Yin Earth Snake

NOT KNOWING & THE IMAGINATION
also... CHAOS & CONTROL

Last month, the Dragon compelled us to make firm decisions, leading to a moment of breakthrough. This month of the Yin Earth Snake, we discover that beyond the threshold of breaking through is Not Knowing. The primary objective of Snake and Dragon is transformation, and the Snake is the yin counterpart to the Dragon’s yang. Whereas the Dragon brought us a flash of illumination, the aha! moment of awareness, the Snake leads us into darkness and the unknown, the Great Mystery where all possibilities are born. 

Yin Earth Snake is analogous to “The Yellow Woman” of Daoist folklore. The Yellow Woman represents true intent and true faith in the center of our being. Truthfulness is associated with the Earth, represented by the color yellow. Woman refers to the mother: the progenitor and genetrix of all things. The first ancestress in Chinese creation myth is depicted with the body of a snake. The Yellow Woman symbolizes our true will to awaken our original spirit, the capacity to return to our source, and she resides in all of us. 

To achieve a state of deep inward journeying requires being a great minimalist. The Yellow Woman is connected to the originating chaos, pregnant with possibility. She knows the universe contains everything you need. In the microcosmic universe of her own body, everything she wants is just waiting to emerge. This simplicity is the understanding that everything we need already exists,  should we cultivate the space for it to arrive.

Minimalism gives us room to breathe and see things clearly. The more empty we can be, the more freedom we can have. Conversely the more we have, the more we must hold and grasp, the more we are burdened. To be minimal invites spontaneity, allowing our  lives to speak through us. Regardless of external conditions, simplicity thrives everywhere because it is rooted in the essential.

The Yellow Woman knows that in order for anything to emerge, one must withdraw. Like a snake, when we shed our outer artifice, we arrive at the center of our being. The truth of what we are is our sincerity within. At our core is emptiness - being empty of obstructions and illusions that separate us from our reality.  Like fish swimming in the ocean, it is this permeable space within that allows the water of life to move through us. Identity is known, fixed states of being, whereas the true self is an eternal void, open and fluid with possibilities. It is a mystery even to ourselves. This month we are are asked to minimize the identifiable self to make room for discovery of the unknown.  Those who cannot be exceedingly small cannot create space for emergence. 

Emergence is a practice in gradualism. Truth and sincerity is revealed in layers of ever-more subtleness. Truthfulness within being put into practice outwardly takes slow cultivation. When we wait, we commit ourselves to a state of not knowing. We open ourselves to wonder, exploration and discovery. 

Not knowing is not a passive state, nor is it ignorance - a rigid refusal to know. Not knowing is an active listening, illogical meandering, existing in non-local and nonproductive time. It is being in liminality, where space and time swing open and close like a gate. It requires evoking the archetype of the artist: the ability to discover and bring into existence that which previously did not exist. 

By placing yourself in a state of not knowing, you enter the realm of the waking dream, the imagination. The imagination is the ability to go out of fixed states, into creative generative realms. It is existing in non-dual time, not belonging to the past or future. In the realm of the imagination, you do not follow time - you create time. 

The capacity to imagine and enter the unknown is inherent in all of us. Yet many of us experience the unknown as a fearful place. Why does the abyss, the birthplace of mystery, strike terror in us? In the West, there is no working metaphysics of chaos and the unknown. Chaos is not a force worthy of its own existence, nor is it seen as essential to existence, having an intrinsic role and place in the universe. Rather, it exists to be controlled, conquered and defeated. 

Serpentine monsters abound in legends, including the Greek mother of monsters Echidna, the Midgard Serpent of Norse mythology, the British Lindworm, as well as Scylla and Medusa in Homer’s Odyssey. All of these serpentine monsters represent untamable chaos, the tumultuous mystical force, stirring in us a primordial fear of the uncontrollable and unknown. The way to deal with them is to tame and conquer these monsters through the ingenuity of human rationality, force and will. When a culture has a pathological obsession with closure, otherwise known as control, chaos has no place. 

The Western trajectory of moving away from chaos, where the anarchic primordial soup exists only so that order can arrive, is antithetic to the laws of nature. Physics shows us that the fundamental force of change and transformation in the universe is entropy. All stars in the universe will eventually burn out, and life feeds off of the heat and light these stars give off on their path to obliteration.  Our lives depend on the unrelenting increase of disorder, the fertile chaos.

