Mercury in Virgo Opposite Neptune in Pisces: Part Two

Transcript:

0:01
Hey everyone, this is Acyuta-bhava from Nightlight Astrology and today we are going to take another look at Mercury's opposition to Neptune. Today, as promised, we are doing part two. And we're going to be taking a little deeper dive into this transit through the I Ching. Yesterday we took a look at this transit from the archetypal standpoint, looking at the combinations of Mercury and Neptune, how they might show up what to watch for. Today, we're going to look a little bit more deeply into the nature of this aspect. And also, the way that I phrase this question to the I Ching. Whenever I approach is, no, sometimes it's a little different. So I'm going to tell you a little bit about how I approach to ageing and the you know, the unique answer that I got back about this transit and what to watch for. If you've watched my if you've watched my videos, you'll know that oftentimes I break things down in terms of the planetary archetypes and combinations, themes and patterns. And then oftentimes, we'll kind of go into like a little sermon from the stars and just meditate on what the teachings are underneath, or what what we might stand to learn or how we may evolve as spiritual beings through whatever transit we're dealing with.

1:06
Yesterday, we really looked at Mercury's opposition to Neptune from a variety of different standpoints. Here you can see it, Mercury and Virgo opposing Neptune in Pisces. And that's passing over today into tomorrow, August 24, into the 25th. And then we're going to see Mars oppose Neptune, and that's coming through by September 2, September 3, and then the Sun is going to come through and oppose Neptune as well. And that'll happen right around September 13, into the 14th. You can see them right there. So what I did was I approached the I Ching. And I just said, Can you give us some general insight about the nature of these Neptune transits coming up three opposition's in a row, anything specific about mercury this week, but more generally about the oppositions overall. So, I do this because, for me astrology has always been like understand the symbols, understand the combinations of symbols that's like part one, sort of like being able to describe the weather and predict the weather. But then there's the question about, well, what's the occasion for the weather, when I mean, this isn't just material phenomenon that we're dealing with. This is spiritual phenomenon. So we're talking about the underlying karmic weather. And that means we have to dig a little deeper sometimes and try to mine for possible explanations about why our soul needs this right now, or what we might stand to learn or gain from the experiences of the transit. For me, the I Ching for 12 years has been pretty much a weekly companion, I say weekly, because maybe a couple days a week, I'll throw the I Ching while I'm meditating in the morning, as a way of helping me understand maybe something I'm going through or the transits, I've long written about them and included them. So at any rate, great reading that came back for today, we're going to talk about it and I'm going to pull it up right now.

3:08
As always, you're going to get usually one or two what are called hexagrams in an eaching reading, and the eaching reading can be sometimes straightforward advice, sometimes a warning, sometimes deeper insights into something that can be very different. Sometimes they're very predictive, sometimes they're very instructive. At any rate, the first hexagram that I pulled with regard to mercury in Virgo opposite Neptune in Pisces, more broadly speaking, all three of the upcoming opposition's to Neptune was hexagram 14, which is sometimes translated as, great possessions or great treasures or possessions and abundance or something like that. So it's a picture of abundance. It's sort of to me, like every time I get this hexagram I sort of think of the planet Jupiter. It's like a planet of abundance, right? So you think of this hexagram and you think of an abundant state, whether that's the money in your bank account, you're in a really good mood, or you have just gotten a raise or a promotion, but it's kind of like your cup is full and brimming. You know, the feeling you get when you know, I don't know a baby comes home from the hospital. It's like everything's teeming with life. And there's the sense of great, great possession and great number or quantity, or sort of large nest or something like that.

