We are deep into introspective Scorpio season – a time to get quiet and allow the hidden layers of your Self to arise.  Yet, no matter how much I hear about the benefits of honest self-reflection, and even though I’ve experienced many of these benefits firsthand, there is still a certain vague discomfort (sometimes descending into dread!:) that comes up when things get very quiet and the gaze turns within.  Yesterday’s alignment of Venus, the planet of love and values with stern taskmaster Saturn in the last degrees of soulful Scorpio urged us all to take an honest look in the mirror.  “Who am I?  How do I relate to others in my life?  Do I dare to reveal the “real me”, even though it feels so soft and uncertain?”  Vulnerability, ouch:)

Luckily I remembered a brilliantly beautiful and highly provocative prayer by a Benedictine nun recounted in a talk by Robert Holden: “Dear God, show me the truth about myself, no matter how BEAUTIFUL it is.”   Wow, do I dare to believe this strange hidden deep dark stuff inside me could potentially be beautiful??  This prayer made me see that most of us are so programmed to expect to hear the worst about ourselves, to assume that seeking the truth means a painful course in “brutal honesty” (Who invented this phrase anyway?  Why does honesty have to equal brutality?  No wonder we’re afraid to reveal what’s inside our hearts…:)  What would happen if we asked to be shown the beauty even in the darkest corners of our inner landscape?  There’s a tender loveliness in the fleeting beauty of the Fall, a sweetness in the scent of decaying leaves…  What if we were open to seeing the beauty in our own inner compost pile as well – all these feelings and experiences we’d rather forget?  I wrote out this prayer on a bright fuchsia sticky-note and stuck it on a mirror, to see if it can help me rewire some of my own habitual evasion of the “dark and tender” side of life.  I’m curious, maybe it will shift your perspective on what “the honest truth” is too:)

This post is also a tribute to an amazing couple I befriended while living on my sailboat in Mexico.  It was their 22 year wedding anniversary yesterday, and they both posted heart-breakingly honest and beautiful tributes to each other which I was lucky enough to get to read.  Their life together is such a courageous example of this “Venus-Saturn in Scorpio energy” – deep love and commitment through some of the craziest, darkest, most challenging blows life can throw at you – years spent raising a special-needs kid, one of them facing a sudden and senseless injury with a painfully slow crawl back… and, through it all they have emerged to live a life of adventure most people only dream about.  And smile, laugh, joke, even though sometimes through tears.  This the truth, dark AND beautiful!  Check out their blog for searingly honest, funny and true stories of adventure and misadventure.  Love ya!