Our relationship with the wild untamed world is that of fear. In practical life, this leaves little room for our own raw, wild natures. The dominant belief in Western culture is that human beings have dominion over their individual lives. The narrative of progress - movement always towards a refined and improved state - has led to the development of tools and technology in order to triumph over our external environment. 

But we are being forced to shift. Our mastery over nature has led to colossal problems. Our technology has brought us to the nuclear age, where the only way to conquer the weapons that will annihilate us is to conquer our will to use them.  Climate scientists report that we have just 12 years to cut our carbon emissions by half before we reach irreversible environmental catastrophe. The defining theme of the “New Age,” or the Age of Aquarius is humanity’s transition to an inverse orientation: from mastery over nature to mastery over the self. This is the biggest directive of our era, our price of admission for being born on this planet at this time. 

We must learn how to navigate and enter into the unknown, to the inner potential that allows for the transformation necessary at the deepest levels of our psyche. Our fear of the unknown paralyzes our collective imagination. Because we do not know how to exist in chaos, we lack the courage for divergent thinking, to explore creative potential realities. Thus, we are terrified to create real change in our lives, society and culture. 

What if our god(s) were not just models of harmony, rationality and order? What if we had a spirituality that was inclusive of randomness, spontaneity and unpredictability? What if we prayed to deities of destruction,  confusion, madness and mayhem - not asking to conquer and control them, but to honor and worship them, seeing them as aspects of ourselves? What if we practiced rites of reaching into the unknown: entering into trance or possession, speaking in tongues, embarking on vision quests? Or rituals of impermanence, such as the creation and destruction of sand mandalas, where we let go of our attachment to fixed states? 

This month is the prime time to use the imagination to develop hidden avenues of human capacity and potential. Call on your inner Yellow Woman to give you strength for your journey into ever more subtle layers of truth. When we do only what is known to us, we collapse into fate, repeating the karmic cycle of time. On the other hand, remember that moving into destiny is always a move towards the unknown. 

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Journey into the Unknown…

This month’s Journey is a guided meditation to connect with the Yin Earth Snake, who will help you enter into the unknown, The Great Mystery, the birthplace of Imagination. 

Using breathing, imagery, music and connecting with your body, this Journey exercise is designed to complement this month's forecast. This audio is modeled after techniques for psychological and spiritual growth, such as psychosynthesis, waking dream therapy, Daoist internal alchemy, and trauma intervention.

If you want to go deeper into the themes of this month (Not Knowing and the Imagination, or Chaos and Control) through the power of visualization, you can purchase the 12 minute audio below. 

Yang Earth Dragon

Decisiveness and Breakthrough

In Chinese mythology, the Dragon is the rainmaker, a magician who possesses the ability to change natural phenomena.  At the moment when clouds have reached their maximum density and darkness, Dragon is the one who releases rain, endowed with the power of liberation. The only mystical being in the zodiac, the Dragon flies between heaven and earth, a symbol of unifying the spirit and material realms. Dragon time is the last month of spring and the time of breakfast, when nature is in its most dramatic transformation: the rise of yang energy. 

Yang Earth is Dragon’s native element and this month is a time of entering the Primal Dragon’s Gate.  It marks a transition time, a moment of crisis, and entry into liminal space where structures dissolve and there is a re-ordering of fundamental principles. This month is characterized by coming to a crossroads and stepping across the threshold.  It requires letting go of the past and the conjuring the power to lead your life. This leads to an important transition during a powerful situation: the moment right before a breakthrough.

Yang Earth Dragon possesses the ability to transgress norms, to go outside the limits due to its mystical power. It represents reaching the breaking point and surpassing all established frontiers. This is a time of excess: pushing your principles beyond their normal limits and accepting the movement this inevitably brings. 

During this time, you must confront the structures of your life that are in danger of collapse. To reach the breakthrough moment denotes departure and surpassing: if your situation doesn’t nourish you and you are unable to stir up new growth, you must go past it, leave. To work with Dragon energy means being unafraid to order things yourself and impose a different direction. When you do this, the spirits of transgression will be invoked; the guides at the crossroads awakened by your call for a new direction. 

