I Haven't Forgotten You

Hello Stargazers,

Just in case you thought I blipped off the earth, I'm still here. Due to dealing with the unfortunate events playing out, I've been on a little haitus with my current project (learning from all signs of the Zodiac).

I'm still learning from Capricorn and will hopefully share my report to you, soon.

In the meantime, please stay well and be your best ever selves. Just as the constellations in the Zodiac, we all shine brightly when we work together and when we're all here.

As always Stargazers, I love you all and look forward to gazing at the sky with you.

My Lesson from Pisces

Greetings Stargazers!

I'm sorry it's been a while. While I have been busy I also wanted to explore a trait from Pisces that I could truly grow from and share with you.

I felt that the trait of, "Acknowledge people and accept who they are," was an invitation to be a doormat, which didn't jibe well with the fact that I kept having customers who were trying to rob me of my services (let's just say they wanted free haircuts on my dime. Beyond ugh).

The trait, "Trust your feelings and intuition," was giving me a hall pass to be honest with my feelings, which was leading me back to outrage with people-a trait I'm trying to undo.

I settled with " Focus on the more spiritual aspects in life as opposed to the material and superficial." Not only was this a trait I could grow from but focusing on more than the material was something I could use at work (a setting driven by numbers).

At first I translated "spiritual" as being more grateful at work. I tried to focus on how customers were pleased with my haircuts as opposed to the fact that my services were taking more time. Being grateful is easier said than done.

Another Piscean lesson came when I least expected it-when I was in trouble for missing a meeting. However it changed the course of how I view work and life.

In order to be fully present and to fully move on with life, you have to accept that  the good (being promoted, having good days) and the ugly (being hated,  having management let you go) will happen. One can only fight the ugly or the prevention of the ugly for so long before the struggle is lost. Let the flow of the river guide you instead of going against the flow. Like the two fish in the sky.

With this principle in mind, I've not only worked my time down from forty minutes to thirty but I've been able to relax at work and just do what needs to be done.

The same has been true for my personal life. You can't live a day down without accepting that bumps are going to happen with what works.

I have felt, in these last two weeks, that I've been the most present and in the moment.  Instead of focusing on what should be ( the future) or what I should have done (the past) I've just been able to deal with the here and now. The here and now produces the least of regrets. Everything that is a need or a want is right in front of you and is waiting for your attention.

As a Leo, I've felt that I've been more relaxed to be my bright, sunshiney self and that I have a lot less of a fear of missing out. Instead of leaving fun things for my day off, I've found that finding those times can come on times off as well.

Well, Stargazers, what do you think? Feel free to comment. And, as always, don't forget to look up at the stars. How are you surviving Mercury Retrograde in Pisces? If you're feeling that communication lines are down and murky, you're not alone.  Neptune is not helping with it's watery energy. It's just making everything muddy. Hang in there and keep a piece of Suglite handy.  It'll help with understanding.

Next time I'll report from Capricorn, our dear, beloved goat. The trait: "Find your purpose and be the best you can be." 

Lessons from Sagittarius

Greetings Stargazers! Sorry it's been a while. I just really wanted to see if I learned my lessons for our current post.

As promised from Gemini, my next lesson came from Sagittarius. The traits that I reflected upon and implemented were, "You attract good fortune by being enthusiastic and positive," and "Let go of attachments to anything or anyone; be independent and don't get bogged down by messy entanglements."

So, without further ado, I loaded my trusty jet pack with the most robust Earl Grey and am floating over the constellation of the centaur.

Within the last two weeks, I divided the two traits by what helped me at work and what I was implementing at home.

At work, the trait, "You attract good fortune by being enthusiastic and positive," reigned supreme. As with Gemini, I saw enthusiastic and positive as using light humor to get through being the newcomer at my job. As with Gemini, "enthusiastic and positive" also meant not taking myself too seriously and learning how to use some constructive, self depreciating humor (believe me, with my nerves, being the joke helped with a load of tension).

With my teasing about how my chair sometimes had a persnickety manner and with making a light joke on missing a step, my customers seemed to relax and their attitudes changed from being apprehensive of me to going along with what I was doing.

I also relaxed a bit, making the first days of being back at work move a bit more smoothly.

