Aries 23º: A pregnant woman in light summer dress.

11:24, 04.14.2015, Aries 23º

p. 66     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 23 (ARIES 23º): A PREGNANT WOMAN IN LIGHT SUMMER DRESS.

KEYNOTE: Fecundity.

Masculine aggressiveness and the woman's desire for fulfillment (Phases 21 and 22) are integrated and realized in the expected child. This three-fold sequence can be seen operating at several levels, and the third term, the child, can take various emotional and cultural forms. The basic meaning remains the same. Summer is the period of fruition. Man—at the receptive "woman" level—reaps the fruits of his dynamic activity.

This is the third stage of the fifth five-fold sequence of cyclic phases. It combines the two preceding ones and suggests INNER FULFILLMENT.

Girlcapsule's—2¢:

Ok, here's some hard evidence:

That is to say...for those who have been following this blog series since it began sometime last year, I don't quite know how to address this moment. 

I had to update my own adobe flash to be able to view this movie:

Honestly, I couldn't be bothered. I found a way to view the video on my big old Mac and what I noticed is some new kind of trick of light there is some anomaly in the 2¢ video that can be seen in the last frame

Here's my suggestion let's nudge-start a you've-been-chosen careers & scholarships: i.e. teach story-telling along with visual light tricks to students of all ages—2¢ contributions will find a way to fund this.

Aries 22º: The gate to the garden of all fulfilled desires.

11:09, 04.14.2015, Aries 23º (late posting)

p. 66     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 22 (ARIES 22º): THE GATE TO THE GARDEN OF ALL FULFILLED DESIRES.

KEYNOTE: Abundance made possible by human togetherness and cooperation.

In contrast tot he crude and cruel road to fame and power symbolized by the prize fighter, we now see a symbol of apparently wide-open and effortless fulfillment. Alone, a human being can barely survive in nature's great life drama; in organized groups men can in due time fulfill their desires. The abundant life is in theory open to all. At least this is the ideal, the great dream. This symbol can  also be given an erotic meaning, referring to womanhood.

At the second stage of this series of symbols, the goal of happiness dominates the consciousness of cultural man, the more validly so the more modest his desires. Religious philosophies, like American New Thought, glorify this social feeling of abundance, glamorizing it into an avid COSMIC OPTIMISM and a cult of success.

Aries 21º: A pugilist enters the ring.

11:00, 04.14.2015, Aries 23º (late posting)

p. 65     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

SECOND LEVEL: EMOTIONAL—CULTURAL

PHASE 21 (ARIES 21º): A PUGILIST ENTERS THE RING.

KEYNOTE: The release and glorification of social aggressiveness.

Here we find potency glorified as muscular strength and will-to-power. Because it is potency operating at a harshly competitive level, it can and often does imply the possibility of defeat or disfiguration. In one sense the symbol translates into social terms the primordial struggle for survival of the fittest, adding to it an eagerness for social fame and social power (i.e. money). In another sense, the ring with two fighters in it can be referred to the Tai Chi symbol and the interplay between Yang and Yin. Each of the two types of energy wins in turn. Victory is always temporary in a dualistic world.

This is the first stage of the fifty five-fold sequence of cyclic phases. Potency and the two-fold possibilities inherent in any release of power are seen operating at the sociocultural and emotional level. The symbol reveals man's deeply rooted feeling of admiration and envy for whoever can generate OVERWHELMING POWER.

Aries 20º: A young girl feeing birds in winter.

10:49, 04.14.2015, Aries 23º (late posting)

pp. 64-65     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 20 (ARIES 20º): A YOUNG GIRL FEEDING BIRDS IN WINTER.

KEYNOTE: Overcoming crisis through compassion.

Nature's seasonal rhythms imply an oscillation between living and dying. Through creative imagination man can "fly over" the cycle, and discover means not only to escape from the fatality of seasonal decay or deprivation, but to  assist other living entities to survive through crises. Migrating birds fly south (cf. symbol of Aries 12º), but by establishing a partnership with other creatures unable to escape wintry deprivation or death, man can maintain the life of the spirit (symbolized by birds) steady through all cries if, like a "young girl," he is widely open to the promptings of love and sympathy.

