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Spiritual Company Newsletter: The Blame Game or The Hippie Temptation
By Steffan Vanel • Astrologer • Tarot Reader • Author of:
"The Astrological Karma of the USA" and
"Charles & Diana: The Inside Story: An Astrological-Karmic View"September, 2007
Dear Friends and Clients,
On August 31, 1997 Princess Diana died, an event which eventually launched me into my first book-writing project, Charles and Diana: The Inside Story: An Astrological-Karmic View.
On September 12, 2001, I had to give a previously scheduled lecture in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, which launched me into my second book-writing project: The Astrological Karma of the USA.
I was expecting a little more hoopla for the 10th anniversary of the death of Princess Diana on this August 31, 2007. In this country it was fairly eclipsed by the anniversary of the Hurricane Katrina landfall on August 29th, 2005. The Katrina disaster was, however, another event I was inspired to write about.
Tomorrow will be the 6th year anniversary of September 11.
All these events fell during the month of Virgo, (August 23-September 22).
Now Virgo is a sign you wouldn't normally associate with such violent, dramatic events. And yet I have begun to notice an underlying Virgoan theme, which resonates with the lessons and personal frustrations I have with the public responses to all of these events. This lesson and theme I have put under the heading: The Blame Game.
On September 3rd, Saturn went into the sign of Virgo, for the next two and a half years or so, so the lessons and energies of Virgo are now due to be looked at in a very concrete, responsible way.
Most of you know that I utilize the Karmic Astrological information that was channeled from the Ascended Master Hilarion. Hilarion has said that someone who is born under the sign of Virgo has been given an additional mental energy to help them to learn certain important lessons in this life. He also says that they have been given a: 'set of very high standards of activity, conduct and ideals, which are intended for use as an internal measure of the Virgo's progress, against which he can assess the way his learning is progressing. Where the Virgo consistently falls short of meeting these standards, it can happen that the Virgo begins to apply them to others rather than to the self so as to avoid the chagrin of facing up to failure. When this happens, the critical side of the Virgo comes to the fore.'
The collective experience of this Virgo lesson deserves more attention than Astrologers have given to it. It is well known, for example that we are moving out of the Piscean Age into the Age of Aquarius. The sign serving as the polar opposite to Pisces, however, is the sign Virgo. So we have really been moving through a Pisces/Virgo age. I see the last two thousand years as having brought in Piscean Religions, involving emotional, devotional surrender, along with themes of martyrdom, and a rational/critical Virgoan scientific materialistic skepticism.
These two polarities have clearly been at odds with each other. A scientific pragmatism in denial of non-physical realities, and religious beliefs that are at odds with scientific facts.
Healing/integrating these polarities, what one could call the marriage of science and religion, is the collective lesson of the last two thousand years.
Now Pisces has a propensity for martyrdom and denial, and Virgo a propensity for emotionally detached mental/verbal criticism.
They are both prone to the victim/victimizer program. The program such that, if you don't want to be a victim, you have to be a victimizer. If you don't want to be a victimizer, you have to be a victim. The only way out of this program is the positive side of the planet Neptune, the planet which rules Pisces and is usually involved in our individual propensity for the victim/victimizer program. The negative side of Neptune is illusion, confusion, delusion, victimhood and martyrdom. The positive side is unconditional love, for yourself and for others, total forgiveness, for yourself and for others, and spiritual faith, trust and surrender to where there are no victims or victimizers, just all of us frightened little boys and girls doing the best that we can.
There is no reliable birth information for Osama Bin Laden, whom I see Osama as the symbol par excel lance of the victim/victimizer program. Not even a reliable birth date is available. One date which is often used, is March 10 1957, which would make him a Pisces.
Hilarion says that someone who is Pisces is someone who in some previous lifetime went through an experience of emotional pain that was so great that it lead them to having taken their own life. This gives the Pisces in this life an echoing memory of a certain pain or sadness that doesn't have to relate to anything in this life. Pisces can also tune into the sadness in everyone else.
In addition, Hilarion says that the Pisces: 'is allowed to tap a deep wellspring of compassion and sympathy for others in the hopes that by occupying himself with the concerns and sadnesses of others, he will forget the melancholy of the self and make of the life a shrine of dedication to others.”
Osama is a modern day martyr, a billionaire's son with kidney disease who has chosen to live in a cave in Pakistan, to plan for the victimization of those who he feels have victimized his people and his religion. This is how he is dealing with the echoing sadness and pain within his own soul. When Osama is finally killed/victimized by the forces he has victimized he will remain the eternal 'Che Guevara' martyr of the Muslim world.