To me, the "good fortune" part was Sagittarius' way of reminding me of the law of karma and how it works. Simply put, the more positive energy you place into anything, the better the outcome.

At home, "Let go of attachments to anything or anyone...." pointed to a more serious undertone to my life. Lately, I had noticed that I have had minor addictions that has kept me from living my life fully. While these addictions were to using the internet too much (to look more into Tantra), reading up on Tarot and watching a whole evening's worth of The Real Housewives series on Bravo, they were the epitome of living 1/3 of my life. I think there was even a time where I had not ventured out of the house for a whole week.

With Sagittarius' reminder of "Let go of attachments...." I was able to notice that I was acting on watery and airy energy by being too logical and intuitive. I was able to balance life by bringing in more fiery and earthy energy by getting back into Pilates again and take more walks. The fiery/earthy shift, alone, has helped me in keeping my back, neck ankles and shoulders feeling nice and strong for work as well as helping me to feel better about myself. When the effects of poor circulation start (i.e. cold feet and hands) you know it's time to move a bit more.

Letting go of attachments also caused for me to start an energetic practice that has aided me with difficult coworkers and customers and just darn, difficult people. It's in setting up healthy energetic boundaries for myself and sticking to these boundaries so that I'm not a lint trap for negative energy.

The exercise rests on differentiating yourself from the person dumping negative energy on you (in order to distance yourself from them), letting the energy go and reaffirming that you're not here to carry this other person's energy. You're here to live in your own spirit.

Let's just say, I've been a calmer person at the end of the day. Far calmer that I was in the past.

Overall, I think that the traits from Sagittarius has helped me to reach the more proactive and lighter sides of Leo. As with Gemini, I think I'll be revisiting these Sagittarian traits, maybe others.

So to all you stargazers out there, what do you think? Please feel free to leave comments for me, especially if you are following me in learning from different astrological signs.

For next time, I'll be floating over the constellation of our lovely fish-that's right, I'll be learning from you Pisces. The trait that I'll be following will be, "How to acknowledge people and accept who they are." I may have to take this trait in two separate steps. We'll see how it goes.

As always, don't forget to look up at the stars. Jupiter and Mercury are near the earth!!! They're so beautiful, especially near the new moon.

My Observations from Gemini

Greetings Stargazers! Alissandra Coffey reporting to you outside the constellation of Gemini.

Sorry it took so long. I just started a new job this week.

However, as promised, I have kept up with implementing a trait from each zodiac sign, other than my own, in order to learn from that sign.

From Gemini it was, "Having fun is obligatory in every aspect of life."

The first lesson that I learned? Over the years, I have forgotten to have fun. I don't know when or how this really sad situation came about, really. Maybe when I graduated from college? When I started to work? Maybe my natal Moon, natal Saturn conjunction finally caught up to me?

Either way, I take life way too seriously and Gemini's main challenge was to find a way to seriously lighten up. This was not an easy feat.

The one way that I could bring fun into my life was to tease myself and bring humor into my life's equation. Even though humor is very simple, it's the most effective way to cut stressful situations into fourths or eighths, even.

With using humor to diffuse tense moments, I was able to enjoy the moment I was in, slightly empower myself and, thusly, enjoy my day.

Whether it was to tell myself that obnoxious dog walkers were picking up on my magnetism or to remind myself to calm down for a job interview (I wasn't up for employee of the month, after all), I was able to center my attention on what really mattered in the moment.

I just had to be careful that I wasn't putting a smiley face on tamped down rage or oppressed emotions.

With Gemini, I also started to get interested in Tantra, Tarot and got back into vocal training for Opera. In a way, Gemini's thirst for new things in life rubbed off. Quite frankly, I needed the bit of extra fun with the interesting subjects that came my way. Another way to let tense situations lie.

I think that I'll keep in touch with Gemini's lesson of infusing fun into every area of life. It might come in handy for the first week of work (everyone's busy but me???).

Well, Stargazers, this is the time I have with you now. Next time I'll report from Sagittarius. The traits I'll focus on are, "You attract good fortune by being enthusiastic and positive," and "Let go of attachments to anything or anyone."