4:27
So the bottom part, the bottom trigram they're broken, it's like six line figures of yin and yang and the bottom part is, is heaven. And the upper part is Fire. So you have Heaven on the bottom and Fire on the top. And this is an image of abundance because if you think of heaven, it's like all it's like young, you know, it's like all young lines, so it's very strong and potent and it has the feeling of power and greatness and then fire on the top. is sort of like an adornment. So it's almost like a big thick pot of gold that's like radiating sparkling golden light off the top. That's kind of the picture that always comes to my mind when I read this hexagram. So that's really interesting for a couple of reasons. One, if you think about Mercury right now, for example, in Virgo. Mercury is exalted in Virgo. And mercury was traditionally associated with money and business. And you know, business transactions and things like that. And with shrewd business acumen, and skills or crafts that could be profitable or lucrative. So Mercury would rule anything from like silicon, a lot of like, tech moguls and people who have, you know, really specialised abilities, making a lot of money in Silicon Valley, for example, not a lot of people think about that as a Mercury thing. But that would be like a Mercury thing in ancient astrology. Could be combined with some other things, too. Then when you put Mercury in opposition to Neptune, it's interesting, because one of the things that can come up is this kind of opulence, this sense of something great and abundant, and really lush. And the reason for that is that Neptune is a bit like that golden, sparkling adornment on top of the Golden pot that I talked about. So if you think about mercury in Virgo, it's like a very earthy abundant place for Mercury. People might not think of Virgo is like an abundant sign. In fact, in the ancient world, Virgo was sometimes called a barren sign, which meant that it didn't it like didn't yield life, or it would it may not have been a good indicator, for example, in like the chart above, like a pregnancy or something like that, or quick horary question about fertility or something. But Virgo is abundant in its own way, especially with regard to Mercurial things. And Mercury would stand for commerce, trade, business, things like that. So it can be a very productive and like fertile sign with regard to Mercury stuff. At any rate, when you pit it against Neptune, in Pisces, you're also you're just getting this idea of something that may be very opulent and grandiose and big. And maybe, you know, something that's been earned through like a lot of hard work intelligence, labour craft skill, something like that. So that image came to mind right away, I thought, Oh, that's interesting, because I hadn't really considered that angle before. But that's definitely contained in this hexagram. I thought, hmm. Okay, but really, what a lot of the times the teaching of the hexagram is going to be deeper than the image, right.

7:36
So basically, this is how the the teaching reads, it says, After fellowship is built things or resources will converge. And therefore an abundance of resources or an abundant state is granted. Here's a little line from it, people gather together their resources, people who gather together, gather resources together. And when large amounts of resources become available, then possession in large measure becomes available. That's interesting. So it's a picture of like a city or a marketplace where lots of things converge. And there's lots of things available, lots of different resources available, that when there's a convergence of all those people and resources, that, for example, on the dark side, a hierarchy will emerge where, you know, not that the hierarchy is all bad either, but just where there's going to be people who have a lot of those resources, who through their crafts, skill, ability, whatever are going to have like a lot. And there's going to be people within that marketplace, that game who have a little so Mercury, Neptune can be pointing to people especially again, because Mercury is exalted people who have like a lot who have gained a lot and sort of the marketplace of life in comparison to people who have very little. And this can actually be something that repeats throughout all three opposition's with Mars and with the sun as well.

9:07
At any rate, the hexagram goes on to say that contained within this hexagram there's sort of a latent crisis, which is like a sort of a torrential downpour of some kind, and that there's something unstable about the situation unless the resources are shared and distributed in a meaningful way, especially with those who have more within the hierarchy that emerges in such a situation. So when lots of things converge, lots of people, ots of skills and abilities and resources converge, there's going to emerge a sort of like pecking order or like a hierarchy. People who have a lot of people who have a little people who are very skilled, people who aren't as skilled, whatever and laden with Then that is the potential that if too much is consolidated in one place, too much power or wealth or greed or anything, it's like too centralised, then there'll be like this burst. And this flood that comes and sort of wipes people out. It's kind of a biblical image. And, along with this is this idea that people who have more skill should teach people, people who have more resources should put them back into the city or the community somehow. It's not like a picture necessarily of like, some kind of utopian state, it's just saying, like, if you have more do good things for the community that you're a part of, or if you have more skill, or ability, teach people and make it accessible, and things like that.

