Sun opposite Eris

89 thoughts on “Sun opposite Eris”

1. First Nation, or dead wrong, we got our asses kicked, straight up. I’ve Blackfoot, so straight up my american friend. We got worked on the front that exhibited our allegiance too the Great Spirit! Those cats will never see our realm. We, never there’s. Big men are huge, little men sink their teeth into this alignment,..

   Love is the only word I call it.. The rest is history…

   Love,

   Jere

2. cybele – abuse has run rampent – those of us who “get it” are riding the wave now, many others tarting to “get it” and move on more easily. Our challenge is to keep it real –i’ve already experienced the back-lash from those who say they get it but use the knowledge to further abuse. Keep on.

   and sibylle – COOL white tiger. BTW what I called “hook” on rope wasn’t at all, it was a torque-ing device much like a vice would have – the rope had to be torqued out. It possibly may have been in response to Mystes discussion of boys birthing from the third eye. The symbolism then I do not understand, but it was allllll good.

3. Hi – i’ve just read as much as I can, for the moment! And this might be quick and general – and not even on topic so much – but abuse of both sexes gets little attention; it took me years to even admit to my own pride that I was abused, or tell people about it, even though it’s a pretty clear case. This helped me understand my partner’s behavior, who was in an abusive relationship when I met him. He hid the relationship from me – the worst behavior from him in the situation – and seemed trapped, wanted to share the blame. His friends and family have told me that could identify it as abusive but he would just retreat into silence when unhappy, the kind that shouts. It’s difficult still, as something between us, as she’s been abusive to me as well and still insists on being in his life, and it would help things a lot if he could make a clear distinction: This is, was, abuse – I don’t have to let her in anymore – but he can’t even hear that yet or consider the word. It’s hard, or would be if I didn’t love this man so much; it’s just necessary to figure out how to deal with it. Showing abuse of men in partnerships and talking about it needs to be done more.

4. Word – oh my gosh what a dream!

   Mystes – I saw Pan the other night. What does that mean??

5. Thanks frannyfan for your compassion.
   What I have learned is letting go and not exercise attachment. Yap, I had my ego mirrored in that guy, brrrr! I started to write a story about the whole experience.
   I am always grateful but such lessons, could be less painful :-).

   Awordedgewise,
   That is an awesome dream. I think positive….
   I dream a lot too. My last dream was:
   I am out with a group of friends. We visit a town built on a mountain. We walk over a bridge and look down. There is a wide channel of water that is divided sharpely into two different water qualities. One side has muddy water full of petals and stuff, no bad impression, but one could not see through. The other side is crystal clear. I say let’s have a bath and before I can think I already see two of my friends in the unclear water having fun. I jump. Flying through the air I scream, “come over here, the water is so fantastic, like an opalesce pool. I feel excitement. Almost hitting the surface I see a beautiful white tiger approaching with high speed towards me underneath the water like an arrow. I think, now I know why they are on the unclear side….before I get to know what is going to happen with that tiger, I wake up.
   I really like those dreams.

   great day to everybody,
   sibylle

   sibylle

6. 99 posts felt like a good number…..

   I know not where to post this, thought I’d continue the long thread here……

   last night dream, can’t remember context – only that I discovered a wound on my forehead, yes, “third eye” material, for sure — it (I typed “I”!) was festering and I worked hard to pry something loose with my fingers — it was a hardened piece of rope with a hook on the end I grasped onto – pulled and pulled, difficult (not painful, but took much effort) pulled pulled the rope until it suddenly wasn’t rope and was “brains” at which point I quickly twisted off the rope and threw it away. The wound closed instantly and I was relieved both to be rid of the rope and to find my “brains” had stayed intact.

   Whoo-Hoo!! Love Dreamin’.

7. Frannyfan and Morgana, I have enjoyed your thoughts here a lot. Hope to read more from you in the days to come. Everything is changing so fast we can hardly catch our breath.

8. eric said: ” I would advice my kid: the person you have sex withh first might well be a trusted friend.”

   Absolutely, that is what I told my kids! The correlation with food is given too. When I was a youngster guys would ask me out for dinner. It was intersting with some of them I could not swallow a bite. I would sit there not eating at all. During the years with the rules of society I seemed to have lost this way. When we listen to ourselves we can see if a person means well only sharing food with him or her and observing if the food tastes good. Sounds very simple?!

   Unfortunately a few years ago I did not follow myself this wisdom to be first friend with the person and got badly hurt. A complex story. I believed and still do so that it was a very karmic encounter (I know they all are). I got rather quickly out of it but the person came back a year later–he lives half around the world we e-mail. For me a great opportunity to grow, we are kind of “friends” now. I try to love him in my heart.

   sibylle

9. Morgana – that is correct! more later

   Eric, you are getting close. We share food and nurturing at my house. Sometimes it is his turn, sometimes mine. He is my best friend and even risked my leaving by doing what he thought i wanted out of the deepest love. works both ways.

10. Eric said: “Morgana, many women have a similar expectation on the transaction; that in exchange for sex, they get the material goods. There is competition, too: the guy who can buy the most can get the next date. This tradition may date to waaaaaay prehistoric times”….

    You’re right. [continues to sit and ponder]

11. To me, a sweatlodge is specific to Native American spiritual practice, and non-natives shouldn’t be running them. I can see where the chaos came from in your situation.

    I kind of flew off into the ether here with my own thoughts. I know you said an Indian was running yours. Spanish has two good words for what it sounds like happened for you. Sounds like you had a brujo (sorcerer) running your sweatlodge, and that’s why chaos/harm happened. Stupid, those who expect to play with sorcery and not have consequences (talking about the brujo, not you). But there are also good curanderos(healers) in the world.

12. …Another medicine man from my husbands band closed the sweatlodge with my husband. Different tribes have different beliefs. I hesitated to use the word medicine man even – because they and my husband tend to leave information out when describing a situation, so that people who shouldn’t be practicing these things will not know how to do them correctly. So forgive the lack of details…

    I understand. I recognize shamanic practice as magic/witchery, in essence. What I do is called “core shamanism,” which acknowledges that some animist/shamanic practices have been common to all cultures at some point in time (consider the Irish “fairy/sidhe faith” and Scandinavian “seidhr” practice – these are essentially shamanic). To me, a sweatlodge is specific to Native American spiritual practice, and non-natives shouldn’t be running them. I can see where the chaos came from in your situation.

    As part of “core shamanism,” I have been taught that all shamans work with a variety of animal spirits. These animal spirits help with healing and soul retrieval work… and as well, they can be used for what I call “sorcery” (which I think is what you identify as the “dark” stuff). We witches have a saying: “you can’t heal if you can’t hex.” Not that you *must* hex. Magic is neutral, in and of itself. It’s just energy. We observe its usage, and we all make fairly subjective judgments about how it is being used. I am sorry you had to go through that experience, with what sounds like a charlatan – they are present in all belief systems, unfortunately.

    I am aware of a warrior path and a healer path among shamans. I practice the healing type. Though that said, the goal is not to be “good” or “light”; it is to be a *balanced* person.

    Broadly speaking, to a pagan such as myself, “dark” is not necessarily evil; darkness can refer also to the Underworld Journey, which is very much about the evolution of Self through the integration of one’s Shadow. It can refer to the inside of the Mother’s womb. It can refer to a time when knowledge comes to you out of pain.

13. Morgana, many women have a similar expectation on the transaction; that in exchange for sex, they get the material goods. There is competition, too: the guy who can buy the most can get the next date. This tradition may date to waaaaaay prehistoric times.

    Food, in any intimate relationship, particularly sexual, is a vital point of contact. It all counts under the general heading of exchanging nourishment. It’s a point of generosity; one of several, but in my view and in some important traditions including Tantra (Mysti, check me here) food is vital essence and skill with food is akin to the skill of loving itself.

    We could make a long list of things that are inappropriate in the exchange or taking of sex, but we don’t generally talk about what is appropriate. We say that sex should be mutually consenting, but we don’t generally give or receive consent; it happens so rarely that it’s considered a little weird.

    Sex, among many, is something you do when your defenses/inhibitions are lowered by alcohol. That we lack an authentic basis of conversation about appropriateness, concern for one another’s physical health, and emotional grounding, is a big problem. What we substitute is the admonition, “don’t have sex until you’re in love.” But that doesn’t help anything, if you ask me. There are many more subtle shades of emotional awareness than the typical runaway infatuation that frequently feigns for “in love.”

    I would advise my kid: the person you have sex with first might well be a trusted friend.

14. Mystes, I have only a moment until I’m off computer for the night: I could feel you earlier, I’m sure you’ll pick up on plenty at your convenience. For practical reference, Jordan was born October 26, 1993 at 2:43AM in Northridge CA.

    Two months later was the Northridge earthquake, me nursing him whilst sitting among the broken that was left of our home on the epicenter. His life has continued to have these “sudden jolts”.

    When he was very young he would spout the most amazing things – with words far to big for a baby. Yet he was not channeling at all. He simply had this “stuff” in him.

    He’s still that way, but has learned to moderate it somewhat.

    Great wisdom he has, but not an understanding of how it mystifies most people and is something that I as mom might understand him in general, but am having to learn along the way much of what he was born understanding without thinking.

    OK Getting kicked offline (at library).
    Love.

15. Morgana I have to go back and start from the beginning on all the messages here. The man who conducted the sweat was Indian, not of my husband’s tribe, and was considered one who does everything opposite – i don’t recall the word for it. He was not a medicine man. It was a medicine man who alerted his nephew who lived here that the sweat lodge was desecrated. Indeed! How did he know? Spirit told him!

    Another medicine man from my husbands band closed the sweatlodge with my husband. Different tribes have different beliefs. I hesitated to use the word medicine man even – because they and my husband tend to leave information out when describing a situation, so that people who shouldn’t be practicing these things will not know how to do them correctly. So forgive the lack of details.

    what I saw were spirits entering me through the vaginal area – that will sound crazy. I’m not the only one who saw – the others saw too. During the sweat when it was my turn to pray i prayed for all the children with incurable disease. The drumstick jumped out of the doorkeeper’s hand and began pounding the drum rapidly by itself!! There was a little boy at my house that night about 2 years old who was going blind. His eyes were coated white. He was cured. I do not want to be spirit possessed again, but I do believe fully that there exists more than one spirit in a person. Edgar cayce describes that rather fully as your body representing astrology. It’s all greater than my understanding. The spirit world is not one that I fully understand, but I have my own understanding of it. I’ve met the dead in my sleep and talked to them. So anyway that is why i read this website, trying to figure it out.

