I’m delighted to share this Full Moon offering from my dear friend and podcasting partner, Jen Braun! ~ April
by Jen Braun
I never saw it coming: The moment that changed everything.
When I woke up on that crisp Minnesota morning in the fall of 2014, it was a day like any other: ordinary, unremarkable. I grabbed my coffee, took a shower, brushed my teeth. I barely noticed my feet beneath me – or the vibrant leaves from our ancient maple tree in a continual free fall, offering an unspoken message on how to let go.
Less than 12 hours later, everything would be different for me. But that watershed moment – which I now recognize in hindsight – was a slow, steady drum, arriving over years, beat by beat; an interminable number of days spent realizing that although my right foot was still attached, it wasn’t holding me up. The container of my body – which used to work so effortlessly – had suddenly failed me.
The following months and years would bring me back to a question I’ve been hearing a lot lately as the pandemic unfolds: “When will things go back to normal? When does this end?”
Let’s hop into the way-back time machine and surveil that autumn morning: There I am sipping my coffee, clearly understanding that life is headed in a new direction – two days prior, I’d announced that I was leaving the nonprofit I’d co-founded in order to take a sabbatical year. I’d spent 21 years working in child welfare and wanted to pursue other dreams.
I had plans and expectations. And I grasped tightly to both.
So, I knew I was on a journey. I just didn’t realize I was heading into a five-year Cosmic Waiting Room, on a painful yet transformational path that would be physically and emotionally demanding. Perhaps I should have stayed safely at my job and not taken any risks. Surely then the signature of time would have progressed differently, and the horse that stomped on my foot would have instead moved two inches to the right – missing my boot-clad extremity, thereby relieving me of the nerve damage that has left me worse for the wear while I learn to walk again. Or would it?
There I was, propelled into something deep and messy and uncertain.
The following months and years would bring me back to a question I’ve been hearing a lot lately as the pandemic unfolds: “When will things go back to normal? When does this end?”
Journeys don’t always turn out the way we think they will. But sometimes, how we view the journey changes. And sometimes our outer journeys transform our inner ones, instead of the other way around.
The Full Moon on May 7th (5:45 am CDT) is at 18 degrees Scorpio and – like all Full Moons – offers us a chance for examination, to see what is in front of us fully illuminated. Scorpio is the sign of transformation. Of magic. But also – of letting go, of release, of death. This Full Moon calls us to observe: What is life showing you? Sometimes, for new things to begin, something else must end.
I know a thing or two about endings, although letting go has never been easy for me. As David Foster Wallace wrote, “Everything I’ve ever let go of has claw marks on it.” Born with lots of Scorpio energy – as well as other “fixed” (read: stubborn/tenacious) planetary traits – I’m a person who has lived life with determination, intensity, and at times the difficult task of figuring out life’s expiration dates: Will I ever walk around the block again, on my own two feet? Will I ever walk without pain? Is it time to stop striving toward an unreachable goal?
Meanwhile, the Sun makes its trek through Taurus, representing our material needs, our physical form, the ground beneath our feet. The Sun and Moon together ask us to balance the tangible with the intangible; the mysterious with the known; the practical, earthly realm with the unknowable things beyond this world we cannot see.
How are you doing spiritually? How can you transform the parts of your life that are ready to be released?
Scorpio is the sign of transformation. Of magic. But also – of letting go, of release, of death. This Full Moon calls us to observe: What is life showing you? Sometimes, for new things to begin, something else must end.
It’s been a hard balance, this idea of sitting in uncertainty, holding my plans without clinging to them – having them in mind yet allowing for the unexpected. As someone who tends to see things through to the very end, I’ve learned that the trick is knowing when the end is.
We never know how things will turn out, and as Pema Chödrön teaches, “Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It’s just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy… Letting there be room for not knowing is the most important thing of all.”
Today, for the first time in ages, I walked to the end of the block, turned around, and returned home. Sure, I had help from my “speed sticks” (the staffs formerly known as crutches). And only one minute of that walk was unaided. But I did it. Literally one foot in front of the other.
Perhaps this Scorpio Full Moon is asking us to let go of our expectations of what this moment should be, and instead notice it – in all its sacred, earthly glory – for what it truly is.
When will this be over? As for me, I’ll make my plans and have my dreams.
Concurrently, I’ll pause outside my door, put my face to the Sun, and take one step into this beautiful world. I’ll let go of wondering whether I’ll make it to the end of the block tomorrow.
Like the wise October maple tree, I’ll bear spring in mind, while releasing what no longer serves.
©2020 Jen Braun. To learn more about Jen, visit her website.
Jen Braun is an astrological enthusiast and the co-host and producer of the Big Sky Astrology podcast. She spent over twenty years working with teens in the field of adoption and foster care, and co-founded Ampersand Families, an award-winning Minneapolis nonprofit that finds and supports adoptive parents for the oldest and longest-waiting kids in the foster care system. Jen lives in Minnesota with her wife and two goofy dogs, and can usually be persuaded to leave her house with promises of puppies and chocolate. Reach Jen by email.