10:47
I was really inspired when I saw this, because I thought, you know, one of the things that, that has always meant a lot to me, for example, as an astrology school has been to make sure that my classes are super accessible in terms of the need based tuition. There was a group in New York City when I was living there called yoga for the people. And it was a donation based yoga studio, and I really loved it, I thought it was a really cool idea. And I grew up in the church, of course, where, you know, the the model of how, you know, my family modelled how many pastors and churches are supporters through, you know, the, the community, tithing to the church, and then the church, you know, creates like a stipend or salary for the staff of the church. So at any rate, I'd always thought of these kinds of things as really important. And I can't tell you how many times when considering a business strategy for nightlight astrology for my school or whatever, that this hexagram will come back and be like, you know, reminding me make sure that your content is accessible, do the Kickstarter at the end of the year, rather than, you know, like, subscriptions or memberships, or whatever. But, you know, nowadays, of course, that's a pretty popular thing to do. But when I first started doing it, you know, there was no Patreon, there was nothing like that. So, it these kinds of models, I've always been really inspired by, and I can't tell you how many times I've gotten this hexagram and it's come, especially during times where I'm like worried, I've I have certain bottom lines I have to meet or whatever and I can't surely you can't just like give stuff away for free or you can't, you know, all this, all these kinds of worries or concerns that can come up. This hexagram really encourages us that our inner wealth, or our our inner wealth in our inner health is dependent upon if you have skill, if you have ability, if you know something, try to be accessible in how you share it, how you bring it to other people, if you have resources, find a way of doing something good with them. And the underlying truth in this hexagram is that because none of this stuff is really yours anyway. And that's the part of it that you know, it Oh, it always hits me is that anything that we have that we're given is really like, well, it's not really ours, it's on loan, including our own bodies, we're not gonna, you know, live in our own bodies forever. So what are we doing with it to be of service to others for the good of other people, for a more peaceful, harmonious, loving, quality of life and existence, to connect other people to God in the heart and God in the world and God and creation? Like what are we doing with what we're what we've been given. Because if you take if you just drop it, I don't know, if you ever just like, take a little time to meditate ever. I think most people even in like, just a couple of weeks of meditation will be like, I'm not my body, my body's on loan, everything I have my kids my house, my you know, like any anything that I'm like, that's mine, it's not really mine, you know? So what am I doing with it? Anyway, not that I'm perfect at this, I feel like I'm always figuring it out and always having to work against the tendency that this hexagram talks about, which is the tendency to hoard things to, like want to keep things or, you know, like, want credit for things or whatever. So, you know, it's like how we do business, how we do relationships, you know, how we do parenting, how we do our job, how we do skill development, if we keep in mind that anything we're getting that there's a cosmic expectation that as soon as we get our skills or knowledge or our wealth or positions, whatever, that we're immediately thinking, well, how could I use this? How could I use this to be of service? That's actually the core teaching of bhakti yoga. So it was, you know, again, like it's pretty common teaching and many world religions. But in bhakti, the question is always, whatever I have whatever I'm given, how can I use it in service? So that's really at the heart of what this hexagram is all about.