    Mystes you are as good a woman as I’ve ever known. Keep on with the teachings! I believe you, and I believe me too, and everyone else!! LOL.

16. “Eric said, of making dinner and other such things: Please trust me, ladies: this is going to affect your relationships.”

    I’ve got a group of friends that I affectionately call my “core coven.” A male gay couple, a lesbian couple, and me (basically straight). We take turns making dinner for one another once a week, and it means nothing other than deep love and affection for one another. However, there is no expectation of sex among us (except between the two partnered couples, and it’s not directly related to that dinner we just cooked at all).

    But how many times have you seen this on TV? Where a guy buys dinner for his date, and he thinks the price of a dinner “buys” him the right to some sexual intercourse.

    The true “currency” is (or should be) emotional, not monetary. I’m not a natural bed-hopper (not that there’s anything wrong with that)… I’m one who needs to feel as if I’ve made an emotional connection with the person before I “hop.”

    I can’t speak to same-sex relationships, but in opposite-sex relationships, are we just silly to fall into this societally conditioned idea that the opposite sex is “alien,” the “Other,” etc.? Really, it’s cool, it’s a *good* thing, that there is more than one gender. Wouldn’t it be great if we could all just have a hella good time exploring this. :-}

    Beyond that, there is so much about us that makes us unique. I hate being compared to other women. It’s my emotions, my soul, my spirit, that makes me an individual.

    Ironically, with all this individuation going on, the thing some of us spirit-minded people are striving for is to be One with God/dess (or the Universe) again. No individuation, just joining with the Cosmic Oneness. Which is something some people feel when they have sex.

    Round and round I go, where I stop, nobody knows.

17. bkoehler said: “Morgana: Your Eris was in the target area for the Full Moon on October 4 at 11 Aries 10. I’m thinking it must be time for you to become conscious of your Eris since it has so little contact with other natal planets. Does your “emotional independence” include a business of your own? (10th house Aries Eris)”

    Hmmmm. Though I’ve been suckling from the corporate teat for most of my working life (comfortably so, until about 2-3 years ago), that independence would be both attractive and scary. At the end of next summer, I’ll be making a great leap into the unknown (and this for me is very Saturn-influenced) – moving about 1,000 miles away from where I currently live, to make a new start. So I may very well end up working for myself, indeed. [whew]

    I will have to dedicate some time to studying out Lady Eris carefully.

18. Patty said: “That sweat was conducted by someone (indian) who was practicing from the dark side and calling on the spirit of animals and the like.”

    Calling on animal spirits has no bearing on whether a shaman’s actions are (or should be deemed) good OR evil. *All* shamans have power animals that they work with.

    As a witch and a “shamanist” (Tom Cowan’s word) myself, I have been taught that we all–shamans or not–have a personal power animal that we are born with, and that will stay with us throughout our lives. This animal functions as our primary Underworld Guide. Not everyone is a shaman, but everyone does have at least one “power animal.”

    Forgive me if I’ve misinterpreted something. I just felt some clarification was in order.

19. Last bit… “(Mystes, I wa referencing the two-petal lotus between the eyes.)”

    Right. Linda, our kids were born around the same year? 95 right? You keep nudging that thought along, I can pick it up on my side. This is important.

    xo

    M

20. I had a bizarre dream this morning. My husband was manipulated into having sex with a woman – she had this magic carpet that would control him. She had his baby and my reaction was to get the baby from her. Seems like good shadow material!

    I’ve got Mars in Aquarius, 12 house, Venus in Pisces, 12 house, Aquarius Sun, Pisces Rising.

    Loved hanging with guy friends in high school. Easy for me to be ‘one of the guys’ – buried my goddess pretty deep. Struggled with meeting men at the university because it appeared that men were intimidated/turned off by smart women.

    Went through a phase where ‘Cowboys Are My Weakness’. I liked the macho guy. I needed his self-confidence. When I integrated that confidence, I could allow my feminine more space to expand.

    Now I’m working with expanding my feminine by knowing that it is safe for me to be powerful. For me it is all about balancing intellect and intuition.

    In Sufi dancing, there is an expression when you change partners: ‘on to the next beloved’. I prefer the term beloved to God/Goddess for reasons pointed out earlier – too much baggage associated with ‘God’. I do meet people at this place of the divine beloved, have also woven it in – as Maya said earlier.

21. (Mystes, I wa referencing the two-petal lotus between the eyes.)

22. Ah! Mystes! This would explain some to do with why my son was 20minute birth from start of labor to finish (nurses looking on at awe at me visibly dialating at such an excellerated rate. They didn’t believe me when I said “He’s coming NOW! Ha.)

    My daughter stayed pent up inside for an extra 6 weeks before we finally cut her out or me — perhaps she didn’t want to venture out the damaged door (now I’m referencing Eric’s discussion of Nesses and the HPV vaccine post re the damaging/innappropriate touches of men to young girls)

    BTW – my daugher is the elder; son’s ultra natural birth came after the C-section.

    He is visably different – fluent in a way of Being not common prior to his generation.

23. Thank you, Sibylle, for the information on the wood/fire – liver/heart continuum in the Chinese system. The interrelationship is striking and is “good to think with.”

    Patty, when you say ‘spirit’ do you mean you felt yourself emerge through other openings in the Being? I think this discussion has suggested (if not established) that each of us is a compilation of sorts, a swarm of several ‘souls.’ But the birth/death passages are not exactly the same as various subtle-body docks and launches that we may experience during a natural lifetime. They are like the Silk Road compared to a goat path. Both are for travel, one is much more heavily mapped and guarded.

    Sweat lodges are amazing places. I’ve only done a few, but I absolutely *live* in a steamroom.

    I have enjoyed listening through here for the last few days. Have to disappear for a while again. Much love . . . M

24. Mystes, I watched several spirits enter into myself during a sweat lodge ceremony that went wrong about 20 years ago. Maybe spirits enter different areas of the body, depending where the incarnation needs to originate? The info on saturn at the link i sent is very interesting and sort of explains my 29 degree saturn in virgo, as well as the old classmate I mentioned. Several people from my class of 69 are dead of suicide or self-inflicted drug problems, and all that i’ve reconnected with appear to have serious relationship issues. The ones working through it like me were lucky enough to have the support of a fantastic partner.

    Anyway it took a spiritual healer to get rid of those spirits for me. That sweat was conducted by someone (indian) who was practicing from the dark side and calling on the spirit of animals and the like. We had a sweat lodge and people visiting our area would come and use it and we never turned indian families away. This couple came and my husband had a bad feeling about them so he made an excuse to go hunting. They invited me to go in with them and I did – big mistake. The next week my husband banned them from our house. Turned out they were taking the bones of some indians they were supposed to have reburied into the sweat lodge. There is a lot of power in the sweat lodge. My husband found out about them because a one of the shamans at the reservation said the spirits told him what was going on and word got back to us. My husband closed the sweat lodge with another Indian man and they did a ceremony to bless the area and buried the grandfather rocks. There is a flower garden over the area now.

25. I want to share some information regarding the 5 elements in chinese mantic arts. Among other techniques it is TCM (traditional Chinese Medicin) and so called chinese astrology (bazi suanming: destiny reading according to the eight signs) which rather discusses the climate of a horoscop not the constellation of planets in the sky.

    Fire, wood, water,metal earth.

    Wood is the element representing liver (emotion: anger..).The planet associated with wood is Jupiter. Foremost wood stands for growth.

    Fire stands for heart and blood system (emotion: passion, joy…). The planet associated is
    Mars. Many associate fire with spirituality.

    If an element, is unbalanced in a chart or course of life-in astrology- it may cause trouble.

    Wood directly is interelated to fire because it is feeding it.

    All elements are interrelated and therefore lack or excess have their result in health, in life in general. You always can do something about it ,if you are aware of it, e.g. with the right choice of nutrition, to balance….etc.

    sibylle

26. Patty, about the Leydens.. I know this is kind of a weird and unverifiable discussion, but in the births I’ve attended (some two dozen in all), I have SEEN that males –or only-recently-gendered-switched males– enter through the do-dal-kanwal (two petalled lotus between the eyebrows); females plow in through the saggitals. This is not second or third hand info, and it is not 80 years old. As much as I love Cayce, some of his stuff is simply not accurate for our time – where bigger, brighter and mo’ better (as well as more …hrrmm… “interesting”) individuals are coming down the chute.

    Heart is a particular kind of gate – one that comprehends all above and all below.

    Kisses,

    M

27. Viper Queeney, Patty, Paletiger, Morgana

    If we haven’t all left this thread by now, I would like to comment on your words.

    VP: Does the pattern you describe only relate to food? You said “this seemed to transform into a very dangerous pattern” and I wonder if you could explain that.

    Patty: re: the liver info; thanks so much. It’s a good thing to know. Now tell me, where’s the endocrine gland? This one I can really relate to. Thanks for the link too.

    Paletiger: Your Libra Mars in the 2nd house is peregrine, which can mean several things, one of them being an unaspected planet. Briefly, a peregrine planet has an inability to express its energy, in this case, because of no aspects to other planets. But, through adversity, your Mars energy can be developed to become even stronger than it would be with aspects.

    Your example “I sought a detached male” sounds like an example of this unexpressed energy. Also, “I am not always in touch with my anger. .” is another example of perigrine Mars. The upcoming Pluto square will challenge your Mars which will strengthen it. It won’t be an overnight change, but you will be much more in contact with that energy in the years to come.

    Morgana: Your Eris was in the target area for the Full Moon on October 4 at 11 Aries 10. I’m thinking it must be time for you to become conscious of your Eris since it has so little contact with other natal planets. Does your “emotional independence” include a business of your own? (10th house Aries Eris)
    be

28. Oh, I too have read more than once about the Liver being our center for our physical existance. But for the life of me (pun) I can’t remember where/what.

    I never thought about the possibility that the parts of the body are connected to parts of the sky? Have I missed something or have I made something up?

29. wow, and on we go. Cool.

    Mars in Capricorn, Fifth house – doesn’t that seem like a bit of a contradiction?

    Sort of like, take a lion, put him in a cage, then ask him to dance?

    Well, and I read that Fifth house is the territory of Leo, my Rising.

    Maybe that’s like giving the caged kitty a protein bar to munch and an audience to clap time.?

    😉
    Hm.
    Again, Hmmmm, I say…..

