Welcome to Ghost of a Podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Lanyadoo. I'm an astrologer, psychic medium, and animal communicator, and I'm going to give you your weekly horoscope and no-bullshit mystical advice for living your very best life.

Jessica:      Marie, welcome to the podcast.

Marie:        Hi.

Jessica:      Hi. What would you like a reading about?

Marie:             Okay. So I'm going to go ahead and read my question. And my question starts, "Hi, Jessica. Thanks for all the magic you bring every week with your podcast. I am writing you because I've been really struggling with getting stuck in the 'it's not fair' mentality. This ranges from my personal life/my career to even the big-picture world events. The feeling can sometimes be so frustratingly large that I want to burst, and I end up shutting down. Is there anything in my chart that might provide some insight on how I can flow rather than feeling like I'm being caught in an undertow? Thank you so much again."

Jessica:            Good question. Yeah. Do you identify as a millennial?

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Yeah. Okay, because your Pluto is at 15 degrees of Scorpio. It is right in the middle of Scorpio. That is such a classic millennial question in many ways because it's such a Pluto-in-Scorpio quandary, which⁠—I will get to that in a second. I sound share your birth information before we dive. You were born August 18th, 1990, somewhere on the West Coast at 11:45 a.m.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Okay. Great. So here's a fun little astro fact⁠—and you fuck with astrology?

Marie:             Oh yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah. Okay. So fun little astro fact: when I'm reading a question⁠—whenever I'm reading basically anything⁠—certain words trigger different zodiac signs, planets, that kind of stuff. And so, when you say, "It's not fair," I'm not going to lie; I'm like, "Pisces?" But then, when you say "frustrated," I think, "Mars? Maybe Pluto?" And so imagine my surprise when I saw this glorious, bold stellium in Leo in your birth chart⁠—so much Leo. You got Jupiter sitting on top of the Moon sitting on top of Venus sitting on top of the South Node sitting on top of the Midheaven, all in Leo, plus Sun in Leo. That's a lot of Leo.

Marie:             Yeah. So I've been told.

Jessica:            It's a lot of Leo. I mean, and as a person who has a lot of Capricorn, I don't have as much Capricorn as you have Leo. So that's a lot of Leo. And I want to maybe pick at your question, get a little more details, and then dive back into the chart.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            This feeling of "it's not fair"⁠—did it start at any particular time in your life?

Marie:             I think it became most noticeable after I was diagnosed with endometriosis because that really changed my life, and now, I am disabled. And so that's really opened up my eyes to a lot of things, and the unfairness became more prevalent everywhere. So yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah. First of all, I'm so sorry that happened and also that you're still fucking dealing with it. How old were you when that happened?

Marie:             I was diagnosed at about 30, 31.

Jessica:            Okay. And how old are you now?

Marie:             I am going to be 35.

Jessica:            Okay. So this is like you made it through your Saturn Return; life wasn't unfair⁠—or it was?

Marie:             Well, yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. Okay.

Marie:             I didn't become aware of it until my diagnosis. However, I grew up in an abusive household. I have a lot of trauma with a lot of my childhood. But that didn't really come up for me, didn't come to the surface, until about my Saturn Return. And that's about when my body was having a lot of unknowns⁠—a lot of unknown pain, a lot of unknown sensations that nobody could figure out.

Jessica:            Okay. And I'm really limited in what I understand about endometriosis. I feel like I hear different things that give me really different ideas of what it is. Is it something that hits your immune system?

Marie:             Yeah. So it's a chronic illness that also causes chronic pain. It's different for everybody. I do want to clarify that. So⁠—

Jessica:            Which is part of, probably, why I have lots of different ideas of what it is and isn't. Okay.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Yeah. There are so many questions I have about that, but I want to just have you say your full name out loud so I can get a little energy picture here.

Marie:             Absolutely. So my name is [redacted].

Jessica:            You⁠—wow. Okay. So, before the endometriosis hit your system, you had a lot of energy, and you were able to really move through things; is that right?

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah, like a damn fire hose. I mean, and I know, lots of Leo, but man, you were a fire hose. And so, yeah, "Trauma⁠—I punch it to the curb. Mean guys⁠—I kick them in the buns."  You really were able to just move through things. Am I seeing this correctly?

Marie:             Absolutely.

Jessica:            Okay. And this is actually like your mom's side of the family?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. This is the pattern. It's like there's a strong feeling. It could be a physical feeling, an emotional feeling. It could be like coming out of your mind. It's a strong feeling, and then you kind of ride the wave of the feeling instead of sitting with it and letting it kind of settle through the layers.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Okay. Okay. And then chronic illness kicks in, and you have no option to do that. You're forced to just sit in the layers.

Marie:             Absolutely.

Jessica:            Okay. So, first of all, ugh. I'm sorry.

Marie:             Thank you.

Jessica:            That is like a hundred million yikes. And also, man, your body is doing you a solid on a spiritual level. That is such an obnoxious thing for me to say. I apologize deeply.

Marie:             No, I agree, though.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Marie:             I agree.

Jessica:            I mean, it's⁠—

Marie:             It sucks, but⁠—

Jessica:            It sucks, but it is very real because you could have lived your whole life being effective in the world and burning yourself⁠—just burning yourself, just burning yourself.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Your body has stopped you before you went too far, in a way.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And⁠—because you're still really young right?

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            And is there a treatment for the endometriosis?

Marie:             There unfortunately is no treatment. The only, quote unquote, "treatment" is to get surgery, and that only lasts so long because endo regrows.

Jessica:            Oh. Okay.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            I'm so sorry. It's just awful. Okay. So there's two layers, and I want to⁠—there's not two layers. There's many layers. But I want to just say I'm kind of stuck with two layers because you're not asking me about your chronic illness, but also, it's almost like this function in your body or this malfunction in your body⁠—we can call it either, honestly⁠—has forced you to tap in. So you've got this North Node conjunct your IC, right?

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Your North Node is in Aquarius, and it's at the very bottom of your chart. It is very tightly conjoined to your IC, and it is in opposition to every one of your Leo placements except for your Sun, and so⁠—a.k.a. your South Node is conjunct your Midheaven, your Venus, your Moon, your Jupiter, all in Leo. Whenever I talk about the Nodes, I always want to be exceptionally clear this is not a personality trait issue. This is an evolutionary issue. And that North Node wants you⁠—that North Node at your IC wants you to tap into your feelings, to heal your roots, to acknowledge your personal needs and to sort through them.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            You were all set up to be a high-functioning adult who literally fucking never did that because you didn't have to because you could [crosstalk] shit.

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And it's kind of ironic that, literally, the treatment is⁠—did you say that the surgery is like they kind of burn it off, or did I make that up in my head?

Marie:             That is one form.

Jessica:            Okay.

Marie:             The most common one.

Jessica:            I wouldn't do that one if I were you. I'm not giving you medical advice, but it just feels too much like a reiteration of the trauma, in a way.

Marie:             Yeah. See, I got excision, which they say is better because it takes it out from the root rather than just burning the top away.

Jessica:            This is such a metaphor, right?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            It's such a powerful metaphor. And your North Node is in Aquarius, and so, yes, it's on the IC; it's all about healing the roots, and it's doing it your fucking way. It's doing it your way. It's not doing it in a conventional way. It's not doing it in a way that might even look like tapping in and healing to someone else. It's doing it your way. Do you have human babies?

Marie:             No.

Jessica:            Okay. And do you want human babies?

Marie:             No.

Jessica:            Great. Great. I agree. Figuring out how to nurture, support, and parent yourself or re-parent yourself⁠—I feel like that's the call.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            I think that's the move. And part of me⁠—because I'm also a bit zippy, and also because I'm tapped into your energies like, "And I want to tell you this, and I want to tell you that, and I want to tell you this"⁠—and I promise I'll tell you lots of things. But I want to just sit with the profundity of how fucking terrible and awful it is to feel awful and to be slowed down and to realize how fucked up and unfair life is and to even figure out how fucked up and unfair your life has been, which⁠—how nice is that, to have not fully realized it until you hit your 30s? I mean, it's not that nice, because then when it hits you, I'm guessing it hits like a ton of bricks.

