The Tao Te Ching for Astrologers: Verses 35 & 36

Hey everyone, this is Acyuta-bhava from Nightlight Astrology, and today we are continuing our series on the Tao Te Ching for astrologers. We're going to be looking at verses 35 and 36 today as we continue to make our way through this classic spiritual text. Every time that we do, so we're reading through the text two verses at a time and then reflecting on how these verses may relate to us as students of astrology or as practitioners of astrology, or as people who just love astrology. So obviously, I do this series because I think it's important. I always do it in the middle of the week; it's important to pause and ask ourselves, why am I here taking in astrology content? Why do I do this? So it's a good way to recenter ourselves middle of the week, kind of tap back into that spiritual center behind the astrology that we are consuming each and every day. So for me, this is a daily part of my practice. Tao Te Ching has been a part of my spiritual practice for a long time and is a source of inspiration for the way I look at the world and astrology.

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All right. Well, that being said, let's turn our attention now to verses 35 and 36 of the Tao Te Ching. And I'm going to just put a little; we're going to put a PDF up so that you can read along with if you care to. Let's make that full screen. There we go. So verse 35. And you guys know how I do this. I read from the Tarcher Cornerstone edition translated by Jonathan Star in case you care to follow along from the addition that I'm using. And I read verses 35 and 36. I'll read it through once. On the second time, I'll read each verse through and offer some reflections. So here we go.

Verse 35,
Hold fast to the Great Form within and let the world pass as it may
Then the changes of life will not bring pain but contentment, joy, and well-being
Music and sweets are passing pleasures yet they cause people to stop
How bland and insipid are the things of this world when one compares them with Tao!
One tastes, but the sweetness turns bitter
One sees, but the colours grow faint
One hears, but the sound fades into silence
One may look for fulfillment in this world but his longings will never be exhausted
The only thing he ever finds is that he himself is exhausted

Verse 36,
Contraction pulls at that which extends too far
Weakness pulls at that which strengthens too much
Ruin pulls at that which rises too high
Loss pulls at life when you fill it with too much stuff
The lesson here is called "The wisdom of obscurity"
The gentle outlast the strong
The obscure outlast the obvious
Hence, a fish that ventures from deep water is soon snagged by a net
A country that reveals its strength is soon conquered by an enemy

Go back to the verse 35 again,
Hold fast to the Great Form within and let the world pass as it may
Then the changes of life will not bring pain but contentment, joy, and well-being
Music and sweets are passing pleasures yet they cause people to stop
How bland and insipid are the things of this world when one compares them with Tao!
One tastes, but the sweetness turns bitter
One sees, but the colours grow faint
One hears, but the sound fades into silence
One may look for fulfillment in this world but his longings will never be exhausted
The only thing he ever finds is that he himself is exhausted

Reflecting on this verse a little bit, what does it have to do with astrology? I mean, it's beautiful and filled with wisdom. Regardless of if anyone ever practices astrology or not or has any interest in it, but as an astrologer, I find it remarkable how similar this ancient wisdom is when compared to what ancient astrologers said about why we do astrology. Hold fast to the great form within and let the world pass as it may. Then the changes of life will not bring pain but contentment, joy, and well-being whether you're reading Vettius Valens, Ptolemy, Firmicus Maternus, any of the Ancients, a number of whom were Stoics, but also Platanus and hermeticists and people who came from different philosophical and religious backgrounds. But they all said something similar, which is that the planets never stopped moving; they always keep moving, they're always moving, because the world is always changing.

Heraclitus famously said you can't step foot in the same river twice. And the astrologer said that when you study the coming and going of the planets, you start to realize that because they reflect the constant changes of the world, and you ride through the different seasons of life, the ups, and downs, understanding that these ups and downs are reflected in the nature of the planets and the stars, they're reflected in the seasons, the changing of elements and daily weather, the rising and setting of the sun, the waxing and waning of the moon cycle. We study this so that we can find the changes of life, whatever they may be, to be a source of interest, joy, appreciation, and contentment, that there's a still and steady center that starts to emerge. Our soul starts to come forth, and our souls, maybe its best attribute is that our soul really, experience loves experience without, you know, discrimination; the soul is naturally in the bhakti tradition, we say, capable of enjoying what and why because the soul is part of God, and everything is part of God. And so, there's an appreciating capacity when the soul starts coming forward. It's as though we start to appreciate things. We're curious about them. And we're not riding the roller coaster of good and bad I prefer this, thumbs up and thumbs down, pain and pleasure, that my cup is full now, my cup is empty, and I'm constantly riding the Wheel of Fortune and misery, round and round.

Know the soul may go through any and every experience but feel that the experience is soulful, divine because we can see eternity as the underlying reality hold fast to the great form within and let the world pass as it may. When we understand that there's something of divine eternal and mysterious beauty value depth within experience itself. Then we don't have to; our likes and dislikes. The ups and downs don't have to dictate the nature of how we experience, and that's what's being said here too. That's what ancient astrologers that's why they said; this is why we study astrology, not because I want to know what's going to happen. I'm so addicted to having to know what's going to happen because I'm addicted to the highs and lows, and so That's why I take in astrology is for it to further or for it to amplify my addiction to current events in my life or in the collective and just helped me you know stay more and more attached to this sickening wheel. But what is the nature of that sickening we'll music, and sweets are just passing pleasures. One taste, but you know, eventually sweet things turn bitter; you see something, but eventually your eyesight fades, you hear something, the sound eventually fades into silence. You can look for fulfillment in things that are constantly changing in this world. But your longings will never be exhausted. The only thing you'll find, if you try to satiate yourself in that way, is that you will become exhausted.

