🦄 AuDHD Magic is a celebration of Autistic and ADHD magic, mysticism, and sensitivity, hosted by Stephanie Elizabeth!
Ever felt like you are way off track and late for your life path? ⏰ This episode is for you.
I’m taking you behind the scenes on my recent Big Life Change (revealed in the episode) that was barely even a twinkle in my eye a year ago.
We’re getting into:
the astrology and numerology at play
how my obsession with “right“ timing had me unintentionally stuck in an evolutionary loop
the fears and false beliefs that were clouding my decision making process
the turning point that finally allowed me to leap forward with a swiftness
the big reveal and what’s next
Listen now:
Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, and more.
Read the text version:
Hello hello, and welcome to Season 2 Episode 1 of AuDHD Magic!
Well…. this episode is 7 months behind schedule, which is actually so AuDHD that it almost feels like a seal of authenticity. 😂
Naturally I have a long list of Reasons ranging from family health crises, to neighborhood drama, to a major life pivot that seemingly came out of nowhere.
That last part is what I want to talk about today. I’ll be getting into the backstory, and the turning point that allowed me to move forward, rather quickly, after being stuck for a looooooong, looooooong time.
Plus, we’re going to look at the astrological and numerological context to see why now is actually the perfect time for this change, even though part of me thought I was majorly behind schedule in life. I’m going to reveal the results of my decision, but first: the backstory.
The backstory
So to backtrack a bit, if you listened to Episode 2 in Season One, I discussed some of my ongoing astrological transits involving a strong influence of Uranian and Aquarian themes. I conceptualized this as the arrival of a new personal “era” in which I would embrace being unhinged and giving less fucks about catering to anyone other than my people. (Totally still on board with that. 👍🏻) I knew I’d be making new friends and connections during this time while focusing more of my efforts on serving the neurodivergent community specifically.
That was all true, but there was another piece of it that I never acknowledged: Uranus has been transiting my tenth house Midheaven, very much hinting at sudden changes in my career and life’s work. Not just a vibe shift but a Tower moment, a major crossroads in life.
Then there’s the numerology. 2025 was a numerology Nine year, bringing an end to the cycle that began in year One, 2017. Historically I have experienced big life changes when the nine year cycle starts anew. In my last nine year (2016), a dramatic relationship implosion forced me to confront some toxic relational patterns I needed to shift.
There were so many things I wanted to accomplish at that time, yet I had been pouring most of my time and energy into romantic connections that actually offered little more than short term gratification, disappointment, and a hearty dose of pain. So as year 1 began in 2017, I put my focus on my healing, beginning a two year professional training in body centered energy healing. By the end of that year, I had officially founded my business, starting out by offering birth chart readings and writing astrology articles.
My training program was open to all healing arts folks, but most of my fellow trainees were psychotherapists, a career I was strongly considering for myself at the time. After a decade working in corporate, I already had a soul-deep ache and longing to do more meaningful work, but the particular shape of it was still nebulous. The training was partially a way for me to explore that and determine if it was the right path for me.
Fast forward to two years into the training. I’d learned and healed so much, but I was still ambivalent about becoming a therapist. It didn’t light me up, and I wanted to be helping people NOW, not years down the road. I also wanted authenticity and freedom from the confines of institutional hierarchy, so the idea of committing to years of school and jumping through academic hoops only to become an agent of “the system” was completely unappealing to me. 🤮 And after growing up parentified in a family rife with unsupported neurodivergence and mental health conditions, I didn’t want to be constantly immersed in tending to others’ distress.
Ultimately I decided instead to go all in on my business, expanding to add coaching, Akashic Records readings, and guided meditation offerings that incorporated some of the foundational healing arts skills I had learned. I’ve been continuing to pursue skills training over the years to become a better coach and facilitator. Eventually all this work and training grew into my current practice centered on developing intuition, inner guidance and self-trust. Because everything is connected, I was also growing personally through these professional experiences. (As I’ve said many a time, if you want to work on your personal issues, start a business! Lol)
This business was the plan for the foreseeable future, yet to be honest it has often felt like a perpetual struggle to achieve critical mass. Periods of expansion were always followed by waves of contraction that left me exhausted and uncertain. The promise of freedom and meaningful work turned out to involve a lot of drudgery, sacrifice, and pouring all my energy into creating content for consumption on corporate social media platforms. Not to mention, I had to create and hold the entire structure myself which, on paper, sounded perfect for my AuDHD self because: it’s flexible and I can do whatever I want! But the field of unlimited possibility induced the same kind of pressure as a blank canvas. It was overwhelming and decision-fatigue inducing to be navigating it all by myself, figuring out how to get where I wanted to be without a clear pre-determined path to success.
Don’t get me wrong, I have loved my client work over the past 9+ years. I have watched my clients disrupt intergenerational patterns and learn to trust themselves more, with support from their guides. I’ve been fortunate to also collaborate with some amazing fellow humans. But sometime around my birthday last fall, I finally acknowledged the gnawing sense that something needed to change.
The rude awakening
The more I got really honest with myself, the more I realized that I still wanted to be a therapist. But I was afraid of what it would take to get there: committing to years of full time school, taking on more debt, starting over and trading my cherished professional autonomy for years of supervised practice. Can you say ego death?
It seemed like I had missed my chance anyway, because there was no way I could do all that now. At my age? With my neurotype? After a decade of time freedom and fuck the system energy?!?
A harsh inner voice let me know that this was my own fault. I had chosen wrong a decade ago and now I just had to live with it.
