Octopus is the animal guiding us with its wisdom this week in regard to gratitude. In the video below expanding on the message of gratitude, you also have the choice to pick a card – 1, 2, or 3 – to go along with Octopus. Enjoy, and as always, if you wish to go deeper and receive support for a challenge you are facing, please feel free to reach out to me. You can learn more about my guidance sessions here. xo, Barbara
In this week’s video oracle reading and guidance session (below) I talk about something I’ve been thinking about lately and that is completion cycles in our lives. John and I just completed 35-years of marriage and now move into our 36th year together. It feels like just yesterday that we were saying our vows to each other.
To celebrate we ventured off on a mini getaway this past Saturday to a town about 2 1/2 hours from us and we stayed at a cozy upper flat of an Airbnb. On the way home, we stopped at the Horicon Marsh which is both a national and state wildlife refuge area. It also has the largest freshwater cattail marsh in the United States. There is an educational center and outside of it is this wooly mammoth sculpture that I just had to have my picture taken with. Isn’t it amazing?!
Celebrating 35 years of marriage, completing a big part of the process of writing and editing my book and all the small details that go with it before sending it off to the design team which I did today, plus thoughts of the year coming to a close has really had me thinking about the completion of cycles …
No doubt you are too as the year winds down, so I hope you find this oracle reading and guidance session helpful. xo, Barbara
One-to-one personal oracle readings and guidance sessions available here if you are in need of extra support.
The editing and the cover of my book, I’m Fine Just the Way I Am have been completed for a few weeks now and the manuscript is in the hands of those I reached out to for endorsements. It’s the final tidbits of book publishing I need to yet complete before it goes off to the design team who will put together the interior layout.
The past few days I’ve been working on the very last page of my memoir. The page I’m working on? The acknowledgments. I’ve been writing a little each day. Trying to find the most appreciative and heartfelt words to express to those who have walked this journey with me.
I’ve done this so many times before and yet again I find myself in this stuck place. I know it’s because I feel a depth of gratitude for those that have supported me, but then how do I truly convey that in words?
And so I did what I often do when I’m feeling stuck. I pulled some tarot and oracle cards. I received Guardian of Water (from Gaian Tarot – Healing the Earth, Healing Ourselves by Joanna Powell Colbert) and Canary Spirit (from The Spirit Animals Oracle by Colette Baron-Reid).
Guardian of Water was part of a New Moon reading I did for myself on Sunday and Canary Spirit is my animal for the month of December from a year-long spread I did for myself at the beginning of 2019. Interesting their appearance again.
Right away I understand these cards as reminding me to continue to go with the flow and not against the current. The turtle on the card symbolic of the fact I can’t rush this, and the fish swimming upstream I see as trusting my own flow. I can’t force this, but allow it to unfold naturally. Water is symbolic of emotions and I’m swimming in them right now, though not quite sure how to express them. The shell I see as if holding to my ear, and to listen and tune in to my heart, and then let it flow. Flow seems to be the theme here, now doesn’t it?
Canary Spirit reminds me that no matter what, this whole journey of writing this book has been about singing my own song. Tears actually pooled in my eyes when I pulled the Canary card as it is packed with so much meaning for me. The writing of this book has set me free in boundless ways – and no doubt will continue to as it goes out into the world.
And in the end, no matter what, I know I put my heart and soul into this and grew in ways I never imagined I would. This allowing and not forcing has been something I continue to hone. And so what a lovely reminder from these two cards to come forth as the needed reminder to allow the flow with gentleness and graciousness…and trust that it will all come together, just as it always has.
And so with this message of truth, I now sign off and head out for a walk, which always proves good medicine too…
xo,
Barbara