Category: Intuition

Fear of Retrogrades

Sunday, 18 March 2012 18:55 0 Comments

Fear of astrological transits, and especially retrogrades, can be lurking below the surface of our general astrological dialogue, affecting our emotions and behaviors. For this reason, I’m often ambivalent about writing about future transits. It’s nice to know what’s happening astrologically, to feel like we’re in alignment with these symbolic weather patterns, but when we attach seriously to edicts of what to do or not to do, we begin to lose our sense of soul centered power, our ability to simply live in the moment intuitively. It can be challenging to balance the value of living consciously in alignment with astrological cycles and the trust to simply live consciously.

Recently someone asked me about the prospect of beginning a relationship in the current Mars retrograde cycle (January 23rd to April 13th). She had been told that initiating a sexual relationship in a Mars retrograde ‘would end up in disaster’. Followed strictly, that would mean not becoming intimate with someone she’d been seeing for awhile. They both felt ready to take things to the next step. Should they wait for three months? Does that mean every relationship commenced in this time period will end up in disaster? What actually qualifies as disaster?

We’re also in Mercury retrograde, also considered to be an inauspicious time for starting anything. With Mercury, conventional wisdom focuses on communications issues, equipment breaking and problems with traveling, To begin a relationship under Mercury retrograde is associated with problems with communication as if Mercury will somehow ’cause’ the problems.

And let’s not forget Saturn. We are in a Saturn retrograde that began on February 7th and continues to June 24th. Saturn rules business and the structures we create in the material plane. Most would suggest that we don’t begin new ventures during this time period either, but focus instead on working on what we’ve already committed to, setting boundaries to define what works and what doesn’t.

Should we just sit around and watch television for the first half of the year? I don’t think so. When we think of planets causing misfortune, calamities, disasters and problems because we began something in a retrograde time, we can feel paralyzed and then begin to manipulate our way through life feeling disempowered and disconnected from our intuition. This is not the best use of astrology, nor of our life force.

From an intuitive view, I would suggest that we are operating always in alignment with the planetary energies, because we are the planets. Looking at astrological forecasts and charts simply gives us a language to help explain what we’re feeling or what we feel compelled to do, the kind of flow, challenge or complication that might be within at the particular time.

One of the most intense relationships of my life began under a Mars retrograde. It was definitely not easy, nor was it a disaster. I learned about my own Mars and how it operated (or in fact didn’t operate) in my life. Anger, assertion, ego and physicality were highlighted in that dynamic and combustible dance that brought me into another round of therapy. The healing I accomplished was profound. I wouldn’t have been the same person without it. Was it a bad relationship because it happened to start it under the retrograde and would it have been calm and peaceful if we’d waited a couple of months? (I know absolutely not!) … or did the retrograde define the energy I was called to review in that cycle of life?

I’m not saying we should all completely ignore the current triplet of retrogrades and charge forward into projects and relationships. Probably most of us are in alignment with this review vibration internally anyway. I’m saying it’s not necessary to be afraid that planets are affecting us negatively and then putting our lives on hold. It’s a time to rethink, review and restructure the direction of our life force, our relationships and our business affairs. If that includes something that seems to want to start at this time, then start it. There is something you’re learning, healing or understanding here. Follow your gut instinct. Read documents carefully (always good advice!). In most cases, if there’s an problem you can do a re-start later. There are always more retrogrades and more reviews, and there’s never a perfect time in human reality. Life is complicated, messy, delightful.

The Spiral Dream

Saturday, 25 February 2012 22:51 0 Comments

I’ve been pondering the issue of tiredness. Virtually everyone I talk to feels tired despite sustained efforts toward health. We might be eating well, exercising, getting enough rest, and yet still in the morning we can feel dragged out. Sometimes we remember many deep and complex dreams. Others are having difficulty getting to sleep or staying asleep.

Last night I received a message about the process we’re in. I was shown a number of identical golden spirals, each spiral representing a part of my life force incarnated in the hologram of lives. Although we think of life and past lives in a linear way, they are actually all occurring at the same time. And although we see other people as distinct and separate from us, we are all in fact one vibratory force incarnated into separate bodies over lifetimes, that are, of course, occurring all at once. Our time/space model conditioning makes this kind of difficult to understand, but if you just relax into the concept and think of yourself as a droplet of water in the center of an ocean, you can intuitively feel the concept. Another drop of water might be in the ocean on the other side of the world, and yet water is all water and it would be impossible to separate the droplets permanently.