Marie:             It absolutely does hit me like a ton of bricks. It did, I should say. It was a lot.

Jessica:            And I imagine it's still⁠—I mean, it's one of those things that if it wasn't your identity in your 20s and your teens that things were hard, that it's quite an adjustment in your 30s, of which⁠—you're only five years into them, right?

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            So I want to just acknowledge that and acknowledge that, on a soul level, you've not done this work before.

Marie:             Yeah. Okay.

Jessica:            Yeah. That's what the North Node is. The North Node is the thing that your soul hasn't done before. And when you come in with a lot of conjunctions from your South Node to your planets, it indicates that you're evolutionarily very fucking identified with those planets. And so a Leo stellium between the ninth and tenth houses⁠—I mean, it's mainly in the ninth house⁠—yeah, I'm going to fucking figure it out. I'm going to be smart. I'm going to move fast. I'm going to make it happen. I'm going to keep on moving. Nothing's going to stop me. Right?

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            It's fire on fire. But it is a fire hose. It's controlled because we're talking about fixed-sign Leo. You had a lot of self-control, and then what happened? Your body's like, "What is control but a lie?"

Marie:             Oh, it's so true, though.

Jessica:            I'm sorry. And because you have this Sun square to Mars in your birth chart⁠—you know, you actually don't have a lot of challenging aspects in your birth chart, which is part of how you got away for so long without tapping into how unfair life and the world is.

Marie:             Yeah. Okay.

Jessica:            That's how that happened. It wasn't just denial. It was also your ability to be like, "I'm going to make fucking lemonade. I like lemonade. Okay, I may not like lemonade, but I have a friend who likes lemonade." You adapted, and you made it work, and you just were determined to make it work, and you were going to make it work.

Marie:             Oh yes. Yes.

Jessica:            Yeah. And there are elements of that that might be dissociative or whatever, but that's also a set of high-functioning skills you don't want to lose track of, right?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            That's some of the beauty of having all this Leo in your chart. But that Sun/Mars square⁠—one of the ways that it loves to function is literally like⁠—did you use to run? Did you use to go for runs a lot?

Marie:             No. I had asthma.

Jessica:            You had asthma. Okay. I'm sorry to hear that.

Marie:             Only when exercising, asthma would kick in.

Jessica:            Exercise-induced asthma.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Specifically. Interesting.

Marie:             Specifically. Yeah.

Jessica:            Interesting. I want to be really clear. I'm not a fucking doctor.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            In my private practice, I do a lot of medical astrology, and on the podcast, I really hesitate to because it's a dangerous practice, medical astrology, to be honest. And I don't want to encourage a lot of people to reach out a lot about it or to go seeking TikTok astrologers who are going to [indiscernible 00:12:10]. I think it's dangerous.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            That said, I have to say exercise-induced asthma⁠—it's like your body is such a weird, mean coach and is just doing everything it can to stop you from doing the things that metaphorically you're not supposed to do.

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            It's wild. It's wild.

Marie:             That's funny.

Jessica:            It's like I couldn't come up with a better metaphor for you.

Marie:             Wild.

Jessica:            It is wild. It is wild. Okay. But back to my question. The reason why I asked about if you ran is because Sun square to Mars⁠—generally, it's like you need to be doing something. You need to be pushing yourself. You need to be [crosstalk].

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Okay. Good.

Marie:             Not physically, but like when it came to work, when it came to thinking, when it came to just doing activities, 1,000 percent.

Jessica:            Right. And so, when something stops someone with a Sun/Mars square⁠—or opposition, depending⁠—from doing and being effective and being competitive or whatever it is, what tends to happen is the other side of Mars. And the other side of Mars is, "Nothing's fair." It can be paranoia. It can be sheer exhaustion, like demoralization. You know what I mean?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            It's like, "Life is so fair that there is literally no point in me even trying. And everything that happens to me is so out of my control. Then fuck it. Why even bother to engage?"

Marie:             I wouldn't say that I get to that extreme.

Jessica:            Okay.

Marie:             But it is that feeling of⁠—like it's so out of my control. And instead of falling into, "Why even bother?" it just makes me pent up of like, "But I should be able to. I should be able to."

Jessica:            Okay. So you get angry.

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            And it's angry at God, angry at the Universe; it's not angry at yourself?

Marie:             Yeah. Well, a little bit both.

Jessica:            Okay. A little bit both. Okay. Okay.

Marie:             A little bit both. Yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. Were you raised with religion?

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Mm-hmm. Do you mind if I ask which one?

Marie:             Catholic.

Jessica:            Okay. Let me tell you why I'm asking, okay? Because⁠—so you got all this shit in your ninth house. I mean, it was an easy guess, right? Raised with religion. Okay. But I find a lot of religions have this idea that if you're a good person, you go to heaven or some version of that. So, if you're good, good things happen; therefore, if you're bad, then clearly, bad things happen. Okay. Is this [indiscernible 00:14:34]?

Marie:             Oh gosh. I literally wrote down one of the⁠—on my notes for this episode, I wrote down I was raised to believe that being kind and working hard means that you will be rewarded for it, and I'm learning that that's simply not true.

Jessica:            Yeah. That's right. That's completely right.

Marie:             I never even thought about that, [crosstalk].

Jessica:            Yeah. It's religion. It's this idea that the Universe is symmetrical. I have a conviction⁠—not to upset people who are religious⁠—that it's a way of controlling people. It's simply not true, because if it was true, then explain to me how the, quote unquote, "most successful" people in the world are also the worst people in the world.

Marie:             Yeah. Exactly.

Jessica:            It really is like we do not, as a society, reward people for being kind and doing well.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            We reward them for looking a particular way, being selfish, being cruel.

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            There are so many problems with this belief, but inherently, they're ableist, right?

Marie:             Yes. Yes. And that's what makes it even more frustrating now as someone who identifies as disabled. I'm like, "All of this is just so ableist and BS."

Jessica:            It's purely ableist. And within that ableism⁠—I don't know if it's the umbrella to the ableism or within the ableism⁠—everybody dies. Now, not everybody gets to grow old. But unless something takes you out in an accident, your body will take you out⁠—slowly, fast, one way or another. It is the human condition. And there is something of this kind of⁠—I don't know if it's called prosperity gospel, but there's this some sort of⁠—you do good things; you're rewarded in heaven or whatever the hell it is. This kind of idea is a way to dissociate from⁠—every single one of us are going to have sore body parts, at the fucking very least, right?

Marie:             Mm-hmm. Yep.

Jessica:            It's not humanistic is what I would say, right?

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            And from my perspective, humanism requires our willingness and ability to embrace the frailty of the human condition, the frailty of the meat suit, and how when you are in pain and when you are sick, it is not a sign that you've done something wrong. It's a sign that you're a human in a body. And I'm not going to name names, especially not in public, but I happen to know somebody who cannot eat dairy, okay? This person cannot eat dairy. And do they travel the world with Lactaid in their bag? Yes, they do. And does it help? Not all the time. Do you know what I'm saying?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            There's a way that we can accept what our body needs from us. We can work with it. Lactaid works⁠—not always, but it works, right? Wait. Hold on. I started to talk about this, and then something happened for you energetically. Do you have a weird thing with dairy, or is it completely [crosstalk]⁠—

Marie:             Truly, I'm also lactose intolerant.

Jessica:            Okay. Okay. Okay. I was like, "What is it that I just pulled up?" Okay. Great.

Marie:             It resonates.

Jessica:            So okay. It resonated too much. Okay. So hold on. Let me just see this because I want to just say that there's something that I saw happen for you energetically when I just touched on that. And it's not like⁠—I'm guessing lactose intolerance isn't the biggest of your problems in life.

Marie:             No. Yeah, no.

Jessica:            But it is⁠—it's a not-fair point.

