The current Pope’s resignation is symbolic of the millenia-old patriarchal and hierarchical culture of control, violence, deceit, perversions and total cowardice, established during the beginning of the Piscean age, that must crumble and fall if we are to enter into the Age of Aquarius with any awareness and wakefulness at all.

The current demise of that outdated culture/structure (Pluto in Capricorn now), founded 2000 years ago, during which the authority of Western males was firmly established to the detriment of female wisdom, personal authenticity, peaceful relationships with others and the desire to acknowledge individual talents in service to the greater whole, is one to be celebrated.

These red cocks wearing their girlish costumes (which once belonged to the province of temple priestesses – now aped in bizarre frocks worn by men and demeaned by them), must be cast aside if we are to enter into the Aquarian concepts of community, right relationships and the attainment of higher Mind.

Aquarians are all about creativity of the Mind and individual expression of personal, spiritual meaning, and we must all yield to their heralding changes.  In the same light, we must acknowledge those of Piscean heritage who will usher out the last two millenia of travesty that began with our age.  Sorrow and the transmission of learned lessons are what those born in Pisces (and/or those with charts heavy in Pisces/Calypso/Chiron) have to hold during this transition.  WE do know the wounds inflicted over this past era and we can, indeed, communicate the errors of those ways.

The skirted, poof-ball perverts of the Catholic Church, which established extraordinarily ridiculous theories and behaviors at the beginning of the Piscean age, have led us all astray during these two millennia of their rule in left-brain, boy thought, orthodox behavior for far too long.  When I use the word “poof ball,” I am not referring to someone’s sexual orientation (though these guys have some serious hangups in general around sexuality);  I am referring to a person’s utter lack of courage, honesty and integrity.  The word is actually the informal name of a member of the edible fungi family – a mushroom.  They are usually round and are distinguished by their ephemeral, fragile structure.  If one squeezes a poof ball, millions of spores “poof” from its insides, after which it collapses.  So, originally, referring to someone as a poof ball did mean that they were a lot of air with very little substance.

Let’s all watch the pope run and hide just as the Church’s dirty laundry is washing in on the tide.  I see there is a reason to thank Pluto for her revelations of secrets and lies at this time, as well as her influences in the collapse of useless structures.

What shall happen as Calypso, the true ruler/goddess of the seas and oceanic spirituality of the people (mis-named by males as Neptune) moves through Pisces over the next 10 years, will be the drowning of those patriarchal robes, ermine capes and false red slippers in the waters of transformation.  Dorothy, where are you and will you please, for all of us, click your ruby sequined slippers?  We are being asked to realize that there is, indeed, no place like home and I hope we can all begin to awaken and recognize the true members of our small communities once again.  And, it is going to take diligence and work on the part of us all.

If any of those red-capped boys were at all functioning out of honesty or integrity, they would immediately suspend the upcoming joke of “choosing a new Pope,”  throw up their hands and say, “We failed.  Most miserably, in a quest for spirituality.”  Each and every one of them would resign if they had any conscience.

Alas, no, they will, even in the face of all facts as to their pedophilic, bank fraudulent and corrupt behaviors, try to pump themselves up like adolescent boys on viagra.  We should all laugh and walk away from their theatrical gesticulations at this point.  The emperors/popes are all, indeed, rendered naked.  Better for all of us to simply turn away as they embarrass themselves once again before humanity.  It is the polite thing to do, though politeness is far more than any of them deserve.

Transitions

Change.  Transition.  A new language.  A new relational orientation to the world and our relationships with each other.

This is the promise the Aquarian Age holds for us.  Yet, it’s inception/conception is as important as its fruition.  HOW we choose to enter into this new way of being is critically important.

This is why reflection and contemplation of our last age is important.  We cannot forge new ways unless we have fully comprehended the errors of the old ways and chosen that which was useful and that which must be discarded in our future.  We cannot become whole unless we do so.  This is why Pisceans and Aquarians have such an important role to play at this time in our transitional state.  Pisceans, those who are fully aware of the symbolic meaning they hold, and Aquarians, also those who are fully aware of the very important symbolic meaning they hold as they lead us into the future, are so important right now.

Pisceans are comfortable in the realms of dissolution of structures that have outlived their purpose (Pluto in Capricorn – the destruction of material structures and revelations of the secrets held within them).  We thrive, treading water in open oceans.  Most terrestrial humans do not understand the feeling of tides washing the sand away from beneath their feet.  Yet, that is the very thing all of us face during this transition time.  Pisceans can step in and assist those who are not used to their sea legs to understand and accept the great wash of uncertainty that is now surrounding all of us.  We can, indeed, teach others how to let go of the buoy, the life raft and begin to swim.  On our own, in tune with the changing of the currents.  Our job is to teach others how to release the life vest and begin to feel the strength of our own kick, our own purpose, our own direction, in an ever changing sea of events.

We can do this because we have understood that the beginning of each epoch heralds its end result.

And we understand that, at the beginning of the Piscean Age, seriously wrong things occurred.  Very seriously wrong things.  We understand that the myth of Jesus was transmuted, used and abused by those unwilling to give up the tyranny of hierarchy and patriarchy and was, then subsumed into the small and limiting way of being.  A way of being that, over the past 2000 years, has diminished and demeaned us all in service to authority.  This is the purpose of Piscean/Calypso people at this time:  to show that the way we begin an epoch shall determine its end.  And this end, at this time, is truly a sadness to be mourned.

As Pisceans, we also understand very thoroughly the very important role we have to play in handing the reigns of power and vision to our Aquarian brothers and sisters, who are here to forge the way into our collective futures together.