It's like, imagine that someone said, okay, look, you're never going to die, ever, and you've never been born ever. You just exist, and you always will exist. You can't die. Really? How would that change the nature of your stress? You know of what you care about. The idea in this text is that when we get in touch with this eternal nature, that is called Tao, a name that can't be named, really. When you get in touch with it, there's this sense of like, like the existential urgency like there's somewhere to go or something to accomplish. At the very least, those goals or ambitions or dreams or wishes or hopes or aspirations or longings are at the very least understood as adventures, as things to be curious about and to have fun with, but not to let those things, you know, rob you of your eternal perspective. The soul is eternal by nature. And when it knows and remembers its own eternity, then the relationships that it has in this world with the passing things of the world become really rich and divine and also eternal. And that's why they don't tend the things of this world. The same tradition tells us to stop being judged as good or bad. They start being considered soulful, deep, interesting, mysterious, beautiful, different ways of relating to the same experience. Because we've shifted a perspective. That's what we're actually is that perspective is what we're trying to cultivate by living with astrology day in and day out.

Verse 36,
Contraction pulls at that which extends too far
Weakness pulls at that which strengthens too much
Ruin pulls at that which rises too high
Loss pulls at life when you fill it with too much stuff
The lesson here is called "The wisdom of obscurity"
The gentle outlast the strong
The obscure outlast the obvious
Hence, a fish that ventures from deep water is soon snagged by a net
A country that reveals its strength is soon conquered by an enemy

Let's reread that one contraction poles at that which extends too far. They extend too far; you get pulled back. We see these dualities built into the very language of astrology, Jupiter and Saturn. The expansion and contraction, weakness polls at that which strengthens too much. That's a yin and yang dynamic. We can also see with Mars and Venus, Mars demonstrates strength and machismo, etc., but is ultimately often taken in by things that are more comparatively feminine or gentle. Ruin poles that that which rises to high loss pulls that life when you fill it with too much stuff. The lesson here is called the wisdom of obscurity; the gentle outlast the strong, the obscure outlasts the obvious; hence a fish that ventures from deep water is soon snagged by a net, a country that reveals its strength is soon conquered by an enemy.

One of the, you know, best and most repetitive lessons of the Tao Te Ching is not about demeaning yourself or degrading yourself. But it's about walking a humble path. The humble path is one of just being careful because you know that there's a kind of spiritual physics at work in the universe. And if you leap or lunge or grasp too hard and too far, that things that you want, the underlying sense of dissatisfaction is what ends up getting fed back to you. At the end of the day, we grope, grasp for reach for things out of a sense that you know, we're not enough; I don't have enough, I'm not enough, life is not enough. I need something else. We, in that spirit, that intention betrays itself. And eventually, the result, the consequence of the karma that comes back is that if you ruin will pull it, that which rises too high loss will pull when you fill life with too much stuff because it's just the cycle of things.

So the other thing that astrology is really good for is helping us to create the best possible karma. The goal of life is not to, you know, get stuff or manifest stuff. But it's to be aware of the, what is that sweet spot of alignment, right, if we can find, if we can walk a path of alignment with the Tao with these very subtle laws of the universe, so to speak, the intelligence, it's living, and it's relational. It's not impersonal or objectifying. It's relational; it's right relationship with the universe. And if we walk in that way, then there's a kind of flexibility that keeps us safe, content, happy, engaged, and curious. It creates intimacy; it creates depth; it creates meaning. There's an abundance of meaning in the universe, but meaning by that, what I mean is that there's a sense that you're on a path and that it's meaningful, like a story, and you, you can anticipate and see where it's going. And it's so rich.

When we're constantly grasping for things from a state of lack and not, and we're always groping for things. And we're coming out of our center, so to speak, which is the place of walking humbly in the universe, we lunge out of that spot, and all of a sudden, we get grabbed and dragged into like a spin cycle of reactions. So the lesson here is called the wisdom of obscurity, the gentle outlast the strong, the obscure outlast the obvious.

So, we have to keep that in mind. And the planets are always teaching us that the planets are the administrators for the ancient Indian astrologers or the administrators of karma. They were called grahas, grabbers; they seize those who are not living with a sensitive relationship to this beautiful divine intelligence that is alive and in and through everything. And by seizing us, they bring us back to our senses; they're ultimately very merciful. Sometimes it may take us lifetimes to come back to our senses. And that's allowed, isn't that beautiful? So the sense that there is absolutely nothing at stake. And therefore, we can have any kind of adventure that we want as long as we bring the soul along, that all adventures are sanctified as long as we bring the right relationship and loving relationship with our divine source.

What a beautiful, beautiful, what a beautiful reality we live in! It's easy to forget, especially if we only take in astrology from the standpoint of the daily celestial gossip, the daily addiction to the news cycle of our own lives. So getting this perspective to me, it's always worth it to stop one day a week and just remember why we're here. So hope you guys enjoyed today. Don't forget to like and subscribe, share your comments, helps the channel grow, and helps other people find what I hope is valuable spiritual astrology. Thank you guys very much for listening, and we will see you again next week. Bye.