30. Quote from www dot near-death.com/experiences/cayce08 dot html

    The lyden (or Leydig) gland, located above the sexual glands, is the starting point of the soul’s activity toward higher levels of spiritual consciousness. This endocrine gland can act on the body to function as a door through which the soul may go on to higher afterlife realms. If this gland is the highest gland activated during a person’s life, at death they will be able to dwell in the corresponding afterlife realm associated with the planet Neptune. According to Cayce, this afterlife realm is referred to as the realm of mysticism, where souls have the ability to have direct experience with the Creator and perceive the Creator. Neptune gives the urges to seek the unusual, the mystical, the unseen forces around us. People who come to Earth from this realm seem peculiar to others and are many times misunderstood. A love of mysteries can indeed be spiritual, but it can also be “of the sleuth or detective nature.”

31. Edgar Cayce said that the spirit enters the body through a place that is located in sex organs. I’d have to look it up – he called it something and I don’t remember now.

32. I have Mars in Cancer, 2nd house. It’s a really weird combination, to me. In me, it manifests as the “smother/mother” in relationships. I guess I buy them lots of socks and underwear. And I was married for 8 years to a man who was the emotional equivalent of a 10-year old. [sigh] I’m divorced now… I realized I didn’t really *want* to be his mother. Or anyone’s (I have no children, either). I’m learning how to “detach” emotionally, to a healthy degree. Also actively cultivating my own emotional independence (4th house Pluto/Virgo).

    My Eris is at 10 degrees Aries, 10th house. I can’t get a grasp on what this means at all. The house is otherwise unpopulated. The only aspect is a semisextile to MC.

33. i can’t imagine life flowing from the liver – even though we can’t live without a liver. The blood pump is in the heart. My husband’s ancestors ate the hearts of enemies and it has been subject of many a gruesomely funny evening at my house. A lesser warrior might only get a stringy arm or foot. I’m the strong one at my house, with mars in aries. I’m the one that called school to work out issues that required a firm hand, filled out loan applications, paid bills, helped with homework and brought home the money too. He was the one who played with the kids, taught them to ride a horse and shoot a gun equally well. He hunted, painted, played music, built saddles, barns, houses, and taught the kids those things too – and gave me the paychecks. Can’t complain – it was all good. He’s the one that wrote the tipping point letter to the daughter I gave up for adoption – it was the letter that caused the change of heart. He’s a mars in Sagitarrius, I’m a Mars in Aries. he’s the thoughtful spiritual live every moment for now person. I’m the one that goes to the store manager and says ‘do you want me to take the sign out of your window since you are out of widgets?!?’ Such is life and anything else would be boring indeed.

    BK the liver is sort of under the right breast. It is a large organ. Maybe someone else answered that.

34. Mystes said: “Shall I assume that вЂ?gay’ is inclusive of lesbians? My first marriage was to вЂ?maricon’ a gay man, by the way, so it is quite possible to be married (and very sexual) with a person who is not attracted to the вЂ?other’ gender.”

    Yes, I meant both. I know that what you describe above is possible; however, my friends in question are a little icked out by the thought. Unfortunately. 😀

35. Garn…how embarassingly long is that post? I’ve just seen it go up. Jeez.

36. Hello chums, I am v tired tonight – a lot going on – but decided that I may postpone sleep for a few minutes so I can at least make a contribution to this thread.

    I have enjoyed popping into this session immensely, and at the beginning of the discussion it seemed to me that it was a case of life mirroring astrology. At times it has also seemed to me that some of the discussion was a tad dry in parts – too much intellectual posturing and theorising, this is how it is – no it’s not etc., and not enough of ‘how is it for me?’ Glad to see more folks came on with the personal stuff – that is where it is at.

    Anyway. Eric you asked about Mars integration experiences and it so happens that this is a bit live for me, as current events go.

    My mars is in Libra in the 2nd house. It’s not aspected by any major planets, only teensy wee ones (not that they won’t matter, I’m sure they do), however it stands untouched by the biggies. Also in the 2nd is Uranus and Pluto, both in Virgo. Pluto is square my Mars any time now – if not right now. Should be a party…

    For me, now, I do not see men as men, or women as women – I do not view either sex as a collective or general and find it hard to take that on. When I meet someone, male or female, it is the person, that individual that I am meeting. I am very, very attracted to males and so my partners have always been men though with Sappho in 12th alongside my Venus in Leo (I am also attracted to women, but in mild fantasy only – though many have taken a shine to me). However, as friends or lovers, there is always an attaction of sorts for me. To ‘who’ that person is. I could not be attracted to a man if he were not bright and sharp of mind and wit, if he was a conformist and loved the status quo, if he were unhappy in his skin, if he was miserable and not generous of heart, if he were narrow of mind, if he abused me, if he did not value or appreciate who I was. Maybe its my Aquarius 7th, but I need a bit of eccentricity too. What I hope for in a partner applies to my friends too, male and female. I hope they recieve good things from me too. My lovely partner is Aquarius and I feel I am blessed as he is all of the above and a flawed human too – perfect.

    There was a time when this was not the case. An early departure of a detached Dad, and the presence of a depressive, victim mother (both hiding from and using her power simultaneously) – she was the envy of her friends – unusual, clever, attractive, quick with wit. But she lost that in the moment a need from a man was not met. She eventually expected that need to never get met. And it never was. A pattern that has faded in strength, but still exists even in her 70’s. I learned from her for sure. But I did break that learning cycle eventually.

    I sought a detached male, in a bid to get him to want me the way my father clearly didn’t. I never felt he tried to keep me or see me, he moved away – another country eventually. There were 4 of us – how could he leave us so far behind? Years go by and I remember that my father never said anything about how I looked – only once, that I had pretty feet. For all sorts of reasons, I believed I was ugly and unlovable for years as I pursued men like him in a bid to change them to men who would want, desire and nurture me. It never happened. From the off it was a non-starter – how could it have been anything else? And there were times it was the opposite – Pisces Saturn in the 8th and you get the picture.

    All the while this was going on I was ignoring the fact that I was actually quite a striking, attractive, fun and strong person. I could not see what was under my nose. I didn’t discover it until a few years ago. And I did that through all sorts of methods, including time with a therapist.

    Libra Mars – I am mostly reasonable and fair, I look for balance, I look for justice, I have strong reactions to lack of fairness – and always check as to how fair I am. To the point that I become pathetically accommodating and get taken for a ride. I sometimes think too much about what the other wants/needs. I want people to like me, so at my worst, even though I think one thing, I might say another to avoid conflict. At my best, I’m direct and honest – which is often. Though, I think my mars softens it still. I take care of my partners, I am a nurturer (Cancer) and I love to listen, share, trust, love, hold – what do you need? Whatever you need.
    I used to rescue but don’t any more – I encourage others to help themselves rather than be a fixer. I am also a fiery girl, I flame up fast and I am told that the energy can be felt in different counties (equivalent to the next state 🙂 ). I am not always in touch with my anger and it can take a few days for me to realise that I was and – well fuck me, did I not let something go that needed confronting, sort of thing. I am a good mediator – it is what I do for a living funnily enough – I work with groups that have major dysfunctions and can’t get along, or come to a solution that works for all on their own. I also work with change.

    The 2nd house for me is money and how to get it, by that I mean the energy and application to get it. It is also self- esteem. I have had to find mine as it was v weak. And that is linked to how much money I earn, or charge – what I think I’m worth. I have worked on it a lot and it’s getting good. Though in this recession (depression) I am struggling to ground income at the moment and that eats in to my self worth – I’m not earning = I am failing. It’s a challenge to keep my heart full of ‘keep going’ at times.

    Some men and women find me scary, many don’t. I have strong opinions. I suspect I can be overbearing but find it hard to know where that begins and ends. If I try not to be, I feel it’s transparent that I’m not myself. If I let it hang out I risk everyone telling me to piss off. Ha! I don’t see that anyone has to sort me out, or help me, it’s hard to help me but I am learning and letting people do it more and more. I make food and I buy dinners. If a male can’t handle that, he is not for me. I struggle with friends who don’t let me give to them. I don’t depend on anyone, but I know they matter because I love them. I suppose, looking at Fe’s and others comments, that I have a strong male energy – though I don’t like calling it that, I may have a strong vibration permeating the atmosphere however, I am soft as your pocket.

    I lived with a Virgo for 7 years. We didn’t really have any sort of passion, we were more friends (co-dependents), he was younger, and he seemed to accept and put up with (or so I thought) the unacceptable part of me – the part that could not be loved. In exchange, I paid for everything – the house, cars, fuel, food, insurances, everything. He rarely worked. I woke up a few times during the relationship but could not face being on my own, so blind eyed it. I woke up for real in the end and stopped all money going to him so he would have to leave. He did then. But he cleaned me out financially during that time – I was left with nothing. I am still clearing up the mess. Never again!!!

    I sorted myself out so I was ready to meet potential partners on as close to equal terms as poss. I let out the goddess, or my true self as I think she is, I let a lot of other stuff go, beliefs, history, houses and I have drawn to me in these last few years many wonderful, loving caring people. They might have found me before, but I don’t think I would have recognised them, nor them me.

    My libran mars is going to apologise for being so long. I haven’t even read it back to see how bitty and leaping about it is – night night PW’s. Love H.

37. Wandering Yeti… I appreciate your delineation of the states of organ consciousness, and you’re right about the interplay producing an emergent awareness around the vicinity of the physical heart.

    As I try to make clear in other writings, it isn’t the ‘system’ that concerns me so much as the basic activity that permits you to *discern* those systems. This connects to an old semiotic argument (“can you know something before you can describe it? and if you have a description, isn’t it necessarily preclusive of what cannot be described?”), that can’t be resolved at the level of denotative or expository language. Still, we use what we’re given, then try to refocus the dataset by extracting karmic factors that would skew a system one way or another.

    For men and men’s hydraulics, the question of Truth’s physical seat behind the sternum may be a more open one. Or there may be a completely different yoga for full awakening in men than women. I’m still gathering (1000+ later) data. I *can* state –categorically– that in women’s bodies the deepest discernment/passion/intelligence and yes, fully stabilized and illuminated awareness takes place in and through the heart center.

    The qualifications for that heart space are part of another writing, so I’ll leave it there for now. It strikes me that there is a huge difference in nomenclature — part of my training is drawn from Tibetan, not Chinese systems. If the Chinese –or the Celts, or the Mexica– see the “heart” as ‘controlling, manipulative and cold’ in their healing systems, it tells me that we are simply not talking about the same thing. Cordialis, coeur, carotid – all refer to the twinge –the nearly impossible hairpin turn– where power and compassion educe one another.

    M

38. “Independent is INTERdependent, NOT a bad word. Quite reasonable. (We all have to Love each other or it’s all fucked!)”

    You rock Jere. Yep, interdependence is a goal we could all set our sights on.

    I also love it when you say (in the post upstairs) that you see everyone as equal and as goddess/god, just as you see yourself, and this is how I try to live my life as well.

