Okay, here is your file, about 1 hour and 22 minutes (last 25 mins is Q and A) from The Sanctuary at Omega Institute, beginning at 2 pm sharp. The presentation was part of the Staff Sanctuary Hour series of talks given each Wednesday by a different presenter.
The presentation will appear on the old-style player soon (along with the full archive of my podcasts).
Thank you Gary and Len! These are great articulations. They have helped me snap some pieces of the puzzle I’m working on into place. Eric just said in his last podcast that BEAUTY keeps him going. This was such a hot clue. I realized my zest for life has waned since I decided no longer to be an artist 9 years ago and then in the last 3 stopped knowing how to recognize my own beauty with the changes of age. My actual physical life force has been effected.
I have been allowing the devotional side of Venus pull me out of bed and the intention of service to guide my purpose but I am definitely feeling the neglected heart of beauty awaiting my admiration. Sometimes I long to dissolve into space with such passion it hurts – “forming a direct relationship with the intangible spirit”. Instead I pull from my south node in Virgo 7th house helping people embody themselves and feel more comfortable. I provide kind benign circumstances in which people can greet their own being and hopefully tap their vigor. Its still a great thing but I am feeling the tug of something more wild – it must be art or naked awareness. In the mean time I’d love to be called to make some $$. oh well. So thank you, gentlemen for holding up the mirror and explaining these reflections.
Len #1 ? First I said, uhhh wow? But, the thing that came to mind was listening to someone talk about how for years he went to therapy to cure his sense of loneliness. It was a positive thing for the most part but after the pathology was cleared he still felt lonely. When this person mentioned it to his therapist, his therapist said sagely, “That is a loneliness between you and God.” His entire point being that when you get to oneness it is just you on some level. I’ve been feeling into that a lot. Ceres is the grain mother, right? So the nourishment in being alone, one, solo?
I so appreciate being able to ask for and receive communication at this level. Peace.
LW
yogafeldenkrais,
(1) What Gary said. Thank you, Gary for your deep wisdom. Especially concur with considering the traditional ruler (Jupiter) over the modern ruler (Neptune) given the 12th house context.
(2) As of this writing, Ceres is nearly finished making another pass through Pisces, so you have recently had a Ceres return. The Minor Planet Center number for Ceres is “one”. You may have found that it fits on several levels of meaning during your transit. Go with your recent discoveries and insights as relating to the word, the number, the idea of “one” and you will probably find both a jewel and a useful tool.
(3) Vesta in the fifth house (Leo) may be cause to consider the words “deliberate” and “intentional” in the context of your life. See if that reveals a road less traveled that you may want to notice and explore.
hey yoga, to me the pisces n node speaks to the souls desire to walk a mystical path. pisces is the nocturnal rulership of jupiter, so unlike the monk or priest of sagittarius, the mystic of pisces does not rely on scripture or anything tangible. forming a direct relationship with the intangible spirit world is necessary.
with venus there also, in her sign of exaltation, this means it is really important to this soul to actualize this archetype. love and compassion are a little more tangible than the pure pisces archetype, so perhaps venus is there to help you get a handle on this slippery realm through the principles of devotion, loving-kindness or the like
Hello Planetwave family,
This talk was right on time form me as I’ve been looking for a way to organize my thinking about dharma as it applies to my life. I’ve heard Eric say if you have astro questions about your chart to extend them to the many Astro students here. So here goes, I have my sun conjunct venus, ceres and my north node in Pisces 12th house. How can I decode these symbols of wisdom? What could these configurations be telling me about my dharma? Both leo and virgo cusp the 6th house and vesta is in leo in the 5th. I think all the 12th house Neptunian fog has blinded me to the meaning. I’d love to hear what you (who ever you are) would say.
Cheers!
LW
“To the right man (or men), whoever you are, you are somewhere out there: I don’t think we’ve met, but I really want to fuck.”
🙂
woo hoo! rock on, darkmary.
To Eric: yeah… that IS a great moment!!
