Lost in the woods: Where I Would be without Jyotish (Vedic Astrology)

The idea is to live life coherently;

so we are not just a log in the river.

You dont want to be buffeted by waves and the flow of the current.

You want to have some way of steering through life.

This is what Jyotish offers us.

Clear perspective, remedies to our problems, and uplifting guidance.

From a Blaine Watson interview

Outside my window on this cool Monday Morning I can hear the hum of traffic mixed with small finches fluttering and chipping about on my bird feeder. If I close my eyes, I can almost feel the electricity from people getting ready for another work week.

With two short days off work; its back to the grind. Sipping my morning tea I cannot help but think its sort of a funny, imbalanced cycle. I rather be like the birds on my feeder.

After reading a gripping novel about a man named Randy Morgenson who spent most of his life in the mountains; I have been contemplating modern life. I have no doubt that Randy would agree with me that it feels like a series of distractions; keeping us occupied with little to no time to be focused on anything else, such as becoming quiet and relaxing under a tree.

Career goals, family goals, and retirement goals. This is the path our parents taught us to follow. This was also the path that Randy rejected.

Society has us marching towards progress at all costs, with this elusive carrot hanging in front of us that we can never seem to grasp. Because it is never enough. There is always more, always another destination. We are always acquiring or in this state of acquisition. This is why many people might wake up one day and wonder what has it all been for? Were these goals that were imposed upon me, my goals?

The answer for many of us is no.

This brought me to think about depression and how its effected so many people that I know and love; and to contemplate the tools and resources needed to navigate those murky waters.

Depression is disconnection. It is dissatisfaction. It is when we have lost our deeper connection to our life purpose; to our truth and our gifts; and when you are mentally unable to navigate yourself out of those dark recesses of the mind it can be a lonely, overwhelming place. Especially if you are looking around at the external world for answers, or if you feel behind on society’s terms of success. I’ve had friends take their own lives because they felt this way.

Yesterday I had another Jyotish session; somehting that I do around 3-4 times a year.

Now I feel

uplifted

connected

and clear.

Yet I am finding it difficult to express how much this support has impacted my life.

I can not emphasize enough how important it is for our body, our heart, and our mind to have spiritual guidance in our lives.

We are not meant to go it alone.

We do not have all of the answers.

While Western therapy can offer some very cerebral and strategic support to our lives; for me personally I have found that I need something rooted in a larger perspective that psychoanalysis.

Jyotish translates as the supreme light; because once we understand our karmas and what we have come into this world with, life doesn’t happen to us. It happens for us. Then, everything becomes filled with light. We can now look at our past as a lesser evolved state for ourselves, and feel the guidance as a force of evolution forward.

Then we can turn away from a path of consumption (external fixation) to a path of contribution (internal dedication).

The Yoga sutras say “avert the danger that has not yet come”.

This is the purpose of Jyotish. To see what is looming on the horizon, and to be ready for it. In this way we make friends with our karmas. Ayurveda and Jyotish remind us to put ourselves in tune with natural law.

I’ve had some friends say funny things about astrology over the years. “I dont believe in it.” “It can not tell me who I am.”

Then I remember a key phrase that is sweeping the self help world. Be who you are. And its true! This is the key to your successes in life! It is just to be who you are. An astrologer said that your chart should not come as a revelation; it should come as permission. This is who I am.

In that who I am, we have infinite potential. This is where the tools of Yoga and Ayurveda comes in, and why they are here to help us along our path. Yoga reminds us that we have infinite potential, because that is our true nature. Its really beautiful when you think of your self as the sky because thats where the planets are. Its all within you. Its all connected. How lovely! How humbling! How inspiring!

This is where fatalism and nilihilsm get destroyed because there is no limitation for ourselves.

It can almost feel like a switch in our consciousness.

We are here to connect and be in a state of fullness. To run through the woods. To play in the waterfall. To see fear and push through it anyways because we know that ultimately it is an illusion. We are that state of fullness.

Be you.

Be wild.

Seek counsel.

Move with grace.

Astrology is the study of man’s response to planetary stimuli.

The stars have no conscious benevolence or animosity; they merely send forth positive and negative radiations. Of themselves, these do not help nor harm humanity, but offer a lawful channel for the outward operation of cause-effect equilibriums which each man has set into motion in the past. Superstitious awe of astrology makes one an automaton, slavishly dependent on mechanical guidance. The wise man defeats his planets; which is to say, his past- by transferring his allegiance from the creation to the Creator. The more he realizes his unity with Spirit; the less he can be dominated by matter. The soul is ever-free; it is deathless because birth-less. It cannot be regimented by stars. Man is soul, and has a body. When he properly places his sense of identity, he leaves behind all compulsive patterns. So long as remains confused in his ordinary state os spiritual amnesia, he will know the subtle fetters of environmental law.

-Sri Yukteswar