Hi friends,
Happy last week of November.. (already?)
Happy week of gratitude, too. Happy Thanksgiving and Happy Native American Heritage Day. Happy week of Power and Focus, the first two Human Design gates of Sagittarius season. Happy New Moon in Sagittarius.
Happy? I use this word as a greeting and a wish, but I don’t know if that’s the right word for these times we’re living in. I definitely don’t want to come off as insensitive by wishing you happiness this week. Wherever you are in the process of grief/rage/disassociation/tiredness/overwhelm/mania this week, I am here for it and fully support it. , Personally, I’ve gone through all of the above in a Groundhogs Day loop for weeks now. But, as I write this, I do feel happy. I do believe we all have the right to moments of happiness, however fleeting.
I’ve been thinking a lot about Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness lately, with America’s Pluto return reminding me to look back at the founding tenets of the country I call home. In digging into these unalienable rights, which the Declaration of Independence says have been given to all humans by our Creator, has made me consider the phrasing “pursuit of happiness” rather than simply “happiness”. When we have the right to pursue something, especially something like happiness, we are never able to be in the present moment. We are always in a state of seeking, dreaming and working toward the future. And, paradoxically, the present moment is the only place that can actually hold happiness… so the unalienable right of pursuit leaves us in the lurch. As we complete the 248 year cycle of Pluto around the sun since the Declaration of Independence was signed, I’d like to call for a revision:
We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all humans, regardless of their gender, race. or class, are created equal & independent, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & daily moments of happiness.
What moments of happiness have you experienced lately? For me, I’ve been happy in my body for taking my kid swimming a few times this past week. Happy that I got to celebrate my grandmother turning 98 last week. a few days after my daughter turned 6. Happy that I feel clarity and alignment with myself and my purpose after many years of confusion and heartbreak, as Pluto changes signs and moves into Aquarius. Happy that I can always think of things- and people, mostly people- to be grateful for. Happy to have gotten to be in conversation over the past week with some powerful, deep, and inspiring people.
This past week I was honored to have the opportunity to be a guest on one of my favorite podcasts, Britten LaRue’s Moon to Moon. If you’re not familiar, Britten is an astrologer who focuses on the work of un-shaming. She holds space for people to move beyond the stereotypes of the Zodiac and the shame that many of us feel related to each sign’s archetype, so we can embrace our authentic desires and truths. I’m a big fan of her work, so it was really fun to chat with her about Cycles of Time and the 6 Human Design gates of Sagittarius season. You can listen to that episode here:
The day after I chatted with Britten, I got to have another beautiful conversation with a truly embodied Sagittarius sun- my qigong and martial arts teacher, Jaye Marolla. I have been studying martial arts, qigong, and what she calls yin warriorship with Jaye for a couple of years, and I have been truly transformed by the practice and her way of teaching and bringing powerful people together in movement.
Jaye’s birthday is coming up this Sunday on December 1, and her Sun is in Sagittarius in the Human Design Gate of Focus. As you’ll hear in our conversation, her life path truly resonates with both the determination of the gate of Focus and the adventurous traveling and seeking qualities of Sagittarius. This is the Gate where the New Moon in Sagittarius will happen on Friday, as well, with the sun moving into the Gate of Focus on Tuesday, from our current place in the Gate of Power.
Let’s get into the highlights of the week and chat briefly about the gate of Power before getting into the interview with Jaye!
(If you’d like to jump straight to our conversation, it starts at timestamp 25:41)
This week’s highlights:
Monday, November 25: Mercury Stations Retrograde, so the power and focus of a typical Sagittarius season might be a bit subdued or more internal than external
Saturday, November 30: New Moon in Sagittarius, in the HD Gate of Focus
Human Design/I’Ching:
Last Thurs-Tues: Gate 34, the Gate of Power
Wednesday the 27-Monday Dec 2: Gate 9, the Gate of Focus
This week’s themes:
True strength is embodied self- assurance, not forcefulness
Focus on your goals through small actions- “the journey of 1000 miles starts with the ground beneath your feet” - Lao Tsu
Our Place in the Wheel of the Year
Medicine Wheel Direction: NORTH (Wind, Elderhood, Spirituality)
Wuxing Cycle Element: Metal
Pagan Season: Samhain
Zodiac Season: Sagittarius (November 22-December 21)
Moon Phase: New Moon in Sagttarius (Gate 9, Focus)
I Ching Hexagram/Human Design: Gate 34 (Mon-Tues), Gate 9 (Wed-Sun)
34: Thunder over Heaven, (“Great Strength”) or the Gate of POWER
9: Wind over Heaven (“The Taming Power of the Small”) or the Gate of FOCUS
Last Thursday thru this Tuesday: the Gate of Power (34)
Just a quick word on the Gate of Power before we jump into the conversation with Jaye, since Power is the energy that we’re in in the early part of this week and that we’ve been navigating since last Thursday.
The gate of Power is a beautiful jumping off point for Sag season, cultivating all of the deep inner work we did in Scorpio season and transmuting it, like the phoenix out of the ashes, to a new part of the cycle. As a sign, Sagittarius is well known for their power, and they are both exalted and shamed for it.