At this fifth stage of the symbolic sequence we witness human activity motivated by sympathy overcoming the seasonal phase of impotency. Life potency in nature spirits reaches a higher level in the human being. The theme is THE TRANSMUTATION OF LIFE INTO LOVE.

Aries 19º: The "magic carpet" of oriental imagery.

18:10, 04.10.2015, Aries 19º

p. 64     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 19 (ARIES 19º): THE "MAGIC CARPET" OF ORIENTAL IMAGERY.

KEYNOTE: The use of creative imagination.

A way of life refusing a hectic involvement in social competition and waste-producing overproduction allows for the development of unattached and transcendent understanding. The static floor (carpet) on which man's feet (symbols of understanding) rest can become transformed into the means for great flights of imagination and super-physical perception. The period of rest from outwardly directed activity bound to collective normality presents the creative mind with the possibility of surveying in dreams the totality of the present-day social situation, thus "to see whole."

The fourth stage of the fourth five-fold sequence of symbols invokes the possibility of developing a new technique of perception, A STRIFE-TRANSCENDING AND UNATTACHED OUTLOOK UPON EVERYDAY REALITY.

Aries 18º: An empty hammock stretched between two trees.

18:03, 04.10.2015, Aries 19º (late posting)

pp. 63-64     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 18 (ARIES 18º): AN EMPTY HAMMOCK STRETCHED BETWEEN TWO TREES.

KEYNOTE: A constructive alternation of activity and rest.

The symbol refers to the ability to balance outer vitalistic activity and withdrawal from such activity and relaxation. The owner of the hammock is active, but in his consciousness he can hold the image of rest in the midst of reenergizing nature. The concept of following the rat race of business therefore has no hold. Potency may be preserved and extremes avoided. Time is found for recuperation.

This is a third stage symbol which suggests a middle path between total involvement in instinctual or social drives, and withdrawal in impotent silence and narcissism—thus LIVING RHYTHMICALLY.

Aries 17º: Two dignified spinsters sitting in silence.

17:55, 04.10.2015, Aries 19º (late posting)

p. 63     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 17 (ARIES 17º): TWO DIGNIFIED SPINSTERS SITTING IN SILENCE.

KEYNOTE: The ability to transform a natural lack of potency into poise and  inner serenity.

Here we have a symbol which contrasts with the preceding one. In our culture, the "spinster" represents the woman who has been unable to meet or accept the vitalizing power of love and organic fulfillment through biological polarization. Yet the symbol depicts two spinsters, emphasizing that refusing the natural expression of bipolar love has produced a special kind of dualism of experience. The two women are silent because this dualism has a narcissistic character. Life has turned inward seeing itself in a self-created mirroring. We have here the result of a negative inward approach to potency. The ascetic or saint also turns inward, but he accepts a higher nonbiological type of polarization: man and God. Just as the activity of nature has a compulsive character, so the resistance of the spinster to biological fulfillment is also compulsive.

This is the second stage of the fourth five-fold sequence. Like all second stages it reveals a contrasting potentiality of experience which can also be seen to complement or polarize the symbol of the first stage. It refers to the value of a dignified INWARD WITHDRAWAL.

Aries 16º: Nature spirits are seen at work in the light of sunset.

21:12, 04.07.2015, Aries 16º

pp. 62-63     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

SCENE TWO: POTENCY
(Aries 16º to Aries 30º)

FIRST LEVEL: ACTIONAL

PHASE 16 (ARIES 16º): NATURE SPIRITS ARE SEEN AT WORK IN THE LIGHT OF SUNSET.

KEYNOTE: Attunement to the potency of invisible forces of nature.

