Welcome back to *Wreaking More Joy*.

I’m Janette Dalgliesh, and in this season, Rekindle, we’re exploring how women can rekindle the romance with our purpose, our joy, and our personal power — especially in our working lives.

Today, I want to talk about something very tender, and very human.

That deep longing most of us carry: the longing to contribute, to be useful, to matter.

Not in an abstract way, but in a way that feels solid and physical and three dimensional. A way that feels real in the body.

But oh, how easily that longing becomes tangled up with our sense of worthiness, especially when we can’t see clear, measurable evidence of the good we’re doing in the red hot moment.

I want to start with something a client said to me recently. She was reflecting on her work, work she genuinely cares about, and she said: “I can’t see direct results of what my work does for others, so my brain weasels make up stories about that, to invent the old certainty story that I’m not enough.”

If that made something tighten in your chest, you’re not alone.

Your brain loves certainty, as does mine, as do all human brains.

Human brains also abhor a vacuum. They cannot STAND not knowing the details. Look at how quickly various different theories spring up, any time there’s a mystery to be solved.

Human brains are story-making machines, which cannot stand an incomplete narrative. When someone is late getting home, or we notice a scowl on a friend’s face, or there’s a strange noise in the street, we instantly start theorising about what’s happening - we can’t NOT do it.

So when we can’t see our impact clearly, our brains fill in the gaps with stories, and thanks to all the systemic stuff we’ve already talked about, those stories are often ridiculously harsh ones we wouldn’t dream of making up about someone we loved. Or even someone we liked!

Those are the brain weasel voices, the stories that go something like:

* If my contribution had mattered, I’d know about it

* If I were doing enough, I’d see proof

* If I were really contributing, someone would tell me

* The silence about my contribution means nobody saw it / nobody benefited / it wasn’t valuable / my best efforts are kind of s**t

This is where our inborn and beautiful longing to contribute gets quietly but devastatingly twisted into a demand to prove our worth.

Not imposed from outside, but stabbing at us from within.

In our last episode, we talked about the Solar Principle and, you guessed it, this week I want to talk about its opposite number and its closest partner, the Lunar Principle.

The Moon, in astrology and myth, represents our yearning for the feelings of connection, belonging, emotional resonance, being held in relationship

Moon relates to our desire to feel like we’ve come home - to ourselves, as well as within our lives.

Moon asks questions like

* Am I connected?

* Do I matter to others?

* Am I felt by those I seek to connect with?

That yearning is not a flaw, and it does not indicate weakness.

It’s ancient, relational, deeply human and - let’s face it - from an evolutionary standpoint absolutely essential.

But when our Moon feels unheard, when our emotional needs go unmet or worse, unacknowledged, they can get distorted.

We start asking:

* Am I even useful enough to deserve belonging?

* Am I contributing enough to be worthy of care?

* If I disappear, would anyone even notice?

Oh, my heart. That is such a very heavy burden to place on your work.

And as we know, the systems within which we do our work tell us over and over that only the strongest survive, that it’s all about fighting off the competition, that if we let even a tiny chink of vulnerability be visible, we’ll be torn apart by wolves.

No wonder it can all start to feel joyless and achingly vulnerable.

Last episode we talked about the Solar Principle, which pulls us towards individuation, becoming who we actually are, trusting our inner compass, being the authority in our own lives.

How can that feisty energy of autonomy coexist with our yearning for connection?

How do the Solar and Lunar Principles work together, rather than cancelling each other out?

The Solar Principle reminds us that our worth is not up for debate.

It reminds you that you exist to express who you are, not to earn permission.

And that means you can show up for connection as your own true, full self.

The Lunar Principle opens the door to heart-to-heart connections where we can feel supported, WHEN we get picky with those connections.

Because if we engage only Sun, without the Moon, we risk becoming isolated.

And if we engage only Moon, without the Sun, we risk erasing ourselves in order to belong.

Our work is to hold both: to be connected AND individuated, to belong without abandoning ourselves.

And to contribute without our worth becoming conditional upon visible results and outcomes.

One of the hardest lessons I’ve had to learn — and honestly, I’m still learning it — is this:

I will never, ever know all of the good I do in the world.

Never.

Not because it doesn’t exist, but because that’s how the ripple effect works, and I have to trust it.

You have NO idea about the impact you’ve had.

I know your brain is full of stories that it had to make up, to fill the vacuum of not knowing. But if you’re still listening or reading this, I know that:

A conversation you had five years ago might have been overheard by someone whose entire trajectory of life was changed by it, and you’ll never know.

A sentence you wrote might have landed at exactly the right moment for someone you’ll never meet, someone you have no idea even exists.

A boundary you upheld a decade ago was witnessed by another woman, and gave her permission to set her own, and you’ve no clue.

You won’t be there to witness every contribution you make.

The human ego, which craves validation and feedback, hates this.

But your soul and your heart both understand it completely.

At some point, you have to let your good flow outward into the world, without demanding receipts.

Which brings me to the important topic of showing up in a chaotic world, when it all feels like too much.

It’s true that I’m probably more mouthy than a lot of my peers, when it comes to speaking out about things like politics and activism. From the outside, it might look like I do a lot.

But I’m also limited, by location, by health, by age and capacity.

There are things I simply can’t do anymore, like marching in the streets of Melbourne the way I did when I lived there and had a younger body.

And that is okay.

Because real change and activism very rarely depend on one heroic individual, despite all the Hollywood myths. We won’t be saved by the Pale Rider or the Magnificent Seven.

Change and activism are a tapestry, a rich weaving together of many, many threads of all kinds of sizes and colours.

In fact, in many spiritual and magical traditions, altar cloths are made from multi-coloured or embroidered or layered fabrics, for this reason.

Each piece brings something different. No single thread carries the whole meaning on its own.

This is how collective change works too.

Your strand matters, even if it’s quiet, even if it feels invisible, even if it doesn’t look like anyone else’s.

The Lunar Principle reminds us we are part of something larger.

The Solar Principle reminds us we bring something uniquely ours.

Both are true, both are needed, and having them in balance is the most exquisite source of joy.

So if you find yourself thinking “I’m not doing enough” or “I can’t see the impact” or “Maybe I’m not that important”, try this instead:

What if my contribution is real, even when it’s unmeasurable?*

What if my worth doesn’t depend on being constantly visible?*

What if connection and individuation can - in fact must - coexist as brilliant partners?*

That’s not spiritual bypassing, that’s nervous system wisdom.

If you’ve been undervaluing your contribution, f your longing to be useful has become tangled with self-doubt, if your brain weasels keep demanding proof that you matter, then please hear this:

You are allowed to belong and to become.

You are allowed to contribute without overextending.

You are allowed to trust that your good flows outward, especially when you can’t see where the ripples land.

That balance between Sun and Moon is not something you perfect; it’s something you practice, just by living life and being open to both.

Thank you for spending this time with me.

Until next time, be gentle with yourself, and trust that your presence counts. Because it does!

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