The Water Oracle's Monthly Messages From Spirit
August's Spiritual Horoscope
August is here. That’s month 8 of 12 for those of you still keeping track. How do the days seem to move by so fast yet still feel so slow? Time is a strange construct that doesn’t really feel like it is aligning very well with our expectations these days. Things keep tick, tick, ticking along though. It feels like we’re just collectively holding our breath, waiting for the moment to pass. But the moment doesn’t pass, only time does. We are ¾ of the way through the year and through the journey that is 2020 and it feels like we have a few more years to live through yet before we ever reach December.
For this month we have a new band of three animal spirit helpers joining us. The appearance of three suggests some progress can be made and some positive results can be yielded as we head into what is typically the harvest season for this hemisphere. This month we’re working with the energy of Rabbit, Hedgehog and Hawk. Certainly, an unlikely trio, but each contributes something of incredible value for the times we are facing. The unusual combination of energies is reticent of how we too must be. Thinking outside the box, allowing old constructs like “normal” to fall away. Let’s explore the lessons and energy these great teachers bring to us and how that energy works to support us.
RABBIT. Rabbit energy brings us many lessons, many of which are about working through fear and anxiety. In application it is the idea of feeling the fear and doing it anyway. Working through it. Rabbit behavior teaches us that we too can overcome fear or insecurity, and that ultimately our survival or success depends on our doing so. Some of our greatest successes in life come from this very process. Rabbit is the energy of creation which is why it is so closely related with fertility. She reminds us that now is the time to work with what we have in front of us. Create something better or more fruitful using the resources available and the wisdom you’ve already acquired. The overarching message here is that we must continue to create and do so without fear or the influences of the past. The energy of creation ushers in the possibility of new beginnings and new creative projects for us this month that have remarkable potential for the future. Utilize the seclusion to nurture your inner creative genius. Rabbit energy this month gives us the courage to turn over a new life and try different things. It’s definitely time to breathe life back into any tired routines and dream up some new ideas. You may feel the need to recharge and reinvigorate yourself. Remember that fear and insecurity block our creative flow. Try to relax into some moments of play or discovery to get the passions flowing again.
HEDGEHOG. Hedgehog energy is the power of staying present and the lesson of working with what is right in front of us. She teaches us that our power lies only in the present moment. Hedgehogs present us with strong earth energy, meaning they are well grounded beings, practical, careful, and realistic. Because of their poor sight they rely on their other senses and what “is” to provide them with the information they need to make decisions. They respond to the present moment as it comes. This can be a valuable approach to living for many of us right now. If you are scared or feeling vulnerable right now, learn to stay in the present. Don’t let your mind wonder off creating scenarios of doom. In August, base your decisions on the information that you currently have in front of you. It is also a time to follow your gut instincts. Use the data and the resources you have now and base your actions on that.
Hedgehogs are cautious creatures and know how to protect themselves. Again, they use the information they gather through their senses to determine their safety and their actions. But they are also inherently sweet and gentle souls that luxuriate in moments of full vulnerability. For us, this behavior illustrates the need to set personal boundaries for ourselves. Learn to trust your intuition about people and situations. Having boundaries and listening to your instincts will protect you, but it will also allow for you to know when you can be vulnerable and relax. All creatures prefer a state of being relaxed, open, and receptive. Our current world circumstance have us ever vigilant and this can be exhausting. We also need to know when we can let our guard down so that others can see who we are. This is the place that we build real connections with others from. So, we need to be able to unclench so that we can connect to our community. Knowing what you will and will not accept from others is important. Understanding when a person or a situation is no longer good for you is valuable. Now is the time to draw that line in the sand. Self-preservation is not selfish. You do not need to throw yourself to the wolves in order to be loved, respected, or even paid well. What you need to be is a good communicator and have the strength and courage to stand up for yourself when you need to and walk away when you are not treated well. This has never been more important than it is right now.
HAWK. It’s no surprise the message coming from Hawk this month is short and specific. It is the nature of this energy entirely. Hawk energy wants us to focus in on the details and learn to hone our focus when we are looking for new ideas or paths forward. He warns us about having too much on our plates and trying to do everything at once. Now is not the best time to try to multitask. When our attention is splintered so is our energy. We can’t give 50 things 100% of our energy. You can’t manifest everything at once. Carefully select what is most important to you right now and work on that. When that no longer needs 100% of your focus you can move on. A scattered mind is scattered energy and that creates very little when it comes to yielding results. Hawk energy also swoops in to guide us towards seizing opportunities that are on the horizon. Look for things that grab your attention. Examine what comes along and see if its right for you. Now is the time to keep your eyes open. The idea of keeping our eyes open and noticing details is important this month. Hawks don’t miss a thing. If you’ve been missing an important piece of your puzzle, chances are it’s closer than you think right now. Pay attention and you are likely to find exactly what you need soon.
AUGUST
The collective, meaning the community as a whole, consciously wants harmony. We see the wrongs and we want them made right. Even if you don’t think you and your neighbor agree right now, the one thing we all agree with is that the problems we’re facing are numerous and all equally serious and important. The problem is we can’t agree on how to solve them or even which one to work on first. We lack any unifying agents. So, if we are actually the “WE THE PEOPLE” we believe ourselves to be the only way forward is to do for ourselves. This means grassroots, community engagement and improvement. What we’ve learned is that our governments are broken, tone deaf instruments of the past. They are relics of an age that no longer represents its people. We are seeing government as we know it in its death throws. Humanity at its core is inherently good. We are taught wickedness. We are taught cruelty. Our nature is not to be so though, it is a conflict that starts from within. That is why so much of what we are confronted with right now is difficult. We are being asked to deal with societal woes at the same time we’re being asked to look within ourselves and right those wrongs too. The two are related you see. Talk about exhaustion. We’re reaching a point where we have crisis fatigue. It’s the point in the hero’s journey where we think he/she may give up on their quest.
This is where another character usually comes in to remind our hero that they can only do so much. That they have everything they need to be successful. They only need to gather themselves up again and find the courage to continue. This is the same advice I give you now as well. Take a breath. Unclench. Turn off the news for a minute. Focus for a bit on yourself and recovery. Self-preservation is not selfish. If you completely burn out now, you’ll be of no use to anyone later because you’ll be too overwhelmed. Being overwhelmed leads to two things: paralysis or frustration. Neither is good, productive, or healthy.
In August we spend most of our time with Leo energy. Seeing and connecting with family and friends will be very important right now. Make each moment count. In Leo things from the outside world will be filtered through a lens of identity. How you feel. What your role is. What you want. We’ve been asked to bear a lot of self-scrutiny lately. For this month, you’ll need to return your focus to your life and your goals. Do you need to pay attention to what the community needs too? Yes. But you get to choose how you participate and how much you can participate while maintaining your own wellness and path in life. It’s a balancing act for sure. But we need to only control what we can and that is ourselves. What is your role in the pandemic? What is your role in correcting social injustices?
Our responsibility as a community is first, building awareness and building bridges that lead to better communication. It is then holding that communication accountable towards initiating engagement, action, and change. Our responsibility as an individual is to engage with this process. Only you can decide which piece of the puzzle you are able to work on. What are your personal strengths? Engage from that space. That is what you have to offer. Oh, and vote! Show up where and when you can. But no one can decide how you show support or what you should focus on right now. No one gets to decide for you what your morals and ethics should be but you. But you are being challenged right now to understand your beliefs, evaluate them and act on them. How you do so is up to you. Leo brings out our passion and ignites our drive to act. You might it easier this month to find your own voice in all this. What we are being reminded of most right now is that self-determination should be a human right not a privilege. If you have the ability to make changes, don’t squander it. If you are reaching that place of burnout however, it will be necessary to take a breath. Take a day off if you can. Spend time outside. Take time to regroup and figure out how you want to proceed in the way that keeps you engaged but whole. Whole and true to yourself.
