*Editor’s Note: “Whether it’s science or magic, if it’s of fun benefit, enjoy!” ~ ed

I always say, “It is no longer my duty not to enjoy myself.”

This affirmation reflects the opportunity I need to release my conditioning that surrounds obligation during this upcoming full moon lunar eclipse in Gemini.

The astrological lunar energy informs the emotional needs that our souls want us to prioritize in order to optimize our experience of personal power and self-expression. 

Those of us who are healing from childhood trauma, especially childhood sexual abuse, may feel energetically more activated by this full moon’s heightened demand for greater self-esteem—especially if our inner child was conditioned to betray their desires for sovereignty and flexibility.

The residual trauma energy in our nervous system predisposes our inner child to cling to their survival patterns in the face of becoming more emotionally engaged and responsive.

This resistance will typically manifest as a person exhibiting particular anxieties, which are rooted in a subconscious fear of taking one’s foot off the survival gas pedal.

Thus, it is important for those of us who are intentionally healing our childhood traumas to recognize our triggering thoughts and emotions during the various lunar tides. It’s an energetic signal from our inner child to release the expectations and patterns that undermine our capacity to meet our deeper emotional needs. 

The Gemini full moon on this November 30th is an opportunity to identify and release any blocks to our expressions of joy, discovery, and determination.

From my own inner work process, here are the five fears to release during this full moon in order to harmonize Gemini’s emotional needs for curiosity, feeling understood, and supported:

1. Release the fear of saying the wrong thing. 

Personally, this fear becomes prominent in my thoughts when my inner child needs me to acknowledge the validity of my own inner wisdom. If we were punished as children when our caretakers did not believe our truth, then this might have created a limiting belief that the success of our efforts is compromised if others doubt us.

I’ve discovered that doubting the correctness of my self-expression sustains this trauma pattern by treating myself in the same manner as I was once treated.

Since my projections onto others is the best indicator of how I am subconsciously treating myself, then assuming the best intentions in others is an instant practice for diminishing the fear of saying the wrong thing.

As we perceive others in a better light, then the less we will assume that they are judging our expressions. 

2. Release the fear of not knowing what to do.

This fear manifests in my choices to signal my inner child’s emotional need for spaciousness and support. We are innately wired for learning and discovery; therefore, this fear was created from childhood experiences of being rushed to make decisions that we didn’t feel embodied in.

If we felt particularly pressured in how to respond during our experience of childhood sexual abuse, then our inner child will become more fearful of not knowing what to do when our presiding triggers actually call for taking more time and additional resources to gain clarity.

During this full moon, practice giving yourself the grace to allot your attention to only one thing at a time to foster the mental space needed for introspection and contemplation. 

3. Release the disappointment of letting yourself down. 

I now realize that I continued playing out the trauma pattern of letting myself down until I recognized that these experiences were illuminating my inner child’s unmet emotional need for forgiveness.

Not being able to stand up against sexual abuse as a child created a subconscious belief that I could not trust myself to do the right thing when I needed to—a belief that subsequently manifested into a self-fulfilling prophecy of making self-defeating choices. 

Giving ourselves permission to pursue our passions and goals is one of the ways that we can energetically practice and integrate self-forgiveness. This rewires the childhood conditioning of having our simple pleasures being taken away for “bad behavior.”

We are always worthy of showcasing our gifts even if we have made mistakes. The Gemini full moon is an opportunity to practice giving yourself permission to share your magic even when you let yourself down.

4. Release the fear of not having enough time. 

When this fear is exaggerated in my circumstances, it is an invitation to meet my inner child‘s emotional need for lightheartedness. Through ongoing shadow work, I’ve come to recognize that this fear stems from a childhood environment of being given so much work to complete before I could savour my desired emotionally elated experience.

This approach may have had the benefit of bolstering discipline when someone else was telling me what to do. However, it’s evolved to promote a subconscious sense of self-scarcity as I endeavor toward greater creative expression. 

Reframing my relationship with time entails reparenting myself to adopt a more lighthearted energy as I am completing my tasks. You can practice shifting out of the serious energetic posture, which induces fear in our inner child, by talking in a different voice or accent for 10 minutes to experience the possibility of having fun even whilst all the work is not done. 

5. Release the fear of people being mad at you.

This fear is triggered to bring our attention to our inner child’s unmet emotional desire for the freedom and confidence to enjoy our own peace of mind regardless of other people’s moods. Meaning that this fear pops up to urge me to release the childhood compensatory mechanism of seeking safety by matching my mood to a loved one’s unhappiness. As children, we may have learned to fear that our contentment would offend or upset those who felt unhappy. 

The inner work of releasing this fear entails letting go of my expectation that others need to feel happy all the time. Our desire to take other people’s sadness away is what leads to downplaying our own joy so we can join company with their misery.

My practice for releasing this fear is to stop, smell the roses, and become more fully present to savoring the good feelings that are available to me instead of being distracted by my imaginings of other people’s assumptions. 

Those of us who have experienced childhood trauma, especially sexual abuse, are highly sensitive to uncomfortable sensations. Therefore, understanding how our inner child’s survival mode patterns are triggered as the moon moves through each zodiac constellation helps us to become less reactive and more harmonized with the lunar emotional currents.

My poetry is birthed from my continual practice of bridging the gap between the moon’s energetic flow and the opposing constrictive trauma energy in my nervous system. 

This process had offered me a wealth of experiential wisdom about using the lunar astrological intelligence to gain altitude over my circumstance, so I can remain more grounded in my experience. I believe that we need to take advantage of every tool of self-understanding that nature affords us.

~