Completion

Tend to the End!

Endings are valuable junctures that many times do not get the respect they deserve. Beginnings definitely get all the attention. Yet, endings are important rites of passage. Learning to tend to the END, especially the END of the End is a skill, an art and one that helps you move forward with clarity, confidence and a sense of lightness in a good way!

To get to that point however, there is some temple keeping to do. The temple being the self.

To be a good steward of the end, asks us to create a little space to honor what has been and look to see if there is any residual tasks or unresolved feelings that would be easy to ignore, avoid or jump passed yet are asking to be acknowledged and witnessed. As I have already pointed out, the beginning is where the excitement lives and many people cut off the end and do not give themselves proper closure. In traditional ways, there are ceremonies to mark the passage from one phase that is ending to a new beginning.

These ceremonies are frequently skipped, meaning that you continue to carry along what you did not give proper closure to. The grief stays repressed. The sadness gets buried. The judgment gets projected. The expectations get bigger and as It all gets driven further into your field, you may eventually start to feel tired, exhausted, confused, bored, anxious, unhappy, flat, uninspired, unable to make change or move forward in your life; and these may all be signs you are carrying around and did not give proper closure to the past and it’s siphoning your energy.

This year has been hard! It has presented major challenges and learning opportunities which means you have likely found yourself in and out, or mostly in the growth zone; aka the incredibly painful zone of discomfort and not knowing. You have been given opportunities to notice what is not serving your highest good, what needs clearing, perhaps you have had to let go, tie up loose ends, let things drop and maybe even say your good byes! You may have moved, changed jobs, ended a relationship, lost someone important to you and maybe even all of it! You may be in the struggle now or on the other side of it.

Either way….

In some way, you have changed, made a change or been shown the change to make.

With all of what this year has brought up for you this is a moment where you are now being offered a chance.

This is the end. What is Done is Done - Be Done with IT.

As Winter’s breath begins to sing cold and the Sun’s Light and warmth fade into leafless trees, exposed wood and the smell of rain; I invite you to pause to reflect on how far you have come and to recognize, honor and value your growth and accomplishment.

Let’s make this juncture one that counts in a good way by bringing to honor what has been so you can be ready for the path ahead and perhaps even ready for the path you are on.

In Reflection

This is one year I am looking forward to saying goodbye to.  The year, not marked by

an artificial date, rather a moment in time. This year has felt like dragging mountains up mountains. It felt like moving planets to move anything along, yet.... I did it. This today marks my 12th Blog Post. I have written one blog post a month for one year. Today I take a moment to simply honor the accomplishment.

While working on a project that required editing 77 videos on an IPhone 11, I was thinking “this project has taken 2 years to get to this point. It has taken a lot of dedication, commitment, patience and focus to sustain it that long. It keeps running into obstacle after obstacle.”  That thought expanded to a curiosity as to why so many projects over the last five years have felt like epic feats.  

On a few occasions I caught loosely formed thought remnants floating around “this is going to be hard, I don’t want to do this” or “how will this…”. I call these the “I don’t wanna” and the too far too fast too soon thoughts.  Thinking about the result while still working through something is one great way to thwart the process.  These thoughts carry a weight. What would it be like to create without carrying around that type of baggage?  Would I be more effective at getting started and working through things? Is that even possible or are those thoughts part of the process?

Regardless, it’s been hard.

In retrospect, the end of 2024 into 2025 was more indicative of a 9 completion year.  I actually ended 2024 with an authentic sense of accomplishment after having finished every project I had set out to do that year.  I entered 2025 with the blank slate that I had worked intentionally to arrive at.   

The Reading: 2025 began on the first breath of new life. The new born begins to move, explore and gets curious. The family retreats to provide a safe container for the growing child.

Looking back, this was the theme of the last 12 months  I committed to consciously cultivating several projects.  From the blank slate, I haphazardly started to fill in the empty space and said I would do somethings: create and design a pair of yoga pants, write a journal and a book, finish this poi learning program and my oracle deck, post one blog post a month, record regular content and a few others.  When I said it, I sort of meant it but I was not taking myself seriously.  I set goals around it, but they were not well thought out goals.  I expected myself to not take action on any of this. The dates were random far off in a distance dates.  The steps to get there were loosely organized. I left myself a lot of leeway.