    To fellow Wavers out there – these discussions have been fantastic to read – thank you.
    (and i swear that all my organs are feeling that bit better for it as a result!)
    😉

39. hey, Vipe Queen, i’m gonna try, as concisely as possible, to put this.. You are as validly US, as WE are. You’re here. Here as in on this planet. (Your validity is based within yourself, you’re a gorgeous person, whether you realize it or not.)

    Let the old cats go (the familial’s whom denial, and delusion was tantamount to destruction of spirit. There is No weight you can’t levitate!)

    Food is one of those things, (the real deal), ..We All deserve it.. We can make it.. (..but that’s not exactly where we are..)

    HEY! We could SHARE!! How’s that, Man? You up for sharing? Do it up, if you’ve got some food, share it! (anyone, it doesn’t matter). (It feels hella good!).

    That’s not exactly it either..

    (We’re all on this planet together. There is the individual (Hi!), and the collective. This shit never changes on this plane of reality, so, Take Care Of Yourself, But Allow others too take care of you… (not in a “pansy” sense, {but keep looking, there’re cats who just dig being cool, [far, few in between]}), ..so that you can enjoy the moments that you create with another being, (and mostly yourself!)

    Independent is INTERdependent, NOT a bad word. Quite reasonable. (We all have to Love each other or it’s all fucked!)

    Kick it down, man. Work it through.

    Love,

    Jere

40. Mystes: actually for the Chinese there’s a soul for each of the 5 yin organs which are the ones (mostly) inside your ribcage. The heart’s soul is desire and engagement as its fire clings to the world like a flame to its fuel. The liver’s soul enables our ability to envision and see the big picture which when the liver is healthy corresponds to emotional expressions of kindness. The spleen’s soul crunches data like food, processing information, delineating the finer details. The lung’s soul adapts to conditions from moment to moment and maintains the groove. The kidneys hold the deeper will, your will that is less like your personal desire and more like the movement of water in a river or ocean currents.

    Yeah, the heart holds the soul that’s like our light on, our sense of identity, but life as a human is more than that. I think it’s more correct to say that the human soul arises from the interplay of the individual souls of the organs rather than saying it resides in the heart or liver or brain. It’s all over like a wi-fi signal that each organ is able to tap into in its own way.

41. So many amazing words espressed thoughts already, need no more of mine at all, but I add that I too, LOVE to prepare meals for people, plan parties, entertain – and love the seduction that comes when it is an intimate situation — yet amazing how many times (men) try to prove their worth by not accepting my gifts of “service”, if it be that. Perhaps it need be viewed only as “gift”.

42. Hi everybody,

    I read this morning with interest the article and most of the comments. Unfortunately I do not know about eris in my chart…. My venus I know, it is first house, pisces.

    While going shopping for groceries, what Eric had sad about his buying lunch or dinner for the ladies stuck in my head. This is a multilayered, dependant on culture very subtle subject I realized, while choosing the vegetables I wanted to cook later.
    Here in Germany this discourse seems not complicated to me. When two friends (male female, two females, any combo) go for dinner they might share the check. If one has much more money than the other, that’s the one who might pay the check. If a man is “interested” in a woman and invites her for dinner, he pays the check. It seems to be obvious before, who will pay for dinner. One who wants to make his position clear could agree with the other in splitting the check before having dinner. I know, such so called not important things can be cause of much nuisance and misunderstanding.

    I even discussed it with two of my daughters, age 22 and 18, to exclude seeing it out of my 50+ perspective only. They agreed that when the man invites the women out for dinner he pays dinner. In cases like, “oh, let’s have dinner together”, it is splitting the check unless one particularly invites the other. There always exist exceptions to these generalizations. So may be here in Germany we, both men and women, are liberated in where the “going for dinner pay rule” is concerned. We do have “multi culti” here and many foreigners, e.g. Moslems. They would not accept that the woman pays at all, it seems it would show her independence.

    One personal example, I went out several times in New York with a “male friend”, Italian origin. He invited me and always payed for my dinner. The last time we had dinner I decided that I pay…..that was a year ago, the last time I had dinner with that friend…..

    sibylle

    It just stated to snow!!

43. Erratum:

    Chinese physiology holds that the life force moves around the body in a lunar cycle, the “Soul” riding your meridians like a roller coaster.

    I was taken aside in the dream state last night and gently corrected on this point. It is the Life Principle that rides the meridian circuit, not the indestructible aspect of Being [insert your favorite term here], a/k/a “Soul.”

    “The Life Principle (tib: ‘bla’) is the physical body’s analogue, the last, most perfect-possible copy of your Truth. A Truth which is [Oneiros pointed out with an ironic smile] categorically impossible to duplicate. ”

    That ‘Truth’ or (for want of a better term) Soul rides in through the heart center. Ff’s point about electrical stimulation is well-taken, as I have personally seen ‘ro-lang’ (a term for an entity who is *not* the person who just died) come back into the body through that gate with CPR. That is indeed a problem – but one that is being managed by those with more wit than me.

    Still — with the exception of that little technological stain– the profound lover/beloved relationship played out between the You and the World finds its cushion, refuge and restoration in the physical location of the heart.

44. Flux.

    (some)Men are afraid of (some)women. (some)Women are afraid of (some)men. We incarnate as one or the other (or sometimes both). We arrive (on earth) with lessons to learn. We learn by experience. We come to a specific place at a specific time and in a specific form. We arrive with certain gifts. Am I right so far?

    I hope all PW readers here have learned as much as I have in the last 24 hours from this exchange. I especially would thank “newby” pwoodard and (new-to-me) frannyfan; thanks for sharing your insight and your “gifts”.

    I’m grateful to read the words of old favorites like jlo, mystes, Patty, Len, aword, Fe and all the others. Grateful that Eric lost his original text and to read the seeming”out-of-context” words of Sariel.

    I re-read Sariel’s words just now, with better perspective than yesterday. As always, hindsight is so beneficial. Her words “Males provide the ability to divine the future through thought, and to analyse the deep wisdom of the female and translate it into grounded action.” Yesterday that meant a man and a women, but today it means one person with both male and female abilities. Whatever society and whatever time and whatever gender we find ourselves in will determine how we navigate the learning process. What helps us is how open and how fearless we and the others we meet are. Some societies, some time periods and some situations are more conducive to learning than others. The internet is a rocket ship to learning about one another, don’t you think?

    “Men play a part in this (understanding the destructive tendency in females) in having the COURAGE to stand up to their mothers and other females with HONESTY and COMPASSION.” Eric was right, Sariel doesn’t waste words and here she tells us about the improvements men (in general) could make to improve the negativite traits that (in general) women embody.

    We learn from the past as well as the present. We are in transition. We are in flux.

    I still maintain that this was an Eris-apple-toss to her opposite conscious Sun aspect. Eric, you are a nurturer, sometimes mentally (thanks Aquarian Moon!) and sometimes emotionally (Pisces, Cancer stuff) but it could be your earthy Venus that brings the ladies to your dinner table. If you provide nurturing, you will attract the nurturing-needy. If you want to be fed you will have to express your hunger. There are many of us of the same persuasion as your grandmothers and godmother Josie. If that’s what you really want. We like to be needed. Perhaps it’s because you have some of your grandmothers and godmother Josie’s gifts of nuture and seek other types of nuturing.

    Where exactly in the body is the liver?

45. Roles are a funny thing!! Now, we can’t deny the physical make-up of our bodies. (I know that might get some flack from the feminist) however men are physically stronger than woman, so going out on the “hunt” they were prepared. Just as woman have the “nesting” instinct. I remember quite well a few weeks before my daughters were born having the overwhelming feeling of cleaning, folding checking and rechecking in anticipation of their arrival. Now that’s not to say that woman aren’t as strong as men, quite the contrary, I also remember bailing hay at my aunt’s farm, some might consider that a man’s job. After going through two marriages over the past twenty years, and encompassing the feminine role, I do have to say that it is bullshit how society has portrayed the male as the unfeeling, do as I wish ,come through the door and have my supper ready persona. This observation not only is prevalent in my situation, but in many friends and family members alike gay and straight! To whom do we compare?
    I have to say, I enjoyed the “wife” role. Nothing could bring me more pleasure than taking care of the ones I love, however when that goes out of balance, then everything sucks. There have been many a days I wish I could “grow a set”. Isn’t balance the name of the game. Giving up preconceived notions of who we are supposed to be and just be.

    P

46. “.. ’til things we’ve never seen, seem familiar..”

    (It’s “Lady with a fan”, Grateful Dead. Think run into Terrapin Station.)

    (Dammit man!, I need another Dead seen! The bastards are running on me to create, but I’m flakin’ the job!)

    Dani was quoted it, and I spoke it earlier.. Too fuckin’ easy, eh!?!

    (Right there in front of us, and yet………….

47. Dude (which means all of you, in my reality), I was so freakin’ out of this, completely, ’til Eric posted the Dani Katz statement of, “..Holding the vibration of BEING it and ALLOWING it to come to me.”

    This statement couldn’t be more true!

    When you overcome the point of exhaustion, you know. You’re tired. You’re done, with all the shit, the garbage that this lifetime has too hold for you.

    I speak as an androgonous(sp. f’d) being at this juncture, (nobody with half a clue sees dick’s or pussies. We see eyes, the windows, baby! )

    This “Vibration”, this “Being”, “allowing”, (That’s You man, You.)

    The shit that’s in this Universe, it’s both male and femme, and neither at the same time. It’s beyond all the duality crap! And that’s us! Perhaps the duality, but more so the INDIVIDUALS that we have the opportunity to INHABIT OUR OWN BEINGS!

    Hey, realities come and go. Lifetimes fly. It’s no big deal, just the Universe (us) playing with ourselves (that does sound kinda funny;) )

    ATTACHMENT is a massive word. Bake on it.

    As always, you’re a gorgeous, beautiful bunch!!

    Love, Peace, Happiness in all!

    Jere

48. “Heart is Sun but if you need electrical activity to revive it, i suggest trying a pacemaker instead of short term solutions to make it beat.”

    I wasn’t suggesting anything endogenous. Pacemaker? electrical?

    I was simply saying: There is a spot in the heart center where Love enters. It isn’t a mechanism, it’s an opening.

    Under and in. . .

49. Frannyfan writes… “The liver is supposed to be the center of the soul not the heart!”

    As did the ancient Greeks. And each of the internal organs are great candidates in their own time and way. Chinese physiology holds that the life force moves around the body in a lunar cycle, the “Soul” riding your meridians like a roller coaster. Liver does create the essential elements of the body (lipids, enzymes, aminos, etc.), but Love is not created, only distributed.