The Potential Aquarian Error

The largest Aquarian error that can be made at this time is this, New Age, idiotic phrase:  “We are all one.”

The answer is, well, yes and no.

We are, indeed, all one within the place of our collective womb – that place from which we were all birthed.  Yes, in that oceanic realm of our mother’s womb and the divine collective consciousness of humanity, we are all one.  We came from the same, primordial place.  Pisceans know that place – the place that gives us all a sense of longing throughout our physical lives here on the planet.  It comes with the territory and will never be satisfied until our deaths, when we return to that primordial womb.  The memory of our communal existence inside that fluid womb is one that is real and to which we shall return.

However, once we are born here as individuals to express our personal identities, we are NOT all one.  Our very existence in this place and time (which we all chose to do) is bounded by our very flesh, our very ideas, the families which we were given, our very personal aesthetic ideals of what life means.  In that, we are NOT ALL ONE.  These are personal decisions to be made and enacted here as we traverse our singular and cellularly-defined lives.

And, you know, no Aquarian would ever give over their personal expression in life to a beehive mentality.  That is the old way.  Aquarians are our rebellious individualists who chafe at “we are all one.”  They WANT to put their individual mark on the canvas of life.  They offer us the chance to really step back and see that canvas as a whole (the canvas is the mother womb, the individual strokes are our personal contributions to that whole).

The new way is to really identify each and every single person’s unique, creative contribution to a collective.  The collective cannot subsume the individual (that is the old, Piscean way of obeisance to authority and a desire to merge with a collective identity).  We cannot proceed forward  with this moronic idea that we are all one.

We are not all one on this plane of existence.  If we were, we would all be some kind of collective beige – how boring and uncreative.  The antithesis of the gifts Aquarius has to bestow to us.

The Divine is not beige at all.  Certainly, our peerings into the cosmos prove that.  There are vast spaces out there of black holes and stellar collisions and comets and super novae that disprove that very two-dimensional new age assumption.  And, besides, do we all really think the fantastic, creative, divine essence would choose beige as her color of choice?

Of course not.  She is made up of Payne’s Grey, cerulian blue, sunflower orange, burnt sienna, turkey umber black, indian red, mustard, daisy yellow and all sorts of different hues and shades of life.  And that is just on our planet alone.

Does anyone really know the true shade of a black hole, or a supernova, or the huge amount of dark matter that encompasses all of life in our universe?  No, we don’t.  Yet morons will continue to say, “We are all one.”

No, we are not.  Not at all, if we really wish to express the vast and different shades of our mother and the universe she has birthed for all of us to enjoy and explore as unique, individual seekers of meaning and nuance.  Yes, in our birthing we all share.  But, no, we are not all of the same hue and it is within our realization of our own, individual and unique experiences that we shall find our true colors upon her canvas.  Some hues just don’t go together – they can, in fact, stimulate dissonance and discord.  Others blend with superb confluence.  Our own choices about blending or separating from various and sundry shades of life give us all meaning and empowerment.  We are not meant to “love” everyone here.  We are meant to love our own while we are here.

My message to all as we begin to turn to our higher selves (manifested by the Aquarian Age) to something greater than our individual realities, is this:  please do find your own unique expression of the palette of our mother.  Know your pursuits are unique to you.  And then, as all brilliant aquarians do, transmit that unique light onto the canvas of the cosmos.

That is how we will all find each other in this Calypsoean/Piscean state of being of dissolution and reconstitution in our future of unique, purposeful and wise people.  Find your individual creative groove and it will, indeed, serve the larger purpose, my Aquarian friends.

Please,  do, contemplate the agonies and ecstacies, the wisdoms and errors, of the last Piscean age before you proceed.  Learning from our mistakes is the most useful practice I know.  Aquarians, please do seek the advice of Pisceans at this time.  And, vice versa.

Let us all bring in the Aquarian age with right mind, even thoughts and stable behaviors as we delve more deeply into this stage of Calypso, oceanic and uncertain times out on our great, collective seas.

And, please, let’s all stop paying attention to that idiotic idea of the “Holy See.”  There is, indeed, something far more useful to be understood out on our collective sea.

Those of you who wish to usher in and participate in the new Aquarian Age must ask yourselves this:  “How do I want those 2,000 years from now to remember me and my unique efforts on this planet on their behalf?”  It’s not about US right now.  It is all about THEM in our future.  Take heed of that in every decision you make right now.

“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood

And I, I took the one less traveled by

And that has made all the difference.”

Make the difference.  Each and every one of you.  Own and love yourselves just for you.  The Aquarian mind is all about letting go of validation from external sources and settling into one’s self as whole and complete unto one’s self.  They have always been the rebels against authority and I think it would be wise to step up to that plate.

And, always do the right thing by those more vulnerable and less fortunate than you.  That’s where we find humbleness and humility.  Those things will guide us well as we all make our way into an unknown future.

A wonderful man I once knew, my acupuncturist, who was actually my star twin (born within two weeks of each other) told me that, being a Taoist, one becomes the interstitial fluid that flows through and into each and every cell of the body.  We flow.  Others choose to be the stationary cell, but we choose to move between millions of those cells.  Neither one can be what it is without the other.  Flow depends on the stationary and the stationary depends on the flow.  It all comes down to discerning choice.  Emphasis on Discerning and Choice.  Know what it is you are choosing to do and all becomes right.

So, I hope you stay with me in the flow of life and the tao and astrology and all other subjects that bear upon our lives at the moment.  As that famous quote states:  ”Every tangent turns into a circle, if you just have the patience to wait long enough.” I am over there right now. With my crazy, drunk masters of light.   Hope you can make the journey.

In the meantime, as I still stumble toward Venus and self-identity, I hope the essay I have written of THERE helps in that process.

in light

This is what I wish we all could do for our children and ourselves.