Note: I just read on the internet the following statement by Bin Laden in his latest video: The condition of Islam at the present time makes one cry ... in view of the weakness, humiliation, scorn and enslavement it is suffering because it neglected the obligations of Allah and His orders, and permitted His forbidden things and abandoned jihad in Allah's path," he said.
This expression of sadness over the suffering of Islam is very Piscean.
Now, as far as Princess Diana, I've learned that there are generally two kinds of people in this world, those who care about and are interested in Diana, and those who aren't. If you are in the second category I beg your forbearance during this next section of this newsletter. If you are in the first category you may be interested to note that there is an interview with me which is available in the internet archives of the San Francisco radio show: Seeing Beyond with Bonnie Coleen at www.seeingbeyond.com.
Bonnie had me on the show on August 28th in respect of the 10th year anniversary of Diana's death, and I shared insights from my book, such as a general view of Diana's Astrological Chart, her relationship with Charles, my view of what caused her death, some unique insights derived from the Astrology charts of William and Harry, and my feeling as to what the whole 'Diana' phenomena was about.
The one issue I would like to address briefly here in relation to this 10th year anniversary of her death, is one which is in resonance with the theme of this newsletter, the Blame Game.
On the day of the anniversary of Diana's death the Royal Family held a memorial service in her honor. I read a newspaper report that Rosa Monckton, a former friend of Diana's, had said that Diana would be very unhappy if she knew that Camilla Parker Bowles was on the guest list for the service, because Diana saw Camilla as the cause of the break-up of her marriage to Charles. As a result of the outcry over this it was decided that Camilla would not attend the service.
As anyone who has read my book or can easily imagine for themselves, the failed marriage between Diana and Prince Charles was way more complex than suffices to simply blame Camilla as the essential culprit.
I decided to ask my Tarot Cards two questions and share them with the public the answers to these questions. The first question was: How does Diana feel towards Camilla now? The second question was: How does Camilla feel towards Diana now?
The card for how Diana feels towards Camilla was, The Sun, the Major Arcana initiation card corresponding to the sun, portraying two children dancing in the light, with total faith and trust and innocence. I often relate this card to the Bible passage where it says: 'Lest ye can become as a child, ye cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven.'
When I saw this card appear I could immediately feel how, after all the episodes of their relationship, Diana now feels a childlike innocence and sisterly love for Camilla. Diana knows the complexity of the triangle between herself, Charles and Camilla. She also knows of the sincere love and loyalty Camilla has born for Charles, and he for her, and I would sense that Diana is now happy that Charles is now happy in his life with Camilla.
The card for how Camilla feels towards Diana was the Four of Cups, 'Luxury.' This card represents an emotional harmony and balance and stability, but in a kind of 'holding pattern' being somewhat rigid. Ironically, I would say that the one person who really needed to attend that memorial service, to process and deal with unresolved emotions and issues remaining with Diana, was Camilla.
By the same token, I would say that it was no accident that Camilla had to suffer the 'blame game' accusations of Rosa Monckton (as there are no accidents), and I am sure that in the time that Camilla spent apart from everyone else at that service, Camilla probably dealt with her relationship with Diana in her own way.
We can all see themes of dysfunctional craziness in this world. Themes, which evoke the feeling that 'if people could just see how crazy this behavior is, the world would be so much better.'
Maybe it's my own Virgoan Astrological placements, which make me prone to being particularly annoyed by, and ironically seduced into, the blame game. I get annoyed by all the conspiracy theorists and their self-righteous blaming, let alone the 14 year old level of emotional/psychological maturity in the functioning of our own government, both the 'demagogues and the reptilians.'
One thing I would say to those who believe that 9/11 was 'An inside job,' according to one poll, 36% of Americans believe in some level of government complicity. If that was the case, and they had the ability to maintain that degree of secrecy and manipulation of reality, with no leaks of the truth whatsoever, then why didn't they just 'find' weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? If they rigged the World Trade Center with explosives why couldn't they at least 'find' a trailer of mustard gas canisters?
The United States has the rising sign, representing its self-image of itself, of Sagittarius. Sagittarius rising gives a self-image of oneself as being 'honest, upright, and morally strong, whether true or not.' This is the self-righteous American fanaticism, left and right, atheist and fundamentalist, across the board in America. Sagittarius is an Astrological sign which is square, in tension with, the signs Pisces and Virgo, hence our exaggerated propensity for a self-righteous indulgence of delusional religious fanaticism, or intensely keen self-righteous mental criticism. To remain unconditionally loving and compassionate in this country is a great challenge. It is challenging for us, but also launches us into taking on the effort to facilitate a healing integration of these exaggerated extremes.
I recently saw a film, which epitomized an American experience of the clash of these Virgo and Pisces energies. The film was a CBS documentary from 1967 hosted by Harry Reasoner entitled: 'The Hippie Temptation.' The film was being shown in honor of the 40th year anniversary of the 'Summer of Love.'
