Mixed Blessings

 What a month it’s been. Like a dog on a lead we’ve all been itching to get out of this confinement and spring into action. But like all things everything has its time. This month has been all about preparation, as the buds prepare to burst out from the winter’s stillness and the baby is preparing to leave the mother’s womb; timing is everything. The last stages of gestation cannot be rushed and no one understand this better than Mother Nature. Spending time with her is the blessing and the teaching. When we feel ourselves pulling against her and try and rush our way out of this she gently guides us and reins us in, if we choose to listen.

The Pisces constellation shows two fish bound together by a cord and held by a knot at a central point. They are pulling in opposite directions and here we find ourselves in polarity pulling against each other. The star that connects the two fish is called Typhon and is named after a great conflict in Greek Mythology and where we get the name typhoon.

It feels as if we are living in the middle of a storm, and finding the eye, the place of peace, at the core of this is vital. While we spend so much energy pitting our beliefs against each other, pulling in our directions of righteousness, I would like to call people to remember that conflict is gift, it is an opportunity to come together and respectfully learn from each other and grow.

Listening to an online talk by an American Rabbi i was drawn to a story about rope, about the fact that when a rope frays and we weave the broken ends back together, this part of the rope is stronger than any other part.

This is our opportunity to choose to work together to reconcile our conflicts, to surrender to the possibility that we may not be 100% right and that the ‘other’, who we believe we are in conflict with, might hold some of the answers too. Then we can grow back together stronger than ever because of the healing process we have chosen to work through.

There are always solutions to conflicts, when we are ready to let go of our fears, our need to control and our need to be right. This is our time. Let’s walk hand in hand with Mother Nature and let her guide us forward. She can teach us how to listen, empathise, slow down and nurture each other. 

Bringing our High Ideals Together?

 

This month I have been delving a little deeper into the relationships between ourselves and our community and how to solve the problems we find there. Frome is a very active town, working to find solutions to problems entrenched in our society. This is typical of the archetype of this month’s energy of Aquarius and how we address it is vital. We can either remain flying overhead, seeing the problems and endlessly discussing our high ideals or we can come down to earth and really engage. If we choose the latter, how we do this is crucial to our success.

One problem has been flying around my head for a long time now. I am increasingly distressed but at the same time curious about the great divide that is growing daily, between our beliefs, ideas for the future, and needs for the present. This is heightened by Social Media, of course. On top of this is an inability to see people who think differently from ourselves as having any iota of intelligence or goodness in them.

I sense that if we keep moving further to the extremities of our way of seeing things, whilst still believing ourselves to be in the right, we will never have a hope in resolving our differences or finding any harmony in our society.

Surely there is a better way. I know we all generally want the same things in life; peace, love and a feeling of belonging and anyone who doesn’t want those things i am really interested in hearing their wants. However, wanting the same things doesn’t mean we all look for them in the same way. This is what makes life interesting though, isn’t it? Imagine if we all thought the same way, what a dull world we’d inhabit.

However, I believe we are living in unprecedented times. We are going through a transition, an emergence into something quite new. Like the caterpillar that goes into the cocoon it has to breakdown completely before breaking out of it shell utterly changed. This means we are in a place that is unknown, uncharted territory, but we are also at the helm steering and creating as we go.

Having this power in our hands is quite frightening, but as with every hero’s journey it makes us strong. How are we going to come out of this and are we going to make it?

Personally, I believe that healing the divides that have come between us is paramount. 

I sense we are in two worlds at once, some people have their feet in the new, some are still in the old and some are straddling both. 

One subject that is causing great conflict is our medical system and particularly the virus and the vaccines that are being created to combat it. I am fascinated by the vitriol, the verbal abuse that is being hurled around and interestingly it is dividing sections of society I would have usually imagined, in most other circumstances, batting for the same team. My understanding is that much of the vitriol is created by the potential the Internet has to distort and muddy the truth. I am not going to go there.

