A Priest Performing A Marriage Ceremony is the oracle at 19° Cancer. The keynote is: The ritualization of productive interpersonal relationships. But to my mind it is the priest who is the key player here. He is the sanctified third entity who transcends the polarities being united, or indeed he has the power to unite them. We are seeking to sanctify our experience, not just blindly go about it. That’s all I have today on this one. It’s not really speaking all that loudly. Maybe there’s just not enough complexity in the image to dig into. And frankly I am at a loss to make the connection to Aries in a twelve-fold sequence. It’s just as well. I have a ton of work to do today.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

With a quick meditation, one might easily understand how, at Cancer 18°, the oracle—A Hen Scratching The Ground to Find Nourishment For Her Progeny—would be ruled by Pisces in a twelve-fold sequence. Tha axis signs of Virgo and Pisces both deal with ingesting and gestation, the Virgo virgin about to impregnate herself with that phallic scheaf of grain and Pisces’ embryonic association with the womb-tomb, opposite facing fish signifying the two way roundabout of life and death; but also, as the figure of the womb, we see its natural filtration system, the fish pointing to nutrient and detritus, in with the former out with the latter. We are at that primal metaphorical Pisces, primordial soup-to-nuts place where the running question whether chicken or egg is perpetually being asked. Human existence is at its most basic, here, at bare bones, the ground dry and dusty, yielding but few of those germinated seeds we spoke pf yesterday. They would do, would they not? But wait, those were nutritious nuggets of certain enlightenment. I suppose we now find them scattered to the wind, whereupon we might scarcely dine. What’s up with that: the chicken begins the process of assimilating life, feeding her progeny, other chicken-egg paradoxes.

Our revelations are as germinated seeds, some of which take root only to be immediately plucked up for their nourishment. That’s life. And speaking metaphorically, a seeds that you have germinated is, say, a new book or a new painting or a new piece of music or a new product or a new project or a new deal or whatever, it immediately becomes fodder for the fade away. But never fear, there is suddenly a giant chicken that will gobble up, and feed others upon such tender morsels you’ve brought to light. Even those you think you didn’t. The cosmic farmyard is where everything ends up, nothing is wasted. All we create for public consumption is being constantly digested, again, by this damn giant chicken. Pisces is akin to it: Chicken or egg? Womb and Tomb? Alpha Omega. Simultaneaity. The moment you create something the world chicken starts scratching at it and reingesting. And like the chicken, dear reader,  you scratch and save and scratch others backs and they yours. You rifle through the debris and the discarded, elements of the Pisces 12th astrological house,  la poubelle of the Zodiac, ruling all that, and whom, is discarded and disenfranchised, cast to the elements.

This oracle shows us where everything has been left and scattered and where the process of recylcling now begins, most fitting for Pisces the last sign of the zodiac. Let us see what we find tomorrow when we turn the wheel and begin once again.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

What happens when we receive certain revelation is that a seed is planted. At Cancer 17° we explore The Unfoldment of Multilevel Potentialities Issuing From An Original Germ, the keynote of which is the urge to actualize our birth potential. Not surprisingly, this oracle is ruled by Aquarius in a twelve-fold sequence, the sign associated with evolution, revolution and rebirth. The Waterbearer, whether the Biblical John the Baptist or the classic Hebe or Ganymede, who poured out the immortalizing nectar of the gods, embodies the emergence of new (spiritual, divine) life within us in our present state. Such should be as simple a process as germination. When I think of unfolding I think of the lotus; unfolding is a word one often hears too, in the vernacular of the Unitarian Universalists, stemming back to the American Transcendentalists.

Dane Rudhyar says, “the seed becomes the germ, just as the Tibetan student meditating silently and peacefully on the Mandala is followed by the Christian Crusader.” I understand this until the Christian bit. I think dear Dane is trying to illustrate action, in the form of the crusader, deriving from meditation; but we don’t need it and I think it’s the wrong metaphor. Unfolding isn’t the action of the crusader. Unfolding isn’t outward as he would have us think. Unfolding is still an inner process of becoming, the full expression of our being, that emanates from the same core as was struck by the meditation. An unisolatable core expressing the inexplicable. Meditation removes the obstacles, the impediments to our full unfolding. In real terms it right-sizes the molehills we make into mountains—which casts said mountains, whereupon we receive our revelation, in a whole new light. Indeed we speak of the via negativa, the negative way via which we come to revelation and change. Personally, I think it can be a pretty fun way to get there, battle scars not withstanding.