Until then, don't forget to look up at the stars. It looks as though Mercury and the Sun are starting to make their way towards Aquarius. I see testing communicative patterns more.

Virgo Findings

Greetings Stargazers! Happy New Year to all as, in Chinese Astrology, we move from Year of the Earth Pig to Year of the Metal Rat. Interesting eh?

As usual, I have loaded up my trusty jet pack with Earl Grey and am hovering over the constellation of Virgo.

As mentioned in my last post, I have chosen to act and reflect on the Virgo trait, "Having a routine can help prioritize mental energy," within the last week.

I have to say, most of what I learned was incredibly helpful.

In order to embrace the routine, I did what was closest to living routinely in my Leonine world-making a list, at the begining of each day.

The list mainly consisted of things that I needed to do (laundry, looking for work, physical therapy exercises) along with things I could do (take a walk, have a discursive meditation session, draw, read).

Overall, having the list helped me to live each day fully and do as much as possible with those days.

Unlike Virgo, I can be incredibly disorganized and haphazard. When I have a day off, or a moment to myself,  I usually ask myself as to what I want to do with the day only to come to some sort of an answer two hours later. By the time I get to the activity, the day is halfway over.

When the day is winding down, I'm quite the typical fire sign. I usually complain that I haven't really seized the day, in doing everything I wanted.

Making a list minimized the dreaded question, "So, what shall I do today?" or "What shall I do this instant?" I merely added what I had wanted to do along with what I needed to do, before the day was over. All that I had to do was look the list over.

Overall, the list had kept me from wasting time (i.e binge watching Frasier re-runs), so I could come close to completing my screenplay, or try my hand at drawing human figures (an enjoyable activity, by the by) or going to an indoor pool to conquer a fear of water. All of this with looking for work.

The only drawback with living this routine was the fact that there were days where I felt a little restricted. I could see where Virgo could box themselves up a bit, considering that spontaneity is the bane of their existence.

There were times where I had to remind myself to do what I could, since my day was coming close to, "Stop looking at jobs by 13:00. 17:00 promptly: take a walk.  Follow up with reading at 18:00 sharp! Don't forget your Yule candle. Go to bed by 22:00."

I not only had to omit times but add spontaneity to the routine by simply getting to things when I could. Close to the end of the week, I simply had to live with the fact that some items on my list (i.e. going to Manitou Incline) simply had to wait for another time, another day.

My conclusion would make a Virgo a little irritated: We're only human and can do so much.

While many fire signs would have found routine a little boring, routine freed me up a bit and had allowed to focus on what's important.

Whether it's living in the grown up world or self care, Virgo's message to me, was,  "Every day is an important day to live. One has to be open and ready to what awaits."

For the next week, I'll revolve around to the next Mutable sign of the zodiac: the airy and fun filled sign of Gemini (as with Virgo, ruled by Mercury).

The Geminian trait I will be focusing on is brought to you by Marianna Sharktooth of Thought Catalogue. It's from her article "20 Irreplacable Life Lessons I've Learned from my Gemini Mom." The trait of, "Having fun is obligatory in every aspect of your life," resounded rather heavily with me. Especially since I just started to suffer from Depression, just way out of the blue (no pun intended), since the Holidays.

As always, don't forget to look up at the stars.

Holly Moley! Is that Mercury joining the Sun, Saturn, Jupiter and Pluto in Capricorn?! It's no wonder why everything and everyone is so serious and hounded by matters related to careers. Poor Capricorn. He has a heavy load of planetary energy to deal with.

Hang in there, dear goat. This too shall pass. Hang in there Stargazers. This burden shall pass, in due time.

Scorpio findings

Hello Stargazers! Alissandra Coffey reporting to you in my trusty jetpack filled with Earl Grey, over the constellation of Scorpio. I'm wishing Mars a little Loving Kindness, in order to prevent it from colliding in me. Yikes!

As I had mentioned as of Sunday of last week, I was going to reflect and implement the Scorpio traits of "Fall down seven times, get up eight" and finding the rewards of being in the background as opposed to the limelight.

While learning from Scorpio (and about Scorpio via Liz Greene, for that matter) I noticed something interesting and unexpected about me. Even though I don't have natal planets in the sign, I actually have some Scorpionic tendencies.

