In the study of algorithms, one is always, always concerned with efficiency: is this algorithm the best possible? But, of course, the question is: "best at what?" And what we find over and over again is that it is impossible to be the best at everything.
Usually, one cares about how fast your algorithm is, or how short your algorithm is, or how easy to change your algorithm is, or how didactic your algorithm is. But, often, improvement at any of these comes at a cost to all of the others! So one must be very clear on what it is they care about, and why they pursue it.
Yesterday, @temporaryreality made an offhand comment about pursuing a balanced life, which was a surprising goal to me: would not one rather pursue being optimal at something? But then I realize that, often, one who is designing an algorithm is not yet sure how it will be used, and it is extremely wasteful to try to make your program fast if it is only rarely run, or didactic if nobody is ever going to look at it. We call this kind of thing premature optimization. It's considered good to start by making your algorithm a jack-of-all-trades unless you're sure exactly how it's going to be used.
And so @temporaryreality is quite right that pursuing balance is a valuable goal. Indeed, I think it should be the default goal, for most people, most of the time.
You can't make a cup out of water.
For any given complete symbolic system, there is a spiritual path corresponding to each symbol. So we might classify different spiritual paths by which symbols they correspond to in that system. (Naturally, since there are many symbolic systems, there are many such methods of classification.)
Let's take an example and look at the classical elements.
The path of fire is a masculine path involving drive, will, and transmutation. I imagine many of those who found their way to this diary from Ecosophia would easily recognize this as where magical paths belong.
The path of air is a masculine path of interaction, communication, and dispersion. This is perhaps the path most foreign to me—my natal chart contains no air at all, and so I find airy things bewildering—but I imagine it's what the Bhagavad Gita refers to when it's talking about the karma yoga: a path of service to others.
The path of water is a feminine path of purity, reflection, and dissolution. This is the path I would tend to associate with the image of an anchorite or monk: one who separates themselves from the world, studies wisdom traditions, meditates, etc.
The path of earth is a feminine path of embodiment, effort, and acceptance. I would associate this path with mystical traditions that emphasize good works, and also with what's been called "The Path of the Hearthfire" or of "lay monkdom:" doing your mundane work to the fullest.
(I'm certainly being a bit sloppy here; these are very large bins and we have few widespread spiritual images to draw from in the West; I'm also mostly typing it out as a reminder to myself for something to circle back to later, so I'm writing quickly rather than deeply.)
One can do a similar exercise with any other complete system: the astrological planets or signs of the zodiac (or both together, if you want a year or two of meditation themes), the geomantic figures, the ba gua or I Ching hexagrams, the Tarot, etc. I think the exercise is worthwhile, since it helps one recognize and identify what kinds of spiritual teachings or methods—and there are a lot to draw from, many of which are marketed as The One True Way™—are likely to be of benefit to one's own path.
It seems we have some gardeners and craftspeople here on Dreamwidth! Let me briefly change gears from spirituality and talk about booze.
(Alan Watts used to joke about "a scholarly Chinese" who would say, "if you're going to meditate, you should have a couple of martinis first, since it'll speed up your practice by about six months!" But it really is a joke: wine does not help spirituality, in my experience.)
I have lived in upstate New York for most of my life. One of my side projects for the last decade or so has been to make wine from as many native plants as possible and catalogue which of them are worthwhile. I even planted an orchard to this end, but the plants are yet young and I will be moving before they are mature enough to harvest from. Still, I thought I might share what I've learned in case it's useful to anyone else. (Anyway, most of these plants grow all over North America, so perhaps you have them in your area, too!)
If you haven't made wine before, I recommend it, even if you have to buy the ingredients: it can be as easy or as hard, as simple or as complicated as you want, but even at the low end the result is rewarding—the results will be better and cheaper than you can buy at the wine store! The only things to be watch out for is that you will be washing things a lot and that you will be waiting a lot. Oh well, cleanliness is next to godliness, and the best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago.
There is a vast selection of books on winemaking, and I've read dozens of them! Let me save you some trouble and recommend that you buy John Wright's Booze: it's by far the best book on the topic. (The one downside is that it's all in metric units. Get yourself a kitchen scale and a calculator.)
If you've never made wine before, the easiest and best thing to start with is (if you live in the Northeast) maple wine or (if you live anywhere else) mead. They're quick, easy, fool-proof, and simply some of the best wines there are. A good recipe is available in John Gorman's 1992 article from Mead Digest #19.
If you have access to elder trees, by far my favorite wine to make and drink is elderflower champagne. It takes some work, but it's worth it. Just be sure to use heavy-duty bottles: I have made a few grenades!