In the light of personal fulfillment (symbol of sunset and wisdom) man may be able to establish a life-giving contact with natural forces. These are active any time growth processes take place, but man's individualized mind is usually too focused on working for consciously set goals to be able to realize concretely the presence of invisible (or "occult") forces in operation. These forces constitute a specific realm of any planetary life. They are inherent in all "biospheres," on whatever planet. They are nonindividualized and unfree energies forming in the substratum of all life processes—thus of the process of integration at the level of the planet-as-a-whole, i.e. the planet as an organism with its automatic systems of growth, maintenance and organic multiplication. In this planetary organism those nature forces act as guiding and balancing-harmonizing factors—somewhat as the endocrine system does in a human body, and behind this system the more occult web of chakra energies related to prana—the solar energy. It is when this energy becomes less dominant—thus symbolically at sunset—or when the body energy is weakened by illness, fasting or sensory deprivation, that it becomes easier to perceive these "nature spirits" and to give them forms that symbolize the character of their activities. These forms differ with the cultural imagery of each human collectivity, retaining nevertheless some basically similar characteristics.

When this Sabian symbol reaches into the consciousness of a man seeking meaning, it should be seen as an invitation to open his mind to the possibility of approaching life in a holistic and non rational, intuitive manner.

This is the first stage of the fourth five-fold sequence of cyclic phases. it implies a call to REPOTENTIALIZATION. What this means also is the process of "becoming like a little child."

Girlcapsule's—2¢:

I am fascinated by the mention of the process of witnessing first spirit entities, then clothing them in the thought-form most appropriate to their activity. This reminds me of the story of Findhorn in Scotland. One of the co-founder's, referred to as R.O.C., claims to have been met by the god Pan and meeting other mythically clothed spirit entities as he worked on the project known as Findhorn.

I have not yet encountered such a being, not in waking state. I do believe these energies can come towards us in such a manner—there are many of these kinds of experiences recorded that have been experienced by crowds of individuals together, and not limited to only one person's perception. I am so curious about these events. What might catalyze such a moment? Is this something to be worked with, or something to avoid? What agency does a person have in such a moment?

Aries 15º: An Indian weaving a ceremonial blanket.

16:05, 04.06.2015, Aries 15º

p. 61     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 15 (ARIES 15º): AN INDIAN WEAVING A CEREMONIAL BLANKET.

KEYNOTE: Projecting into everyday living the realization of wholeness and fulfillment.

In Christian tradition one hears of Jesus' "seamless robe." In Asia one is told of the "spiritual vesture" of the Perfect Ones. The man who has attained the spiritual state is figuratively robed in the universe—and more precisely, in the Milky Way, the Great White Robe of interwoven stars. This is the ultimate kind of weaving. There are also Penelope's weaving and unweaving, waiting for the return of her polarizing mate. The mind of the American woman in which these symbols took concrete form could think only of "Indian weavers." For the white man who is hungering for symbols of a state of living in total harmony with the universe, the traditional Indian can be glamorized as the answer to the inner emptiness of the city-dweller surfeited with artificial values. At any rate, we may thus prefigure a future state of fulfillment in conscious harmony and unpossessive love.

If this symbol comes to the consciousness of the inquirer after meaning, deliberately or through an aleatory act of revelation (like the act of throwing sticks to obtain an I Ching symbol), implied is the profound fact that every individual has as his ultimate conscious task the weaving of his "immortal body," his Gnostic Robe of Glory. It may sound very mystical and "far out," but there is a moment in every cycle when, in however small a degree, every individual many be confronted with the potentiality of a fulfilling act of self-realization and may, ever so relatively, find himself "clothed in light" for an instant.

This fifth stage of the third five-fold sequence of symbols ends the first of the twenty-four "scenes." We are told by it that the FULFILLMENT OF DESIRE is a possibility, at whatever level and in however incomplete a manner it may be experienced.

Girlcapsule's—2¢:

Today I am happy to have caught up in this task—this commitment to walking this Sabian Symbol path. I feel a bit discouraged due to having viewed last evening a documentary on Ron L. Hubbard's fiasco of a legacy known as Scientology. It makes me feel hesitation to trust this testing process that humans seem to be undergoing in a collective sense. The will for power is so strong and attractive to the human ego—it still so easily blinds one from a greater vision that is unfolding. And the aggregate of human choices is showing little to no reason to hope that we can avoid the increasingly prevalent wars for resources as well as the psy-ops that may come with this suicidal strategy for control on a global scale.

