Leaving the Karma of the Stars Behind

Suzanne White, synthesizing astrology of the east and west, says about the Leo Snake, “He is always right, even when he is wrong!” I stopped reading afterwards, that was already more of the truth I was ready to handle. While this might be my nature, nothing is fixed in our lives. We can even leave behind the karmic pull of the stars.

I got a PhD to become a professor; a perfect environment to eat wisdom with spoons, as we say in German. The view of the world changes every decade or two in the academic world, plenty of time to lecture others with the accumulated wealth of knowledge. Until something new comes up, you protect your views with indestructible lines of argument.

Alas, God had a plan, so He sent me into the financial industry instead. To be taken seriously there, we had to make predictions of the future, and those expectations change all the time. I felt gutted over and over again by life’s eternal ups and downs, and each episode when I was proven wrong took another chink out of the ego’s armor.

I wouldn’t wish this traumatic route towards enlightenment to anyone, yet, when you listen to the different Awakening stories, that’s indeed what happens to many. One of these blows that life inflicts on everyone is so heavy that we have to sit down and look for a different way. Suddenly, the Way knocks on our door, ready to teach us.

I no longer eat wisdom with spoons. I haven’t picked up a book in years. I quit my financial job when I figured that I had better things to do with my life than follow the eternal ups and downs of markets and economies. I work with spiritual travelers instead, and help them find the Signs of the Way.

Looks like the snake is shedding its skin, and the lion stands ready to defend the wisdom of the ever-changing Way. We may always be embedded in the star formation we are born in, but boy do we have a freedom to express our true Self within that constellation. The Way is beyond it.