Piensa en el 80 por ciento

Hola Reader,

January. Sigh. Over. Happy 🌕 full moon of February. It’s the “Snow moon,” says my Polish friend from Ireland.

In my little circles, the word circulating has been “intense” to describe the energy of the past couple weeks. Arguably, as we start to enter the Fire Horse of Chinese New Year astrological fame, signals point to an intense year.

Here’s what you’ll find in today’s newsletter. Enjoy.

1. Immigration news
2. Techniques for tough times
3. Client story: April Dunbar
4. Mutual aid: Sarah Regenspan
5. Scattered testimonials throughout, and Closing

If you'd like to read or reference this later, it's available on my blog:

​https://shaynagrajo.com/2026-02-01-february-full-moon/

(Available to subscribers only)

Immigration updates

While you-know-who cracks down in the US, in Spain, Pedro Sánchez’s administration announced this week it’ll be approving a rapid, historic “regularización” of work permissions and residency permit approvals for migrants who’ve dwelled in Spain five months prior to December 31, affecting half a million people. The period for applications will be from April to June, with a stated turnaround time of 15 days for a swift decision.

So the focus of my week has been to have clear next steps for my years-long project (immigration to Spain). My lawyer finally got back to me with an update that the extranjería needs a new FBI background check from me, translated and with apostille. A background check will also be necessary in the applications for those going the “regularization” route, but in my case I’ve been working on the love route: a visa via “arraigo social” that would be valid for five years.

I’m happy to say that I have clear next steps. I’ve found an American-run company opening an office this month in the Algarve, Portugal, which is much closer to me in the South than say Madrid or Barcelona. They do guaranteed digital fingerprinting with FBI-certified hardware and software, and if prints are rejected by the FBI, they’ll redo them for free. (Which for me is a big deal, because I’ve had my prints rejected twice in the past when doing it via paper in the mail—first rejection was DIY, and second rejection was through the local police station.)

Back home, my mother has signed up to become a legal observar of you-know-who (Voldemort, I suppose). She’s been quite politically active in the resistance, as she’s retired and, well, believes in democracy. While her job is not to get involved, there is still a risk if things go awry. So I’ve been taking this news in stride. There is no way I’d ask her to live her life any other way, and I view what she’s doing as honorable (even honourable, for all my British friends reading this). But I do worry for her.

Techniques for tough times

In enough private conversations, adversity has come up again and again. Fear, uncertainty, or even seasonal Northern Hemisphere cold winter weather.

Everyone has different strategies for managing ultra stressful situations. I tend to think of extreme examples for perspectives in what can seem like extreme times.

TNH

Thich Nhat Hanh for instance was a reluctant activist monk who, during the Vietnam War, would conduct such activities as helping to rebuild a village in his homeland four consecutive times after three consecutive bombings. He also helped refugee ships arrive safely to shores. It was eventually his leaving Vietnam to go on a world tour and present his findings that led to his exile from Vietnam and decades of political asylum in France.

While through all his early efforts, his technique was slowing down, being present, and breathing—a term he helped introduce to the world called mindfulness—it was much more so when living in the West, far from his home country and climate, that he really had to put to practice what he preached. He had to walk his walk.

Maria Ressa

I also think of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Ressa, who’s also lived through wars and reported within war zones. And aside from being arrested however many times for exercising her constitutional rights in the Philippines (a country whose constitution is modeled after that of the United States), she once had a 10-day long negotiation with terrorists to release two of her journalists.

She similarly relies on some kind of uncanny yet human ability to be with but "control" her emotions and her body in these tense situations. She details this further in her book, How to Stand Up to a Dictator.

For some people, it’s making space to relax within the constraints of what’s available. For others, dance is a form of grounding.

But I’ll also cite a technique my partner often challenges me with.

Ángel Beltrán

“Piensa en el 80 por ciento,” is his wisdom and his solution. Think in the 80 percent.

According to him, in our lives, we’re surrounded by so much to be grateful for. And even if 20 percent annoys us or could improve or are things seen as negative… It’s only when we dwell on the negative that we become stuck. We can reframe by bringing our energy to the 80 percent.

I’ve had objections to this… Toxic positivity? Not calling out systemic failures? Settling instead of going after what more could be possible?

But I also see his training as parallel to the technique Taking in the Good.

Rick Hanson / Jen-Mitsuke Peters

In Rick Hanson’s practice of Taking in the Good, “Just 15 seconds can shift neural networks strongly!” wrote my friend Jen-Mitsuke Peters, the shaman and depth eco-therapist who recommended this practice to me years ago, during the pandemic.

“Seriously, take on Taking in the Good as a serious practice! It’s the one.”

Jen coaches:

“Whenever you find something good to focus on, feel it with as many sensory modalities as possible. Be fully permeated by the experience. Exaggerate how good the experience was. Make it better than it may actually have seemed. Grow it as much and as long and as often as you can.”

It was Jen, also a neuroscience PhD holder and a licensed professional counselor, who once said, “If you practice ONE thing, one thing meditatively in your life… This is it.”

Te Toca a Tí

What is one of your go-to techniques?

Client story: April Dunbar

In January I launched the website for an artist couple in Taos, New Meixco: April and Tyler Dunbar.

April is brilliant. She’s someone I’ve known a little over a year now, after a collaboration on a different website. The longer I get to know her, the more surprises I discover.

For instance, while I’ve known that she is a modest clinical herbalist and healer, I was recently surprised to found out she's had three past healing artists businesses in herbalism. I also was surprised to find out this winter that she studied architecture and design the last three years, and shocked even more so when she told me she has three kids (for some people, their children is front and center to their identity, but with April, this was something she casually mentioned when talking about the kids not having school and being home during the holidays).

So perhaps it’s not at all surprising that after finding out of April’s three past businesses, three years of architecture studies, and three kids—it turns out that April hates computers and chooses to support her family and dedicate her life to art with wool: sheep, goats, and local alpaca.

Her husband Tyler is a woodworker and builder of upcycled materials and burn scar furniture.

It’s folks like these I love to support: hands-on healers, educators, and artists who’d rather toss their computers like a rind and taste embodied human-scale work.

April recently got back from the three-day Southwest Arts Festival in the Coachella Valley.

​https://wildearthinside.com/​

You can check out this sapling website here to watch her store grow. As always, a work in progress. While I support larger scale projects in the web design agency Maple Creative, I also support whom I call family and friends in my freelancing development work.

This is my first build project involving WooCommerce functionality for an online shop.

Mutual Aid: Sarah Regenspan

“There is much going on in our world. I hold the tremendous grief and how disturbing it is, as well as the awakening and the new way that wants to emerge out of the wreckage of our failed and dying systems.”

Sarah Regenspan just published these words in an update today on the GoFundMe page for her physical and financial recuperation after a life-changing surgery.

Sarah is a friend from upstate New York. I’d love to share the word today by circulating her story and her page. In doing so also, or by contributing, you can be helpful and make a difference.

Sarah herself has "supported hundreds of people with navigating systems and resourcing themselves to take care of their health and listening to their hearts' longing."

​Help restore Sarah’s health here.

Closing

While traditional marketing knowledge is important, I’m much more interested these days in marketing (as much as possible) outside algorithms, ads, Google, and social media. Some of you are catching on to this, and I'd love to continue to write on the holistic benefits of de-Googling, digital minimalism, and deep work where possible.

See you next time on the New Moon

I may eventually only email from this list, but for now it's full moon emails here, and new moon emails from Substack ;)

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