Submission to the fire

Can we dance in the flames of our pain and use the pain as a transformer?  Can we let it show us the way we need to go?  Can we tune into our heart’s delight that we may have been dissuaded from?  Can we let that fire light our way?  Can we burn clear of the things that restrict us and make it hard to breathe?  Can we keep fighting until we break through?  Can we surrender to the flames which are forcing an alchemy upon our soul?  Can we stand alone if that is what is asked of us for a time?

I think there is a flame in the spirit that can be dampened by others.  But I do not think the fire every really goes out.  Even in those who are numbed beyond recognition that fire will burn in their so called ‘madness’.  It may have gone so deeply underground as to no longer be fully recognised and yet it is there.  If someone came upon this person and recognised the fire within them that burned, a shift would come.  The true evil, I believe is to try to kill this spirit in others.  The true triumph is when the person stays true to it, despite how society tries to break it and them.  Think of people like Oscar Wilde and Nelson Mandela for example.  They both spent many years in the middle of the flames.

I have been thinking of this metaphor of fire for the creative spirit or essence in us today after considering some of the writings of Carl Jung that I read many years ago.   I have been thinking about the heart of a Leo Sun that had to find its own truth and suffered to stay true to a calling others could not fully understand.  I just came across a quote from Jung in which he said that he could never seek advice from so called ‘holy men’.  It is up to all of us to discover our own truth, he wrote.

I have thinking about this a lot as my North Node is in Leo and with a strong Aquarian influence in my chart in the 7th house of others I do read a lot and look to the words of others to guide me.  I have a sense that there must surely be a common path that some of us travel and yet in the darkest moments we are alone and have to find our way to steer towards the home that speaks to our individual self.  At times for our own spiritual good we have to turn away from others who would keep us dampened down and dissuade us from our true calling.

This may not be as strong a theme for those without the Leo influence playing a significant part within them but I still think it plays a huge part in how well things work out for us.  If we disconnected from our own creativity it becomes problematic if that creativity is what will bring our spirit fully alive.

Our spirit may be dampened by conditions.  We may have surrendered it to follow the pack or to gain acceptance but in the end surrendering it makes us lost.  We end up travelling down wrong pathways.  And yet those so called wrong pathways may be learnings for our soul.

In alchemy the stone of darkness is transformed to burnished gold in the fires of the suffering nigredo.  The butterfly forms its wings of gossamer in the dark space of the chrysalis.  A beautiful pearl is what emerges after grit trapped within the oyster shell undergoes its transformation.  So it is for us.

This is the tempering work of Saturn.  Our souls and spirits are forged in the furnace of life.  If we keep opening to the fire and submitting to it, it will in time burn us clean.  We may have to suffer greatly there but if we trust ourselves to the flames I do believe that in time we will come out transformed.    We can make gold of our hardships, if we just stay true to and say ‘yes’ to our spirit.