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I made a Libra Season Lessons for Birth & Parenting post on instagram back in September, not planning to make it a series of astrological parenting posts. I wondered if I should continue for each of the signs, but hadn't felt motivated to write with clarity on what Scorpio season really brings up for me personally, not to mention in the space of birth and parenting.
I've felt stuck in a murky heaviness and overwhelm swirled on top of all the goodness in my life. But just as Scorpio season is coming to an end, I feel like I'm coming up for air. And so here I am smiling to myself at how Scorpio-y the process of writing this was.
Here's the simplest manifestation of Scorpio lessons that came to me, inspired by my Scorpio moon daughter. Every single day without fail, and no matter how rushed or chaotic the morning is, my almost 5 year old runs back in the house to give me a big, beautifully deep hug goodbye and makes sure I charge up her stuffed animal of the day with love. And without fail, the way she remembers and demands this goodbye ritual snaps me out of the distractions of everyday life and straight into the present moment - a bit deeper than the present, actually. Those seconds embracing and being embraced by her are a reminder that school drop off times are made up, and that I can't know when our last hug will be, or what lies ahead for that day. This darkness and light is meaningful and impossible to untangle. Two sides of the same coin. To truly embrace life, we have to hold death closely.
The closer I get to giving birth, the more that death is on my mind. The closer I hold on to the nature of existence and my own mortality, the more intentionally and joyfully I move through my life. At a playdate for my daughter's preschool today, I was talking to a friend who just had her third baby about that transition and wondering whether I'd want to have another. She commented something along the lines of me seeming so calm and content as a mother. My immediate response was that I have my challenges, but attribute my unwavering joy and appreciation for motherhood to my preoccupation with death. Knowing how temporary, how fragile, how brief and filled with unknowns this life is puts absolutely everything else in perspective. There's a saying that depression is being stuck in the past and anxiety is fixating on the future, and that we do best as humans when we're basking in the present. Nothing shifts me in to that space more quickly or easily than thinking about death.
I've never experienced something more vulnerable or terrifying than giving birth to a child and having them exist in the world - simultaneously my total responsibility and a completely separate being that I can neither control or always protect. But letting ourselves go to the depths of that journey and expanding our capacity for feeling that fear is inextricably bound to our capacity to feel the transcendent magic of creating and then truly getting to know our child. Not to mold them and shape them, but to let them show us who they are.
And in the spirit of Scorpio layers and complexity - we cannot truly offer this presence and unconditional love (or any other support for that matter) to our loved ones if we deny it to ourselves. I hate that this is true. But becoming a parent is an invitation to go deep within ourselves, and resitance to that invitation bubbles up in so many ways that get harder and harder to manage. So much of the intensity of parenting comes with what it brings up in ourselves. Scorpio season reminds us that our power lies in going to those depths and coming out the other side. That's where we rediscover who we are, what we desire, and what we need to feel whole.