In August the universe is asking you to take a look at your career. If you are retired or a stay at home parent, this would be a focus on planning for the future. Career and money matters are being highlighted as we find ourselves feeling nostalgic for the past when things were “normal”. There is a lot of wishing things were the way they used to be going around. People are tired of being uncomfortable. I get it. I want to throw out a word or two of caution, however. As much as I miss sipping matcha at my favorite café with my laptop, we have to be careful to not overly romanticize the way things were before. There were a lot of problems with how things were done in the past and a lot of unhappiness and inequality in the way the past operated and is still operating. Toss the rose-colored glasses out. We are not going to go back to the way it was.
We have to imagine now what is best for us moving forward. What’s working for you? If you need to look backwards, examine what actually is still working well for you. Look at the skills, resources and tools that have brought you this far and pivot from that point. How can you use what works to create something new for yourself? How can you utilize your current strengths and assets to push you forward? Let me give you an example. During this pandemic maybe you’ve been forced to work from home. Six months later you’re finding that this really works for you. Use this as a pivot point to either find employment that will allow you to always work from home or perhaps suggest this as a more efficient and cost-effective way for your employer to run your department. If the social changes that are arising within our communities have inspired you, use this passion to pursue equality within your own workplace or to find career-oriented opportunities that allow you pursue that endeavor further while still utilizing your professional strengths. Figure out what you have learned about yourself, your needs or your work that needs to be retooled. Take what you need from the past and discard the rest, using the best of it to fuel and shape your future.
We all know there are obstacles ahead. We can see them coming. The virus is omni-present, and we have children returning to school soon. An election looms ahead and the economy is hovering on the brink. The fall months are gonna be CRAZY with activity. Which is why we need to take that moments pause this month and also why we need to get focused on what we’re doing going forward. Worry has no seat at this table. Re-read that. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. But there will be a lot to navigate after this month. Fall brings decisions we need to make and there is a lot of noise and clutter to clear in order for us to do so. Take a deep breath and remember that you have everything you need.
By the end of August, we move from naval gazing with Leo energy to following that inner light with conviction in Virgo. Virgo is a powerhouse earth sign. Where Leo is passion and personal goals, Virgo takes that energy and harnesses it with that “Eye of the Tiger” type determination. If Leo is willpower, Virgo is the follow through. The end of August and then into early September are about application, follow through and getting the job done. We are grounded, we know what we want, and we know how to get it. That feels nice. Feeling like your feet are on the ground running in the direction you want them to, is a nice change of pace. Having momentum is a nice change of pace. Fall will be the last big push. Just keep repeating to yourself, “There’s a light at the end of the tunnel. There will be positive progress. There will be positive change.” The end of August though it’s “Eye of the Tiger” time. Nose to the grindstone type of focus and work. It may be hard to see right now, but all this topsy-turvy turmoil is leading us somewhere. The intense pressure, the unbearable waiting, will eventually pay off with diamond like results. We’re being asked to co-create the future. Don’t sit this one out and let others decide what yours is going to look like. Stay positive my friends. There’s a lot of negative energy swirling around. Don’t let yourself get caught up in it. Do what you can when you can. Make decisions right now based on your gut instincts and the information that’s in front of you. Create something new with the resources and skills you’ve already acquired. You’ve got this!
Focus on the good. Think outside the box. Have a wonderful month!
All the best,
Stacey The Water Oracle
The Skink & The Zonkey?
Chaos. Transition. Evolution. Change.
2020
Like it or not our collective path has been set. We’re all on the road to change. In the current moment though, we hang mid-air in the upheaval of it all. Unsure of where we’ll land amidst the chaos, we wait seemingly paralyzed with uncertainty waiting for the other shoe to drop. Disease, death, food shortages, unemployment… the list of things going wrong is long and scary. But it is not all terrible news. In fact, there is still plenty of good in the world and still plenty more to come. Tragedies are often laced with silver linings. And while it’s tiresome to have people continually tell you to look on the bright side, under these circumstances it is nice to have the reminder. It is nice to see the level of human compassion there is in the world. It is nice to see us returning to ourselves, our natural state of being. We come into this world agents of good. We are loving, generous and noble creatures really. It is fear and ignorance which alter our natural continence. We are changed by our experiences here unfortunately and we can become distracted by the goals in which we are told we should pursue. Natural disasters like pandemics have a way of humbling people. They shake people free of everything they’ve clung to and remind them of who they actually are and often what they actually value.
These are unusual times and there is no doubt in my mind that there are divine forces at work. Global pandemics are kinda their m.o. A single striking blow with massive ripple effects. These events produce an unseemly, yet awesome amount of course correction. Humanity has been here before at different times throughout history and for different reasons. Sometimes it seems that spirit just needs to kick us further down the road of development. Why now? We’re killing our planet for starters. And though we are technologically smarter and perhaps even healthier than we’ve ever been, we are still getting the same basic things wrong. Again, and again we allow the greedy to seize power and then watch as they turn and use it against us. Again, and again we allow the ignorant opinions of bullies to rule and forget that we are all in fact made as equals. We forget our kind and generous natures. We forget. We lose ourselves. And then spirit comes and upsets our apple cart to remind us. This time though, there is something different at play. Obviously, changes are coming and will come as we pick up the pieces from this event. However, spirit is not dictating what the major changes will be. The universe instead has simply cracked us open and exposed us. We stand on the edge of evolutionary level changes and I believe we are being offered a choice. We can pretend that everything was all right the way it was and go back to sleep or we can tighten our belts, roll up our sleeves and prepare to do some serious work.
I’ve been sitting here in silence. I have been allowed to sit and I am grateful. I am grateful for being able to have this moment’s pause. I am grateful to be safe and grateful to be allowed to just be patient. This is grace. I’ve been blessed in this way. I know others suffer and my heart goes to them. I have been drained of my own worry and fear however. My job right now is to see. It is to be patient. And when spirit has something for me to do or to say, I’ll know what that is. Part of being an intuitive medium is acting as an interpreter for spirit. Energy chooses how it wishes to be expressed. It’s our job to then decipher the meaning if the message is not straight forward. Sometimes it comes as words or as visions. Sometimes it is expressed through the actions of others or hidden within the synchronicity of events. My favorite however is when it is passed to me through the hands of nature. My favorite message bearers and story keepers are the spirits of plants and animals. Woven within them are all the lessons and needed medicine for all living things. They stand as the first guardians of the living world and care so deeply for it. These are unusual times. It is not surprising to me then that the spirits that came forward recently were themselves unusual and unique. We have already heard from Vulture this year who stands by as our shepherd for 2020. But there have been many others who have risen from around the world, the marsupials, for example. And more continue to come with pieces of wisdom to share in the hopes that we as a spiritual family will move towards a brighter future. Over the last few days, I’ve been working with the information from two rarer animal spirit allies and I believe it is likely that those are the spirits we will hear from more now. The ones without wood carvings and paintings and the ones that have yet to find their voice in our world. When I saw them, their stories came leaping into my consciousness, painting a picture for me of what to expect as we move forward into the unknown. Both speak of the ideas of choice, evolution and transition.
In this week’s message we find ourselves hearing from two unusual animal influences, the skink and the zonkey. These two species are so bizarre and rare, it sounds like I’ve made them up. But I assure you they are entirely real and incredibly fascinating. A skink is type of lizard that looks like a snake but has tiny hands and feet. A zonkey is rare hybrid species who is a cross between a donkey and a zebra. Unlikely allies for unprecedented times.