15:13
The changing hexagram that came up, I'll talk about that in a second was number 21, biting through. And that can mean that there's like a latent crisis, if we, in other words, if we misuse what's given to us, if we, if we don't properly give back from what's given, if we do hoard, then as the inner that kind of the inner part of the hexagram, 14 talks about, there's almost like this biblical sense of like flood and destruction that comes. And this is, in many ways, it's a reflection on like, what we're doing to the environment, if we don't use the resources of the earth, well, eventually, there's a latent crisis. And there's a sort of destructive phase that comes in, in the ancient world this was understood in astrological traditions in the East in the West as a dark age that human beings would go through the Kali Yuga, for example. Hexagram 21, is also about a warning, that if you're not using your skills properly, if you're not, if you're not almost like finding a way to use whatever you have, whatever you've been given, whether it's your inner gifts, or your material gifts, or whatever, if you're not finding a way to think these are not mine, they're on loan to me, and I need to find a way to give them back. If you're not thinking in that way, it's not that the flood comes right away. Right? That mean, it's not like oh, well, then you know, there's someone's going to strike you down in the sky, like some some like, so you should be giving out a sense of fear, right? That would be pretty crappy. But the hexagram sequence that came up 14 changing to 21 does say that, if you're not thinking in this way, and you're not acting in this way, then what happens is there are these like thunderbolts that come like these cosmic thunderbolts that shake you awake, and they make you reflect on what you're doing. And they remind you that it's not yours, they remind you that what you have can be taken at any moment in time. They remind you that hoarding things or trying to hold on to things with some sense of greed or entitlement or, you know, me, my, what's the Beatle's song I, Me, My? So, you know, like, if that's the state that you're in, you're going to start getting some messages. And if you're receptive to them, they can be really wonderful. It's funny that that this came up, because last night, you know, I was laying in bed. And I was just thinking about a few areas in my life right now, where I'm kind of, I feel like I'm slacking off. You know, there's just a few like, just in my personal life, and I'm just like, I'm sort of slacking off here or there. And I was thinking about them before I went to bed. The craziest thing was, I was having this dream about them. I was having a like a full colour, like vivid dream about these areas of my life that I'm slacking off. And it was very creative, the way that my mind or subconscious or whatever came up with a way of sort of personifying the whole thing in the stream. But I was woken up from the dream by a strike of thunder. And I was like, Oh my god, that's so fitting for the I Ching. That is hexagram 21 to a tee. So 14 great treasures, leading to like a searing bolt of thunder meant to awaken, maybe it scares you a little bit.

18:35
Okay, so something about this sequence tells me that right now, between now and say, mid September, that we have to ask ourselves, what am I doing with the time, energy, resources, skills, gifts, money, whatever it is that I have, what am I doing? How am I planning, we don't have to give everything away become martyrs fall on a sword, lack boundaries, it's not any of that stuff. People will always like what rape raise the red flag when you talk about these things, and they'll be like, I've given too much away in the past. Well, okay, but no, that's not what we're talking about. We're not talking about giving things away as a way of trying to make yourself feel good about yourself or trying to make other people feel good. And it's something that ego got wrapped up in and it was unhealthy or destructive, not what we're talking about. This hexagram sequence is really about careful, thoughtful, daily consideration of what I have what I've been given, what I have is something I've been given. And what I've been given is something that I'm being asked to use in service somewhere, somehow. That doesn't mean that that we don't, that nothing is ours, that we don't receive anything because some things you know, we were meant to just receive. It's not about never being in a receptive position to receive something either. That's another thing that people will mistake this teaching for it, they'll be like, well, if I take this attitude that nothing is ever mind, isn't that in a sense not being able to receive the things that are being given to me to actually enjoy them. Like, doesn't God ever want to just give me a back rub and make me feel good? Or just God every time God wants to give me a back rub I'm like, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, this can't be mine. I'll just give it to someone else. Oh, no, no, no. I don't think that's it either. I don't think that.

20:31
For me, there's a really fine line between being able to receive the gifts of the universe. And at the exact same time realise I can enjoy these without holding or possessing them as if I'm entitled to them, there's a subtle difference, you know, so like, my kids, my wife might, you know, my love of astrology, these things that feel like really fortunate blessings in my life anyway. I'm like, Yes, thank you for these, these are amazing, I'm so glad that I get to hang out with these, and they'll be gone someday. And they're not really mine. And I can hold both simultaneously. So we can all do that, right. There's a really good teaching that comes from the third line of this hexagram. And that was the changing line. In particular, there were two changing lines. But this was one of the changing lines. And the changing line here reads like this. It says, The superior person uses sacrifice to worship heaven, the villain is unable to do so. The superior person uses sacrifice to worship heaven, the villain is unable to do so. So the literal translation of this particular line to pay back for received benefits, once one becomes prosperous, or opulent in any way, one must give something back. When this line changes, the hexagram becomes alienation, where the one above and below become alienated from one another. So what does that mean? Well, if you consider it like this, in the ancient world, like the worship of the gods, demigods, what was it rooted in, it was rooted in the idea of reciprocation, that the rains come, and that whatever grows from the rains, we take a portion of and offer it back to the rain gods. That same idea is inherent in like, traditions all over the world, that whatever we have that's given to us through nature, it's given to us, but you know, inherently, we're endowed with it somehow in birth, like a skill or an ability or something like that. That the natural position that we should take is, this is such a gift that I received this, and I enjoy it. And thank you. And that also means there's a commission for me to use it somehow in service. So we can take up that attitude of receiving, Thanksgiving gratitude, and how do I use something in service simultaneously?

