My Spiritual Yoga Journey Part 18
A review and a reflection upon what Cancer Season has meant to me
My Spiritual Yoga Journey Part 18
As we move ever closer towards my Solar return, Leo, I thought I would take the chance to look back over what Cancer Season has brought with it. As a Leo, I find Cancer Season always intriguing. It is a Water sign and a chance for feeling all the feels in a quiet way before the full onset of Fire bringing its energy. My Moon is in Scorpio so I find a natural magnetising system when it comes to Cancer. During Cancer Season I find a pull towards my Scorpio which opens it up. I feel drawn towards that area of my chart but housed within the protective shell of Cancer making it safe to do so. And as I step through Cancer, there is also an eagerness to reach my Sun's return. But to get there the theme is all about the home - family, friends and nurturing our soul's health.
With that in mind I feel there is a lot to look back over. For one thing I have been delving into reading new material and listening to podcasts. Some of this has been a process of going with my intuition as well as being provided for by the universe through synchronicity. Things have popped up on my other social media platforms and that has provided me to look more deeply and find new resources. I have downloaded free books on Buddhism and yoga which has been a great journey and has coalesced some of my pre-existing thought and understanding as well as opening up a new pathway of study. Then that led me to find some podcasts to listen to on my route to work which has brought a sense of calm on my travels.
What is interesting, and this is related to Cancer itself, I have found some kindred recognition in the relationship with some of my fellow travellers. The podcasts are on Buddhism and meditative practices which is very interesting and has been a process of opening up a new way of thinking and seeing that has at the same time been in the background and foreground as I have similarly found kinship with some people who had been travelling at the same time to the same area of town where my school is. They had just been just faces in a crowd before and are now people who recognise me and vice versa and who we reach out and talk to. This is definitely a Cancer Season element. Making friendship with kindred fellows, creating bonds and generating a sense of family.
Another Cancer Season process has involved creating a new area of my flat. This is for my yoga and meditation. It is a corner that is devoted to my study. All of my props (blocks, a cushion for a bolster), mat, some crystals, Mala beads, singing bowl and a huge raven feather (one of my main spirit animals) are all there. I found the raven feather at the onset of Cancer Season when out walking with my partner. As we were strolling along, we stopped to look at a house that had wisteria all over the front door which was glorious. For some reason I looked down and spotted this huge black/blue feather. I thanked the universe as I picked it up. It is over twelve inches long and is intact. A simply beautiful thing. I use this in my meditation when I have finished chanting and playing the singing bowl. I hold it in my hand as I let go of my physical and enter the spirit realm. My spirit animal guides me safely on my journey.
For Cancer Season Tarot I wrote in regards IX Cups and II Swords - “... this tarot combo emphasizes that important decisions need careful consideration to be made. It further suggests we may be at a stage in our lives where we need to trust ourselves to be able to move forward, even if this means stepping out of our comfort zones. We need to trust in the power of the universe and Spirit to guide the way…”
Well that definitely seems to have been the case. During this Season I have stepped into my leadership and allowed Spirit to guide me as I have given more opportunities to show this and by doing it I have equally had more respect from my leaders. My voice is heard, my opinion matters and I can make decisions on my own. This has been really important for me as I have changed schools recently over the last two years and had become disillusioned with my career. Moving to this school last September was a gambit as I didn't know what to do. This school was a gift from the universe being newly created and a pioneering Specialist Autism school in the country which, when I was interviewed, they just wanted me to start immediately. It was like a coming home - I didn't know that at first but it was during this Cancer Season which has brought it home for me to feel. What with some of my past lives being shed, this has also been an area of celebration.
During my spiritual yoga Flow, that has also involved chanting and meditation, I have got in touch with some stuck areas that are related to past lives. I have had some vivid pictures, images and feelings from distant echoes either that have been in my own past, or have been from previous times that are equally important and still have been a sticking point in this time frame. Bringing them up safely during Cancer Season has been a relationship with what was started during Scorpio Season and released in the Scorpion Full Flower Moon. Cancer Season and the Full Strawberry Moon in Sagittarius has been a process of looking more deeply at what was left from that clearing and making sure it was healed. That any last vestige of those ties had been given the proper send off - relinquished, owned and delivered. That guilt, shame and hurt has been released.
Where have I felt those about before? Coach Kevin Martin (@coachkevmartin) recently posted about the guilt and shame pertaining to the Church and how our sexuality is not something recognised in the eyes of the Lord and instead resides in the darker corners of sin. How do we reconcile this with our sense of Spirituality?
I thank Coach Kevin for raising this - and it would be during Cancer Season! - into our consciousness as it is a very important discussion to have. This sense of reconciliation is a hard one to resolve and is hard won. Messages from the Church lie deep in our sense of self much like our parental imagos. They sit in our Superego as voices that equate our desires to be dirty, vice driven, or at worst shameful. That we need to cleanse ourselves, our souls, of such things has been the motivator for practices that are not ethical and in the worst case scenario damaging.
All of this has been some of the work I have been doing to shed what no longer serves me. My Spirituality is an opening up and out to the universe, to Spirit, and in that sense is not confined to a Church. Some of my thinking is based on Buddhism but is not only that. There is Wicca in there too for my mother is a Wiccan witch and both of these practices bring harmony and unite us with the light and love of the universe. That we can be ourselves without question. My father was a late bloomer in acceptance but was always loving and wanting to know more. He has done a lot of work to reconcile his own feelings and find a relationship with me and my partner. My parents separated when I was twenty and his new partner has fostered in him a new realisation. Some of this work has been one I have had to look at to be able to see him fully in his new light.
