6/29/12—Facing The Black Hole

Today's Draw: Nine of Swords—The Black Hole—from the Science Tarot. Do you often feel that something's missing in your life? Is there a bad habit or excess you'd like to eliminate from your life? How often do you spend time by yourself with no distractions—no radio, not when you're driving the car, not while you're reading—just you, yourself and thy sitting around being good to each other?

A black hole is when a star collapses in on itself, pulling all its mass into something so small it can't even been seen. Everything in its vicinity is pulled inside, too, never to be seen again. Not even light can escape the prison of a black hole.

Even though all that mass compressed into an invisible black hole is tough for even my favorite astrophysicist, Neil de Grasse Tyson, to wrap his head around, on one level, we kind of understand it, don't we? Because each of us has one inside us...a black hole so vast that no amount of Oreos, no kilos of drugs, no number of children, no posse of pool boys and no storehouse of sparkly things can fill it. Its gravitational field pulls us in. Nothing can escape it, least of all the light of peace.

*mindlessly filing my nails while some of you slit your wrists over this ugly truth*

So today's Nine of Swords comes to us for a couple of reasons on the final day of "how to create peace" week. The first reason is that it's in the suit of swords, which is the suit of the mind. Yesterday's card was a Swords card, too. And both of them are pretty dreaded cards to get in a reading. Not because they predict bad things, but because they point at things we're already doing—the  ways in which we allow our own minds to defeat us. Yesterday's card was about the negativities we dwell upon and today's is about disillusionment and the lies we tell ourselves. 

Really the two cards are very interconnected. Some of the negative stuff we dwell upon is about us and our abilities and potentials, for example. On one end of the scale we tell ourselves that a prince will come in on a white horse and we'll live happily ever after, thereby ruining every relationship we forge under that belief before it even starts. On the other end of the scale we tell ourselves in one way or another that we are somehow limited—not smart, lucky, pretty, creative or deserving enough to reach for the highest star. So these are some ways in which our minds defeat us. And with all that noise up there, with all our limited potential and dashed dreams, how will we ever find peace?

Gratuitous photo of my next-life boyfriend, the phenom known simply as NdGT.

But the other part of this Nine of Swords is this black hole inside us. The one we fill with food, alcohol, social engagements, television and other, more innocent sounding distractions like music, books and gardening. (Oh, yeah. That.) None of those things are bad by any means, by themselves and in moderation. But when they build up into a ball of noise and roughage so huge we can't hear ourselves think...when we use them to numb the pain inside...when they keep us from listening to our inner voice...when we expect them to fill the void...that's when they create problems. 

I think this is probably the #1 thing society is in denial of. Somewhere inside us, though, we know. We know "something" is missing. We know something else is excessive. A big part of it comes from looking to something outside of you—romance, children, potato chips, possessions, thrills—to make you happy or rescue you from the burden of your "self." Our fears overtake us and that black hole looks like a source of comfort, but it always ends up leaving you cold.

So what's the answer? Some of the answers have been given this week. Learn how to love and trust yourself, learn how to accept yourself and others and start a healthier relationship with yourself...listen to yourself, give yourself a break. That's the thing that's missing—a healthy, loving, respectful relationship with yourself. Yeah, I know it's hard to do. There's no Cliff Notes version. It takes time. Trust me, I'm still working on it myself. It's a practice, more than an event, meaning it's something you form the habit of doing every day. Just like you formed the habit of second-guessing yourself way back when. 

Still not sure who Neil deGrasse Tyson (NdGT) is?

But the biggest part—and, honestly, the reason I think you come here however often you do—is to stop being afraid of what you'll find when you look within. Have the balls to ask yourself the tough questions and be honest about the answers, which so many of you are already doing. So much is stuff we've been struggling with since childhood. The input we got from back then is deeply rooted and nobody escapes unscathed. Sometimes I swear I think we come here to this earth to heal our childhoods...haha. But another way of looking at it is that our childhoods happened the way they did to give us the cues we need to heal our souls. 

One of the reasons I'm so frank about my own life here at times is to show others they're not alone. Monsters thrive in the dark, and until we shine light on these things and deal with them as they are, we can't defeat them. But we can't do that if we think we're the only ones who feel emptiness or disappointment in our lives and in ourselves. The energy we spend holding on to the shame could be used to escape the black hole. This may not be possible in outer space, but it is possible within.

1/16/12—Finding Hope Within

Today's Draw: The Star from the Legacy of the Divine tarot. When things are bad, where do you find hope? Is hope something within your command or is it a gift from God? And what's the difference between you and the most distant of stars?

The Star is a card that signals hope, especially in hard times. As you can see from the rubble in the background, the city has been destroyed. The card just before this in the tarot is The Tower, a tower that has crumbled. So something in our lives has been beaten down to its very foundation and The Star comes along to say "all hope is not lost". Whatever has happened in your life, happens for a reason. The destruction or damage was necessary for you to rebuild on a stronger foundation. Getting this card is a sign of better times ahead.

Today, however, this card reminds me of what my favorite astrophysicist, Neil deGrasse Tyson says—"we are stardust". OK. Not original. But what he means when he says that is that the universe is made up of elements and atoms and energy, just like we are. And the iron that courses through your veins is the exact same iron that hits the earth as a meteor. Here it is in his own words:

“The atoms of our bodies are traceable to stars that manufactured them in their cores and exploded these enriched ingredients across our galaxy, billions of years ago. For this reason, we are biologically connected to every other living thing in the world. We are chemically connected to all molecules on Earth. And we are atomically connected to all atoms in the universe. We are not figuratively, but literally stardust.”

The cool thing about NDGT (as his fans call him), is that his mind is as blown by this as yours is. He's a leading astrophysicist. He's not some metaphysical guru and, in fact, like most scientists, does not even believe in God.  And this blows his mind, too. He doesn't say this because it sounds nice or because he thinks it's what humanity wants to hear. He's the Director of the Hayden Planetarium and host of NOVA ScienceNOW on PBS. He says it because it's a scientific fact.

We are walking, talking stardust. Each of us is a museum of earthly and universal elements. Even if you believe we end at the outer edge of our skin, there is no line between us and all there is. Our breath continues past the skin, skin cells, waste. As NDGT says, "we are in the universe and the universe is in us." We are incredibly small and incredibly large at the same time. And if you don't believe NDGT, maybe you'll believe CSNY:

We are stardust, we are golden, we are billion year old carbon,And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.

I really love the thought behind those lyrics, because I think we get so caught up in our "king of the jungle" ego here on earth that we forget we are no greater than anything else that exists. It's all stardust. And we think we're the smartest and fittest, but on whose scale? Earlier versions of man had respect for the earth and its critters. They didn't have the wisdom NDGT has, but they sensed it within them. They had to. They lived and died by nature.

Anyway, relating this back to the card, there is nothing outside of you the inside of you can't handle, manage or transcend. Hope—and the magic it brings and the change it promises—is not something that exists outside of you. It is within you right now. Sometimes we get caught up in our dramas and forget this. We see situations as worse than they are. Or we see them realistically, but feel "there is no hope in sight". But there is always hope.

And there is always a solution. Which is not to say that the solution will land you where you were before the problem came along. But there is always something that can return you to peace, whether it's something outside of you or something inside you, like a thought. When it comes down to it, that's where all the problem is anyway, right? In the mind? Because even if we have a physical issue or an issue with a loved one, it's all dependent on the way you choose to think of it.

So what it comes down to is this...the next time you're waiting for hope to come along and bless you, remember there is nothing outside of you that you can't find within. It was in there all along just waiting for you to claim it.