While I agree that shared masturbation as you masterfully outline does indeed have much to offer, it is an option that honestly is not so appealing to me. For me, masturbation has been something that I have enjoyed in my own way and in my own space… not out of shame or guilt, but in a similar way that most forms of meditation is something that is not really possible to share, per se. For me, being sexually intimate with another is about the energy going back and forth between the polarities. Perhaps that does happen in shared masturbation… I don’t know since I’ve not done it before… but I love that you are bringing this forward strongly and passionately as an option for erotic exploration which solves many issues of unintended consequences that for now, are part of the sexual soup. I do love that.
I also agree that the abstinence programs as they are presented today are not worth defending as their ultimate purpose is to disconnect young people from their bodies. I merely wanted to point out that it is possible to have positive experiences from choosing this option. But in the hyper-sexualized culture that we live in, it is a difficult path that most see as a strange and unworthy choice. Also people love to make judgments about those who might choose this option. It seems that just about all reproductive choices have downsides.
To Half deWitte, my apologies if my posting sounded like a feminist rant, I did not mean it to be so. What I was trying to say is that until we can with certainty disconnect the biological consequences (both pregnancy and STDs) from the huge arena that is “sex”, we are all going to be stuck with choices that are somewhat dissatisfying and still leave us vulnerable to some outcomes that we would prefer to avoid.
And I agree completely about the “Feminisms”.
Amanda, you say it all perfectly : > but yes, i’d be thrilled to bits if my partner wanted to consider a vasectomy, since he has expressed that he’s not planning to have kids. <
And this is my point exactly. Why is it that in almost all of our current societies, the vasectomy option is not promoted more? Why is it that if you even mention the word, in a crowded room, silence usually ensues and about half the room's consciousness immediately drops to their second chakra in a shielding stance… even if it is just for a moment. Why is this? I suspect it is because that we as humans, have deep, deep ingrained suspicions about the "Infertile One" (regardless of gender) … that for some biological reason, we quite unconsciously equate fertility with power. And, given that most of the dominant cultures that have been scattered across this globe over the past epoc have been experimenting with various forms of Patriarchy, the notion of disconnecting the potent male from his perceived source of power is a non-starter for many if not most people, regardless of gender.
But I'd be willing to bet that if you asked 20 women from anywhere on the planet who are in their fertile years , how they'd feel about being able to be sexually active and have 100% birth control protection with their men, 17-19 of them would probably say, like Amanda, that they'd be "thrilled to bits" if they knew their man had made this reproductive choice.
Men have this option now, so why are we still so squeamish about this topic, I wonder? How often does it really come up as a viable option for those couples who are having discussions about birth control? What is it about this choice that has men holding their crotches (and not in a good way) and thinking that a woman who even suggests it is a man-hater? (present company excluded, of course)
I'm just really amazed that we don't, as a collective, see this as a phenomenally freeing choice that could really contribute positively to the sexual evolution we are all wanting. Instead it too is shrouded in mixed messages and pushed off to some sideline world as something to be avoided, and not even discussed, if possible.
Will we ever be able to re-work this paradigm, I wonder?
Thank you to everyone for making this such a safe space to disclose such an intimate part of my life and for offering such loving support.
Amanda, if there is some kind of useful anger that wants to express itself in your life, know without a doubt you can trust your body to tell you when the time is right.
Eric, “It’s the most feminist form of sex, until a woman says, yeah but I really want to fuck.” I love that so much I might have to print it out and hang it on my fridge.
To the right man (or men), whoever you are, you are somewhere out there: I don’t think we’ve met, but I really want to fuck.
Blessings, all.
This talk was brilliant. Quite surprised how much a practical discussion of the nodes made me laugh!
Green,
A few brief responses. I advocate choice in sexual matters. My promotion of shared masturbation is in alignment with the choice to abstain from, or have an alternative to, potentially pregnancy-creating sex. The logical thing for an “abstinence education” program to advocate would indeed be masturbation, sharing masturbation, shared fantasy, and so on.
