Your Must-Listen List: 3 Podcasts to Binge Before 2022 is Over (If you want to blow your mind)

To say that podcasts have gotten me through the last three years would be an understatement. 

Podcasts have become the new school, essays, articles, entertainment source, and more. As someone who can’t stand to not be multitasking every moment of every day, I can tell you that podcasts have been the background of my life for at *least* the past three years. 

When I find a podcast I love, I practically foam at the mouth and search ravenously to make sure it has more than five episodes.

So, as my end-of-year gift to you, I want to offer you binge material that will catapult you to a new timeline, clear your skin up, smack you in the a**, and change your life- if you’re ready- all in the category of “spiritual and spicy”- just how I like it.

#1

Awakening OD

Categories: Comedy, Spirituality, Pep Talks, Aliens

OD stands for “Orientation Department” but it could also stand for Over Dose considering I have listened to most of these episodes more than once and the content feels like a punch to the face, and leaves you feeling like anything could happen and you may be God, but maybe that’s not a good thing... 

Jessa describes the podcast premise as “An 8th Dimensional being disguised as a comedian reluctantly shares pointers for life in the Matrix,” and that is very accurate. 

Jessa is as profound as she is funny and leaves no stone left unturned in the catalog of episodes which range from “Ugh Love” which demystifies companionship and romance when you’re “awake,” to “Eat Your Vision Board” which gives you actionable ways to participate in manifestation. 

Episodes I recommend: “A Tour of the Matrix,” “Ugh Love,” “Hot Alien Summer”

You can check it out on Spotify and Apple Podcasts (or wherever else, I don’t know, google it).

P.S. Jessa is a good friend, but that has no bearing on this very unbiased review..

P.P.S. Jessa just started a new podcast called “Spiritual Bro” that’s quite genius, check that out if you run out of episodes and want more.

THIS ARTICLE IS SPONSORED BY:

YEAR AHEAD 2023:

An Event to Guide You and Prepare You, Emotionally, Spiritually, Energetically and Physically for 2023

#2

Cheat Codes with Pea

Categories: Sci-Fi Spirituality, Art, Reality Creation, Timeline Jumping

Pea is also a friend of mine and I feature on one of the episodes, but the genius of this show goes beyond my relationship with Pea. 

This podcast really does give you the cheat codes to living your most authentic and dialed-up life. 

With a heavy emphasis on freedom and doing whatever you want without apology, Pea offers a lot of concrete advice in their solo episodes and a lot of mind-bending conversations in their interviews with guests that will leave you feeling *neutral* and *charged up* in the best way.

This is a great podcast to put on when you’re going for a walk and can really listen, but just make sure you have your notes app open or you’ve brought a notebook to keep track of any revelations this content brings you.

Episodes I recommend: “Spiritual Capitalism with Kinzie Madsen,” “Your Success Is Not a Fluke with Flex Mami,”  “Distorted Mirrors with Jas the Moon Mother”

#3

Bitchcraft: Spirituality for Bad People


Categories: Truth-telling, Punk-Rock Spirituality, FairyCore

I found this podcast a few weeks ago and every episode I’ve devoured so far is gold. If you lean a little “conspiracy theorist” (aka like to find your own truth), and want to hear about christ consciousness, fairies and sex in the same episode, this podcast is for you. 

Grace is a fellow Astrologer and often brings in Astrological themes, but this is not an astrology podcast…it’s the podcast of my dreams, and I don’t even identify as a “witch.” 

I highly suggest you pick some episodes out to binge before the end of 2022.

Episodes I recommend: “The Fairy Rings of the Vatican,” “Mary Magdalene and Christ Conciousness,” “The Apocalypse, The Ascension and Atlantis”

What were YOUR top three podcasts that got you through this year? Comment down below and let me know…I’m running out of episodes..

*~

Want to hear the list of honorable mentions? The three podcasts that have been crucial to my sanity and evolution from this year and beyond, but weren’t included in this list are on the full article on Patreon!

Mars Retrograde 2020

image: Kelsey Lu by Emmet Green for Crack Magazine

This year, the Mars Retrograde portal opens on 09/09/2020, and closes 11/13/2020. 

As a planet, Mars governs our ability to assert ourselves, and our relationship to our primal nature. It is associated with the physical body, physical health, sexuality, wanting, conflict, war, resolution, and energetic output. 

Whereas Venus is the receptive principle in Astrology, Mars is the active. 

Where our Mars lies in our chart (sign and house) is the area in which we feel most inclined to assert ourselves, find our dominance and understand our own power, strength and limits.

The Warrior archetype associated with Mars demonstrates the way it impacts how we physically show up and fight for our values and what we believe. 

A regression of the active principle means we think before we step, and we get to spend intimate time with our “why” instead of living so much in the mechanics of “how.”

