Re-igniting the momentum of self employment once again, with my energetics

aka choosing how not to get overwhelmed and still keep it simple, fun and organized.

Sep 04, 2024

It’s Virgo season and for the first time in 12 months I am not doing a post on signs as their season begins - so yay, we have covered all 12 signs so far. Read Virgo’s post to get your Virgo szn in order (pun totally intended!).

Coming from the last few months of Pisces moon progression where the structure was out for a toss, momentum was slow and the valley was (almost) dead, with this reviving season I am feeling the urge to call back my systems again. This time not so that I can work and race and earn more, but so that I can make TIME for all the richness that life showed me in these last two years.

a note I scribbled on my notes app with a looming tear in my eyes after witnessing glimmers in my work life once again :)

It’s how Blair Waldorf once said, “Once they’ve tasted caviar it baffles me how they can settle for starfish”.

Same girl same.

As much as I love and adore and almost worship working as a Virgo, I cannot settle for a lifestyle ever again that is only about work.

A lifestyle that asks me to sacrifice my sacral on the altar? No, ma’am.

I want my cooking, I want my painting, I want my baking. I want to explore the hidden sandwich joint in my city. I want the downtime for laughing with my fam at the dining table or catching up on a movie from the 70s. I want my non-negotiable time to feel my feelings and shed tears of joy or grief. Ah, my time to read soft poetry and spicy fiction, and my time to write one. Time to lie down for a luxurious 30-minute nonsleep deep rest or chat about life’s mysteries with my sisters and girlfriends. My goddamn mermaid time to bathe for as long as I desire. Please please please. And maybe even more (?) as life continues to surprise and treat me with its gifts, romance, and beauty.

How will I ever do that? All that - and showing up deeply in devotion to my life’s work? The kind of work that moves me, inspires me, one that is my sacred service and privilege, all in one?

This last Aquarius full moon on the 19th August + mercury rx in the last three weeks shone light on my 6th house of daily routines and systems to give me that answer. “Systems, baby cakes. Systems.” I rolled my eyes at first. Then I went ahead and made a couple of pinterest boards (ofcourse not without first cleansing the cobwebs of my open head in

Kirsten Morrison

‘s Catalyst!) After a week, here I am writing this.

But before that, a little bit on 6th house in astrology - something I’d be referring to over and over again.

Everyone’s natal chart has the sixth house, a house associated with a specific zodiac sign. You may or may not have planets in your sixth house. This house is about your mental, emotional as well as physical health primarily considering it is ruled by the sign Virgo and planet Mercury. Hence, it includes everything which you do as a daily chore and obligation that makes up your lifestyle. In vedic sciences, Ayurveda works on the principles of ‘dincharya’ ie. daily lifestyle. Ayurveda says that the health is heavily dependent on your dincharya and if you want to improve your health, you work with your daily lifestyle. In my opinion, this perfectly describes the sixth house in astrology. Your daily lifestyle includes right from your time to wake up to what you eat and drink, what you do as a job daily as well as your workouts - everything that makes up your day.

from an IG story archive this week on the gram! If you’re on the ‘gram, plz lets be friends - I have been dying for resonance on that app! My handle is @shivaanibaghel <3

So here i am sharing with you a few of my living takeaways from my current re-ignition of spark in my self-employment life, thanks to this gorgeous virgo season:

1. Romanticizing my workscape again through radical self-acceptance

A few weeks back, I read this wonderful article by

Kristen Garaffo

where she was romanticizing setting up her work-from-home office and like a wave crashing on the shore it hit on me, “omg! Did I just get bored of my lifestyle?!”. Looking at her, I remembered an old version of me who had dreamt and yearned of this WFH lifestyle way before the pandemic made it popular. Looking at her joyful post, I said “I need this excitement again. I need this joy again!”

For the past few months, I have been changing a lot in my business but there was still this feeling of restlessness I couldn’t put my finger on. Over the last three weeks of Mercury retrograde, the fog has cleared and it has become clearer that what needed to change was my lens on e v e r y d a y.