Marie:             Yeah. It's also like that idea of⁠—you were starting to kind of talk about it where it's like working with the body and understanding and being allowed to be like, "Okay. Well, my body obviously needs this. How can I accommodate?" And that also really hit when you said that because that was the lesson I was forced to learn when I was diagnosed with endo.

Jessica:            Yeah. I'm so sorry because nobody wants to learn that fucking lesson.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Nobody wants to learn that lesson. It's a terrible lesson. What I saw happen when I just hit that point⁠—and I think it was just coincidental; again, I don't think this issue is the biggest thing⁠—was that something kind of got activated in you, and then it was almost like⁠—I've seen amoeba things do this where everything moved away. You pulled back from yourself, and then there was some mental fog that instantly hit. Did you notice that?

Marie:             Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. It's like you experience a trigger, and it's something around⁠—oh, it's around being weak. It's around being weak, you damn Leo.

Marie:             How did you know? Oh my gosh.

Jessica:            Well, I'm sitting in the triggers. I'm hanging out here with you in your triggers. And it just⁠—your kind of survival-based reaction to that is to abandon yourself, to bolt away.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            It's so instinctual that it happens spiritually. It happens physically. It happens emotionally. And then it makes your head feel foggy.

Marie:             Oh my gosh. Yes.

Jessica:            Yeah. And it can happen in any old thing. I was just talking about some nerd who uses Lactaid, and that wasn't like the deepest thing to you, but it just triggered something. And because something like that can happen ten times in a normal conversation⁠—

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            That's not even related to if you have pain, right? That's not even related to if you had a shitty time at a fucking doctor or something. You know what I mean?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Because those things can happen so much, it can mimic some of the chronic illness that you're experiencing.

Marie:             Interesting.

Jessica:            And this is because it felt so much like brain fog. I could see that. It felt like, "Oh, I can't focus. I can't figure it out." And it's emotionally demoralizing.

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            And again, this is not to replace medical common sense, obviously.

Marie:             Of course.

Jessica:            Okay. Just⁠—

Marie:             Thank you. Yes.

Jessica:            ⁠—need to emphatically say that because this is not an "instead of." It's an "and also." The kind of mental confusion or all-over-the-placeness that gets kicked off for you is a reaction to self-abandonment.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And it's happening at such a deep level that I gotta say this was modeled for you, I'm guessing by your mom.

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah, I can see that.

Jessica:            And I'm guessing that it was modeled for your mom in a much more dramatic way than it was for you by one of her parents.

Marie:             Yes. Yes. Her mom.

Jessica:            She had a very intense childhood.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And whatever happened to you, in her thinking, it was better than what she went through, so what's so bad?

Marie:             Yeah. Yes.

Jessica:            Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. Did she immigrate here?

Marie:             My great-grandparents did. Yes.

Jessica:            They're very⁠—I don't know what your background is, but they're very identified with that.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            And they brought a lot of the cultural norms with them.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Will you say for me your mom's name, her full name?

Marie:             Yes. [redacted].

Jessica:            So you mentioned that your father passed.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            I'm sorry. And were you close with him?

Marie:             No. He was my abuser.

Jessica:            I'm sorry. Did you ever get to get mad at him, to him?

Marie:             All the time.

Jessica:            Okay. Okay. I have a question for you. If you are suffering, that you can find meaning in your suffering, does that change the feeling of fairness or not-fairness?

Marie:             I guess recently that kind of happened when I realized, similarly to kind of what you were talking about where⁠—because my body had all this information, it did get me to really focus on myself. So⁠—hindsight 20/20⁠—now, I can be like, "Okay. That no longer feels so unfair," because I found the positive within that. But it still took a while to get there.

Jessica:            Fuck yeah. And also, you're allowed to not be grateful for being chronically ill. That's cool, too. It's an "and also," not a⁠—

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Okay. Now, I want to make sure I'm answering your question, but I'm going to just⁠—I'm just going to tell you what I'm being shown, okay?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            You get to let yourself off the hook. There is this way that you had to be a fire hose. It's not just that it's your nature. Some of it's fucking your nature, but some of it is a reaction to things in your epigenetics, things in your lived experience⁠⁠—both⁠, and just the fucking world, too. And you get to actually give yourself permission, if you want, to walk away from it all. There's something with you and your father. It's like your anger is the thing that connects you to him. It's your⁠—I wanted to say righteous indignation, like your certainty that you're right and that he's wrong.

Marie:             Yeah⁠—

Jessica:            Yeah. I mean⁠—

Marie:             ⁠—because that's how he was.

Jessica:            Okay. Okay. That's why I was like, "This feels like a triggering thing to say," because it's triggering. Okay. But it keeps you connected to him. It's the cords that are left between you. Those same qualities are what protected you from him psychically, in many other ways, but now, they're the cords that keep you connected. And if you were to let those cords go, I fear you might weep and weep and weep. Do you cry?

Marie:             No.

Jessica:            I didn't think so, girl. There's too much fire in you. It just burns up those tears.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah. I mean, I'm looking for the water in your chart. Oh, it's your Scorpio Rising and your Pluto in Scorpio. That's the only water in your chart.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Oh, and Chiron. Oh my God. I mean, it's just like wounds, wounds. Yeah. So do you not want to cry?

Marie:             So you remember how you said the thing about not wanting to be weak?

Jessica:      Yeah.

Marie:             Yeah. It's partly that, and it's partly because when I was a kid, I wasn't really allowed to cry. So it's both.

Jessica:            All the fucking more reason, my friend, because this re-parenting⁠—have you ever hung out with kids?

Marie:             No.

Jessica:            Oh, interesting. Do you dislike them actively?

Marie:             No. It's just that I don't really know anyone who has kids.

Jessica:            Yeah, just don't have kids in your life.

Marie:             No. Yeah.

Jessica:            That's real. That's real. Crying can be lots of different things, right? We can describe lots of different things that crying is. But one of the things that crying is is a physiological response to a buildup of energy. Let's go woo.

Marie:             Yes. See, that resonates.

Jessica:            Yeah. We can go woo.

Marie:             Woo. I'm like, "Okay. I get it."

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah. It's straight woo. It's a buildup of energy. So I just walked up a hill a couple hours ago, and I sweat, and some perspiration came out my armpit; I'm sure of it. And when emotion gets to a certain level, I'm supposed to have liquid come out of tear ducts, right? Theoretically, right? Now, all bodies are different, to be fair, but this isn't physiological limitation for you. This is a value judgment, right? If you're weak, then what? What does it mean?

Marie:             Yeah. That's a really difficult question. I never really thought about it. When I was in physical therapy, I was always sad that I was like a little baby bird. When I cry, I feel like I can't fully express myself, and that feeling of weakness⁠—not wanting to be weak, but I guess it's because it makes me vulnerable.

Jessica:            Interesting. I would contend, woo to woo, that not being able to cry is what makes you vulnerable. There is a power in vulnerability. There is great power in vulnerability. Also, there are certain of our vulnerabilities that make us more open to various forms of injury. Not being able to cry actually makes you more vulnerable to injury because what's happening is you're actively submerging, shoving down, judging, pummeling your own emotions if you're never crying. And I don't want to brag, but I don't have an easy time crying either. I have to trick myself into crying sometimes. And a good trick is a sad movie. Do you cry at sad movies?

Marie:             Not all the time, but it's funny because when I give readings to people, I tell them the same thing. I'm like, "Trick yourself with a sad film," but⁠—

Jessica:            I saw earlier that it doesn't exactly work for you.

Marie:             Yeah. No, it doesn't.

Jessica:            It doesn't exactly work for you. It could work theoretically, but what happens is you feel manipulated by the movie, and then you're like, "Nope."

Marie:             I also worked in the entertainment industry back before, and so it's hard to dissociate from it.

Jessica:            Yeah. You're just like⁠—you're too in the movie part.

Marie:             Yes. Exactly.

Jessica:            So here's the thing. We are now touching on something consciously that your survival mechanisms are not down to have us touch on. Your ability to not cry and to control and contain your own emotions is really deep in your survival mechanisms. And so I want to just acknowledge that, that we are in a territory where your flight or fight is like, "No. Fuck you."