It is called:  Remember Your Song

http://www.earth-heal.com/index.php/news/news-for-an-earth-in-tranition/64-the-joy-of-being/494-song.html

And, yes, still working on the next installment of Venus Crossing the Sun.

HOW SOLAR FLARES AFFECTS OUR BODIES.

“We are the hero of our own story.”

Mary McCarthy

In order to begin to discuss the significance of Venus eclipsing the Sun way back in June and to tease out the meaning of it at this juncture in history, it is necessary to step back and view the bigger picture inside of the narrow one from which our cultural definitions of her have emerged and been defined over the past 7,000 years – under hierarchical and patriarchal rules of relationship.  We are, indeed, at a critical time in re-defining relationship on this planet and, in order to do so, we do need to stage a break-out of the feminine from the prison within which she has been required to function over millennia.  We have to, first, acknowledge this sorry state of affairs.  Women, in fact, have no idea who we are  . . . yet.

What we should all be celebrating is this:  The idea that SHE’S BAAAACK!  This occasion truly is a once in a several generation event and we do, indeed, need to sit up and take notice.  That notice is sent to all females (and males) who want to graduate from juvenile ways of relating and ascend to being a woman relating to men, in their own rights.  My last post is all about that.

It has been over two months now since I began writing of Venus (see my post Stalking Yarrow: New Moon in Cancer) and I have pondered the comments to that post by one of my readers in which she stated, “I am feeling this waiting so strongly. I keep writing words for my next post but it is never ready. It hasn’t gelled yet, still gestating.”

Thank you, Periane, as this comment perfectly defines the current state of the feminine:  that of waiting, of gestating, which has been her only role in the male domain for centuries.  It is, indeed, our role to take in and to transform.  And yet, at this time, given that we have been gestating our state of affairs as females in multiple male dominated cultures for thousands of years, I feel it is time to enact our yang energies.

It is really time for us to begin the process of speaking and writing, of putting ourselves forth into the world at large, even though the Divine Feminine’s spirit and form may be as yet unknown to us.  Waiting simply leaves us in the same mire we have been in for a long time:  waiting for and then allowing the male element  and narrative to define us.

Women must begin to put forth the definition of ourselves for ourselves and of ourselves, regardless of how tentative and uncertain that definition may be at the moment.  Of course we have no idea what it is as we have been under a state of amnesia for a very, very long period of time.  And, it will take time for us to, indeed, re-member (mentally, spiritually and bodily) ourselves.  We have been bound and gagged for generations.  By stupid males.

Each part of our collective re-membering will allow us to become whole again.  No, that’s not easy, and it takes courage to do so.  So write and speak it, Periane (you are, indeed, the embodiment of that desire to name ourselves and to step forward – a representative for us all to follow suit).  DO IT, initiate your yang power from deep within, no matter how insane it may seem.  Do no that it will, indeed, appear insane and that you may suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune because of it.  Just always remember, you are suffering the blows of an already, completely yang dominated structure of culture that is, itself, utterly insane.  So welcome those stones as they are a compliment to you – an external piece of evidence that your are, in fact, beginning to undo the insanity that has lead us all to the abyss of our collective destruction – which is the only thing unbridled yang/male energy can and will do.

In so speaking, writing and doing, what we are actually enacting is the true essence of the yin element.  In so doing, we begin to undo the long history of the yang over-riding element so prevalent in our global community at large that and drowns out the Divine Feminine’s true and essential nature.  In so doing, we begin to reclaim ourselves, outside of the male narrative.  In so doing, we stand up and begin to utter the most self-loving and life-giving word known to woman:  NO.  No more.

It is important for us to do so now, as the yang has become so out of control we all face extinction under its distorted and violent forces of aggressive consumption and obsessive sexual impulses.  That has been the plight of the nurturing, yielding yin:  to be consumed and subsumed under the linguistic, cultural and physical rule of yang.  If we do not take the proverbial bull by the horns (Taurus, ruled by Venus herself) and speak, we will, in the end, simply observe ourselves as participant colluders in our own and other’s demise.

And, certainly, our off-spring, those to whom we have given birth (whether biologically or artistically based is irrelevant) and our future generations deserve more from us than that.  We are their mothers, after all.  All of them.  It doesn’t take the fact of birth to summon our innate sense of wolf-like protection of our children – we all know it’s power equally.

We need to take the risk of ostrasization and condemnation from a ruling culture that is, indeed, on a psychotic path toward our mutual destruction.  We need to take very seriously our legacy to our children here, women.  And that legacy will be judged by our progeny and future generations.  Judgement is, indeed, a useful tool.

We need to ask ourselves how we want them to remember us.  Do we want them to understand us as the passive, impotent creatures male culture has demanded that we become, servant girls in a male pantheon of gods and corporations?  Or do we want to have them herald us for having stood up, like that bull, and done what we could to preserve them?

I think the answer is abundantly clear.  We all have to, eventually, lie down on our own death beds and reconcile ourselves to the lives we led here, in this brief time.  Imagine yourself there and contemplate the thoughts and feelings and visceral knowledge you want to understand of yourself and this lifetime as you lay quietly, right before your eyes shut for the last time and right before your very last exhalation on this earth.  This is the place that will tell you who you are and were here.  Courage or cowardice.  Integrity or ignominy.  Action or complacence.  Nurturance or destruction.

These are ours to choose.

Choose well and carefully, my fellow women.  Our collective future depends on it.

Venus loves, sustains and abides by the feminine element.  And, yet, she also knows we have no idea who she is at this point.  She does, indeed, heartily encourage our current endeavors toward our re-discovery of ourselves and harbors secret admiration in our so doing.