I was shown that while dreaming I am focusing attention on these spirals and bringing them into alignment, into a sense of oneness. Slowly each spiral came closer to the other and began to line up on top of each other and then merge.

I was told that once they are all merged together my task of integration will be complete and I will be free, and that this message extends to everyone, which is why I am sharing it. Visualizing a number of golden spirals all around you and then merging within your heart can be a powerful meditation.

Then to my amazement as I looked for an image of a golden spiral to go with this post, I discovered the golden spiral is a geometric construct:

In geometry, a golden spiral is a logarithmic spiral whose growth factor is φ, the golden ratio.[1] That is, a golden spiral gets wider (or further from its origin) by a factor of φ for every quarter turn it makes. (from Wikipedia)

Amazing! There are actually images of golden spirals all over the internet! Perhaps I should have known about this as my new logo is a nautilus and it is a close approximation of a golden spiral, but I guess I slept through geometry class! I was thinking of the nautilus as showing us how we start small in the center and continue building our consciousness, moving into each larger room we create for ourself, yet our original rooms are always still intact. Very psychosynthesis.

As well as working with the golden spiral image in your meditations, give yourself the gift of sleep, as much as you can take. Try to sleep in without an alarm clock on any days you can. Takes naps when possible. A few yoga stretches first thing in the morning and last thing before bedtime can help with sleep and the day’s sense of wellbeing and purpose.

We are coming together in Oneness, despite the forces that are still trying hard to make us believe in separation and turmoil. Ignore the voices of fear and feel your connection to everyone who is connected to their inner spiral as we create a brilliant new paradigm.

Snap out of It! Aquarius New Moon

Monday, 23 January 2012 01:31 0 Comments

I’ve been pondering how people change. And whether we should even focus on change. Sometimes total acceptance and gratitude for every moment are really the answers.

Yet most of us are not completely in acceptance. We have issues and challenges we’d like to change, transform, or address in some way. We work on these ‘problems’, talk about them, process and perhaps debate whether they’re even changeable. The issues might be quite personal, like wanting to change jobs, lose or gain weight, find a relationship, have more money, eat more healthily. We might want to transform the glaring issues we see in our community or in another part of the world. We donate money; we volunteer.

What I notice is that most people circle around issues for quite a long time before they change. Most of us don’t change much at all in key areas or we change quite slowly. We end a relationship because we don’t feel it’s the right one only to pick another person, soon finding ourself in a similar relationship dilemma. We go on and off diets for various reasons. We donate money to a cause and then feel frustrated and dejected about its potential to really help. Intention becomes action and then fades to inaction.

And then it changes. Something happens and we snap. The friend we’ve been thinking about letting go of disappoints us just one time too many. We see a photo and are shocked at how we actually look. We see a community problem that hasn’t been fixed for years but we snap into an awareness that it really can be transformed.

One woman described her relationship snap. She had put up with several long relationships with men who weren’t really committed or present. Leaving the last one after several years of therapy and workshops, she was dating and feeling discouraged about ever finding a life mate. Then a man she was interested in called at the last minute to finalize details of a previously planned date, having left her wondering for days whether it was on or off. That was her snap moment. She told him she wasn’t interested in the date or in seeing him at all. That moment crystallized her sense of self worth to know she deserved and wanted a mate who would be reliable and committed. Weeks later that mate showed up and they are still married many years later.

We have a new Moon in Aquarius today. Aquarius is the sign of snap! Fast, unpredictable, lightning bolt change is possible when we tune into Aquarius. New Moons represent new starts. Aquarius is about authentic freedom and the ability to evolve rapidly.

What would you like to change? It may be that you’d like to not actually change anything, that your evolutionary goal would be to accept what you have and snap into gratitude and faith. That’s fine too. But if there’s something you’ve been thinking about changing, this Moon might provide a bit of an extra push.

Truthfully though, the potential to snap out of what we don’t want and snap into what we do want is always within us.

