Except for posts where I forgot to add the Category, everything we’ve written about the Yin Gate can be found at
https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/category/configurations/yin-gate/
The best summary among those articles is probably…
https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2016/10/18/portal-18-10-part-1/
and the geometry of the Yin Gate Configuration is illustrated at…
https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2014/06/13/full-moon-yin-gate-and-portal-7-5-15/
The Yin Gate is a special case of the Golden Rectangle, which is the blue rectangle in the picture. Blue lines represent Energies of Grace or Ease. This particular blue rectangle is called “Golden” because the ratio of the length of the long lines to the length of the short lines is the “Golden Ratio” (~1.618 to 1.000). That ratio is called “Golden” because it is found everywhere in Nature – among tree branches, among leaves, among veins in leaves, among bones and vessels and nerves in Critters, in Crystals, in molecular structure, etc., etc.
We might also encounter it as the “Golden Angle” (360 Degrees divided by 1.618 or 222.5 Degrees). We’ve written about that Angle in astrology, at
http://www.jbuss.com/jbl4/bluemoon204.htm
We focus our astrological Attention on the Angles between planets because the Angles between them indicate the sort of Energy the planets Act Out through their combinations. The Signs in astrology represent Flavors of Expression, the Houses represent Material Manifestation Styles, and the Angles (“Aspects” in astrologuese) represent Energies. We happen to believe that the Essence of the Universe is Energy; Matter is just a side effect. So we focus on the Angles – the Energies.
We differentiate the sort of Curiosity that seeks Answers from the sort of Curiosity that’s Perpetual. Perpetual Curiosity is akin to Awe and Wonder, like the Awe and Wonder you can see in the eyes of a Newborn when they’re Safe, or what you’re likely to Feel during a Total Solar Eclipse. We focus on Perpetual Curiosity because it Allows us to escape from our Birdcages.
When we Understand, we create a box or a Cage to put ourselves in. We do it for Safety. Just as an example, suppose you’re walking down the sidewalk of a road that has curves in it. At some points in the curve, cars will appear to be coming directly at you. Do you leap out of the way every time this happens? No, because your Understanding tells you that the driver will follow the road rather than go straight ahead and run over you.
This saves you from burning out your adrenals every time you go for a short walk, and keeps your clothes and shoes tidy because you spend less time in the shrubbery. Now, once you encounter a driver who’s composing a text on their cellphone instead of paying Attention to the road, then, once you get out of the hospital, if you do, you’re going to recognize that your Birdcage needs to have some of its bars adjusted. This is the Danger of Understanding; it works till it doesn’t.
When we study the metaphysical Universe, Understanding is constantly in our way. The more we Feel Safe about our Understanding, the more Danger we’re in, physically. Of course there’s no metaphysical Danger; cars can’t put Souls in the hospital, as much as they Enjoy the game of trying. Or so we Understand.
There are things we Know, a priori. These things don’t come from the mind’s Understanding, they come from the Heart’s Knowing. Understanding is Dangerously subject to mass hypnosis and a slavish Devotion to Logic and Pleasing. While everyone focuses on what’s Logical, they seldom mention that Logic is irrelevant when you Change the Assumptions. Without specific and carefully specified Assumptions, Logic is nothing but propaganda, also often known as Bullshit. And while everyone focuses on Pleasing and Conforming, they seldom mention that it freezes off your Creative Genius as if it was a wart.
We were all raised to Understand (and sometimes follow) reasonable Limits of socially acceptable – in our Culture and in our family – behavior, thoughts, and Emotional Expression. Maturity it’s known as, and you’ll look long and hard to find folks who Understand that Maturity is propaganda. This is called our “Programming,” and it’s not easy to break out of.
There are places for all of us where our Programming and our Heart’s Knowing don’t jive with one another. Self-Sabotage is the result. Deprogramming ourself and eliminating Self-Sabotage is a worthy goal of astrology, since your natal chart shows how you ran your Energy before you were Programmed to Conform to socially acceptable Understanding.
Which is not to say that many forms of social standards aren’t very handy – no one needs to be murdered while just walking down the street because someone’s Deprogrammed self thought it would be kicks, or because their Emotional Response to Fear was to strike out. On the other hand, the Heart’s Knowing is far less likely to be murderous than, say, the mind’s Ideals or the Solar Plexus’s or Belly’s Emotions, so Deprogramming to the Heart’s Knowing is not in general anti-social.