What I want to consider is the fact that we are on the cusp of a new way of seeing the world, much like when the discovery was made that the world was round. I guess that for a long time both beliefs were held by many, until the new information became a norm (even though some, even today, dispute it).

Our world of medicine, for the last few decades, has been constructed around a world that only considers the physical dimensions. Centuries prior to this, a more mystical, spiritual view of healing was embraced. Although some held onto this ancient art of understanding the body and spiritual wisdom available to all, it was mostly stamped to by the witch burnings over the centuries. This created a fear around any use of, or the ability to connect and feel into these ways of being. 

Now they are returning and many people are beginning to truly understand the gifts that are freely available to use; simple ways of connecting to our greater body wisdom and natural healing energy. In recent decades, when transformational healing occurred without the intervention of modern medicine, it was called a miracle. Now miracles are occurring so often, as more people realise how beautiful this way of working is, it can no longer be seen as extraordinary. Of course, there are still many who choose to remain cynical and that is fine. It usually has to happen to yourself or someone close for you to believe it’s possible.

I believe that when a greater number of people begin to believe in the power of this healing and it becomes a norm then we will realise that there are choices available that will simplify our existence. Preventative medicine will be widely practised and our immune systems will be strong and capable of staving off even the harshest of viral diseases.

However, we are not there yet and at the moment we have people standing in both camps, both absolutely right in their beliefs, as both are real, but sadly, waiving their fists at each other.

How are we to solve this conundrum? How can we grow our perceptions so that we can encompass everyone’s beliefs, the old and the new, the physical and the holistic. Both are true, both make sense to the holder of their truth.

Things get messy when we let others take a possible truth and start manipulating it in order to create more chaos, more unrest and distress. This is the state of our Internet today and If we hold to this idea of righteousness at all cost and close our ears to the truth that others hold and we will all lose out in so many ways.

Let’s listen to what others have to say with kindness and take steps to come back to the middle ground where there is room for all to be heard. I would also invite people, rather than regurgitating what they have heard on an Internet platform, to speak from their hearts. Who knows what might emerge?

Aiming High

2021, a year of hope and opportunity? I certainly believe it’s possible, and I believe that ‘believing makes it so’! This is a phrase I received in a dream and have woven into many of my creative outpourings. It brings together so many of my aspirations and understandings of where we are as individuals and as a race; one being the mirror of the other.

We have experienced a truly challenging year and although we are still in the midst of it, how we come through it is up to us, it is in our hands. These winter months are a time of hibernation, a time to nurture the seed for spring growth and this month, in particular, is possibly the hardest of all; the long uphill journey through the darkest of days and so much of the winter still to go.

        Working with the archetypal aspects on offer here, we are being led by Saturn, our teacher and guide but also our limiter. Saturn shows us our limitations but, through this, teaches us how this can enable expansion. 

We have had a year of limitations, and if we can choose to find the positives in this way of being then we can certainly expand our horizons, like the caterpillar who, after going into the cocoon, transforms into the butterfly. This, however, entails the cells of the caterpillar to completely dissolve into a fluid which is made up of some cells called imaginal cells. Imaginal cells are undifferentiated cells, which means they can go into a state of metamorphosis and transform into any type of cell. Saturn, representing time and death, is constantly inviting us to make such a transformation, to choose to see things in a different way. He asks us to find the joy in the hardest of journeys and to see death, not as an end, but as a opportunity to transform. 

It is up to us how and what we make of this opportunity. If we can choose to free ourselves of the shackles of fear, separation and conflict within ourselves, then we can create this freedom within our community. If we can respect the differences, choose to work together to heal the rifts between ourselves and our communities, we can learn to live with rather than struggle against the diversity and extremes in our points of view.

        Dissolving the fear, reactivity and lack of empathy we hold in our minds can bring about change beyond our imagination, but we have to believe it’s possible. If we make this something we can believe in then we can reach the top of the mountain and literally save our souls.