So stumble, and make mistakes and take wrong turns and feel stupid and awkward in the new speaking, writing and naming of ourselves.

We are all, together, on totally new territory here.

So write, Periane.  And all the rest of you.  Put your stamp on your assertions toward authentic expression.

An honor to one who came before us.  Look at her eyes and feel her heart.  Really LOOK at her face.  Take it in.

This is the picture of a serene, yin warrior, fully cognizant of her choices and, yes, consequences under our idiotic boy way of doing things and dispatching those who buck the system.  She should be celebrated as our hero.

We would all do well to follow her example.

More on Venus and her attributes later, but this is where we all need to start:  honoring the courage of those who have walked our path and suffered the consequences of walking the one of authenticity in an inauthentic world.  Let us all resolve ourselves to break out of our prisons, males and females alike.

]]> http://sistertongue.wordpress.com/2012/09/17/re-defining-venus-stumbling-toward-the-light/feed/ 0 sistertongue slide_230442_1061479_free 10-beautiful-chinese-women-executed-over-past-30-years-15-feng-cuiqiong 10-beautiful-chinese-women-executed-over-past-30-years-07-tao-jing-560x373 http://sistertongue.wordpress.com/2012/08/30/venus-rising/ http://sistertongue.wordpress.com/2012/08/30/venus-rising/#comments Fri, 31 Aug 2012 00:13:17 +0000 sistertongue http://sistertongue.wordpress.com/?p=1599 ]]> Here is the essence of Venus crossing the sun and rising:  a woman (not a girl) owning herself.  More to come.  But, you know, this is why, in my taowisdom.wordpress.com blog, I will shortly be discussing why males have no business teaching females about their sexuality: tantric, kundalini or otherwise.

You know why?

Because she already knows what she is doing.  Always has.  Our work, if we want to become men and women, instead of just boys and girls playing boy games for vacuous entertainment, is to recognize her for who she is in her own right.

Notice how all the men (and they are men) musicians simply support her while she expresses herself?  That is how it is supposed to be.

She isn’t on that stage “performing.”  She is on that stage revealing herself as she is, for who she is.

She is not there for your pornographic fantasies, boys, nor as a warm-up for your phallic pleasures.  Not at all.  She stands complete unto herself and will not be denied. Those supporting male musicians know that.  And, look, they are celebrating it.  So, let’s all start to bend our minds and imaginations into THAT reality.  Because that reality is the only one that is going to save any of us at this point.

This video is the absolutely, perfect metaphor for our times:  Venus eclipsing the Sun.  A long time coming and a much needed alteration in our course of being.

So, sit back and listen, all you boys and girls, and try to learn something new for once.  Grow up.

Enjoy.

.

Yes, it has been a while since I have posted.  This is not due to neglect but, rather, because I have been re-directing my attention to other avenues of thought and creativity.

Most of you are aware that I have incorporated, over time, the philosophy of the Tao into my astrological writings and readings.

After much contemplation and a feeling of being torn between two places of thought and interest, though both dovetail seamlessly into my consultations, I find that I have needed to devote a greater amount of my time right now to developing another of my websites, which is dedicated solely and entirely to my writings and classes about the ancient Tao.

I have, indeed, been developing that website and initiating my classes devoted solely to that pursuit.  Such contemplations and writings have been stimulated by my renewed commitment to teaching and interpreting the ancient (versus traditional or conventional) Tao.  It has been a long time in coming as I have been engaged in the philosophy and practice of the Tao for many years.  Reflections upon it never cease to delight me, as well as encourage new ways of thinking and being in the world.

I will continue to write here of astrological interests and find that my need to write of the ancient Tao does, indeed, completely resonate with our most recent collective experience of Venus crossing the Sun – a once in a 105 (or so) year occurrence.

We should, indeed, all sit up and take notice, as many of our own progeny will never experience it and all of us who witnessed it are fortunate to have done so.  My own mother never did during her lifetime. In that light, I have initiated my separate website on the ancient Tao, which, I hope, may begin to elucidate and transmit the feminine Tao, so long lost amidst, betwixt and between our patriarchally- and hierarchically-oriented culture.

Venus crossing the Sun means that the Divine Feminine, if allowed to do so in this place and time, can lead us into new paradigms of equality with one another.  Such equality means we must divest ourselves of old paradigms of male/female relationships and to forge new ways of being with each other.  The death of the old social/cultural paradigms of boy/girl dating/relating are over.  Here, we have the opportunity to start to meet each other as adult men and women within a more holistic understanding of the world and our place within it.  That will take listening to our guts (solar plexus) and acting with guts.  Risk-taking is the order of the day and, after many years of contemplation, I realized my own need to do so.   Such are the writings of my new website, which will, ultimately, inform and direct my writings here. They always have.  It is just that, at this juncture in our (and my own) history, I choose to address such issues more directly than I feel I have been able with the focus here of astrology as its main concern.

I will indeed, write of that rare occurrence of Venus and her crossing of our Sun shortly.  But, for now, I do invite you to visit my new website:  taowisdom.wordpress.com to find out more about what I am doing these days, as well as to read of new days ahead for all of us.

Thank you all for your continued support and reading of this site.  I have not forgotten all of you.  I have, in fact, been forging a new way for myself and all of us to think about ourselves in a larger context and, whether here or there, I will address those issues.

in light,

amelia

It is, in fact, however, a very mundane, though richly nourishing experience that takes place out in nature, far from the madding crowds and without accompaniment of vacuous devotees.

