Midway through 2024, an Eight Collective Year
Midway through 2024, an Eight Collective Year
on ordeals, pleasure, abandoning and recommitting to hope, and more
Happy July!
Regardless of how the first six months of this year have gone, or not gone, congratulations! You have survived. Take a deep breath, in through the nose and out through the mouth, roll your neck around on its axis, and with your eyes closed, say, Good job, you brilliant creature, you.
No seriously, say it. Out loud or silently, but really give that recognition to yourself. You deserve it, no matter what your blasted brain says.
2024, a collective eight year, has been one trial after another. It’s shown us how quickly things can move and how some things never change. It’s tested our resolve, our faith, our ability to harness our emotional energy into supportive action, and it will continue to do so for (at least) the next six months.
In January, I made predictions about, and offered magical medicine for, 2024 through the lens of four keywords: Powerhouse, Embodied, Ordeal, God. If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend doing so as here, at the halfway mark, we are checking in with these topics and themes, as well as some tips and tricks that can help us venture further into the murky, fertile darkness of the Underworld.
To be totally honest with you, I feel just as in the mud as you might. I’m having a hard time juggling what’s realistic with what’s fearmongering with what’s possible. But if I’ve learned anything along my eight life path, it’s that we always have options and opportunities for aligned action. We just have to dig a little deeper, and believe a little harder.
The only way out is through. We’re all in this together.
Eight is the Powerhouse
When reading over my predictions at the beginning of the year, one thing about eight’s domain of power, karma, resources, and abundance that really stuck out to me was how it rules over big picture constructs that have tangible impacts on our daily lives.
Corporate restructuring and lay-offs, industry-wide slow downs, and the rise of AI technology, have all created conditions for an abysmal job market. Despite reports of a continued rise in available jobs, many job seekers on public forums are sharing that they’ve sent out hundreds of resumes with an incredibly low response rate, and are competing against an increased number of qualified candidates. Recent analyses of pay rate trends also “suggests that the pendulum has swung slightly more in favor of firms and away from workers.”
No matter your working situation, take this opportunity to check in with your resources and finances. The reality of a changing system is that there are more chances to get caught in a bureaucratic trap. Are your taxes filed? Have you made payments on time? If you set budgets or goals, how are you doing with those so far? What sober changes do you need to make? If you’re proud of where you’re at, how can you treat yourself to something meaningful? If you’re in survival mode—which is awful and you’re not alone—can you breathe into this moment and, as Pema Chödrön suggests, abandon hope in a way that reminds you to be alive with or without the ground beneath your feet?
(Unfortunately, my own household can corroborate these stories, so if you’ve been thinking about booking a reading with me, or attending a summer workshop, now would be a meaningful time to support my work!)
Everything shifts. This too shall pass. (Next year, in the nine year… *winks*)
2024 has seen big political actions around power and money.
While the Biden Administration continued to send weapons to Israel, pro-Palestine protests swept through the nation’s college campuses. In April, police and other pro-Israel groups led violent campaigns against these settlements, and with the support of campus administrations, most were dismantled and the protestors arrested. Then in June, Pro-Palestinian, New York congressman Jamaal Bowman was defeated in the primaries by George Latimer, who received millions of dollars from AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.
As of writing this, Former President, and current Republican nominee and front-runner, Donald J. Trump has been found guilty of 34 felony counts of falsification of business records. Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, has began restricting political information, while charging loyal users for verification and other important business tools. And the (largely bought and paid for) US Supreme Court has made major rulings around government powers and oversight, including granting broad immunity to official Presidential actions.
In January, I also mentioned that the average age of historical empires is 250 years. Last week, on July 4th, the United States celebrated its 248th birthday.
If you’re a person of color, a member of the queer community, a woman or femme, disabled, living under systemic poverty, or part of another marginalized group, you may be more familiar with having your power stripped from you by laws, judgments, and other official means. But privileges aside, I think we can all relate to the helplessness and rage these injustices inspire.
As the Empire crumbles—or solidifies, depending on what side of the coin you’re looking at—I fear that, unless we can take empowered, collective action, more and more will know what it’s like to have the political tide turn on them.
🌟📚 JULY WORKSHOP SCHEDULE 📚🌟
In addition to opening my books for private readings, I’m teaching three workshops this month! Whether it’s in person or on Zoom, I hope you’ll join me for:
Numerology 101: Know Your Numbers
LIVE at Open Eye Crystals in Los Angeles, CA, on Saturday July 20th from 1-2pm PST
Where the F*ck Am I? (The Road Trip #2)
VIRTUAL on Sunday July 21st from 9-11am PST
Healing Your Creativity with Fanfiction
VIRTUAL through Ophelia’s Books on Thursday July 25th from 5-7pm PST
Eight is the Embodied
What do you want? Do you even know?
Flipped on its side, the symbol for 8 becomes ∞, the lemniscate, the infinity symbol, which reminds us that we are here to experience a brief, physical moment in the ever-churning gyre of Time. There literally is no time like the present to get clear on what it is that you desire outside of oppressive institutions and systems. If you’re not sure, it’s time to get a little closer to the answer.
In case you forgot, eight is a sexy number! It wants you to feel yourself (and others)! Especially now, knowing and embodying your deepest desires is a revolutionary act of resistance against the dominant powers! This is vulnerable work that will take you to the very edges of your shame. Press on anyway!
With the collective energy this chaotic, focusing on what we want may seem impossible. We’re almost to a collective nine year—the end of the cycle we’ve been in since 2017. So of course, we’ve been through it, honey. Take a drag on that weed pen because we’ve seen some shit. Maybe there’s a large part of us that is crispy and no longer firing on all cylinders. Maybe zero cylinders. Maybe the sparks have even stopped sparking and the engine is dead. That’s okay. Eight reminds us there are other sources of energy.
