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January 22 through January 28, 2024

We'll experience lots of astrological shifts this week, as three planetary events shift our focus and raise our awareness. Venus will move into Capricorn on Tuesday, and could inspire a personal or home makeover. Venus isn't really concerned with your budget, and could have you spending lots of money to revise your world to reflect the new year and new you coming into view! We'll have a full Moon in Leo on Thursday, which is also a more self-focused event, though because full Moons represent release, could have you clearing out closets and clutter to make room for new purchase down the road. Uranus will turn direct on Friday after five months of backward motion, and because it is the planet that rules Aquarius, again we'll be looking at what changes we can make to create a more perfect world. Upgrading or revising our friendships and relationships could be a theme under this aspect, so if it's time to let go of connections that are draining you or go in search of new friends, this next three months are great for clearing out and restocking your social "closet."

5 Ways to Manifest Outer Health, Inner Peace, and Beauty, by Dr. Debbie Palmer

(Article originally published in The Llewellyn Journal.)

We're all looking for balance these days. Juggling work, life, and taking care of ourselves is a full-time job that can very often sap our energy, enthusiasm, and health. I have experienced this struggle in my own life and see this every day with patients, too, who seek me out for help in achieving this balance.

I can tell you with 100 percent certainty that achieving balance is possible—without having to book a month-long yoga retreat or overhaul your entire life. This is why I wrote my new book, Mindful Beauty. It's a modern-day guide to living in mindful balance using simple tips—which don't take a lot of effort—to revamp your daily habits. The end result of achieving this balance is inner calm, vibrant health, and outer radiance.

As I talk about in Mindful Beauty, this balance can be summed up in what Ayurveda (the holistic healing system that originated in India over five thousand years ago) calls ojas ("oh-jus"). Pure beauty, says Ayurveda, is clear, glowing skin, silky hair, happy eyes, youthfulness, and even a pleasant smell. This is the result of inner and outer happiness and health. Ojas is considered the "sap of life," true inner and outer beauty and health that radiates from a relaxed, peaceful state. This state of balance is a result of finding peace in your life, but it's also a result of a nourishing diet, regular mindful movement, and restful sleep. That's what I want to talk about here: exactly how to manifest outer health, beauty and radiance, and an inner calm for longevity and true inner and outer beauty. Below are five ways to get started.