Out here in the real, this is high season for wildcrafting the herbs and medicinal plants that root themselves under the guidance of nature in our fields and ditches.  Those who lead the fast-paced urban-based tourista sort of life behind the wheels of expensive and usually debt-procured speeding cars never notice the abundance passing by their windows along the roadways  and byways taking them to their final destinations.

There is an entirely different journey to be had out here and, at it’s core, brings the traveler into intimate contact with the flora and fauna along the winding path.

Wild oats jangle under the brush of a passing hand and the red stalks and deep greens of wild spinach are pulled and picked by grateful fingers to be served at the evening meal.  Crows perch in branches and loudly harass the passerby, whether it be a bi-pedal human strolling along on the silent carpet of pine needles or a raptor that has strayed too far into the corvids’ nesting area.

Astrology, at it’s finest and most original, is all about the understanding of the turning of the cosmos and fluid changing of the seasons.  As  we should know, it’s practice was developed during a time of humanity when the whirlings of the stars and the rhythms of nature were viscerally understood as one and the same.  The measuring of the constellations took place with a simple compass under a darkened sky.  Planting and tending and harvesting held center stage in the activities of every household.  Astrology was conceived and birthed during an epoch where humans realized themselves fully as being in relationship to an intangible life force whose meaning might be perceived in the touch of a leaf, tasted in root soups, seen and heard in the singing of the wind in boughs that wept and swayed on high.

They were times in which to seek the counsel of an astrologer was to engage in a dynamic and ongoing conversation regarding the metaphysical meanings of the physical world.  They did not involve transient,  individual “readings,” a lazy and hierarchical habit now employed by most astrologers in which they simply sit and “talk at” the client.  Such astrologers merely reflect the larger cultural environment in which we now live, one where “civilization” has diminished our abilities to engage in real relationship, one where the subtleties of actual relating have been lost to a two-dimensional, authoritarian style of making pronouncements about the client.  Those are the astrologers that prefer the speeding car to the walk in the woods.  Most of those live in urban environments, shuttered inside walls and blocks of concrete and smog that block their view of the heavens.  They spend their time at their computers, attempting to glean some meaning of the world around them from glowing screens amidst fearful street lamps the obscure the shining and darkness of the moon.

Ah, well, Lao Tze has always said that civilization destroys the true essence of the human being and, in my years of experience now, I have come to agree with him.

Yarrow harvesting is the name of the season here at the moment.  And, indeed, they are tall plants on narrow stalks, their leaves feathery and light, all culminating in a cluster of white flowers so identifiable, even at a distance.  This is the time where those of us who know, see them out of the corner of our eyes even as we traverse winding, rural roads and stop the car, gather our gathering bags and scissors, and traipse out past the lined highways and gather, gather gather this amazing medicinal plant.  And then there comes the washing and hanging and drying and then, on the New Moon in Cancer, immersing them in their healing oils to sit and infuse that oil with their profoundly healing essences.

New Moon in Cancer – aahh, the great mother, ruler of the breasts and giving of her abundant, nourishing milk.  And she will bestow those juices when the time is right.  Patience is her virtue and that which she teaches to those willing to surrender to her guidance.  She takes unto herself the primary ingredients and, over time, just like a gestating woman, transforms them into complex life.  All others must wait and honor the time and place of her transmutation of those simple things.  She has her own rhythm and it is ours to develop the subtle perceptions to know when her delivery is right and full and imminent.  And then, to minister to the birthing of her progeny.  We know that she, and they, will bestow their gifts for a long time to come, shall heal our illnesses even in the muted and grey days of winter and hold us steady until spring comes again.  Her oils, salves and tinctures are rich beyond belief and ours is to trust that she does, indeed, have the power to guide us through the uncertainties of the darkness.

My writing this comes at a time when we, as a collective, both conscious and unconscious, face an uncertain and precarious future.  That is true.

I also write this just 6 weeks after Venus has crossed the Sun, a once in a lifetime event for all of us alive right now.  That influence is not just generationally epochal, but belongs to the larger anals of centuries of recorded human history.  This era, for many reasons, shall be studied by many, from anthropologists to paleontologists to astrologers alike for a very long time to come.  Though many in western civilization simply say, “oh, yeah, I was there and did that,” before they turn their attention to the next, newest headline on the tv screen, our duty here is to pause and contemplate the deeper meanings of Venus’ appearance at this time and this place.

My next entry will, indeed, be devoted to that very topic, though I am still reflecting on it and will, indeed, wait until she moves me to speak.  She does herald a very important message in amongst our doom and gloom.

As all psychotherapists ask when any new event or appearance makes itself known, the question is:  ”why here, why now?”  Therein lies the rub.

In the meantime, I wish for all of us to step outside and smell the smells of green and abundance, to lie down and listen to the  soft, story-telling murmurs of the feminine as we lay our heads upon her chest and drift into sleep.

She is there, always has been.  We have simply forgotten her.

Venus returns now to remind us of her power and her beauty.

Dream well.

The temperature is rising, physically, politically, socially and metaphorically.  Feel the burn?  Well, that’s exactly what we should all be feeling.  And, for those of us willing and able, we need to learn to welcome that sensation.  Fire is the elemental of the spirit and, yes, that is the very elemental that is being asked to transform, for all of us as a collective and for each of us individually.  The collective we can apprehend with common sense.  Where that fire will take place for each of us as individuals is tied directly to the particular cosmic mandala each of us drew for ourselves to live through before we arrived here in physical form.  That mandala is the natal chart and its hieroglyphs and meanings can only be discerned through consultation with an astrologer skilled in counseling and soul astrology.  Such a consultation is indeed, a creative conversation regarding the individual dynamics chosen for achieving both personal awareness and finding our place within the larger global context. As this burning time progresses, the message is:  Don’t get lost in the details.  The overall burning allows us to sweep away the mundane ashes of our existence and to participate in the ensuing purity of self that inevitably results from that process.  Authenticity is the treasure that can be sifted out and held in one’s own hands once the fire has died out.  Every alchemist seeking that ephemeral philosopher’s stone knows this.  Become that philosopher and alchemist. Beginning with the lunar eclipse of June 4 and continuing with the transit of Venus across the Sun a day later, we should be feeling the heightened sense of fire and heat that is continuing for us all.  The last transit of Venus (2004) brought with it, shortly thereafter, the tsunami and concomitant devastation and death of thousands to southeast asia, particularly in Thailand.