We are changing whether we like it or not, despite our intention or perception of change. “Change” and “Transformation” connote two different processes, designated in the Chinese concepts 變 bian and 化 hua. Bian denotes external, momentary or apparent change. Hua denotes fundamental and essential change, a true transformation. The difference between a fleeting change and a powerful breakthrough is one’s decisiveness.

In the Yijing (The Book of Changes), the hexagram for “Decisiveness” is also defined as “Parting”.  What is difficult about decisiveness is that it denotes separation. Being decisive must imply parting with the self that no longer serves our decision to change. We must part with what is unnecessary, un-beneficial and untrue. Because of this, perceptiveness is at utmost importance at this time. Becoming decisive involves a powerful transition: a redefinition of the Self to get to the truth. The Dragon is a hybrid animal (sometimes depicted as part lion, snake, fish or turtle), showing us that we must release the idea of the Self as a fixed identity. To embody the power of the Dragon is to connect with the Self’s true nature: the capacity for change. 

How to work with this month’s animal and element:

What is the process that leads us to decisiveness, and how do we know we are making good decisions? The Dragon teaches us that returning to our truth, our center of balance, is not achieved through compromise. This month we are learning how to achieve harmony through the element of surprise. The Dragon is often seen as reckless, however mastering the element of surprise is actually about alchemy - precise measurement and calculation. It is knowing that one does not use disorder to attack chaos, or in other words, responding to fire with fire, or a flood with water. 

The way to establish balance is the activation of oppositional force to create an intentional disruption, thus creating a transformation. Calmness surprises the fanatic. Humility surprises the greedy. Being liberal surprises the hoarder. It is using order to surprise the confused. Being broad to surprise those that are narrow. It is creating emptiness where others try to hurt us. Through the work of the alchemist, refinement to a pure state can be achieved. 

There are times for compromise and times that call for unequivocal, firm resolution. It is through our steadfast resolutions that we breakthrough. You must be resolute about what you are separating yourself from - denying  power to what you are parting with. Let resolution spring from your heart and the truth be announced openly whenever possible. The process of making a public resolution requires that you examine all parts of yourself. Make a verbal resolution to depart from outdated opinions and part with old patterns. Remember that one who is too full can develop no further and can only invite collapse. 

Be resolute to change, but know that you are not promised what is on the other side. What promises did you make with your spirituality? Does your spirituality promise you a life-raft? Does it assure that you won’t get wet? Once you reach the bank on the other side, are you promised redemption, salvation, happiness? Keep in mind that this time is only one of many crossings. If you are fixated on an ideal destination, you will never achieve perfection and end up in a perpetual transitory space. 

In a time of breakthrough where we step into the unknown, we must examine the bargains we have made to manage uncertainty. Do you believe that your spirituality will lead you to visions, wisdom, freedom, healing, and/or clairvoyance? Spirituality is not a transaction. Just like a friendship, if you see relationships only through the lens of what you can get, your friendship will not last. Spirituality is a relationship: it is a place where we go to give, not get. 

Wherever it is in your life that you are generous - giving without expectation of receiving - that is your spirituality showing up. It is where you go beyond your own needs, not self-cultivation for its own ends. Breakthrough is not a guarantee: it is an offering, a sacrifice of your former self. This month is a time of internal alchemy, an examination of where you are being attached to staying the same. 

Decisiveness results from accumulated force and the month of the Dragon is not a time for vacillation. We can now act with great strength and power and with practice, the time it takes to make the right decision can be instantaneous. We need to arrange the world around us and inside us to support our transformation. This month asks, are you making decisions that support your life changing or do you make choices that support your life remaining the same?

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My free gift to you this month:

Download A Journey with the Yang Earth Dragon, a guided meditation to identify your inner Dragon Spirit.

Using breathing, relaxation, imagery and connecting with your body, this Journey exercise is designed to complement this month's forecast. If you feel called to connect deeper with the themes of this month: Decisiveness and Breakthrough, please listen/download the audio below. 