So this week, I went on and made this Pinterest board called ‘Romanticizing WFH’ (or let’s just say self-employment) and started browsing through pictures of women working from home or cute coffee shops - some with coffee on their desk, some with pink and yellow daisies - and some with both. I looked for women who looked like me - earthy, fun yet seriously dedicated. I think I have been going through sort of what you say, an existential crisis trying to find my footing in these changing work landscapes from traditional 9-5s to new agey extremely flexible workstyles? (I am editing this on 1st September when Pluto has gone rx in Capricorn one last time for the next 200 years - how cool is to have this conversation rn?) I desperately desire to create my version of workstyle. It’s so interesting how this has been a topic ever since I started working. In my first 9-5 job, I quickly realized as much as I love writing, I cannot do that in a boring cubicle setup. Next to that, I moved to work with a co-working company which was trying to make working out of office spaces cool. This is 2017 - coworking was not a concept known or accepted in India. I loved working with this company so much because I felt my values and desires for a freestyle working aligned so deeply. However, unfortunately, my association with them quickly turned to another conventional jobs. Two and a half later, at 25 I asked myself - “what on earth am I doing here? This does not align with the ‘freedom’ lifestyle I was looking for!!”

Clearly the world has not been ready for the Aquarian era.

And that is why I decided it has to be a self-employed business for me. I cannot work in conventional jobs. I joke with my sister often about how unemployable I am!

The last 5 years in business have been nothing short of yet another rude awakening of how I too was not ready for this freedom that I have been praying for. I ‘thought’ having a business was my ticket to freedom but how can it be when your mindset is still working with the old structures? You know how you see entrepreneurs joking, “I didn’t want to work a 9-5 so I started a business and now I work 24*7.” Umm not a joke when the joke is on you! Lol.

Anchoring into my 6th house energy is making me realize that I am here to be unconventional in my workstyle and will really throw out all norms and expectations of what work is ‘suppose’ to look like on a daily basis. Just the fact that I went on and worked from home 6 years back when I was 25 made many people around me raise an eyebrow. One of my ex-bosses asked, “aisi bhi kya majboori thi, haha?” which translates to “what made you so helpless that you had to choose freelancing at such a young age?” Lol, lust for freedom, Sir, lust for freedom.

The grass was not and will never be greener on the other side. Everything will always pale in comparison to what feels real to who I am and what I was made for.

So to plug into the same delicious excitement I had 6 years ago, I plucked out some aesthetics of cute Genz girls working on their laptops, women slaying it even in their comfy lounge wears, flatlay laptop and beverages being the vibe —- I mean I did the flatlay/coffee shop/ journal aesthetic years ago - but I need it again now - tell me it’s still just as hot to work from home. Visualizing Carrie Bradshaw writing from her tiny desk in her New York apartment always helps!

2. Streamlining my subconscious energy

Pretty much like the above, I think I didn’t even realize when I started slipping off from keeping an eye on what I was consuming. You know how the manifestation witches say, “you become what you see”. It’s very scientifically true. Neuroscientists have proven time and again that the mind is malleable and you get to reprogram it the way you desire to. So much of my past work was based on this! So this month, I am remembering that once again and re-aligning my sources of inspiration. I am re-aligning the accounts I follow, the stories I listen to, and the timelines I am showing my mind. Watching my Dad work in corporates for years and seeing no adult around me having a self-employment/business experience growing up, my subconscious mind struggles with the idea that one can have a very fulfilled, abundant and independent life through working for yourself. I have seen the depth of this programming these past few years and how it gravitates me to and realized that the re-programming of this core belief demands a continuous effort on my part. And so, I am encouraging myself to engage with more proof for my mind to expand this reality for me. Technically this translates to:

more examples and content surrounding this goal/vision
engaging with people - online or offline, who continue to thrive in self-employment as a norm
picking up my reprogramming meditations once more (feel free to message me for one of these in my toolkit!)
reassuring and re-affirming my path

3. Honouring daily grounding + guilt-free rest

As someone with lots of air + mercury energy in my astrology, I tend to get anxious and wired very easily. Aquarius is a fixed air sign and hence, I am consciously choosing to work with the air element. I agree it’s the most boring thing in the world for a fast-paced mani gen, but I will also agree that how doesn’t make feel just super fantastic but also how everytime I end up saying, I needed it!". To be honest, Shivani before a breathwork and shivani after a breathwork are two different people - haha! Maybe our chart is indeed charted the perfect way. To fly like a super machine, supremely multi-passionate MG I need these no-fluff daily practices that anchor me into the ground.

