The inner work of 2020 has already asked us this: what do we have to show for it?

What new choices have we stood behind that are now beginning to create a sturdier foundation of a truer solidity beneath our feet?

Yes, we still feel pangs of the past, of the old habits, and old ways of seeing and viewing ourselves, our lives, and others sneaking back in to ask us:

Are we really done with the old way of being, living, and operating?

It feels much like one foot is straddling on one side of the looming valley beneath us, and the other has toes just familiarizing itself with the other side. We are the bridge, and yet, we know eventually we are going to have to jump to the other side—both feet in—to be fully committed to the new and to letting go of the old.

It’s scary as f*ck to our more primal, survival mechanisms; it feels like death. As humans, we know little of what is on the other side of literal death, so it makes sense why we would fear these “smaller” deaths of the former self and of the former world.

2020 was the inner work, the inner clearing, the inner purging.

2021 seems to be this weird in-between space of no longer and not yet. We have changed enormously, yet our new form of self is not yet fully clear. We feel it a little more each day we choose love over fear, and still, fear is so intoxicating to the brain and the mind.

We are taking bigger steps a lot of the days, and sometimes, yes, we just want to hide out in our rooms and just take a break from it all, from all the intensity of transformation and letting go.

All the inner work we’ve done really shows up in how we choose to take actionable steps in our day-to-day reality. The inner work is only really integrated as it starts to ripple into the ways we act, choose, and behave, when our new visions, ideologies, and beliefs have something in tangible physical form.

We’ve all been working on creating new pathways that nurture and nourish us: new habits; new environments; new behaviors; new decisions; choosing love in the face of our conditioned fear that tells us something bad will happen if we choose differently.

I, for one, know what it’s like to feel the strangulation of the comfort zone, to feel like certain death and doom will find me if I step outside of it. The fear convinces us that the leap, the jump, the fall, the plunge will be our demise.

For most of my life, maybe yours too, whenever I have chosen to stand in front of fear, whether shaking or crying, but standing all the same, and said with my actions and behaviors, “I choose the choice that scares me the most,” what has awaited me on the other side was never death, but regeneration. New life. Rebirth. Expansion. Freedom.

Awaiting me was the eagle wings to soar into clearing skies from fear’s stormy presence. The wings rise out and above the horizon, ready to take flight with power, strength, and deep-found trust in this truer, more reliable bridge and connection to spirit.

I speak of these qualities because something magical happened just the other day as I was casually driving to work. I had just made a “big” decision for myself to choose love over fear in the face of starting a new type of therapy for myself. My intuition had been urging me that this was the next step for self-healing and further liberation.

I felt all the fears; I heard all of their worries: money, time, what-ifs, future-looming uncertainty. I heard them out. I gave them space. Making an empowered choice is often not about shutting down the fear, but allowing it space to breathe, to be seen, and to be heard.

Then, from there, we can make the empowered choice to say, “I hear you, fear, and I know on some level, some part of my being and soul knows this is the next step for me, even though the mind will try to tell me it’s beyond logic.”

So, here I was having made an empowered choice, choosing love in the face of my fears, and the next thing I know, driving to work, a giant, beautiful eagle flies out from a tree beside the road right in front of my car. I was stunned!

I knew it was a sign, a message; I began to think what the energy of eagle encapsulates.

I asked myself inwardly, “What does it mean?” Next thing I heard was a song titled “Freedom” on the radio and couldn’t help but bust out into giddy laughter. To confirm any self-doubt I had, the next advertisement on the radio talked about “finding freedom.”

In the span of a few minutes, I had a received the message: freedom.

I speak of all this because magic speaks to me—and all of us—when I have quieter, less-assuming ears to hear it and stiller eyes to see it.

Yes, life is crazy and intense as f*ck this year already. Things are changing on the daily. And, yet, magic is so very much alive and so evident when we begin to make empowered choices and actionable steps forward.