We begin with messages from the skink. The lessons and energy he shares are deeply connected to the moments we find ourselves in now. I noticed them first because the story behind what makes them so special is extraordinary. Two years ago, scientists in Australia discovered a type of lizard that had begun to develop bimodal reproduction. The three-toed skink, a native reptile of Australia was witnessed to not only lay eggs, but several weeks later also give birth to a live baby. Unheard of! This was actually the first known instance of vertebrates doing so. It is a very rare occurrence in nature period. Generally speaking, we do one or the other. Science had witnessed the evolution of a species in action. To me Covid-19 is humanity’s event horizon, a point of no return. It is a crucial moment’s pause before we can make decisions that will lead to our own evolution. Lizards like the skink reflect this very lesson. Lizards have the amazing ability to shed their tails when threatened by a predator. This act of self-preservation can only happen once. A proverbial get out of jail free card. It is their single chance to recognize danger and make a sacrifice for their survival. They know that by adapting quickly they can overcome the danger they are in. After their sacrifice, they can then turn and regroup, healing from what has been lost. Sound familiar? I think almost eerily so. Lizard here symbolizes something profoundly necessary for us in this moment. We need to remember what we actually value. I think the circumstances we find ourselves in are helping us have this realization. What matters to us as the individual and to us as a society? Like a tail that can be shed, what can we let go of? If we sacrifice now, can we create a better future for ourselves tomorrow? Lizards reflect much of this narrative and lend to us the comfort in knowing that we can come back from this. If a skink loses its tail, it grows back stronger. This is a beautiful message for this time. We can rise from this disaster a stronger people.
The shedding of the tail and the shedding of a lizard’s skin represent the wisdom of leaving the past behind you. The old ways will not usher in a new era. Some of what has been lost cannot and should not be regained. For this truth we must grieve and let go. But we can rebuild what is truly needed and valued. We can move forward with the knowledge that we are adaptable. We can find solutions and find new ways to continue to do and produce what really matters to us. We are already doing it right now! We have seen what is possible when human beings unite in their beliefs and in their compassion for one another. History repeats itself until we learn from our mistakes. We’ve literally just been shown all our mistakes. This is a rare opportunity for us to learn and start over. It’s a matter of choice.
The witnessed evolutionary moment of the skink is a reminder of our own potential. It’s believed the skink developed this ability to lay both eggs and give birth in order to adapt to it’s ever changing environment. It evolved in order to adapt to the world it was living in. We have the potential to do the same. Knowing what we know now we can start sewing the seeds of real changes that we need in both our societal infrastructure as well as in our environment. We can make sure that all people have access to a better standard of living. We can take more drastic steps on how we can safeguard the environment. We can pay the people we counted on most in a crisis livable, sustainable wages. The rebirth of a people happens in stages. Much like the developmental stages our skink friend is in the midst of. True change takes time. But we must first admit that there are problems that need to be addressed. There are greater threats to our world here beyond the virus. The idea to learn to adapt and change is both an individual commitment as much as it is a global one. We as individuals must address the changes we need to make in our own lives. We can then move on to electing government officials who care more about people and less about profit. Can we shed our tails of ignorance and greed and learn from the past? Our track record says no. Humanities track record on this kind of stuff is not good. But maybe, just maybe we are ready this time. People will need to rise up and demand change. Are we able to? Are the generations present for this crisis able and willing to enact the changes necessary? Again, it will boil down to the choices we make.
Messages from spirit come to us in sometimes strange and often beautiful packages. Our zonkey friend is no exception. The zonkey is a reminder of what is possible. To me it is a little beacon of hope and a reminder that love will find a way even in the darkest of times. It is not often that zebras befriend other animals in the wild. I would say that it is even more rare that a zebra would have the opportunity to even see a donkey in the wild. But, with a romantic twist of fate, a stray female zebra had such an opportunity when she was rescued by a wildlife refuge in Kenya. It was there in the refuge that she, their only zebra met and befriended a friendly donkey. Soon, cosmic sparks would fly, and a rare hybrid creature was born. Zonkeys are adorable creatures and the perfect combination of these two species. They also perfectly represent the transition between two worlds. Similarly, that is what humanity is working towards right now, a transitional period between the old ways and new ways. If we look to zonkey energy, it carries with it the potential lessons of both creatures and both are relevant! Let us examine each contributing parent’s message.
The applicable lessons we can focus on from our friend Zebra are our understanding of ourselves and the community we belong to. This understanding is the appreciation of all the roles we play as we deal with the humans around us. These are roles with our friends, our family, co-workers and neighbors. It is about the interconnectedness of our world. Zebras as a species are immediately recognized by a shared characteristic, their striped fur. To the untrained eye a zebra’s striped fur pattern looks the same from one member of the herd to the next. But in reality, those stripes are as unique to it as our fingerprints are to us. It is this uniqueness that identifies them to each other within the herd. Zebra teaches us of the importance of community and the unique role we play as individuals within in it. Your contribution to society through the use of your skills or your voice for example. But it can be so much more than the career you choose or the cause you stand up for. She teaches us about how our personal choices and actions contribute to and impact society. We each have our own lives and our own work to do. We also have to consider how our choices impact the world we live in. How you spend your money matters. Whether or not you vote matters. Whether you participate in the census matters. Using glass rather than single use plastics matter. You matter! All of our little decisions add up and contribute to what is happening in our world. It’s the domino effect. Who you are is reflected in the sum of the whole.
Zebras as a herd use their bodies striped patterns to disorient predators as they zig and zag their way towards evasion. Their movement as a group makes it hard for predators to visually focus and single out one zebra for pursuit. Thus, Zebra reflects the lessons we can learn from gaining perspective. When we struggle to see the big picture, or see our personal role within an entire community, zebra can help reveal what needs to be learned. Humanity often struggles with the idea that we are all part of a whole. We tend to focus more on our differences rather than our similarities and we often are more inclined to think of ourselves as individuals rather than as members of society or as part of a greater whole. So many messages come through from spirit with reminders of the need to change this way of thinking. Almost every single message from spirit contains an echo of this plea. By looking to the medicine within zebra we can learn how to balance the ideas of individual vs. communal. It’s important to understand the interconnectedness of both.
Echoing the energy of the skink, zebra reminds us of the need to react quickly to danger. The skink reacts on an individual level often through self-sacrifice. The zebra reacts to danger as a herd, deciding to change direction and move towards safety with coordinated effort. This very lesson is specifically how humanity must move now from this chaotic and dangerous time. We must be united in our decisions and efforts to react and make changes that help us all survive. If we work together, we can achieve a great deal more than recovery. We can begin the transition away from chaos by working on the lessons from Zebra. As we continue forward in that process, we will enter the energy of Donkey and learn how to prepare for the long haul.
With the Zonkey we are offered both the lessons of the zebra and of the donkey. Zebra guides us through our roles and the role our community plays in the days to come. We will transition to donkey energy as the pandemic curve moves from being flattened to being managed. Donkey prepares us for the long, slow road ahead. He is the herald of long journeys and brings the potential for a brighter future. Donkey medicine can be used to guide us through difficult times. His wisdom is that of patience and prudence. Donkeys are risk adverse. They take time and careful consideration when planning to move forward. They can teach us to take stock and be steadfast in our convictions knowing that the road ahead will test them. It’s a long way back from a global pandemic and economic recession. From this point forward we will have to be careful and learn from the past. We have to recognize the pitfalls of our greed and lack of compassion. We will need to take stock of what has happened here and plan for change before change will be possible.
On both the individual and communal level donkey asks that we consider what we’re taking with us as we move forward. What are we carrying around inside of us? What might make our burden too much to bear as we continue on our journey? There are clearly things about the way we live that should be examined. When we think of spiritual wisdom, we often envision animals like elk or owl. However, Donkeys are very smart creatures. Like elephants they are known to have excellent memories. A donkey remembers everything. He knows exactly where he has traveled before. With this wisdom it will not expose itself to dangers that have threatened it before. It knows who and what it can trust. These traits are certainly skill sets for us all to embrace. From this period of crisis, we will know who we can trust and count on moving forward. We will know how to take better care of ourselves or what needs to be taken care of in our lives. We will learn where we are weak as individuals and where the weaknesses are within the structure of the society we have built. Like donkey we must remember what has happened and use the wisdom we gain from this experience to create a better, safer future for ourselves.
