Most every year, at Valentine’s Day, I like to watch the movie Moonstruck, it reminds me how much, despite the best of our plans, life happens in its own way, on its terms. The best part is that when we surrender, allowing life to lead, rather than attempting to control and coerce the world around us, we discover there are better plans for us than our little (albeit brilliant and often useful) conscious minds could ever come up with.
In Moonstruck, Loretta (Cher), becomes engaged to Johnny (Danny Aiello) who she doesn’t really love, and is tasked to make peace with Ronny (Nicolas Cage), the brother she didn’t know he had and invite him to the wedding, while Johnny is visiting their dying mother in Italy. When she goes to do this, unexpected sparks fly, fast and furiously between Ronny and Loretta. At first she is clear that she must be logical, and stick to her plan to get married and even slaps him as she demands he “snap out of it”, after he declares his love for her. But the Moon, the unconscious and life itself, has other plans. In the end ***SPOILER ALERT*** Johnny comes back to let her know that he can’t marry her because his mother had a miraculous recovery, and at that moment Ronny proposes marriage.
At one point in the wonderful human cacophony of this movie, Loretta’s grandfather, who is from the old country and only speaks a few words of English, rubs his forehead and says, almost in tears, “I’m so confused!” And rightly so. If we are not in touch with, and respectful towards, our intuition; aware of and in synch, or at least in a healthy form of surrender, with the movement and flow of our unconscious, we can become so very confused. The Moon reminds us, when this happens, to trust our hearts, our guts, our instincts, what we know in our bones, regardless of what “logic” tells us what should be otherwise. It's about acknowledging what is, trusting our higher selves and allowing the unconscious to take the wheel until we are aligned enough with the higher plans for our life to be trusted with it again.
Put your thoughts to sleep, do not let them cast a shadow over the moon of your heart. Let go of thinking.
~Rumi
I’ve heard recently, from more than one source, the theory that our conscious mind is responsible for only about 10% of the decisions/choices we make in our lives, and the other 90% are actually made by our unconscious. I find this fascinating, and in looking at what my conscious personality had planned for my life since I was about 5 years old, versus how my life has actually worked out, I’d have to agree. I have recently decided, that rather than continuing to be angry at and fight against my life, for having such seemingly complete disregard for my personal & individual plans, I am now actively, lovingly, engaging my unconscious in a dialogue, opening the lines of communication. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPazGVuBXmY
“What is the plan, dear one?” I ask, “And if you give me some really easy clues, perhaps we can work together going forward, in the highest and best interest of all…” The Moon is a reminder that the unconscious has messages for us, and it's time to really listen, deep down, from the inside.
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Moonstruck by Carrie Vielle[/caption]
As a spiritual being having a human experience I like the idea that my spirit is all knowing and wise, so closely connected with the all there is. That my spiritual, higher self knows why I have decided to come here to this beautiful planet Earth, and what I planned to learn on this journey, through my relationships with myself and everyone else. I have this image of the instantaneous clarity that is my higher spiritual self, getting slower, denser and heavier as it condenses and squeezes itself into the earthly matter that is my physical body. This comparatively crude, and beautiful, matter (the miraculous work-in-progress of billions of years of evolution) moves so much more slowly than my spirit self and hence I appear to do much bumbling around with, and knocking into, the others I’ve chosen to meet and learn with here, causing myself and each other pain and healing in this ultimate journey of LOVE. Only rarely, during epiphanic moments of IN-SPIRATION, am I clued in on the point of it all, and in this busy crazy material world I often forget what those lessons were, until the next epiphanic inspirational moment comes wherein I re-member and integrate it with the last and also move forward with the current.
In the Sun and Moon Tarot deck, which is the deck that works with me, the Moon is represented by a beautiful woman sitting in the crescent moon. Her blue dress and long dark hair both flow towards the ocean (of emotion and the unconscious) and two fish leaping above the water in a dance of the sign of Pisces between two lighthouses, each on its own cliff, guarded by jackals (animal instinct), white on one side and a dark one the other. And when She appears in one’s reading she is offering a strong message that the Querent’s (the person asking for insight from the cards) unconscious has something to offer and is trying to get in touch. This is such a strong message, in fact, that this is one of the few cards that comes with a homework assignment.
The assignment is to start/continue/keep a dream journal, for it is in, and through, our dreams that our unconscious is continually communicating with us, via symbol and emotion and story, to give us clues that we can follow in order to be in alignment with that part of us that makes the majority of our decisions. If the person “doesn’t dream”, then in addition to keeping paper, pen and light at their bedside (just in case ;), I also ask them to explore some sort of artful expression: painting, finger-painting, clay work, play dough, sand play, drawing, free-writing (“the pages” in the Artist’s Way), or dance…anything that will allow them to let go of their habitual concrete ego driven mind and put them into a place of free flow where the unconscious can clearly convey a symbol or a feeling or message that can be recognized as such.
Your body is away from meBut there is a window open from my heart to yours.From this window, like the moon,I keep sending news secretly
~Rumi
Without the rest and repair of nighttime, of silence and sleep, along with the integration of our daily lives, we would go crazy and our physical bodies would break down, and there would be no place for the unconscious to make its offerings regularly. And the moon, while reminding us, and reflecting the brilliant light, of the sun from the other side of the world, also encourages us to go inward, to look into our own inner luminescence, to remember solitude and peace and take respite in the darkness. The Moon, when she appears in a reading is asking us to rest and reflect, to look into the depths of the darkness and see how she and many of the stars are casting back the light of the sun to offer another perspective.
At night, I open the window and ask the moon to come and press its face against mine.Breathe into me. Close the language door and open the love window.
~Rumi
This year, it seemed to me that my New Year didn’t actually start until February, around the Chinese New Year, which started with the first day of the Chinese Lunar Calendar (this year on February 8th). So it seems appropriate to look to The Moon for guidance as we move forward into the second month of the Lunar Year.
Take some time to meditate on the moon, to “moon gaze” and see what comes up for you, or rather what pulls you down into yourself in order to offer inner-illumination and reflection. Where in your life is it time to let go of and hand over the wheel to that part that has a bigger perspective on your life? Where is it time to take the wheel back as you begin to see the way open before you? What do you know to be true despite all logical and empirical evidence otherwise? Is it time to take the metaphorical step out onto the shining glimmering path illuminated by the moon?
The moon stays bright when it doesn’t avoid the night.
~Rumi
It's time to look & listen, deep inside, and find out.
Come by on Friday, March 25, and let’s explore what the Moon has to illuminate for you!
Admit Something:Everyone you see, say to them‘Love me.’Of course you do not do this out loudOtherwiseSomeone would call the cops.Still, though, think about this,This great pull in us to connect.Why not become the oneWho lives with a full moon in eachEyeThat is always sayingWith that Sweet MoonLanguageWhat every other eye in this worldIs dying toHear?
~ Hafiz