But here we are, we’ve gone to the mountain, we’ve meditated on our mandala, and something took hold in us. We asked for it. Now what? We become a different being. Aquarius works its revolutionary/evolutionary magic in us and we begin to unfold. The trick now is to do so in no half measures but the full ballerina flower petals opening display. What are we waiting for? Why not become our full potential, why not give it our all, why not achieve a certain enlightenment in this life time. We don’t make it happen, this isn’t action as Rudhyar would have us believe. Aquarius is a fixed sign. We can’t move the germ from the place it’s fixed, crucified, in the soil. We have to dig in to unfold fully, lotus-like. The via negativa may have provided us some wild times and anecdotes but also hard knocks and home truths. It wasn’t easy to climb that mountain—we had slips; and others might have used our fallen bodies as stepping stones; we might have played the role of sherpa, carrying someone’s purse, playing second fiddle to rampant egos while we considered ourselves humble, while in fact we were playing the patsy. Revelation. Screw this shit. I’m a flower, bitch. I’m a lotus. I’m unfolding. Give me room.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

As we move from a Sagittarian-ruled image to what would be a Capricorn-governed one, we today, at Cancer 16°, find A Man Studying A Mandala In Front of Him With The Help Of A Very Ancient Book. A mandala gives symbolic form to what abundance and multiplicity one might have perceived in meditation, so in this way it combines the energy of the two previous days. The energy of the sign of Capricorn is conservative and preservative, the Capri-corn (goat horn) contains the plenty we perceived at yesterday’s banquet into what is known as the Cornucopeia, the container of the copious. And if here bounty refers to the vastness of all existence, the mandala seeks to formalize, concentrate and conform the vast multiplicity and complexity of the All of eternal existence into a perceivable form upon which one might continue to meditate. Here we seek to find footing, like the sure-footed goat, and to stabilize ourselves within the cosmic enormity. The mandala comprises the consolidation of such an effort. It’s the basic blueprint of the infinite.

The Zodiac itself is a mandala and a most perfect one to my mind. Though not purely geometric as eastern versions are, it is figurative in its imagery associating more readily in the human mind with myth and archetype for which the various animals and humans and objects stand. It might be regarded as a Fisher Price type pictograph as compared with the elaborate geometric patterns espoused in the east and yet I find it no less powerful or, as I say, perfect as it seems to encompass every thought, action, emotion, sense and the very nature and sequence of all things earthly and celestial as they relate one to another. Which of course is the purpose of astrology as well as the point of any mandala, to provide a formal link between the earthly and the cosmic experience. Of course the organization of the zodiac is geometric, a circle divided into twelve equal slices of celestial pie, the energies of each giving over to the next round and round, spiraling upward infinitely. It has a lot more complexity than, say the symbol of the cross which speaks to man being at a crux, or crossroads of earthly and spiritual life, which may be true; but that is just one of so very many symbolic meanings that arise from something like a true mandala which is an elaborate symbol system, again, something of a blue print telling us how cosmic nature functions, and we in it.

I think certain art functions as mandalas. Mondrian and Kandinsky come to mind in their each unique but allied visions of distilling thought-forms into points and lines and planes. Of course Kandinsky wrote a book entitled Point and Line to Plane, and also Concerning the Spirituality in Art. If Kandinsky were to write a book about the Zodiac he might have called it Line and Point to Plane because the signs of the Zodiac in turn are cardinal, fixed and mutable, repeated four times. Cardinal translates to a line, moving, directional and initiatory, fixed of course translates to a point, and the mutable signs are indeed planes in that provide a field, on which the preceding energies of the cardinal and fixed signs are negotiated.

Mandalas seek to formalize the infinite which would seem an impossible task and yet the complexity of the mandala does manage, on the earthly plane, to represent that vastness, in and of itself, while it creates a portal as well to mind-blowing eternity, revelation. The cardinal-earth sign of Capricorn is symbolized by a mountain, which the goat is best at climbing: the mountain is a vast astounding structure which provides a seat upon which one can receive revelation. That is for which one goes to the mountain, in the metaphoric sense—Sinai for instance. It is also the seat of divinity, immortality—Olympus, Shangri-La. But I have a more ready example of the notion of mandala at work in every day life…