To be on the front lines of a deadly pandemic takes strength and courage. To deal with the trauma of a pandemic also takes strength and courage. We are all faced with difficult choices and challenging times ahead. We can call on the donkey’s energy to lean on when we feel we need strength or a boost from spirit. It is okay to lean on one another. In turn, when you are feeling strong, be the person people lean on knowing that they will also have your back when you need it. Donkey also warns of allowing ourselves to become overburdened during this time too. In times of struggle and challenge it is easy to become stressed and take on too much. Remember to pace yourself. Know that the pace should be slow now. Set achievable goals for yourself and have patience with yourself and others. Have patience with progress as he will move slow and sure like the donkey also. Please try to shake yourself free of old ideas of how things are supposed to be. We’re being asked to think differently now. Try not to be too rigid when evidence is provided that is contrary to your old beliefs or way of thinking. Allow for new information. “Supposed to be” is a fantasy. We can no longer look to fairytales but must ground ourselves in facts and science. We must use the information available to us to make smarter decisions. We need to disconnect ourselves from the myths and the marketing machines and look now to what is real. The raw truth is that humanity was in trouble before any pandemic hit. Millions of people were already in crisis. Pandemics and death just have a way of changing perspective. If we take the time to see what has happened and try to learn from it, we have the potential to make evolutionary level changes. We can plant the seeds now to create a world where we are less vulnerable and prepared for a crisis. We can create a world where all of us are thriving or at least have the same access to that potential. We only have to commit ourselves to change. Let’s not return to “normal”. Normal was not good. Normal is the psychology of the average. Averages dictate hierarchies where there is always the bottom and always a top. Meaning there will always be people who suffer needlessly. Let’s be better than that. The rose-colored glasses are gone. Time to roll up our sleeves and start making a plan. Healing and recovery are going to take a while. I know we have what it takes to get through this. Now let’s see if we have what it takes to move forward from it.
Disasters are not punishment. They are hard lessons to learn which can result in opportunity and growth. Spirit comes through to remind us. It comes to awaken the parts of us that have fallen asleep or have been distracted. Messages are often more moments of illumination than anything else. It comes when we need it the most. Please remember that though there is pain and loss that spirit is there with us, inside of us, connecting us to each other and to source. It moves through love and connects to us when we can be open to its embrace. May your hearts have peace in this time!
Stay home when you can and stay safe.
Stacey
Want a private, personal reading with Stacey? Email her at thewateroracle@gmail.com
These are unusual times and there is no doubt in my mind that there are divine forces at work. Global pandemics are kinda their m.o. A single striking blow with massive ripple effects. These events produce an unseemly, yet awesome amount of course correction. Humanity has been here before at different times throughout history and for different reasons. Sometimes it seems that spirit just needs to kick us further down the road of development. Why now? We’re killing our planet for starters. And though we are technologically smarter and perhaps even healthier than we’ve ever been, we are still getting the same basic things wrong. Again, and again we allow the greedy to seize power and then watch as they turn and use it against us. Again, and again we allow the ignorant opinions of bullies to rule and forget that we are all in fact made as equals. We forget our kind and generous natures. We forget. We lose ourselves. And then spirit comes and upsets our apple cart to remind us. This time though, there is something different at play. Obviously, changes are coming and will come as we pick up the pieces from this event. However, spirit is not dictating what the major changes will be. The universe instead has simply cracked us open and exposed us. We stand on the edge of evolutionary level changes and I believe we are being offered a choice. We can pretend that everything was all right the way it was and go back to sleep or we can tighten our belts, roll up our sleeves and prepare to do some serious work.
I’ve been sitting here in silence. I have been allowed to sit and I am grateful. I am grateful for being able to have this moment’s pause. I am grateful to be safe and grateful to be allowed to just be patient. This is grace. I’ve been blessed in this way. I know others suffer and my heart goes to them. I have been drained of my own worry and fear however. My job right now is to see. It is to be patient. And when spirit has something for me to do or to say, I’ll know what that is. Part of being an intuitive medium is acting as an interpreter for spirit. Energy chooses how it wishes to be expressed. It’s our job to then decipher the meaning if the message is not straight forward. Sometimes it comes as words or as visions. Sometimes it is expressed through the actions of others or hidden within the synchronicity of events. My favorite however is when it is passed to me through the hands of nature. My favorite message bearers and story keepers are the spirits of plants and animals. Woven within them are all the lessons and needed medicine for all living things. They stand as the first guardians of the living world and care so deeply for it. These are unusual times. It is not surprising to me then that the spirits that came forward recently were themselves unusual and unique. We have already heard from Vulture this year who stands by as our shepherd for 2020. But there have been many others who have risen from around the world, the marsupials, for example. And more continue to come with pieces of wisdom to share in the hopes that we as a spiritual family will move towards a brighter future. Over the last few days, I’ve been working with the information from two rarer animal spirit allies and I believe it is likely that those are the spirits we will hear from more now. The ones without wood carvings and paintings and the ones that have yet to find their voice in our world. When I saw them, their stories came leaping into my consciousness, painting a picture for me of what to expect as we move forward into the unknown. Both speak of the ideas of choice, evolution and transition.
In this week’s message we find ourselves hearing from two unusual animal influences, the skink and the zonkey. These two species are so bizarre and rare, it sounds like I’ve made them up. But I assure you they are entirely real and incredibly fascinating. A skink is type of lizard that looks like a snake but has tiny hands and feet. A zonkey is rare hybrid species who is a cross between a donkey and a zebra. Unlikely allies for unprecedented times.
We begin with messages from the skink. The lessons and energy he shares are deeply connected to the moments we find ourselves in now. I noticed them first because the story behind what makes them so special is extraordinary. Two years ago, scientists in Australia discovered a type of lizard that had begun to develop bimodal reproduction. The three-toed skink, a native reptile of Australia was witnessed to not only lay eggs, but several weeks later also give birth to a live baby. Unheard of! This was actually the first known instance of vertebrates doing so. It is a very rare occurrence in nature period. Generally speaking, we do one or the other. Science had witnessed the evolution of a species in action. To me Covid-19 is humanity’s event horizon, a point of no return. It is a crucial moment’s pause before we can make decisions that will lead to our own evolution. Lizards like the skink reflect this very lesson. Lizards have the amazing ability to shed their tails when threatened by a predator. This act of self-preservation can only happen once. A proverbial get out of jail free card. It is their single chance to recognize danger and make a sacrifice for their survival. They know that by adapting quickly they can overcome the danger they are in. After their sacrifice, they can then turn and regroup, healing from what has been lost. Sound familiar? I think almost eerily so. Lizard here symbolizes something profoundly necessary for us in this moment. We need to remember what we actually value. I think the circumstances we find ourselves in are helping us have this realization. What matters to us as the individual and to us as a society? Like a tail that can be shed, what can we let go of? If we sacrifice now, can we create a better future for ourselves tomorrow? Lizards reflect much of this narrative and lend to us the comfort in knowing that we can come back from this. If a skink loses its tail, it grows back stronger. This is a beautiful message for this time. We can rise from this disaster a stronger people.
The shedding of the tail and the shedding of a lizard’s skin represent the wisdom of leaving the past behind you. The old ways will not usher in a new era. Some of what has been lost cannot and should not be regained. For this truth we must grieve and let go. But we can rebuild what is truly needed and valued. We can move forward with the knowledge that we are adaptable. We can find solutions and find new ways to continue to do and produce what really matters to us. We are already doing it right now! We have seen what is possible when human beings unite in their beliefs and in their compassion for one another. History repeats itself until we learn from our mistakes. We’ve literally just been shown all our mistakes. This is a rare opportunity for us to learn and start over. It’s a matter of choice.
