Soak It In and Enjoy

By Amanda Moreno

It feels as if my identity is shifting in so many areas these days that I can’t quite keep up. There’s a lot of dream catching going on amidst the integration of the past few years of intense transformation. An influx of new relationships of all kinds means more projections to wade through as well, and I’m finding that taking a quiet moment to settle back into my center is a task I’m needing to attend to on a regular basis.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Walking home the other night, I was reflecting on my day. It had been a glorious mix of lounging, tarot card reading, and then meeting up with a group of people I’d never met before.

The meeting with the group was a particular highlight because they were so genuinely insightful, friendly and intelligent — and well worth the effort it took to force my sometimes socially awkward self in the door of the establishment and up to the table. It was a gathering of non-monogamous folks, and I need more people in my life with whom I can relate when it comes to the ways we engage relationships. Participating in that kind of community is one of the many goals I’ve set for myself this year.

So as I walked, reflecting, I giggled a bit at how good things are, at how great it feels to be in such an extroverted stage, how surreal it is to be at a place in my life where I can focus so much on building my practice while at the same time maintaining a social life, and how happy I am that such a shift has recently occurred for me at so many levels.

Suddenly, I got a bit choked up. I felt a rush of bittersweet longing and an inkling of weighty grief pooling into my chest. I got weepy — and I couldn’t quite pinpoint why. Then I remembered to stop and find my center.

When I went about my yearly practice of creating a 2016 vision board at the beginning of January, I struggled more than I ever have before. You see, somewhere in the journey of the past six or seven years I transitioned from being a person who never really had the ability to envision her future, and who never had much foresight or many goals, into someone who not only dreams but combines that vision with the will and drive to make those dreams reality.

I think part of me is just waiting for someone to call me out on it all — someone who will say, “Hey! You can’t actually be an astrologer who practices past-life regression therapy and writes for an incredible website and coaches people who identify as kinky, queer and polyamorous AND feed yourself and keep a roof over your head!”

There’s a surreality to the fact that this path has opened up, in many ways with an extreme amount of ease, that keeps me wondering when others will notice what an imposter I am. I wonder if the whole thing will come crumbling down. The thing is, really, that it might! I might fail hugely at my life as I’m setting it up. But I get to keep moving forward with it all anyway.

In any case, I was having a hard time narrowing down my intentions for the year because I kind of want it all. I seem to be entering a period of expansion. Then it occurred to me: maybe I don’t need to narrow it down, maybe I can just go for everything I want this year. What would be important and helpful, then, is remembering to find my center. So I created a vision board that reflects that theme and placed it on my altar as a daily reminder. It has been a stunningly useful decision.

And so, as I walked home that night, stopping in the empty schoolyard, overwhelmed with some kind of bittersweet syrupy and Piscean emotionality that I didn’t quite understand, I closed my eyes. I took a deep breath. I found my center. And while I could tap in a little bit, I felt small and afraid. A sense of despair arose. I asked myself what was going on — why the sudden upset? There it was: how can I trust the universe? How do I have faith? There was a whisper underneath of an old script I won’t give life to by articulating here.

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I opened my eyes and looked up at the sky. The Moon shone brightly down from overhead, and next to it Jupiter, planet of faith and belief. I took another deep breath and that sense of openness to the magic of the mystery of this existence returned.

And there it was: that feeling of grounded centeredness amidst an awakened and deep knowing of how tiny I am, how inconsequential in the grander scheme of things — and how that knowledge of how inconsequential I am does not mean I have to live small or safe, or that my journey doesn’t matter. It reminded me how lucky I am to get to play on the surface of a ball hurtling through space at millions of miles per hour.

Even though I’m not entirely sure who I’m becoming, even though scripts are being re-written faster than I can keep up and sometimes I feel like I’m lost in a sea of projections, I’m here and present and can slow things down and take deep breaths and lean into that feeling of being at home within myself. I can tap into the wonder and the mystery of the living night sky, bask in the glow, and just agree not to know what the end point will be, only that when the journey feels good it’s OK to soak it in and enjoy.