The Bard's Grove

"There are times when people need stories more than they need nourishment, because the stories feed something deeper than the needs of the body."
Charles DeLint, The Onion Girl


Monday, February 17, 2014

Living the Symbolic Life: The Pisces Challenge





                                                Pisces: The Fish

While the Sun is in Pisces, our awareness is called back to the Source, after traveling around the whole zodiac.  The ocean is an apt symbol of the womb of the Collective Unconscious—the place of memory where we find the essence of what it means to live here on Earth.  Love and anger, hardship and plenty, death and birth, family and country—it contains memories of all of life’s experiences, human and otherwise. This is where new life gestates. It is the source of the Wisdom of Life, the World Soul.  

So after flying to Aquarius’ starry heights, we are called to dive into the deepest oceans to regenerate our lives through the agency of those heavenly lights.  If we take that photo of Earthrise to heart, we need to get out of the old patriarchal story that refuses to take that image seriously.  

We can dissolve the old patriarchal story within us during the Sun’s journey through Pisces.  Like the Catholic’s Lent or Ra’s nighttime journey through the Underworld, humans need to take the time to let go of, withdraw from and dissolve what no longer serves our new vision in preparation for the new life of spring. 

Your new story of life will shape your energies this year, energies which will emerge into the world with the Spring Equinox.  So consider sacrificing and making sacred (Pisces) your daily schedule for the next month by adding some spiritual practices into your day: 

1.     Find quality quiet time to listen to your body, your heart and your mind.
2.    Meditate on letting go of old fears and patriarchal beliefs.
3.    Imagine the gift you want to give to the world.

2014 is a 7 year, a year of completion, initiation and conscious choice.  The energies are building toward a strong stellar configuration in April, so taking the time now to get balanced and centered will help you tremendously in a few months. 

If Winter Solstice 2012 was the end of a great age, then 2013 was the beginning of the next stage—the gestation of a new age.  Back in the 60s we sang about it as the Age of Aquarius.  Our vision was very idealistic and full of fun.  The Baby Boomers are the Pluto in Leo generation, and we not only want to stay young till we die, we want to give our creativity to the world.  Now that we’re becoming senior citizens, don’t you think we’re called to step into the world with wisdom and compassion to help our children bring about the changes we envisioned back in the 60s, since the same issues are confronting us once again at this turning point in the cycle between Pluto and Uranus.  
        
When we let the Cosmic Story inspire us and choose to live a symbolic life, we can more easily bring that heavenly energy down to earth. The other option is to remain caught up in the fears and illusions of patriarchy, fighting the energy of change. 

Here are some images to meditate on for Pisces.

Genevieve Cseh, Sedna, Inuit Goddess of the Sea

Sedna symbolizes some of the goddess energy of Pisces.  She sacrificed (Pisces) her fingers to create the bounty of the seas, exemplifying the need sacrifice our ego’s perceptions and open to what comes to us from the deep unconscious. When we turn our attention to our dreams, we find new life and new sustenance.  The Collective Unconscious is open to us during Pisces.  

Kali is a good example of Plutonian goddess energy with her demand that we release the old life so we can engender the new life waiting to emerge in us.  But first we have to die to the old vision. 


Christ embodies the energies of Pisces—the need to say, ‘Not my will but thine’, to surrender to the Source of Life, to sacrifice our ego desires for the good of the world.  Christ speaks to our need to become the light of the world.

These two energies—feminine and masculine—encourage us with the knowledge that sacrifice is part of our human heritage, that life is not all about our desires and needs, but about the needs we share with others.  The more compassion and imagination we bring to our own time of ‘letting go’, the more wisdom we will gain from our sojourn through Pisces.

So who will engage in the Pisces challenge with me?  The challenge involves releasing the old stories of separation, domination, and violence because we have discovered the new story that we are all one family sharing Mother Earth.  Through these times of crisis and transition, we will learn to live together in a very different way.   We will create a new civilization which is founded on absolute equality between feminine perceptions of life and masculine ones.  We will live in the mystical brain where right and left sides of the brain work together to give us a better vision of how we can live in harmony with the Earth and each other.  Let us create a world full of depth and light and beauty, where we take responsibility for our actions and treat each other and the Earth with courtesy and respect.  

Starting on Tuesday, February 18th, when the Sun goes into Pisces for a month, create a different daily routine for yourself, one which includes playing in those creative, inner spaces where we can touch the Source and imagine a different way to live in the world.

Merry meet, and merry part, and merry meet again!  Blessed Be!
Cathy

 

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