…it’s called your every day life. Meaning, every day we create structure; every day we try to systemize our existence, whether in the putting together of pressing projects or in the management of our household or business, in the formalization of our relationships or the acquisition of knowledg through learning, in any creative venture, in any anything, really. So what is the stuff of life but the formal organization of the mysterious animation that is us and life itself? Is the multiplicity of organisms, or the system of just one organism, not an infinite mandala, the formalization of the spiritual? Are we not all living mandalas, a physical system and network so vast and varied as to be infinite and inexplicable just as is the universe itself? Can we ride that notion? If we do we find that we are more apt to allow things to happen through us than we are to try and make them happen. In any case, that’s my own mantra for summer and beyond ad infinitum.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Whenever I see the word banquet, I immediately think of the sign of Sagittarius. The outsized Auntie Mame, for instance, with her “life is a banquet” delcaration is the very emblem of the (female) Sagitarrian psyche that sees the world as an abundant place, and we’ve employed the fictional(ized) Mame Dennis as an archetype of the sign. So when I awake to find that the oracle for today at Cancer 15, ruled, in a twelve-fold sequence, by Sagittarius, is: In A Sumptuous Dining Hall Guests Relax After Partaking Of A Huge Banquet, it provides a small sense of divine order and faith in my imposing this twelve-fold overlay. It is an image of certain substantial fulfillment which, perhaps ironically, comes on the heels of yesterday’s image of a very old man staring down a vast darkness.

I have always been curious how the sign of Sagittarius, whose symbol is the third-eyed shape-shifting centaur-sage, is associated with material wealth, being ruled by over-the-top planet Jupiter. Grandeur and delusions thereof. What I’ve always cited was a sort of reverse snobbery; as if material abundance, in the form of wealth, was to be pooh-poohed in the larger scope of plenitude. Why? Abundance is abundance, no matter on which metaphysical plane it might manifest. Billionaires like Warren Buffett (whose name is akin to buffet) or J.K. Rowling or many others who take great pains to transform their material bounty into the morally uplifiting or spiritual sort is proof in the pudding that abundance, in the form of a bankroll, can be a mighty means for proliferating plenty on every human level.

Maybe this is what stems from gazing into that vast darkness of yesterday. It strikes me now that that image was also one of pure meditation. And what might have been gleaned in mediation was the sense that the universe, which is expanding (Jupiter energy), is essentially abundant. So what can a(n also) mere mortal do but try to echo that spiritual abundance in the material world. This is where that reverse snobbery comes in: Some look down on those who live abundantly and, yes, of course there is conspicuous consumption and waste (the shadow side of the Sagittarian experience, which is why it is followed by Saturn-ruled Capricorn, the energy of conservation, to reel in that glut); but I find, in my own experience, that those who go out of their way to deride the haves are those who have a have-not mentality, don’t see the world as naturally abundant and who, given half the chance, would be the greediest of gluttons if their poverty flipped to the opposite polarity.

Ancient Sanskrit Chant of Abundance :
Om Gum Shrim Maha Lakshmi Yei Swaha

Yes I understand the evils of gentrification. I fight it every day in my own experience. But I also believe that abundance in any form is not only not an evil, I think it is all our birthright. And I believe it begins on the spiritual plane. We must see with our Sagittarian third eye that the universe is bountiful. The rich douche-bag for whom nothing is ever enough—all of us have a Mr. Potter, from It’s A Wonderful Life, in our own. That person is the poor sucker who is starving to death even though his own bankroll could strangle a bull. Why? Because he can’t enjoy what he has. Why? Because he can’t share it. Why? Because he doesn’t see himself as an agent or vehicle for the bounty. The buck, literally, stops there. Oh he might pretend to share, but there will be strings attached. How many of us can do what our friend J.K. Rowling does and not only give so much money away but work tirelessly in charitable endeavors, helping the disenfranchised and underprivileged and forgotten, sharing the wealth so that more of us might come to see that not only is the world an abundant place but we are the catalysts and conduits thereof.

The banquet is metaphoric. But can also be real and that’s okay too. So long as everyone goes home with a doggy bag.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

I have had the joy slash made the mistake of trying to explain to a live audience what the procession of the equinoxes entails, that which defines the Ages—we are transitioning from the Piscean to the Aquarian age—each age lasting two thousand and some odd years, such that we would work through a cycle of all the ages in about twenty-six thousand years. This is related to today’s oracle at Cancer 14° A Very Old Man Facing A Vast Dark Space To The Northeast, the keynote of which is: Fulfillment in transcending and changeless wisdom. Here, let Dane Rudhyar confuse you further:

” In occult terminology the northeast is the direction from which spiritual-cosmic forces enter the Earth-sphere. This is probably because the polar axis of the Earth is inclined by some 23 degrees away from the exact perpendicular to the plane of its orbit. Thus the actual pole of our globe not only differs from the permanent pole of the Earth’s orbit, but constantly changes its direction, successively pointing to several large “circumpolar” stars during the so-called processional cycle (or “tropical year,” or Great Polar Cycle), which lasts somewhat less than 26,000 years. Because of this inclination of the polar axis, we have the phenomenon of seasonal change. Supposedly during the early Golden Age no such change occurred; a “perpetual spring” reigned. This is the (traditionally) spiritual state.”