    The corporeal fire from the liver drips *down* for people who are being led in the dance of time. Which is why we ‘tombe/cadare’ that is, fall down at the end of the life. We follow the fire, and its extinction.

    The heart center has energy, but not a metabolic fire — it is like the difference between wood and glass. And the point at which Love enters the room is a tiny (teensy tiny) little dab of neurons deep in the tissue. (You’ll find it just fine on your own.) It doesn’t flow up or down, it disseminates.

    It’s like comparing a thornfire to sunrise.

50. I’m not a woman but I wished I was when I was an ignorant teenager getting daily shit flipped at me for being a musician, told being a musician wasn’t a proper job for a man. I didn’t know the shit women have to deal with at the time, I just knew I didn’t want to be the man I felt I was expected to be so I used a fantasy of not being a man at all in which to hide. Go figure. Venus rules my ascendant (Libra) and Mars is in my 7th house in Taurus ruled by Venus. I can hide in my room for weeks recording and practicing, but have always had a hard time getting into or forming bands so that the music I compose can come alive and be more than a recording locked in space time, never changing. I used to mostly have unconscious access to my Mars where I’d identify totally with the sensitive artist and then periodically get possessed by unconscious rage. I’m a lot more familiar with my interior these days and harbor no delusions about the sensitive artist being the only mode of expression available for conscious identification. Asian bodymind technology like Yoga, Tai Ji, and internal, awareness based forms of Kung Fu like Bagua Zhang plus maintaining relationships with women who do know how to hold space for an emotionally present man have helped me cultivate deeper awareness of my body which is also deeper awareness of the medium of expression of whatever emotions really “are”. Being able to sense anger when it’s merely a glimmer in the region of my liver and knowing how to move and transmute the energy with my mind greatly reduces the tendency to find myself possessed by intense emotions.

    Also, the thing about the heart being the most vicious organ…that’s exactly the heart’s shall we say diseased(?) expression as observed in the context of Chinese medicine. Cruelty, impatience, malefic passion are the flip side of passion, love, and harmonious engagement with the world. The heart’s element is fire and related to the planetary energy of Mars.

    Sun/Eris is on my 1st/7th axis to the degree. Ouch.

51. Okay, my first post here. I am presently on a mission to cultivate my “inner princess”. I’ve gone from being an independent woman, to a strong, woman, and then I took a nose dive into that special hell reserved for Superwomen. And I never lacked for men, but I did lack for men whom I could respect. Because I did not look for a man to be either a provider or a protector, because I could provide for myself and I did not need protecting, I ended up attracting boys. I attracted men who wanted me to their provider and their protector. Because I did for man years, say to sex because I wanted to have sex, I ended up being disrespected by the men with whom I was sharing myself. I do not like weak, immature, inconsiderate users-but that was who was coming my way. I have a history of raising the ire of women supervisors, perhaps because I am not a person who easily accepts the dominatrix trip and many women supervisors tend to “strap one on” before they come to the job. After much introspection over many years and several bouts with celibacy (both elective and circumstantial), I have discovered some important truths about myself.
    *I may be self sufficient, but I don’t want to be independent
    *In the past, there was a large part of me who enjoyed having the significant people in my life dependent upon me; at least for awhile, then it got old.
    *I have a tendency to be extremely domineering (although I am happy to say that I am growing out of that)
    *I want a man who wants to provide for me and to protect me. Most of the time the man who does that feels better about himself and is therefore nicer to me.
    * I like the whole woman as nurturer piece. I will cook, give massages, make little gifts.
    *I like the whole woman as sex goddess/lover piece.
    *I do believe in sex roles, but I don’t believe that one sex is inherently more important than the other, or that one’s”job”, one’s role is more important than the other’s
    *And yes, women can be back biting, evil, jealous, conniving, and hateful. Hate to point it out, but it seems that I must. Those are the ones that the fellas like and go for first. those women who are not looking for a dick with a paycheck, or really, just a paycheck tend to be chosen last, if at all.
    *My present (and I pray permanent) significant other told me the other night that strong men are intimidated by strong women because men need to be needed and strong women don’t seem to need anyone. Click! I was manifesting all of this strength, but in reality I was a mass of unmet dependencies so therefore they came to meet me in the form of all of those weak, don’t want to keep a job men I was attracting. So if I want a strong man (and my current is much more in touch with his emotions than I am), then I don’t need to be one, do I? I need to be woman.

52. Addendum: I like being a woman, but my own kind of woman. Love cooking for others. (Taurus rules my fifth house.) Have ambitions to always smell like cardamom cake! Came to terms with the laundry sock pile a couple of years ago, but certainly don’t want my ambitions to end at the front door.

    Love dani’s description of a great man. And here’s the challenge of Libra Mars: stand up for yourself. Don’t dim your own light at the expense of another’s burned out bulb. Diplomacy, one of Libra’s great gifts, is about finding balance between two sets of legitimate needs. Legitimate needs.

53. Looking back at the first time Sari’s words were published in this space (well before Mercury entered the other side of the echo phase) i expressed anxiety over not being able to compete with the masculine ideal of a centaur. As if. i can look back on it now and laugh at myself, but it was a feeling i needed to move through and work out. For now, at least, i am my own masculine ideal and it works for me. If it does not work for someone else, hey – there’s enough space for us all.

    Now on the other side of the echo phase, the PW Community takes it all to a higher octave in a beautiful way. Given the Aries Point action going on, please indulge and / or forgive me as i quote a few lines from a Cat in his pre-fatwah days:

    “Now i’ve been crying lately, thinking about the world as it is, why must we go on hating, why can’t we live in bliss. `Cause out on the edge of darkness, there rides a peace train. Peace train take this country, come take me home again.”

    If you booard first, do me a favor and distract the Conductor long enough for me to sneak on. See you in the observation car.

    Love,
    Len

54. Would any women here like to describe their Mars and what it says about their perceptions of men, and what you have done to integrate your Mars energy into your psyche?

    Can I jump in with this?

    Libra Mars. Most significant aspect is opposed Aries Moon. Also in a loose trine to Pholus/Venus in Aquarius.

    I instinctively see myself as “good” as men. Always have, unless and until someone comes ’round and dishes out bad manners. I get help from my Aries Moon, that instinct for yang, in me. I often forget that I’m NOT a man.

    (See? I don’t automatically reach for the ‘M’ word (misogyny), I see it as bad manners.) Very Libran.

    For years, though, I overplayed this Libran side of me and bought into the notion that a good companion was always a responsive companion who anticipated everyone else’s needs before her own. Gracious and goodness will follow her for the rest of her days… I even married a double Libran and really got an upclose experiment in indecisiveness.

    My Mars expects men to be charming, but ultimately superficial. My Mars also demands that I be a fully vested partner in any expedition with men. So there’s the rub: how can I invest in partnerships I assume will never hold any depth? I am still working on this one.

55. dani katz of los angeles writes:

    i know that i’m releasing a lot of male energies from my framework: fixing, doing, figuring out, hustling, control. В lunging after what i want, instead of holding the vibration of BEING it and ALLOWING it to come to me.

    my definition of man? В hmmm….man is independent, man is confident, man is whole, man knows what he wants and goes after it, and yet, never oversteps, overpowers, or using brute force or manipulation to get it; man is confident, man is COURAGEOUS – this is a big one, man is powerful and empowered, man knows himself, man is connected to his feeling nature and his emotions…

    the man that i’m interested in connecting with is his biggest, boldest most amazing self, or at least committed to the full realization of that, and is confident enough to support me in being my own biggest, brightest, most amazing self – he doesn’t need me to dull my light to feel confident.

    man also knows the wisdom and the value of woman and of the feminine, and defers when appropriate, knowing it neither affects nor reflects as relates to his own manhood.

56. But I didn’t know you were “pagan.”

    I didn’t know I wasn’t.

    Tantra embraces anything that embraces everything.

    Pan frances anyone?

    *8^}

    M

57. Funny, I love making guys dinner. And you’d better come with an appetite.

    Ceres in Cap with Venus in Sag in the 10th – I can make dinner for lots and lots. I love making dinner generally, and the more the merrier. I could probably turn it into a business. Oooops – there goes my yang energy again!!!

58. Mysti, yes, a sincere compliment if I ever had one. But I didn’t know you were “pagan.”

    Again apropos of this conversation, in my second session today, I was working with a woman, again repeat client w/good rapport, who is an actress (TV/film/stage), retired international model (still young, but done being an international model), theatrical producer, articulate, intelligent and a truly exotic beauty who was wondering: where the right guy is.

    So, as is my method these days, I switched the conversation to gender roles, and started looking at her Moon, Venus and Mars, out loud. Based on this, I suggested that she do things with men that give her a more traditionally female role, so they notice she’s a woman, and so that she notices she’s a woman. (She is one of those people who wants to be a woman and who wants men who like being men. But she is running more male energy, high vibration and potent, than the next five guys put together.)

    Her: “Like make them dinner?”

    Me: “Yes!”

    Her: “It doesn’t mean I’m servile if I’m serving someone dinner. But suddenly I feel like a prisoner and a slave.”

    Please trust me, ladies: this is going to affect your relationships.

59. I just started reading a few of the notes here. I connected with an old high school mate on facebook this week, and learned that 1. He wanted to ask me out but was afraid to, and 2. that he got a girl pregnant about the same time I was giving my own baby up for adoption. He wante dto marry the girl but her mom wanted her to marry a rich boy, so she dumped my hs friend and told him it wasn’t his baby and he wasn’t welcome anymore. Twenty five years later she calls him and wants to know if he wants to meet his son. The shit hits the fan and present wife forbids the meeting because she is jealous. My husband had the same reaction when I finally met my birth daughter – fear that I would leave him. My friend hasn’t stood up to his wife, and I am encouraging him to do just that, explaining that all the guilt and nightmares go away once you do what you are supposed to do. I think he always knew the baby was his. Curiously he and i are nearly conjunct astrologically, and both have saturn at 29 degrees of virgo. Is it fate or what, that we are having this conversation?

    Maybe women are little she-devils. We seem to hold the power over these men. God(dess) would never hurt anyone the way we hurt our friends and family.

60. For you Len, mostly for you.

    As Venus sidles up to the Super Galactic Center you can feel the pull of (as Phil Sedgwick says) the cosmic vacuum cleaner. However, I only jumped in this time to say that Pandora is at 19 + Aquarius, with just-direct-Jupiter only 2 degrees behind and gaining. And with Chiron and Neptune ahead, what a lot to heal! Some will also appreciate that Vesta is opposite in Leo, stirrin’ that pot and hottening it up, but it’s all good.

