New Year, New You 2018: Week Four (technically – in place of week one) – Be Kind To Yourself

Here we go again, kids.
 
I’m (once again) doing Miss Sugar’s New Year New You Experiment in Radical Magical Transformation because I find it’s a really good way to kick my own ass into getting things done. It’s a good mix of practical, magical, and thought-based exercises to help accomplish specific and significant change in your own life. If it’s relevant to your interests, give it a try!
 
Instructions: This particular prompt was originally written for Week Four BUT it comes with the caveate of “do it whenever you hit the first week of January”(or some other culturally significant New Beginnings and Goal Setting date, but mostly early January) regardless of where you are in the exercises. I’m just starting this off, and I feel a bit silly starting it on the prompt that says “Maybe just don’t?” but here we are. This week, the plan is to “give yourself permission to enjoy the fruits of your labor and to give yourself something nice“.
 
Tarot Card: Nine of Cups. I chose this specific iteration of the Queen of Cups partially because it’s from my latest deck – the Next World tarot – which I’m rather excited about, but also because the artist’s write-up in her Little Book says specifically that the Nine of Cups “reminds us to stay glamourous”. (I’m snickering a little because, the last time I did/wrote-up this particular prompt, I was Having The Feels about bad patterns and bad habits and wanting to have a Nine Of Water week and… not really succeeding).
 
I’m having an easier time saying “Nope. Nine of Bottles. This is the Time, this is the Hour” this time around but also am having feelings about bad habits and patterns that I’m spinning in.
I mean, maybe I’m spinning in those particularly well-worn tracks all the time anyway, BUT it’s been hitting me a little harden in the past 48 hours, so there’s that.
 
Anyway. On the subject of Stay Glamourous… You know that I’m doing the Esoteric Experiments in Miss Sugar’s book, Glamour Magic: The Witchcraft Revolution to Get What You Want (yes that link will get me tiny amounts of cash if you buy her book through it). So, partly I chose this card as a reminder not to let myself down on that front, even on Laundry Day. But this card is also about “the magic of self care” and how the sensory (touch, sight, smell) side of my femme-nicity matters a LOT to me feeling good in and about myself. It’s a reminder to be kind to myself by remembering that I’m worthy of pleasure, sensuality, “easy days and pretty things” (to draw on Kathryn Payne’s essay about Lineage in Brazen Femme) and that beating myself up about, or punishing myself through deprivation over, Bad Habits and Patterns isn’t actually going to help me stop perpetuating those things.
 
So.
Two Nice Things for me this week:
1) I upgraded the internet. With a discount, no less. This isn’t actually going to change until Monday, BUT it will mean that my lovely wife and I can watch movies-on-the-internet (and chill, or maybe even “chill”, wouldn’t that be lovely), and also I will worry less about “running out of megabytes” when it comes to uploading stuff as per this particular version of the Nine of Cups. It’s a practical thing, and it doesn’t only benefit ME, and I did it mostly because the internet-provider just happened to call and offer it to me today (which is why I’m aiming to do two things, rather than one), but I did it. I am allowed to have nice things and do not need to exist in austerity all the time.
AND
2) I haven’t entirely decided this one, but chances are good it will involve an afternoon – or maybe even a whole day – spent curled up with either a beloved old book (OR a fascinating new one) and a box of chocolates I got on post-new-years clearance. There will be lounging. I am allowed to do things that are pleasurable purely for the sake of pleasure and do not have to Be Productive all the time.
 
 
TTFN,
Meliad.