1. Find a way to connect with your inner you every single day. I cannot stress enough the importance of taking time to nourish your soul. We eat three-plus meals a day to feed our body, but what are we doing every day to feed our soul? A soul-nourishing "diet" is as important to our balance as food is. While once-a-week yoga or meditation is great, we must begin to incorporate soul-nourishing habits every single day. When I explain this to my patients, they immediately think they have to meditate for thirty minutes every day and explain why they don't have time for it. But you don't need thirty minutes and you don't even need to formally "meditate." I do meditation at my desk during my lunch break and sometimes it's no more than five minutes. But in that five minutes, I focus on my breathing—which nourishes my inner self—reducing heart rate, lowering stress, and giving me a boost to get through the rest of the day. You can also practice walking meditation in your workplace, home, or even the grocery store. (See more about this later.) There are plenty of meditations in Mindful Beauty that you can do, too, if you want help getting started. A simple morning moment of gratitude—being thankful for things that are going right in your life—is sometimes all it takes, too. There's been research that shows that having a sense of awe and gratitude for things in our lives can lower levels of inflammation in the body. Inflammation is a precursor to disease—which is why keeping levels low in the body is so important. Nourishing our inner selves is a key part of living a healthy life today: when we feed our soul, we strengthen our physical being, too.
2. Eat plenty of plant-based foods. When you eat a diet closer to the Earth, as the Mediterranean cultures do, your body responds with more energy, better sleep, and healthier, more radiant skin. Why? These foods—like fruits and vegetables, nuts and seeds, legumes and beans, and whole grains—have more key nutrients like fiber, vitamins B and C, and calcium that the body needs to thrive. This doesn't mean you have go vegan or vegetarian. In fact, I recommend that patients eat lean meat like poultry regularly and limiting red meat. Fish is also important as part of this Mediterranean-style of eating. This step doesn't have to be overwhelming: simply adding one or two plant-based food to every meal and snack during the day is a good way to start. For example, with breakfast, add an orange or grapefruit; with lunch, add a side salad or greens to your sandwich; with dinner, be sure that half your plate is plant based. A handful of almonds or walnuts as a mid-day snack is another option. Once you start adding these foods to your diet regularly, you'll find that you want to experiment more with plant-based recipes (I offer a few of my family's favorites in Mindful Beauty). You'll notice that these simple changes will result in you feeling more vibrant physically, and also feeling better mentally: you'll be more energetic, more confident, and more invigorated to take charge of your life.
3. Move with mindful intention. When I suggest to my patients that they exercise regularly, so many of them explain that they already go to the gym for a sweat-inducing bout of cardio. As I tell them: there's more to movement, however, than just working up a sweat. So many people today are on their phones—either talking or listening to music—or watching TV while they're exercising. While this definitely helps pass the time, I also suggest shutting off your devices once or twice a week and, instead, focusing on your breathing. That is mindful movement. While a good cardio workout is important for heart health and overall physical health—as well as reducing anxiety and boosting mood—mindful movement achieves balance on a deeper level: you're working out your body while nurturing your inner you. Our brain waves shift from the analytical beta waves (that are important for getting our to-do lists done) to calmer alpha waves (which are important for feeding our soul and our daydream states). One of my favorite ways to move with mindful intention is simply walking outdoors with my phone silenced. Walking meditation, or "forest bathing" as it's been called, makes us more mindful in the present moment and sustains elevated states of this mindfulness the rest of the day when we're not walking. Yoga, swimming, running, biking, and really any form of exercise can achieve this elevated state of mindfulness as long as we're focused on our breathing and the rhythm of our bodies and not our devices.
4. Create a night-time sleep ritual that works for your life. Developing a ritual at least an hour before bed every night will ease you into sleep, helping you to fall asleep more quickly and stay asleep longer. So many people have trouble sleeping today and I attribute so much of this to the digital world that surrounds us 24-7. From a scientific standpoint, our devices emit something called blue light, which has been shown in numerous studies to interfere with the production at night of the sleep hormone melatonin, particularly if you use your devices too close to bedtime. When darkness falls, our body's natural reaction is to produce melatonin, which makes us feel sleepy. But in our modern world—where we're doing work at night on our computers, checking social media late into the night, watching TV, or texting—our bodies aren't producing the amounts of melatonin we need to get to sleep and stay asleep. So my advice to patients is always: shut off your devices at least one hour before bed. Give your body time to produce melatonin and to ease into sleep. Other bedtime rituals can include five or ten minutes of meditation, calming yoga asanas (like shavasana or legs up the wall), reading quietly from a physical book (i.e., not an e-reader), or just sitting quietly drinking a cup of herbal tea. In Mindful Beauty, I also include crystal and bedroom feng shui tips that may help with sleep. What works for each person, however, is different. The important thing is to find a ritual that works for your schedule and start to incorporate it every night. You'll notice that you feel calmer overall—all day long—and sleep better. A good night's sleep is so critical to better health, both mental and physical, and overall radiance. You can have a strong inner you, but without sleep, you can't have a strong outer you and overall balance.
5. Develop a consistent skin-care regimen. The skin is the largest organ in the body and needs regular care. Eating a nutrient-rich diet feeds the skin from the inside, as does moving regularly (this boosts circulation, which provides skin cells with much-need oxygen). Drinking enough water is also important; it keeps the skin hydrated and radiant. Just as establishing good habits in other aspects of your life keeps you in balance from the inside, though, so too does creating a consistent skin-care regimen keep your skin in balance from the outside. Washing skin twice daily, exfoliating (to get rid of dulling dead skin cells), and hydrating skin are basic steps that everyone should incorporate every day. I give many more details in Mindful Beauty, particularly about what to look for when choosing products, but starting here is an important first step. If you're experiencing skin problems like eczema or acne, I recommend that you see your dermatologist, but I also recommend putting into practice the steps that I recommend here and, in more detail, in Mindful Beauty. The skin is usually one of the first places to exhibit signs of imbalance in the body. Helping to get the body back into balance typically has a positive effect on skin conditions, as so many of my patients have experienced. This is why, as an osteopathic board-certified dermatologist (one of only several hundred in the country), I incorporate Mindful Beauty strategies into each one of my patient sessions.

