It’s spring. What will you grow?
Last Friday (March 20th) was the spring equinox and the official start to the spring season. During the Becoming circle that I hosted, I said “spring is sprung”—a rather commonplace phrase.
Then I immediately corrected myself. Because spring doesn’t pop off like a compressed spring, shooting rapidly forward.
Spring slowly unfurls, growing and slowly uncurling like a fiddlehead fern leaf.
Copyright Allison Emin at Unsplash
If you are a gardener, or just a person who’d like to grow a few things to eat this year, you may be getting garden beds ready for planting, starting seeds, or making a list of starter plants you intend to purchase and plant when the time is right. Maybe it’s new herbs, or lettuce, or tomatoes. Maybe you want to plant some flowers to beautify your house (outside or even inside).
If you are not thinking of growing things outdoors, you may be finding yourself seeking out a new houseplant or even some cut flowers from the store to bring something living into your space. (Yes, cut flowers still count . . . they may not live super long inside, but they weren’t going to live super long on their plant, either.)
It’s because spring puts us in mind of growing new things.
The things we grow don’t have to be plant life.
We can also grow other things, like our savings account, our willingness to stretch ourselves (physically, emotionally, or ideologically), or our time spent offline and/or out of doors.
Unfortunately, we can also grow things like our distrust of neighbors, our fear of the government, etc. It’s my pet theory that some of the more fascistic folks in the current administration know this and are deliberately trying to encourage us to grow our fear as a means of keeping us down and keeping us inline.
The thing is, I am just contrary enough to not like being told what to do (sometimes even by my own self), so I refuse to grow my fear and my obedience. I prefer to grow my empathy and my willingness to push back. It doesn’t mean I’m ready to spearhead a revolution or anything remotely like that, but it does mean I’m not letting myself get pushed back into the 1950s. Or the 1850s, which honestly seems more like the goal—when men meant “white men” and women, children, and minorities were property that they could treat however they wanted. But I digress.
What I am growing
Savings
I am working on growing my long-term savings, despite the economic fuckery going on right now. Because I am about to turn 62, and old age isn’t all that far ahead of me, and I’d like to retain my financial independence if possible.
How I’m doing it: I am continuing to make a monthly deposit into an investment account, which is managed by the kindest, smartest, most no-nonsense woman I know. If you want a certified financial planner who is trustworthy and knowledgeable, hit me up and I’ll give you her details. Ann is a goddess of financial smarts. Oh, and I’m also making a deposit into my Roth IRA account.
I am taking every $5 bill I get as change during cash transactions (yes, I still use cash fairly often), and stashing it into a savings account. Turns out you don’t often receive a $5 bill, but also, five dollars is enough to make a difference in your savings nest egg, in a way that a single dollar might not be. I usually deposit them once every month or two, and usually have somewhere between $15 and $40 to put in there. (Of course, if money is extra tight, this might not work for you . . . but I am betting you could put away every 5-cent coin you receive, and still end up with a dollar month to put away. And even $12 in savings is better than none.)
My witchy coaching business
Of course, this one isn’t entirely up to me. In order to grow my business, I need clients who are willing to pay me for coaching or tarot readings or to attend events.
But I know for a fact that I’ve been playing small, not wanting to talk about some of the witchy stuff I do or the fact that I’m a psychic medium who can get messages from the spirit world. I mean, that makes me a lunatic, right? Well, maybe. And maybe I don’t care anymore. If the world is gonna be on fire (* gestures broadly *), perhaps it doesn’t matter if some people think I’m nuts.
If I were going to apologize using a formal format, it’d probably go something like:
Forgive me, Universe, for I have stubbornly refused to accept and acknowledge my gifts. I have not developed the gifts you’ve given me before now. I have been guilty of rolling my eyes or pushing gifts away because I worried what other people might think—including strangers I’ve never met, who have no real input into my life. I have not been public about my strengths and abilities, because I worried about the judgment of others. I have fallen short of living up to my full potential. I have not trusted you, despite you showing me you have my back time and time again. For this, and for other reasons, I apologize. I seek the strength and opportunity to do better from here on out.
My authenticity
I am growing to be more my authentic self, and to let that show in my dealings with other people.
The thing is, I’m good at what I do. My coaching clients tell me all the time what a positive difference I’ve made for them, and that includes the folks for whom I have read tarot or run workshops.
It turns out that listening and caring and offering people access to a different perspective on things, or a new approach to dealing with them (which is essentially what a coach does) is massively enhanced by access to those people’s spirit team, who are already on their side and cheering them on. It helps folks to see what it is they have been blind to, whether because they truly cannot see it, or have pretending not to because seeing it means work.
