What is it like to live in America and be in school? What does it mean? Well to me, as a Californian it feels rushed. In a sprint to make it to personal goals faster, people rush themselves and miss the beauty of the experience. Cramming on more than they can handle, to prepare for the future they are already behind in achieving.
Personally, I don’t find it beneficial to rush myself to the finish line to meet some hypothetical goal I have created in my mind, so I may feel accomplished. So different than the past versions of self who had immense grief from not meeting those personal deadlines and goals.
The earth energy in me pushes me to commit, to lean steady, to keep to what I said I would do, and now, feels like a time to resist and fall. Let things fall as they may, and lean into letting things be easy. I lead a life outside of my studies that requires peace and quiet to integrate. I lead a life that I am an active participant in and that I want to savor, experience, and enjoy.
This quarter, many of my classmates are in that rush, that demand of pushing to finish to meet a goal to transfer to a four year university in time, and I am comfortable moving at a pace that feels right to me. Fall seemed manageable and then I realized my cadence, how I like to quilt quietly in my lap and enjoy reading books to my daughter in the spring, how I enjoy preparing the garden for the yang energy of summer to come, how I love to spend time in outward bursts of joy with friends in the summertime, and how each winter term, I crash and burn because the shorter days indicate to my body that I need more rest.
Of course there are parts of me that would love to be first in a new cohort at Uni. There are parts of me who wish to say “I did it first” but what benefit is it to have done it first when you can not savor any pieces of it because you were too busy focusing on getting it done?
2024 will continue to be about less. What else can I remove from my plate? How can I thrive on the bare minimum? What are my true necessities?
If I love learning and I love life, there can be consideration that some things signed up for are truly for personal enrichment. If I am truly moving forward as an anthropologist, the best thing yet would be to have a deeper understanding of humanity and make it less and less about otherness, continuing to bridge the gap.
As Pluto enters Aquarius today* and exits a 248 year cycle with Capricorn we are entering a new era. I feel the shift and the internal pressure is immense. Despite this, with the rain beating on my window, I choose to rest. To take it slow, to continue to commit to keeping things easy. My desire to own a home still exists and, I lean into the notion that sometimes, just having a corner to quilt in and watch the birds feels like enough.
Quieting the mind is a new practice that I am improving my skills in, and in less than one month, I will be a published author. If you have interest in ordering a book, feel free to reply to this post.
For now, I will keep this short and sweet, and leave you with a thought to ponder: How do you wish to feel in 2024?
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Written under a sun in Capricorn and a moon in Gemini, feeling fancy and mellow.
*this actually was meant to be published on the 20th and I forgot to press publish.
Question of inquiry: If English is the language of commerce, then what is the language of love? Are all romance languages qualifiers or does one stand out more to you?