Capricorn, that sits at the top of the astrological wheel, represents our Mid-heaven, our divine purpose and also it represents our wealth and health as a community. Choosing to raise our vibration to such an extent that we make this evolutionary leap is our purpose for this time. 

We are stepping into a new era, the end of a period that has lasted 500 years, which is part of a greater cycle that lasted 5,000 years, (and another of 26,000 years) on our way to a golden age which, we are being asked to imagine will transform our world.

I believe we can make this leap and I believe that the more people who join me in this belief, together we can make it so.

 

A Pilgrimage to the Christmas Star

 The long days are now just a distant memory and while we are speeding our way to the end of the year the brevity of each day almost takes your breath away. This time of advent is a time of preparation, waiting for the most important moment of the year, the coming of the light in Capricorn.

We are being asked to find patience and slow our pace of life down. The winter months are a time when Mother Earth stops breathing out and begins breathing in, when everything on the surface seems to have died, a time of hibernation. The outward energy of growth is exchanged for one of germination as the seed goes underground, out of sight and is growing in the earth’s fiery belly.

We are asked to do the same, to go within, to slow our energies and hunker down for the long winter months ahead. This allows us to take stock of all that we have propagated in the year, honed down and harvested in autumn, so that we can fully absorb, digest and process it all, ready for the next year’s spring growth.

It has been a tough year, no one can deny that, but we humans have an amazing capacity for resilience, to make good things out of bad. We all hear about the Blitz spirit in times of difficulty, well this is when we must dig deep and find it again, if we are to survive this dark time.

As a culture, we are terrified of the dark, of feeling unhappy and of death. It seems to be that now we are being asked to face all these fears at once. Although this might feel unbearable, there is not only light at the end of the tunnel but light beyond our greatest dreams. I am not speaking of this year, the journey’s end is still a long way off, but this is worth the wait and we still have a great deal to learn and remember.

This month of Sagittarius, ruled by Jupiter, the great planet that teaches us how to expand our energy and reach for new heights and scale new mountains, is leading to one of the most important astrological moments in our history. On December 21st Jupiter and Saturn will be conjunct at 0 degrees Aquarius. This will look like one big star in the sky much like the one the three wise men saw two thousand years ago. This has huge portent and if we wish to make the most of what this might mean we would do well to pause for a moment and follow the journey of the sun as it slows and reaches its time of rest; the solstice, meaning ‘sun stands still’. 

This Christmas star, as it has been named, will remain in view like this for a few days, while the sun appears to stop. Then, when the sun begins to move again on the 25th of December we experience the coming of the light. This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius, of the Cosmic Mind, the time of the community, when the light can be found within us all. Then we may learn to allow our minds to be governed by our heart rather than our heads governing our heart.

This will not hit us like a thunder bolt or a huge shift in our lives. The feelings will be subtle. This is what we are being asked to do; to listen to the subtle energies that we have lost connection with for Millennia. When we still our minds, these energies may start to be felt and the more we feel the more we will be able to feel. We will be able to use our senses in ways we have long forgotten, retrieving many ancient ways of being. 

The Sagittarius archetype, looked at with a modern view, is often seen as the traveller, the one who shoots the arrow to far off lands in search of the truth. Another interpretation of this archetype is to know that the inner, rather than the outer, physical, journey offers far more wisdom with infinite worlds to explore. In the stillness we can expand our lives in limitless ways and discover truths beyond facts and figures, books and words.

In this time of preparation we can only imagine what is to come but the more we let go of wanting to know and learn to become still, like empty vessels, we can allow Jupiter to guide us and expand our possibilities beyond the limits of the ego.

This is such an important time, I truly hope that despite all the fear and pain we see around us we can choose to remember that this must be balanced by the same amount of joy and love in the world. I have faith, in these days leading up to this auspicious moment, that we will open our hearts to the amazing opportunities we are being offered during this incredible time. 

A Silver Lining in the Darkest Sky

How to look for the good in life when things can look so grim? I believe we all have an ability to look on the bright side, it’s a choice we make. I have heard people tell stories of their most painful experiences and yet they can be told with a positive outlook. 

