Three Misconceptions of the Zodiac Sign: Taurus

Transcript:

0:01
Hi everyone, this is Acyuta-bhava from Nightlight Astrology. And today we're going to continue my series on the misconceptions of the zodiac signs by taking a look at three misconceptions about the sign of Taurus. So we started the series with Aries last week, if you missed that episode, you might want to go back and take a look at it. Today, we're going to take a look at some of the most popular misconceptions about the sign of tourists that I see day to day, year after year, in my practice, and hopefully by doing this, we'll try to validate some of the stereotypes that come across about these signs, while also clearing up some misconceptions and trying to go a little bit deeper. There's always probably some misconceptions or stereotypes that I don't get to in the series, I'm just kind of picking the ones that I hear the most and personally, I feel like I'm always correcting or educating people about maybe it's my students or someone who I'm just meeting somewhere and they're saying, like, oh, you're your Taurus rising, or especially my wife's the devil Taurus, for example, oh, Taurus, you must be like this, or whatever. Kind of, but it's, you know. So these, these are the kinds of things that I have just heard everywhere, whether I'm just meeting someone or from students or whatever. Anyway, a lot of what informs this presentation came from rereading a book recently called the astrology of fate by Liz Greene, it's one of my favourites, highly recommended, I'm actually going to read a few things from an essay by James Hillman today, called Imagination is Bull - appropriate since we're going to be talking about the sign of the bull.

1:45
But let's go ahead and dive in. So the three misconceptions about the sign of Taurus that I'm going to talk about today are that Taureans - now when I say Taureans, I mean, you could be Taurus rising Taurus, sun Taurus, moon, a big stellium in Taurus, maybe a planet in Taurus on the midheaven. So it doesn't have to be just one thing. And the misconceptions I'm talking about are really in terms of the psychological dynamics of the signs that are often attributed to them. And we know in ancient astrology, that signs are not even primarily used to describe psychology. So this is, in a sense, a little bit more modern, but I do use utilise psychological approaches to the signs in my practice all the time. So I think this is really worthwhile to do. So these are the three.

2:32
1) That taureans are all about comfort and luxury. So that's one that I hear all the time. Oh, taureans, just like nice, comfortable, luxurious kind of stuff. 2) Or another one is that Oh, taureans are so peaceful taureans are all about peace. 3) And the third one is that taureans like simple things are sort of sweet and simple, and maybe even simple minded. Okay, so those are the stereotypes. And I think these are, these are misconceptions that people have. So let's dive in. So a few things to say about the sign remember that Taurus is the sign of the bull. It is an earth sign, it's a solid earth sign, and it is the domicile of the home Temple of Aphrodite, Venus, and the exaltation of the moon. So it is such an earthy feminine sign because of its elemental association, because of the goddesses that inhabit or that find their home temples, in Taurus, the moon and Venus, that, you know, it's not a surprise that some of these misconceptions come right along the lines of some of the stereotypes that you know, you might be used to hearing about the feminine, or goddess energies in general, comfort and luxury, sort of maybe materialistic, just sort of peaceful, simple and sweet, maybe sort of naive and not like super intelligent, like these kinds of things. And let's break them down one at a time, by talking about taureans are all about comfort and luxury. That's number one.