The list of projects was ambitious.  My mindset was not in a goal driven place. Months went on. Some of the tasks like writing the blog post and content creation was all I could muster up the energy to do.  Many times sitting down to write with zero inspiration and falling asleep yet staying with it letter by letter.  The bigger projects that required more steps sat.  The goal dates drifted by in the wind. Several of the projects dropped like hot potatoes and in fact, by July all of the projects except for blog posts and content creation had dropped. 

Putting things down and walking away for a moment is an important part of the process. If it is not for you, what is put down will be forgotten or fall away.  What is for you to do will persist.

I tried to walk away, but some projects were not falling away. The thoughts kept lingering like one of those conversations you know you need to have but don’t actually want to. 

Some of the projects required growth.  I did not know anything about copyrighting, publishing and printing books; writing a book and a journal as well as finishing the oracle deck were things that were going to take more effort on my part.

Somewhere around August or September however, it occurred to me that if I focused on one of these projects at a time, there was still enough time in the year to finish them by the end of the year. My mind tried to make it a linear process, it was not. At first the Oracle deck was the closest to being done, however as I sit it is the last thing left to complete. It is so close with the last part is writing the booklet and paying a hefty price to order the test print. The biggest project that I was reluctant to do was the Poi Program because it felt like a chaotic, huge disorganized confusing never ending mess. Writing the book seemed easy, yet turned out to be harder than I expected. The journal also at first seemed easy but turned into a 288 page journey with printing challenges because it was so big. In fact, the printing for all of it was challenging.  I knew nothing about formatting and learned that Canva is not the place to format and write a book, but… I did it. That led me into the Print on Demand world to Printify where I ended up designing branded shwag for both of my businesses and low and behold a pair of yoga pants. That was just a joke at first, however turned out to be something that brought me a lot of joy to create and wear around. I rebranded the fire dance logo and designed sweat shirts which I gifted to the performers who were all over joyed with the gift, which also felt good.

It has been months of sitting on the couch, burning the midnight and early morning oils while coaching clients all day. I feel neglected and irritable as my life for months has been on these projects,

A month ago I finished the Luminous Life Journal and Luminous Wisdom book and ordered a test print copy of each. When it arrived it felt so good. I also created Greetings Cards out of some of my art images. Those are for sale in a local crystal store. Those too felt so good to receive the finished product. The Oracle Deck is hand drawn. There are 112 images, which is way too big for an oracle deck. There have been so many phases to this. Getting the images from paper to a computer while maintaining the quality of the image, writing all of the messages, formatting the card, adding numbers, designing the box and writing the book. In addition, I learned that publishing and printing decks is it's own unique process. To print a 112 card deck with booklet was going to be expensive. Two days ago I found a source to order one test print deck however they require their own format which has meant reloading the whole deck and reformatting into their template and redoing the book. I am almost there as the last step is finish the book and pay the cost to order the test deck. I am excited to get to that point, yet reminding myself that it will happen all in the right moment. The time for pushing is coming to a close for now.

Not even on my radar was the building of a print on demand store with Printify. In researching out print options for the journal, I learned that I could make a more simple journal on Printify that could be available for people that doesn't require extensive publishing steps. I created the Courage Builds Confidence journal that is up for sale on my Luminous Life Journey Printify store as well as Mission Upgrade mugs, Sacred Fire activation candles, greetings cards and canvas prints of my art, sweatshirts and yoga pants.

The final stage of an ending is closure.

1. What has ended that you are creating closure around?

2. What is ending that you are being asked to carry through towards completion?

3. What is needed for you to have proper closure?

Endings are sacred. They deserve reverence, not resistance.

When we skip closure, we carry physical emotional energetic debris into the next season. It’s like trying to plant new seeds in soil that hasn’t been cleared.

That’s why I created Mission Possible — a 5-week guided journey to help you bring closure to what has been and find the resilience and perseverance to see it through.

If you feel the call to give your story a proper ending… Visit Mission Possible here.

To conclude...Job well done! Remember to celebrate the accomplishment.

Signing off 2025!

May you walk in a good way!

Sequoia Raven Moon