Other areas that I am shedding are based upon my teenage years when I was bullied by my peers. Some of this projected shame was related to how I felt about myself and so that was the hook upon which was hung the cloak they wanted me to wear. And wear it I did willingly. I became mute, writing in my journal for relief of my fears and guilts, which I couldn't own in external object relations. I was trapped in a psychic battle of my own creation as I didn't want to be what I knew I was for the messages I received externally was that gays were predatory, sinister and filthy. I had no positive role models upon which to grow up and feel healthy in my sexuality.
Related to this is part of letting go, and my letting go and reconciliation with my Self has been to set up a Rainbow Club in the school for the LGBTQIA+ community which has been very transformative already not just for the young people at the school, or the adults working there, and the families of children but for me. This is exactly what I would have loved growing up. I needed it when I was younger. And now I can provide it for those now and for me. What is interesting is that it has arrived during Cancer Season. It makes it all the more special.
Yoga Flow for Cancer Season
Chakra: Sacral
Sanskrit Name: Swadhisthana
Element: Water
Colour: Vermilion Orange
Symbol: Six petals
Essential Oils: Sandalwood, Jasmine, Ginger
Crystals: Golden Citrine, Red Jasper in daily life; Golden Citrine, Labradorite for meditation
Affirmations: I release any fears or blocks that hinder my creativity; I am connected to the abundant flow of the universe; I embrace change and welcome new experiences
Asanas for Cancer Season: Mountain Pose, Warrior Pose i, ii and iii, Forward Fold, Wide-Legged Forward Fold, Triangle Pose, Half Moon Pose, Dancer's Pose, Low Lunge, Cat / Cow, Downward Facing Dog, Revolved Child's Pose (Thread the Needle), Boat Pose, Pigeon Pose, One-Legged Pigeon Pose, Bow Pose, Child's Pose, Reclined Butterfly Pose, Supported Shoulder Stand, Hip Openers, Seated Meditation - either in Easy Pose or Half Lotus, Seated Twists, Supine Twists, Corpse Pose
Asanas for Summer Solstice: Sun Salutations (short or long forms) daily
While we are still in the last throes of Cancer Season it is important to look back over our Flow and see in what ways it challenged us as well as opened us up.
Cancer being a Water sign has been really interesting for one thing. The level of Kundalini that has been generated each session has increased and I have been drenched in sweat from its energy. This has been something that has developed during Gemini Season, I had some sessions which involved Kundalini as well as the Full Scorpio Moon, but this Cancer Season has seen this elevate further to involve every session.
There was a time before my injury when I did Kundalini yoga and that feels very different looking back to what it means this time. Now I am using a much more spiritual context and practice and that means the containing of the energy is much more healthy and healing. It is generating a power which I am only hinting at but know that it is extending out to every corner of my life - whether writing, in my career, spiritual practice, relationships et cetera.
I mention here the Summer Solstice Flow as during that I completed the Sun Salutations which felt enlivening to do during the return of the Sun to the Northern hemisphere. It is a ritual which evoked memories of doing such when my friend lived with me who originally taught me yoga.
The Cancer Season Flow has been deep and pushed me in places I have not expected. My Ego was looking forward to applying the Flow and going deep into it, however I wanted to embrace the intuition of Cancer and seeing where that would take me, unsure as to the places it would lead. However, what has transpired is delving into the full Flow. I didn't know this would happen and now, as we are nearing Leo Season, I can look back and see just how much it has transformed my very being - mind, body and spirit.
When I started the Flow felt quite difficult as it was activating so many different areas of my body that felt stiff and stuck. As I slowly and gradually moved my way through it, I have discovered how it has been necessary to break out of the shell - this analogy is on purpose to explore my relationship with Cancer Season. As a Leo, I need to get in touch with the deeper elements of Cancer and feel inside my body on a deeper level to know what needed transformation. Through loving care and mindfulness I was able to nudge my body into shifting it in alignment with the celestial transition.
The Sagittarian Moon allowed my Fire to awaken and respond with determination of where I was headed - in synchronicity with this I began to explore books and podcasts as I have mentioned earlier and that inspired me to go deeper.
Now I am nearing the end of this Season, it has been inspirational and enlightening to have worked with Cancer's caring, loving energy. It has extended throughout my yoga practice and into other areas offering me a glimpse of the transformation that is happening and where my soul purpose resides… for good. There are massive changes happening and the burgeoning Leo Season will generate the Fire needed to make it determined.
The Crystals I have used predominantly have been Golden Citrine and Red Jasper. However there has been a Crystal that has come into my presence during this Cancer Season and that is Blue Dumortierite! It is a Leo stone and I have been so wowed by having it enter my crystal family. It has been paired with Golden Citrine, Red Jasper, but more this week Tiger’s Eye. I think as we are nearing Leo these two stones are beginning to orbit my spiritual realm in preparation for what is to come. And I am feeling ready for what it will bring.
I cannot wait.
What Cancer Season has started, Leo will take further.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read my post, it really does mean so much to me.
If there are any issues, questions or thoughts my post has raised for you please do not hesitate to contact me or post a reply. I would really love to hear from you. I will endeavour to get back to you as soon as I can.
Sending you all many Blessings!
Namaste 🙏✨🕉️🌼🦋