Marie:             Yeah. It's so funny because as you're saying that, I can feel myself getting anxious.

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            I see it. It's tighter. It's activated.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And so, if we are conscientiously, intentionally, lovingly, respectfully re-parenting, then we don't push past that. Let's not push past that. Let's acknowledge your survival mechanisms really, really, really, really like it that you don't cry.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            It is a huge part of your identity. And something you said in the mix of when you were answering that question is like you don't feel like you can express yourself when you're crying.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And my first thought was like, "Why would you want to be expressing yourself all the time?" But it's because you have seven million planets in Leo. And so being seen and understood is like⁠—it's like breathing. You want those things, right?

Marie:             Yes. Yes.

Jessica:            And when you're crying, you're turned inside. And so being seen and being understood are completely irrelevant because you're not looking outside of yourself to see whether or not you're being seen.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            We're using the word "see" a lot, which is its own form of ableism, so I want to acknowledge that. But it is flowing with our conversation, so we [crosstalk].

Marie:             Thank you.

Jessica:            Yes. No, and thank you. All to say here's a practice. When you notice your survival mechanisms kicking in, acknowledge it. "I can feel my fucking survival mechanisms kicking in." Maybe you take a note⁠—not write a poem. Take a note. "Huh. Somebody mentioned Lactaid, and my survival mechanism kicked in. Okay"⁠—or whatever it is. And don't push it. Just acknowledge, "I have a boundary. I'm going to hang out and respect that boundary. I'm not going to push past it. I don't need to understand it," because a child of abuse did not get that.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            If you are going to win your own trust, if adult you gets to win the trust of survival-mechanisms you⁠—which is like little-kid you, right?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Then you have to start by doing what every little kid needs, which is respect of fucking boundaries, right?

Marie:             Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            So we can hang out there and acknowledge that there are certain ways that energy flows. When energy is flowing through a fire hose, you're really comfortable with that flow of energy. But your physiology can't sustain it. It's too much heat, right?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Right. Okay. So how can you ground that fire? How can you ground that heat, not so that you put it out⁠—because if you are a little more grounded and if you cry, you still have heat. You don't lose yourself altogether.

Marie:             Okay.

Jessica:            Does this make sense, what I'm saying?

Marie:             Yes. And it's funny because I do have a difficult time getting grounded. It's something I've been working on really hard to do, but I still struggle with it.

Jessica:            I don't know many people who don't have a hard time with this, to be honest. I mean, I'm a triple Capricorn, and I have a really hard time with it. You have a beautiful Grand Trine. Mercury, Mars, and Saturn⁠—they're all in earth signs, and they're all in this beautiful trine with each other, just making out and getting along⁠—

Marie:             Love it.

Jessica:            ⁠—in this beautiful threesome. And here's the thing about this Grand Trine. Throughout your life so far, the way that you've experienced that is, "I'm going to get shit done. I'm going to tell you what's getting done."

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            "I'm going to get shit done."

Marie:             A thousand percent.

Jessica:            Yeah. So that's the downside of all three of these planets, is, "Let me show you. Let me show you what I did." Right?

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            And so what I'm starting to kind of unveil here is that your primary mode of taking care of yourself is external.

Marie:             Yeah. Oh, and this is where a lot of that pent-up frustration of "it's not fair" comes from. With my career stuff, everything I've been doing is like, "Put it out there. Put it out there. Go, go, go. It's gotta be external. It's gotta be"⁠—and my therapist recently asked me, why can't the validation come from within? Yeah. So⁠—

Jessica:            That's the fucking question; is it not? And what is it that you do for a living?

Marie:             I'm actually a Tarot reader/pet communicator/overall psychic witch.

Jessica:            Okay.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. So wait. I don't want to get caught into career yet because⁠—

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            ⁠—it'll take us off on a whole other conversation, and we'll get shop-talky. So even saying it out loud that we do the same thing for a living⁠—it fucked you up to say it out loud. It's like you want to put it out there, and you don't.

Marie:             Oh. That's frustrating because I so do.

Jessica:            Yeah. And you don't. So okay. Why do you?

Marie:             Why do I?

Jessica:            Yeah. Why do you want to put yourself out there? Why do you want people to know about your career or whatever it is about your career that you want? Why do you want that?

Marie:             So my ultimate goal has always been inspiring people. So I used to be an artist. I loved inspiring. However, working in a studio environment where I was a cog in the wheel, I did not feel like I was actually doing that.

Jessica:            Wait. I'm going to ask a question. I'm going to interrupt you.

Marie:             Yeah. Yes, yes, yes.

Jessica:            This is one of my gifts, is interrupting. Inspiring people⁠—why?

Marie:             Why? Because I love⁠—it's inspiring through, also, education and guidance. I love seeing the "aha" moment that people get⁠—

Jessica:            Why?

Marie:             ⁠—and when something clicks⁠—

Jessica:            Okay. Wait. I'm going to keep⁠—I'm going to be obnoxious. "Aha" moment and the click.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            I mean, woo to woo, fuck yeah. But we're getting at your shit, okay? What do you get out of my "aha" moment?

Marie:             It feels like I was⁠—oh, I think I see where this is going. It feels like I was able to lift somebody up and pedestal somebody else and be like, "Oh my God. Look at you. You're amazing."

Jessica:            Okay, but what do you get out of that?

Marie:             Yeah, this is what I was afraid of.

Jessica:            Do you have theories? Do you have any theories?

Marie:             No.

Jessica:            Okay. Okay. So okay. When you give me my "aha" moment, there's lots of this that is like⁠—I mean, we don't need to pathologize all of this. I want to be really clear. There's a lot of this that is clean and beautiful, but then there's the part that's trauma, right?

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            It's when somebody else looks at you and says, "You've done me so right. Thank you so much. Aha."

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Then they're saying you're okay. You're good. Leo. Leo stuff.

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah. It's the external validation.

Jessica:            It's external validation that you are capable of lifting me up.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            I kept on hearing, for the last few days, "Lifted me up from perdition." I had to look up what perdition is. Is perdition like⁠—I think it means hell or something like that.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            It's something I probably heard from a sci-fi show. It's not something I know. But it's this thing of like⁠—it's heavenly on some level. Some of this is really related to religious trauma, I think, for you because⁠—

Marie:             Wow.

Jessica:            ⁠—it is like if you can pull you up, then what does that mean about me? I must be good if I can help you be better. So, if your circumstances, if⁠—whether we're talking about your physical health or⁠—I don't know⁠—figuring out how to get clients or whatever it is that is the thing, right⁠—are stopping you from thriving, then I have to agree with your shrink, annoyingly: why not focus on the internal development and allow the energetic ripple to do its work? Somebody asked me the other day about when throwing Tarot cards⁠—do you fuck with Tarot as well?

Marie:             Oh yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. So they asked me something to the effect of, "When I throw Tarot cards, how do cards know what position to place themselves in, like if I'm doing a Celtic cross or some sort of larger reading?" And I was just like, "You are overthinking it, girl." The Universe⁠—you focus on the question. Let the Universe do the rest because the Universe is here to do the thing, or your guides or whatever we want to call it. You believe that wholeheartedly until it comes to you.

Marie:             Oh. I mean, I feel seen, but I also feel "ick" because this is literally what I was telling my therapist, is when I do spell work for myself, when I do divination for myself, when I meditate and connect with my guides, for me, I tell myself, "Oh my gosh. I'm crazy. There's something wrong with me"⁠—yada, yada, yada. It's not true. But when I do it for other people and I see them light up, I'm like, "Obviously, this is something."