Warren Buffett: Billionaire Bath Taker

Thursday, 25 August 2011 18:10 0 Comments

The news this morning is that Warren Buffett called the CEO of Bank of America and offered to invest $5 billion in the company to help them out, immediately raising B of A stock 12% but also ensuring some likely sweet profits for Buffett. I’ve been interested in Buffett since I saw an interview of a young woman who wrote his biography for him, and she talked about how calm, relaxed and balanced he was as he went through life. Recently he suggested that the ultra wealthy really should pay more taxes, and he has been getting billionaires to sign a pledge to give away half of their wealth by the end of their lives to charitable causes. Last I heard he had 40 signers. That’s a lot of money. What an interesting human!

But what really tickled me this morning was this line:

“Buffett told CNBC he had never spoken to Bank of American CEO Brian Moynihan before Wednesday, and that he dreamed up the idea while taking a bath”

Basically he’s telling us that creative ideas come to us when we’re relaxing, that we’re more intuitive then, that we ‘dream up’ ideas. I so agree with this. When we have problems to solve, too much thinking blocks our creativity and often moves us into stress and anxiety, lost in habit loops of the mind.

So as we come into the last day of the Mercury retrograde, getting ready for the New Moon in Virgo on Sunday — lots of initiating, moving forward energy in the next month, let’s take a bath, a walk, a dip in the pool. We’ll meet in creative dreamland, solving problems and creating magical solutions!

For astrology buffs: I wanted to see where the water is in his chart, knowing there would have to be. He’s a Virgo sun sign with Neptune conjunct, adding that watery Piscean flair for compassion and concern for those less fortunate with a strong alignment to service. Additionally he has Pluto, Jupiter and Mars all in Cancer. Pluto is often associated with wealth and power, Jupiter with fortune, and they square his nodes of the Moon, indicating he really has to own those energies well to find the independence, freedom and aliveness he seeks for this life. The New Moon on Sunday will be right on his Sun.

The Gift of a Summer Retrograde

Wednesday, 27 July 2011 17:41 0 Comments

Life is always about cycles, and we feel them whether they are named as planetary movement or are simply our inner urgings to move forward or to slow down and ponder. The idea of long, slow, lazy days of summer are perhaps related to the heat, but I’ll bet there’s a few farmers who aren’t finding it a slow and lazy time at all. For them it’s a careful tending of the plants sown in the initiating months. This August looks like an interesting blend of a slowing down, playful healing and a review of bigger plans.

Right now the transformational planets are retrograde as they always are in the summer months. If we’re inclined to transformation we gestate in this cycle. Now Mercury joins them, retrograde beginning August 2nd and direct again on August 26th. Giving a few days on either side for the slowing down/stationing effect, that means virtually all of August asks us to review our lives, get things done in a different way, think about projects, and perhaps be patient in our plans. We know that Mercury retrogrades can be times for equipment failure, errors in documents and quick decisions that turn out to be in error down the line (usually about three weeks down the line!). But let’s look at the whole planetary picture to understand a bit more about August’s inner question.

The Mercury retrograde begins in the sign of Virgo, indicating we might be looking at a problem to be solved that requires skill (the debt ceiling debate might be just one such issue, but we all have something personal we’re pondering over the past couple of weeks that will be reviewed). Over the month it will return to the sign of Leo, drawing in energies of creativity, a bit more fire and a perhaps a sense of entitlement. (If you know where these signs are in your chart you’ll know where your personal place of review is). There are also strong energies of spirituality, compassion and perhaps confusion that will be in the mix of this month’s inner question, and our current deep processes of transformation and the healing of karma continue whether we co-create with them consciously or not. My sense is that during the month there will be breakthroughs in thought and resolution of inner challenges, but that putting plans into action might not occur until mid September through November.

All in all, August is a great time to take a restful vacation, perhaps close to home, or with patience and a smile if you’re relying on planes, trains and automobiles. You might do a mid-year review (by the pool?) to look at what you’ve set out to accomplish, fine tuning and adjusting your path, based on new information and creative, compassion infused ways of looking at your self and your life. It’s a great time to play with the children and friends in your life and remind yourself that the overwhelming issues facing our planet require us to have a balance between work and play. The news is filled with scary events and prospects. It can be very helpful whenever we are exposed to these stories to imagine a beautiful spirit-infused outcome and beam this thought back to the cosmos, rather than give in to the black and white pictures of conflict and negativity that are beamed at us.

This is a marathon we’re in; not a sprint. We might as well enjoy each moment and not be too concerned with the details of what the finish looks like. We can’t probably even imagine it (it’s that good)!

« Older Entries