This month is one of my favourite times of the year. I love the concept of how cycles of time are all reflected and I see that autumn is very much a mirror of dusk, another favourite of mine. After all the outward energy of summer, Mother Nature is now turning in once more, the colours are changing and she is at her most beautiful, in my opinion that is. The year is, symbolically, dying but it is beautiful and we are being asked to find love and beauty on our way as we journey with her. Now the days and nights are of equal length and balance, and the beauty of this idea, is at the heart of the wisdom she is passing on to us for this moment.
This is the first time that we get to experience a month that has an astrological opposition. We can look to the beginning of the seasonal year, the Spring Equinox, which reflects the birth of our life. After six months in childhood we are now ready to step into adulthood, into our heart chakra, look at the mirror, the others in our life, and fall in love with our reflection. The understanding is that we are being asked to see the others in our life and realise that everyone is just a reflection of ourselves.
Scientifically, we see this as the human egg cell divides and divides to create one whole being from that initial piece of information, we too are created as a human race in the same way. We may think we are separate from each other but actually we all a part of the same being, the body of the human race; all inherently and genetically connected.
By learning to love ourselves we can find empathy and harmony in our world by sending that love to everyone we bring into our lives. The more I travel on this healing journey, the more I am coming to understand that this is the most difficult thing to ask of anyone.
Life is calling us to come into balance, to find the common ground between us all. -
The elements are continually doing this as the atoms with the least or highest atomic numbers are constantly looking to chemically bond with others to get to the middle ground. -
It is easy to think that, as a society, we are all pulling in the opposite direction from each other. This is, undoubtedly, causing friction. While we become more and more unbalanced, our ability to find ways to resolve this looks less and less likely.
That is the pessimistic view of course and I am the ultimate optimist. The darkest moment being just before the dawn, can never be over-stated and this, I trust, will be our hope and salvation.
It leaves us with interesting times ahead until we see it for what it is.
The story of the archetypes involved here are the Aries warrior or foot soldier, (Aries is ruled by Mars, the God of War) who is quick to react, leaping to action without thought and Librans are the rulers hoping to create a beautiful and just world (the scales of Justice symbolise Libra). When society becomes out of balance with itself, then the shadow aspect of the archetypes come into play. The Libran rulers and judges, become warlike, wanting to push their ideals on those who they believe are against them. They are the ones who send the Aries soldiers to fight their wars for them.
This is what we are seeing today. It is the mechanism of Social Media (which has the potential to be, and is often, amazing) when in the hands of those in power and in fear (and I believe this is the majority of people, not just the rulers, as we have not yet realised our power, but we have it nonetheless) that can wield a divide in society that drives the wedge harder and harder.
I do believe our world could actually be in a state of balance, it’s just very hard to see.
I do think that there are people who do terrible things in this world and people who achieve wonderful things too. But I don’t believe it’s as simple as this. We can all make amazing contributions as well as behave in ways that are not good to lesser or greater degrees. We also have lesser or greater degrees of trauma in our lives which can make us behave in a variety of ways. I struggle when I see people condemned before their circumstances are fully understood. We are very quick to take on the role of judge, too quick, in my mind. We all play our part in adding to the positive and negative vibrations in the world and I would like us to consider this before bringing down the judge's gavel on others.
I believe, at a core level, we all want the same thing, we just express it in different ways and if we took time to take a step towards each other and find our common ground we would understand the others in our world much better. If we took time to empathise with people’s stories and rationals, we could find properties that would help us chemically bond far more easily than if we just remain in our corners, coming out to fight when we felt angered.
There is so much work being created by people who really understand how to make change, how to discover the power we all hold as individuals that can shape a world, create that beautiful Libran ideal, into one that allows everyone to have their needs met (when we truly understand what that means). This is something I really want to investigate more fully and will bring whatever I learn here over time.
I am, of course, only touching the surface of what needs to be said on this subject, but I do believe a good deal of finding the balance we desire in the world begins with doing the inner work. Can we learn to understand ourselves and our needs better so that we know what to ask for and also know when we are stepping into love and when we are in fear? When we close down our ability to see the other and are unable to find room for their needs in the world, we are in danger of creating as much dis-harmony in the world as those we believe are in the wrong. Righteousness is a precarious platform to put ourselves on. In order to remain there we can become single-minded, uncompromising and obstinate and often lose the ability to hear another’s plight and understand the journey that brought them here, in this place of opposition to us.
Personally, I struggle with the concept of the Western modern culture always being in the right when we butt up against others we believe are wrong. This feels far too simplistic when I see our society as a having an Imperialist, colonialist, racist, patriarchal and consumerist heritage, a mindset woven through all our veins whatever we believe consciously. I feel we all need to keep revisiting these concepts on a regular basis, whenever we are confronted by others in the world we are so sure are wrong. I am not saying that they are right, but that we should look to ourselves before we judge.
Once again, I am asking for people to take a deep breath, look a little closer at everyone’s story, our history and why we are at this time of such division. I, personally, don’t believe this polarisation is real, I think that we are just being drawn into this combative way of interacting because of the stress and fear we have created in our way of living.
Do we have to wait for the bubble to burst and for us to lose everything, or are we going to ease the transition and start choosing a different approach to life? Once again, the archetype of Libra hands us the baton and tells us we are the magicians of our own life, the Generals that can choose to wage war, fight for peace, or choose a higher road and look for balance and harmony, starting with ourselves. Then we can begin putting that out into our lives with the people we encounter daily and then start pushing that out further and further beyond.