What is interesting from an Astrological perspective is that San Francisco is the largest city in the Pisces section of the planet. The line divides Los Angeles and San Francisco. Los Angeles is in the Aries section. As they say there: 'That's enough about me, now lets talk about me.' The Aries section goes from California to Ohio. The East Coast is Taurus, money, money, money, and all the people who were happy with their own comfort and didn't take up the Arian 'Pioneer Spirit.'
Most of Pisces is Pacific Ocean. Neptune, as I said earlier, rules Pisces. In 1967 Pluto, the planet (still a planet), of complete death/rebirth transformation moved into an exact conjunction with the Natal Neptune in the birthchart of the United States.
Neptune rules drugs and mystical experiences.
In the CBS program a large focus was put upon pointing out the dangers of using LSD. There was the interview with the later to be debunked medical claims of chromosome damage. The one episode in this film which, to me, epitomized the clash of Virgoan/Pisces energies taking place at that time was when they interviewed a teenage boy who had been placed in a clinic specializing in treating kids experiencing problems with LSD experiences.
The kid is very eloquent, telling how LSD made him aware of his fear of people, fear of their rejection of him, a fear he always had, but now he is aware of it. He goes on to share how he also had the experience of seeing God, how God is in everything and is everything. He says that he was so overjoyed with this experience that he tried to share it with his parents, but they really couldn't understand and it frightened them, and that is why they put him in the clinic.
Afterwards they interviewed his mother, a nice young woman, clearly concerned about her son, whom she said never exhibited such aberrant behavior before. She then stated the classic statement: He was trying to tell me that he saw God, and nobody can see God until you die.
Now, these days, the mystical remains of the 60's have so filtered into the mainstream culture that this boy's statements wouldn't be quite so horrific. But at that time you could see how the film presents these two interviews with the obvious conclusion that you are going to side with the mother and think the kid is an absolute nut.
As far as LSD, one of my favorite quotes about the manifestation and effect of this drug is by the former San Francisco hippie spiritual teacher, Stephen Gaskin. He said in regards to LSD: 'Our culture had become so materialistic in its outlook that it needed its avatar (manifestation of God) to come in a material form.'
The fact that scientific research looking for a cure for headache would provide teenage boys the ability to see God is another classic Virgo/Pisces polarity manifestation.
I will end with a short discussion, which I placed in my book about the US. It is about the second enemy of a spiritual warrior. This is my own derivation of a teaching of Don Juan by Carlos Castaneda. According to Don Juan, the first enemy of a spiritual warrior is fear. That one I think is pretty obvious. It is what 98% of the charades and pretense out there is about.
The second enemy of a spiritual warrior, however, is clarity. That one is more subtle and requires a bit of investigation. My understanding of it is this: When you are no longer motivated by common fears, you gain a certain awareness, a certain insight, a certain 'clarity.' And with that clarity you can then see clearly into everybody else's 'BS.' The thing is, what are you going to do with that clarity? Are you going to live in judgment and criticism, and bear the literal burden of being superior to everyone? Or are you going to move past the enemy of clarity to the next level, to unconditional love and forgiveness, spiritual faith trust and surrender.
I confess that I, personally, struggle with this enemy every day. I can also see how prevalent is this enemy within the alternative/New Age movements. We are all largely trapped in our 'clarity.'
That is why we need to keep role models like the Dalai Llama, Gandhi, Jesus, and other saintly beings who are no longer trapped by and have overcome the 2nd enemy in their own spiritual battles, giving us a view of life from the 'other side.'
I am continuing the writing of this newsletter on the morning of September 11. At 8:44 AM Eastern Daylight Time, twelve minutes from the exact time of the attack on the World Trade Center, there was an eclipse of the Sun.
Eclipses are powerful moments of Death/Rebirth. It bears a certain weight and forbearance today. I am not sure what new currents will emit from this event.
I confess it is hard to see the arrival of the Love that is the only antidote to the Blame Game. I had hopes with the arrival of Barack Obama, until I heard that he would attack Bin Laden in Pakistan, with or without the permission of the Pakistani government if he had reliable intelligence that he was there. Obama being the one to make Osama into Che Guevera? Sad.
Obama's Astrological Sun in Leo is square (in tension with) Neptune. There is a lot to say about that in a future newsletter.
One fears the consequences that Gandhi warned us about: 'An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind.'
We must each do our best, and let God/Goddess/All That Is do the rest.
Blessings,
Steffan VanelThis newsletter is given free of charge. If you would like to have a private Astrology and/or Tarot reading with me please go to readings page to see the various readings I offer.
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