However, these experiences promote sexuality, sexual consciousness and erotic sharing while avoiding the problems of unwanted pregnancy and the anxiety around STIs. They open up an erotic common ground that goes beyond gender politics.
Abstinence programs as created by the Christian right political movement specifically shun masturbation and other forms of erotic sharing. The basic law is, hold it all in. These programs should be ridiculed and disposed of as dangerous, self-defeating and damaging of young people specifically as they are designed to do so. They are based on a lie: the lie being that they are really anti-sex programs per se.
Of course, playing with masturbation and shared masturbation are not exactly abstinence. Or they are a special kind of abstinence. One could argue that sex is sex; that all erotic expression is a form of sex. I would still set aside space to consider shared masturbation as something extra because it creates an environment where certain kinds of karma will not be exchanged (particularly pregnancy and STIs, and the concerns and associated fears can be relaxed thanks to an environmental factor). There is a middle ground between you and me; there is a dialog; there is acknowledgement of the other; there is conscious mirroring of self and other.
It is pretty easy to fuck without ever discussing it. It is less likely that two people will share masturbation without making a conscious choice to do so. Generally, there is a dialog. And at the very least sharing masturbation gets a gold medal for being the thing that precipitates that dialog.
The subject of shared masturbation fairly soon brings up what to many is an obvious notion — lots of the boys as well as the girls want to fuck. It’s no longer something that males want and females are victims of; sharing masturbation is a big wash and in that wash, one’s sexual truth has a way of coming out. It’s a coming out experience.
If we’re talking about a form of sex that is more circumspect and more ‘feminine’ in that it’s not specifically about penetration and/or conquering (footnote to issues of 2nd wave lesbian separatist feminists, or anyone who wants to go a little slower); a form of sex where women’s bodies and men’s bodies are on equal terms; where the risks to women are minimized, as are the very real risks to both sexes of having an unwanted child or a pregnancy at the wrong time for them; if we want sex on level ground, to my thinking that is sharing masturbation.
I am not proposing this as the only way of sex, but rather as an obvious mode or space wherein we can experience authenticity, fun, pleasure, daring erotic sharing, and yet not have so much risk and paranoia — and get to know one another and see where to go next.
It’s the most feminist form of sex, until a woman says, yeah but I really want to fuck. I really want you to eat my pussy.
That’s a great moment, isn’t it. And then everyone involved gets to decide consciously what to do.
Gender, biology, choice and relationship themes are being conflated here, Green-Star-gazer, with respect to sexual intercourse. Contraception is not the bottom line unless a particular view of transactions is in view.
I love feminist theory and we need to listen carefully to the experiences of women – but also men. Wombs are not really a battleground unless we make them into one!
We often get polyamory articles and articles on sex in many forms as related to the humanum here on PW. We dance around themes comprehensively and often issues get conflated and occasionally reduced.
When we focus on rights (which is important) to the exclusion of matters that are less about individuation then we often neglect other core feminist values (funnily enough feminism is not simply about women’s rights and bodies – it is also about a different set of values than are found in patriarchy).
Sharing, nurture, care, communication in non-patriarchal mode are prominent.
By the way, feminism should of course be feminisms (how often is this neglected). I often think of the African Womanist movement that is political and very clear on the deficits of white, educated, middle class women being elevated as the norm of ‘woman’. ‘Woman’ is not generic and neither is ‘man’ unless it is being ideologically distorted as representing some real person.
By drawing delineating lines around wombs we unfortunately elevate a crucial element of *a* woman to a petrification of truth – a tradition that becomes unassailable and actually curtails debate – a little like a trumping card.
But as I say, there is much feminist critique of ‘male’ rationality and truth elevation as a tool of control – through shaping discourse and even language from a dominant male perspective – so, if two (or more) people truly wish to engage in caring and sharing in any relational contract (here assuming hetero due to the pregnancy line) why would the debate not be much broader than rights?