Because of course, we all hide from doing the work from time to time. It’s not laziness . . . it’s listening to the parts of you that fear change, the ones that worry that if you do something different, or grow a new skill, or allow yourself to step into a bigger life (no matter whether it is a huge step or a tiny expansion), people will talk. They will judge you. They might not like you any more.
I’m not going to spout the “let them” theory at you, in part because I don’t love that Mel Robbins stole the idea from someone who interned for her and then didn’t give that woman credit. But mostly, it’s because I think that theory is a load of horseshit. Because it only works in certain circumstances, and it’s easily turned against you to force you to accept ill treatment at the hands of other peoples. But again, I digress.
What I will say is in two parts:
First, other people aren’t thinking of you all that often, or that much. Sadly, even the ones in your life you are closest to and whom you might count as the most important, aren’t thinking of you all that much. They are worried about themselves: what do other people think of them? what next? what if something bad happens? why did they wear those shoes? where should they go for dinner next Tuesday?
We all are tied up inside our own heads, worried about our own actions, reputations, relationships, needs, wants, and more. Often, even when we think of the other people in our lives, we are worried about what they think about us. It’s like the old punch line: “but enough about me. What do YOU think about me?”
Second, we don’t get to control what other people think of us.
Not even those who are close family members. If they want to believe that we are the same person we were when we were 7 or 15, they will—as I found out when my brother went off on me after my father’s death, just before my mother’s terminal cancer diagnosis. I had been trying to be considerate of him and his feelings, while also helping my mom through her days.
My brother definitely did not behave like an adult; instead, he yelled about how I “always” behaved in a certain way. Funny thing is, the “bossy” behavior that he described is completely foreign to me these days. It may have been a (biased, but not entirely inaccurate) view of what I acted like as a kid, but it bears absolutely no relation to who I am now. Just thinking about it causes my heart to race, and my eyes to tear up a bit: how could he not only be so wrong, but also so loudly wrong about me?
At the time, I just stood there and listened. I figured he was just upset because he had just lost his father, so perhaps this was his way of blowing off excess emotion. I decided to let it slide and give the poor guy a break. Nevermind that we had the same father, the same loss.
I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Because that is who I am now: an adult, who has put years of work into being better regulated and to overcoming family dysfunction. I used to joke that my core birth family “put the fun in dysfunction”, but truly, there’s nothing fun about dealing with disregulated people who aren’t willing to make any effort to understand the people around them, who never look inward, and who are quick to judge others and hurl abuse.
The number of people I have met and spoken with (whether they are friends, acquaintances, or clients) who have family members who have done no work on themselves, and who keep the people I’ve spoken to stuck in a form of mental amber where they are some past version of themselves, is A LOT. It’s even true of high level coaches who I have been a client of.
Turns out that life is always a bit messy. And other people might eventually judge you, but that doesn’t mean that their judgment is accurate or in any way correct. They could just be loudly wrong about who you are now. That’s not your problem to fix, and trying to convince them otherwise isn’t likely to be welcomed or accepted anyhow. If they want to repair things, they will. If they just want to spout their opinions and make you smaller, then they can go ahead with that first part and spout off. But the only person who can make you smaller is YOU.
You don’t have to accept wrong information from anyone, even if that person is someone you love.
My magic
I am planting seeds for more magic in my life. That means more simmer pots on my stove, more herbs in my garden (and better knowledge of herbalism), more learning about astrology and tarot, more spellwork focused on things like banishing ICE and protecting those at risk . . . More learning, more practice.
And also, more sharing. Because sharing is a form of caring, and it turns out that more people want a bit of magic in their lives. Magic can be as simple as acknowledging the intention with which you live. It can be as easy as fixing your morning coffee or tea. As simple as letting air into a room, or lighting a candle.
So I will be learning more about magic, but also doing more with it in my life and in my work. In fact, let me know if there’s anything in particular you are interested in learning about.
What will you grow?
Copyright Tina Xinia at Unsplash
Wanna work with me?
You can book a tarot reading here. If you book before the end of March, I will add a bonus single card reading from the Seasons of the Witch Ostara Oracle deck for you.
If you are interested in figuring out where your dreams went, or what your dreams or goals are, or how to get started doing something you haven’t been able to start, or anything along those lines at all, you would probably do really well with a coaching session. We figure out what’s up, get you some clarity, and can get some destinations on your life map. Book coaching sessions here. Once you pay for a session, we will set up a mutually convenient time.
XO,
Kelly