23:07
A lot of the times I see this pretty sarcastic common attitude, you'll see and I'm guilty of it myself. So I don't mean to sound like I'm above it or anything, but we consider much of what we do to be a sacrifice. And we act that way. We make sure we let our kids know what a sacrifice it is to be a parent, I'm thinking of parenting things a lot lately, of course. You see lots of pictures of parents exhausted and being like what I do for my kids, you know, and I'm not saying that there isn't a place for that, obviously, it's funny. The word sacrifice, among other things etymologically means to make holy, to make holy. I wonder I catch myself with that kind of sarcastic, you know, self gratifying kind of dark humour, like, I've sacrificed my whole life for you little suckers, like that space, which again, I'm not trying to take away humour from the dance of life. But when we're constantly thinking what I've done is such as sacrifice, it's not a sacrifice, because the sacrifice means to make something holy. And when something is made holy, it no longer feels to us like it was a big deal. It feels like it was the best deal. It's not a big strain on me personally, it's a gift for me personally. It's the gift that keeps on giving. Because when we make a meaningful sacrifice, we feel better about ourselves than we did when we had the thing that we sacrificed. Because we knew the value of whatever we had so much, we tasted it so much and loved it so much. We appreciated it, that we could actually take joy in giving it or using it in a constructive way for others. So a sacrifice is something given to us, that is given intelligently back to someone or something else. And when we understand it in that way, we realise it was never really my sacrifice to make. It was something that came to me to pass along.

25:20
I wrote this line down, I said, when we think of all the sacrifices we have made, we're already losing touch with the holiness of what was made through the sacrifice. So how can we shift our consciousness or our heart into a space of whatever skill, ability intelligence, you know, because it feels good to be like, oh, like, I've studied my butt off for 10 years doing astrology, and so many readings and whatever, so I have some special skill and it's easy for me to fall into that as an astrologer. I mean, there's people who are way better at astrology than me but it's easy for me to feel like some kind of relative expert and I because I'm smart and because I've like worked hard and blah, blah, blah. And I find that that is the most pernicious subtle little enemy of my peace and my love and my ability to sort of stay in the right relationship with the cosmos. The planets give they give their their karmic administrators' what is karma. Karma is the rain. Karma is the fire karma is the droughts, karma is the sunny day, it's all the different weathers of creation. And the planets are like the administrators of these things. Whatever we get, whatever we get, we're looking, you know, the right attitude, whether you're talking about, you know, the the attitude of the people who practice Hellenistic astrology, the people of Indian astrology, or so many other traditions that had any kind of connection to Gods as representatives of the one, the right relationship is to think whatever's coming through How can it be made use of, how can it be made use of it in a way that benefits others? And whatever wealth I have, am I using it to benefit others? That everything of how much that attitude could just change things, and it can't really start anywhere? I mean, it's easy for me to be like, Oh, you know, what, when this idea, just change the world? Well, it only changes the world to the extent that I can use these ideas and have some impact on my immediate environment, and it's a, you know, it's a work in progress. Because, again, the subtle piece of us that feels entitled to things that comes up over and over again. So, when we don't seek credit, but we seek to give credit, when we give credit to what has enriched us, whether it's teachers or books we've read or places we've been or people that have blessed us, one of the things I love about my wife, maybe more than anything about my wife that I have always loved is that she is someone who's always giving little gifts, always sending little notes, always leaving little notes, always giving people little acts of affirmation, or just sending little thank you cards, she's so into that. And when I grew up, it was kind of like a guilt trip. Like, did you write your grandmother Christmas card, you know, the thank you card for your Christmas gift, shit. You know my mom's like, Catholic background or whatever. And I was always like, oh, man, you know, my wife, like loves this, this is like, this is how she just how she works. In fact, if I had to think of like one thing that might have made our yoga studio more successful, you know, over the years than any other thing that either of us had, it would probably did that quality, but my wife is she's so incredibly thoughtful, went about the people and things that she does, and that she meets, whether it's plants out nature, or like people, anyway, I just love that about her. And not surprisingly, she has a bunch of contacts with Neptune in her chart. So Neptune, like, oftentimes, you'll see that, that that connection, she actually has a trine from Mercury to Neptune, come to think of it.

