My roller derby friend, Kat Lee (aka Snarls Darwin), has become a business mentor/spiritual entrepreneur in the past few years. Lately she’s been posting a lot about marketing for spiritual entrepreneurs, and how spiritual folx are triggered by traditional marketing systems… and how our nervous systems react to that triggering. I’m finding her posts extremely illuminating and informative. (She’s at: https://bio.site/empoweredcuriosity, if you want to check out her offerings!) It seems that my nervous system tends to freeze. Today (and other days) she posted about procrastination as a manifestation of freezing. I really relate to her message. I don’t know if wanting to be a writer/blogger fits under the mantle of “Spiritual Entrepreneur” or not. I don’t really see myself that way. But I do believe I have a message that needs to be released from inside me, if for no other reason than to heal myself. And just possibly because others need to hear it. So that they – so that WE – feel less alone in our experience and our process.
For years – decades in the case of one of my projects – I have sat on completed projects. I have written, rewritten, edited, and re-edited ad infinitum a fairy tale that I wrote in my 20s and a novel that I wrote in my 40s. I have purchased special writer’s software and retyped my stories into it. I have allowed a handful of people to read the fairy tale. And I allowed one very trustworthy human to read the novel. I have gotten extremely favorable responses, as well as helpful suggestions.
And yet… I do NOTHING with my writing. I am terrified of the next steps. Is it fear of failure? Fear of success? Fear of exposure? Fear of my creative children being exposed to the harsh ugliness of the world?
Is it lack of savvy? I have literally NO IDEA how to find an editor or agent or publisher. When I try to do research, or even think about taking any of those steps, it sends me into a panic attack, and I freeze up again. Even now, I can feel my heart racing, my breath getting more shallow, my throat constricting just admitting this publicly.
But the thing is: the work is done. The stories are complete. They need to be read. I need advice on how to edit and fine tune them. I need guidance on how to take the next step. But I have no idea where to turn. And as a woman in her late 50s, I feel the pressure of Time bearing down on me. I don’t want to leave this life with my creative children locked in drawers and closets. I want to set them free, let them find their wings, and participate in their emancipation. I want to allow myself to make room for what comes next. What stories want to be written? What service can I offer? How can I help myself and others? How can helping myself help others? How can helping others help me?
Yesterday Saturn entered Pisces, which is my Ascendant/Rising Sign and home of my natal Saturn placement. This means that Saturn is now in my first house of Self and I am now officially in my second Saturn Return for approximately the next three years. When Saturn moves out of Pisces I will be in my last year or so of being in my 50s. Wouldn’t it be phenomenal if I could use Saturn’s gifts of Time, Structure, and Boundaries to allow myself to release my creative children into the world before my 60th birthday? Wouldn’t it be a precious gift to my inner (and outer) Maiden, Mother, and Crone if I could allow myself to be SEEN? If I could allow my creative children to be known?
So today for my daily tarot/oracle reading, I asked my oldest and newest decks – the tarot deck I have carried since I was 20 or 21 and the Alchemy deck I’ve had for less than a year – what my creative projects need and how to support myself while giving it to them. How do I stop procrastinating about even publishing the next blog post? How do I birth these children into the world? What do they need from me? And how do I take care of myself while I give it to them?
If I’m reading the signs correctly, my creative children need me to take a leap of faith. They need me to silence my latent perfectionism. I always say that I am a recovering perfectionist. In many ways, it’s similar to other addictions or compulsions. No matter how much better I get, the critical voice of the perfectionist is still lurking and whispering deep within me. Preventing me from doing anything for fear of it not being good enough. Or being TOO MUCH. For fear of not being perfect. Where is that Goldilocks sweet spot of “just right?”
Maybe “just right” isn’t the point. Maybe I need to knock over all those chairs, bowls of porridge, and beds and just make a goddamn mess. Maybe the truth, the freedom, the answer is in the mess.
My creative children also need to be released to the Void, to be shown to trusted allies, and to be entrusted to the Universe. It’s time to release them, perhaps little by little. And in releasing them, they will give me the gift of peace and satisfaction of a job completed. Which may even be something I can take to the literal or metaphorical bank.
We need each other. My creative children and I need each other. My creative children and I need you. I need to allow myself to need you as much as I’m willing to provide for your needs.
This is me saying I see you and I need you, too. This is me waiting and watching for signs that the Universe is listening. This is me ready to take that leap of faith, to make that mess, to trust that it is safe to give these creative babies to the world. To know that even if we get a little battered in the process, we will be okay.