The witnessed evolutionary moment of the skink is a reminder of our own potential. It’s believed the skink developed this ability to lay both eggs and give birth in order to adapt to it’s ever changing environment. It evolved in order to adapt to the world it was living in. We have the potential to do the same. Knowing what we know now we can start sewing the seeds of real changes that we need in both our societal infrastructure as well as in our environment. We can make sure that all people have access to a better standard of living. We can take more drastic steps on how we can safeguard the environment. We can pay the people we counted on most in a crisis livable, sustainable wages. The rebirth of a people happens in stages. Much like the developmental stages our skink friend is in the midst of. True change takes time. But we must first admit that there are problems that need to be addressed. There are greater threats to our world here beyond the virus. The idea to learn to adapt and change is both an individual commitment as much as it is a global one. We as individuals must address the changes we need to make in our own lives. We can then move on to electing government officials who care more about people and less about profit. Can we shed our tails of ignorance and greed and learn from the past? Our track record says no. Humanities track record on this kind of stuff is not good. But maybe, just maybe we are ready this time. People will need to rise up and demand change. Are we able to? Are the generations present for this crisis able and willing to enact the changes necessary? Again, it will boil down to the choices we make.
Messages from spirit come to us in sometimes strange and often beautiful packages. Our zonkey friend is no exception. The zonkey is a reminder of what is possible. To me it is a little beacon of hope and a reminder that love will find a way even in the darkest of times. It is not often that zebras befriend other animals in the wild. I would say that it is even more rare that a zebra would have the opportunity to even see a donkey in the wild. But, with a romantic twist of fate, a stray female zebra had such an opportunity when she was rescued by a wildlife refuge in Kenya. It was there in the refuge that she, their only zebra met and befriended a friendly donkey. Soon, cosmic sparks would fly, and a rare hybrid creature was born. Zonkeys are adorable creatures and the perfect combination of these two species. They also perfectly represent the transition between two worlds. Similarly, that is what humanity is working towards right now, a transitional period between the old ways and new ways. If we look to zonkey energy, it carries with it the potential lessons of both creatures and both are relevant! Let us examine each contributing parent’s message.
The applicable lessons we can focus on from our friend Zebra are our understanding of ourselves and the community we belong to. This understanding is the appreciation of all the roles we play as we deal with the humans around us. These are roles with our friends, our family, co-workers and neighbors. It is about the interconnectedness of our world. Zebras as a species are immediately recognized by a shared characteristic, their striped fur. To the untrained eye a zebra’s striped fur pattern looks the same from one member of the herd to the next. But in reality, those stripes are as unique to it as our fingerprints are to us. It is this uniqueness that identifies them to each other within the herd. Zebra teaches us of the importance of community and the unique role we play as individuals within in it. Your contribution to society through the use of your skills or your voice for example. But it can be so much more than the career you choose or the cause you stand up for. She teaches us about how our personal choices and actions contribute to and impact society. We each have our own lives and our own work to do. We also have to consider how our choices impact the world we live in. How you spend your money matters. Whether or not you vote matters. Whether you participate in the census matters. Using glass rather than single use plastics matter. You matter! All of our little decisions add up and contribute to what is happening in our world. It’s the domino effect. Who you are is reflected in the sum of the whole.
Zebras as a herd use their bodies striped patterns to disorient predators as they zig and zag their way towards evasion. Their movement as a group makes it hard for predators to visually focus and single out one zebra for pursuit. Thus, Zebra reflects the lessons we can learn from gaining perspective. When we struggle to see the big picture, or see our personal role within an entire community, zebra can help reveal what needs to be learned. Humanity often struggles with the idea that we are all part of a whole. We tend to focus more on our differences rather than our similarities and we often are more inclined to think of ourselves as individuals rather than as members of society or as part of a greater whole. So many messages come through from spirit with reminders of the need to change this way of thinking. Almost every single message from spirit contains an echo of this plea. By looking to the medicine within zebra we can learn how to balance the ideas of individual vs. communal. It’s important to understand the interconnectedness of both.
Echoing the energy of the skink, zebra reminds us of the need to react quickly to danger. The skink reacts on an individual level often through self-sacrifice. The zebra reacts to danger as a herd, deciding to change direction and move towards safety with coordinated effort. This very lesson is specifically how humanity must move now from this chaotic and dangerous time. We must be united in our decisions and efforts to react and make changes that help us all survive. If we work together, we can achieve a great deal more than recovery. We can begin the transition away from chaos by working on the lessons from Zebra. As we continue forward in that process, we will enter the energy of Donkey and learn how to prepare for the long haul.
With the Zonkey we are offered both the lessons of the zebra and of the donkey. Zebra guides us through our roles and the role our community plays in the days to come. We will transition to donkey energy as the pandemic curve moves from being flattened to being managed. Donkey prepares us for the long, slow road ahead. He is the herald of long journeys and brings the potential for a brighter future. Donkey medicine can be used to guide us through difficult times. His wisdom is that of patience and prudence. Donkeys are risk adverse. They take time and careful consideration when planning to move forward. They can teach us to take stock and be steadfast in our convictions knowing that the road ahead will test them. It’s a long way back from a global pandemic and economic recession. From this point forward we will have to be careful and learn from the past. We have to recognize the pitfalls of our greed and lack of compassion. We will need to take stock of what has happened here and plan for change before change will be possible.
On both the individual and communal level donkey asks that we consider what we’re taking with us as we move forward. What are we carrying around inside of us? What might make our burden too much to bear as we continue on our journey? There are clearly things about the way we live that should be examined. When we think of spiritual wisdom, we often envision animals like elk or owl. However, Donkeys are very smart creatures. Like elephants they are known to have excellent memories. A donkey remembers everything. He knows exactly where he has traveled before. With this wisdom it will not expose itself to dangers that have threatened it before. It knows who and what it can trust. These traits are certainly skill sets for us all to embrace. From this period of crisis, we will know who we can trust and count on moving forward. We will know how to take better care of ourselves or what needs to be taken care of in our lives. We will learn where we are weak as individuals and where the weaknesses are within the structure of the society we have built. Like donkey we must remember what has happened and use the wisdom we gain from this experience to create a better, safer future for ourselves.
To be on the front lines of a deadly pandemic takes strength and courage. To deal with the trauma of a pandemic also takes strength and courage. We are all faced with difficult choices and challenging times ahead. We can call on the donkey’s energy to lean on when we feel we need strength or a boost from spirit. It is okay to lean on one another. In turn, when you are feeling strong, be the person people lean on knowing that they will also have your back when you need it. Donkey also warns of allowing ourselves to become overburdened during this time too. In times of struggle and challenge it is easy to become stressed and take on too much. Remember to pace yourself. Know that the pace should be slow now. Set achievable goals for yourself and have patience with yourself and others. Have patience with progress as he will move slow and sure like the donkey also. Please try to shake yourself free of old ideas of how things are supposed to be. We’re being asked to think differently now. Try not to be too rigid when evidence is provided that is contrary to your old beliefs or way of thinking. Allow for new information. “Supposed to be” is a fantasy. We can no longer look to fairytales but must ground ourselves in facts and science. We must use the information available to us to make smarter decisions. We need to disconnect ourselves from the myths and the marketing machines and look now to what is real. The raw truth is that humanity was in trouble before any pandemic hit. Millions of people were already in crisis. Pandemics and death just have a way of changing perspective. If we take the time to see what has happened and try to learn from it, we have the potential to make evolutionary level changes. We can plant the seeds now to create a world where we are less vulnerable and prepared for a crisis. We can create a world where all of us are thriving or at least have the same access to that potential. We only have to commit ourselves to change. Let’s not return to “normal”. Normal was not good. Normal is the psychology of the average. Averages dictate hierarchies where there is always the bottom and always a top. Meaning there will always be people who suffer needlessly. Let’s be better than that. The rose-colored glasses are gone. Time to roll up our sleeves and start making a plan. Healing and recovery are going to take a while. I know we have what it takes to get through this. Now let’s see if we have what it takes to move forward from it.