Few of my go-to breath practices:

4-6-8 breath
alternate nostril breathing
brahmari
conscious connected breathwork

A few ideas of resting and self-regulating:

15/20 minute shavasana or non-sleep deep rest
holding a yin pose for 15 minutes
cuddling with my sister and soft toys
reading a book, a poem, or an article (long form)
listening to music
showering
skin care rituals
making and sipping tea/cacao/matcha
going for a walk in nature
journaling

4. Commiting to sit with my art each day, even if just for 30 minutes

In the past, I have struggled with showing up to work with my feelings. Hence, I did what every Virgo or Aquarius moon would ever do - switched off my feels. While that’s an art I am an expert and pro at, I also realize how feels are the juice of my creative work. And so, these days, I am committing to showing up right with wherever I am - thank you Saturn in my 6th house for this epiphany. I trust that these ‘feels’ are just as much a part of my sacred experience and creation. Now I don’t mean to say I am forcing myself to make a video when I am having a full meltdown - but I am saying to sit with it in any way I can at some point in the day. It gives me the rooted grounding I need when I am drowning. I struggled with this in the last few months when I let myself get off work when I didn’t feel like showing up. Just because I could, doesn’t mean I should. Sometimes brooding Shivani has great wisdom to offer while sensitive Shivani has deep empathy to bring to her writing.

5. Making time to ‘feel’ as an emotional authority

This brings me to the fact that I am an emotional authority in Human Design, meaning my decision making authority is heavily reliant on my how much time and space I am allowing myself to process my emotions. In the last two years of Pisces Progression, I have learnt big lessons on emotional healing. Maybe the reason my pisces moon progression was SO hard was because before that I had lived with the expertise of switching off my feels. That’s one thing I’d never wanna do again. I am no one without my feelings. So just the way I’d show up for my art each day, I’d wanna show up for my e-motions regularly as part of my day or week. This could mean sitting for a self-soothing meditation when I find myself emotionally sensitive or dysregulated or listening to a playlist that gets me in the feels, or taking time to reflect on what has moved me lately. Many times, painting or cooking are very sacred times for me to feel.

6. Finding magic in the mundane with sacral sprinklers

Now I am a manifesting generator and I have found ADHD tips and resources to be extremely helpful to support myself. (I also have a mani-gen meditation -listen to it if you’re one). I once heard an ADHD diagnosed say that life was pretty cool till they had a good schedule up in school and college but once they were out of the structure, their ADHD really acted up. I find something similar happening to so many of us who leave the routine of 9-5 and instead of feeling the freedom, we end up feeling completely overwhelmed and zapped out. We eventually start thinking maybe this is not for me - but so was not 9-5? I might fantasize about stable jobs all day long, but I also know how much masking it takes me to stay at it. People with ADHD struggle with executive functioning so what feels basic to other people doesn’t come naturally to neurodivergents. The extraordinary mind might be solving the biggest mysteries of life but can’t remember to put dirty clothes in the laundry or turning up to the meetings on time.

These were never my struggles but in the last few years, I think I was going through so much emotionally and mentally after being completely burn out by my business that I didn’t even realize when I got well, really off the track.

Once the awareness clicked in, last year I started writing down my daily to-do lists - ‘take shower’, 'go for a walk’, ‘have breakfast’ and check marked it and applauded myself when I did those. (I am totally game-fying these tasks this season!). Heck, I got some really interesting bath products to remind myself what a mermaid I am and what sacred ritual bathing was for me (making the mundane magical!). I mean what they tell you about entrepreneurs, “ I didn’t want to do 9-5 so now I do 24*7’ is so true! And it comes with a cost for your physical and mental health.

Maybe it is true, maybe my mind does produce less of a dopamine than other people and maybe, I need to make things extra magical to be interested in the mundane. This is indeed my recipe to stay grounded and show up for my work and daily life the way I have dreamt to. I am trying to romanticize daily life and adding magic to the mundane. It looks like sprinkling everyday tasks with colors, with music, with fun outfits, with interesting technology to keep the dopamine alive…. The mint green typewriter style keyboard has been so good for me to turn up to writing. I have started to do my nails again and reach out for chocolates once mid-day again. I am nomore being too hard on myself if I wanna have Maggi noodles on a rainy evening or if I wanna take a break from work and do a random scrapbook project or have a fun gossip sesh with my sister. At this point, I am prioritizing my magical pleasures the most mundane days.

It’s also important to note that my transition into self employment coincided with the start of my spiritual lifestyle. It has been such a big lesson to understand that in order to be a spiritual teacher, I don’t have to give up on my earthly humanness. I think many people, like me, who start their spiritual journey somewhere get so caught up in the facade of spirituality that we forget that spirituality is indeed a ritual for the spirit. Your mind and your body are home to your spirit.