Why would this man and this woman (or multiplicity) not communicate, share, plan and consider each other *together*? Why would we presume that generic categories, theories or practical contingencies would be more important than the interactions of the (hopefully) aware people involved in their unique transaction?
Are we assuming oppression before we even get started with the relating bit?
green-star — you bring up a great point. yes, what *about* vasectomy for men who are sure they do not want to have a child?
i get very frustrated with birth control options for women, especially having had not-altogether fun experiences with the pill in college. not all of it was awful, and maybe a different brand and dosage would be ok. but i have a strong aversion to messing with my hormones like that, and was even once told by an astrologer that my retrograde pluto says, “don’t do homones” [i.e., birth control, etc].
so… it’s condoms, close attention to my cycle, and other forms of sex besides fucking a lot of the time.
but yes, i’d be thrilled to bits if my partner wanted to consider a vasectomy, since he has expressed that he’s not planning to have kids.
re: abstinence education… it’s a tricky one. because it is not necessarily “awareness education” or “responsibility education” or even “empathy education.” it’s so wrapped up in a warped morality, i think we have a looooong way to go to unwrap it from that.
i hear your point about empowerment. i just wish it wasn’t the empowerment of “no.” i’d love to have an option that is empowerment via “yes.” but as you point out, that biological burden is mainly women’s… unless we decide to have our tubes tied.
Darkmary, I can remember tapping into the well of rage inside me when I was younger, and while it IS terrifying to come face to face with that amount of raw energy locked up inside oneself, learning how to manage controlled releases can be incredibly empowering. There is a stream of thought that it is the Earth herself that is raging and we become vessels for that rage if we are willing. This cathartic, co-creative expression can help unlock the frozen energies and move them forward, clearer, cleaner and re-newed…. and I bow to your willingness to journey along this path. It is a potent one and one much needed in these time. So few people are willing to look at and embrace these denser emotions. You go girl!
Eric this was a very enjoyable listen and provocative. This and the Eclipse have stirred up for me an elementary truth… that is: until there is 100% safe and 100% effective birth control for women to be able to count on 100% of the time, sex between biologically potent opposite gender partners will always carry an edge of fear: fear of the unwanted pregnancy.
I’ve always wondered why more sexually active men, who want to have a lot of sex with women who are in their fertile years, but who themselves know they are not wanting to have any (more) children, why do they not get a vasectomy and free up all their future lovers to have worry-free sex? Let’s face it, men rarely choose to have a vasectomy, even though there are very good means of preserving their genetic material for the time when they decide they DO want to become fathers. Why is this option not more freely talked about, promoted and even, “fashionable”? Because we still live firmly in the grips of the Patriarchy, is why. I rarely see this getting talked about, yet if more sexually active men would take this step, think of how much that would free up our society and all hetero couples to really become the fully sexual beings we could be. As long as ALL the burden of birth control ultimately falls onto the women, then we will know that we are still in the grips of patriarchal values. When men start choosing to help liberate society by taking reproductive responsibility more seriously, and making similar “sacrifices” that women have to make now, then we will be making some real progress!
Eric, you make a lot of fun of the abstinence line of thinking put forward by Reagan. When I was younger and sexually active, I tried all the various birth control methods that were available to me at the time, and all of them had health risks and none were 100% reliable. I (and my partners) were very diligent with making sure I was protected and I still got pregnant three times. One ended spontaneously and the other two ended when I had abortions. Each and every event was unique and brought up such rage and shame as I have never experienced before… rage because all this was my emotional burden to bear. When the men found out about what happened, the attitude was, well, sorry, and hey…. good luck with whatever you decide to do. These were not shallow, careless men, it is just that when an unwanted pregnancy arrives, it is usually left to the woman to “deal with it”. When I got pregnant, it was ALL on me. and this made me rage because it showed to me, more than anything else, how dis-empowered women are in this society.