Disasters are not punishment. They are hard lessons to learn which can result in opportunity and growth. Spirit comes through to remind us. It comes to awaken the parts of us that have fallen asleep or have been distracted. Messages are often more moments of illumination than anything else. It comes when we need it the most. Please remember that though there is pain and loss that spirit is there with us, inside of us, connecting us to each other and to source. It moves through love and connects to us when we can be open to its embrace. May your hearts have peace in this time!
Stay home when you can and stay safe.
Stacey
Want a private, personal reading with Stacey? Email her at thewateroracle@gmail.com
Messages From Spirit
Working with Vulture in 2020
Lesson: Working With & Overcoming Fear
Since last year the messages that I’ve received from spirit have focused heavily on self-reflection, preparing for change and the need to build and connect to family and friends. We’ve often talked about the idea of putting the right people in place and severing ties with relationships, beliefs and practices that are no longer good for us. Through this same time period we saw an escalation in the seriousness and frequency of natural disasters. Tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, and forest fires ravaged parts of the United States but also around the world. The symbolism set deeply into these domestic and global events, including the Covid-19 pandemic echo this same message. A need for self-reflection, paying attention to and working on our sense of community and preparing ourselves for the need for change. When the fires raged in Australia many of us in the spiritual community felt that something else would come, another event, which would again try to ring the alarm to awaken the human consciousness. And now it is here. Rather than a tragic event on the other side of the country or some far off part of the world, this virus will touch every one of us, everywhere. There will not be a way for us to remain aloof or detached. Covid-19 is a global intervention for humanity as a whole. It will impact each us no matter where we are in life. We will all need to respond to the changes this brings into the world.
At the beginning of the year I talked about the spirit of Vulture coming into 2020 as the animal medicine for the year. That vulture energy would help guide us through a turbulent time of shifting and changing. This energy comes as a recognition that there were things within each of us as well as with the community as a whole, that needed to change. Vulture energy helps us to embrace change with grace knowing that this is the cycle of all living things. When some things end, it is only to make room for the road to new beginnings. Vulture teaches us to re-build from stronger foundations that begin from our core values and beliefs, rise up from our strengths and thrive from the support of the people we care about most. Like a wrecking ball, this pandemic is moving through our world dismantling the establishment and forcing us to look and what lies beneath it. It will force us to reassess what we value and how we see the world. It will be necessary for us to reconcile ourselves with the choices we’ve made up until now. It is apocalyptic in the sense that it is life changing on a global scale. It is precisely in these moments that we can turn to the spirit of the Vulture and ask that she send guidance in our time of need. How do we cope, how do we move forward in the midst of crisis? Vulture carries with it so much relevant and valuable wisdom that I couldn’t think of anything more well-suited to guide us through these times. When I turned to spirit and asked what we needed most for April, it was Vulture that came through to answer this call.
The overall goal for right now is learning how to move past fear. Fear is a survival mechanism. It is our brain’s response to the unknown. Our brains perceive the unknown as a threat and it scrambles to forge prediction models and scenarios which skew our thoughts towards negativity and the potential for loss. In order to manage fear in a healthy way we must first respond to it by engaging our ability to reason and respond. Fear is meant to illicit an action. A “call to arms” if you will. We can respond to this need for action by gathering up facts and information where available and by taking precautions and enacting safeguards where possible. In other words when we are told a threat is coming, we can protect ourselves. Fear is useful in this sense; in that it instigates taking appropriate action. We all know by now that the threat of this virus is very real. We can take precautions and protect ourselves by staying home and ramping up on our sanitary habits. We can continue to protect ourselves and our loved ones by staying in contact with one another and checking in on those around us who may be at greater risk of infection. We can contact our landlords, our banks and other financial institutions and talk to them about how to move forward under the circumstances when financial loss is of great concern. As many are unable to work, we can quell some of our fears by filing for unemployment and other assistance programs. We can respond to our fears by doing what is within our power to do to keep us as safe as possible. And then, we must move forward despite the fear. How? We start by taking the measures and actions available to us first. In order to disengage fear, we must then continue to live even through frightening times and even through grief. We do this by extracting our focus from the crisis and placing it in what remains available to us. Place your attention back into what’s in front of you. Control the controllables and then take a breath.
Find ways to consciously shift your thoughts to curb anxiety. If you don’t already have ways to cope with elevated stress and anxiety you may need to work on this now or help a loved one do so. Start by developing tools that engage logical thinking/problem solving skills or that require manual/physical engagement. Examples would be puzzles, games, yoga, crafts etc. When you feel yourself starting to slip down the rabbit hole, engage with that tool. Don’t be afraid to let someone know how you are feeling. You can call a friend or try to schedule a call with a therapist. The point is to find something that works to help you maintain a sense of wellbeing. Indulge a hobby, spend time with you children or catch up with your friends. Join an online group, read, write, etc. What can you do now? You can continue to live your life regardless of having to modify it. Turn your attention towards what remains available to you. Remember that this is only temporary and that even in the darkest of times there are often opportunities hidden in the shadow.
Living through challenging times and economic uncertainty requires a great deal of courage and strength. It takes courage to seek out the positive. It takes strength to find joy or maintain hope. This does not mean that we pretend there is not hardship. It means we must cope with hardships through perseverance and not despair. We focus on what we can do. Spirit encourages us to continue to work with these core concepts: Self-reflection, community, and preparing for and allowing for change in our lives. Things will get better.
We can manage and move through our fears by digging deeper into our connections with our family and our community. Reach out and make an effort in your personal relationships. We must remember that families are our most valuable asset. Bonds with our loved ones whether they are blood related or not are essential to living a healthy life and surviving times of sorrow and hardship. A healthy human support system is necessary for every one of us. Within the family and within the greater community we need to work in cooperation with one another. We can work through fear by supporting our friends and our neighbors too. Turn your attention towards others and being of service to them. We can stay connected to others by communicating our feelings and showing each other we care through simple acts of kindness. Asking our neighbors if they are all right. Dropping off a pizza at the hospital. Thanking the cashier at the grocery store for being there. These simple gestures remind people that they are valued. Our modern world has created imaginary walls between us. Now is the time to take down those barriers and show our compassion and empathy for one another. Smile, say thank you, ask how you can help. All the distractions which allowed us to stay detached from each other have been removed. Its time now to engage.
Look at where you are in this moment. What has been removed by this event (temporarily or not) will allow you a little clarity on what the universe is trying to draw your attention to. If you are at home, it’s likely that you have time to think about these things. Are you finding yourself glad to be away from work or out of the office? Maybe its time to address those feelings. Is there something missing in your life? Are you bored out of your mind? Allow yourself some discovery time along with some much-needed rest and relaxation. The stress of living through a pandemic and processing what is happening around you can be overwhelming. You don’t have to be productive now. But it might be a good idea to take a little of this time to reflect. If you are even busier now or in fact are working on the front lines during this time, you are likely going to need time later to process all of this. Know this now and plan for it. You are working through trauma and trauma needs to be processed. Lean on your loved ones for support and don’t be afraid to ask for help. If you do have the privilege to be safe at home, try to get the most out of it. Whatever that means to you. We need to allow ourselves to cope and process in the way that we each feel is right for us. If that’s Netflix and chill, have at it.