The Bonfire of the Vanities

There are many now in the world who are vying for prestige and power through predictions of the mundane “Event” that will trigger the Big Crisis/Transformation of Humanity.  Such superficial machinations and competitions are irrelevant at this point and are one of the last vestiges of the limited and truncated left-brained male cognition still trying to retain control over something that is uncontrollable.  Please do note that 99% of these “guru predictors” are men.  Most of them are selling for dollars the product of light and hope to the masses.  The other polarity are selling doom and gloom.  No matter which one, no matter what form (from the “channelers” of disembodies entities, to the “energy healers” promising to open your chakras, to the “I just had a head injury (or near death experience)  and now I am enlightened,”  who want to write their memoirs, to the fundamentalist, survivalist paranoids, to the gold and silver financial wizards) all of them are functioning in the old, worn-out game of attempting to profit from these inglorious and uncertain times. To “know,”  is the newest form of trying to “do” and flailingly attempting to retain some mastery in a quixotic universe.  That’s not going to take us anywhere, though males (and their female zombie followers) will constantly try to re-direct our attention to that arena.  Because it puts ignoble dollars in their pockets.

Walk away and spend your good money and spiritual energy elsewhere.  Uranus square Pluto means choosing whether to bring life to your own spirituality (Uranus) or sink into the realms of material gain (Pluto).  Be very, very clear about your choice.

The Ashes of Enlightenment

Spirit is entirely “other” than the brain.  It is intangible, esoteric and deeply personal.  No man nor woman can hold power over it.  It dwells within each of us beyond language.  We own it wholely unto ourselves.  Shirk anyone who attempts to take it from you.

The current astrological squares and intensifying global heat are all about allowing a different form of understanding wisdom to infuse and lead us to a truly integrated mind.  Such understanding requires the marriage of the body (common sense instilled through each of the five physical senses that, when fully and acutely developed, lead to that intangible state of “sixth sense” understanding) and the rational, linear left brain.  Each needs each other like oxygen and, when fused, will, indeed, take us to a higher level of consciousness.  Unfortunately, the body, whether of woman or earth, has long been vilified, pillaged and raped by the truncated, logical male brain for so long that few even know the qualities of common sense any more. We are still far from realizing, respecting and honoring both parties in the sacred union of intertwined masculine/feminine  knowledge and wisdom, respectively.

Now is the time to cultivate those qualities within ourselves and without with each other.   Awareness will ensue, if we allow it.  If we stand in that, we inevitably walk the long, dark corridor (Pluto) into the light (Uranus). And that is exactly what Uranus square Pluto requests we consider. Fully, as sentient beings.  Our ability to discern and accept the darkest, most nefarious secrets of ourselves, at both a micro- and macro-cosmic level, desires to be revealed.  The exact form of delivery of the darkness that gives way to the light and freedom that follows is completely unknown and quite irrelevant to the ultimate goal.  And it is deeply personal and honoring to each of us.  In and of and for our personal selves alone.

Lightning is both an illuminating and darkening experience, as anyone who has experienced a thunderstorm knows.  This particular astrological and electromagnetic alignment summons us to embrace both the polarity and union of the metaphorical storm we all can see on our horizon. The full apprehension of the contrasts between darkness and light are absolutely necessary at this time if we are to synthesize their individual moments/lessons and ascend to a larger view of ourselves as a whole.

We are not  simply “all one,” as the vacuous, current new agers proclaim.  That is just silly childishness.  Neither are we  separate and atomistic entities all vying for our own sense of importance and meaning, as the conservatives espouse.  Winner take all.

We are BOTH individual AND collective at one and the same time.  And we must be willing to sit with both our alone individuality and our collective dilemma, oscillating between those two facts of existence.  That is the prevailing paradox that can always be found at the heart of the Tao (and many other eastern philosophies) , as well as this current astrological phenomenon.  We  must learn to say “yes” to each, and maintain our equanimity while balancing both in a conscious and aware manner.  That is the heart of enlightenment.  And enlightenment unfolds in small steps over a long period of time.

Let’s not remain boys who masquerade as “Men Who Stare at Goats.”  Staring at goats, or determining the exact “event,” simply makes one good at staring at goats.  Or inventing notions that what is external to us is within our control.   All of these endeavors fail.  For good reason.

There is a much larger universe unfolding out there and it is time we realized our smallness within it, as well as our acquiescence to it.

True Transformation

Our  personal, probing questions to ourselves at this time should be:  to what end shall we use our common sense (yin/feminine) and knowledge (yang/masculine)? And the evaluation method is equally as simple.  To what higher ideal do we employ our personal actions?   To heal or to destroy?  To exploit or to support?  To demean or to inspire?  To arrogantly pillage and profit or to humbly give and renew?  To extend ourselves toward life, or to wield weapons of death?  To give sustenance  to others or to starve them? These contemplations and considerations, which form the foundations of our personal code of ethics, are about what we wish to attain and how we want to go about doing that, from a place of equipoise and wisdom.  Sit down now and write out your personal code of ethics for life.