    I missed the network news just to keep reading what you guys have had to say. Damn! (Just kidding, it is great stuff . .so real . .and I bet even Eric is glad the story he had for us got eaten up)

61. Morgana…”I pause to wonder, in light of Fe’s observation above, if the gay community functions on some level as the “emotional gatekeepers” for the rest of us as well?”

    Shall I assume that ‘gay’ is inclusive of lesbians? My first marriage was to ‘maricon’ a gay man, by the way, so it is quite possible to be married (and very sexual) with a person who is not attracted to the ‘other’ gender. I simply played a drag queen in that relationship. It all worked out.

    I am still puzzled by the bitterness coursing through quite a bit of this discussion. My lovers are usually men (though I am currently in love with a woman), and nearly all of them are a) terrified of and in love with their mothers; b) will defend to the death their denial of this. I’ve learned to trigger that adoration *veeeeeerry* carefully. I do NOT think the first is perverse or a malformation; I think it is a very rich vein of emotion.

    Our (women’s) inability to breathe through and make room for the mother/lover ID is somewhat problematic, but I think we’ll figure it out.

    ***
    E.

    God? Oh, come here, baby…

    Well… I’ve called you Pan. Does that count?

    M

62. One other transit that now seems pertinent: Ceres moved into Scorpio today.

63. Fe said: However, is it possible that we are so far removed from the model of an emotionally present man that women would not know where to begin to identify one, let alone realize it as a culturally acceptable norm? Is that necessarily all our fault? Can the confusion come because that norm is not comfortably established without the fear of appearing “gay” or “metrosexual”, or “soft”.

    I don’t think we’re far removed from that model, Fe. It’s easy for me to identify these men in my life. It’s the gay men who are the most emotionally present.

    These are also, unfortunately, the men I relate to in what I believe is a non-sexual manner (meaning, they and I are not going to be *having sex* together). However, my two best male friends are partners with each other, and they relate to *each other* in an emtionally present manner, as well as with me. There are so many ideas in this discussion that are important, and I can’t quite put my finger on how to integrate/synthesize them all. What is it (if is there something at all?) about hetero sex, or gender differences, that makes us want to cover up, figuratively speaking?

    Several weeks ago, I ran across an interesting interview with the Dagara shaman Malidoma Some. He believes that gays function as “spiritual gatekeepers” for the rest of us. I pause to wonder, in light of Fe’s observation above, if the gay community functions on some level as the “emotional gatekeepers” for the rest of us as well?

    This is an amazing discussion, something I have come to love so much about PW.

64. Perhaps it would be useful to add for clarification; it took decades of introspection and work to understand 1) that my parents influence was overpowering, 2) what that influence* was or could be 3) what a process could be for identifying what I chose for MINE regardless of it’s origin and 4) how to I replace what I don’t want with what I do, and keep myself in check such that this becomes a constant – and enjoyable process of growth — such that browsing in the bookstore I could see this book on housekeeping and think “perfect! just what I was looking for”, even though I wasn’t looking for anything in particular at all.

    *and including the influence of other authority figures including my own inner voice of authority that echos, mirrors and warps those voices.

65. Would any women here like to describe their Mars and what it says about their perceptions of men, and what you have done to integrate your Mars energy into your psyche?

    Mars in Aries in the first house, trine my Venus in Sag in the tenth and Pluto in Leo in the sixth. Ahem – Born to have a career in construction management? No, I studied to get an art degree and somehow, through aspiration, came to this place happily being female in a male-dominated environment and culture. Things were a lot tougher when I first began than now, but it always felt like an odd set of circumstances was set in motion to place me where I never expected to be.

    I feel as though I grew more comfortable in my power when I learned enough to rely on my own instincts and intuition, coupled with my actual experience. I’ve often been told that I have a strong “male” streak of initiative and directness, that cuts to the chase in situations.

    As for men in my life — most of them are brothers. The ones I meet who I am attracted to and its mutual are mostly comfortably paternal, and they are amused by me, not threatened. Or at least, that’s as far as I know.

66. I was in the used bookstore during your latest post about resentment based in lingering attachments to our parents/past — in said store, I purchased (for a well-spent dollar) a book on how to clean and keep clean “your palace”. The female writer is a successful entrepreneur in the housekeeping business and i figured she’d get me into a frame of mind about cleaning that took it OUT of what I grew up with (Monday washday, Tuesday ironing day etc.) and into a context that is more “busiiness” like, more mature, and more about filling the actual need to have a clean and orderly home, than about oppression or repressed parental agendas.

    I find displacing stuff that doesn’t work (hate houswork because it’s attached to a childhood/mother that didn’t work) and fill the void with something that better suits MY need, not my mom’s.

    For what it’s worth to this discussion,
    Linda

67. Apropos of this discussion, I just did a session with a young woman who is a repeat client, so I have a sense of who she is. One theme was not her wanting to be seen by men as the little wifey who cooks and cleans and does laundry. I asked her when the last time she did the laundry for a boyfriend was; the answer was never. The resentment was all mom’s lurking resentment toward her father – for being the one who takes care of the home.

    We have a lot to learn about gender roles, and why it’s not a great idea to polarize into one set of roles because you resent the other set of roles. This shapes our expectations of ourselves and of our partners and is in effect living out the past; which is often about retribution.

    Note that we are having this conversation with Venus and Mars changing signs – right now. These concepts are in transition, which presents many challenges. It’s difficult, for example, for people to have stable relationships when our concepts of what a relationship is, and what comprises the elements of a relationship are changing; and it’s even harder when most of the process is either “unconscious” or a taboo discussion.

    One of the things that I am seeking from my clients lately is their ideas of what a man is. I am then comparing and contrasting this with Mars in their chart, and introducing them to the concepts of projecting Mars onto men; and integrating Mars on their own. This is using astrology as a growth tool rather than as a predictive device; and it’s powerful stuff.

    Would any women here like to describe their Mars and what it says about their perceptions of men, and what you have done to integrate your Mars energy into your psyche?

    ==

    Maya, for whatever reason, the notion of “seeing goddess in women” is quite different than “seeing god in men.” God has been fully co-opted by fundamentalist and corporate religion. Goddess is a much more down to Earth concept; which is about having reverence for the Feminine, demonstrating that reverence; and embracing it sexually as a cosmic expression. I view this as healthy as long as the ideals don’t get in the way of our actual responsibilities.

    Perceiving god in men, or god at all, is a very different story. Playing God means you are are a megalomaniac who throws around authority and power. There is no equivalent of “playing Goddess.” But it would be what I am describing in the shadow feminine, abuse of natural feminine power, and the perception that one’s million dollar fur really can buy anything. The problem with that notion is not that it’s false; like most lies, the problem is that people actually believe it.

68. Len, just confirming that I am sitting here in the background with you, as much in respect of Saris words as the first time Eric published them (I kept a copy of them, actually, they spoke that strongly to me) and interested by this discussion.

    Thanks for noting the day’s aspects……and funny thing that in the midst of my personal “stall” that is, not getting my film school application turned in last week, I was just last evening asked to design a clothing collection for an upcoming series…..(I walked away from costuming and design a couple of lifetimes ago. – so “why now?” Note; the show is about Very Strong Women (who take a similiar shape to my Lilith…..and which for me ties into Sari’s essay).

    Fascinating.

69. We’re all regular blokes, Eric. Gods and goddesses and regular blokes. Nobody’s exempt from stumbling through life and fucking up and hurting one another and (hopefully) learning from it. If you’re waiting for someone to wash your feet with her hair, I can’t help you – nobody’s doing it for me either, believe me. We’re short attention span creatures who manage it for bits here and there, but we don’t generally sustain, what with all the flaws.

    I just don’t think it’s true that even a momentary acknowledgment of godhood necessarily reeks of arrogance and fundamentalism, except maybe to fundamentalists. I think that’s too pessimistic for even me. Humans are terrible and beautiful creatures, capable of profane horror and divine grace all at once. We’re doomed, but there’s hope. We do the best we can. We try to move the bar on “best”. So it goes.

70. Maya, I am steeped in Pagan culture. The only Pagan I have ever met who actually treats me like a god is Jenny Singer, a Gardnarian High Priestess. As for the rest (among the Pagans I have met), I’m a regular bloke or at best, a good teacher and helpful astrologer.

71. Oh yeah, also wanted to comment to this: “It’s now trendy to see women as вЂ?goddesses’, but to see вЂ?god in men’ still would reek of arrogance and fundamentalism.”

    This kind of took me aback. In the general culture I guess it’s prolly true (so many things I take for granted!), but pagans do it in ritual all the time. It was a nice thing to spend my 20’s doing, noticing the divine in both of us and caring about the balance between masculine & feminine. Took a long while for it to become something I embody outside of circle, but I sure do notice that it’s a thread in my weave now.

    just sayin.

72. Oops. Correction.
    “would NOT dump and exit” fer crying out loud!
    (and Mercury is out of the echo?!!)

    BTW Rushed typo and not my subconscious Mr. Freud.
    ;-))

73. I had a revelation this morning as I was attempting to shed some light on some suppressed and stagnant emotions alongside making room for some “mental clarity and the conscious” as Eric so aptly describes it. I knew I wanted an understanding that would illuminate my path forward. Somewhere in recent article I read that Joanna Macy believes that power should no longer be interpreted as a dominant energy held by one group to control another but as the power between groups and the energy which fuels all our potential to create. So there I was this morning, yakking away at myself in my head, anticipating a future conversation with someone that I interpreted as having “power” to persuade me toward a particular course of action without my input, (which is, of course, no longer acceptable to me) and I was attempting to find a more productive way to voice my power so I would “dump” on them and then exit.

    Then it hit me. I have been heavily suppressing my power and my voice because I am afraid to use it. I am afraid of myself. It has been the default mode for me to unconsciously vent in “violent manipulations” and then follow up by indulging in ways to excuse it. I really don’t want to operate like that any more but instead prefer to channel my energies into loving kindness and communal creation. Frightening, ridiculously frightening but I am trying to be honest here (albeit reluctantly); it is how it is for me, right at this moment in my lifetime and I want to change MY modus operandii. I have too readily explained the whys and wherefores of my upbringing and my conditionings but I am tired of doing that now. I have put all my energies seekin new ground in which to plant myself and to blossom and realise that, hey it’s actually here and I’m the cultivator.
    No one else but me.
    Scary.

