Eclipsing Intentions

It’s eclipse season. The question is asked- what are you eclipsing out of your life? 

When a friend asked me this, I drew a blank. I’d taken a step away from tracking all the current energies and astrological events and what they might bring to our lives because I have had very little mental and physical bandwidth lately to do more than basic living tasks. Even simple steps to move myself forward over the last few months felt like I was dragging one leg behind me. Also because my spark for it, even my patience for it, has been turned down. By what, I haven’t been sure, but I know there’s a reason. I let it be and turned off the noise of forecasts, predictions, analyses and everyone’s opinion of what to focus on.  

So it was news to me we were in eclipse season again. I felt a bit like a bear waking after hibernation- confused, groggy, and wondering what all the bees were buzzing about. And then, what I should be buzzing about. I wasn’t concerned about setting any "eclipsing out” goals. The first thing that came to mind was the process I’ve been in to cleanse my ancestral lines of everything that is affecting my family and keeping some of my ancestors from crossing correctly to a realm of peace. So that was my response- whatever was meant to be cleared as a result of this cleansing. 

This cleansing process has not been light. If you reach the point when you realize you’re being led to seek the help of a diviner and a group of tribal elders with generations of wisdom and experience behind them, some very uncool non-benevolent energies (to put it politely) have found their way to you and your ancestral line. Just like when we cleanse our bodies and move through detox symptoms, cleansing the spiritual side also comes with its physical, mental and emotional grossness. Initial resistance (i.e. subconscious fear of the changes to come), emotional landslides and releases, extreme fatigue and a brain so far away that you’re not sure whose eyes you’re looking through because what’s in front of you feels a million miles from wherever your head is- all to be expected. This fact does not make it much easier to ride the waves of emotional discomfort. Nor does knowing most of what I feel during this isn’t even mine. I’m just the uncomfortable vessel for clearing them out.

After night three of the ritual process, when my misplaced ancestors were set to cross back into light, I woke in the morning to a feeling of normalcy I haven’t felt in months. I listened when my body told me to stretch, connecting my mind back to the joy of movement. I held my spine straight as I walked down the street, something I used to do diligently but had abandoned some time this year under weight of fatigue, apathy and confusion. For the first time in what felt like a very long time, I felt the surge of lightness, the body lifting, the unplanned smile that comes when you can feel your true nature reconnecting with your surroundings. Your cells coming back online with no one else’s weight upon you. 

I noticed how ridiculously blue the sky has become. Pink blossoms were collected in drifts on the sidewalk like confetti left behind after an explosion of joy. The palms shuffled in the wind, and a sweep of energy moved like bubbles across my back. I saw myself dancing, the mind putting image to this new feeling of motion. I thought about motion and realized, if it were up to me, this eclipse season would put an end to stagnation. In one word that is exactly what I’d been feeling. Stagnation. Physical stagnation, mental stagnation, financial stagnation, sexual stagnation. It had all slowly started to leak into spiritual stagnation. So my intention would be movement. The solution and next step in every area would be an act of movement. If motion in one area felt like too much, I could at least shift and move something in another area.

As soon as the idea came to me, I remembered it doesn’t work like that. We can have our intentions, but the Universe has its directives and plans for us. We may create what we intend, but we also have to meet what is brought to us. It's not our decision what this eclipse season will bring up. Whether we set intentions or sit back, our only decision is how we meet what comes to us. That will determine what is eclipsed out of our lives.

If we remember this always- the importance of how we meet everything that comes our way, we are released from needing to know what the astrology is or what energies are swirling around the collective. In a growing appreciation for simplicity and paying more attention to my own observations, this is comforting to remember. Another way to turn down the noise and listen to the inner voice always telling us why we’re here.