Below is a table of all the wines made from native or locally grown/foraged plants that I've tried:
| Plant | Verdict | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Maple Syrup (Acer saccharum) | A | Quick, easy, fool-proof. Like mead, but better. Use dark or very dark syrup. Can also be jacked to make a rum-like beverage. |
| Serviceberry (Amelanchier × lamarckii) | ? | I planted a small orchard of these. The fruit is good—like a cross between apples and blueberries—but birds adore them above all other fruits and will strip trees bare before they're even ripe. Sadly, I'll move before I get enough to make into wine. I'm told it's fair on it's own, but excellent if mixed 50–50 with rhubarb wine. |
| Pumpkin (Cucurbita pepo) | D | Fussy and uninspiring. |
| Wild Strawberry (Fragaria virginiana) | F | Like medicine. |
| Apple (Malus domestica) | varies | Quality depends on fruit: favor cider apples, wild apples, dessert apples in that order. (It is not worth making cider from dessert apples alone.) |
| Fire Cherry (Prunus pensylvanica) | F | Unpalatable: too much tannin, even when mixed with European cherries. Makes a good vodka infusion, though: use as a mixer, especially with elderflower liqueur. |
| Wild Plum (Prunus nigra) | F | Like medicine. |
| Blackberry (Rubus spp.) | A | Easy and reliable. Like grape wine. |
| Elderflower (Sambucus canadensis) | A | My favorite wine. Labor-intensive but reliable. Like champagne and every bit as good. |
| Elderberry (Sambucus canadensis) | A | Easy and reliable. Like grape wine. |
| Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) | B | Labor-intensive and fussy! Tastes like bottled midsummer. Unique. |
| Highbush Cranberry (Viburnum trilobum) | F | Stinky socks. I have only attempted with wild specimens; there are cultivars that may be better. |
| Ginger (Zingiber officinale) | A | Best hot or mulled, curled up in front of a fireplace. |
I very much dislike the body I inhabit, but I was mulling this over today and it occurred to me: does anyone ever care how well a raft works? No, it is a ramshackle device built for a temporary purpose; and once one has crossed over the river, it is either taken apart or discarded. So it is with us, and if our bodies barely work or cause us great pain, what does it matter? They only have to hold together until their purpose is fulfilled.
There's lore out there that two people shouldn't share the same divination tools. I can confirm this from experience: my wife and I are fairly well-aligned, but her emotions and energies are so much more intense than mine that, if I attempt a reading with her Tarot deck, I often get her last reading, repeated.
Even after a few years, I'm always fascinated when geomancy bonks me upside the head with actionable information. Yesterday, I got this chart:
I always look carefully to the I as "what should my focus be?" for the day, and here, we have Fortuna Major (a challenge that'll work out) occupying the II (money), VI (services), and XII (unknown enemies). I figure that "services related to money" implies "credit card", and so I check my credit card statement and—lo! and behold!—somebody's made fraudulent charges to it.
Dispute the charges, cancel the card, and everything's fine. But would I have thought to check, had I not been warned?
The question often pops up on @conjunctio as to who we are conversing with when we perform divination.
According to Plato's Symposium, Socrates believed it to be one's δαίμων (that is, genius, guardian spirit or angel, etc.): "From [the agency of genii] proceed all the arts of divination, and all the science of priests, with respect to sacrifices, initiations, incantations, and in short everything which relates to oracles and enchantments. The deity holds no direct intercourse with man; but, by this means, all the converse and communications between the gods and men, whether asleep or awake, takes place; and he who is wise in these things is a man particularly guided by his genius."
According to C. H. Josten, by contrast, Robert Fludd believed it to be one's mens (the unconscious mind or higher self) acting through the media of the anima intellectualis, intellectus, or ratio (the conscious mind or lower self), in the same way that a master exercises authority over servants: "The servant, in carrying out his master's command, does not know what the intentions and secret motives of his master are. [...] Mens in man is of the same essentia as mens divina. On a smaller scale (in virtute minori) mens humana may, therefore, perform the same actions as mens divina."
For my own part, I am quite convinced by my own mystical experiences that I am in communication with my guardian angel.
Earlier, I was having a conversation with my angel:
Me. Do you know why [X] is so?
Angel. Yes, but I'm prohibited from telling you.
Me. Why are you prohibited?
Angel. I can't tell you that, either. I'm sorry, but it's better this way: it would cause you to despair.
There are also many things that I can't know because I lack the capacity for comprehending them. It is difficult to keep to a path when one is blind! And yet what choice do we have?
It occurs to me that, if your expectations are low enough, literally all things are "too good to be true."
One of the staple practices mentioned in The Art and Practice of Geomancy is casting daily (or weekly, or monthly, or yearly, or life) charts, to see the influences coming to bear for the time period in question. I've been doing this for a couple years now, and I've cast several life charts for people, and I thought I'd share a bit about how I do it.