You’ve heard some astrolgists, and detractors of the art, tell you how we are no longer aligned with certain signs at certain times, or that there is some thirteenth sign. Well that’s true, in a sense, for a time. But we are not concerned with the post-it notes of the constellations (which due change over the 26,000 years only to return to their original position) but the energies they are meant to mark which are immutable. The point is that even our system of the zodiac is in a state of circular motion, but it isn’t, I assure in a state of flux. Seen from outside time and space, the particular shifts are rather insignificant, give a take a few 26,000 years.

The Old Man knows this. He comes from that spiritual state of perpetual spring, just like the mythical Saturn, whose son Zeus overthrew him, ruler the Golden Age, before duality or duplicity entered into existence. In simple terms, the wise old man is an archetypal figure inherent in all mythologies, as, it is meant to be, in life. He is faces true north not that which is subject even to cosmic reorientation—that there is something even more permanent, essential and immutable than the movement of the planets or stars. This is the vast dark space he faces. It is no surprise, thus, that this symbol is ruled by Scorpio in a twelve-fold sequence. In contrast to the previous sign of Libra (Light), Scorpio is Darkness but we must explore the paradoxical nature of this dichotomy just as we look at the obvious meanings in the polarity: Libra can be the world of appearances, thus illusory, whilst Scorpio can point to the unseen, mysterious but essential and inalienable. Scorpio is ruled by Pluto god of death and god of riches, the lord of the underworld which is at once abyssmal and yet where the worlds riches (gems) are buried. The “dark space” might be thought of as death, whilst Scorpio and it’s 8th astrological house speak in terms of regeneration, rebirth, reincarnation, cycles, upon cycles. Even the number 8, mysterious like the mystic eight ball, forms the shape of the lemniscate, a symbol for infinity, endlessly looping. So the “vast dark space” isn’t, in this vernacular, a void, emptiness, but something where truth and meaning are revealed, at least, to the wise who cast their case their or “face” the unknown so it might be knowable.

Scientific discussions on dark matter not withstanding, we do know that the opposite of a star that burns brightly, becoming a supernova, before it dies and becomes a black hole, is one and the same, thus with that void. Ultimate light and ultimate darkness being two incarnations of that same stellar experience. It’s the same with us. We may burn brightly as stars in our world but we rarely gain wisdom in doing so. If anything the wisdom comes when we are not squinting in the limelight but on the other side of our shiningest moments, when we are facing down our own fears or void or what have you. Rudhyar speaks of “that apparent Darkness which is an intense Light invisible to our senses.”

Ever since I was a child I wanted to travel north and east. Boston and New England beckoned as did the northern cities of Europe. They still do. I used to have this vision, this hope, this dream of meeting a really old man, an alchemist, someone who may have transcended the cycle of life and death. I still do. Only now I also see this figure as being one and the same with myself. If I’m on a journey toward wisdom I know that i have taken a single step on a road of infinite leaps. At the same time I’ve never felt so convinced of the fact that we either all live forever in various forms or that we reincarnate. But I’m almost certain there is no death, just as the Zodiac says, only regeneration. I feel like I’ve been having some brushes with so-called disaster as of late but what is dis-aster but the coming apart of those very stars, a symbol of ultimate fame and achievement, which we know collapse upon themselves in Time. But what do they do outside of It?

The best way to become wise is to wise up to ourselves. I find that my own patterns of so-called mistakes generally derive from my inability to transcend, oh I dunno, certain bad habits or desires the indulgence of which only ever seem to cause me more pain than joy, even if the goal was pleasure, or indeed, especially so. So what I’m thinking is that you have to transcend first. You don’t achieve transcendence just be sitting around hoping and wishing, and certainly not by indulging in all the temptation that the limelight might bring you. Transcendence isn’t the end, it’s the means by which it breeds itself. I can have my vision of some wise old man with white hair whom I might magically encounter in some northern European city, an alchemist who will take me under his wing and impart all the wisdom I might be able to take in. Or I can be that man myself and, like any true alchemist “get the lead out” in my own journey toward true north, the true light hiding in all the density of darkness.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The power of the will in shaping character is the key note of the oracle at 13° Cancer, A Hand With A Prominent Thumb Is Held Out For Study. This is ruled by Libra in a twelve-fold sequence and, if you’re read our book Sextrology, you’ll know that the Libra Man chapter is entitled The Character, pointing to that sign’s focus on the development of personality shaped by principle, asserting the notion that we are whom we become.

