Waxing & Waning: A Simple Primer on Living in Rhythm with the Moon
For anyone who’s ever quietly longed for more ritual, more rhythm, more permission to rest — the moon has been keeping time all along.
In my mid-thirties, I rediscovered ritual.
I had yearned for some sort of ritual since I was young — a sequence of actions I could take, words I could recite, a concoction I could consume to make me feel more connected to my purpose and to nature.
And I know now that I’m not the only one who feels this way: So many of us are looking for quiet ways to mark time, honor transitions, and feel connected to something bigger than ourselves.
My desire for ritual went underground as I got older and settled into agnosticism. It wasn’t until my thirty-fifth year that I unearthed my spiritual side after a conversation with an old friend whose opinion I greatly respect, who had taken a deep dive into astrology in recent years. By her side, for the first time, I understood my birth chart beyond the simplified sun sign that our culture tends to focus on, and even visited a crystal shop in the mountain town we were staying in that weekend.
All of it, it seemed to me, seemed like an unparalleled opportunity to connect with nature and my own intuition to an extent I’d long hungered for. And so I decided to let my own narrow conception of the way the universe worked expand to hold this new way of understanding myself and the world around me. Because living in line with nature doesn’t require you to align with any notion of spirituality — it’s simply a framework for noticing. It’s a structured invitation to check in with yourself regularly, set intentions, and reflect.
Thus: the moon. The moon is a reliable, visible, universal prompt, and I rapidly fell in love with the idea of aligning my months with the lunar calendar — something that our ancestors once found as natural as breathing. (In fact, the word “month” itself is derived from both “moon” and “to measure,” as this is how ancient societies kept track of time).
Our society views time in a linear sense — one day blends into the next, forming identical weeks that stack on top of one another. Our only built-in time for reflection comes on January 1, when we write New Year’s resolutions that quickly become irrelevant as we get lost in the blur of the forty-hour workweek.
What would change if we instead viewed time as cyclical, with built-in periods of expansion and contraction, effort and rest?
The most important shift, I think, is that we begin to give ourselves permission to not always be in growth mode — because this goes against nature itself. We’re not meant to set ambitious goals in the dead of winter. We’re meant to take the time we need to turn inwards, learning vital lessons and restoring our reserves of energy so they can bloom anew in the spring — just as the natural world outside does the same.
There’s a whole conversation to be had about living seasonally, and we’ll get there in a future newsletter. But the moon is where my own practice began — and it’s where I’d suggest starting yours.
The Basics of Lunar Living
The most important thing to know is that there are two major arcs: growth and release. As the moon waxes, moving from new to full (dark to light), we focus on intention, building, and action. And as the moon wanes, moving from full to new (light to dark), we focus on reflection, release, and rest.
Get Robin Young | In Your Nature Wellness’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
For those with a menstrual cycle, this likely sounds vaguely familiar to you, because of course, our bodies have a natural rhythm as well. We spend half of the month in the follicular phase, building up to ovulation when the egg is released, where many women feel an increase in energy and mood. The other half of the month is spent in the luteal phase, where many feel tired and moody, building up to menstruation, where the lining of the uterus is shed. Both the menstrual cycle and the lunar cycle consist of a similar number of days, and some believe that they once synced up much more regularly before widespread exposure to artificial light.
In other words: Our bodies aren’t separate from natural rhythms, even if modern life acts as though they are.
If you’re looking to incorporate the lunar phases into your own cycles of growth and release, here’s where to begin:
Keep track of the phases of the moon, whether it’s through an app, a calendar, or a planner. (If you’re into astrology as well, I’m partial to the CHANI app and astrological planner.) At the beginning of the year, I add in the New Moon and Full Moon dates to my personal calendar so I get alerts corresponding to these shifts. If you have an Apple Watch, you can even add a widget to your watch face that allows you to see the moon’s current phase.
Commit to a biweekly journaling practice that aligns with the lunar calendar. On the day of the New Moon, journal about your intentions for the coming weeks. This is an excellent time to set goals for yourself, like New Year’s resolutions on a shorter timeframe — a routine you’d like to begin, a skill you’d like to hone, an area of your life you’d like to focus on, etc. And on the day of the Full Moon, reflect on what you’ve accomplished over the previous weeks, identifying anything you’d like to let go of — a habit, a resentment, a relationship, a long-held idea about who you are, etc.
Consider a meditation practice as well to help you to envision the changes you’d like to make in your life along with the phases of the moon. You can visualize the type of growth you’d like to attain between the New Moon and the Full Moon, or what you’d like to release between the Full Moon and the New Moon.
Begin layering in other variables as you become attuned to this new routine. The moon goes through eight phases throughout the month — new, waxing crescent, first quarter, waxing gibbous, full, waning gibbous, last quarter, and dark/balsamic moon — each with its own characteristics, so you’re welcome to make your practice as nuanced as you like. You can also consider which moon you’re journaling under, as each month has its own unique name, the most well-known being the Harvest Moon in the fall due to its proximity to the autumnal equinox. There’s also the astrological sign the moon falls within, each bringing its own emotions and areas of focus to add depth to your practice.
Some people enjoy “charging” crystals or water under the Full Moon, where you place them outside to bathe in moonlight overnight, believing it imbues them with a certain power — whether literal or symbolic. It’s worth noting that many recommend avoiding doing so during eclipses, as these have heightened, often chaotic energy associated with them.
Rituals surrounding the moon can be an excellent way to help you tap into your own intuition as well as the natural cycles that modern life tends to roll right over.
I spent years longing for exactly this — a way to meaningfully mark time, connect to something bigger than myself, and reflect on my own growth in a world that’s relentlessly moving forward. Because the moon just asks you to pay attention, and to trust that rest and release are as necessary as growth.
If you want to go deeper, Kirsty Gallagher’s Lunar Living is the book I’d hand you — it’s a beautiful introduction that also works as an ongoing reference every time you sit down to journal.
As I write this, the next Full Moon is coming up tomorrow on Sunday, May 31, and the next New Moon will be on Sunday, June 14.
Where in your life are you craving more rhythm or ritual right now?
Robin