And while I have no shame about the choices I’ve made regarding whether to bring children into this world, or not, I did feel shame because I felt rejected, abandoned and somehow defective because all the men in my life ( from father to lovers to friends and even my own doctor) seemed unable to fully comprehend what a burden a fertile womb can be. I don’t blame them, how could they REALLY understand this unless they had full access to their own memories of when they were a woman or if they were incredibly psychic empaths. So, while you may make fun of the abstinence choice, there is also an aspect of empowerment in it that cannot be so easily dissed. It is the only non-surgical option for a woman to absolutely guarantee that she will not have to face an unwanted pregnancy.
Yes, it is true that there are countless ways to enjoy intimate, physical and emotional pleasure without the risk of pregnancy… but until the risk can be fully removed (either surgically or biologically with time) being female and being sexual, with (fertile) men, will always have a shadow side. And that “what if I get pregnant?” shadow is made up of all the deepest, darkest emotional turmoils imaginable… and, as women, we know it, even if we have never had to actually face it, we know it. We know it before the first kiss. We know it as we turn off the lights… We are never truly alone with our lover for that shadow and it’s huge menace is always in the room with us. Waiting.
For a woman, abstinence can be hugely empowering because by asserting her will to not become pregnant, in the only 100% effective way available to her currently, she gains control over the “what if” shadow. That power cannot be fully understood by men, I think… for they cannot truly understand what it is like to be stalked by that particular shadow. Please understand…. I am not advocating abstinence as it is currently promoted by the rabid Right, it is a particularly difficult and rigourous path to choose. But it is not all about shame and repression as you have alluded. What I am saying that I understand it’s power having practised it, consciously and willingly for well over a decade, and I feel it is a sexual option that should be better explored, understood and respected as a really viable choice for some people…. not all, but some.
darkmary — to be honest, sometimes i wonder if i’m a bit cut off from some level of intense but useful anger. it has been suggested to me. but who knows. in any case, i want to affirm again that it sounds like you’re burning through much that it’s time for you to burn through; maybe like burning a lawn, you’ll grow even greener & lusher on the other side.
This was/is SO good. Thanks Eric! Hi everyone else.
Dear Darkmary,
Such a burden you are holding inside. I offer you a healing session, if you wish. The rage is very removable, beneath it, the spiritual connection to yourself. Contact me at zbolduc@yahoo.com. An hour on the phone will reveal much.
xxzoey
Darkmary,
“Joys impregnate, Sorrows Bring Forth…” Wm. Blake
Suffering is. Joy and delight are as well, but suffering is the matrix for existence in this and many other dimensions. Get with that, and your capacity to co-suffer, co-self, co-exist will become boundless. That rage? (chuckles softly…) is the umbilicus to the Mahakrodha, the Great Anger – a.k.a. “the mother of the Buddhas” out of which all consciousness recurs, becomes aware of itself. Ask the iron if it loves the furnace – you may be surprised by the answer.
My motto is: the Path doesn’t eliminate anguish, it only changes what suffering can accomplish. Suffer for, or suffer with. For a functioning bodhisattva, those are the only questions.
***
(Keeping in mind that most humor is black…)
You who were named for the bitter and ~sal~ubrious sea… Selah, tempestuous Mer…
Shebear and Amanda, Thank you for your kindness and support. I wish I could say I thought I was finished going through the rage, or rather that the rage was through with me. It is a hell I do not wish on anyone. Rage is maybe the ultimate rejection of life. It has clearly been stuck in my body and energetic memory for years (or lifetimes.) But, as Shebear said, when I go through yet another round of releasing it, the process *is* profoundly life-affirming.
How exquisitely ironic (and sometimes hysterically funny, when I can lighten up), after years of locking this part of myself away and then finally admitting that I yearn for a loving, sexual relationship with a man (or men) that I have such profound blockages to what I desire. I am soft and feminine externally, but imagine that I kind of ooze this Lilith rage on some level. Let’s just say it is not exactly love potion number 9.
So for now, I am letting the rage and karma burn itself up, the blazing fire held in the cauldron that is this body, that is, in turn, held by the earth. In some ways, it is the most loving thing I have ever done for myself. I hope that it frees me to give and receive love as I never have before.
