All's hallow

The halfway point between the beginning of seasons (in this case autumn and winter) was also celebrated in the old days, and is remembered as today's Halloween, previously All Hallow's Eve. All Hallow's Day is remembrance of our dead loved ones.

It's all about spirits of the dead.

In my case, it's been all about the spirits of the living, too: Specifically mine.

I am reading a book by Emmet Fox, "Diagrams for Living: The Bible Unveiled", an interpretation of the Bible's stories as metaphors and allegories for how to handle human struggles. I recognized Fox's (no relative) take on Noah's ark as a parable for how to create peace of mind in the midst of big problems in my own experience in Aurlandsdalen: Build a place in your mind (ark) that helps you focus on the spiritual (stay afloat) instead of letting the problem get to you (drown in the flood). In Aurlandsdalen, I found myself worrying about this and that, and so had to put out the thought that God was in charge, and everything would be all right. Any doubts I had would be akin to Noah looking out of the ark and seeing there was still no dry land. So focus on God (the ark had only one window and the only thing to be seen from it, was the sky, i.e. look up).

That was a good period. October went to hell. Bad moods, feeling depressed, aggressive encounters with people. Aarrrgh!!! And I wondered if it was because I hadn't been reading Fox's book at night for a few weeks like I had. (There's something to be said for such positive and encouraging reading just before sleep.) However, spiritual focus can happen anywhere at anytime, so that's not the only thing, but not having some spiritual focus at all probably did trip me up. It's so amazing how quickly things deteriorate for me. (Happily, they are also quickly fixed.)

Bad situations can indeed be hidden blessings: They can usually get our complete attention and so remind us of stuff we still need to sort out, of hidden traps we still set for ourselves. In my case, an attitude adjustment that only now came to my attention, after having had it for years.

When I get cranky, I want to be left alone. I feel very non-social and I have trouble talking about my stuff then. But part of my depressive feelings were also because I felt so alone, not having anyone who can lift me up, and generally just missing some good friends I once had.

Helen Reddy has a song titled "Leave Me Alone". I started humming that. "Leave me alone, just leave me alone, oh, why don't ya just leave me alone."

Oh.

The Universe always delivers. And I have indeed been left alone.

(I should have a T-shirt that reads "I'm With Stupid" and an arrow pointing at my head.)

But, there's no point in chewing oneself out. Instead, be grateful for the discovery, for finally getting a problem defined. That means you can do something about it! So I was grateful.

Me, I said to myself "New tune!", and switched to humming a line from Cockney Rebel: "Come up and see me, make me smile." In my mind, I was saying, "I want to be seen."

This was Monday, a day where my storm cloud had reduced to a more normal looking cloud, but I didn't see any blue sky yet. On my way home, I passed a neighbor I have a nodding acquaintance with but never speak to. This time, though, he made it clear he wanted a chat, so we spent a few minutes exchanging views on his selling his car and then we parted ways.

Then it hit me: Someone did come up, see me, and make me smile! Oh, thank you, God!

PS: The astrology of the above: Any transit to the angles and their houses (especially Ascendant/1st house and Midheaven (MC)/10th house) gets a lot of focus. Squares are the most edgy in energy. My transits during my "down time" in late October included transitting Jupiter squaring natal Jupiter (Jupiter is our awareness of the gods and whatever they get up to), and transitting Mars (aggression, activity) passing over my Midheaven, bringing me a lot of attention and aggression, from other people and internally, since that means it also triggered my natal Mars-Saturn opposition by squaring those two planets. How this all resolves, with emphasis on 10th and 1st houses, is through awareness of self (1st house) and goals (10th house), which need not necessarily be worldly. Transitting Jupiter is still in my 9th house (house of philosophy and higher thinking), so I'll probably feel drawn to the reflective and spiritual for a while longer.