While being in the background sounded a bit challenging, due to my Leonine personality of wanting to be noticed, when I acted on the Scorpio trait,  it felt quite natural.

On day three, I found out that it was due to my natal Pluto being conjunct my natal Moon (conjunct meaning that the planets are really close together). Natives to this transit can display overt sensitivity to even the tiniest of slights and can have a propensity to remain secretive. Those who are more evolved could excell in Psychology, due to their absolute facination with transformation. I don't know about you, but that encompasses some of Scorpio's traits. All we need is probing the truth out of life and people and we're all set.

I notice this aspect when I encounter new surroundings and people. Where typical Leos would approach newness with, "Tell me, who are you and entertain me with something interesting,"  I tend to remain to myself, observing if the new people are kind enough to not betray me.

When betrayed, I still keep to myself, discerning the truth of what is truly wrong with the situation.

When I acted on staying in the background, (i.e. not saying hello to people) a lot of people didn't notice me at all. I took the liberty to observe the people passing me on the street. Whereas my past self would blame me on not being interesting enough, it was actually the individuals who were shirking away from everyone around them.  They didn't want to talk. It made me feel better and more reasoned.

I would say this is Scorpio's way of saying, "When it doubt, pull back and gain more perspective on your situations. You would be surprised as to what is yielded."

On the trait "Fall down seven times, get up eight, I'm going to be honest, Stargazers, this trait drove me up a tree. It was not easy to encompass.

When I first acted on this trait, I was in a job interview. For the interview I had to find a model on the 16th Street Mall! To say the least it was hard for me to swallow my pride, when I was blown off, and keep going. I managed but I came across as a diluted version compared to how a true Scorpio would manage the feat.

What was even more challenging was when I was blown off by several employers by not getting word back. As much as the trait would encompass, "nearly badger the employers until you get an answer," I also didn't want to come off as unprofessional or combative. In the end I called and texted the employers and had to leave it at no reply.

It was also an exhaustive trait. I could only hustle for so long before my body gave out. For this matter, I admire Scorpio's drive to get it done, no matter what.

To be honest, I found Scorpio and her lessons to be a little elusive. The traits were so subtle that there were times that I didn't know if I was fully acting on them. If you are learning from Scorpio, make sure your focus is 100 percent on the traits.

As a Leo, however, my perspective was broadened by Scorpio. I think I'll keep taking a step back, either mentally or physically, to see what really is going on with trouble areas of my life.

So, Stargazers, what do you think? Please feel free to leave comments.

Going into the holidays, I'll focus on the Mutable sign of Virgo. Her trait is brought to you by astrotraits.com. It will be, "Having a routine can help prioritize your mental energy." I might try a little discursive meditation on spots that I'm stuck with.

Whether you're celebrating Yule, Hannaukah (I hope I spelled it the holiday right), Kwanza, Christmas or any other holiday, Happy Holidays. May they be a safe and happy one. Until next year, keep looking at the stars. As mentioned, Mars is in Scorpio. I avoided it's transit. Whew!

Depending where Scorpio falls in your chart, there will be a zest in what it brings. Just be careful of impulsive actions and argumentative behavior.

Leo Traits

Greetings Stargazers!

As promised, I'm here to impart a couple of traits that you can learn from the Lion in the sky-Leo.

This list is compiled from my own experiences of being a Leo coupled with Liz Greene's viewpoints and astrotraits.com. I hope you can enjoy and if you are learning from Leo, I hope this helps.

• Find confidence with being in the limelight.

• Before you wake up in the morning, find at least three things that are going well in your life. Throughout the day, bring that sense of positivity to others. 

• Find your charisma and take charge of a situation that you feel needs leadership.
• Live your life in honestly. See how it lightens your life.
• Whether in fashion or in life, make your own statement and strut it. 
• Don't tolerate crappy treatment from others. You know you deserve better.

For this next week, I'll see what I can learn from Scorpio. The traits that resounded for me were from astrotraits.com. They were, "Fall down 7 times, get up 8" and that working in the background can be just as rewarding as being in the spotlight. 

If you are following my project, please feel free to reach out and share some of your insights.

As always, Stargazers, continue to look towards the sky. Peaceful wishes for the full moon.