We are individuals and with that we each have our own unique strengths and weaknesses. During this time, we need to make room for that in both ourselves and the people around us. These are hard times and we will need to muster as much patience as possible to get through this with grace and sanity. A little self-awareness, restraint and compassion can go a long way right now. The key ingredient to harmony is communication. A skill that is often tested in times of duress. It will be the essential component to our success moving forward. Look now to how you can improve upon your own communication skills. To move past our fears this month, we can clearly communicate with the people around us about our feelings, thoughts and concerns. The time is right to identify your personal truths and share them. Heart-felt connections with family and the feeling of community stem from a feeling of being connected with ourselves. When we are able to get in touch with our own needs and wants and are able to communicate them, we can forge deeper bonds with those around us.
The way forward is uncertain and unclear. I know that not knowing what will happen next can create an incredible amount of anxiety. What can we do when the future is a mystery? While it’s hard to remove fear and stress from our lives all together we can continue to move forward by relying on our personal connections for emotional support. We can work on being patient with ourselves and taking time to think things through. We know we need to communicate more with one another to create solidarity and foster cooperation. We can also work on focusing on what is possible for right now. What can you do today? Take it one day at a time this month and stay present. Information is changing quickly from day to day. Use the facts at hand in each given moment to guide you forward. Try not to allow your mind to wonder too far ahead. We’re not meant to focus on summer yet. Stay here now. Many of us will have to actively shift our mindsets from emotionally processing situations to logically processing them. Actively try to disengage your emotional override system when it comes to making decisions right now. You don’t want to make fear- based decisions that you might regret later. Do what is possible and manage what is right in front you. Let this month pass before you start making any big decisions. It is likely you will cry. Allow this grief to come and then let it go. Let your children do the same. It is likely that things will not go back to the way they were before this started. Try to make peace with that.
Lastly, be a good role model. Be the “change you want to see in this world.” If you have children at home, they are looking to you on how to handle all this. Be honest with them. It’s okay to let people know, even children, that you are afraid. There is nothing wrong with being afraid. It is all in how your respond to those fears that matter. Look to how you are responding right now. Pay attention to that, especially if others look to you to set the pace. Are you the person that throws their rubber gloves on the ground in the supermarket parking lot or are you the person that drops off the pizzas for the cashiers at that supermarket? That’s for you decide. In the meantime, do the best you can with what you have. Today and every day, just do the best you can. If that’s the lesson we teach other this month, I’m happy with that.
Stay home when you can and stay safe.
Stacey
Want a private, personal reading with Stacey? Email her at thewateroracle@gmail.com
At the beginning of the year I talked about the spirit of Vulture coming into 2020 as the animal medicine for the year. That vulture energy would help guide us through a turbulent time of shifting and changing. This energy comes as a recognition that there were things within each of us as well as with the community as a whole, that needed to change. Vulture energy helps us to embrace change with grace knowing that this is the cycle of all living things. When some things end, it is only to make room for the road to new beginnings. Vulture teaches us to re-build from stronger foundations that begin from our core values and beliefs, rise up from our strengths and thrive from the support of the people we care about most. Like a wrecking ball, this pandemic is moving through our world dismantling the establishment and forcing us to look and what lies beneath it. It will force us to reassess what we value and how we see the world. It will be necessary for us to reconcile ourselves with the choices we’ve made up until now. It is apocalyptic in the sense that it is life changing on a global scale. It is precisely in these moments that we can turn to the spirit of the Vulture and ask that she send guidance in our time of need. How do we cope, how do we move forward in the midst of crisis? Vulture carries with it so much relevant and valuable wisdom that I couldn’t think of anything more well-suited to guide us through these times. When I turned to spirit and asked what we needed most for April, it was Vulture that came through to answer this call.
The overall goal for right now is learning how to move past fear. Fear is a survival mechanism. It is our brain’s response to the unknown. Our brains perceive the unknown as a threat and it scrambles to forge prediction models and scenarios which skew our thoughts towards negativity and the potential for loss. In order to manage fear in a healthy way we must first respond to it by engaging our ability to reason and respond. Fear is meant to illicit an action. A “call to arms” if you will. We can respond to this need for action by gathering up facts and information where available and by taking precautions and enacting safeguards where possible. In other words when we are told a threat is coming, we can protect ourselves. Fear is useful in this sense; in that it instigates taking appropriate action. We all know by now that the threat of this virus is very real. We can take precautions and protect ourselves by staying home and ramping up on our sanitary habits. We can continue to protect ourselves and our loved ones by staying in contact with one another and checking in on those around us who may be at greater risk of infection. We can contact our landlords, our banks and other financial institutions and talk to them about how to move forward under the circumstances when financial loss is of great concern. As many are unable to work, we can quell some of our fears by filing for unemployment and other assistance programs. We can respond to our fears by doing what is within our power to do to keep us as safe as possible. And then, we must move forward despite the fear. How? We start by taking the measures and actions available to us first. In order to disengage fear, we must then continue to live even through frightening times and even through grief. We do this by extracting our focus from the crisis and placing it in what remains available to us. Place your attention back into what’s in front of you. Control the controllables and then take a breath.
Find ways to consciously shift your thoughts to curb anxiety. If you don’t already have ways to cope with elevated stress and anxiety you may need to work on this now or help a loved one do so. Start by developing tools that engage logical thinking/problem solving skills or that require manual/physical engagement. Examples would be puzzles, games, yoga, crafts etc. When you feel yourself starting to slip down the rabbit hole, engage with that tool. Don’t be afraid to let someone know how you are feeling. You can call a friend or try to schedule a call with a therapist. The point is to find something that works to help you maintain a sense of wellbeing. Indulge a hobby, spend time with you children or catch up with your friends. Join an online group, read, write, etc. What can you do now? You can continue to live your life regardless of having to modify it. Turn your attention towards what remains available to you. Remember that this is only temporary and that even in the darkest of times there are often opportunities hidden in the shadow.
Living through challenging times and economic uncertainty requires a great deal of courage and strength. It takes courage to seek out the positive. It takes strength to find joy or maintain hope. This does not mean that we pretend there is not hardship. It means we must cope with hardships through perseverance and not despair. We focus on what we can do. Spirit encourages us to continue to work with these core concepts: Self-reflection, community, and preparing for and allowing for change in our lives. Things will get better.
We can manage and move through our fears by digging deeper into our connections with our family and our community. Reach out and make an effort in your personal relationships. We must remember that families are our most valuable asset. Bonds with our loved ones whether they are blood related or not are essential to living a healthy life and surviving times of sorrow and hardship. A healthy human support system is necessary for every one of us. Within the family and within the greater community we need to work in cooperation with one another. We can work through fear by supporting our friends and our neighbors too. Turn your attention towards others and being of service to them. We can stay connected to others by communicating our feelings and showing each other we care through simple acts of kindness. Asking our neighbors if they are all right. Dropping off a pizza at the hospital. Thanking the cashier at the grocery store for being there. These simple gestures remind people that they are valued. Our modern world has created imaginary walls between us. Now is the time to take down those barriers and show our compassion and empathy for one another. Smile, say thank you, ask how you can help. All the distractions which allowed us to stay detached from each other have been removed. Its time now to engage.
Look at where you are in this moment. What has been removed by this event (temporarily or not) will allow you a little clarity on what the universe is trying to draw your attention to. If you are at home, it’s likely that you have time to think about these things. Are you finding yourself glad to be away from work or out of the office? Maybe its time to address those feelings. Is there something missing in your life? Are you bored out of your mind? Allow yourself some discovery time along with some much-needed rest and relaxation. The stress of living through a pandemic and processing what is happening around you can be overwhelming. You don’t have to be productive now. But it might be a good idea to take a little of this time to reflect. If you are even busier now or in fact are working on the front lines during this time, you are likely going to need time later to process all of this. Know this now and plan for it. You are working through trauma and trauma needs to be processed. Lean on your loved ones for support and don’t be afraid to ask for help. If you do have the privilege to be safe at home, try to get the most out of it. Whatever that means to you. We need to allow ourselves to cope and process in the way that we each feel is right for us. If that’s Netflix and chill, have at it.