Truthfully I already had been living with it—the anxiety. For years I’ve had recurring dreams in which I was always catastrophically late and unprepared for some imminent activity I needed to do: catching an international flight, moving homes, giving a performance. Ya know, ADHD stuff.
It felt like there was something more I was supposed to be doing, some unidentified “right” path I needed to be on. There was a ticking existential clock inside me, reminding me of the time that I was “wasting” as I flailed around trying to find where I was supposed to be - definitely somewhere other than a middle aged failure to launch.1
For months, I marinated in this angsty double bind while investigating other career options: going back to full time corporate, becoming a financial advisor, getting into tech. Ugh.
It was all feeling just a bit too familiar. Somehow I was right back at the beginning of the nine year cycle, still trying to exit the system. Another layer in the evolutionary spiral path was presenting itself. I’ve learned that with each new layer of growth and healing, new possibilities can emerge.
The turning point
I allowed myself to just consider the possibility of going back to school. No pressure, no commitment. I started talking about it with trusted people. Everyone reacted really positively. In my weekly readings, my ancestors continuously sent me signs of positive changes ahead. As I followed the breadcrumb trail, an incredible tarot reading with my friend Alycia provided zero details of what I was to do. Yet it somehow gave a clear message: needing to make a choice with the long term future in mind; being willing to slow down, pause and take what looked like a step back, in order to eventually leap forward toward the life I am creating for myself; incremental progress toward an achievable goal; tending to myself and my community. Okay…🤔
I asked myself, What would I do if I knew things were going to work out for me?
It was immediately obvious that I already knew what to do but fear was distorting my decision making. I realized I was trying to prevent risk, an impossibility. No potential option could be guaranteed 100% safe. Then I remembered that anxiety tends to appear before a new path emerges in my life. So the anxiety and uncertainty were normal and not a sign that something had gone wrong.
I began unconsciously selling myself on the idea of finally becoming a therapist:
I thought about my vision for inclusive, accessible, liberatory therapy that centers the neurodivergent community and honors our lived experiences without pathologizing us. A therapy by and for Autistic people, something I myself was not able to access until very recently.
I thought about my ongoing obsession with understanding ancestral/intergenerational trauma, patterns and cycles, and how they shape our lives, society and culture.
I thought about all the ways I have been unable to help my clients as a coach because of my limited scope of practice.
I thought about my exhaustion of trying to make my current business financially sustainable in these times without burning myself out and triggering chronic illness flares.
I thought about my conviction that therapy and healing are inherently political, and how therapists can be agents of culture change.
I thought about how school is more than just a pathway to a credential. It’s an opportunity to spend the next 2 years immersed in studying my special interest and growing my expertise within a community of similarly dedicated classmates and colleagues. Wait, that actually sounds amazing?!?
Then I found the perfect Master’s program that intuitively felt like a fit, somewhere I could show up and be myself.
I decided to take a chance and do something different. I would just apply and see what happened. In deciding this I already felt the relief in my body as I could now see a clear path to follow from where I was, to my future as an independently licensed psychotherapist.
The application process was competitive. It took a lot of work and asking people for help and favors. Then I had to get through a group interview that involved on the spot role play, which is exactly as anxiety-inducing as it sounds. I watched some of my fellow applicants imploding under the pressure. Yet when it was my turn in the hotseat I felt oddly calm. Deep down I knew I would be accepted and this is what I was meant to do.
The big news
Wait, how did I get on this? Oh yeah, I was going to tell you that I’m about to start the semester as a full time grad student working on my masters in marriage & family therapy!!!
It wasn’t too late. It’s actually the perfect time because now is the time that I am ready to take this step and this risk. Would it have been easier 10 years ago? On paper, Yes (Thanks perimenopause and recent student loan reforms in which my licensing-eligible degree is not considered “professional.” 😑)
Turns out that even with these factors, sometimes shortcuts end up taking longer and being more work in the end than just making the best choice you can, and living into that. I thought I was taking a shortcut to the healing and helping work I wanted to do, but it actually was far more work and struggle and stress than it would have been had I just gone to school.
And waiting until the exact “right” time to make a big life change is impossible and can actually delay you in moving toward the future you want, because there is no right time. There’s never going to be an ideal time where absolutely everything is perfectly aligned and there’s no disruption or inconvenience. That doesn’t exist.
Truthfully though, these ten years weren’t wasted. I was growing and acquiring skills and formative experiences that I will continue to build on in this next chapter. As a result, I’m now able to step into this new identity with confidence and a clear vision for how I want my future work as an Autistic therapist to contribute to the mental health field. I am unsure if I would have had the capacity to do this at a younger age. Certainly, not in my twenties.
What next?
So that’s my big news! In the meantime, I’m not closing my business. I’m still offering online birth chart readings, Akashic Records sessions, and personalized intuitive coaching to support your journey of becoming more you, as you were always meant to be.
And don’t worry, I do plan to release more podcast episodes as time allows. If you missed my teaser post about the topics I have planned, go check that out here. I’m not going to lie, the publication schedule could be sporadic this fall, but it will happen.
Next up will be Neurodivergent astrology part 2: looking at the phenomena of masking and personality curation through the lens of your birth chart. [See Part 1 here.] I’m already working on that one and I have so many thoughts. Make sure you’re subscribed now so you don’t miss out when it drops. Until then, take care and stay magical! 🦄
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AuDHD Magic is created and produced by Stephanie Elizabeth. Our theme song is Crystal Waves by Starry Eyes (Stephanie’s music project).
Oh hi, internalized capitalism and ableism.