🐗 2019 Year of the Yin Earth Pig / Boar 🐗

Integration and Submission

The Pig or Boar is one of the most energetically ambiguous animals in the zodiac. It is the quintessential symbol of domesticity yet maintains an instinct for the wild. Preferring a languid life of comfort and withdrawal, it is nevertheless admired for perceptive and prestigious leadership. It is the embodiment of a yin exterior that holds yang power within, an elegant example of integration. While gentle and adaptable in appearance, the Pig teaches us about our inner strength and courage. 

This new year is also ruled by Yin Earth, which is symbolized by fertile, soft soil. It demonstrates the qualities of receptivity, invisible labor, acceptance, humility, nurturance and patience. The earth possesses a power unique to itself: the ability to generate new life. The earth accepts all death, rot and decay that lies upon it and brings forth new existence. All beings rely on the earth for sustenance, being the foundation on which all life stands. Both good and evil find home and are supported by the earth. Because it does not judge or reject, it is significant to all. Through indiscriminate submission, it is all-powerful. 

Conversely, last year ‘s Yang Earth Dog was a time of exercising judgement and separation, acting to reveal the areas of dogmatism and tribalism in society. The year forced us to define our values, pressured us to form packs, call out against injustice, guard against enemies and put up a fight. This year, the Yin Earth Pig brings our quest for truth and integrity home to the most personal level. Our newly defined values will need to resonate throughout all our relationships. Rather than incriminating in a “us vs them” fashion, we must turn our attention to our relationship to home, family and self. This is the  principle of integration. 

Megalomania and authoritarianism is on the rise, from America to the U.K., Brazil, Philippines, Turkey, Russia and Venezuela. The Dog would focus on the egregious behavior of these despotic leaders, assigning blame and asserting a morally superior code. The submissive Pig sees beyond the concept of good vs. evil, asking instead how the rise of fascism elucidates the needs and problems of an age characterized by transition and uncertainty. 

An authoritarian personality has a pathological need for control that rises to significance in a climate of political and economic instability. Its aggressive over-compensation for inferiority is born out of trauma and a cynical view of humanity. Fear and anxiety abound when a worldview devoid of empathy becomes populated by enemies. This type of personality resonates now because feelings of powerlessness are seduced by external demonstrations of brute force. 

The Yin Earth Pig is the precise alternative to this show of strength. The Pig exemplifies holding your energy deeply within, even hiding your talents and power when a situation does not support you. In Daoist philosophy, power is harnessed through the path of flexibility - rigidity will lead one to break. When we practice submission, we seek power not through demonstration but from its source. 

For instance, the use of weaponry is a symptom of weakness. Weapons are always the tool of the weak - that is why they are needed. Although there is a momentary exhibition of strength, it is dependent on an external means. Even a hunter depends on a weapon to kill an animal, revealing the hunter’s innate deficiency in comparison to the prey. If you are mugged at gunpoint, your attacker is in a status of scarcity. The year of the Pig is a ripe time to perceive and re-define true power so that we don’t fall into false projections of strength. 

How to work with this year’s animal and element: 

It is vital that we refrain from cynicism if we are are to develop a healthy worldview and heal our relationship to power. At the core of integration - the act of making whole - is the practice of interconnectedness, which requires a worldview that is not deprived of empathy. Dogma and rigidity exist in both the political Left and Right. As an antidote, we must create a compassionate reality with acts of willingness and vulnerability. When we practice our values on the most personal level, we see the highest form of courage is the availability of our hearts. 

Integration means letting go of our labels, status and identifiers that separate us from the truth of our interconnectedness. It is an opportunity to detach from our manufactured identity so that we can restore our friendship with all sentient beings, including the self. We acknowledge that when we do harm, we do harm to ourselves because we are not separate in ultimate reality.

Like being caught in a lightning storm, we are in an age where many things are seeking grounding right now. We can model ourselves after Yin Earth and become the ground in which frenetic energy can land and generate new life. It is only through the connection with the earth that new seeds can grow. We take from this example in nature that yang is born from the power of yin. 

The earth welcomes all things to rest and grow, bearing and nurturing them with its power. If we make ourselves broad like the earth, we become the basis on which all things stand. The industrious Pig, with its snout pointed to the ground, also embodies this concept of humility. By making oneself lower, all things eventually come to you.