We are individuals and with that we each have our own unique strengths and weaknesses. During this time, we need to make room for that in both ourselves and the people around us. These are hard times and we will need to muster as much patience as possible to get through this with grace and sanity. A little self-awareness, restraint and compassion can go a long way right now. The key ingredient to harmony is communication. A skill that is often tested in times of duress. It will be the essential component to our success moving forward. Look now to how you can improve upon your own communication skills. To move past our fears this month, we can clearly communicate with the people around us about our feelings, thoughts and concerns. The time is right to identify your personal truths and share them. Heart-felt connections with family and the feeling of community stem from a feeling of being connected with ourselves. When we are able to get in touch with our own needs and wants and are able to communicate them, we can forge deeper bonds with those around us.
The way forward is uncertain and unclear. I know that not knowing what will happen next can create an incredible amount of anxiety. What can we do when the future is a mystery? While it’s hard to remove fear and stress from our lives all together we can continue to move forward by relying on our personal connections for emotional support. We can work on being patient with ourselves and taking time to think things through. We know we need to communicate more with one another to create solidarity and foster cooperation. We can also work on focusing on what is possible for right now. What can you do today? Take it one day at a time this month and stay present. Information is changing quickly from day to day. Use the facts at hand in each given moment to guide you forward. Try not to allow your mind to wonder too far ahead. We’re not meant to focus on summer yet. Stay here now. Many of us will have to actively shift our mindsets from emotionally processing situations to logically processing them. Actively try to disengage your emotional override system when it comes to making decisions right now. You don’t want to make fear- based decisions that you might regret later. Do what is possible and manage what is right in front you. Let this month pass before you start making any big decisions. It is likely you will cry. Allow this grief to come and then let it go. Let your children do the same. It is likely that things will not go back to the way they were before this started. Try to make peace with that.
Lastly, be a good role model. Be the “change you want to see in this world.” If you have children at home, they are looking to you on how to handle all this. Be honest with them. It’s okay to let people know, even children, that you are afraid. There is nothing wrong with being afraid. It is all in how your respond to those fears that matter. Look to how you are responding right now. Pay attention to that, especially if others look to you to set the pace. Are you the person that throws their rubber gloves on the ground in the supermarket parking lot or are you the person that drops off the pizzas for the cashiers at that supermarket? That’s for you decide. In the meantime, do the best you can with what you have. Today and every day, just do the best you can. If that’s the lesson we teach other this month, I’m happy with that.
Stay home when you can and stay safe.
Stacey
Want a private, personal reading with Stacey? Email her at thewateroracle@gmail.com
January 2020
A Year Working With Vulture Energy
Vulture is a story of sacrificing for the greater good. With her energy coming with us into 2020 she is acknowledging that sometimes the journey is difficult. We may have had to put the needs of others ahead of our own. That we may have had to shelve our plans or our progress to take care of bigger concerns first. The good news for 2020 is that the sacrifice part of the story is coming to an end. This means the focus is back on us. Our power can be used towards what we want to do rather than what we have to do. Vulture energy can teach us a great deal more than sacrifice, but also how to rise. I’ve outlined some of the most valuable takeaways from what vulture can bring.
Powerful Lessons Vulture Energy Guides Us Through This Year
Purification: Purification is the need to release what doesn’t align with the life you want, the changes you are trying to make or your better health and well-being. It entails working on letting go of negative patterns of behavior, as well as managing grief and learning how to process and manage trauma. The influence of vulture is about restoring harmony and balance to our lives. This will come in many shapes and sizes depending on where you need this particular medicine. It may mean healing old emotional wounds, finding work-life balance, etc. Vulture will also help us focus on wellness and restoring good health practices. Her energy helps us recognize our bad habits and work towards healing them.
Death and Rebirth: We are constantly evolving creatures. Like a snake we must learn to shed the skin of who we thought we were in order to become who we are meant to be. Allow yourself to try new ways. Push past the fear of loss so that you can gain access to the potential of what is possible. Today is not yesterday. Rebirth is a chance to cling to what works and let go of what is not yielding results or bringing you joy. Vulture energy allows us to build on a clean slate from a solid foundation. In vulture we come to understand the necessity of change. She is a master of the cycle of life and knows that we must learn to allow things to end so that new beginnings are possible. Death and rebirth are intense and powerful processes. We must work to learn from and embrace both in the coming year.
Truth: In vulture energy we meet the archetype of the Egyptian goddess Maat, the goddess of truth. If a new beginning is going to succeed it must be built on and around truth and honesty. Be honest with yourself about where you are, who you are and what you truly want. It is also important to be honest with the people around you with what you want and how you feel. Stop saying yes when you mean no. This archetypal energy also reveals truths as well. It can lead you on a journey of self- discovery, unraveling mysteries about the past or where your true abilities and purpose lie. Vulture and Maat can also help us discover what all the hard work and suffering has been for. Why is it taking so long? This is a year where you will finally start to understand and be able to make peace with the length and difficulty of the journey you have been on.
Detachment: In vulture we find a little Zen Buddhism. The lessons it brings are about learning to detach yourself from expectation. Pre-determining what things should look like, feel like, etc. is the road to disappointment and often gets in the way of us enjoying what actually is. Detachment or non-attachment does not mean not feeling. It simply means letting go and embracing what comes, Attachment to what we think things should be like causes suffering and pain. While its good to have standards and important to have beliefs, not everything will live up to our imagined expectations. Detachment allows you to make room for and peace with reality. Let go of old ways of thinking when new ideas come into focus.
Flight: Vultures are beautiful and graceful in flight. Their ability to soar seems effortless. It is because they are using little to none of their own energy but the energy of thermodynamics. What this means to us is that this year’s effort will not seem so arduous. Learn to work smarter rather than harder. Use resources you have already as the base. Glean the wisdom from the experiences of the past few years, even from things that didn’t work out. This year you will only need the knowledge you have already to get started. Network and use the connections you already have to gain access or move forward. Vulture says you are not starting from scratch because you have already learned how to fly. Now you are just going in a new direction.
The Committee & The Wake: Vultures are highly social creatures. There are several names used for the way they gather. A group of vultures is called the committee and is similar in context to the way we use the word tribe. A flock of vultures in flight is often called a kettle and a group of vultures feeding together is called a wake. People gather in similar types of groups; friends, family, co-workers, etc. Vulture energy pushes us to create strong communities of people around ourselves this year. If we have established this already it is time to add new members to the flock or to invest more time with feeding these relationships. Take a look at who you bring your important information to. Who are you sharing the stories from your journey with? Time to assess who the members of your committee are. Do they have good judgement? Are they supportive? Do they have positive energy? Do you trust them? The committee are the people you can trust most in life. They are the ones who would bury the body with you, no questions asked. In the wake, the vultures gather to feed. The wake on a human level are the like-minded souls we gather with who we share our interests or beliefs with. The wake are the people we feed our souls with. These are the people we go explore with and pursue our craft with. They are the people from our community; in our churches, the ones we play soccer with or go to yoga class with. Spirit is urging us to come together again. We are drifting as people, further and further apart. Build social groups for yourself and help your children do the same.
Vulture is here to help foster a loving, social environment which focuses as much on your own needs as well the needs of others. She teaches us to spread our wings and soar and to build our lives based on truth and a belief in ones ability to reach new heights.
May the luck of the cosmos be yours!
Stacey
Want a private reading in-person or over the phone? DM Stacey here on Facebook or email her at thewateroracle@gmail.com
Copyright © 2020 by Stacey Held The Water Oracle All Rights Reserved
