blog

January new moon 2021

Dana’s Moon Page for the New Moon in January 2021

Use the energy of the new moon in January to help you trust your path!

Reflect

Many years ago, I printed out and hung on my office wall the words, “I trust my path” or maybe it was “I walk my own path”. I can’t remember exactly but I do know that at the time, I didn’t know how to walk my own path. I didn’t know how to be my own woman. I didn’t know how to stand on my own two feet and walk forward along the path that only my heart and spirit could carve out for me because I didn’t know how to listen to my own heart never mind trust her.

Looking back, I wish I could take the younger version of me aside and say,

“My dear Dana, you are not walking your own path. You have a trauma response that keeps drowning out your own wisdom. You are more aware of other people’s emotions than your own. You care more about making other people happy than you do about making yourself happy. You have no idea what truly lights you up because you’re so used to dismissing your own thoughts and feelings. In fact, you’re so used to dismissing yourself you don’t even know when you’re doing it. You’re not living your own life. You’ve stepped off your path and you’re walking in the wilderness. You are lost. You keep finding a path to follow but it ends up being someone else’s. You’re just following them on their path which makes you a shadow. You are more than a shadow. You have your own path.

Wake up and find it. Figure out how to hear your heart and your Spirit and honor them. They will lead you to your path. It’s a good one. I promise it’s perfect for you in a way no other path could be. It won’t be an easy one but no one’s ever is so might as well face the monsters on your path then stay lost forever trying to find your way on everyone else’s.”

I obviously didn’t have that conversation with myself and instead those words hung on my office walls where they encouraged me but it took me many years to truly walk my own path. It’s hard to find your own path and then once you do, it’s so very easy to get pulled off it.

First of all, with white privilege, ableism, sexism, poverty, anti-fat bias and other societal factors, not all paths are created equal so when you find yourself on a path that has obstacles built in from the start it’s hard to want to walk that path. Then there’s the fact that your culture, your friends or your family will want you to live a certain way and you’ll feel blatant or hidden pressure to conform in order to fit in and belong. People you love and admire are going to try to tell you how to be, what to wear, how to show up, who you are, what you should like and dislike and what you should value and what you shouldn’t. This will happen in little and big ways.

People tend to live by rules and they’re convinced the rules they live by should be your rules too but there are as many ways to live as there are people. There are as many ways to practice spirituality as there are people. You don’t have to follow someone else’s rules. Make your own or find a set of rules you love and make you feel like you’ve come home to yourself and follow them despite everything and everyone else. The truth is, you won’t always feel loved or seen for who you really are and if you have deep abandonment wounds, you might be like I was and prefer to bend and contort yourself to be what you think will make others happy rather than risk rejection.

It takes a lot of courage to walk your own path. You also need to be attuned to your own heart and Spirit and you need to have your own back. You need to know that no matter what YOU will be there to love and support yourself even if everyone abandons you. Your path is going to test you and push you and cause you to grow and stretch. It will want you to become the very thing you’ve secretly been scared to become your whole life. You’ll bump into all your insecurities and feeling of unworthiness. But trusting your own path and walking on it without getting pulled off it is where all the spiritual gold is in my opinion. It’s where you meet who you are at the core, past the trauma and the limitations the world has placed on you, past the stories of littleness you’re used to telling yourself, past the fear that gripped you in the past. And greeting yourself – who you truly are – is finding meaning and purpose too.

If you are not on my email list and haven’t received this month’s moon page, visit my homepage and sign up. You’ll receive a link where you can download the hand-drawn page I created for this particular moon. Print it, grab a tea and a cozy blanket, get comfortable then follow the instructions below.

Create

If moon rituals are familiar to you, prepare your sacred space and invite Spirit to join you in whatever way works best for you.

If, however, you are new to moon rituals, I’ve included a quick guide to the steps I follow to prepare for my moon rituals in a past blog post. Take a look at it before moving forward.

Print out the January new moon journal page.

Set two goals for yourself: a short-term goal that is accomplished in the next 2 or 3 months’ time and a long term goal that spans the next 20 years.

First, think about the goal you want to accomplish in the next 2 to 3 months.

Vividly see yourself achieving this goal. Take note of how it feels to achieve your goal. Picture your surroundings with as much detail as possible. See the colors being very bright and all the action happening around you. How does it feel in your body when you accomplish this goal? Let this emotion of accomplishment sink into your bones.

Now, set a long-term goal for the next 20 years. If you were to greet yourself twenty years from now, what do you hope you will be experiencing? What will you be doing? See yourself in as much depth as you can. Look around and see all the little details around you….people, objects, nature or whatever you see. Picture it as vividly as you can. See your friends and many people congratulating you on your accomplishments. Notice how it feels to achieve what you desire. Let this feeling grow and fill you up completely.

Now write words or draw images on the ankles and feet depicted on the journal page all the things you can think of that capture your visions and goals. Imagine you are tattooing your feet with your dreams.

Finally, color your moon page as you think about how you will feel when your intentions become real.

If you end up completing this spiritual art ritual, I’d love to hear how it went. You can even take a picture of a part of your process and share it on Instagram or Facebook with the hashtag #danasmoonpages or email me at support@danadaponte.com and share with me how it went for you. It’s fun for me to know there are others out there enjoying the moon with me.

with love,

Dana da Ponte

 

 

 

Pinterest pins:

hi i'm dana...

dana-da-ponte-sidebar

This is a space where art and spirit come together. On the blog, I share art rituals for working with the magic of the moon. I also work with the subconscious mind to lighten your emotional load and follow your creative dreams.

img-heart@2x

Work with Me

Subscribe to receive hand-drawn journal pages to enjoy every full and new moon:

Previous posts