I am aware that life comes in cycles and that we are currently experiencing the planetary orbital return of Uranus, that takes eighty-four years to travel around the sun. Looking back to the beginning of this cycle brings us right back to the thirties and a rise of political extremism.This shadow looms once more. 

A few weeks ago, we entered the astrological sign of Scorpio and here Pluto, the God of the Underworld, is asking us what are we going to do with this. Are we going to bury our heads in the sand and return to old response patterns or are we going to face our fears and choose new paths?

In these times of polarised views and our ability to create ambiguity between truth and illusion with comparative ease, knowing who to believe can become increasingly difficult to fathom. We need to look at this more closely.

Hallowe’en, or Samhain in its Pagan form, is the time when we are invited to follow Pluto into the Underworld and look at our demons, stop limiting ourselves to just the physical view of the world, but look beneath the surface and see what lies beyond the veil. In order to do this we need to block out the noisy external sounds in our life just long enough to feel what's within. This is a subtle energy field, where the feminine sensual aspects of ourselves come alive, a world lost to most of us, as we are bombarded with the harshness of modern day living. 

This invitation to slip beneath the surface of our awareness and allow ourselves to connect with vibrations that pervade our every moment with nonverbal, non audible communication can be a revelation when we allow it in. There is a wisdom here that cannot be so easily twisted, that teaches us how to listen and respond with a depth most of us are not used to.

It seems to me we have all settled into the idea that things have improved hugely since the terrors of the Second World War. What if that was also an illusion? It seems to me that all the improvements have only been made in our physical lives. Yes most of us in the West now live more comfortable lives, however, as the wheel turns once more I believe we are being asked to question if that’s enough. Are we only engaging with what goes on above the surface? Pluto, who isn’t so interested in the individual, is showing us what still lies below, what still lurks in the shadow of our culture.

When we truly pull back the curtain we see how the many of the improvements are just superficial, how racism is still a huge issue for those of us who are not white-skinned, how the power of the masculine stills rules with a tight rein over the feminine. 

- It is also important to remember that it is not the power and beauty of the sacred masculine that holds the power here but the fearful, domineering aspect of the masculine which is out of balance. This is the male energy which resides in us all. This is not a gender issue, this is the division that splits our heads from our heart, our actions from our feelings.

We just have to look around to see how we, through our consent, our non-action, allow so many people on this Earth to be harmed and so much of our environment to be destroyed.

This is what Pluto is asking us to examine with eyes wide open. 

It’s time for real change, to choose a positive outcome, and have a sense of command over what that could look like, rather than choosing to do nothing so we then have no choice when change is forced upon us.

Photo Mark Brookes 

A Question of Balance?

This month I am looking at balance and what that means for us as a community. Arriving in autumn we have the Autumn Equinox which offers us a chance to embody this beautifully. A time when the days and nights are of equal length and we have the Spring Equinox, the moment where we started our journey, coming into view as a reflection of where we are so far. This is the first month where this mirror is available to us. 

This year has been such a rollercoaster and feels like it’s hurtling towards its close at a ridiculous rate. Yet we are being asked, more than ever, to step up, in whatever way we can, to shift the problems in our society we have been ignoring for so long.

This month, the astrological month of Libra, is represented by the scales of justice. It is demonstrating fairness and judgement in the best sense of the word, where we can weigh up our situation and make the best choices. This is an air sign and we are very much in our heads being asked to create the best and most beautiful idea of the world we wish to inhabit.

It is at this time that the leaves are turning and for some this is the most beautiful time of the year. The colours are going back through the chakras from green to red, back to source as we are shown that, as this month corresponds with having reached adulthood on our lifetime journey, while we are now learning to live we are also learning to die, but that this is beautiful. 

Understanding what it means to be adult, to step into our heart chakra and use the metaphor of the mirror to feel the ‘others’ in our life with empathy and love, enables us to start waking up to the beautiful world we can create. 