4:13
One of the problems with this, is that while there's an element of truth to the idea, for example, that taureans might like a sense of security, peace, abundance, prosperity, sensuality, these are all things that could be associated with say Venus, or even with the Moon, the sense of security that the moon needs in an earthy, solid sign like Taurus, the establishment of security, okay, I can understand that. The desire for wealth abundance, sensuality and pleasure with Venus ruling the sign and an earth sign. Okay, yeah, I can get down with that. But it's a little bit more complicated than that. And one of the ways that we can learn a lot more about the signs comes when we look at what's happening in the alternation of light and dark in the solar year that's happening within each sign. So for example, in the sign of Taurus, we're in the light half of the year where light is dominating darkness, there's more light than there is dark in the 24 hour day. The Sun is also moving upward, gradually toward the pole star, the North Star, the unmoving emblem of eternity, that the Sun gets close to on the summer solstice before turning around and descending again, by the arc of the Sun lifting up gradually higher and higher in the sky each day. So Taurus is a spring sign, it's a youthful sign that is moving toward a fixed ideal, the pole star, the unchanging pole star. It is doing so while stabilising the initial takeover of light that happened in the sign of Aries. So you're talking about Taurus doing two things simultaneously. One, it's moving into the future toward a fixed ideal as it is doing so it is also maintaining or stabilising the initial or youthful takeover of light that occurred at the spring equinox. So it has two goals in mind. One is stabilisation of a young and early light. And the second is the moving toward a fixed ideal, an unchanging ideal of beauty or prosperity or abundance or happiness or success. So in this sense, one of the things that really if you if you look at that carefully, it immediately sort of goes against the grain of the stereotype. The idea that taureans are all about comfort and luxury can almost slide into thinking that taureans are lazy, or that they're only thinking about their senses or indulgence in the present moment. But actually, this sign has a lot to do with moving toward the future a future call of peace and prosperity. In that there's almost as much emphasis as on on that future ideal of peace, prosperity, abundance, beauty, whatever it might be, as there is with any current state of abundance or prosperity and so Taurus is a deceptively future oriented sign. It's a sign that has a lot of ambition when it comes to the future and moving toward an ideal in the future, however, as it does so one of the reasons that you could think it's only interested in the present is because Taurus is also in a sense, it's a good manager, Taurus is going to be the steady as she goes in terms of how it moves toward its fixed goal in the future. But don't be deceived. That doesn't mean that Taurus is only thinking about chewing on the grass and like looking up at the sky. Think about stabilisation of peace and prosperity as one is also slowly and methodically with a lot of control by the way, and fixity: moving toward a future goal of even more peace and prosperity, which is why there can be an almost like a gold lust. You'll find for example that sometimes Taurus is going to be associated with the idea of idolization. Idolising, the good, idolising the beautiful idolising some degree of security idolising things in a way that leads toward control, an idolization or an idealisation similarly can grip the person and make it seem like it's almost like you can be so possessed by the goal or the ideal, or whatever it is that appears beautiful, that one will either hold on really tightly with an underlying kind of like, tenacity and fierceness that you don't necessarily see on the surface. Or one can move toward the future with that, all the while thinking Oh, I'm moving toward it because it's good. It doesn't matter how secretly or covertly intense or fixated or obsessive I've become, because it's a good and beautiful image.

4:31
So, the obsessiveness and the underlying desire and an even almost idealisation or idolization of something can be very powerful, so don't make the mistake of thinking that Taurus is simply about this dumb, stuck in the present obsession with like sweets and comfort and luxury. And those kinds of things don't, don't at all get down into the intense fixation on ideals and the power and strength and focus and control that's often going into either maintaining them or moving toward a future goal. So that's it. One of the beautiful things about Taurus is that it can maintain an external or superficial degree of peacefulness laid back, you know, kind of ease while being that fixated and controlling. And that's not a bad thing either. I'm not suggesting that that all of those qualities are bad, but it does sort of cut against the grain of this kind of simplistic vision of the bull.

10:57
All right, well, the next one is kind of the same thing from a different angle, that taureans are all about peacefulness. Remember, that bulls in the ancient world were associated with the power of the gods and the power of heaven. Why? Because they're images of fertility. And we have to remember that in the ancient world, Nothing happens without the sanctioning blessing guiding or administrating of the gods. So it doesn't rain, you don't have babies, you don't get a house, you don't get a job, you know, you don't do well at your job. You cannot be strong in your physical body, or successful. Remember, the gods in astrology are literally assigned to the limbs in your body. It's not that I'm moving my limbs. It's that I'm intending to move my limbs and the gods who who rule those limbs are allowing, they're sanctioning, right? So in the ancient world, all these demigods are aspect of the one. And they're all governing everything. So you have to remember that when we're thinking about a bull. This is an animal that was sacrificed across many different traditions, specifically, in relation to the the power of heaven. Okay? bulls are not just peaceful animals, right? They're associated with the life giving power of the gods. So, when you think about this, don't forget that this has to do with the granting of strength and power to create. The strength and power to create is something that you makes the bull, a creature of heaven. This is why the bull is in the stars, not just on the earth. The bull is an animal that is related to the fecundity of psychic energy, not just apple pies, and you know, barefoot romps in the park. It's an earthy creature, sure. But it's associated with this idea of the harnessing of the power of the gods to create things to be, and that could be empire building. So don't get it twisted as the kids say, this is not just about peacefulness, and earthiness. This is about the way that Earth is run by the powers of heaven. And the way that the earth is that the earth very soil and all the things we do are turned into empires, because the gods sanction us to be, you know, builders of incredible things that are all rooted in our projections, fantasies and desires.