This full moon—and first full moon of 2021—at nine degrees of Leo on Thursday and Friday, January 28 and 29, 2021, is ready to unleash some deep magic and powerful creative energy, perhaps by first illuminating lingering old thought forms.

Leo is a fire sign. Fixed. Fiery. Impulsive. Fun-seeking. Creative. Play-oriented. Expression needing. Life-giving. The inner child. The need for play to be an integral part of work. The artist. The need to create, to explore, to be seen for its gifts and talents. The leader. The individual. The one who knows how to stand out, to break out of the rut, out of the old outdated mold of tradition. To be different. Bold. Daring. Adventurous.

Leo’s love with their whole heart and being. To be loved by a Leo is a beautiful gift. Leo’s love to shine, to stand out, to break out, to no longer tie themselves to the “shoulds” of society, culture, or tradition.

This full moon is inviting us to do the same, to step out of the box of our old, outdated methods and modes of thinking, believing, and being. We saw last year how those weren’t and haven’t been working for us for a long time. This full moon is an invitation, a fiery one at that, to create something new, a new habit, a new way of behaving, to step out of the comfort zones that bring us nothing but stagnation anyways.

This full moon invites us to step up to the edge of the cliff—face-to-face with fear—standing among the pressures of all the energy and turning back toward the power and strength of the Leo heart, saying, “Yes, life you can have me now.”

It asks us to soar into freedom like the eagle breaking out of its tree nest, to expand back into life and gain broader vantage point of self, of fear, of love, to know that this path we are seeking is one we create—that’s perhaps the scariest part of all: that we create it.

It’s us deciding to make the empowered choice to change, to create something new, to create a new version of self. In that facing of fear there can only be further liberation of the self, previously imprisoned by self-inflicted limitations of belief and patterns of fear.

The skies are mirroring to us these energies, as they always do. The sun is in Aquarius (Leo’s opposing sign), as are many other planets and energies (Saturn, Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury soon-to-be end of January, beginning of February).

Aquarius is all about the group, the community, the bigger expansive perspective of life. Leo is the individual, the self that needs to progress, to evolve. Aquarius is the evolution of the whole, the innovation of society at large. The two polarities need each other, of course, duality at play.

The self needs to know what choices to make to further its evolution, in turn, furthering the evolution of the planet and of humanity. We need to see the smaller, Leo, self-focused picture, as well as the bigger, Aquarius, whole-focused picture to know what steps to take.

The Leo full moon is squaring Mars (the planet of war, aggression), as well as opposing Jupiter (the planet of luck and expansion). These aspects may have our tensions and frustrations stirring, while simultaneously having us feel an overconfidence and a lack of self-control.

Of course, these are just energies, as is most of life, so it is always up to us what we choose to do with them.

How will we use the energies to choose more freedom in the face of fear, more love in the face of doom and gloom, more courage and strength in the face of all that comes to test us—to push us to level up to all that we really are?

We can always soar higher above the present physical reality, to see the bigger perceptive, to spread our wings a little wider and choose the path of expansion and growth, freedom in self-expression and self-liberation, knowing that the choices toward love—back toward the heart of who we are—are the exact choices we need to move forward.

Let this Leo full moon fire you up, but remember to temper the fires, too, with breath, with grounding practices, with presence for all the feelings, knowing that the evolution of the self serves the greater evolution of humanity. And, that happens by you choosing more of you, choosing more of what lights up your heart and soul, what brings you back to life—no matter how uninspired we might feel.

To say to fear, “I am choosing more life. Thank you for being my teacher and my guide to illuminate all possibilities I didn’t see until I stepped through your threshold. I’m choosing love as my teacher and guide now.”

In that choice to become sovereign and free again, we will be the bridge we came here to be, bridging spirit back into the web of humanity.

Freedom is always a worthy cause. And, so are you.

~

*Want to better your relationship with your sweet self? Join our Maitri Course at Elephant Academy—It’ll help you make friends with yourself as you actually are. Then, your basic goodness will manifest.