What does the last Full Moon of 2021 hold for us?
Here we stand almost at the end of 2021, the Solstice is nearly upon us, and the days begin to get lighter heading back towards Spring, and its Full Moon time again. Our last Full Moon of this year and a time to really work with those energies of forgiveness, of releasing, of letting go, but also of gratitude. I wanted to start with talking a little bit about what this Full Moon means and when it's occurring along with a little bit on some of the planetary aspects. There are so many astrological planetary things to talk about this month that trying to cover it now would result in an epic blog so I'm going to keep that section really, really brief this time around. What I’d really like to focus on, especially because this is the last full moon of this year, is forgiveness and gratitude by sharing my ritual with you. Working with Lunar rituals is a good habit to get into for so many reasons which I’ve covered before. Practising forgiveness and gratitude is a wonderful way to finish off the energy of the year before we move into 2022. And of course, we start 2022 almost immediately with a new moon on the 2nd. But what does this moon have in store for us and how can we best work with her? Here’s my guide to all that, grab a cuppa and a notebook and pen, sit back, and let what resonates speak to you.
Planetary Aspects around the Full Moon
Our last Full Moon occurs at 4.35am on the 19th of December in the UK, it also ends the eclipse season that began back in November. We’ve had some pretty amazing skies this last few weeks so I’m keeping everything crossed it’s another beautiful star ridden night and we get to see Lady Lunar in all her majesty. But, even if we don’t the energy is still there for us to work with and enjoy. Of course, this is followed quickly by the winter solstice on the 21st when we move out of Sagittarius into Capricorn season. We have Venus jumping retrograde back into Capricorn on the 19th at the time of the Full Moon (Venus rules love and relationships but it's also about money). You might notice a few things rising up around relationships, around repeating behaviours, or people coming back into your life, old exes, old flames that you might not have seen for years, old friendships that you might not have had anything to do with for some time can come back round. But also questions about where our true values lie, values around not just love and relationships, but also about money and about finance. This moon is asking us to think about what we really, truly value, and what we need to shift in our values as well.
Venus is, as I mentioned not just love but also finances, its banking, its economics. And it might be that you find Venus going retrograde can make it a little bit more difficult to find your comfort zone, you might find things just feel a little bit awkward, that the spaces you normally find comfortable become prickly and irritated. An important thing to do as we move through this Full Moon and into the next few days following it, is to do some breath work, meditation, visualisations, chanting, dancing, walking etc. Whatever you can do to bring your energy back into your centre so that you don't feel tired and scattered, or as if bits of you are flying off all over the place. One thing that I like to do regularly with clients is to bring those elements back to you that you've left out there. Every time you work with somebody, are there for somebody, every time you listen to problems, issues and grievances, every time you're there for a friend, a lover, a family member, or a colleague, you can leave like little ribbons of yourself out attached to those people that you care about. It's just part of caring for somebody. But sometimes it's great to pull that energy back to yourself, back to your centre again. Especially when the work is finished and you’re not constantly connecting with that person energetically or holding the space. Breath work, meditation, chanting, mantras, affirmations, grounding work, anything like that will get you through what might feel like a slightly turbulent time over the next few days.
Full Moons bring things to a head, they are about facts and information coming to light. They might be facts and information about how we feel about things, they may be facts and information about things that have happened or things that have been hidden. The Moon illuminates’ things for us, she brings things that we've kept hidden out into the light, so that we can work with them and can move it forward.
In addition, at this full moon we have Mercury exactly squaring Chiron which means there's a lot of energy around health and healing. And, because it’s a Gemini Full Moon, and we're still in Sagittarius season, then it's about choices and discussions or even information coming up to light around health and healing. And, again, it's a really great time to access our higher wisdom, to connect with our spirit guides, our higher consciousness, our higher selves. And to look at things from a much more spiritual point of view.
