Shedding the Snake, Riding the Horse
This past year has felt like a long, deliberate shedding.
The Chinese year of the Snake—at least as I’ve lived it—has been about molting. About letting go of skins that once fit, skins that once protected me, but eventually began to restrict my breathing. Relationships have shifted. Some ended or changed shape. Ways of being I once relied on—old patterns of caretaking, old strategies for belonging, old versions of myself that kept the peace but muted the truth—began to crack and loosen.
Shedding isn’t dramatic in the way we like to imagine transformation. It’s quiet. It’s awkward. And sometimes it’s lonely. A snake doesn’t shed because it wants to become something else; it sheds because growth requires more space. That’s how this year has felt. Less about becoming “better,” more about becoming truer. Less about reinvention, more about release.
In shedding those skins, I’ve also had to look at how I relate—not just to others, but to myself. How often I override my own instincts. How easily I adapt to keep things smooth. How familiar it can feel to live slightly sideways to my own nature. The Snake year asked me to notice those misalignments, and then—patiently, sometimes painfully—to let them go.
I spent much of this year in quiet — not out of withdrawal, but out of respect. Respect for the grief moving through me personally, and for the wider grief carried by this place after Helene, and by people navigating a strained and unsettled country. I grounded myself deliberately, returning again and again to the body — to breath, movement, and stillness — choosing presence over distraction. I tried not to rush into new attachments or reach for numbing when things felt raw. The point wasn’t improvement. It was balance. Not to fix what was broken, but to stay present long enough to honor what was being felt — and to be ready for what comes next.
As this cycle turns, I find myself looking toward the year of the Horse.
The Horse feels different in my body. It’s not inward like the Snake. It’s not about watching and waiting. It’s about movement. Breath. Muscle. Momentum. The Horse doesn’t slither away from what’s true; it runs toward it. The Horse lives in the open. It chooses direction. It commits.
For me, the Year of the Horse feels like permission to live as myself—more visibly, more instinctively, more honestly. To stop translating who I am into something more palatable. To ride forward instead of folding inward. To trust that forward motion itself creates clarity.
There’s a reason this symbol lands so deeply for me.
Me in sync with my favorite horse.
When I was a teenager, I trained quarter horses—western riding, barrel racing, long days in the saddle. At a regional horseman’s show one year, my horse was especially spirited. Bucking a little. Full of energy. I loved it. It felt alive, responsive, real. But as we circled the arena, I remember thinking the judges might see it as too much. Too wild. Too uncontained.
What I forgot, in that moment, was this: the horse wasn’t being judged. I was.
At the end of the event, I was surprised to see the judge wave me forward—first place, champion. When I rode up to her, still confused, she smiled and said simply, “You sit a good saddle.”
I’ve carried that line with me for decades.
She didn’t say I controlled the horse. She didn’t say I restrained its energy. She said I could sit it. I could stay present. Balanced. In relationship with the movement instead of fighting it.
That’s how this transition feels now—leaving the Snake and entering the Horse. I’ve shed what no longer fits. I’ve learned where I lose balance. And now, I’m positioned—grounded, centered, honest—to ride.
Not by forcing direction.
Not by dimming the spirit.
But by sitting the saddle well.
And riding forward, at last, as myself.