Aries 14º: A serpent coiling near a man and a woman.

15:41, 04.06.2015, Aries 15º (late posting)

pp. 59-60     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 14 (ARIES 14º): A SERPENT COILING NEAR A MAN AND A WOMAN.

KEYNOTE: Identification in bipolar relationship with the impersonal rhythm of natural energy.

The symbol for Phase 4 pictures a man and a woman in love walking together. At this new and more mentally stimulated level of experience and consciousness, a third factor appears: the serpent, whose coiling represents the spiral-like process of evolution—not merely "sex" according to the maker of cathartic symbols, Sigmund Freud. We can understand this "triangular" image—man, woman and the serpent—if we relate it to the preceding one in the series, the unexploded bomb of the anarchist or activist. The urge to blow up some structure which somehow has become in the activist's mind a symbol of the Establishment—the ruling elite—is usually the protest of an alienated and often immature mind that refuses relationship, because in the relationship he would occupy a subservient position. In this symbol, the serpent represents the acceptance of relationship by the two polarized human beings.

There must be a polarization before there can be fulfillment. The tragedy of so many contemporary lives is that, having become sharply individualized, the men and women cannot find their truly matching polar-opposite. Because they are not fulfilled at the root level of human emotions and vitalistic forces, they pass their lives seeking the ideal complement, often glamorized as the "soul mate." This search can find its expression at several levels. At the mystical level we have the examples of the "spiritual marriage of Saint Francis of Assisi and Santa Clara, or recently of Sri Aurobindo and Mother Mira.

The Adam and Eve story (in Hebrew, Ish and Isha—much more significant names!) refers to this principle of polarization, although the story has been turned upside down by priestly intellects to serve their purposes. Adam and Eve accepted the Presence, not of the Tempter, but of the Individualizer, who sought to have them born out of the womb of unconscious passivity to Nature's God. But the result of the experience frightened them. The "hid"; they failed in the great test of individualization, and in this sense the archetype of that failure is deeply imbedded in man's generic unconscious. It is repeated time after time.

Modern "individuals" are confronted with another test, but they do not understand its meaning. It is the test of polarized conscious participation in the evolutionary process—a polarization that could dissolve alienation, isolation and egocentricity. In a sense at least, this was the old Tantric concept in India; but today many young people accept the concept only superficially and miss its real essence. They cannot understand the meaning of entering into the serpent, i.e. of developing eonic consciousness and that transpersonal living which once was characterized by the words: Not I live, but Christ lives me—Christ, whose symbolic number in Gnosticism is 888.

At this fourth stage of the third five-fold sequence, we are confronted with an image suggesting the transpersonal way to the "cosmification" of desire and the conscious acceptance of polarization as the solution of the problems generated by individualization. But this need not mean what is currently meant by "sex" and the glorification of the orgasm. It implies rather the RITUALIZATION OF RELATIONSHIP.

Aries 13º: An unexploded bomb reveals an unsuccessful social protest.

15:35, 04.06.2015, Aries 15º (late posting)

pp. 58-59     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 13 (ARIES 13º): AN UNEXPLODED BOMB REVEALS AN UNSUCCESSFUL SOCIAL PROTEST.

KEYNOTE: An immature evaluation of the possibility of transforming suddenly the status quo.

The symbol pictures the result of a particular attempt to resolve the conflict between two concept-feelings of order. Resolution by violence fails because the ego-power at this stage of the process of individualization is far too strong. "The State" thwarts attempts at popular revolution, because these are premature expressions of a consciousness which is not free, but can only react "wildly" to constraint and to a central ruling power. It is thus a symbol of immature refusal to conform, in the name of an overidealistic desire for harmony and peace.

This is the third stage of the third five-fold sequence. A negative attempt at reconciling the spiritual idea and the very earthly reality, denying the validity of the latter. It suggests ADOLESCENT FRUSTRATION. 

