SAYING YES TO LIFE
It’s been a devastating last week over here in the US of A. Most of us respond to the spectacle of the national political situation with rage and/or hopelessness. We give up. Or we yell at everyone to call their senators and or blow up the white house, etc. Honestly, any response seems ‘rational’, to a completely irrational farce of a situation.
I bring this up because the tendency to want to either take dramatic, unsustainable actions or totally give up is such a human, common thing I see in myself and in others. This is the thinking that holds us back SO MUCH. We miss out on so much possibility, in what we want to eat, in how much we meditate, in changes we want to make to our relationships, to our jobs, to our finances, to our political nightmares, etc, because we think so short-term and so dramatically. It’s not going to do anything to make this small change so I’m not going to change at all, we tell ourselves.
This thinking keeps us in the trap that we call the bleak future, but actually, it is just us being depressed in the present.
I’m not even saying that what we do will lead to some political improvement. I don’t know that. What I’m saying is that what we do matters right now, in how it makes us feel, in this moment, with the people we live with and encounter - because as small as that seems, it’s the impact that most of us will have to show for at the end of our lives. So we need to do these things that represent our own saying yes to life, to each other, because of how it makes us feel, not because of what it might do. And if these things we do end up changing something bigger, that is a beautiful bi-product, but we do not have control over that. If we foreclose on possibility because of how dark this shit looks, then we foreclose on ourselves and this very moment, which is actually all we have. This very moment. In which to act in a way that says yes to life. Whatever that means to you.
ARIES | March 21-April 19
Question - How is your breathing lately?
Meditation - bright cream.
Assignment - Breathing. Resist the urge to make it more complicated than that. Return to the breath, if you do it enough, it really will provide what you are seeking.
TAURUS | April 20-May 20
Question - What are you harvesting this week because of what you set into motion last week?
Meditation - the elasticity of time.
Assignment - Harvesting. If you don’t already know what you are harvesting, make it your mission this week to see what is being harvested in your life right now. There is something - many things in fact.
GEMINI | May 21-June 20
Question - When do you seek information below you?
Meditation - dusty rose.
Assignment - Look down and in. Connect through the earth instead of through people and ideas. Move your awareness down beneath your feet, over and over.
CANCER | June 21-July 22
Question - What have you been doing for others that feels like a gift to yourself?
Meditation - ginger.
Assignment - Cooking. Return to this comfortable place. Cook something you love, let it be easy. Do it for yourself and for someone else.
LEO | July 23-August 22
Question - What is being neglected in your life?
Meditation - focus.
Assignment - Return to what is worthy of your attention. Do not miss out on the spirit of your life - on display at every moment in front of you - because you are fulfilling what seem to be pressing obligations. Do not wait.
VIRGO | August 23-September 22
Question - What do you look at in your work space?
Meditation - the relaxation of sunset.
Assignment - Revise what you see on your work space in some way this week. Make sure what you are seeing includes a symbol of the sacred, whatever that means to you. Let it help you relax into your life as it is.
LIBRA | September 23-October 23
Question - What will you sow now for the upcoming year of your life?
Meditation - living soil.
Assignment - Sowing. Take an action that is a movement toward something you want in the future. Make it a ritual. Give yourself time to adequately sow for the future.
SCORPIO | October 23-November 21
Question - Where do you find shelter?
Meditation - rooted to the earth.
Assignment - Tend to your home this week. Give it new life. Find a new way to let it be a refuge, even if it’s inadequate or stressful in some way.
SAGITTARIUS | November 22-December 21
Question - What can you learn from stillness?
Meditation - stillness.
Assignment - Find short periods of time to be still this week. Ask a question at the beginning of the stillness to sit with while you are being still. Use your curiosity and seeking mind to guide you into the activity of stillness.
CAPRICORN | December 22-January 19
Question - What do you miss in your life because it’s not material?
Meditation - ephemeral, unseeable.
Assignment - Investigate the nonmaterial this week. What do you miss because it doesn’t count as real in your mind, including your own contributions that aren’t monetary or material? Be with these things, let them become more real by meditating on them.
AQUARIUS | January 20 to February 18
Question - What might life be asking you to see right now?
Meditation - deep blue shimmering.
Assignment - What is the opportunity in your struggle? Look to nature to help you see what you might be blind to - a perspective that will reframe your experience. Spend time in nature to cultivate this new seeing. Don’t try too hard, just put your body in a place that feels alive to you.
PISCES | February 19 to March 20
Question - What intuition are you not acknowledging?
Meditation - flexibility of sea legs.
Assignment - Let yourself be good at what you are good at this week. Let your intuition in. Even if you don’t act on it, acknowledge it. Everything in us just wants to be acknowledged, and the more you do this, the more peace you’ll feel.