Something important to remember: each of us is unique and beautiful—even though we sometimes don't feel this way. Manifesting beauty and uniqueness comes so much easier once we nourish ourselves from the inside out. These strategies and so many more in Mindful Beauty can help. Wishing you a soul- and body-nourishing journey to your best self!

Article originally published in The Llewellyn Journal. Copyright Llewellyn Worldwide, 2020. All rights reserved.

My mom told me that two weeks prior to my birth, she had a dream in which she was sitting by the sea when all of a sudden the sea parted, and right in the middle of the sea walking towards her was a beautiful woman in white, carrying a tiny baby girl. She said the woman floated towards her, looked at her and smiled, and gave the baby to her. In this dream she was pregnant, so she was wondering why the woman gave her the child. The woman turned back and went back into the sea, and the sea came together again. Two weeks later, she gave birth to the same child - me! As a child, I was haunted by dreams in which I was swimming with mermaids and fishes. I had a whole series of them. Then I woke up one day and needed to urinate, but I couldn't because in place of my two legs was a fish tail. I went back to sleep and when I woke up again, it was gone! There are so many things I can't explain. I am considered to be a highly gifted young woman, and I still do odd things in my sleep. WHO AM I? How do I make good use of the powers I know I possess? I see dead friends in my sleep and we talk, and the whole time I know that they are on the other side. I'm really wondering if there is something different about me related to these mermaid dreams. What do you think?

- Nola

Dreamchaser:

I believe your mother had a prophetic dream of what you were going to look like. I also see that your mother considers you a gift from the Universe. You didn't tell us your birth date, but are you by any chance a water sign?

It's quite common for a woman to dream of the child she is carrying. When we are pregnant, we're forming a psychic bond with the child in our bellies. I've heard many stories of women who "saw" their children in dreams or visions.

You've had very active dreams your entire life, and you do a lot of your soul work while you're sleeping. As I have stated over and over here, when we sleep, our souls leave our bodies and go to where they most need to go to clean up from today and prepare for tomorrow. Some people (like you) remember their dreams vividly, while others (like me) rarely remember a dream. We both are doing the same amount of soul work in our sleep - you just happen to remember your soul work more easily than I do.

Water and things IN water have always signified emotions. When we dream of water and the things that water holds, we are working through emotional issues. As a child, you were quite emotional. You felt out of place, and you had a lot of emotional issues to deal with as a result of not fitting in like the other kids. You dealt with lots of those issues while you were sleeping.

When you dreamed of being in the water, it was an environment that other people could not enter, for they were human. YOU fit in there and you felt like you belonged with the other fish and mer-people. It was your mind's way of dealing with not being accepted into the society you had to live in every day.

I have always heard that when we need to urinate, we often dream of water. I am not in any way trying to minimize your dreams, but you mentioned yourself that you would wake up having to go to the bathroom.

As you've grown, you've started to associate with spirits on the Otherside that you know (and also many you do not know) when you sleep. Again, you are doing most of your soul work and psychic work while you sleep.

You have to accept the fact that you are psychic, and that you are never going to fit into "normal" society. Stop trying to do so. Once you do stop trying and accept that you are different in a wonderful way, you will see this work coming into your physical world, and not so much in your dream world. If we suppress what we are, it WILL manifest in some way. Your way is to dream it.

I wish you acceptance of your special nature!