The eighth house in astrology rules over shared resources, and energy is absolutely a resource. Gathering in crowds of people—no matter how you feel about that experience post-pandemic—can inform our behavior, amplify our experience, and boost or deplete our personal stores of energy. A crowd is an organism that builds and grows until it pulses with it’s own intelligence and desires. There we are, back to the wanting that eight brings. Don’t be afraid to bring others into your explorations, or grab a body double to help you focus.
Want to explore embodiment and expression work in radically accepting community? You may remember my confession from January about creating fanworks, which has now turned into an upcoming, virtual workshop called Healing Your Creativity with Fanfiction, hosted by Ophelia’s Books. This class is for writers of all genres and skill levels, as well as those who are scared to call themselves writers. Fandom, just like creativity itself, is for everyone. Come play in someone else's sandbox!
Keep calling your energy back to you, stay grounded and centered, and watch out—it’s easy to get swept up in the current this year. Your bones and belly hold so much more power and magic than you think.
Here are some questions and fill-in-the-blanks for you to muse on for the remainder of this eight collective year:
I embody:
I feel purpose through:
I desire:
I value:
I am transforming:
How do I connect my desires and my values? How do I turn them into action?
What are the practices that allow me to move more easily through feelings of insecurity?
When was the last time I felt like I couldn’t do something and what ended up happening?
How do I invite more love and pleasure into my everyday life?
Who are the people or spiritual entities that I’ve worked with and what have they offered?
Eight is the Ordeal
In Welcome to 2024, an Eight Collective Year, I wrote that 2024 can offer you a chance to find your faith again. Eight helps us to clear out what is no longer working, which can be a vulnerable and traumatic process. But it also holds us while we dare to dream about what will be built in its place. It offers us a malleability that’s necessary for radical action, as well as a gentleness of spirit, which comes in handy when holding tightly to hope.
Earlier, I looked to Chödrön’s notions of abandoning hope as a means of releasing us from suffering. However, organizer and author Gloria Steinem told Vogue before her 90th birthday, “Hope is a form of planning. If you don’t imagine what could be, you’re already defeated. We need companions in hope because we are social animals. But hope is practical and necessary.”
At the midway mark of a really tough year, I hope you know that you are not alone. Not in your fear, and definitely not in your yearning for more. Now, more than ever, we need to be grounding into and broadening our communities, which is a lengthy and complex process of showing up authentically, building trust, and taking action that’s rooted in love in action, mutual aid, and community care.
When things fall apart, it can also help to go back to basics. Touch in with the people, places and things that allow you to feel into hope and optimism. Eight is pain, yes, but also pleasure. How can you spend more time each day doing something that you love? That makes you feel good, no matter the amount of money in your bank account or the waves of anxious fear churning in your gut? Eight reminds us that it’s not over until it’s over.
Want to revisit and deepen your understanding of the basics of numerology? Join me for either Numerology 101: Know Your Numbers, live in LA, or online for part two of The Road Trip: Where the F*ck Am I? A workshop on numerological timing techniques.
Commit to showing up for your passions in ways you’ve been avoiding or putting off. Preparedness is important, but don’t deny yourself joy, rest, and the opportunity to create a life you love due to the ever-changing nature of an external reality.
Eight is God
After leaving the church, it took me years to find comfort in the word God again. Truth be told, I’m still not totally comfy with it, and often use words like divine, Source, or creative energy instead. It wasn’t until reading the Gnostic Gospels that I realized just how deep my God-wound actually was, and how much of it had to do with the ceaseless weaponizing of divinity by those who are ignorant to its, and their own, truths.
A few weeks ago, I wrote to you about Louisiana, the Ten Commandments, and the Truth About Religious Freedoms in the US. What’s the aforementioned truth, you ask? Well, there’s a direct link from the oldest code of laws to Biblical laws to American laws! So while we are inching closer and closer to a theocracy in the United States, it’s important to keep in mind that we are deeply Christian nation, even though we say we do not want to hold onto those roots.
People with large platforms like Doreen Virtue, Russell Brand, Daddy Yankee, Kat Von D, and others, have all publicly repented their old lives and beliefs, and pledged themselves to the Biblical Jesus Christ. There’s also been a spotlight on the New Age to Christianity pipeline, which has also been bobbing and weaving with the conspiracy group QANON in the last handful of years. As external structures continue to breakdown before our very eyes, religion offers a surety and a sense of belonging that’s enticing. Whether it provides enough protection to save one from the realities of the world, however, is another question and story.
If you live in the intersection of spirituality and social justice like I do, do yourself and your tarot practice a favor by pre-ordering 78 Acts of Liberation: Tarot to Transform Our World by Lane Smith (with a foreword by Maria Minnis, author of Tarot For the Hard Work), which examines the structure, history, and components of Tarot through the lens of power, helping us better understand power dynamics in our life and in society. If that isn’t a perfect book for an eight year, I don’t know what is!
The remainder of 2024 is going to require discernment in spiritual and religious spaces, even more so than you may already employ. Who are you listening to and what are their values? Do they align with yours? What are your spiritual practices and traditions, and how do you put them into action in your life? Are they appropriated or stolen? If yes, can you reconnect with a decolonized ancestral tradition?
I’ll leave you with a few bullet points from the beginning of the year, when everything was ahead of us and we were hoping for the best! While some may seem farther away than ever, I think we can all stand to pull ourselves back towards the core of eight energy and all that it offers.
2024 wants you to integrate and embody
2024 wants you to get back to going deep
2024 wants to resource you so you can keep going
2024 wants to pleasure you
2024 wants you to pleasure yourself
Otherwise, what’s the fucking point?