14:00
So there's a lot of the lust of creation and building things and the connection to the power of the gods and tourists. And that's a little bit different than just saying taureans are peaceful. Don't forget that Hitler was born with the sun and Taurus. I didn't realise until I put these names side by side How funny this was, but didn't Mark Zuckerberg was. Taurus didn't mean to make that comparison, not not saying anything there. And Che Guevara. Now, I'm not again, these are all characters who have had incredible mission driven lives, some, you know, kind of evil, and, you know, revolutionary. You could say with Mark Zuckerberg, you know, he's a sort of social entrepreneur but kind of pioneer in the social and cultural development, but he's not just trying to connect people. You know what I mean? Like he has a very strong agenda. And I'm not a fan or a detractor, I really don't care. But this is just my observation about him. So, if you guys want to sound off about who you like and don't like, you know, to me, it's kind of a waste of time. But whatever, whatever you feel like writing into a comment box. Mark Zuckerberg, one thing about him is just to notice how if you see him, he always has this kind of youthful look like, I'm just trying to do simple, good things. You know what I mean? And you have to, you always just have to be aware of the fact that the sun and Taurus is not just good and simple and peaceful, even though sometimes there's going to be that sense of like, I'm just your average American person, or I'm just your average peaceful guy, or whatever the case might be, that there is a blood lust underneath the surface of Taurus that people don't always get, because bulls are sacrificed in order to appease and harness the power of the gods to build and move heaven and earth. So you have to remember that this image, I mean, sometimes this is, this is really funny, but like, you know, you can kind of think of like, a big bull walking around with like, you know, the balls that are size of soccer balls, you know, like you have to kind of get into the idea of this kind of dense, powerful, procreative dominant energy to get into this. Not all this is bad, right? You can build beautiful things in the world. But it's just again, what a misconception it is to say that Taurus is just about peace.

16:52
Okay, anyway, so I'm just playing around here. Third misconception taureans like simple and sweet things, And might themselves be sort of simplistic, simple minded. I want to read you now, a few passages from James Hellman's. imagination. His bullet is one of my favourite essays by James Hillman where he talks about the bull. The essay is called imagination his bowl and it's a play on words because he's talking about it in relation to the mythic image of the bull that imagination is literally like a bull. But also the idea that nowadays people tell us you know, if you're an imaginative person, someone might say you're full of bull shit. You're full of it. Full of what? Full of bull so he's, he's diving into that. What do people mean when they say you're full of bull? Okay, so let's hear what he has to say in a few different passages. What does this bull about the bull tell us?

18:09
"First of all, we see that the bull releases extraordinary imaginative power. The power of its image is like the power of imagination itself. The range seems unlimited bull is both father and Moon mother. See how we have a connection to the moon there again, soft rain and thunder, seminal and fecund. Both meet and mystery, natural and spiritual, raging, and Venusian Earthbound in cosmogonic. A mass of blood, muscle and horn and the celestial constellation governing light footed springtime. Perhaps then bull is another way of saying imagination. Perhaps then imagination is simply bull, as rationalists have long complained. Consequently, I am adding another body to the list of substances we have already reviewed and other pars prototo such as bull as blood as horns as testicles as eye as face as hide. Let us propose that the most recurring, recurring, enduring and sacred essence is it's BS. It's mythmaking power. What bull breeds best are fantasies. Then the stories we have seen in the interpretations take on another sense Gilgamesh and Enkidu are punished for destroying the cosmigonic imagination, and so Gilgamesh and that tail had to seek personal immortality since the eternal Cosmos was no longer open to his imagination. When the Egyptians worshipped the bull then it was not simply a fertility divinity of life that the fecundity of imagination that kept the gods themselves alive."

20:27
Another passage: "When we turn to imagination we let in the bull, it breaks up the bourgeois china shop, it disrupts the plebeian conviviality of the TV ad beer party and causes wild rides in the rodeo arena as in the stock market. Yes, it can burn you with its excrements if you chase it, as plenty said. And at the same time, the beginnings are with the bull, the false first letter, a left the first treasure, the first creature, the guardian of all other creatures, and so perhaps of all other letters of literacy itself. Imagine the bull as the head of the word its chief and King, which means nothing less than literacy begins in bull, power stories, sex stories, Hero stories, Marvel and miracle and creation stories about how it all began. Told with stubbornly bullheaded insistence of their real literal truth, even piling up the earth in search of physical proof. To win the day with one's tails one must rather bull one's way through it is the far flung that prevails in the body of the beast must come with its breath into the line into the phrase make way for the alphabet, it walks in like an elephant, to stated again and another way around, no bull, no imagination, no imagination, no foundations and no imagination, with its concomitant extra mental excess bubbles of hot air. Rhetorical hyperbole amplified with a bullhorn, far flung flump far flung fantasies and crap bull crap. All this follows the bull and follows the mythical imagination as it ploughs forward imagining indulgence, imagining, indulges itself in excess, what a load of bull crap, yet just where we protest, that's a load of bullcrap, there is the beast breathing an uprising of a founding ideal image. Imagination is wasteful because it is fecund like nature. superfluids fantasy is the first flaring of imagination, the materia primer of creation. What then holds the two hot air and true imagination and felicitous concert? How keep the fertile bull and cut the crap?"