The Concrete and the Spiritual

I am going to pause here to give a very concrete example of the hidden and overt dynamics of which I speak.  As someone before me has said, “The Divine is in the details.”  In order to discern the details, we must be willing to inquire of the whole.

I was housesitting for a man who had gone to europe on vacation for an extended period of time.  The dwelling is an apartment in one of those pre-fab complexes designed for the working class that pretend to middle class levels.  Ordinary and mundane. As invited by him, I set up my computer in his study and there, plainly and clearly, on a series of sticky notes, he had left a complete accounting list of his investments, profits and capital gains taxes paid, all stuck, in plain view, on the wall-mounted ledges of his bookcase.  Nothing hidden, readily available for perusal.  I was surprised and uncomfortable.  I was raised in an environment where such private and personal information is not displayed.

Of course, he is a lower class, aspiring 99%-er, just like all the rest of us.  Aspirants to the 1% often reveal themselves through their faux pas, though they remain completely unaware of their own social embarrassments.  We actually have been trained to believe that our gains at others’ expense is to be admired and praised.  That’s the way it’s done, right?   Obeying the laws of culture and finance should be rewarded, right?

At any rate, all of this man’s investments were all neatly listed with their stock market symbols on their displayed sticky notes.  And we are not talking fabulous amounts of money here.  Very modest sums.  That detail is, in our larger discussion, irrelevant.  It is the activity of investing, regardless of sums, that is the point of focus.  So, being a discerning observer, I decided to investigate what those stock market symbols were.

Turns out, every single one is a mining company, ranging from silver to other precious metals.

Mining investments.

Yes, let’s see, mining.

Let’s actually sit down and THINK about the what the activity of mining is and does. As long as profits can be made, no one, at any level, really bothers to contemplate the collateral damage done by those investments.

Mining is an extraction process and its tailing pools, literal scarring of the landscape and destruction of the environment, as well as the use of indigenous people for slave labor to gouge out those precious metals from the mother earth, is one of the most toxic, damaging and exploitive practices on the planet.  It may well be second only to war in its utter devastation to humanity and the all other forms of life.  It leaves, in its wake, for all of our children to have to deal with, a river of pollution, waste and exploitation.

And, yet, this man is proudly displaying his profit status off of his personal, financial practice.  That practice, in detailed reality, is nothing more than one of destruction, facilely carried out in his little study on a computer, far removed from the reality of the devastating costs of that investment.   It is the financial version of drone warfare.  And it does kill.

I know he is doing no more and no less than behaviorally responding to the brainwashing of the 99% by the 1% in order to aspire to wealth of a very superficial kind.    It is that aspiration that should be called into question.  Our current culture labels  this man, who is one of hundreds of millions, as a “savvy investor.”  Yes, in our twisted world of destroying our planet over the long-term for short-term gain, he is.

He has simply been successfully indoctrinated into copying the actions of those he dreams of becoming.  Such a waste and sorrow. In a more just and fair world, one that seeks to judiciously preserve the environment and to aspire to respect and trust and love humanity, he is nothing more than an exploiter of both flora and fauna. He is, while executing his trades via the internet, ultimately and stupidly, trading off his future generations for his personal trip around europe.

This is a man who has no empathic connection to others, not even his own living children and grandchildren.  And that is the definition of a sociopath.  No, he is not a consciously malicious one at all.  But, he will, without regret or thought, push the buttons that will eventually lead to the impoverishment of both his own progeny and billions of others as well.  Why?  Because he has been institutionally trained and manipulated to do so. His own mind has been successfully infiltrated and colonized by those above him.  And that requires a dumbing down of the brain and very myopic sight.  He is a retired member of the military and he holds a very nice pension.  Yet, he wants always more of those little pieces of paper that give him a sense of false wealth.  He, like so many, is a perfect example of cognitive/behavioral programming.  But, of course, that would be expected of a soldier who salutes authority rather than utilizes adult discernment.  No surprise there.

His obeisance to authority and our system goes still further, however, and extends to exploiting his neighbors and friends.  I was originally  approached by his girlfriend (of course, women most often negotiate the ignoble deeds of these unconscious males) to water his plants and take care of his cat.  She asked me to do these tasks AND to contribute to his vacation by subsidizing his trip in the amount of covering 2/3 of his rental expense. She originally justified it (for him) by saying he could get a neighbor (of course another woman) to do it for free, but would be willing to do me a favor by letting me stay there.

Really?  Of course, I refused the initial amount of money, though at the time negotiated a smaller payment (because I am also a woman and still naively brainwashed into thinking women give for nothing while men over-compensate themselves for doing nothing at all – still working on that).

In retrospect and after discovering his lazy profits off the backs of others,  I found myself angry at the ludicrous idea that others are supposed to subsidize his most personal desires and wishes. This is exactly what the 99%-ers accuse the 1%-ers of doing, yet, like this man, they continue to do it to each other.  Like most entitled, caucasian males (again, the macro-level is that this is a very lop-sided, western, masculine way of arranging the world), this man is well-liked by all in the community.  Oh, yes, he is funny and charming and “nice.” No one questions or confronts his underlying selfish behaviors.  We have all been duped into smiling and acquiescing to such practices through silence.  In that silence, we all support the deception and destruction of our planet and each other. He is a plain, lower-class person pursuing the nefarious (plutonic) ideas and actions of the “trickle up” theory of abundance.  He will use others, whether far or near, to profit himself.  Just like those ceo’s in big corporations.

