Welcome to the Winter Solstice, Capricorn Solar Festival, Full Moon in Cancer 2018 Cosmic Weather Forecast. Warm greetings from your co-Editors, Curtis and Jane.
This month Jane and I welcome a new feline member of our family, a female orange tabby cat named Lila, pronounced Leela.
You may remember the beautiful one-eyed spaceship captain Leela from the animated TV show Futurama. She was the only one who had any sense out of the whole Futurama crew.
Lila is a Sanskrit word meaning divine play. Divine play is one of the most important concepts of Hindu cosmology and metaphysics, crucial to both dualistic and non-dualistic systems of Hindu thought, familiar to devotees of Krishna, Vishnu and Shiva alike.
Physicist, systems theorist and deep ecologist Fritjof Capra discussed the foundational Hindu myth of lila in his ground breaking work The Tao of Physics: An Exploration of the Parallels Between Modern Physics and Eastern Mysticism.
"The basic recurring theme in Hindu mythology is the creation of the world by the self-sacrifice of God—'sacrifice' in the original sense of 'making sacred'—whereby God becomes the world which, in the end, becomes again God. This creative activity of the Divine is called lila, the play of God, and the world is seen as the stage of the divine play. Like most of Hindu mythology, the myth of lila has a strong magical flavour. Brahman is the great magician who transforms himself into the world and then performs this feat with his 'magic creative power', which is the original meaning of maya in the Rig Veda. The word maya—one of the most important terms in Indian philosophy—has changed its meaning over the centuries."
"From the might, or power, of the divine actor and magician, it came to signify the psychological state of anybody under the spell of the magic play. As long as we confuse the myriad forms of the divine lila with reality, without perceiving the unity of Brahman underlying all these forms, we are under the spell of maya. (...) In the Hindu view of nature, then, all forms are relative, fluid and ever-changing maya, conjured up by the great magician of the divine play. The world of maya changes continuously, because the divine lila is a rhythmic, dynamic play. The dynamic force of the play is karma, an important concept of Indian thought. Karma means 'action'. It is the active principle of the play, the total universe in action, where everything is dynamically connected with everything else. In the words of the Gita Karma, karma is the force of creation, wherefrom all things have their life.
— Fritjof Capra, The Tao of Physics (1975)
As long time readers may remember, the Sanskrit phrase for the underlying Unity beneath the apparent duality of existence is satya. Those who attain understanding of maya and karma and lila attain the experience of satya, which means truth. These awakened ones attain Unity Consciousness.
This is how we chose the name Satya Center. Our goal is to be an agent of transformation, a virtual resource for those who seek to pierce the veil of maya, engage in the divine play of life without attachment, and release the karmic bonds which limit our experience of the Universal joy inherent in each and every moment of existence.
Speaking of transformative experiences, our little Lila is growing so fast we can't believe it! She was merely a 2 pound baby when we got her about three weeks ago, and now she's long and lean, having doubled in size!
She is a streaker, as you can see in the picture below taken only a day or two after we got her. I was taking a picture of a Tarot reading on our bed late at night, when Lila jumped up onto the bed. Totally by accident, the camera captured her as she streaked across the cards. A very auspicious reading for us, by the way, and a very auspicious start for our new life with baby Lila.
Winter Solstice 2018
The Sun enters Capricorn December 21 at 5:23 PM EST, marking the official start of winter, and the Winter Solstice, one of the four sacred cross-quarter days in the yearly calendar. The Earth's axis reaches the point in its yearly cycle when the Northern Hemisphere tilts furthest away from the Sun. This is the time of the shortest day, the longest night, and the moment that heralds the lengthening of daylight throughout the northern half of the planet. Native Americans call this lunation The Long Night Moon.
It's rare for a Full Moon festival to coincide with one of the four cross quarter days, and this weekend, we've got a Winter Solstice Full Moon accompanied by the Ursid meteor showers, which appear to emanate from the Little Dipper, also known as Ursa Minor, and depicted as a Little Bear in the sky.
Unfortunately, the Full Moon will provide so much light that stargazers may find it difficult to see the Ursids as they stream earthward.
The celestial configurations at the time of the Winter Solstice provide good indicators of the conditions we can expect on planet Earth throughout the new season that unfolds over the next three months.
This Winter Solstice, for a welcome change, most of the lights flashing on the celestial instrument panel are green for go! Love is in the air, a universal love for humanity and for our Mother Earth.
A potent Jupiter-Mercury conjunction in Sagittarius favors consciousness expansion, the creative use of mass communications, ceremonies crystallizing magical manifestation and fearless loving interpersonal interactions.
Venus in Scorpio trines Neptune in Pisces, offering us the opportunity to exercise the power of love in our spiritual practices to connect with Unity consciousness. This is known in Hindu spiritual tradition as the practice of bhakti yoga.
The Venus-Neptune trine provides an element of ease and grace that supports the transformation of our everyday holiday season obligations and interactions into spiritual practice, to the degree that we can enter into the spirit of selfless service and unity with our families, friends and neighbors.