22:55
What a writer he is, holy cow, he just always blows my mind. So if you think about some of the simple, bull tourist images that people might have, oh, taureans are just simply like simple, sweet things like cowboys and rodeos. And the Dallas Cowboys and cheerleaders and I don't know, I'm just making things up No offence to anyone who might like those things. I like NASCAR, and I like pumping iron. And I like heroes. And these things might seem just kind of simple. They might seem just kind of like all American. But any myth that on the surface appears just simple and sweet. The intensity of the power behind those images of cowboys and steak houses or whatever the you know, whatever the simplest image of peace or simply, you know, I'm just going for a ride out in the country. You know, in my truck, or a lot of them a lot of the taurian things that people associate are almost like downhome all American country type of images, at least here in the US and abroad. I think I suspect it's similar though, it might be different culturally. But, you know, hilman makes the point. Even those things that appear simple, are so deeply rooted in fantasy. Think of how nostalgic It is to be rooted. I mean, I grew up in a couple of places that were relatively more rural. And so I lived with, you know, cowboys, and lots of cowboy boots and rodeos and like literally grew up with there being a rodeo every summer. So why are they so life giving for people? There's a good amount of our culture that that you know, and probably people watching who find those things deeply satisfying. And there's a way in which it's like, yeah, you know what, don't complicate it. These are just simple, easy things. I'm into a simple life. I'm not trying To figure out the mysteries of the world, you know, just give me my dog and give me my guitar. And you know what I mean? So, again, not at all making fun of anything or belittling anything.

25:11
But the point is that that's not simple. That's not just simple and peaceful, as Hillman would say, in his essay, within those simple and peaceful and easy looking images, even like the eagle song, I've got a peaceful, easy feeling. Why do so many people just like love hearing that song as they're rolling down the highway, it's not that it's simple and peaceful and easy. It's that it makes you feel that way. Because underneath it is this intense, deep, fixed power, this power of fertility, this the power of feeling good in your body, feeling controlled in your body, this, this under underneath that is the bowl, that's the point. And the ball is a creature of heaven. So it's interesting that so many of what we think so many of the images that we think will pass for like peaceful, easy feelings and images are rooted in the stable power of this heavenly creature that's connected to the fecundity of the gods, these heavenly beings. This is really interesting juxtaposition of images that if you keep meditating with very, very interesting, think about, for example, the Buddha, who is also said to be born in the springtime and Taurus season with a full moon in Scorpio, apparently, Buddha is someone who has to walk the middle path, he goes to the extremes of worldly indulgence and all the fantasy of the the power of fantasy of those images of palace life and wealth and sex and power, you know, like political power and so forth.

26:53
And it goes to the extreme of asceticism and renunciation, trying to do away with those things and in the way you know, that you find the Buddha in the end is sitting or sitting under a tree on the earth, having found a kind of middle way. And so one of the things that we are always working toward in Taurus, you could say that taureans are working toward a connection with the most abundant and beautiful powers of heaven as they come into the earth to work with those things and have right relationship with them, while also not getting caught up in their fantasies which underneath voted they may look peaceful there is blood and sacrifice and lust and power and control and even greed as the underbelly so these are all things that we have to pay attention to. I say this with no no way trying to derive or hate on taureans. I'm a Taurus rising wife is a double Taurus. So there's a lot of Taurus energy you know, in my life every day, but it's also it's good to get to know you know, what's, what's going on. And, and what kinds of complex mysterious powers otherwise, we get caught up in bullshit. Okay, that's what I've got for today. I hope you guys found this interesting. And feel free to leave your comments in the chat box below. How do you relate to being a Taurus or having Taurus energy in your chart? What are the kinds of misconceptions that people have about Taurus, whether wisdom could you hook us up with about Taurus, always love to hear your guys's thoughts and expertise as well. And yeah, hope you guys are having a great day today. sometime next week. We'll probably get into misconceptions about Gemini next. Alright, take it easy, everyone. Bye.