Neptune is also present in the mix, and Neptune is around secrets. It's a great time of insights, soul downloads and information coming to light, particularly around the solstice and through into next year. Hopefully you can see that there's an awful lot of positive energy around supporting us in our spiritual growth well into the next few years. Each time you illuminate something, taking it out of the dark and out of the underworld and bringing it up into the light for it to be seen you facilitate change. Even though it can feel quite turbulent when this information comes to light it's a time where we can then grow, move forward, and learn those lessons. I don't know what your thoughts are on the subject, but I like to look at life as a map. When we decide to incarnate on this planet, we choose our pathways, who we're going to work with, who we're going to come into contact with, what lessons we want to learn. And that also means choosing endings. It means choosing to release people at a certain time. It means understanding lessons not only individually but also collectively, as humanity, and understanding about the planet that we share with beautiful creatures, animals, with plants and trees, etc.
The Energies of this Gemini Full Moon
Coming back to this working with the energies of this full moon. Now’s your chance to release any habits, beliefs or thought patterns that that don't fit with you anymore. It's a chance to completely wipe the slate clean, let go and start anew. Full moons are when the sun and the moon are in opposition. On the 19th we’ve got this wonderful Full Moon in Gemini opposing the sun in Sagittarius. We can use this to see where we're feeling, or indeed living, with some imbalances around freedom to do with communication and thoughts. The ruler of Gemini is Mercury, the planet of communication, and Gemini is all about intellectual thoughts and communication. Sagittarius is about freedom, of travel and fun, of getting to the nub of what your purpose is. You could find feelings coming up around freedom of expression, or where you might be experiencing some restrictions in your ability to express yourself, to be heard and understood. Or if you feel unable to express yourself; maybe you're feeling totally free and being allowed to do that which maybe you haven't felt before. Full Moons are a time to work on letting go and to work on freeing ourselves, releasing ourselves from what no longer serves us or what doesn't work for us anymore, what doesn't fit, but they're also about gratitude and abundance, they're about recognising what we do have rather than fretting about what we don't have. Journal your thoughts, intuitive hits, downloads, ideas and even dreams and meditations. Communicate with others, maybe it’s time for you to reach out to people you haven’t been in contact with for some time, again don’t be surprised if you find yourself thinking about someone then they pop up in your life unexpectedly.
As we're heading towards the end of this year I really want to talk about forgiveness and forgiveness rituals. I’ve talked above about there being a lot of planetary action in December, and it's heading into next year, I mentioned that Venus turns retrograde on the 19th back into Capricorn. And that's until towards the end of January next year. Now, at the same time, that's conjunct Pluto, and Pluto is about transformation. This combination can show up where we might have repressed our anger, or where we've had emotions on simmer for a long time. You might find that they now come to the boil. Partnerships, friendships, relationships, finances, health they're all going to come under the microscope. And interestingly, that's not just about our own personal values around those, but also on a much larger scale. Don’t be surprised if we see things happening on a more economic, financial institution, banking level coming up, or coming under the microscope, or things may come to light that maybe we haven't known about before, it could be interesting to see what comes out here.
Both Geminis and Sagittarians love bringing people together, chatting, discussing, and having fun - what more could we ask for around the holiday season than a sociable and communicative moon. If we allow ourselves to be open minded and see others’ views, it’s a great time to share ideas with each other and to learn from others too.
Crystals for a Gemini Full Moon Grid
Creating grids for lunar work is great fun, creating a wonderful looking grid brings out our inner child, but it’s also really useful for focusing your mind on what you’re trying to achieve. Using crystals that help us to release a relationship, to find courage to let go, that are known for manifesting work etc can be helpful for putting the right energies out into the Universe and for amplifying the inner work we’re doing at the time.
Choosing the right crystals matters. You can choose to work with crystals that resonate with the moon like Selenite, Moonstone, Labradorite, Opal, Moon Quartz (Girasol) or even Abalone shell alone or add in some more relevant crystals chosen to reflect and assist in the energies of each full moon.
Because this is a Gemini full moon with a Sagittarius sun, I’ve chosen to include on my grid this month the following:
Moonstone as it’s the stone for Gemini’s, obviously a lunar crystal but is also good for accessing our intuition, downloading information, and working with our higher selves, it promotes creative thinking and connects us with our subconscious. Perfect for this full moon.