Aries 12º: A triangularly shaped flight of wild geese.

15:23, 04.06.2015, Aries 15º (late posting)

pp. 57-58     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 12 (ARIES 12º): A TRIANGULARLY SHAPED FLIGHT OF WILD GEESE.

KEYNOTE: An idealistic reliance upon a mental image of universal order.

The wild goose is the mystical bird, hamsa, of Hindu tradition. This word, which has recurred in various cultures (the Hansa League of Germanic cities in the late Middle Ages, and El Hanza, the founder of the occult Brotherhood of the Druzes in Lebanon, during the era of the Crusades), has always had at least an undertone of integration at an expansionistic level, spiritual or economic. The Hindu hamsa was the symbol of a man's transcendent soul. What previous interpretations of this Sabian symbol have failed to grasp is that the flight of geese presents not only a remarkable geometrical V-shape moving through the sky, but also that this flight is seasonal and therefore attuned to planetary rhythms.Thus, it symbolizes cosmic order, in contrast with the social-political order within a nation which is represented by its ruler. It is order made visual on the background of the clear sky. It is a "celestial" type of order, even through it is earth-born birds which reveal it by their ability to keep their flight structured. The symbol therefore refers to the Soul-consciousness as visualized by the heaven-oriented mind. Yet this soul-consciousness can be called transcendent because it has not yet become "incarnated."

Because this is a second stage in the third five-fold sequence begun with Phase 11, we have to consider what it pictures in contrast to the preceding symbol. A basic dualism of consciousness is thus suggested. We see arising a potential conflict between cosmic and social principles of order. The principle of COSMIC ORDER polarizes the all-too-human reliance on the social concept of law and order.

Aries 11º: The ruler of a nation.

15:15, 04.06.2015, Aries 15º (late posting)

p. 57     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

THIRD LEVEL: INDIVIDUAL-MENTAL

PHASE 11 (ARIES 11º): THE RULER OF A NATION.

KEYNOTE: The power resulting from the formal integration of the collective desire for order.

At this stage of the cyclic process this symbol refers to the appearance of the (personal) ego as the central manifestation of a type of "order" which transcends and seeks to rule the emotional and instinctual drives of the individual person. Actually the ruler at this social-political and mental level of integration is often the one who is being ruled by collective pressures. Nevertheless, a desire for a larger type of integration has now emerged. It is no longer biological-impulsive (Aries 01º) or emotional-personal (Aries 06º), but social-collective and institutional. At this ego level, laws and the restrictive power of a police force are dominant features. Psychologically speaking, this means that the integrative principle is the limited, more or less narrow "I am" realization. It manifests itself as the personal ego exerting its will to control the reactions of the bio-psychic organism.

This is the first stage of the third five-fold sequence of the cyclic process. It indicates a CENTRALIZATION OF POWER as the level of a rigidly structured consciousness.

Aries 10º: A teacher gives new symbolic forms to traditional images.

14:50, 04.06.2015, Aries 15º (late posting)

pp. 56-57     AN ASTROLOGICAL MANDALA, by Dane Rudhyar (1973)

PHASE 10 (ARIES 10º): A TEACHER GIVES NEW SYMBOLIC FORMS TO TRADITIONAL IMAGES.

KEYNOTE: Revision of attitude at the beginning of a new cycle of experience.

This phase is the fifth of the second five-fold sequence, and in it we find expressed the capacity to restate the problem inherent in the first phase, i.e. the problem of focusing one's energies upon emotional drives and cultural values which exclude far more than they include. The subsequent stages of development taken together have added considerably to this attitude; as a result, there arises in the consciousness a desire to reformulate at a new level much that had been taken for granted because it indeed originally had been an evolutionary necessity. The very concrete emotion-arousing images of the past can now be reinterpreted as "symbols" with a wider scope of meaning. 

At this fifth stage a new dimension of consciousness is discovered, revealing higher possibilities of experience and mental development. This is a phase of ABSTRACTION and of emotional allegiance.