The last six months were all about childhood where life is very self-orientated. We, culturally, have built our modern world around this mindset so we have lost the initiations and mechanisms to ‘grow up’ and feel what true balance means. In this way our lives are out of kilter and we are left feeling isolated, fearful and helpless to make changes.

Unfortunately there is no one out there who is going to do this for us, it is only something we can choose to explore ourselves. However, as the desire for change is growing, there are plenty of groups emerging who are offering online workshops and discussions, XR’s Trust the People Project, Conflict Transformation and Collective Trauma and Food Revolution workshops to name just a few that I have got involved with.

Of course none of these are of any use unless we bring the skills we have learned there and become engaged in our community, find a positive attitude that encourages us to be responsible, active and creative citizens. This doesn’t have to be a chore, when we get involved we start to feel like we belong and that we can, together make a difference. Our neighbours become friends and we can choose what kind of community we live in by being an integral part of it.

If you are frustrated with what you see in the world but feel you have no voice, this is the time to get inspired by the work thousands of people are doing and start balancing those scales. It’s one thing to want a better world, have the ideas and beautiful dreams, but there’s nothing like putting those desires into action., However small your part feels, with the actions of everyone else playing their small part, together it creates a field of energy that is vastly greater than the sum of its parts. 

This is much more than a few words printed on a page, this is what our hearts are yearning to feel. Let’s be the change and create a balanced and beautiful, fair world. I know it’s possible and it’s exactly what we are being asked to do. 

photo Mark Brookes

Choosing to Heal

And so it comes to us all, the time when we are required to grow up and look to the future. It can happen at any stage in life, but this year in particular the need is truly upon us. Whether we are in our teens or nearing the of life we all have something to offer and it as now that we are being asked to step up.

The summer is coming to the end and although it is unseasonably hot for the time of year, it is time for us to get in the fields and bring in the harvest; reap the rewards of the summer’s fruits. We are being asked to get back in touch with Mother Earth and get our hands dirty. Our sickle and scythe should feel comfortable in our grip while we can discern the wheat from the chaff, what is good to keep and what to throw out.

We have the long winter ahead and we need to prepare well. For many people in this country, this might well be the most challenging winter we will have experienced to date.

On our lifetime journey this archetype represents the apprentice, the university student, preparing for adulthood. We will be honing down our skills and learning what our particular gifts are; what we have to offer the world. As individuals living in our community we can begin to see how these two states of being are inseparable and the skills we attain help to shape and heal our own lives, just as they heal our world around us.

This year is our chance to work some magic, as it becomes imperative to bring our skills together and make sure everyone in our community is looked after, and not left out in the cold.

After holding the energy of the Leo lion, where we are king of our domain, now we are the peasant, or the secretary to the Managing Director, here we can ensure all the details are dealt with and the minutiae well organised. When we can learn to balance both states within us then we can begin to shine as individuals and as a community.

This is my dream, that we understand that we have to become responsible adults, responsible for ourselves and those around us. That way we all are looked after by those who know and care about us, rather than some distant overseer who has no clue about are needs or the way we work. When we continue to expect everything to be done for us and take no part in the running of our lives we will continue travelling away from each other rather than choosing to come together, discovering the unified field we are all a part of.

I am an optimist, I believe we are capable as a species of amazing things and I believe we can turn this pending disaster around but only if we step up, plug in and takes the reins of our lives once more. This means we have to start breathing and feeling into our bodies, being honest with ourselves and start talking to people in a caring and compassionate way. The body is a great healer and it holds all the memory of our pain and joy, our grief and love. 

Virgo holds the energy of the healer, this is the most amazing potential that we carry in our body. The sexual and loving healing that can bring life back to parts of ourselves that have been cut off and frozen in trauma is one step away from being transformed. That first step is simply choosing to rediscover the power latent in us all. I am choosing to heal, choosing life. Once that door is opened we can just walk the path and the more of us that make that choice the easier it is to walk together.