I do not write this to blame any individual, I write it to demonstrate how our collective brainwashing/acquiescence happens every day, in every home, on any typical american (and western european) street.  I intend it as an example to address the financial, gender and racial dynamics of inequality with which we are engaged on an on-going basis at the most mundane level, each and every day of our lives, whether we are aware of it or not. And to demonstrate how we all participate in it.  The 1% aren’t out there somewhere.  They dwell within us, at the deepest levels of our unconscious.

To acquiesce to such a person or philosophical ideation, no matter how apparently benign, is the downfall of us all.  It has been culturally accepted for eons, but that doesn’t make it morally, nor ethically nor spiritually right.

Usury is not a spiritual practice, which is exactly the reason why Jesus turned over the tables of the money lenders upon the steps of the temple so long ago. I am not a religious person, though I find the philosophy behind his actions to be just and correct.  The time has come for all of us to withdraw and say “no,”  to this kind of selfish. short-sighted garbage.   That garbage is Pluto, the revealing of it is Uranus at work within us.

More and more of us, in order to save what small future our proceeding generations might have, must be willing to turn over the tables of the users.  And first on the list is our very own.  We do need to hold ourselves accountable to ourselves first.  We need to divest ourselves of our own ill-gained over-abundance.  Those heavily involved in their plutonic selves will not want to hear the truths said out loud by those within the uranic sphere.  Those who do speak it are most often ostracized by those who seek the  illusionary comforts of the plutonic system.  There are those who will say that what I write is offensive.  We must, however, recognize that the entire system within which we function currently is offensive to our spiritual development, our emotional and intimate relationships with each other and our physical beings as well.

Say it anyway.  As astrologer’s know, the destructive forces of our dark Plutos always win, unless we bring them to light.  And we have to be willing to say it to our family, friends and neighbors.

The Bigger Picture

Our scaffoldings are falling down, crumbling into dust.  The bricks and mortars of all to which we have clung out of ego attachment, and to which we have knelt in obeisance, are disappearing. We are in error if we want or attempt to resurrect or bolster those old girders.  Eleven years ago, all of us witnessed the very real event that dropped those symbolic towers built by and for financial wizards.  Since then, we have been living in the aftermath of that metaphor.  They were built upon the philosophy of exploitation and self-interest.  They needed to fall.  All we are doing is waiting for the roar of thunder after that lightning strike. Running around and blaming others or seeking revenge wasn’t what we should have done then, and it isn’t what we should be doing now.  Reflection on its philosophical and spiritual meanings is where we should be focussing our attention.  Parading around at OWS protests while still actually invested in the giant investment casino game of profiteering of the labor and resources of others just makes one a hypocrite.

During this particular time Uranus (explosions) has become necessary to bring to light to our deepest, darkest secrets (Pluto), which are useful tools in determining which kind of human being we want to be as we traverse this transformative epoch.  First is to uncover those more nefarious parts of ourselves, in whatever arena Pluto resides for us individually.  And that’s no easy task, but the reward is in coming clean with ourselves and each other.  Pretending we do not have them and putting on a good face isn’t going to help us with this task.

WHAT will happen pales in comparison to HOW we will meet it and what higher meaning we derive from it (or them).  And how we treat each other through it.  Yes, we will all make our mistakes with each other, but the true ability of humanity lies in becoming absolutely AWARE of the dynamics and actions of our darkest places and the willingness to correct them when they are made plain, hopefully by ourselves and by those who love and respect us enough to show them to us.

This time and place in which we find ourselves gives us the gift of delivering the fire necessary to reveal, burn and cleanse and to, ultimately, change ourselves and our collective course.

There is a Phoenix that wants to rise out of the ashes of our wayward civilization.  We all made it together and we all need to walk across those glowing coals to get to the other side to change it.

Those who have invested themselves in the old way of being, those who have invested themselves in an external locus of control (the “event” predictors, the wealth possessors and such nonsense) who do not have the capacity to let go, will perish.  Whether physically, spiritually or mentally, they will die.

Those who have already let go and are well within the powerful state of an internal locus of meaning, are most likely to find their way through this explosive, confusing time.

No guarantee at all of that, though.  Not for any one of us.  And, like that final moment of physical death,  none of  us, not a single one, knows what lies on the other side.

Time to become comfortable with descending beneath the ocean waves and traversing through the unknown.  Davey’s Locker awaits us all, at some point. This is a time to feel the heat, challenge ourselves to walk through fire, and let go of any expectations at all  as to what lies on the other side of those flames for us.  Neptune in Pisces until 2024 also promises the dissolution of our former emotional and spiritual attitudes towards life and each other and rigid, religious institutions will come down as well.

All aspects of both ourselves and of humanity as a whole are on the table and awaiting re-negotiation.  That will happen when we choose to engage with each other face to face and risk the vulnerabilities we have with each other, a facet of ourselves from which we have cut ourselves off with our focus on the cyberworld.

The exercise has the potential to lead us to the achievement of a state of grace. And that, indeed, is the prescription for facing our own, individual death.  An event that all of us go through, rather successfully I might add (I have never met anyone who has failed at their dying or their birthing).  We are all equals in our success at both of these states of transition.

In my mind, that is all this entire celestial/global exercise is about:  preparing for that ultimate moment of letting go of everything we have ever known and being willing, with courage, awareness and honor, to go into that place.    That process requires an enormous commitment to self and other and whatever divine meaning we hold within.  It is, in essence, the very thing that eastern philosophies try to teach – that every moment of letting go of attachments is a lesson in our final letting go.

I wish  for all of us, to meet the explosive light of Uranus, however it may come in the coming days, unafraid to stand tall in it’s brilliance.  And to look into the abyss of Plutonic darkness and bring it to light.   It is going to get messy.  It is, however, a most rare (just like Venus transiting the sun) and unique opportunity.  And it will determine our collective future.

May grace and love follow you on the journey.