Yesterday was our monthly New Moon Alchemy Coaching Circle in Dream Book. While I was getting ready for it, I looked at my notes from January's call and was stunned to see the goals I had set then.

This last month I've done lots of things, but none of them were the things that I said I'd do, at last month's new moon circle.

I shared this at the start of our call, and said that I planned to put this month's goals into my daytimer as a way to hold them better.

Is that a failure as a coach or is it freedom to just follow my creative flow or is it something else?

I think of failing your monthly goals as a really good thing, as one of the ways that you learn what your dreams REALLY need and grow into the person who can do those things.

But I didn't fail at my goals. I dropped them, that's different.

Not to make excuses or anything, but I think it's the pandemic.

Should we use the pandemic as an excuse, or reasonable reason, to not bother with our goals?

I think some goals should absolutely be shelved right now. Like I wish giant corporations would put their profit goals aside and just focus on helping their employees and customers get through the pandemic safely.

Let me explain the difference between GOALS and DREAMS here.

Every month in the New Moon Alchemy Circle we set GOALS to that help us move towards our DREAMS over the following month.

DREAMS are nourishing and help us be our true selves. Dreams heal and grow us. We should NEVER not bother with our dreams because working with your dream is generative.

Especially now, we need the medicine of our dreams. And there are an infinite number of ways to work/play/grow with a dream - it's NOT all about the "setting and meeting goals" part. The inner aspects of Dream Work are especially valuable right now.

Dream Work is the high quality self care that we all need right now.

And the point of the new moon goal setting is to step OUT of our usual ways of being in our lives, step IN to an alchemy circle where anything is possible, and then check in with our dreams and our selves, and make a plan for where to focus next.

It's NOT all about the "making it happen" part. Some months are more about healing and restorative self care and incubating ideas.

But my story more complicated than this.

Because when I looked in my daytimer to add my goals this morning - well holy shit my goals WERE there all along, written in both the monthly goals section and in each week's to do list.

It just didn't FEEL anything like how I remember it FEELING during the new moon circle where I set the goal.

These moments of surprising ourselves are often a sign that we are growing, our perspective has shifted we don't recognize our own goals.

This is good. SO good.

It's just super confusing to navigate.

So here's what I am doing: I had a whole page about this in my Dream Book so I went back to update it, and took all of the ideas I had there and made a list. This month the goal is to spend time with each idea.

SPEND TIME can mean: journaling about it, meditating on it, taking action on it - just go with what I'm feeling in the moment, not trying to force myself into taking action.

It's very easy to FORCE a dream.

We can use willpower and hard work and an attitude of "I won't allow any negative thinking or self-sabotaging beliefs to get in my way" and just steamroll our way into a dream.

That's a great way to create the OUTER form of the dream.

You may not be happy with how it FEELS to be there though. It might be hard to hold onto it, it might be stressful to take care of it, it might not fit into the rest of your life and create other conflicts.

There are so many ways that dreams can go bad when we force them because we didn't take the time to HEAL and GROW into it.

On the other hand, it's also very easy to suffocate a dream from not taking enough action.

You can't just meditate and journal your way into a dream. This work should become the FUEL for the outer work.

Finding the right balance IS complicated.

It's NORMAL to get lost sometimes.

I think it's even necessary to get lost, to go too far to one side, because that can teach you things that you can use when you come back into a more balanced approach.

So I'm forgiving myself for not working with my goals the way I wish I had over the last month.

And committing to try again this month.