Turquoise for communication
Sunstone for raising vibrations, communication, and fun.
Blue Kyanite for the throat chakra enabling self-expression
Amethyst for accessing third eye wisdom but also to calm down any anxieties around releasing work.
Citrine for abundance and finances.
Apatite (golden) helps with releasing stagnant energy, repressed emotions, removes blockages and supports moving forwards with less baggage.
Celestite is said to increase understanding, help with mindfulness and accessing higher consciousness as well as connecting us to the angelic realms.
Full Moons are also times to cleanse and charge crystals and make Lunar water which I confess to loving making each month. Just remember not to use water to cleanse any more soluble crystals such as Selenite, use some sage, incense, Palo Santo, or a crystal bed instead. You really don’t want to destroy that gorgeous lustre that they hold.
Practicing Forgiveness
Back to Full Moons and forgiveness rituals, this is one of the rituals that I really, really love doing around a full moon. Why? Because forgiveness means allowing yourself to let go of something, it allows you to let go of a weight that you may have been carrying. And you know forgiveness isn’t saying that it's okay that somebody treated you that way, or said that thing, or that experience happened. It doesn't mean that at all, it doesn't even mean that you've got to open the door wide for that person to come back into your life. What it does mean is that you acknowledge what happened, how you felt, and even the part that you played. And then you choose to let it go, you choose to release the pain and to heal the wound. And if you're going to do a Forgiveness Ritual, it's worth doing it fully. Putting a sticking plaster over a great big gaping wound is not going to heal the wound properly. You really need to do that inner work to truly release. The good news is this is a great time to do it. Forgiveness and releasing will make it easier to go forward and work with the new moon energies at the beginning of January. And indeed, every new moon. Letting go of arguments, cross or harsh words, things that have upset you, anxieties or fears, disappointments, regrets, where there's been too much drama in things, you get the gist here, that act of letting go frees you up for other energies to take centre stage. It’s really hard to focus on something creative or loving if you’re filled with hurt or anger.
And if we truly allow ourselves to acknowledge those events, to step outside of that emotion and look at what's happened, we can understand what the lesson was so that we can learn from that, because I firmly believe that everything in life is a learning opportunity. It gives us an opportunity for growth, to understand what we're supposed to be learning from it, what understandings we're supposed to be gaining. And we can choose to ignore it and repeat it. Or we can choose to work with that energy and allow ourselves to understand those lessons, and then to let it go and grow, and move on to the next chapter, the next part of our pathway. By seeing each painful moment as a growth opportunity it's not mitigating or ignoring the fact that growth at times can be a really, painful thing to go through. I'm not in any way disparaging the fact that pain exists. And there are things that happen to us that can cause us to feel that for quite some time. I guess I'm saying when it's time to release it, when it's time to let go of it, unburdening yourself so that you can move forward and get on with your life means you can grow on a personal level and on a spiritual level. And even at that point, being grateful for the lesson that you've learned.
We’re all just doing the best we can here, we're all trying to just walk our walk, talk our talk, and make decisions with the information that we have at the time. Allowing ourselves to grow and move forward and doing the best we can. When you’re dealing with those emotions, trying to get through those bumps in the road forgiveness rituals are a really, really great way of focusing your mind and allowing you to release, acknowledge and forgive, fully letting go of any attachments. It doesn't mean that you have to forget what happened. In fact, sometimes it's actually good not to forget, because the lessons are really, really valuable. It doesn't mean you're saying that the other person was right to do or say those things. What it does mean is that you're choosing to let go of the weight that you're carrying around what happened. This is a Forgiveness Ritual that I love doing that I hope you don’t mind my sharing with you.
Find yourself somewhere really comfortable and quiet to sit where you're not going to be interrupted. You can light a candle, put a wax/oil burner on, burn some incense, make it a really nurturing, comforting environment for you to be in to do your releasing and forgiveness work.