Remember that a retrograde is simply an earthly perception- that planets don’t go backwards, but are just seen to do so from the vantage point here on earth. 

Similar to the planet, you may feel during this time like you have regressed- that your old habits or frustrations are rising in certain areas and thus you must not have grown or evolved as far as you thought. 

This is one perspective, a perspective that you’re free to choose, but don’t have to.

Another perspective is that you are in every moment of time and every experience for a reason. When old positions or feelings arise in your field, they do so to offer you resolution with who you are, and where you are. An opportunity to recognize that all states are transient and the more you grow, the less impact these states have on you, your life and your self-perception. 

Your plight up until this point is both validated and challenged by this planetary moment. 

You may realize you once experienced certain things with regularity, but don’t anymore. This means you are doing things differently and are getting different results, and that, my love, is the definition of progress. 

Mars is the planet of embodiment and physicality, of force and sexuality. The lessons of this time have a deep impact on your body, but so will your resolutions. 

This particular retrograde is also a powerful one because of Mars’ travel back through the sign it rules in traditional Astrology, Aries. 

As the first sign of the zodiac, Aries does things without asking for help or permission. 

Aries represents the spice of new leadership and the pain of using brute force to muscle through your obstacles. 

Aries is also about want, need and choice. It is an explosive, messy, beautiful energy, full of life and possibility. It is both suffocating in its individuality and liberating for the same reasons. 

Mars in Aries embodies the quality of infancy- the state of separation from being a part of a whole to being an individual. 

Mars in Aries describes the primal nature of this occurance- the fact that being human means being part of a collective while being a wild, free, and singular body with our own desires and will all at once. 

There is no real separation between you and your connection to all of creation, nor a separation between you and your current expression as one human body- both realities exist at once. 

In a lot of ways, a Mars retrograde in Aries is a time for reflection on our very paths as human beings- our assignment of learning as individual spirits on this lush, abundant, living planet. A reflection on the ways we have separated ourselves from others, separated from ourselves, from our true nature. 

Below I have given you some reflections questions to get you started with embracing and embodying the themes for this season. Pick a couple to journal on and come back to throughout the retrograde, and stay tuned for special Mars Rx events coming soon by adding yourself to my newsletter below.

Want to support the production of this kind of content and the continuation of this work? You can click here or here to make a donation!

Reflection Questions:

What do I feel is my “true nature”?

What parts of my primal nature do I hide from the most?

What is my relationship to shame?

When was the first time I really wanted something?

What was that experience like?

What is my process for feeling, listening to and honoring my desires?

What is my process for maintaining my relationship to the things I acquire?

Why do I think I am meant to experience and express through my individuality?

What do I think I am meant to express through relationship with others?

All love,

Jaliessa

Venus Retrograde 2020

image: Thurstan Redding of model Adwoa Aboah

Beginning on May 13th, 2020, Venus- a planet that concerns our relations, and our ability to create and sustain pleasure and stability- will retrograde; shifting its course and looking to us as if it’s receding.

From Mercury to Pluto, all planets have the ability to retrograde; to appear to the Earth as if they’re going backwards. But this is an Earth-based perception, a time characterized by our unique vantage point- it is not a definitive story of the retrograde experience.

In the West, we perceive time as linear. History is behind us and the future is ahead. We make future-minded decisions and think from start to finish. Astrology reminds us that the universe and life are cyclical. 

The effects of this time may pull up troublesome longings for past relationships, obsession over the state, pace and direction of your current relationship, or, for some, it may feel like nothing at all. 

These experiences, varied in complexity and impact, are all valid. This is because a retrograde is not a broad-stroke experience but instead a time for a nuanced assessment of our own relationship to progress.

We only carry baggage if we think it’s still useful to us in some way. It’s our job to analyze which of what we’re carrying is worth the weight, and what is compelled by scarcity and fear and thus blocking our swing into the future.

Retrograde is a time to slow down, to allow former iterations of ourselves and our relationships to meet us where we are. To greet them with compassion, knowing we decide the weight of their burden on us now. 

During a Venus Retrograde, you might want to leave your job to “move forward,” because the job is “holding you back.” You may feel the same about your relationships. These feelings do not come from a planet’s motion. The motion triggers a unique relationship to time and value that helps us consider how far we have come, how far we are from where we want to be, and the quality of the gap between the two.

Nevertheless, it’s not as much a time to act, but a time to notice.

To let go during a retrograde is a slow-release, a meditation on moving on, and a lesson in the medicine of mutability. The trick is to know that what you cast away may never stop coming back to you. The goal must not be to get rid of the things that haunt you but to change your relationship to them. To contextualize the return of old feelings, desires and memories as an opportunity to reflect. 

