complexity is in the system
spa?
Spa? Venus moves into Taurus on Monday, April 29. This is her home of choice, her sensual nighttime sign. Earthy and lush and physical. A good chance to do some napping. Go to spa if you can. Do some loving etc.
A little letter about complexity.
Hello! Here I am again, writing to you.
A few weeks ago (almost a month, somehow) my friend Valerie responded to one of these newsletters and asked: what does it mean when u behave or act out (i think i'm trying to strike a nuance between the two rather than being redundant) against your enneagram / big three signs? … what's your take on the spiritual side of things, what explains the dissonance / rupture when it happens, what's the evolution going on, what is to be learned, why?
I like this question a lot. I like this because it evokes what is, I think, a central tension within wisdom traditions like the Enneagram or astrology. The tension is that we’re very complicated creatures and the world is a very complicated place and there isn’t a system that will fully simplify any of that complexity. We won’t ever be neat and tidy.
I’ve been reading some Richard Rohr books. If you were raised around Christians who were at all progressive then you are probably a little familiar with him. If not, then all you really need to know is that he’s a Franciscan priest who’s always a little bit pushing the Vatican’s boundaries and making mainstream Catholics mad. He founded the Center for Action and Contemplation which is an organization that tries to encourage less dogmatic and more positive practices in the church such as presence and nuance.
A central tenet of Rohr’s work is the idea that modern religion tends to be dualistic while true wisdom is nondualistic. To “see like the mystics see” means to recognize shades of gray. Wisdom, he believes, does not allow for the kind of black or white thinking that pervades modern Christianity and modern society in general. He explains that what religion and spirituality are meant to provide is competence in paradox. This is what mystery, whether it’s of the religious variety or not, can offer.
Back to Valerie’s question: what’s it mean (how does the Enneagram or astrology account for) when you behave counter to how that system explains you to you?
The Enneagram does have a good bit of logic for this. First, there is the movement along lines of integration or disintegration — sometimes called resource points.
An example of this: a Type 5 has a resource point within Type 8 and one in Type 7. When that normally withdrawn Type 5 is at a party and can’t get out of performing the social dance, they might grab onto one of those points and perform their version of Type 8 intensity, expressing disinterest in connecting, using their physicality to discourage socializing. Alternatively, they might try on what they think it is to be a Type 7, making jokes and rapidfire chitchat with the hope that they can just keep the spotlight off of themselves. From the outside, these look like strange behaviors, variation from the “defined” type and an argument against using a model like the Enneagram. From the inside, it’s consistent. Contradiction is in the model, because contradiction is in life.
In Western astrology, we’ve been on an interesting journey that I’ve talked about before but that I want to run through again before explaining how I think astrology makes sense of complex behavior and inner nuance.
In its origins there was mystery. The credited author of several of the earliest known astrological texts was Hermes Trismegistus, a legendary amalgamation of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth—the art of astrology was something that could only be understood as divine. Over time it became a science accessible to the elite and used for political purposes, then it became something forbidden, witchcraft that threatened the church’s rise, and, eventually, it was a harmless form of entertainment. (Lots of zigging and zagging along the way but that’s enough of a gist.)
Horoscopes that could mean anything for anyone became very popular for Sun Signs in the 1970s and 80s and remained popular if marginalized in magazines for teen girls. Slowly, however, astrology’s tendrils spread throughout culture with concepts that didn’t try to make such big claims from just the month you were born. There’s Mercury’s retrograde, a very good thing to blame for things going wrong. Then, more recently, the Saturn return entered common language—and who can argue that life often gets hard around 27?
Now it’s pretty normal at least for those of a certain age and with certain algorithms on TikTok, Instagram, et al to know the time they were born and the resulting Rising and Moon signs. A non-negligible number of people are beginning to understand the idea that there’s a whole chart behind that “big three”. They know that chart is circular and has lots of symbols and crossing lines and confusing numbers around it that tell some kind of story even if they don’t necessarily know how to interpret that story themselves.
So this is a turning point. This is where there’s a big door that’s open for those who like to use astrology to ask questions that expand our complexity and present us with our paradoxes. For those who aren’t interested, it’s easy enough to shut the door and keep things simple. If you’re selling something, this is the prudent choice. It’s way easier to sell a vague, open-ended astrological assessment than it is to offer something complex and specific. Specificity can challenge people. Complexity demands thoroughness and thoroughness is hard which just doesn’t sell super well. I’m always trying to boil down concepts that are not and cannot ever be simple into something tangible.
I still haven’t answered Valerie’s question about what it means, spiritually, when you act in opposition to what your chart expects. Here’s my attempt at answering this simply:
First, it’s possible that this moment is teaching you something about your chart. Any good astrologer that you meet with will consistently be adapting their understanding of your chart (and, therefore, of astrology) as they consult with you. You are a living example of what your chart means in the world, so your experience is the authority.
Second, is it possible that you could see your “oppositional” action in a different way? This is the benefit of looking back at events with your chart as a reflective tool. Maybe that “failure” you have been beating yourself up about, that core defect you believe about yourself, isn’t in your chart. Is it possible that you could stand to reframe the belief? Or contextualize it within a longer story?
Third, good astrology accounts for time. The natal chart doesn’t change, but there are very, very many techniques that different astrologers from different eras (across thousands of years) would swear by for understanding what is going on in a given chart. What’s your Solar Return chart look like? Who’s your profected time lord? What about for the month? Have you checked your Zodiacal Releasing periods and did you account for what sect your chart is? Is your chart more driven by the Lot of Spirit or the Lot of Fortune? What about circumambulations? And from what point? Did you account for minor years and triplicity lords of the sect light?
It’s extremely unlikely you’ll find an astrologer who can effectively evaluate your chart using all these techniques and I don’t know if there is a single astrologer alive who could synthesize them into a meaningful consultation and deliver their synthesis in a skilled, conscious way. Maybe Demetra George.
So, what you do with it when you act in opposition to your chart, or to your Enneagram type, or whatever else, is try to be curious. This is a lot harder in practice than it is in theory. But it’s true, always, that your experience is teaching you. The present moment is always going to have as much truth or more for you to learn from then what someone has written about your type or your natal chart from the outside.
When something like the Enneagram or astrology takes you away from the present moment, it’s a good indication to evaluate how you’re using it. Where’s the complexity? What is your experience teaching you?
Always a lot of credit goes to the people who have been my teachers, both directly and through their freely shared knowledge, and so many books.