After I cast the chart, the first thing I do is link up all the houses that share figures by occupation, company demi-simple, or company compound. (When I say "link up," I mean literally draw connecting lines on the chart between these houses. Company must exist in this chart for such figures to be connected, so for example Laetitia and Tristitia are not linked in all charts, but only in those where they are in appropriate houses. You'll note that company capitular isn't considered: it appears to be too weak to matter much.) The figures of the court are considered to be houses for this purpose, and the Witnesses in particular are considered to have potential company between them (as they are houses which get added together). Houses that are linked indicate both emphasis (e.g. these are more important) and shared events affecting multiple facets of life (e.g. a link between the V and the IX indicates some single event affecting both children and education, say). Be sure to pay attention to the normal meanings of company when considering these: the nature of the company is usually important to the meaning of a linked group as a whole.
Particular attention should be paid to:
Anywhere the first house is linked to: these indicate a focus of attention for the time period.
Anywhere the twelfth house is linked to: these indicate the greatest challenges for the time period.
Anywhere the Judge is linked to: these indicate the factors most salient in affecting the time period.
Any links involving many houses (and the more houses, the more attention should be paid to them), as these indicate something of particular significance. (Enough houses and there may be significance beyond the time period, as well.)
(I don't tend to pay much attention to the cardines or aspects, either in time-period charts or generally. If you find them useful, you might look for those as well.)
Beyond that, I tend to look at the court for the overall picture of the time period, and then go house-by-house to determine the factors that shape each facet of life. I write down predictions for each, and at the end of the time period, I'll go back over these to assess what happened and how well I did. (I find that the charts are 90–95% accurate in hindsight, but I tend to only get something like 60% ahead of time, though I've been getting a lot better with practice.)
It helps to keep a journal with a page for each house, and note special meanings when figures or links relate to that house. An example that I've seen again and again is that Carcer in the twelfth house is suggestive of insomnia.
Finally, it's worth noting that even groups that aren't connected together may be related... but the only way I've found to follow these is intuition. (For example, that Rubeus in the V may be the very reason for that Carcer the IX... can't study if you're hung over!)
Let's look at an example, a daily chart of mine from last month:
As noted, I first cast the chart, and then draw lines linking each house that share figures either directly or through company. This resulted in three "groups:" Carcer in the IV (home), XII (difficulties), and J (overall picture of the day); Puella in the XI (friends) and RW (internal factors of the day); and the figures of Mars in the III (communication), VII (spouse), VIII (spirits), and X (goals). This is a pretty difficult chart, with nine of the fifteen houses containing malefic figures, most of which are tied together into groups. One would expect the day to be challenging!
The I occupies nowhere else, so I shouldn't expect to have any particular focus for the day. I have a very difficult relationship with Acquisitio: I find the figures of Jupiter confusing, and this one is no exception. As a figure of Jupiter, it should be generally beneficial, but I've found it to be almost universally troubling in my readings, indicative especially of having too much of something or hanging on to things that I should let go of.
And speaking of troubling, the XII is actually quite a significant house in this chart: it contains Carcer, which is pretty strong in the XII house (as both the figure and the house are about limitations), and furthermore Carcer occupies three houses total, including the J! This simply says that I'm going to be isolated today, especially from my home life, and that it'll be the single most defining aspect of the day. Naturally, this was a work day, I don't much enjoy my job, and my workload for the day was crushing: so I simply had to buckle down and grind it out. (Indeed, I didn't get it all done until late evening, went straight to bed after, and had great difficulty sleeping despite my exhaustion due to melancholy.)
The next significant thing to look at is the group of Puer and Rubeus. To be quite honest, I was pretty baffled when I saw this; given the presence of the III and X, I assumed it had something to do with work (and it kinda did, given the way I had to plow through everything), but the links to the VII and VIII, themselves in company, made no sense. In fact, when I reviewed the chart before bed, I was no closer to a conclusion. I only learned what it meant the day after: my wife complained of difficulty sleeping because "something in the sky was watching her." And, look: upset Rubeus in the VII (for my wife) and turned IX (of dreams), in company with combative Puer in the VIII (of spirits) and X (of things above). Sensible in hindsight, though now I pay attention to such things! (Luckily, the following day, my wife was in company with Puella in the VIII, and slept great.)
That Puella group refers to friendly and pleasant conversation with a female co-worker, who I tend to counsel: this put me into a generally helpful and accommodating frame of mind, which helped me be constructive at work, but also probably made me bite off more than I could chew.
And, of course, one should pay attention to each individual house. I won't go into each, but as an example, the meaning of Tristitia (sorrow) in the V (of pleasures) simply means it won't be a very fun day (not surprising, in light of the above).
And there you have it! I cast one of these every year (on New Year's Day), every month (on the first), and every day (in the morning when I get up), and I review them again at the end of the period (New Year's Eve, the 31st, or before bed). I also put my daily charts on a scrap of paper so I can carry it around with me and review it throughout the day as needed. I think nothing has helped me understand geomancy more than the constant and consistent practice these have afforded!
As good an illustration of the nature of the geomantic figure Cauda Draconis occurred in my living room just now:
Daughter. Mommy, we're going to play hair salon. I'm going to shave your head. Do you want your head shaved?
Wife. No.
Daughter. Too bad, I'm going to shave it anyway. BZZZZZZZ
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