Mars forms a tight T-square with the Sun in Capricorn and the Moon in Cancer, energizing us, providing us with increased stamina for the many holiday events we all attend. The typical Cancerian familial karmic dynamics that also surface every holiday season could be super charged by this same T-square, and it is possible for Mars in Pisces to be a little foggy in the brain, so be careful that you don't over react to the familiar family dramas. What you think you see that triggers you so badly may not even be exactly what you think it is. Not even close. Tuning into the loving energies of the Venus-Neptune trine and the ultra-clear awakened consciousness of the Jupiter-Mercury conjunction will enable you to transcend the limitations of the T-square and just enjoy the rush of energy it generates.
The Gabriel Initiation
The sacred interval of the Winter Solstice is a fantastic time to participate in spiritual practices of Wisdom traditions of both East and West, especially with the mainly positive, potent aspects this weekend. In Western Wisdom school traditions, Archangel Gabriel presides over the Winter Season, the divine messenger who delivers glad tidings of great joy to suffering humanity.
For Esoteric Christianity, the time of the Winter Solstice is the time for those walking the arduous path of Spirit to seek a vision of their Higher Purpose, to connect with the Divine Wisdom as revealed by Archangel Gabriel, who presides over the season of Winter. Now is the time to connect with Higher Self and Higher Mind through the intercession of Archangel Gabriel, who interprets the super-rational wisdom found in Higher Realms into words and symbols that can be understood by the rational mind. Through Gabriel’s intercession, we can gain understanding of the mysteries of our own life’s journey, and of the larger mysteries surrounding the evolution of our spiritual brothers and sisters, our nation, and humanity as a whole.
Gabriel’s element is water and his chakra is the throat chakra, which is associated with the color blue, with creativity, and with communication. Traditionally, the opening of the throat chakra represents the beginning of the attainment of Higher Consciousness, once the heart is opened and compassion is attained. The opening of the heart chakra is a long, arduous process, which depends upon the purification of the emotions, which are associated with the element of water.
When we have successfully banished negative emotions, such as jealousy, greed, lust, and anger, and successfully released the old energies of past emotional traumas and failed relationships, then we are prepared for the Gabriel Initiation of the Winter Solstice.
This is why the season of Advent is traditionally a time of purification. Christians are encouraged to perform acts of penance, fasting, and abstinence during the forty days prior to Christmas. Penance, fasting and abstinence are designed to purify the physical body, and also to cleanse the emotions, as well as turning our attention away from material pleasures and toward the summits of spiritual attainment.
Those who wish to pursue the path leading to the Gabriel Initiation of the Winter Solstice are encouraged to spend the three day period of the Winter Solstice and the rest of Advent through Christmas in a spirit of wakeful awareness, open and waiting for a revelation, and to perform their normal spiritual practices in a relaxed, yet determined manner, in an attitude of certainty born of faith, for Gabriel is the Archangel of Faith.
For those who would like to take the opportunity this Solstice Season to connect with Archangel Gabriel, Jane and I have prepared an article with lots of information about Gabriel, the Solstice, and instructions on a short meditation that will serve as your own personal Gabriel Initiation.
Full Moon in Cancer 2018
The full moon at 12:48 pm (EST) on Saturday December 22, 2018 at 0° Cancer makes a transformative sextile aspect to Uranus. We can expect unexpected encounters, sudden flashes of insight and creativity, and helpful impulses that prompt us to transcend our conventional ways of thinking and behaving in the world.
We will want to share our thoughts and our emotions with our loved ones this Full Moon, and we will surprise ourselves and those around us with our intuitive insights into the murky origins of karmic patterns of behavior that have baffled us for years.
Even those of us who turn our routines into hallowed traditions may find that this Full Moon guides us intuitively into a new understanding that will help us re-create our personal rituals and routines into re-energized life patterns more in harmony with the Zeitgeist and our own Higher Purpose.
This Full Moon is in Cancer, which represents the highest aspects of the lunar energy, nurturing, protective, selfless and deeply emotional. At the same time, Jupiter is in its favorite sign, Sagittarius, Neptune is at home in Pisces, and Saturn is in the sign of its exaltation, which is Capricorn. As we enter the heart of the Christmas season, if we tune into the energies of this Full Moon's starscape, we will all feel ourselves a little more at home as well. Perhaps even exalted!
Jane and I pray that this holiday season will see you surrounded by light, infused with love, and embraced by your loved ones in a time of joy, ease and grace!
Meditation Moment: Cast All Your Votes for Dancing
Cast All Your Votes For Dancing
“I know the voice of depression
Still calls to you.
I know those habits that can ruin your life
Still send their invitations.
But you are with the Friend now
And look so much stronger.
You can stay that way
And even bloom!
Keep squeezing drops of the Sun
From your prayers and work and music
And from your companions' beautiful laughter.
Keep squeezing drops of the Sun
From the sacred hands and glance of your Beloved
And, my dear,
From the most insignificant movements
Of your own holy body.
Learn to recognize the counterfeit coins
That may buy you just a moment of pleasure,
But then drag you for days
Like a broken man
Behind a farting camel.
You are with the Friend now.
Learn what actions of yours delight Her,
What actions of yours bring freedom
And Love.
Whenever you say Her name, dear pilgrim,
My ears wish my head was missing
So they could finally kiss each other
And applaud all your nourishing wisdom!
O keep squeezing drops of the Sun
From your prayers and work and music
And from your companions' beautiful laughter
And from the most insignificant movements
Of your own holy body.
Now, sweet one,
Be wise.
Cast all your votes for Dancing!"
~Hafiz