[3.5 Minute Read]
The very first astrology book I picked up was Linda Goodman’s Sun Signs. I don’t remember much about the book, but what struck me most was that she lived high in the mountains of Colorado in a little town called Cripple Creek, and on a clear day you could see forever.
Years later, when I moved to Colorado, Cripple Creek was one of the first places I visited because I wanted to glimpse a view where ‘you could see forever’. I now live on the other side of the Colorado mountains from where she lived. As I write this, it’s late evening nearing 11:00PM and in the valley below the lights from neighboring towns cluster together, with patches of darkness in-between, allowing for the delineation of each town. Following the lights from the valley to the horizon, then beyond to the night sky and the vast Milky Way, I can’t help but think of the contrast of dark and light. Night and day. I wonder, if it wasn’t for the night how would we know we are part of something much vaster and more timeless than we can possibly imagine? I’m reminded of Indra’s Net from the Vedas, stretching in all directions into infinity with no beginning and no end. At each eye of the net is a jewel, and looking into the Jewel one sees the reflection of all the other jewels…the one contains the many.
There was a time in the past, when observing the same night sky and city lights below, that my view was limited by a fear-based lens. I could no more reach out and connect with those closest to me, than could the stars in the night sky. The world around me and the universe in general seemed to be a hostile, dangerous place. Contemplating what has changed since then, my focus wanders closer to home, easily spotting the bright glow of Venus.
For me, Astrology was the turning point, specifically Soul Astrology. The difference is the focus, the birth chart holding within it the Soul’s intention for this incarnation. One cannot connect their consciousness to Soul without a significant shift in approach or perspective. For me the path and all the questions that came, led straight to the source and a conversation. This began with a question, followed by an answer provided in the form of a question which required an answer from me. That answer has taken many years to formulate and will not, I’m certain, be completely answered until the end of this incarnation.
Once again, returning my focus to the night sky I contemplate for a moment… if each point of light contains within it all the other points of light, and each of us are a part of all the light in existence… my heart suddenly expands, overflowing with love. Tears form, ahh yes, the light is love, and I understand that this is why Soul work is so important. Consciously connecting to Soul’s intent over time unites mind and heart, revealing ever more expanding threads of a loving universe in a way that permanently alters the lens through which we see and interact. In turn it gives us a glimpse of a view where we can see forever.
As I write these words, I am struck by how difficult it is to convey the depth and breadth of what I felt. The connecting thread for this little moment is one sentence from the Veda’s, one of the oldest mythological texts known to humanity. Joseph Campbell, in The Power of Myth, when asked about Mythology being a lie, replied,
“Mythology is not a lie, mythology is poetry, it is metaphorical. It has been well said that mythology is the penultimate truth—penultimate because the ultimate cannot be put into word. It is beyond words. Beyond images, beyond that bounding rim of the Buddhist Wheel of Becoming. Mythology pitches the mind beyond that rim, to what can be known but not told.”
The modern world has for the most part lost its connection to any sort of collective myth. Perhaps this is why Astrology, based on more modern mythologies, is one of the most popular searches on the internet. We have lost our connection to meaning and therefore to the larger universe. As individuals we are left floundering in a sea of meaninglessness. Pondering what it is that Mythology, Astrology and Soul have in common, I realize all three connect us to that larger body of which we are all a part, but not apart from, like cells in the body of the great expanse that we choose to call God. [DT]