How will your spirit bloom if your mind and body remain dry and starved?

A few of the basic tools I am utilizing to keep me sane:

post-its and sticky notes throughout my space because my mind is a busy place (my plant has a cute pink sticky saying “water me”, my cupboard has one to say “when will you put us in wash?” amongst ofcourse a list of ‘recurring tasks’ and a ‘dopamenu’ for things that give me that dopamine.
Notion app for my work projects as well as daily routines and food lists etc. Ofcourse the idea is to keep it basic, so that I don’t get overwhelmed. But it’s nice to have one place to keep the current projects I am working on fronthead along with a non-digital notebook. These are the only two things to write down my ideas because it’s been too much to write everywhere and to lose everything all the time. Also I don’t put these projects on my walls because I don’t have a separate workspace in my house and I hate when I keep remembering tasks even when I am not working.
Pinterest for organization - this is pretty obvious but I tend to use Pinterest only for inspiration and even though I have a board for everything, I forget to revisit it. I am kind of making a commitment to use it for more than a mood board purpose. Example: having a interest board for ukulele with short videos so that I can practice quick. Or a baking board to pick a recipe when I am too wired to look for new ones (but I still do all the time - why?). So yes, re-visiting it and using it for organization.
Minimalist app. It costs me 100INR every month and I really don’t mind it because it keeps popping up the timer on social media apps when I am extra doom scrolling. I love how it has made my phone screen make all the false dopamine induced icons go away and it’s simply a clean list of apps with names written in the same font. Agh, virgo dream of cohesiveness. Ofcourse, not putting Instagram on favorites and having to type it out takes an extra minute which give you the window to think if I really wanna go there. And then, putting a Notion app or my astrology app or Substack app on the front makes me wanna choose consciously.
Google calendar only for meetings and workouts - leaving ample of spaciousness and flexibility is so important for me. Whenever I time block, I end up feeling so much chaos and pressure that I cannot get anything done. Also there’s this inner rebel who just doesn’t wanna do anything when she’s asked to?
Rewarding myself after tasks and projects. I am a defined heart and while I have consistent energy to complete my tasks and my projects, I need good motivation to do it.
Occasional coffee shop trips, especially the less crowded ones with huge windows and a coffee station at a distance, for a change of setting otherwise working from different parts of my home (totally works for my valley environment!).
Study with Me videos, especially these ones by Merve. You get to choose a 2-hour or 3-jour or sometimes even 1-hour videos and work along. They have spaces for breaks as well. Pretty much like pomodro system, which I have always been a huge fan of. Most of her videos do not have music and just the sounds of her studying, flipping pages, underlining with a pencil. It feels so comfy to have someone work alongside. Amazing especially if you’re someone who likes the idea of coworking but find coworking spaces to be too overwhelming and crowded (like me).

5. Signing up for non-monetized serious hobby/ies

After being committed to cooking for the last two years and going from a complete novice to almost chef’s kiss baby girl, Ukulele is a passion project I have undertaken. It is completely non-monetized and it is serious because trust me it looks nothing like those romantic girls make it look like - no way. It’s deeply complex for me and I consider it serious right now, In full honesty I don’t even know if I will stick to it but for now this is what it is - my saturn might actually make me stick to it, who knows? Having a hobby channels my frustration into satisfaction. Having a hobby also makes me not put all that intense pressure on my work or relationships.

I am also very into reading and the last one year has shown me time and again how miraculous reading is for me! My very open and very creative head needs a fiction story and fiction characters to get hooked on to (otherwise it starts creating its own?😭) For all I know, having a hobby keeps me sane. I love the Fable app (join me if you’re into it! Who knows we start a book club?). It’s pretty much like Goodreads but more fun interface. There are options to connect with other readers, read reviews, join book clubs, discover new books, as well track your reading progress. It definitely makes me take reading seriously and not cancel my reading time as nothing. I used to read so much in my teenage years until I started going outside, got hooked to the dopamine of texting and gossiping and then ofcourse the doom scrolling. Yet, I know nothing is as satisfying as being hooked to a story that you cannot stop flipping the pages down to!

And that’s pretty much it. It took me two weeks of procrastination, multiple edits and going back and forth with my current experiences to pen this down. Hope this was helpful or inspiring to you. Leave me a heart <3 or a comment to tell me where you feel inspired to add magic to the mundane this season :)