New Moon lessons ~ discernment, permission, protection

I’ve been purging these weeks past… this moon phase has brought resolution to a part of my life that feels finally and cleanly finished. I am so thankful, but I am exhausted. Turning over the soil in my psyche, writing down my dreams and delving into the space of my feelings has revealed a clarity, and ‘seeing’ of what has felt murky for the longest time. I see the moments of last year and the year before stacked like dominoes…encounters, people, circumstances. I can see the motivations and momentum that led to certain decisions, the entrapment I felt and the ways I ignored my intuition. Hindsight is a powerful guide. I am trying not to judge my experience. Although I struggled, I feel almost as though the dominoes had to complete their run in order for me to deeply learn these lessons.
For that, I can only be thankful.

I spiralled into the darkness and experienced my blockages with ferocity. A lack of self conviction led me towards circumstances of imbalanced power. In doubt of my resiliency, my dreams and my worth, I handed my security to somebody else. Created an invitation for dominant and coercive energies. Fell into cycles of obligation and attachment. It feels good to speak the truth, no matter how unsavoury. It feels important.

What I can understand now is that I felt the loss of community very much in my life, more than I realised. I was dealing with and probably denying the feelings of confusion and isolation. In the transition between worlds; the ending of one and the beginning of another there is a void, a question mark, an unknowing. I was swallowed by this. I was missing confidence in my intuition to see the forest for the trees and could hardly see for a very long time that I was seeking sustenance and respite in the wrong places. That, although I had felt like I had left an old pattern of obligation and dependency, it led me straight into the chokehold of another. It’s funny how it works that way sometimes.
But what I’m sure of, is that self doubt, confusion an questioning is normal on this journey of learning ourselves. It is okay. I cannot blame myself for this, nor carry on expecting that I should always have total belief and confidence in what I’m doing. But what is not okay, is for that place of uncertainty, naivety even, to be taken advantage of. Manipulation can be subtle, it can be energetic, and it can be as obvious as it is undetectable to you when you are experiencing a situation and not ready to accept that it is poisoning you.

It really feels like no coincidence, what is playing out in the world right now as the feminine rises up to reclaim her sacred space. So much of what is coming up within me is related. I feel strengthened by the conversation, the rising sentiment “enough is enough”.
I am healing after far too long of a time allowing my sacred space, time and energy to be utilised in unhealthy and domineering ways. I have come to accept that I am not easily able to see this on a surface level with a person or situation which is why it is so important to heed the feelings of intuition, the physical sensations in the body. Feelings do not lie and mine were certainly warning me time and time again… I rationalised them each time. Every panic attack, feeling of overwhelm and fear, the flood of emotions and vulnerability… the visceral feeling of being attached. I subject all these sensations to analysis, scanned myself for discrepancies, asked myself what was wrong with me.

The feelings in the body are always enough evidence. Nothing more is needed.

All of this understanding has come on with a suddenness and lucidity which has completely shifted me out of where I was. Although it has been extremely revealing, it has strangely not shocked me. The stitches have come undone and there is such freedom in speaking, writing and dancing with these truths now that they have come out from the shadows.

Reflecting like this is catharsis. When I think about it truthfully, saying ‘no’, choosing my needs and wants, going against the grain of expectation and rejecting advances towards any part of me…feels dangerous. It feels essentially risky, physically and spiritually. It makes me feel like a child, or a puppet…and obligation is the puppeteer.
Compassion I am positive, is my antidote. And a fierce resolve to self care in more loving, discerning and protective ways.

And with that I am choosing to release these feelings that stifled me. I have dragged them out of the darkness, looked them dead in the eyes and honestly felt ready to annihilate everything that stands in my way. But I am tired. I am not made for war.  To be on the defense does not feel natural. And yet to be soft to the point of permitting trespass is not right approach.  Clarissa Pinkola Estes says, "the wild, because of it's energy and beauty, is always in the eyes of somebody or other, some group or other, for trophy purposes or as a thing to be reduced, altered, ruled on, murdered, redesigned or controlled. The wild always needs a guardian at the gate, or it will be misused." The sacred feminine space is the wild. We must protect ourselves, just as we work to protect our sacred earth.

So let us be sure to leave a guardian at the gate, and be liberated to keep our spirits and hearts open and receptive to love in the right places, and the unbridled experience of life.