Jessica:            So what this does is it gives you⁠—imagine that we as practitioners⁠—and this also goes for artists, and it goes for every-fucking-body, but we're talking about⁠—we happen to be practitioners, right? You have a container, right? You have this container, and this container can hold a lot for a lot of people. And what you've done is really reinforced the front of the container. It's fucking gorgeous, girl. It is sparkly. It is a beautiful container. But the bottom isn't very strong, so it can't take too much weight because that weight relies on your relationship to you.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So disgusting. I know.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            I fucking hate it. I'm with you. I'm meant to do the work on myself, for myself, so that I'm healthier and happier, but also so that my container that allows me to hold energy with and for others is substantively stronger. And there's no way of getting that without practicing that, and nobody is naturally good at that. Nobody is naturally good at that. It is fucking effort and labor. And for those of us from trauma, for those of us with chronic ailments, for those of us who have any fucking inkling about how fucking tragically unfair life is⁠—because it is objectively unfair, for sure⁠—the work is to be able to practice the very things you want to uphold others to practice

Marie:             Oh. Okay. Yeah, that definitely resonates.

Jessica:            It's grody.

Marie:             Yes, but⁠—

Jessica:            It's grody.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            And I would say that's what's in your way. And I would say that's what's in your way because you have North Node at the IC. So the way to recognition⁠—Leo⁠—fame⁠—Leo⁠—power⁠—Leo⁠—is not through your South Node.

Marie:             Okay.

Jessica:            It's never going to be through your South Node, which means it's not through your Midheaven⁠—

Marie:             Okay.

Jessica:            ⁠—which doesn't mean you don't get a career. Let me be clear. It doesn't mean you don't get a career. It means there's⁠—I think Martin Schulman⁠—have you read books on the Nodes at all?

Marie:             One, a long time ago.

Jessica:            Okay. There's an astrologer named Martin Schulman who has a book about the Nodes, and he's kind of a dick astrologer. I mean, he's a good astrologer, but it's kind of like proceed with caution before reading a book by him.

Marie:             Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jessica:            But I believe it was him who said something to the effect of having the North Node in Leo is like being a beautiful flower, and there's only one of you. And having it in Aquarius is being an orchid in a field of orchids. It's being beautiful and connected and not needing to be the only one. Does that make sense?

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            So to do that North Node justice is⁠—and I wouldn't be fixating on this, but it feels like that's what we're here to talk about. So, to be able to do it justice, it's to tap in. It's to self-care. You don't get to have a North Node in your fourth house/conjunct your IC and not cry. I'm sorry. That is not one of your⁠—I mean, that's just not what your soul wants from you. So it's an evolutionary issue. It's not a cry/don't cry⁠—it's not a weak/strong issue. It's giving yourself permission to re-parent yourself. And the only way to re-parent yourself is to engage with your inner child. And children cry as a form of communication.

Marie:             Interesting. Yeah. Okay.

Jessica:            I want to just kind of bring you back to energy. If you are⁠—oh, I don't know, honoring the needs of your physiology, giving yourself the gift of being sad and mad, of being happy when you're happy but not needing to be happy all the fucking time⁠—giving yourself the gift of practicing healthy boundaries in relationship to yourself and requiring others to respect your boundaries⁠—if you do all of these things, it's not like every time you do that thing, a new client calls you, and it's like, "Hey."

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            But what it does for you is it has this ripple effect. And that ripple effect is not a fire hose. So, if we look at the symbology of Leo, it's a fucking little spermy dude. Spermy dude. He just goes swimming.

Marie:             I will never unsee that.

Jessica:            I'm so sorry if you didn't already see that. It is what it is, though.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            It is what it is, though. Yeah.

Marie:             It totally is.

Jessica:            It's a sperm. It's a sperm. So it's like when a sperm⁠—you know, they're all over the damn place. But what is Aquarius? Look at the symbol for Aquarius. It's electricity. It's energy flowing out.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And I wonder if you've already had experience with this where you have a wave where you really tap in, and you do some spiritual work, and you really kind of do some healing work, and then things start to flow to you professionally or in whatever part of your life.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            You have experienced this?

Marie:             Oh yes.

Jessica:            Because that's how your life works. So, if you walk around beating the drum, all you find is you're alone with the drum.

Marie:             Yes. That's the best way to describe that, because that's exactly what it feels like.

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah. It's what it looks like astrologically. And if you instead allow yourself to hang out with your drum, but the other instruments too, and you close the door⁠—maybe you lock the door, but you keep an ear out in case somebody knocks or rings the bell or whatever. The energy just flows to you because when you do the work you do, whether it's creative art or esoteric arts, and you're doing it to be seen and validated, when you're doing it for somebody else's "aha" moment because their "aha" moment validates your very existence⁠—when those things happen, you're reinjuring yourself. And there's no energy in that. So your guides are going to protect you from having too many clients. They're going to protect you from having too many people see your posts.

Marie:             That makes a lot of sense. And that's very frustrating.

Jessica:            Oh yeah. It's super fucking annoying, my friend. It is so annoying. So here. This is part of why I asked you early in the conversation, if you have a sense of meaning, does it help? Because there is a meaning. Every time you try to use a fire hose and it backfires, there's a meaning. The meaning is try a different instrument. It's not there's something wrong with your fire hose. That's not it. This is true for all humans, but I think especially for those of us with stelliums, with heavy concentration of planets. And you've got a massive stellium in Leo, and then you got three planets in Capricorn and two in Scorpio. I mean, diversified? No.

                        Okay. So what happens is you learn early on in life, when you're little, how you can survive in life, what you can do to be okay. And then, when you develop no other tools because those tools are so reliable⁠—

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            ⁠—then, eventually, when life serves you your ass, you're like, "Oh fuck. I have no other resources." Right?

Marie:             Uh-huh.

Jessica:            Yeah. And so, when life serves you your ass⁠—which is a weird expression I don't know why I'm saying, but I'll repeat it⁠—

Marie:             It makes sense. I get it, though.

Jessica:            Okay. Thank you. Thank you. It's an invitation. It's an invitation for you to practice using another tool. And when it comes to this feeling of "it's not fair," you're right. I mean, I have to bring it back to your center question. Yeah, it's for sure not fair. Life is not fair.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            I'm never going to disagree with anyone who says that. Life is grotesquely unfair.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So what? I mean, I genuinely don't know what the answer to "So what?" is. I genuinely don't know. And there is something about all that beautiful fire in your chart that can make you feel like you should have the best, and if you do your best, you will have the best.

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            That's amazing. I mean, I think a lot of my earthy friends will be like, "What? What does that mean?" You know what I mean? Like, "I don't have that feeling." That's a great feeling to have. And it's a feeling that you can return to. It comes back to that kind of religious trauma thing we touched on. If we really believe that, then when we look at people in Gaza, when we look at people with debilitating illnesses, when we look at people⁠—whatever⁠—who are suffering, not by their own hand or their own fault, there's this inherent judgment and belief that on some level, they must have done something to deserve it. And that's not true.

Marie:             It's funny that you say that, because when it comes to me⁠—and when I found out that I had endo, I immediately went to, "What did I do to deserve this?" But when it comes to seeing what's going on, like the examples that you gave, I'm like, "That's so not fair because they didn't deserve that."

Jessica:            Correct.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So here's the thing. Whether you're doing woo work for a living or not, part of why I'm always saying that we embody the North Node from 40 on is because it takes a long fucking time to get to a place where you can actually integrate the things you understand. So you know mentally⁠—you know that bad things happen to good people.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Life is not fair or symmetrical. You don't know it emotionally.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            You don't, because your coping mechanism for trauma when you were a child was to be able to make the world make sense, and you were going to be a good person, and that was going to be a bad person, and you were going to make it work from there. Does that⁠—

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Marie:             Oh yeah.

Jessica:            And so, if we take that coping mechanism away from that little kid part of you, then you're left with what that little kid felt, which was like crying and never stopping, which we've established is not happening today.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah. And I want to just acknowledge, okay, so in that moment, when I just said that, your survival mechanisms let you feel the sadness, right?

Marie:             Actually, my heart got real heavy.

