I haven’t actually celebrated the Gregorian New Year in quite a few years. Working in the restaurant industry was the ultimate killjoy for the majority of our cultural holidays, including New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day. I am reminded of the restaurant I worked at where we hid in the employee stairwells while chugging cheap bottles of champagne lifted from the giant trash cans loaded with ice. A sneak peek from behind the scenes of making a champagne toast work for a 4-story restaurant/bar/nightclub. Then there is the other restaurant I worked at where I served small ramakins of black eyed peas to every customer to wish them luck in the new year. Both of these being an extra service step that received no extra reward (AKA money) for accomplishing.
Holidays were always that way, more work with no extra pay. I feel like that’s sort of how new year’s resolutions are, a lot of extra work with very little pay off at the end. How many times have we started new workout regimes, new diets, new ways of living? And how many times have we actually accomplished the goals that we set for January 1? I did that whole New Year New You thing back in 2018. Last year I had a word of the year, which was choose. This year I am not making any serious commitments to changing the course of my life. I mean I have goals, but none of them involve some sweeping life altering decisions. Most of them are more reminiscent of course corrections, a slight change in the way the wind blows.
The Golden Handcuffs
In the beginning of Mary Poppins, at least the part where she shows up, she pulls a measuring tape out of the depths of her valise to check the status of Jane and Michael Banks. Michael was considered to be “extremely stubborn and suspicious,” and Jane was “rather inclined to giggle and doesn’t put things away.” I can relate to both. And then there was Mary Poppins: “practically perfect in every way.” This one is a whole other ball game.
Perfection is something that is demanded in our society, but something that one can rarely achieve. I’m starting to wonder if perfection isn’t just as made up as Mary Poppins herself. I have strived for it for years in various aspects of my life, to the point of burnout, to the point of sending myself into panic attacks and a near-constant state of anxiousness. Here is something that I am beginning to learn: personal failure only exists if you say it does.
Yes of course, we live in a world where we do have to work within the confines of capitalism to an extent. A girl has got to eat. Hear me out though. We have this vague definition of success, of what it means to be a worthy human being in this world. It changes depending on the culture, the country, the community. It means everything to us, and it doesn’t mean anything at the same time. What is your measuring stick for being good enough? And how do you know when you get there?
The Lovers
The Lovers is our card for the year 2022, which we figured out by adding the individual digits together (2+0+2+2=6). The Lovers is the sixth card of the major arcana. Last year was the year of the Hierophant, the teacher of the tarot deck, and 2023 will be the Chariot, which will be sort of like the planetary shedding of a crab shell. I can’t wait. The Lovers are symbolized by the archangel Raphael, who watches over our soul connections, and is represented by the act of marriage in the Christian religion.
This isn’t to say that this card is about finding your perfect person. In fact, the Lovers card has nothing to do with another person. It’s about finding harmony of the inner and outer life. A true soul mate is when the masculine and feminine work together, and we find our own wholeness within ourselves. That thing that we are looking for is already inside of us. It is imperative that we learn how to look within more than we look out, so that we can then begin to learn how to draw our magic back to us.
It's safe to be a woman. It's safe to be in the female body. It's safe to feel pleasure in my body.
Our culture teaches us that masculine traits are more valuable and worthy than feminine ones, so we suppress those. We essentially numb the certain parts of us, the parts that we fear will get us ostracized from the community. It’s literally essential to our survival, that belonging. The Lovers card is here to remind us to put ourselves back into balance, back into a yin and yang flow with this life. We need both to be in harmony with nature and our true selves. Only then will we truly be free.
Capricorn New Moon
The first new moon of year is on January 2, and it’s a little extra determined due to the fact that the sun is there, along with Venus currently in retrograde. And then there is Juno, the asteroid. The sun and moon will also trine with Uranus. That’s a lot of celestial bodies hanging out with this Sea-Goat, as Capricorn is sometimes referred to.
The mythology states that Pricus, the father of a race of intelligent and honorable sea-goats, surrendered his children to the wild and was given an immortal home in the heavens as the constellation Capricorn. Ea, as the Babylonians called him, was the protective god of water, knowledge, and creation. To the Greek, Amalthea nursed baby Zeus after he escaped being eaten by his father Cronos. Yikes.
The corresponding new moon will occur on July 13, 2022. A lot could happen in six months. New moons provide us with wonderful opportunities to begin again, a new cycle of something different. It doesn’t have to be drastic, maybe something smaller, more incremental. Or it could just be a slight change in the wind. The important thing to remember here is that forcing ourselves into a bunch of change all at once is a recipe for disaster. But the willingness to change is far more important than the willpower you think is necessary in order to do so.
Mad love, Jenna
