Nox Amicus

This past Friday, at 11:53am, the Moon was New again. This is the second cycle in a row where I’ve gotten this intention composed within about a week. This feels like good timing – close enough to be relevant, but not rushed.

Last month’s theme of Conflation spoke about how so many moments this year seemed to ignite patterned responses from years ago – or were even being concurrently mirrored in other parts of my life. The past few weeks have seen the work of doing my best to stay in this reality as I try to navigate the challenges I face now.

There has been no shortage of challenges either. Last week I had to contend with a milestone birthday, the energy shift I feel around the time of a New Moon, and the anniversary of my mother’s passing – all this, in addition to moving through the changes that 2023 has brought.

It has been a turbulent year. I have found that many areas of my life that I had thought were really well defined are now in a state of flux. Some of these changes are good and healthy, some of them are profoundly sad but still healthy, some are still to be determined. To be honest, some are actually all three.

Change is hard. Growth is hard. From an early age I was always shy, hesitant, or afraid. I had felt I was a burden, and in many ways that I was undeserving of love. I have grown and evolved over time, but those early feelings – and the coping skills I’d developed to try to present as ‘normal’ in the real world – were omnipresent. They were the well worn wheel tracks in the road of my life. So much a part of me that I never really saw how much they weren’t “me” at all.

People have told me how my trip to Australia in 2019 was ‘brave’ – when I simply thought I was finally doing what I was called to do – but I see it now. Having the strength to move as our spirit wills us does require a certain kind of Courage. The Courage to loosen our hold on our own expectations, as well as the Courage to trust that the path we are on is true. This is why Courage is the focus for this cycle. 

I am in the process of finding that living this life requires a Courage that I never felt myself capable of. Some of it has been having the Courage to self-advocate, which I feel I have gotten better at. But I am also learning the Courage that both comes from, and results in, taking responsibility for all of the facets of my life – celebrating the victories, and doing my very best to make up for the things I get wrong.

I used to skip to the end of books, or look up the ending to a movie, because the anxiousness of waiting for the outcome was too intense. But the future is unwritten – I would never have predicted some of these twists and turns, but I am doing my best to live this life moment by moment with as much Courage as I can muster; with wonder at what the future might hold. I may finally be learning that the most optimistic question is “What could happen next?”