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry. And this is why you don't feel it, because this is terrible; am I right? You don't want to feel this. This is a terrible fucking feeling. I mean, you know me. I'm constantly encouraging people to feel terrible, and it's because the only way through it is through it. It's not over it or around it or building a cement cave to encase it, which is kind of what you've done, or a fire cave around it or whatever. Your survival mechanism let you feel a little bit of that sadness because you didn't push it earlier in the conversation because you let it come to you.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And when we get off our reading, you're likely to feel tired because that's like a coping mechanism for sad, right?

Marie:             Oh yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. Let yourself feel sad. Let yourself feel tired. Don't judge it. But also, your adult self can be like, "Oh, I know that this is usually a sign that underneath, it is sad. I'm not pushing sad. I'm not pushing it down. I'm not pushing it to the surface. I'm not doing anything. I'm acknowledging that adult me knows something that the biggest part of me doesn't yet know."

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Okay. The fog in your head is kind of coming back. Are you feeling that?

Marie:             A little bit.

Jessica:            Yeah. Okay. So that means we're pushing a little too hard. So we just want to kind of acknowledge that. And again, there's nothing you need to do. But we're just acknowledging, okay, tracking the subtle shifts that happen inside of you is just a good way to be a better friend. And whether we're talking about spiritual healing or the chronic condition that you have that has⁠—I mean, healing is⁠—it's not like you're getting to an end where it's like no more endo, right?

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            That's not the thing. And can it go away? Is that a thing that can randomly happen for people?

Marie:             Not that I know of.

Jessica:            Okay. I'm sorry. That fucking sucks.

Marie:             Thanks.

Jessica:            Yeah. That sucks. So okay. Hold on. All that healing⁠—it's just slow.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            It's really, really slow. It's exceptionally slow. And everything that's slow happens at the pace of emotions, which is why you fucking hate slow, because it's very⁠—

Marie:             I do hate slow.

Jessica:            Yeah. You hate slow.

Marie:             Yeah. It's the worst.

Jessica:            Yeah. You deeply hate slow. And so, the next time that you are fuzzy head, sad, or tired⁠—we're just calling all these kind of different ways of your system expressing sadness⁠—I'm going to give you the homework to practice (a) notice, noticing that it happens, and then (b) asking yourself, "Is there something my system needs?" And if there's no clear, immediate answer, move on. Notice it. Ask yourself, "Do I need something?" Okay? So I want to give you those two steps.

                        Now, I know you asked about fairness, and I want to make sure I'm speaking to that. But I feel called to talk to your career for a minute.

Marie:             Yeah. Sure.

Jessica:            Is that okay? Okay.

Marie:             Oh, absolutely.

Jessica:            In terms of the career, is what you want to do in the entertainment field? Do you want to have a show or something like that? Or is it more one-on-one client work, or something else?

Marie:             At the moment, it's one-on-one client work, and I'm really, really hoping to publish a book⁠—

Jessica:            Okay.

Marie:             ⁠—because I love teaching.

Jessica:            Yeah. And have you written the book already?

Marie:             Yeah, it's almost⁠—the manuscript is almost done.

Jessica:            Congratulations. That's awesome.

Marie:             Thank you.

Jessica:            Here's the fucking rub. Other people's energy lights you up and fills you up, right?

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            You love it.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Leo. Leo, Leo, Leo. Okay. Okay. But here's the other fucking thing. It drains you, it exhausts you, and sometimes it harms you. Have you noticed this?

Marie:             It can happen. I wouldn't say all the time, but⁠—

Jessica:            Sometimes?

Marie:             Sometimes.

Jessica:            Rarely or sometimes?

Marie:             I guess it depends on the situation. If I were to be working a major event, yeah, I'm extremely tired. I know how to shield. I know how to release it. But it still is a lot. But when I do one-on-ones from home, at a shop, it's not a problem.

Jessica:            It's not a problem. Okay.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So here's what I'm not⁠—I don't want to create a problem. I don't want to create a problem, but this is what I'm not sure about. What I'm seeing is that it is cumulatively a problem for you that your system deals with inflammation, which⁠—I'm assuming you know a lot about the effects of inflammation on your physiology, right?

Marie:             Oh yes. Yes.

Jessica:            What I'm seeing happens with client work, one-on-one client work⁠—because I agree. Big events obvi is guaranteed to tap you.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            But this one-on-one stuff⁠—you doing a session lights you up. Doing another session lights you up. Doing another session⁠ lights you up. Each individual session lights you up, but the cumulative impact once you're home alone is⁠—it looks like you get top-heavy. So back to my metaphor about⁠—like, your container is so shiny and beautiful on the outside, but the contrast is too deep to what's happening at the root inside of you. Does it⁠—because I don't want to create a problem if it's not there. So does that actually match up with your experience?

Marie:             I definitely get it because, like I said, there are times where I come home and I'm just like⁠—I don't want to do anything at all, even though I had a wonderful day and I had amazing clients and everything was fantastic. But by the end of the day, I'm just like⁠—I just want to turn my brain off.

Jessica:            100 percent. 100 percent. And there's nothing wrong or bad about that. So you have a value judgment. I can feel it in your system. You have a value judgment: "If I don't love it all the time⁠—fire hose on⁠—then that's somehow like I don't love my clients or I don't love my work or I shouldn't be doing the work." You are allowed to have a full range of emotion.

                        When I do one reading in a day, I'm generally fine. When I do more than one reading in a day, generally, it has an effect on me. That's okay. That doesn't mean I don't love doing readings or that I'm doing a bad job. That's okay. I want to just hold space⁠—oh, you are so messy with this. Okay. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on.

Marie:             I can tell you why I think I'm messy with it.

Jessica:            Yes. Yes.

Marie:             So, back when I was an artist, I thought, "This is me. This is who I am. It's my entire identity." And then the rug was pulled out from under me, and suddenly I couldn't do it anymore. I can't do it anymore. And there's a part of me that's afraid that someone's going to come in and tell me, "Well, you shouldn't or can't do what you love as a reader, as a psychic witch."

Jessica:            That makes sense. That makes sense. Okay. Good news/bad news, okay?

Marie:             Oh no.

Jessica:            Good news is nobody's telling you that. Bad news is, for as long as you hold this issue in, "Fire hose on/fire hose off," "I can or I can't," "It's fair or it's not"⁠—as long as you hold it in those ways, again, everything is pointed outside of you, which will eventually fucking just drain your coffer, just drain your coffer. The reason why healing work is good work for you is because you love doing it and you're good at it. The reason why it's bad for you is because it forces you to heal yourself. That's actually what's good for you, but it's⁠—

Marie:             No, I was going to say⁠—

Jessica:            Do you know what I mean?

Marie:             No, yeah.

Jessica:            You know what I mean, though, right?

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            It's like you signed up for it, but none of us who signed up for it are excited about the fucking assignment.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            That's ridiculous. Who wants to do that? And so I'm going to give you an assignment.

Marie:             I love it.

Jessica:            I think you can do this for six months, but if six months feels like too long, do this for three months. And if three months feels like too long, do it for one month. Okay?

Marie:             Okay.

Jessica:            Again, consent from your system. You are not a bully. You're not trying to be your own mean man, right?

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            Consent from your system. Decide that for⁠—let's say six months, but it can be as short as you want it to be. Every time you think about your career and success and getting more clients or whatever the fuck it is⁠—getting published or whatever it is⁠—you're going to say to yourself, "I'm going to let the Universe use its divine discretion. I'm going to let the Universe take care of it"⁠—whatever you want to call, whatever you want to call it, right?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Whatever words work. But, "I'm going to let the Universe take care of that for the next six months, for the next month, and all I'm going to focus on is showing up when I show up for other people and, when I'm not with other people, showing up for myself." And then actually fucking practice showing up for yourself.

Marie:             Yeah. The hardest part.

Jessica:            Yeah. That's the hardest part. Yeah. Exactly. So that's my homework for you because what I imagine will happen by the end of six months of doing that is you will be really fucking different. You will be really different, and you will see that there's this different way that energy flows in your life, that actually, when you have a lot of clients, it's because you have the energy. And when you don't have as many clients, it's because you actually don't have the fucking energy for it. And that doesn't mean you've done something wrong, actually.

