persephone's choice, read https://badwitch.es/heroines-journey-persephones-choice-embracing-shadow-rewriting-myth/

A prose piece of mine, “Origins", which is largely the product of my own work with shadow and myth, was just published in Dark Mountain: Issue 14, TERRA, https://dark-mountain.net/product/dark-mountain-issue-14-terra/

I'll be writing more as the flowers are sleeping! I'm looking forward to sharing. Keep connecting! Our sparks in the dark.

(Originally published October 24th, 2018)

Eclipses, Flowers, Flow

I was able to make three new essences on the July 27th lunar eclipse, with some help. Virginia Trumpet, Honeysuckle Rose, and Mint. I'll post them on the Flower Essences page soon.

Remake The World

I've been staying in a perfect little French village for the past week with one of my oldest and best friends. I love our discussions. We “remake the world" as you say in French, and talk about our true struggles, with life, with the meaning of things, with how to change, where to live, what to be. It feels very essential and necessary to me at this time.

I’m In A Garden. We Talk About Love.

Also I feel a bit out of the way, away from the maelstrom that is the world, that makes me cry, of dying birds and fires, volcanoes and violent winds. I'm in a garden. We talk about love. I have a safe space in which to observe the mental patterns and behaviors that I want to let go of.

I've read a lot of astrological commentaries about this period. I especially enjoy Aeolian Heart's useful literary and musical takes on the planets and stars and their energies, as well as Monarch Astrology's insightful probing of their meaning. AnandaShree Astrology gives her intuitive Vedic take on the sky which is soothing and purposeful.

Well Accompanied On My Way

Full Moon Eclipse

And I? I've been flowing, with the present as it presents itself and the travel as my path unrolls before me. I'm not sure where I am going, but I do feel well accompanied on my way. I'm appreciative of all my teachers, and the lessons, both the ones I wanted and the ones I didn't. I'm gathering myself together and weaving the new. I'm writing. How about you?

(Originally posted July 30th, 2018)

A New Dress On: Full Moon in Sagittarius

I've been thinking that this full moon feels like putting a new dress on, and this was confirmed in Mystic Mama's recap of the moon's influence:

Newness and freedom, a new dress with nothing else on.

“And ELLIAS LONSDALE Star Spark for this Moon’s degree is: “A man with green skin. He is dressed in leaves."

I've been hearing of people leaving the material plane more frequently lately, some by choice, others not, and I get it. This transition for some (Uranus in Taurus) is better done in a concrete way. Let me just go. Then some new people are coming too, babies in this new era, so there is continuity. Personally I feel neither young nor old, like I'm floating between, neither done nor begun. How are you feeling?

Checking In

In the morning I remember to check in with my physical body, my emotional body and my mental body. Everyday there is a differing combination of sensations and feelings and thoughts. I check in with this new dress I am wearing. Today I am fasting. I usually fast with the new moon, if I am not feeling poorly, but I feel this full moon needs a fast, to be more aware of the newness. I'll drink herbal teas and listen in. In terms of work, this work, soul work, seems like the most important work, and I'm glad I have the time to do it.

I Am Taking In, I Am Giving Back

Studying astrology: I've been feeling overwhelmed, so I'm going slow. Also, I'm a bit confused amid the signs and synchronicity, I need to take some time. I've been meditating daily and remembering that I'm held between the Earth and the stars and other Planets, which helps; as above, so below. I've been doing yoga everyday to remember I am grounded and rooted and to pay tribute to Saturn with discipline. I've been walking and remembering that I am watched by the plants, that they are company, and they tell me things, mostly their surprise at the city that is growing up around them. I agree, it is a bit shocking. I miss the countryside. But then, here in Geneva, I've enjoyed seeing how people save trees, the roads are enlarged around them, the grasses are left to grow high, the insects and butterflies come by, the snails move across my windowsill, and each morning and evening I take in the song of birds singing to the sky. The smells of blossoms make fragrant rooms in this city that I walk through. Breathing I remember I am taking in, I am giving back.

Speedwell Essence

I've been taking Speedwell essence and remembering to be gentle with myself. I've been singing some. I'm really thankful for my teachers. What are you thankful for?

And I've started drawing plant portraits for a presentation I will make when I'm back in Vermont in the fall. It's amazing how their individual planty-ness (I wrote personality first but that's not right! ) pops out. I'll post some!

Blessings of smoothness in all this newness and enjoy your new dresses on.