Make sure you've got a pen and paper at hand.
Start by sitting and closing your eyes. And then take some lovely deep calming breaths that allow you to connect back to your centre, breathe deeply into your heart and begin to really connect back with yourself and the essence, the soul of you.
And if you want, you can do an energetic body scan. Take your mind’s eye, visualise all the way through your body, through all your cells, all your organs, and see if there are any areas of resistance to forgiving and letting go.
If there aren't, then once you've done some more lovely breath work, you can pick up your pen and paper, and begin writing your forgiveness list. Write down the names of anybody that you need to forgive, or any habits, behaviours, or belief systems that you now want to let go of, write as much as you want or need to, the aim here is to get this energy out of your body and onto paper. It doesn't matter how far back you go in your life; it doesn't matter if you go all the way back to childhood, or to being in the womb, or even back to previous lives. The key is to get that energy moving out of your body, out of your energy field and onto the paper for you to release it properly. Basically, you write as much as you need to write.
When you've done this, take a good look at your forgiveness list. And I want you to take each person that you've listed here, individually one at a time. Use your mind's eye to visualise that person surrounded by white, pink, or green light (pink and green are the heart centre colours).
Allow yourself to feel compassion, love and/or gratitude and then affirm ‘I forgive you’. You can repeat this as many times as you need to until you feel that shift happen. You will feel a lightness envelop you. You'll know that forgiveness is happening because you'll feel that shift. And that will tell you that you've started letting go.
Do that for each person on your list. Or indeed each habit or each belief that you want to break by forgiving the habit for being with you. You can begin to release it and let it go. There are some wonderful mantras out there that you could complete this energy with to follow the I forgive you affirmations. Mantras such as the ho’oponopono prayer – ‘I’m sorry, please forgive me, thank you, I love you’ or Buddhist mantras such as ‘For whatever harm I have caused others, may they forgive me. For whatever harm others have caused me, may I forgive them. For whatever harm I have caused myself, I forgive myself’; you could do some chanting, or you could reaffirm it to yourself, do some EFT or tapping. And then finally, to really, complete things, you need to take that list and either tear it into very, very tiny pieces and bury it, or you need to burn it (safely obviously over a sink, or if you've got a fire pit use it, but not so it’s going to set fire to your home).
And then, once you've done that, that energy needs replacing with gratitude. The universe loves a vacuum. Once you've released some energy, you need to replace it with something else. The best way now is to replace that with gratitude. Think about some situations or some people who've been there for you, who've made you feel grateful. And the lessons learned that make you feel grateful. And allow that gratitude, that feeling of gratitude to fill your entire body, breathe in, breathing gratitude in. And then as you think about that, as you feel gratitude filling your entire body when you're ready, with your outbreath release those feelings of gratitude. Because remember, a full moon is all about releasing, it's all about letting go. You need to release the gratitude, as well as the forgiveness.
I hope that this helps you. If you already practice this regularly, you’ll know how wonderful it is, if you've never done it before, give it a go. If you feel some resistance, if you struggle with it, then just keep trying; the more you try something, the more you create a habit it becomes a ritual. Over time you’ll find working with lunar energies allow you some space and time every month to work on yourself, to do the inner work the releasing, the forgiveness, the manifesting, the calling into the abundance work that we need to do to be able to follow our soul paths, our destinies.
And so, this is it for me for this year, my last blog on moon energy of 2021. Don’t forget to share your images of any full moon altars, or full moon crystal grids that you do. If you celebrate Christmas, I hope you have a wonderful and joyous Christmas. And if you don't, I hope that you enjoy some holiday time and relax and take stock. And that we start back into next year with some renewed energy and a sense of purpose. I'll be back with you at the beginning of next month and next year to discuss the new moon that's with us in the beginning of January. Have a wonderful full moon releasing, forgiving, and working with gratitude. Don’t forget to give some thoughts to what you want to start manifesting in 2022 with the new moon being so early into the new year – and how perfect and exciting is that!
Enjoy your holidays, see you next year