    Some of this has come about from my having to face and honestly understand my behaviours around my “emotionally present” teenage son, who has been erupting at me and voicing his frustrations at my inability to let go of my frustrations. Instead I have wanted to negate and push away his annoyances but he insists on being heard and is very accurate in his observations of my behaviours. I guess Mr. Blake called it; I will have to admit to that part of me that is still very much “animal” Hey, I have often said that the meaning of my name describes me so well: I growl a LOT but give great hugs! Now this bear has to do some mental work to balance herself out.

    Yes I crave and desire a goddess energy. I want to channel that goddess energy above all else but to do that, I know in my head and in my heart, that I really need to put a lot of effort and work into honing my powers of reasoning which up until now, I have completely abdicated that power.

    I have so much to learn, so much to let go of, and so much to embrace. When my heart aches, it is for me first and foremost (and not in a selfish but healing manner) and for my need to up my self-loving (today’s oracle says it all really). I just want to heal my heart chakra in a way that embraces not alienates the other. My darlin’ son is yelling at me to change the channel.

    Now that’s some tough loving but I also need the new frequency.
    Yelling is tiresome.

74. Busy as hell, but really felt compelled to comment.

    Disclaimer: all I’ve got to work with is my own perspective. I’m not hugely well-read in feminism, but I am hugely committed to dragging myself out of my own shadow territory & it’s from there that I comment.

    I would love to agree that women are too smart to go for the macho guy & that if they did, the marriage wouldn’t last long. Except that I was one of those women and I tolerated it for a long time (and I know plenty of women in 30 year loveless marriages with macho assholes), because what was modeled for me was putting up with macho ick. Men who made me vulnerable with their sensitivity were fascinating and intriguing from a distance, but it’s too hard to hold yourself together up close, so I recoiled. Repeatedly. With vehemence and unconscious rage. I didn’t want to look at myself or my flaws *really*. I wanted to seem like I was.

    For whatever reason I had the luck to find a good therapist who has helped me past this, but if I hadn’t I would likely have wound up doing the serial thing for the rest of my life, like my mom, acting out that same scenario over and over. For the first 30 years of my life, I WAS that unconscious woman. And I was someone who worked at it! So many don’t.

    I’m surrounded every day at the office and on campus by women who fear and rage and seek to control and all this plutonian madness, who sow chaos for the secret power in it, and sometimes it is pretty seriously difficult to ignore the temptation when it’s everywhere and so socially acceptable.

    So maybe the heart thing wasn’t a very effective metaphor for some, but I do recognize the concept that’s being conveyed – that women are so often complicit in the abdication of their power, and that can even be convenient, because to do so is to enjoy the luxury of victimhood. And maybe we don’t see as many male victims because men aren’t taught to see themselves that way. Which is NOT to say that horrible things don’t happen, or that someone is ever to blame on a personal level for a random (or not so random) act of violence, but to choose not to let such a perpetrator ruin your life is a pretty powerful thing, and one I can’t say I’m that great at either. I’m rambling.

    I guess what I’m saying is that I don’t think the intention here is to blame anyone. We (the collective, ancestral we) are all to some degree responsible for the totally out-of-whack state of the gender polarity both literally and within. The notion that boys are only aggressive and girls are only nice is asinine, and yet I know lots of women who’d call themselves feminist who unconsciously play along with it. It’s hard not to: we’re soaking in it. And we demand so much perfection from ourselves, that it’s hard to imagine that despite our best efforts there might still be work to do.

    Honestly, the piece appealed to me, because I recognized in that writing the sort of unconscious toxicity I personally am capable of, how viscious I can be and how quick I’ve been to victimize myself and thereby avoid my own power, and how much work it can be to keep a light on and choose to work toward consciousness even when it’s scary and painful. I’m glad I’m doing that work, but at the same time, I can feel nothing but compassion (yeah, okay, also irritation) for the unconscious storms that rage around me every day on both sides – and even in the middle – of the gender aisle. Nobody’s exempt from acting consciously and working to create genuine equality and healing, and I can’t imagine that Eric or Sariel meant to imply that was the case.

    I don’t know if any of the unique puzzle I’ve fashioned of the world in my own mind managed to make sense to anyone else. Either way, my intention wasn’t to offend or annoy, so much as to add one more perspective to the kaleidoscope. If I did offend, please take comfort in the knowledge that as I’m still breathing, my growth on this planet is far from done and at some point I’ll look back on this and facepalm. 🙂

    Okay. Back to the music & educational theory books…

75. Since I’m not making so much progress on my other work today, I’ll add a reply to Belle.

    I would remind you that I’ve been listening to the relationship stories of women for the past 15 years as their astrologer, for the past five as a photographer, and for many years before that as a tarot card reader. I have done the astrology of countless divorces. I have learned a little about the choices that many women make, and why, in the process of doing this. Since my astrological method is based on listening, I do a lot more of that than I do taking. For many years I would take a lifetime relationship history in the work and typically will still cover two or three marriages and the relationship to the parents and their marriage.

    Women may not like macho, but few know how to deal with anything else or recognize it as qualifiably male. Things “are changing” but this again is often in politically correct discourse: showing a more balanced image of maleness in a movie to reflect a presumed set of values, so that it looks that way and is “modern” and “cool,” wow, James Bond kisses a child. If you want to see the real values that corporate America is playing to and reinforcing, study TV commercials.

    I know many other women to whom I am not “attracted” and don’t date (I don’t date, I socialize when I have the opportunity), and I hear their values too. I also know men, and I hear their stories. I know other counselors and therapists. I hear from my lovers and past lovers what they have done with and to other partners and what they were taught by their mothers. I hear from them years later why they related to me the way that they did; what was motivating them; what they would not admit then but can admit now. So I’m not exactly speaking from a strictly personal set of biased experiences here.

    I am personally attracted to women who have a real modicum of independence, or who espouse that idea. This, in turn, usually comes with a decision not to be nurturing and allegedly subservient (like their mom was to their dad).

    I understand that I personally was raised to be submissive to women (to be both feminist and chivalrous in the same idea) and to have the attitude of serving them; and it’s taken a lot of therapy to learn how to blow off women who treat me in ways that do not meet the basic standards of courtesy and attentiveness that I demonstrate to them.

    Belle, it’s more about dicks and dollars than we are admitting here — and yes this leads to abandonment, sadness and misery for women.

    This conversation will be complete with more comments of women owning their shadow material, their expectations of men, the things they have done to men, and their image of what a man is; and taking responsibility for the collective shadow of women in general. Let’s go.

76. “She is saying this, in my view. The Eris archetype (which she relates to Sheelob, from Tolkien) is about manipulation, jealousy, passive aggression and women not processing their unconscious, intuitive energy through the rational mind.”

    now the way i might interpret this is that women should be processing their unconscious, intuitive energy through the rational mind? because then i would say – while i can see how women are about 90-95% conditioned and socialized to reproduce (it ain’t all about the eggs) the separation of the sexes and thus the mind and ways of thinking as left/right, logic/intuition, mars/venus, hard/soft, etc., to me the language also perpetuates this notion of yes/no black/white binary-ing of archetypes that we are stuck in. isn’t it about finding and honoring the balance in between and beyond this dualism (which is inherently contradictory in itself), and recognizing the potentiality of all sides within their own situated context? of course this is just my own current contextual meaning-making i bring to this somewhat decontextualized text, please pardon me if i am “lost in textlation”.

    i would also argue that many cultures do not see themselves as simply owners of property in a collective or communal sense, but extend it as a literal part of their being in this world – “i am the desert” – is not just a metaphor. There is no separation for some.

    i can get how we are “banned from seeing” the hypocrisy in the sense that it’s not a common conversation (3 biggest problems = religion sex politics — 3 things “banned” from public discourse = religion sex politics), but i think it’s more the elephant in the room every fucking one of us sees but maybe hasn’t been given or created the opportunity of place or conscious space or even has language to communicate about it. we’re not socialized to be critically reflective or deeply conscious, and in fact we’ve been conditioned by religion, gender socialization and through education and politics to do the exact opposite but that doesn’t mean there aren’t human beings doing so. yet some of us are doing it in academia or are creating autonomous places (like this one can be) because we do not find it in mainstream media or “normal” (whatever that is) social discourse.

    and yea eric, who you hanging out with??? (iTease iTease…;)

77. As synchronicity creeps in under a Neptunian deluge, I hear the words from my very soul talking about the issue of us and how we are all so intelligent and talented, washing dishes for ends meet. That was earlier today. Just now I re-subscribed to planetwaves for a few reasons: because I love astrology and I hear about interesting news on subjects that matter like lgbt and equal rights and the moon bombing plus the astrology of all those AT THE SAME TIME! It’s kind of like doing what you love to make your living AT THE SAME TIME! And I subscribed because it makes what I say here more legitimate. My money is important and valuable to me. I don’t have a lot of it right now, but what I have I do want to go into avenues that I think the world benefits from like Seventh Generation toilet paper and fresh local and organic foods. More on topic, I would like to say that I feel the need and privilege to treat men like gods. Men who know they have feelings, can talk about them and connect?!?! YES! Men who can support my authority, personal volition, thoughts and evolving opinions?!?! YES! So here is this: I am tired of hearing “Don’t take it personally.” In this country, we need to start taking OTHER people’s problems personally. Like Eric once said to me, “I care that everyone has food and shelter and (somewhat exasperatedly?) stuff like that”. Can we get that much done for crying out loud?!

    On the emotional level, when your boss, the one who hands you the check that buys the rent and food is unconscious and PROUD OF IT, when she is motivated by her fear that you’ll do better than her and earn the esteem of manager/daddy, eris is on the scene. When her self obsession eclipses the realization that her trappings keep you in fear of being thrown to the winds, that’s a problem. Why do women keep each other down and how? That’s a question I’m still grappling with. One thing is certain, I’ve been processing my mom’s junk since my mid twenties and I’ve been vocal about it. So there. At times, I have been the unconscious woman. More recently, I am creating Goddess like webs of infinite love and wisdom.

    As far as the heart analysis and metaphor goes, I’d say it’s not that big of a deal. This, from a Leo. After all, is life that valuable to us? Whose life? Should death, yet again, get the short end of the stick?

    Thats my somewhat thought out response with chest cold.

78. How many women do you know who can simply say yes to sex because they want to, without various economic preconditions? And if women cannot say sex because they want to, it has a lot to do with being branded a slut by other women; with lowering the price of marriage. As Susie Bright pointed out in one of her articles, one sexually active woman in a dormitory can drive down the price of marriage for all the other women (and so she must be outcast or destroyed).

    This emphasizes my point: Marriage has been commodified and that poses an “social-economic Darwinism” on women who do not follow the rules. But is this a psychological archetype or a commercial “branding”?