Marie:             I need to hear that.

Jessica:            Yeah. That doesn't mean that you've done something wrong.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            It means maybe that something that got⁠—like have you noticed that when you're doing client sessions, that everyone comes in with the same issue back to back to back?

Marie:             Uh-huh. Oh yeah.

Jessica:            Yeah. That happens. And a lot of times, it's a reflection on something that you just worked on, that you have to work on⁠—

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            ⁠—that you're working on now. Okay. So what your guides do is they're like, "Learn it. Now go integrate it." And you're like, "No, no, no, no, no. I just want to keep on learning it. I don't want to integrate it. Let me just learn it."

Marie:             I love learning.

Jessica:            Yeah. Exactly. Ninth-house stellium. And your North Node at the bottom of your chart is like, "No. You have to emotionally integrate it."

Marie:             So then let me ask you, when you talk about integrating it⁠—because I'm so stuck in the "I learned it. Ta-da."

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah.

Marie:             So could you please describe a little more⁠—

Jessica:            Yeah. What integration is?

Marie:             ⁠—what it means to integrate? Yes.

Jessica:            Okay. So you learned, as an example, bad things happen to good people, that when a client comes in and they've suffered through childhood abuse and they have a chronic illness and they're fucked up financially, there's no part of you mentally, emotionally, on any level, that's like, "Oh yeah? What's wrong with this person? They're a real fuck-up." There's no part of that that comes up for you.

Marie:             No.

Jessica:            You laughed. You literally laughed because you learned it. You know it. You even believe it⁠—

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            ⁠—for them.

Marie:             Oh yeah.

Jessica:            Because you haven't integrated that knowledge as deep as your roots, you don't believe it for you.

Marie:             Okay.

Jessica:            You generally do not believe it for you.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So the adult part of you believes it. The adult part of you, I'm seeing⁠—it's right around the solar plexus. It's right in the middle of your solar plexus.

Marie:             That physically also aligns with a lot of my issues. So yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            Oh, I bet. Oh, I bet. So what happens is all this trauma is at this lower part of you.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            You haven't integrated it, and you don't want to because that part of you, that little kid part of you, a.k.a. your survival mechanisms, rested everything on, "I am a fucking fire hose. I will overcome it.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            "You can't put me down. I will take control."

Marie:             Yes. I'll prove you wrong. I'll do it.

Jessica:            Yeah. Right. "I'll prove you wrong." And so, if we were to say to that part of you, "It wasn't your fault. It was awful. You are not the one who has to fix it. You should have been protected"⁠—even just starting to say this, you can feel there's a lot of emotion. There's a lot of sadness. And then there's like a swirling inside of you to want to rear up and protect you from those feelings, yeah?

Marie:             I actually got teary-eyed when⁠—and I was like, "No, no."

Jessica:            Yeah. But that's⁠—it's good. I'm glad. I'm glad. It's really useful, it's really powerful⁠—it's not weak⁠—to be able to understand how resourceful you were when you needed to be resourceful. And those skills are skills that work for you as an adult.

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            But the convictions you hold for yourself are the convictions of a child who is not being taken care of.

Marie:             Yeah. That makes sense.

Jessica:            Yeah. And that means they're not as bright as the rest of you⁠—

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            ⁠—because they're like, "It's my toy. You're bad. I'll kick you in the face." Right?

Marie:             Mm-hmm.

Jessica:            It's very animal-brains-styles because it's little kid stuff.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And so you can't intellectually reason with your inner child. Nobody can.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Nobody can.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            We can only nurture, support, and protect our inner child, provide for it, and then create more space because the truth is that this part that I keep on talking about is your inner child or your survival mechanism⁠—in your day-to-day, it doesn't feel to you like a part. It feels to you like that's your whole self, and the other parts are little parts. The part of you that can go out and take care of other people and all these things⁠—those are parts, but this thing in you that can't cry, that must keep on going, that must go strong⁠—that's the whole you. That's what it feels like.

Marie:             Oh. Yeah. It's funny because I feel like that's the part I dissociate from, disconnect from.

Jessica:            It's interesting. You do, and yet, when it comes to you, it's the only⁠—where you know how to plug in that fire hose.

Marie:             It's true.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So that dissociating from it is just it. It's, "There's something wrong with me if I feel wrong, so I'm going to dissociate from feeling wrong."

Marie:             That's exactly how it feels.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Marie:             And that's practically what I tell myself.

Jessica:            Yeah. So, the next time you hear yourself saying it in whatever words you say it, be like, "Oh. Actually, that's my survival mechanism. I don't actually believe that," and not to then push yourself past that⁠—to be like, "Oh. Empathy for myself⁠—because I am telling myself some terribly mean bullshit that I would never say to anyone that I like."

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            You wouldn't even say it to someone you don't like.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            You wouldn't even think it to someone you don't like.

Marie:             It's true.

Jessica:            Yeah. You're not mean-spirited that way, except for to yourself.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And it's not that you're mean-spirited towards yourself, although that is your behavior. It is the behavior of a mean-spirited person because it's that interjected perpetrator, right? To survive a dangerous parent, you have to become dangerous yourself, right?

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            And so it isn't fair. It isn't fair. I want to come back to the center of your question. It isn't fair, but it also is. And if it is, you get to grieve that it isn't fair. You get to grieve that there is a part of you that believes that life is symmetrical and that good things happen to good people, and you thought you were a good person, so how come such bad things happened? And you also get to re-parent yourself because you actually know better. The human condition is⁠—it's a crumbly, messy place. The only thing every human does is die. Fuck. What? That's fucked up. You know what I mean?

Marie:             Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica:            You know. Have you ever had a client that didn't have a mess of issues?

Marie:             Yeah. No. No. Yeah.

Jessica:            That's not a thing. We're people, right?

Marie:             Exactly.

Jessica:            We're people. And so giving yourself permission to be who you are and where you are, to grieve the things that you're sad about, and to also be a powerful, vibrant person in the ways that you are⁠—you get to "and also" all of it. One doesn't cost the other. Your survival mechanism will say, "If I start to feel sad, if I start to grieve, I will lose myself in these feelings, and I will never find myself again." And that's because you were told that on some level, to some extent, right?

Marie:             Yes. Yeah.

Jessica:            But you actually know⁠—you know that's not true. Adult you knows.

Marie:             Yeah, logically.

Jessica:            Yeah. Sure. Sure. Sure.

Marie:             Yeah. Hard to apply.

Jessica:            Right. So the integration is slowly, slowly, over the course of time, practicing being slightly different in response to your emotions and your thoughts. It's your fucking least favorite thing in the whole entire universe⁠—slowly, slowly, over time, validating that⁠—okay. I don't know if you've ever seen this or fucked with this kind of art, but in the '70s, a very popular thing in art was like these light boxes were there would be painting on glass, and then there would be a painting on a paper, and they were supposed to set it in a window, like near a window, so that when the light changed, it looked like the paint on the glass would cast different shadows. Have you ever seen this kind of art?

Marie:             No. That's so cool.

Jessica:            I'm '70s obsessed. But what I'm trying to get at here is, my very, very, very, very Leo friend, light is not just a fire hose. Light shifts. And as it shifts, it casts different shadows. And shadows are your friend. Shadows are where we stick our pain, but we don't get shadow without light. And someone like you with a whole motherfucking load of light⁠—you're going to have shadow.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            You're going to have shadow. So how can you practice integrating being present with that shadow as a way to actually make room for more light? Because you're not going to do shadow work to such an extent where you don't have a shadow anymore.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            That's not the point, right?

Marie:             Yes. Oh yeah.

Jessica:            And it's not like you're going to be such a bright light that you don't cast a shadow.

Marie:             Yeah. Oh, absolutely.

Jessica:            That's not the point.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So, if your life's work is digging around in other people's shadows but you avoid your own, your guides are going to stop you.

Marie:             Interesting. Okay.

Jessica:            Yeah. It's annoying.

Marie:             No, but it makes sense.

Jessica:            Yeah.