In its shadow frequency, the energy of Power can be experienced as force. Force is using power to try to do something that is against the natural flow of things, like trying to force a square peg in a round hole- it doesn’t often work out very well.
In its gift frequency, when we stop trying so hard, we experience power as strength. And strength, in its true essence, is effortlessness. Like Yoda said: “Do, or do not. There is no try.” True strength comes from the feminine, the yin, the inner. When we think of strength as outward force, we realize it can easily be overtaken- but strength that comes from the stability of our core, our spine, our breath, our roots- that is access to unlimited inner strength. Strength of the whole cosmos through complete relaxation and trust in our hearts. Once we identify where we are being forceful in our lives, we can move past it.
Personally, I have my conscious and my design Jupiter, and my conscious Uranus in the Gate of Power. Jupiter expands everything it touches, and Uranus brings sudden lightning bolts of insight. And over the past few days I have definitely been feeling this transit! I have felt inner power, strength, and self assuredness… and I couldn’t be more grateful for the timing of this transit.
Richard Rudd says that strength lies in self assurance, in certainty from the cells of the body. It feels truth in every cell. As humans, when our spine became vertical, we became more mental, but we lost the primacy of our heart centers. When we are deeply anchored in our bodies, our roots, our centers, we feel truth in every cell. We have a radiant field of strength around us. When we know at the physical level, then the answer is always so simple, because it doesn’t come through the mind. You don’t have to force anything, because you already know everything- through the wisdom of your body.
This is the emanation of our inner Strength. It’s rooted in core stability, in how rooted we are in our life purpose. The moment we’re in alignment with life purpose, higher purpose, we can access unlimited inner Strength. Then we have the weight of the whole cosmos behind us.
The 64 Ways, Richard Rudd
I’ve been contemplating how force and strength show up in my life a lot over the past week through the lenses of my Jupiter and Uranus in this Sagittarius Gate. In the bodygraph, the gate of Power and Strength are in the sacral center, connecting the sacrum to the emotional solar plexus. I have deeply appreciated the reminder to stay embodied, to trust my cellular connection to the cosmos as a definition of strength. I’ve heard it through the gene keys, the astrology of Sagittarius, and it was also, appropriately, the underlying theme in my conversation with Jaye Marolla, whose business name and instagram handle are The Body Innate.
True to the worldly nature of her Sagittarius sun, Jaye spent significant years in Ghana, West Africa, China, Thailand, Central Asia, and England, studying and attuning to how other cultures express movement and approach their day to day lifestyle. She is an educator, somatic practitioner, holistic bodyworker and martial artist. She currently offers classes in her home Dojo in Santa Fe and consults privately with groups, organizations and businesses offering somatic programs in person and online. Jaye specializes in Thai Bodywork, therapeutic massage and also offers one-on-one Qi Diagnostic sessions.
True to her sun gate, the Gate of Focus, Jaye is a dedicated disciple of Jujutsu, Aikido, Iaido, Taiji, Qigong and Gongfu; Yoga, Contact Dance Improvisation, and Thai Massagr. She brings her deep focus to her dojo, with the mission of empowering others through radical self acceptance and connection to their own innate generative resources.
As we move through this week, power and focus are at our side. I think you’ll really enjoy and learn a lot from Jaye’s deeply embodied perspective. Let’s get into the interview.
Jaye Marolla and Yin Warriorship: born in the Gate of Focus (Wednesday thru next Monday)
Gate 9, the Gate of Focus, is known by the trigrams ‘Wind over Heaven’ in the I’Ching, and also by the name “The taming power of the small”. In the Gene Keys, the shadow of Gate 9 is ‘Inertia’, the gift is ‘Determination’ and the siddhi is ‘Invincibility’.
After the sun transits through the Gate of Power and we learn that true power originates not from force but from the yin side of things, we enter the Gate of Focus. At a lower frequency, those with this gate can tend to get caught up in the minutiae, so focused on the details that they forget to look up to the horizon. But as they become versed in the energetic language of this gate, they embody Sagittarius the archer, who shoots their arrows toward the horizon and has the determination to gallop to their destination, one hooved step at a time.
Jaye Marolla, a world traveler, dedicated disciple of embodiment traditions, and wise teacher, embodies the gifts of the Sagittarius Gate of Focus. Listen in to our conversation by clicking the audio link at the top of this newsletter, or tune in on Cycles of Time Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or anywhere you listen to podcasts.
You can learn more about Jaye and her offerings on her website at thebodyinnate.com, or on Instagram at @thebodyinnate.
If you’re in Santa Fe, Jaye offers classes in martial arts and qigong every weekday morning except Wednesday at 9am at her beautiful dojo. She will also be offering a Yin Warriorship intensive workshop on December 7th from 3-6pm, which is a perfect way to kick off the winter season of water in the Taoist wheel of the year. Hope to see you there!
As always, if you enjoyed this podcast, I’d love it if you shared it with a friend, left a comment, or left me a 5-star review on Spotify! Your engagement helps me get the words and wisdom of my incredible guests to a larger audience. I appreciate you!
You can also follow me on Instagram at @astro.somatics and @cyclesoftimepodcast, or learn more about my work at alisonmariedale.com.
Have a beautiful week ahead, and remember to take it easy and build in extra time and space to your holiday plans during this Mercury retrograde.
Xox,
Alison
