The Year of the Skin Came Off

 A Closing Reflection on 2026...

Whether you believe in astrology or not, it has been difficult to ignore how precisely the symbolism of the Year of the Snake mapped itself onto this past year. 

Something moved beneath the surface for a long time, quietly and persistently, until it could no longer remain hidden. What was buried rose, what was deferred demanded attention, and what had already expired finally shed, whether we were ready for the loss of it or not.

This year did not unfold as a sequence of dramatic events so much as a prolonged internal unraveling. 

For many, it arrived through the body, through exhaustion, illness, and nervous systems stretched past what they could reasonably hold. For others, it came through heartbreak, endings, disillusionment, and the quiet grief of watching things fall apart that had been held together with extraordinary effort. 

And for many, it appeared in subtler ways that were no less consuming, through a lingering sense of being off course and unable to recognize the version of themselves they had been living inside.

Personally, this has been one of the most difficult years I can remember, not because of any single rupture, but because of the cumulative weight of everything that shifted. 

It was the kind of year that dismantles your assumptions slowly, almost politely, while asking you to keep functioning as though nothing fundamental is changing… not chaos, but erosion.

What has stayed with me most, however, is how widely this experience has been shared. 

In conversation after conversation, across founders, leaders, creatives, and friends, I heard the same reflection expressed in different language. 

Something cracked open. Something ended that could not continue. Something demanded to be seen that had been ignored for too long. The details varied, but the movement underneath them was unmistakably familiar.

This reckoning did not exist solely on a personal level. Collectively, the world itself felt compressed, intensified, as though pressure had been applied to reveal fractures that were already present. Division was amplified. Fear was magnified. Illusions about how systems operate, how power functions, and how much we can safely outsource our intuition began to give way. 

Many of us came to realize that returning to what is real is no longer a philosophical preference, but a practical necessity, because the old ways of functioning, shaped by performance, disconnection, and emotional numbness, cannot sustain what is emerging.

For me, this year carried both loss and an expansion I could not have planned. Things ended that I did not want to end. Relationships shifted in ways I would not have chosen. Certainties dissolved that I had built my footing on. And at the same time, without force or orchestration, new directions opened. 

My business took a turn I could not have predicted, yet in hindsight could not have avoided. New people entered my life who would have been unimaginable a year ago, and new conversations, collaborations, and ways of working surfaced. I did not go searching for them. Something in me had simply changed.

This is the paradox of a shedding year. When the skin comes off, there is exposure and vulnerability, but there is also relief. The Snake does not shed in pursuit of novelty. It sheds because growth has made the old form uninhabitable.

As we move toward the Year of the Horse, the energy feels distinctly different. Where the Snake invited excavation and reckoning, the Horse carries momentum, truth, and forward motion that cannot be sustained through pretense. The Horse responds to coherence. It moves when direction is honest. It does not carry what has already completed its purpose.

If the past year asked us to confront what was misaligned, unsustainable, or no longer true, the coming year seems to pose a quieter but more consequential question. Now that you see it, how will you live?

This feels less like a year of reinvention and more like a year of integration, less about becoming someone new and more about living from what has already been revealed. 

It feels like a season of discernment, of raising the bar on who and what gets access to our time, our energy, and our inner world. It feels like choosing relationships, in love and in work, that are capable of presence rather than intensity alone, and understanding that how people treat us is often a reflection of their unresolved inner landscape rather than a referendum on our worth.

If this year taught me anything, it is that forward movement does not come from bypassing grief or rushing toward resolution. It comes from allowing grief to do its work, from listening carefully to what the discomfort has been trying to communicate all along.

If you are ending this year feeling tender, quieter than usual, or uncertain about what comes next, you are not behind. You may simply be between skins, standing at the threshold between what no longer fits and what has not yet fully taken shape.

As this year closes, I am not making grand declarations or pretending that clarity arrives neatly on a calendar date. What I do feel is more honest, more precise, and more aligned with what I am willing to carry forward and what I am ready to leave behind.

That feels like enough to begin again.

Here's to the year that stripped us, and to the year that invites us to move, not faster, but truer.

With love, and an honest stride forward, Deevo

About Deevo

Deevo Tindall is a storyteller, strategist, and identity-focused coach who helps founders, creatives, and high-performing humans recalibrate the relationship between their inner life and their outer work so their path, presence, and direction finally reflect the person they have become. His approach blends psychology, narrative design, behavioral insight, and lived experience to create grounded, practical shifts that influence both personal evolution and professional impact. 

When he isn't guiding clients through these transitions, he is behind a camera, hosting conversations, or writing about the intersection of identity, clarity, and human potential.

www.thebrandstoryteller.com

Follow him on LinkedIn, explore his work at thebrandstoryteller.com, or find him on Instagram @deevothebrandstoryteller.