We think of Leo people as being the most wilfull, indeed the sign’s motto is “I will” and it’s planetary ruler, the Sun, rules the will (just as the Moon rules the want) among other things. But, and perhaps this is why, men of these signs especially clash: Libra has just a strong a will as Leo only it is focussed on the mental, ideological plain, such that Libra people come to embody their principles, which can smack a Leo as phony or pretentious. But we are in the sign of Cancer, I know, you needn’t remind me.

What I love about meditating and musing on the Sabian Symbols divining/assigning governance over each of them in turn by the twelve signs of the zodiac in sequence, is how we see the complexity of any given sign in the influence other sign’s have over it. Perhaps Cancerians born on this day are rather Libra like compared to their fellow Moonchildren. Maybe they embody more character or are indeed more willfull and self-determined. Food for thought.

It is interesting to note that “the thumb” in palmistry is the will. And we can only truly express our character by means of a determinant will. If, when reading an individual’s chart we see this particular point in ones astrological wheel being effected we might understand that a strong will is necessary in regard to the situation. We know that our will is expressed by either a thumbs up or a thumbs down. Dane Rudhyar says that the original symbol suggested that the thumbe was “slightly flexed” which would indicate some versatility in regard to will. I do think character is more apt to be developed through ones own flexibility, being more the willow then the oak. Rigidity can be a character defect. And I think there is far more room for spiritual development if we put our will in service of our destiny in so far as that relates to living life on life’s terms.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

A Chinese Woman Nursing A Baby Whose Aura Reveals Him To Be The Reincarnation Of A Great Teacher is, in a twelve-fold sequence, the Virgo-ruled oracle for 12° Cancer. Symbolically it represents inherent or latent value in an experiece, the revelation of it’s deeper meaning. In the preceding symbol we needed to laugh at pomposity, to take well-known personalities down a peg; here we have the opposite experience, in the undeveloped being, a babe, who doesn’t have a great put-on personality but an inherent power and importance. Just as we are the pompous figure needing the piss taken out of us; we are also all potentially enlightened (or at the least, enlightenable) beings. In this case the baby is an avatar of a great teacher; the notion of Virgoan service being intrinsic in that role.

Dane Rudyar feels that the Chinese nationality of the woman might be a mistake. That the psychic Elsie Wheeler who divined these symbols might have seen a Tibetan woman. I think it is of little importance other than we are meant to understand the eastern provenance of the image where reincarnation, the most occult manifestation of a cycle of life, is espoused most readily. We might ask ourselves what our true purpose might be or why it is we were (re)incaranted into this life. To what are we in service. What have we to give or to offer. Surely we aren’t meant to be just big personalities needing a good toppling from the worldly pedestal on which we might find ourselves plopped—our true greatness is spiritual greatness which the form of the baby cannot bely. Our great personalities are indeed masks that might cover our latent power. Can we let yesterday’s oracle provide catharsis and strip away our pride so we can be, metaphorically speaking, as naked as a babe, that we might glean deeper, essential purpose to our being?

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

A Clown Caricaturing Well-Known Personalities is the oracle today at 11° Cancer. We need not take ourselves so seriously. In fact we might do well to bring ourselves down a peg or two. Humor is a powerful means of letting the steam out of pomposity just as it is a tool for tackling social ills. We are all fallible and we all make mistakes. It’s important to laugh at ourselves and this symbol is a good reminder of the fact. We can be the clown and mock our own aspects of self that smack of some form or other of superiority. It is interesting to note that this oracle is ruled by Leo in a twelve-fold sequence. Leo is associated with fame and being the center of attention. It is also, in its link with the astrological fifth house, about fun and amusement and men (or boys) of the sign are often class clowns, a form of bucking authority. Like crying (associated with the sign of Cancer, cardinal-water, tears) laughter, part of the Leo estate, also provides catharsis. We may have been conditioned to be high and mighty, and we certainly want to have a healthy ego, however self-deprecation in small doses can let the steam out of outsized egos.

Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.

My hundredth post at 10° Cancer: A Large Diamond In The First Stages Of The Cutting Process. It is about the training for perfection in the manifestation of an ideal. I don’t have much to say on the subject today. It’s not exactly triggering ideas. So I think i’ll let it be today and move onto the next symbol.
Copyright 2015 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.