If you know me, or have been following my writings for any period of time, you will know that commercialization, especially of the holidays, is a topic I have a perspective on. For a long time I let it get in the way of my ability to experience this season with joy.

There is a video that is both heartrending (maybe only to me) and hilarious (to everyone else) in which I was trying to share a sense of the meaning and spirit of this season with my family when our girls were very young.

In this video my entire family, who joins us during the holidays for a week, is sitting around the fire. I am attempting to relate to and share the transcendent illustrated story by N. Scott Momaday titled, Circle of Wonder. Momaday’s telling beautifully blends the Native American perspective with the experience of a candle lit Christmas service through the eyes of a mute boy named Tolo.

Suddenly my husband, who is holding our pug Norman on his lap, discovers that there is poop hanging out of ol’ Norms butt. Exclaiming this profound fact, he spins Norm around like a top for all to enjoy, stealing the show in America’s Funniest home video fashion.

I am shaking my head, giggling, and also feeling a bit tender as I write this, because it speaks to a deep longing carried in my journey to reclaim the meaning and the magic of the season.

This instance that will live forever in family lore reflects one of the many transformative moments I have experienced in my own quest to live in a way that expresses the pure awe I feel for life. In the many years that I have spent venturing deeper into my lineage and going on pilgrimage, literally and figuratively, I have rediscovered the spirit of the seasons through an ancient and holistic perspective.

My perception of the season has shifted and along the way I have received many gifts that have enriched and expanded my perspective. Sagittarius, the Wise Women of the Zodiac, who has learned through her adventures and seeking deeper truth, knows well that every journey holds its gifts.

Looking at life through a lens of symbolic literacy and self-inquiry embodied in astrology and archetypal psychology is a gift that continues to give. Through this understanding, I have been heartened by the mythical aspects of life that all humans share and come to appreciate that the gifts we receive in our personal quests are both specific to us and universal in their reflection of the evolution of consciousness.

Signs indicating that in spite of our sense of being lost, we are right on track. Help arriving at just the right time to get us through a challenging pass. A delightfully useful treasure, popping up in the most unlikely of places. The discovery of a sensual pleasure that restores the sweetness of life. And, of course, those serendipitous meetings with soul friends and fellow sojourners that you sense you have journeyed with many times before.

These are all gifts that we experience personally and share in common with all heroines and heroes who, seeking self-actualization and personal evolution, venture to discover.

This New Moon in Sagittarius, as we head into the darkest day of the year and the return of the light, I invite you to take stock of the gifts of spirit that have delighted you in this journey around the Sun. Take advantage of the energy concentrated in the sign of the centaur, symbolizing the half animal, half human archer.

Carve out time to identify those especially divine moments that imbue the mundane with magic and instill hope. Ground into the appreciation and wonder you feel for these gifts. From this perspective of grounded gratitude, aim the arrow of your life force energy with intention, and articulate with clarity the mark that is yours in the next season of growth.