Every time I go to Bluesfest I swear it will be the last time. I mean what’s not to love about this super well run festival* - the chaos, the crowds, the queues for everything including the well tended but still sh**y loos, long slow queues for hastily prepared tasteless food and drinks you don’t need, trekking between stages through mud with thousands of others in punishing gumboots, getting sandwiched in crowds, finding the perfect 'viewing' spot then being squeezed out of it and once more finding yourself behind that rare find - tall men in Australia, being stepped on, fighting your way out to the loo (to avoid the queues) then getting crushed as you blindly navigate, excuse and push your way back through the sweaty crowd. Then at the end of each long day, cold and wet with stinging feet and tired limbs, you’re suspended in a far off dream of being cocooned in your bed as you wait in the nightmarishly long queue for buses to take you there.
After day 1, I am done and yet I show up for day 2, 3 and 4: enthusiastic for what’s to come and eager for it to be over in equal measure. All is forgiven when I am momentarily swept along in that collective bliss as a favourite act weaves their magic or better when an unknown band takes me on a new adventure.
This year I went with my sister, bro in law and two nieces. My sister and her daughter revel in it. I mean at the end of 5 days they don’t want it to end and all I can think is thank god it has. Was it great, was it worthwhile, yes, but NEVER AGAIN. Time to own, deep down and only slightly below the surface, I’m not a festival girl. Call me precious but give me allocated seating at the Opera House any day.
We’ve recently experienced the Libra Full Moon** which of course followed the Aries New Moon. Aries asks who am I? Libra reminds you that everything is relationship and there is no me without we. I am what I am because of who we are.
Aries focus is on self - confidence, leadership and desire. Libra wants you to have all that and experience it in harmonious and balanced relationships. Libra’s symbol is the scales. It’s planetary ruler is Venus. It’s archetypes are beauty, co-creation, intimacy, co-operation (oh sweet equilibrium). The shadow side is people pleasing, mask wearing, saying yes but meaning no, passive aggressive. Aries has a shadow too - it's impulsive, aggressive and selfish. Polarities are ubiquitous but it's never black and white. We like to talk in definitives but we live in nuance - in the degrees between confidence and doubt, desire and satiety, - what will you choose?
So from Aries 'me' focus, to Libra's 'we' can be a gloriously generous journey when we own who we are at our core. When we learn to hold our centre, beyond the external labels and flag flying, we being to accept we must first belong to ourselves. It’s this turning in before we look outside, this valuing of ourselves (liking yourself, liking what you do and how you do it) that is central to every accomplishment, sustainable success and just being you. Ask me if you want to know more about this journey
From this most grounding stable foundation we can finally show up more freely (and generously) in every part of our lives. We show up in our relationships without needing to prove ourselves, fearing we’ll be rejected or seeking others' validation that we are enough. We satisfy Aries need for self-confidence, leadership and desire and Libra’s need for harmonious and balanced relationships. Said like that it sounds simple, but if you know what that really means you know it ain’t easy.
Owning I am not a festival girl I might still choose to go to Bluesfest but just for a day - because I acknowledge it exhausts me and I’d delight in and encourage my sister to go for the full five because it nourishes and enlivens her to be among the whole messy, majestic, melee.
We’re all unique and that’s the real magic of it all.
If you need support on this journey to coming home to yourself - divining and discovering where your gifts, skills, expertise and experience meet I have some 1:1 open this month Book a chat here to see if we’re a match and until then have fun watching Bridget Jones
Until soon
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