Marie:             I think my, now, question is how to prevent myself from logic-ing through it because when I do any kind of paperwork, I'm like, "Let's grab the journal. Let's think about it and write it out."

Jessica:            Okay. So I'm not going to tell you meditate, because meditate isn't necessarily inherently feeling, anyways.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So⁠—heart. I don't know what feels more resonant for you, if it's your chest, the heart chakra, or if it's the solar plexus, which is more like Leo vibes. Whichever one you feel more comfortable with, or you can put your hand over both before you do your journaling, and then again after you do your journaling. You are going to sit and breathe and notice your body and feel your feelings. If you actually notice your body, you will have no problem feeling feelings. You did it instantly just now, okay? And I see that this is what happens.

                        If you actually just slow down and receive your body, your emotions are right there. So, when I'm not here and when you're not at the tail end of a reading, it's going to be harder sometimes. That's fine. Sometimes you'll do it, and nothing will be there, and that's fine. You're not going to be an abusive perpetrator to yourself. You're not going to force something. You're just going to notice, "Okay. I'm having a hard time checking with my system. Do I want to try to sit a little longer, or do I want to go to writing?"

I am telling you to titrate, to make tiny baby steps. I am not telling you to move fast, because it won't work, first of all, because moving fast is your trauma, actually. It's your trauma response to trauma. The trauma was coming at you fast.

Marie:        Yes.

Jessica:      And your response was to get faster, right?

Marie:        Yeah.

Jessica:      And so speed is your best coping mechanism, but it's also your trauma.

Marie:        Oh, I really needed to hear that. That's going to stick with me for a while.

Jessica:      Okay. Good. Good.

Marie:        That'll help me slow down.

Jessica:            Good. I'm so glad. And so, as you soothe that inflammation, you give your system more options. That's all⁠. More resources. And so here's the other thing that I didn't mention. Pluto is going to start opposing your Moon, I think, next month. And it will then oppose your Venus after that. And then it'll sit on your North Node, and then it'll oppose your Midheaven. So you're in fucking Pluto, okay?

Marie:             Okay.

Jessica:            Which is not a reason to be frightened. It's a reason why you got this reading at this moment, because you are healing. Pluto heals. It asks us to release what doesn't serve us. I'm a liar⁠—it doesn't ask; it demands. But you will practice asking you, right?

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            [crosstalk] demands. And what is possible in this transit is so many different things, but in the context of what's going on with you, you can emerge from this really nice, like a nice person to yourself. You could actually emerge from this being kind to yourself and having enough energy in yourself⁠—not for other people. I'm not talking about for other people. [indiscernible 01:10:48] energy for other people even when you're really fucked up. I'm talking about having enough energy for yourself so that when you do something that's out of alignment, you actually feel it, and you don't need your body to scream at you to get you⁠—

Marie:             Yes. Oh my gosh. It's so true, though, because that's exactly what happens.

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah. I see that. You just burn it to the ground, and then you're like, "Ouch. It's hot."

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            The Pluto transits are meant to be transformational. And so, if you try to do the same thing you've already been doing, that you already know doesn't work, then you're not transforming, right? Transformation⁠—it's alchemical, and it requires a new way of engaging.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            What I was just seeing⁠—and I wasn't looking for it; it just came in⁠—is that you have this way of doing energy boundaries with other people that are very Ace of Wands. They're very fire-hosey, okay?

Marie:             Yeah. Uh-huh.

Jessica:            And it's actually fucking you up.

Marie:             Oh.

Jessica:            It works. It works, but you're burning through your own essential energy to do it.

Marie:             Interesting. Okay.

Jessica:            Yeah. So I'm curious if you could practice⁠—do you like watching videos? Is this why I keep on wanting to get you to watch documentaries?

Marie:             No, I love informational documentaries.

Jessica:            Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Okay, about how the roots of trees talk to each other.

Marie:             Oh, I love that.

Jessica:            About animals that somehow live in symbiosis with the dirt and the earth. I want you to find documentary things about how plants actually talk to each other, but humans can't hear them.

Marie:             This is all stuff I'm very into.

Jessica:            Okay. Good.

Marie:             And I'm like, "Why haven't I watched this before?"

Jessica:            Okay. Good. Good, because you're going to be showing yourself energetic ways of connecting to the earth and grounding and having boundaries that way instead of doing it through fire.

Marie:             It's so funny because, literally, my shield is made of fire.

Jessica:            I can see that. I can see that.

Marie:             That's wild. Yeah.

Jessica:            And you're burning yourself up.

Marie:             Interesting.

Jessica:            You have this one really powerful tool, so why wouldn't you use it for everything all the time? That's fair logic. But your system is saying, "Too much fire."

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            How do you get that grounding, right?

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And so, when I learned that trees talk to each other through their roots, I got real fucking happy. And so watch a bunch of documentaries about that. You know what I mean? Or TikToks or whatever the fuck it is, so that you can get more information and have that data easy to pull. And then practice different kinds of boundaries and see how you feel at the end of the day and the end of the week.

Marie:             Interesting. Okay. I love that.

Jessica:            They're all slower.

Marie:             They are.

Jessica:            Yeah. When I figured out that the way I was doing mediumship/talking to dead people was the quickest way, but it was destroying my body⁠—I started to get lots of health problems from it⁠—I was so bummed. And I was so bummed, and then I had to learn a new way of doing it where the information came to me a lot slower.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            And it drove me nuts. But you know what? Nobody I was giving readings to could tell the difference.

Marie:             That really helps me to hear that⁠—

Jessica:            Yeah. Yeah.

Marie:             ⁠—because that was my fear.

Jessica:            Of course. What feels slow to you is not going to necessarily seem slow to the client. And also, there was lots of times during our reading where I had to slow down, and I was just quiet or I was searching, searching, searching, searching.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            I was that spinning wheel of doom on the computer screen. And did it bug you?

Marie:             No.

Jessica:            No. You just saw how much I cared and I was trying.

Marie:             That's exactly the vibe I got⁠—

Jessica:            Correct. You're right.

Marie:             ⁠—which is funny because when I give readings, I tend to talk very fast. I get really hot.

Jessica:            Ditto. Ditto. But learning that you get to take the space you need to really dig in there and see what you're seeing⁠—I know it feels like, "Ahh"⁠—because as I was taking the space, I kept on being like, "Hold on. Hold on. Hold on." You didn't need me to say that. I needed me to say that, because I'm like, "I need to be going faster."

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            I work with electricity instead of fire. Same fucking problem, though. It's the same problem, is that my drive to go really fast is not about you or your needs; it's about me and my bullshit. Right? And it's the same thing for you.

Marie:             Yes.

Jessica:            And so trust that. When a practitioner is working with you and they're taking the space they need to self-care, to get a little deeper, to see what they're seeing, that didn't fuck you up. That didn't hurt your feelings.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            It's only annoying when you don't feel like the person is trying, right? When I'm, like, distracted in some way. But that's not you. That's not you. You have a lot of things if we wanted to look for problems you have, but being distracted during a reading is not one of your things.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            So, again, this is where I want to just kind of bring you back. Now, I know that the question was about things not being fair, and that's not really what we focused on. But do you feel like we kind of answered it one way or another?

Marie:             I feel like everything that we talked about actually is the root cause for why I feel like things are not fair for me in my personal life. And I feel like if I start changing that internal⁠—on the personal level, the external will become a lot easier to flow with.

Jessica:            I agree. Yay. Yay. Yay. We did it.

Marie:             We did it. I love it.

Jessica:            I'm so glad we got to do it.

Marie:             Thank you. This is literally a dream come true. I'm not kidding when I say that I felt a complete shift just talking to you and getting this reading and how excited I am to slow down and focus on me for once.

Jessica:            Yay. Congratulations. That makes me so happy. And also, if that excitement doesn't last, don't worry about it.

Marie:             Yeah.

Jessica:            Slow is the worst, but also, yay excitement, and also, as it ebbs and flows⁠—

Marie:             Absolutely. Thank you so much, Jessica.