If you’re feeling nostalgic for a fizzled romance, what are you actually feeling nostalgic for? Being loved and cared for? Mutual support? Someone to talk to? Free food? Or, how that particular dynamic made you feel?

Longing to get specific needs met from a past relationship, job, or otherwise connection, tells you what your needs are, not that the things you rightfully disconnected from deserve any more of your time.

Aching for physical affection from past partner(s) informs you of how important touch is to your happiness, not that those particular people need to repeat this action to satisfy you. This information can now push you to vocalize that need among the people you already have in your life, and the ones to come, instead of reconnecting with someone you intentionally distanced yourself from.

Venus retrograde does not want you to get a snarky text back from your ex reminding you why you ended it, it wants you to think about why you want to send the text and what you are hoping to receive.

To retrograde is to retrace, not to regress.

Our job right now is to allow the pain, joy and frustrations of the past to take up space and teach us about what we want and how far we have come. To shrug these feelings off, we first have to recognize that we were carrying their weight on our shoulders.

The returning ache from past pain is not silly or naive, nor is it coincidental.

A state of recollection can be informative fuel for foresight. Fresh thoughts on stale experiences exist in the present for a reason. So, when you glance back, let yourself do it without attachment or judgement. 

Venus retrograde is a magical time for the alchemical transformation of regret into manifestation.

To turn “I no longer have” into “this is what I need.”

A Venus Retrograde is but another cycle. It is up to you to decide to either fight the flow or ride the wave into a new, more glorious and informed iteration of you, who embraces your infinite potential for love, power and success.

Ready to take the next step to see how this retrograde will impact your specific chart and what to do about it? Grab my Venus Retrograde guide here!

*This is an re-visted and re-edited version of an article originally written for The Hoodwitch. You can find the original article here*

Weekly Horoscopes (10/28-11/03)

This week starts off with a Sun-Uranus opposition that may trick you into thinking that total freedom and a fresh start means abandoning the things you have been loving and nourishing for years. You don’t have to cut anyone off or move to a new city to bring fresh energy into your life. Focus on the little things, like rearranging the furniture, setting new boundaries, and making new goals before you let this transit push you into something rash.

We also get a poetic Mercury-Venus conjunction right before Mercury begins retrograde on All Hallows Eve. 

We then finish out the week by beginning a new month and Venus’ move into expensive, risk-taking Sagittarius. 

The questions below are based on the Astrological energy of this time and are for you to answer. 

Each question is meant to help you zero in on how the Astrology of this week will affect a specific area of your life with presence and intention. This format is meant to help guide you in getting in touch with your own insight around how to navigate the current cosmic climate.

Water insight of the week (emotion, intuition, spirit, etc):

What kind of situations, feelings, conversations, etc make you want to run and emotionally shut down? What kind of responses would you like to have instead?

Fire insight of the week (creativity, sexuality, etc):

How might you use your sexual spaces (solo or partnered) as containers to explore your creativity? Maybe using sex magic to create your ideal life, or exapnding your idea of what’s sexy:

Air insight of the week (mind, understanding, communication, relationships, etc):

What are your favorite ways to use your voice (through words, noises, singing, etc) to exorcise frustration and pent-up energy? How can you schedule in space and time for this, this week, (especially on 10/28!)?

Earth insight of the week (money, stability, structure, worth, etc):

List all of the times you have taken financial risks and it has paid off:

Weekly Horoscopes (10/14-10/20)

The week begins with the Sun square Pluto. We then experience a Mercury-Neptune sextile, a sextile between Mercury and Pluto, and then a Venus-Saturn sextile. 

This week is caught in the middle of a tug-of-war between the energy of ambiguous power and spiritual influence and “rational” thought and understanding. 

You may get insights this week that seem to come from a “higher” place that you then start to trouble or question rationally. This process my make you abandon the higher wisdom and its instructions altogether. The key is to find a balance; to know when you’re helping to fill in the logistical blanks and when you’re just trying to control a situation or path out of fear.

The questions below are for you to answer. Each question is meant to help you zero in on how the Astrology of this week will affect a specific area of your life with presence and intention. This format is meant to help guide you in getting in touch with your own insight around how to navigate the current cosmic climate.

P.S. If you love this content and would like to support it, you can make a one-time donation below and/or share these horoscopes with your friends!

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Fire insight of the week (creativity, sexuality, etc):

What sexual or sensual urges have you suppressed because they feel complicated to process or rationally accept?

Water insight of the week (emotion, intuition, spirit, etc):

When you’re confronted with what you still need to work on, how do you react? How do you want to react?

Earth insight of the week (money, stability, structure, worth, etc):

When material rewards or resources come to you easily (without much struggle or pain) are you able to accept them as fully and rightfully yours?

Air insight of the week (mind, understanding, communication, relationships, etc):

How does feeling insecure or confused impact the way you communicate? What about this do you want to change and/or improve?