*****

Astrea:

What an interesting story! You mother was visited by a Sea Goddess who wanted you to have what she never experienced: a human life! You were given to your mom because SHE has a special connection to the sea too. You were probably mother and daughter in a mermaid incarnation. Your fishtail dream was a "memory" of that incarnation, and also a MESSAGE from that Sea Goddess that you need to get started on your mission in life.

Why would the Sea Goddess give up her own daughter to a human existence, when humans have to suffer, grow old and die? If you explore mermaid lore, you'll discover that mermaids aren't actually very sweet. In fact, in most depictions, they are shown to be rather mean-spirited creatures. They are forever trying to down ships and drown an assortment of people, mostly sailors. Your sea mother didn't want you to have to experience all that. Also, she had a higher plan for your human life in mind.

If you want to fulfill your highest destiny, listen carefully. If you're not in the communications field yet, get as much information as you can about how you can move into that arena as quickly as possible. Look for a university that is engaged in studying human/dolphin communication. (Dolphins, by the way, could tell you a lot about your past lives, because dolphins can remember all their incarnations vividly). I believe USC San Diego does that - also UCLA Berkley. Get a grant (one will become magically available as soon as you begin to look) to attend that university and start studying!

In a short time, you'll begin to see more and more that your mission in life is to help unite the sea world with the world of humans. Sadly, human beings are so abusive to the sea. Perhaps we're seeing such deadly tsunamis and hurricanes these days so we wake up to its blessings and power.

You could be a trailblazer in a new field called "Marine Life Communication," and there will be many discoveries that you will make with a new partner who also has had incarnations in the sea. This person will enter your life as a fellow student. As time passes, you'll be very instrumental in garnering attention for important ocean issues.

It's going to be a big job, and you'll need lots of support. The next time you're at the shore, write a letter to your Sea Mother in the sand at low tide. When the tide comes in and covers your letter, the waves will take your message to her. She's been waiting a long time to hear from you, and she'll guide you and help you along your path.

Astrea:

Many times in life we hear, "You will always have what you NEED, but not necessarily what you WANT." Your spirit must have needed to experience the feeling of leaving your human body, and the suggestion in the next chapter of Sylvia Brown's book was all it took to get you there.

Even though you hadn't read it yet, your SOUL recognized the title of that chapter as something it had been seeking, and your soul, knowing that you had that reference to read after your experience, got with it and out you went!

While I don't usually recommend her books, Sylvia Brown has a wide reaching and powerful effect on lots of people. A Gemini like you would be able to relate easily to her writing and put it to good use. Synchronicity - you gotta love it!

I like your description of "getting caught." That's exactly what it feels like, isn't it? One minute you're free and hovering above the room, and the next minute, ZAP! back down into your corporeal form you go!

As a little kid, I loved that "feeling of return." With practice, most of the time we can control that event, but sometimes, when our physical ears hear a distracting noise or something else occurs to knock us back into reality, back we go. With practice you will be able to control your return better.

I find it interesting that you were visiting your mother-in-law and not someone in your own genetic family. Evidently, you and your husband got married for reasons that are even deeper than love. His family's interest in "psychic stuff" will nurture your children in such matters and help them to grow into their own abilities.

You'll never have to be concerned that when your daughter visits them, she'll be discouraged from exploring her own psychic life and power. My parents encouraged me to develop my psychic senses in a time when it wasn't nice to even discuss such things in public. Heck, it's STILL not considered a great topic at the dinner table in some families!

Your kids will get to talk about it ALL and ask questions and read and study. This is going to give them such an edge in life! Talk with your husband about how you want to present this to your kiddos, so that you are united in your approach and ready to tell them their experiences are all natural and okay.

A word or two of warning: Geminis often have difficulty staying grounded in REAL LIFE. Don't get so strung out on your ASTRAL life that you neglect what you're doing here on Earth.

You are at the beginning of a long journey to learn where your power really lies. Try to be patient with this process and take your time.