79. Fascinating. On this day, when the Battle of Hastings changed the course of history. On this date, when a hot dog pilot with a hangover and an injured arm climed into a dangerous experimental flying machine and proved it was possible to go faster than the speed of sound without turning into a pumpkin. On this day, the observations from Sari of Wales were published in Planet Waves for the SECOND time this year. Fascinating that the response has not been exactly the same this time around. Cognitive dissonance is well taken. But what has shifted in just a few months?

    Well, Eris is indeed opposing the Sun. Like the issues addressed here today, an opposition aspect does not appear suddenly, it builds up over time until it reaches a point where it has to go the other way (like a full Moon).

    In addition, both Venus and mars are in the anarectic degree of their respective signs today – how often does that happen. AND, just like an opposition, the anarectic degree is an indication that a particular protocol has gone as far as it can go and is ready for a shift.

    Finally, Mercury emerges from the Echo phase today – once again an imperative to step on to new ground, an end to one tired history and the begining of another.

    Watch that new Moon in Libra this weekend. And then the Sun’s transit to Scorpio next week. We are in for a ride that we can define – may we call it the Peace Train, please?

    Offered In Service,
    Len Wallick

80. I’m out of this conversation for a while, as I have other matters to attend to. I think what I am saying is plain on its face, however; and by banned, I mean taboo with a penalty; or not allowed in serious discussion in the media, normal social discourse or academic discourse.

    Let’s keep this conversation focused. I am talking about shadow feminine; that is, feminine shadow material.

81. Eric:

    The institution of marriage was always a means of exchanging property, and the woman was part of the deal. I think the part of time you address was pre-feudal. The current model of marriage is based on the property model, propagated by the clergy of most religions, as well as upper and merchant classes.

    There are so many permutations of this hypocrisy that it’s nearly impossible to see; and we are banned from seeing it. How many women do you know who demand that men be sensitive and caring but don’t know how to handle an emotionally present man, or count that against them at the same time because to be sensitive is �less macho’?

    I don’t know what you mean by “banned” here, but I will address this further down. However, is it possible that we are so far removed from the model of an emotionally present man that women would not know where to begin to identify one, let alone realize it as a culturally acceptable norm? Is that necessarily all our fault? Can the confusion come because that norm is not comfortably established without the fear of appearing “gay” or “metrosexual”, or “soft”. And who puts that stigma on men? I tend to think there is an unspoken economic and cultural rule that puts men in control. And by and large they do.

    I’m not sure what you meant by saying “banned from seeing the hypocrisy” but I think, looking at these tiles of our discussion, that we are speaking to each other from opposite sides of a wall that was not necessarily our construct, nor our individual preference.

    That wall was built, brick by brick, with the mortar of our peers, our fathers, mothers, teachers, employers, priests and by the yoke of traditions long held past that anchor us to a cultural behavior and not an individual acceptance. Its the same wall that divides us from our gay brothers and sisters, the unjust absolute of procreation as the basis of marriage, and by our willingness to play along to get along to be considered “normal” in society.

    As for psychological rape – is this what you intended to say? I need an example before I comment. At this point, I adhere to the legal definition of physical violence, where there is in most cases an actual physical difference between men and women giving the male advantage.

82. Fe, women originally were not property; they possessed the property and were the controllers of the camp and the household. This enabled men to do what men must do: defend the camp, hunt, and later, to trade.

    In many (for instance) Native American cultures, and many other cultures, women hold the property and so are considered ‘part of the property’, as stewards — not in the sense of private property but collective, community property. The notion of women as chattel property is another problem and it’s a big one, but it’s not helped (for instance) by all the legitimized forms of prostitution that women willingly participate in.

    I have probably purchased or cooked a thousand meals for women. I can count on my fingers the number of times I have been invited to a woman’s home (besides my grandmothers and my godmother Josie) to eat food that she cooked specifically because I was a guest. I can count on one hand the times that I’ve been sitting at a restaurant table with a woman and she offered to pay the check (thank you Beth). The feeling is like the curtains and window being opened in a dark room on a sunny day.

    There are so many permutations of this hypocrisy that it’s nearly impossible to see; and we are banned from seeing it. How many women do you know who demand that men be sensitive and caring but don’t know how to handle an emotionally present man, or count that against them at the same time because to be sensitive is ‘less macho’? What do women simply expect men to do for them, from paying for sex in its various legal and culturally acceptable manifestations to unfair custody or child support situations, to living (in the words of Adrienne Rich) with lies, secrets and silence?

    In our society, we have the rape standard, that (in enlightened thinking, and often in court) rules the roost: men who rape women and should be prosecuted (we all agree), but there is supposedly no female psychological equivalent: surely not that you can prosecute, and not that can be named without risking being branded with the scarlet M of Misogyny.

    How many women do you know who can simply say yes to sex because they want to, without various economic preconditions? And if women cannot say sex because they want to, it has a lot to do with being branded a slut by other women; with lowering the price of marriage. As Susie Bright pointed out in one of her articles, one sexually active woman in a dormitory can drive down the price of marriage for all the other women (and so she must be outcast or destroyed).

83. Eric:

    In terms of the competition aspect, I begin to see your point but don’t necessarily agree.

    There is an unmentioned aspect of male-identification going on here, including women who are competing for men and the market-driven society that enforces that behavior. That has been going on for centuries–especially in societies where women played a role as property instead of person.

    “What I explained in my post is that it’s basically illegal to describe this because under political correctness, it’s misogynist to say anything bad about women. Yet what I am describing is an open secret: what women will tell you about how women can be. And what men know, but cannot say, lest they be accused of “hating women.”

    Feminism was a means to respond in part, but there are deeper forces at work here that maybe should be left unnamed until we get this right and understand the full picture. I suggest maybe this is a good forum to begin the discussion, but I hardly think a name can yet be assigned.

84. No mischief involved. Read what she is saying carefully. She does not waste a single word. Unfortunately, my original post, which took all morning to write, was deleted by Word Press, and I don’t have the gumption or the time (consultations and horoscopes to do today) to rewrite it. I may have a go at it tomorrow.

    She is saying this, in my view. The Eris archetype (which she relates to Sheelob, from Tolkien) is about manipulation, jealousy, passive aggression and women not processing their unconscious, intuitive energy through the rational mind. What I explained in my post is that it’s basically illegal to describe this because under political correctness, it’s misogynist to say anything bad about women. Yet what I am describing is an open secret: what women will tell you about how women can be. And what men know, but cannot say, lest they be accused of “hating women.”

    Sari has encouraged me, in our conversations, to give this a name, and she is encouraging women to be aware of and take responsibility for their conduct in social situations, which manifests in different ways in their treatment of women (vicious competition, undercutting, gossip) and of men (use of sexual power, manipulation, deception). Part of the problem is that this is considered “normal social behavior” and “just the way things are.” But it’s as vicious as any form of chauvinism that men are capable of.

    For 40 years we have been compelling men, through various forms of feminism, to own up to their treatment of women and improve their ways. It’s now trendy to see women as ‘goddesses’, but to see ‘god in men’ still would reek of arrogance and fundamentalism.

    I have yet to encounter a form of classical feminism – with one exception, Simone de Beauvoir, who calls out mothers for perpetuation of sexism against women, and for enforcing women’s limited roles in society – that calls on women to take responsibility for how they treat one another and how they treat men. Feminism that only projects blame does not empower women; and women, at the mercy of their ‘unconscious’ motives and ‘unconscious’ actions, are surely not empowered. Most women, she says, are ruled by their eggs and their mother’s fears. [De Beauvoir, for her part is saying the same thing: that if women want to become people and not the ‘second sex’, they need to understand how they were conditioned by their mothers and to take control of their biology, in particular, of pregnancy.]

    She is saying that goddess energy – the yin side, the intuitive and the numinous – is rising, but this will have no positive effect unless that wisdom is harnessed and put to work; otherwise, more chaos will ensue from the impulsive and thoughtless actions of humanity. Sari has a pro-male version of feminism, suggesting that the male component of consciousness was designed to help humanity progress through science, reason and the conscious application of intuitive wisdom.

    When we look at a George Bush (i.e., starting random wars that can’t easily be ended), we see not an “act of maleness” but rather an eruption of violent, manipulative impulse that is based on a failure of reason; a failure of true masculine restraint and mental process. She is saying that this, in particular, is what women need to learn and what anyone courting the unconscious aspect of the psyche needs to cultivate: mental clarity and the conscious, ethical use of primal power, rather than turning it loose on the world the way that Eris did, and the way that is so often done and overlooked.

85. I agree with you too Fe; didn’t see you before I wrote. I think Eric is up to some Eris mischief since she’s still conjunct his Jupiter. Don’t touch that apple ladies!

86. I agree mystes. Seems to me the heart’s mandate is to continue pumping in order to keep the entity it lives in alive. So is this the Eris part of the Eris opposed Sun?

    “. . these subtle twists in our psyche make it difficult for us to treat our children fairly, girls are nice and boys are bullies,. .” I guess this would be the result of the end of the matriarchial line, right?

    Tomorrow is Venus square Pluto. Good grief.

87. вЂ?oh i was just following my instincts’, вЂ?my heart told me it was right’. the heart is the most vicious organ in the body, and if challenged will cut off supply to other organs in order to continue pumping. its main instinct is survival and it will aggressively and competitively win at all costs.”

    I am going through cognitive dissonance reading this paragraph on Planet Waves.

    How can a global understanding of the role of the heart as a spiritual center of immense magnitude and power be so obviated?

    Using this as an actual physical metaphor for the purported relentlessness of the heart? :

    “the heart is the most vicious organ in the body, and if challenged will cut off supply to other organs in order to continue pumping. its main instinct is survival and it will aggressively and competitively win at all costs.”

    you’re damn tootin it should aggressively “win”, otherwise the patient dies on the table.

    What is it that is being said here? Why?

88. “the same with the heart. вЂ?oh i was just following my instincts’, вЂ?my heart told me it was right’. the heart is the most vicious organ in the body, and if challenged will cut off supply to other organs in order to continue pumping. its main instinct is survival and it will aggressively and competitively win at all costs.”

    Ummm… not so much. However, bringing this kind of attention *to* the port-of-entry (and more critically, exit) is an interesting move.

    As I was hearing in another thread: light? dark? silver?

    The physical organ of the heart –and it’s subtle body substrate– is the only place authentic love (where eros & caritas) has consistent refuge in the body. It’s instinctual action is open/close/open/close/open. It unerringly sings that message througout the physiology. To block that results in physical death.

    To declare otherwise is — as I said — a rather interesting move.

    M

89. Sad that your work flew off into the cyber, grateful that you published Sari for us — so much of importance there for this day of mine.

    xo