mars

Elemental Balancing Ritual Connection and Truth Month 8

5-22-2021 I posted a cartoon on Facebook that essentially had this person find this oracle, which told him that some of his problems were of his own causing and I wrote that the one thing all your problems have in common is you. My friend Colleen pointed something out that I felt was rather appropriate since I’m working with martian energy this month. She pointed out that all your problems having you in common is actually a form of abusive self-dialogue because sometimes other people are the cause of your problems and you aren’t the reason the problem is happening. Her response really got me thinking about how far too often I’ve blamed myself for problems that have happened and taken too much responsibility on when perhaps it really was someone else’s responsibility. It’s definitely something I am going to work with further this month.

I did some more of the wood element workshop. The main focus was on working with the ligaments and it was quite intense work. Naturally some internal stuff came up and I worked through it, releasing grief with each release of the ligaments. It did make me reflect on some realizations I’ve been having around my life and the way people have shown up in the past. Afterwards I meditated with the alchemical substances for Mars and Geburah and worked on releasing judgment of myself and others. Working with Geburah in that way is interesting, because typical it is a rather severe energy to work with, yet, I think sometimes people ignore the more subtle ways to work with a given Sephiroth. In this case, learning how to release judgments of yourself and other can be just as relevant as any other work you might do in that sephiroth.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Creativity Month 13

0-22-2019 I am creating a drawing of the archangel Khamael for this month’s work with Mars/Geburah and of course Khamael. I’m also watching one of my favorite movies, A Beautiful Mind, which is a biopic of sorts about John Nash, the eccentric mathematician. I like the movie because I can identify with the character, both in terms of his awkwardness with people and the unusual perspectives he used with his mathematic work. And I can appreciate his struggles, because of my own, though mine aren’t the same as his. I know what its like to be on the edge, to flirt with madness as you pursue genius, as you pursue the distinctive ideas that matter, going against the grain of conventional ideas to discover the potential that lies within the unconventional. I also know what its like to let my own arrogance delude me, and the subsequent fall that can happen with such delusions. At some point in the movie, his roommate tells him that his problem isn’t in the room he’s in, but in the world out there, that he has to discover the problem that other people have. It’s advice I resonate with. It’s what lead me to explore magic from a process perspective, because the problem I’ve found again and again is that magic isn’t approachable from an esoteric perspective. What point is there to practice magic if the work is harder than it has to be?

And I know the doubt all too well that one feels when what you’re trying to pursue doesn’t seem to work or come together. It’s taken me a long time to find what works, to discover the path forward. It’s involved failing and falling, and then climbing back up because I won’t give up on my ideas, on my work, and on the magic. It’s required discipline as well, finding the routines that work and sticking with them even when in the moment there has been despair. Now I am the phoenix rising from my own ashes, and from the hard earned and learned experiences that will always ground me by reminding me to stay humble, while pushing me to continue exploring the edge and embracing the unconventional.