🦉 A Portent at the Threshold

Today, I experienced what felt like a very strong portent: a small screech owl had entered my sister’s house and was perching on one of her paintings when we returned from an unsuccessful trip on snow-filled roads. We had just left to go visit our 97 year-old mother at the rehab center (5 weeks ago, she fell and broke her hip), but were forced to turn around, thwarted by dangerous road conditions. This little beauty had come down through the chimney just minutes after my sister had turned off the gas fireplace.

🌙 Listening When the World Says “Trust your Intuition”

Being the curious seeker that I am, I looked up the esoteric meaning of seeing an owl during the day. What came up was a powerful wake-up call, the need to slow down, to pay attention to my surroundings, to use discernment and trust my intuition.

🌿 A Dream in Living Color

I don’t usually remember my dreams, at least not long enough to be able to tell them to somebody. This dream, however, was very vivid, even if it was just a snippet. My first husband, an ethnobotanist, was walking ahead of me and mentioned the plant that I was seeing in front of me, a vivid carpet of green leaves. Everything in the dream except for the leaves was black and white, but those leaves… the most incredible green I have ever seen.

He said it was “Oregano”, but he described the taste (he taught me to always taste plants for identification) as “Cocculus”, a term I was unfamiliar with. I tasted it, and it definitely had the flavor of Oregano. The term he used intrigued me, and I remembered it when I woke up.

🌱 When Symbol Becomes Medicine

When I told my sister about the dream, she suggested I look up the term “cocculus”, which I did. Incredibly, it was right there: “Cocculus indicus”, a plant that is also a homeopathic remedy, that treats motion sickness, nausea, dizziness and vertigo caused by fatigue. These are all symptoms experienced by our mother, which may have caused her to fall, leading to the fracture of her femur.

🔥 The Return of the Light: Leo Full Moon, Imbolc, and Candlemas

Needless to say, I ordered the remedy. I feel this story illustrates the energies of this particular time: full Moon in Leo, Imbolc and Candlemas, the return of the light. Imbolc and Candlemas both celebrate the half-way point between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, with the promise that winter will soon be over, at least in the Northern Hemisphere. This year, the full Moon in Leo is occurring very close to these important calendrical milestones, underscoring the importance of finding our personal light within, when the conditions on the outside may seem bleak and unforgiving, all in the dead of the winter.

🕯️ Reigniting the Inner Flame

Last night, I dreamed I was lighting candles and helping a young woman find her way. Perhaps this full moon in Leo is helping me to reconnect with my inner light, which felt somewhat dimmed until recently, when I made a few important decisions about my life. Perhaps I am showing myself the way…

🌍 The Collective Mirror: Leo, Aquarius, and the Question of Sovereignty

Looking at this full Moon from a mundane perspective, it would be easy to interpret the recent unrest, whether in Minnesota or the Middle East, as the manifestation of the alignment of celestial movements. Not that these movements are the “cause” of anything - rather, what we see happening is the physical manifestation of the energetic alignments we are witnessing.

The full Moon in Leo opposite five planets in Aquarius speaks of the ongoing battle between “Authority” and “the People”, and the difficulty in joining forces to resist oppression because of the division that was sown amongst us years ago. It’s not about Left vs. Right. This is a spiritual battle, an opportunity to find unity that is presenting itself in a very powerful way, as several cycles are ending and new ones beginning simultaneously.

The stellium in Aquarius made up of all the personal planets except for the Moon (of course: she is opposing them in Leo) plus Pluto, is the representation of our identity, our will, our values, our reason and the ability to transform or transmute all of them in service to a higher good. How can we use our sovereignty to reunite the parts of ourselves that have been splintered and damaged by abuse and separation? What techniques or services do we have access to, that have the potential to bring these parts back into alignment within ourselves? Meditation, spiritual practices, plant medicines, ritual, prayer, yoga… all of these are valuable and can be used towards integration and wholeness.

♒ Reclaiming Wholeness in a Time of Fragmentation

At times like this—when personal stories, ancestral threads, and collective movements seem to echo one another—it becomes clear that healing does not happen in isolation. We are shaped by forces both seen and unseen, and often what we are being asked to do is not to push forward, but to listen more deeply to what is already speaking through us.

Much of the work I do through Crystal Constellations lives in this quiet space of listening. It offers a way to see the hidden patterns influencing our lives—personal, familial, and systemic—without forcing change or re-living the past. When the field is allowed to reveal itself, something often softens, reorders, and finds its way back into coherence.

If this full Moon has stirred something in you, or if you sense that your challenges have roots deeper than effort or insight alone can reach, you may find this work supportive. You’re welcome to explore more about Crystal Constellations, read my blog post on it, or to schedule a free clarity call if you’d like to feel into whether this approach is right for you.

Thank you for reading! Happy Imbolc and Blessed Candlemas, my friends!

In Gratitude,

Sarah Songbird