Mythbusting Leo
Sun enters Leo at 3:44 am on 22 July 2024, US Eastern time. Happy Leo season, everyone!
We all have Leo somewhere in our chart, so this goes out to everyone - but of course, it’s especially loud for the Leos who have a birthday coming up soon.
I’m here to bust some myths.
I bet you’ve heard it said “She’s a Leo so of course she’s egotistical, always hogging the spotlight” - or words to that effect.
NO!!!
Leo is ruled by the Sun, so it's in Leo’s nature to radiate and shine - but it’s from generosity, not ego.
Leo's work in the world is to illuminate and to warm, so people can unfurl themselves like flowers in warm sunshine, and you have to stand centre stage to do that.
You can't illuminate and warm the world from the wings, or the dressing room, or the orchestra pit.
The Leo urge to shine is never about ego - it's about sharing creativity and possibility.
Whatever it is you do, Leo is an invitation to take whatever creative spark brings you joy and let it be a flame you share with the world - whether that’s the Luxor Lamp or a gentle candle in the dark.
And that doesn't only mean art or writing or music. It also means engineering and science and magic and pretty much every human endeavour.
So where did this myth about ego come from?
First, the world has always frowned upon people from historically marginalised communities getting too loud, too visible, too 'out there’.
This goes for women, for people of colour, for people with a disability, for members of the queer community, and people from all the other historically marginalised groups.
Heaven forbid that any of us should try and stand centre stage to share our light, our power, our thoughts, our ideas - that would threaten the power structures of the systems in which we live.
Teaching us that the natural Leo yearning for the spotlight is merely ego and conceit, is how the powers that be keep us small and 'in our place'. I call bullshit on that whole paradigm.
Secondly, and cruelly, the Leo child who is blocked from fully expressing that radiant centre-stage energy is likely to flip over to a suppressed Leo dynamic.
The suppressed Leo turns to hollow braggadocio, talking up their own brilliance and shying away from the intolerable vulnerability of sharing their real creativity.
When we witness the bravado and the conceit, we feel the discomfort of inauthenticity and we turn away, which only makes things more painful for the suppressed Leo.
And remember, we all have Leo somewhere in our chart, so this doesn’t only apply to the Leo-born humans.
Leo season is an opportunity for all of us to ask ourselves:
am I hiding in the wings, when I need to be centre stage - and how do I show up more?
am I bringing my authentic self to the stage, or am I hiding behind well-practised bluster?
If you’re already very comfortable radiating your true and beautiful self, as an act of generosity to the world, keep going!
If you've been hiding in the wings, or relying on grandiose gestures, it's time to do the brave-as-a-lion thing of sharing yourself more openly and vulnerably with the world.
Let the sunlight of Leo season burn away whatever fears or harsh protective shells you might have been placing between your creativity and the outside world.
The unleashed Leo standing centre stage is not being vulgar or conceited. They are sharing their glory and making the world a little brighter for it.
How will you be inhabiting the refreshed and beautiful Leo vibe this season?
Some practical possibilities to consider:
expand your public profile in a new and stretchy (but not FORCED) way
share your wisdom in new places
show up more authentically as you (for example, show your face in your social media profile)
take up a new creative pursuit and share the learning journey as you go
embody the lion - spend time charging up your own batteries via play and rest, THEN go do your thing
devote more time to play, for its own sake - share that, too
Inside every lion is a kitten who just loves to play all day
We all need to embrace our inner Leo, with love and kindness and curiosity and delight.
Because when we do, the world is all the richer for it.
PS one of the biggest saboteurs of unleashed Leo power is Impostor Syndrome: the inability to truly believe that you deserve success, even when there is clear evidence of good results. If you’d like to start dismantling that from your psyche, Leo season is a perfect time to do it and I have the perfect tool. Please click here to grab my free Impostor Syndrome BOOM resource.
