Dear One,
With the start of every new day, there comes a new beautiful opportunity to make changes that bring blessings, healing, and harmony to our lives. I love the flow of my mornings especially, full of sacred structure. Every so often I’ll consider what might need to change to bring in new energy to my days, for I’ve experienced countless times how the small, consistent daily choices I make create the greatest impact on how I feel every day and lead me somewhere new.
My upcoming offering Descent Into Truth expands upon this and provides a powerful sacred structure for transformation that is birthed from consistent daily practice working with Venus in retrograde. The consistent repetition of conscious choices made daily sets the foundation for significant change in our lives, no matter how simple that consistent daily practice may be.
One of my favorite examples of this is the simple daily choice of waking up early. As a once self-described Queen of the Snooze Button, the ability to wake up early in the morning out of personal preference has been one of my greatest transformative feats. For most of my life, the idea of waking up early was beyond undesirable and physically impossible. I was wired to go to bed late and wake up late, and I slept deeply and heavily. Many alarms were needed to wake me up if I needed to be somewhere in the morning. Unless a job or class required me to wake early, my usual morning wake-ups started my days around 9:30am, 10:30am, and often times as late as noon.
Many years ago at a point in my life when a major shift was needed, I began recognizing that the mornings requiring an early start actually felt good once I was awake and moving around. I became curious about the magical, sacred quality of the stillness of early morning that I seemed to have missed most of my life by waking up well past sunrise. I slowly began to shift out of dreading the mornings I needed to wake up early and did my best to wake up early on my own.
The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want.
Don't go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the doorsill
where the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open.
Don't go back to sleep.
~ Rumi
After much practice, patience, and determination, over time I eventually recalibrated my system and evolved into a joyful early-riser, alarm-free altogether. I continuously amazed myself with my increasing delight in waking earlier and earlier, graduating from consistently waking at 6am, to 5am, to 4:30am. I felt the blessings of these early awakenings and how it impacted my energy and increased my creativity. Anytime I slip back into later waking is a necessary reminder of the great gift early rising time becomes for the rest of the day.
Waking up at 4:30am particularly is a threshold of morning magic brimming with stillness that naturally opens the space for focused spiritual practice and self-care. It’s shown that waking up at this time is of great benefit for physical energy, creativity, and mental function. Spiritually, it’s a powerful window of time for easefully connecting to the Sacred in deep meditative states.
Waking up before the sunrise and going to bed no later than 10pm helps to calibrate the body to the natural circadian rhythm. It is a simple way of attuning ourselves with Nature and establishing balance and harmony in our days.
Long ago I sensed that shifting into waking up early would be a catalyst for life change that I was calling in. I recognized stagnation and blocks in my daily life and was ready for transformation. Going through the process of re-wiring myself to wake up early each day confronted me with a wealth of shadow aspects to look at which ultimately brought me great healing, strength, and empowerment.
Consider how waking up every day at 4:30am might alter your reality for your own transformation. If not 4:30am, perhaps somewhere between 5-6am is a better fit for you. Or, perhaps there’s another path all together that best serves your expansion.
42 days of waking up early is just one of several simple practices I suggest for inviting change in your life. Join me in my upcoming group journey Descent Into Truth starting December 19th to dive into the depths of your shadows through committed daily practice in a supported ceremonial container, and re-emerge with newfound strength, clarity, and power. We meet for 7 Sundays 11am-1:00pm Pacific on Zoom (or you can watch later).
A sacred opportunity to descend into your highest experience of LOVE.
I invite you to harness this Venus Retrograde energy by diving with me into the Great Below. This is a unique and powerful way to ritually work with this important transit, and to embrace the gifts and beauty that the Underworld brings.
Please reply back with your questions, and please share this invitation with anyone you feel might resonate with this rich inner journey.
I am so grateful for the honor it is to share this offering, and for those of you who have already joined. The sacred circle of Initiates is growing! I hope you will join me in this transformative, sacred descent if the journey to the Underworld is calling to your heart. May it serve to awaken the power of Love within you during the darkest days of the year.
With Love,
Angela