My deep gratitude to both of you for not shying away from my experience, which, in its sharing, makes most people profoundly uncomfortable. May all beings be free from suffering.
hoo-boy, darkmary — yes, the south node can pack a powerful punch. i’m glad you were able to articulate what you’re going through here. i can imagine how scary such rage must feel; i think a lot of us never get close enough to it to let it take its shape, take its space, and then keep moving. but it sounds like you have some perspective on it; keep breathing & screaming… sounds like some of that ol’ catharsis gary was talking about recently.
Darkmary: Thanks for opening up and taking us through some of the more difficult episodes in your life. Your post didn’t come across as a monologue in the slightest but as a powerful and helpful lesson on how one can travel through some very intense emotions, and reach a hard fought place of “unconditional accepting.” The capacity to move through those threatening rages is a profoundly hard and challenging process, but the end result *so* life affirming, isn’t it?
Kudos to you for going through the cleansing and for opening up new spaces for yourself — and for just being so damn honest about it here. Yeah let’s shake our fists and howl up at BML and all the other south node karmic forces working on us and that we’re moving on!
Thank you so much for sharing this Eric! I am really looking forward to listening tonight. Your generosity and the generosity of all PW contributors and readers is sometimes overwhelming and has come at such a poignant juncture in my life. May it return to you a thousand fold.
Recent eclipses have been falling conjunct my nodes (north node in Gemini, south node in Sagittarius.) I have only slowly been learning astrology and the 2010 winter solstice eclipse (also conjunct my nodes) woke me up to their power. At that time I learned that my natal Black Moon Lilith sits on top of my south node. Last October I left a 14 year marriage to another woman (preceded by a 7 year monogamous relationship with a different woman) and fell in love with a man. His natal Mars was conjunct my south node and Lilith. Holy crap!
With no offense to men in general, now I understand why I was hiding out in relationships with women (who are wonderful, by the way, and I am bisexual, but was avoiding dealing with this karma.) It has been the most painful 9 months of my life dealing with Lilith/south node karma. First, eventual rejection by the man I fell in love with (who saw me as his spiritual “soulmate” but ultimately felt very tepidly towards me sexually) and ensuing grief that (I’m not sure if it trumped by or was simply an amalgation of past abandonment and sexual violence trauma) still feels as though I will drown in. Even more unbearable than the grief is the intense rage that his behavior (and sometimes just his presence) in my life has triggered. We tried for months to maintain a friendship due to a shared spiritual path; I only recently ended it. The thing is, is that the fits of rage (which I have not acted out of, except for pounding my pillows and screaming in my apartment) are wildly out of proportion to what I have deemed his unacceptable behaviors. It is murderous rage I have been feeling. It is scary to see spontaneously arising images of stabbing him in the heart come into my mind. All at once I want to indulge the thoughts and am (good catholic/now buddhist girl) horrified by them. The only way through seems to be allowing everything to arise, move through me and intentionally release/return the energy to the earth, who is unconditionally accepting.
I have always felt and drawn a certain power from the dark feminine energies. But this dance with the pathological/neurotic/vengeful dimension of my Lilith (south node) karma has knocked me on my ass. I feel so good that I was able to articulate most of this process to my friend without acting out the anger in our relationship. In some ways, when just reduced to my experience of the energy, the very dark feminine is like a raging yet cleansing fire, a central channel Roto-Rooter, making room for what I don’t know yet.
It really feels like the universe is asking each of of us to heal old wounds and step into a much more balanced embodiment of the masculine and feminine. I bow to the south node and Lilith as teachers.
I hope this monologue is not as much self-indulgent as it will be useful for someone else who might be dealing with some heavy south node karma (be it Lilith or otherwise) right now. You are not alone. A lot is at stake now on our planet. We can do this.
**********
A very belated thank you to bkoehler who gave some very kind advice and support to me a few weeks ago via this blog.
awesome bro. looking forward to it!