29:09
So a lot of the times when Neptune comes in with Mercury, Mercury of all the planets is the one that wants us to think about anything that we have or done in terms of our own wits, our own mind our own intelligence. It can be very, we can very guilty of that, because there's any place that the ego tends to fall back into, it's that sense of the rational mind. I'm controlling everything I'm in charge of everything. So it hits Neptune and it says, Give nothing you have even all of the thoughts of your mind, your intelligence, your skills. All of this is no different than the blossoming of a wheat field somewhere it just happens to be blossoming in your brain or in your body or or your particular kshetra, your field of karma. So like, what are you doing with it? Anyway, the degree to which we make sacrifice without seeking attention validation for them, which the degree to which we support that which supports us, the degree to which we find ways of uniquely giving our skills or abilities or insights to others. Again, this doesn't mean like one of the things I hate, there's a lot of people who will be like, Oh, you're an astrologer, you know, like, you do something spiritual furling we shouldn't make any money. I'm definitely not going down that path, because it's not about, you know, up self flagellating, whipping yourself on the back in order to like, prove that you don't need anything or we're not going down that path.

30:34
We're talking about giving credit to what gives to us and and i think that this is something that's going to come up over and over and over again in the next month. As we keep seeing the opposition's to Neptune come through Mars is going to be a little bit more intense. And we'll talk about that. The Sun is another really beautiful one to talk about. So we'll be also differentiating these oppositions as we go and talking about each of them. One of the main reasons that we need meditation in our life every day, and I'll close with this is that the only thing that can keep us in the mood or spirit of charity, thankfulness, and, and joyful sacrifice, joyful sacrifice, think of sacrifices to make holy not as to tear your own skin off and, you know, give it to give it to someone else just because that's what you ought to do. The joyful act of making something holy. Think about that as sacrifice. So what keeps us in the mood of charity, thankfulness and sacrifice, we have to CTFO that's the gist of it. I mean, seriously, we have to sit down every day, we have to get into our heart. Take a look at everything in our lives, and intentionally feel thankful for it. And into sort of bask in the glow, just like the little image our lives inherently because our soul is eternal, immortal, beloved, and divine. Our soul is like a little pot of gold. And it's radiating this beautiful golden light off from the top. How can you know that? How can you feel charitable and willing to just find meaningful ways of giving things that you have or using things in service that you haveif you're not tapping into the fact that that's your reality? Otherwise we're just impoverished spiritually, we don't know that. That's what we are. You can't get there unless you sit down every day and drop into your little pot of gold in the heart. So a great reason to meditate to Mercury, Neptune, also a symbol for meditation, taking the mind and bringing it into this transcendental space, releasing the mind so that the heart can speak. That's a good Mercury Neptune thing as well. Alright, today was kind of a little magic little, little Mercury Neptune all over the place. Hope you guys enjoyed it. We'll be back together tomorrow for more. So I hope you have a great day today. And we'll talk again soon. Take it easy, everyone. Bye.