(Originally posted May 29th 2018)

Full Moon in Scorpio: More on Work, Money, Time

As the bus arrives in Boston, pulling through the concrete, tall world of the city, I'm reading E. F. Schumacher's Small is Beautiful and still thinking about work.

Travel and Travail

What is work? I'm always between two languages so I think about travail. This word in Old French meant suffering, so that must be why I don't want to do it. The first recorded use of it is in reference to the pains of childbirth, which makes sense, so it is birthing something, creating. In Songlines, Bruce Chatwin associates travail with travel, they come from the same word: “‘Travel': same word as ‘travail' - ‘bodily or mental labour', ‘toil, especially of a painful or oppressive nature', ‘exertion', ‘hardship', ‘suffering'. A ‘journey' (p. 215)." I'm traveling now, this strange mixture of productivity and suffering that is movement across the Earth. I always write more when I am on the road. In Old English, the main knot of meaning seems to be simply “to do" which leads to a more productive meaning for the word: to do something, to make something. Both words of course now have economic meanings and have been caught up in that all-encompassing, unshakeable structure we call capitalism. Marx of course criticized “abstract labour", the reduction of man to the work he does in support of a fraudulent economy. This runs behind my thoughts; the whole system is corrupt so why would should I “work" for it?

Work, In Many Forms

But I do work. My work is usually intellectual. I work with words, I write, translate, I think, I put concepts together, draw conclusions, read, on repeat. I make and reinforce lexical fields and neuronal connections in my brain. I try to do this with as much awareness and consciousness as possible. I learn. It doesn't feel like work and it makes my eyes and back hurt. I sometimes get paid for it. Then there is the work I have been doing on a farm. I walk to the barn, I check on the lambs, I give them hay. Another day I come in and pack sauerkraut into jars with a crew. I do this till my shoulder hurts and then I ask someone to do it for me and I put labels on jars. This is what many people call work. I'm working to produce something marketable, but I'm not getting paid for it because I like the communal work and I believe that more people should eat sauerkraut. I did get paid for tending the flock. Mostly what I get paid for is teaching, but that feels less like work than all the rest. That is helping someone learn so they can think and then grow from this thinking. I like that work.

It’s A Lie There Isn’t Enough Money To Go Around

So, money? It seems to accumulate when I am not looking and has a function that is actually quite independent from my level of “work". It seems to me to be another big fraud. It's materialized energy that we use to get goods. It is nice to have and not having it makes you feel like you don't matter or even exist. People think they don't have work so they aren't worth money and then it's a downward spiral to not having any. It's our cultural and social currency and some people are purposefully left out of it because our current system rewards greed and being white and male, generally. I feel pretty safe saying this. People look at homeless people and think “They should get a job" regardless of the fact that having a job doesn't even mean that you have a place to live anymore. It seems to me more people might notice all these things that don't line up between what we believe about money and how it works. I'm ready for a monthly minimum salary for everyone so that then we can only do the work we want to do, and it's a lie there isn't enough money to go around, just like it's a lie that we can't nourish everyone on the planet. We say this because we want to keep wasting food and money. I'm not sure why, to keep the whole system up and running? I haven't figured that one out yet, but it also doesn't make any sense. I need to read more about it. In the 1990's Jeremy Rifkin published a book The End of Work which didn't end work and didn't please many economists and sociologists. We are always creating new work.

Cyclical and Mythical Time

What about time? What can I add? Hello Saturn. It's cyclical and mythical to me. I realize I learn in cycles, I go back, the same blocks appear again, I react a little differently because I'm a little wiser. I'll do this till I die. I'm back in Geneva now, again. It's the Full Moon in Scorpio, or was a few hours ago, and in celebration of my more scorpionic showy side, I've posted a poem composed during ritual about being the moon, on my poetry blog:  orphanedline.blogspot.com. I don't know if anyone will read this but I like putting it out there in case it can help someone. Maybe you are the moon sometimes too.

On Being Seen

This makes me think about being seen, and I'll leave you with Asia Suller's beautiful musings on the topic, of how we are always and already being seen by the world around us. Don't forget! https://onewillowapothecaries.com/you-are-seen/

Just the other day a chipmunk watched me from a tree trunk, listening intently as I sang the Gayatri mantra. I'm getting ready to take Asia's Intuitive Plant Medicine class again and I'm very excited about the plants I will meet this time and the things I will learn. I will continue going a little deeper down the spiral.

Enjoy the wheel of time as she turns again to Beltane! I'm getting back to work.

(Originally posted April 30, 2018)