The mind doesn’t know that everyone’s Heart’s Knowing is different from everyone else’s. The Heart does Know this, and accepts it Fully. “Don’t bother me with the Facts” is completely legitimate when it’s the Heart that’s speaking. When it’s the mind’s Ideology that’s speaking, it’s rhetoric and propaganda.
All this is a long way of saying that the emphasis in a Yin Gate is on the green Xes, and the green lines represent Curiosity, hopefully Perpetual Curiosity. Perpetual Curiosity is Yin (Magnetic); Understanding is Yang (Dynamic). An important facet of Perpetual Curiosity is Paradox – the Yin side of Contradiction. The mind is Dualistic; the Universe is Multifarious and Unitary. Dualistic Either/Ors Limit us; Multifarious Both/Ands Expand us.
So the mind has to be retrained to simultaneously accept what appear to be Mutually Contradictory ideas or Emotions. We sometimes refer to this as “Cognitive Dissonance,” after Castaneda, but the term is sometimes used differently by others. For instance, can your Attention be simultaneously within your Body and outside of your Body? Attention is the scarcest “commodity” we have; if we can retrain our Attention to be Multifarious, we’ll be Living much more fully, living more Multidimensionally.
That’s our Objective, to be as Present as we can, to as much of Reality as we can, as much of the Time as we can.
We recognize that the Logical mind can not take us there, so we use “Right-brain” or Yin Manifestation techniques, which we call PIAVA. If you’re at https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/ (as opposed to pointing at one of the articles) you can scroll down to the list of Categories (in the right-hand column) and click on “PIAVA,” or you can just read…
https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2016/09/02/piava-review/
for a more concise review.
This is important because only the “Right” brain can access Perpetual Curiosity. While we could use any of the PIAVA techniques to address one of the green lines in the Yin Gate, we often use Wonder.
In astrologese the green lines are called “Quincunxes” – an “Unx” is one twelfth, and “Quin” means five – so we’re looking at an Angular relationship between planets where one planet is five twelfths of the way ’round the Zodiac from the other planet. (We often use this type and indentation for technical astrological notes.)
In the particular Yin Gate that Blesses us as we speak here in early December 2016, the four green lines connect…
- (1) Lilith (Self-Sovereignty) to Chaos (Unlimited Potential) – the format is “planet (meaning)”.
- (2) Haumea (Rebirth) to Sedna (Embracing Fear).
- (3) Ixion-Pholus (Recovering our Abandoned Genius) to Sedna (Embracing Fear).
- (4) Lilith (Self-Sovereignty) to Uranus-Eris-Ceres-Mnemosyne (Memories of Deviation from, or Rejection of, our True Self).
So the way this Yin Gate Mystery School game is played, you can assign a PIAVA of your Choosing to each of the four green lines, assembling your PIAVAs using as building blocks the meanings of the planets (given above in parens) and relevance to your own Life at the moment. For instance, I might Choose…
- (1) “I Wonder what Potential Surprising new ways I will Create or be Given, to Survive and Thrive in the face of Cultural Collapse, when I am more fully Deprogrammed.” (ie, Self-Sovereign, rather than being Driven by Unconscious Programming.)
- (2) “God, Goddess, Creator of All That Is, I Command that my Ego be Gently revamped so that my first Instinct is to Embrace Fear Lovingly, Breathing into it. It Is Done, It Is Done, It Is Done… Thank You, God/Goddess… Show me…” (This is a specific Ritual format; see https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2015/11/02/piavac/ . By Ritual, I simply mean that there’s Power in Repetition; I don’t mean that there’s a “right” or “wrong” way to do it. The Ritual portions are in purple.)
- (3) “Ganeshi, please Remove All Obstacles to a Loving and Gentle introduction to the Fears that Restrain my Unique Creative Genius, and please Remove All Obstacles to my Lovingly and Gently Embracing those Fears and Liberating my Brilliance, Gorgeousness, Talents, and Fabulosity. Thank you, Ganeshi!” (Another Ritual form, less structured than the first; see https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/17297.Marianne_Williamson .)
- (4) “Great Spirit, please Lovingly and Gently and Rapidly and Completely grant me the Self-Sovereignty to Let Go of of Self-Sabotage and Fully and Permanently Embrace my True Self.” (Here I’ve put the adverbly clause in purple to emphasize it, because it’s a very useful addition to most PIAVAs, in an attempt to reduce or eliminate the “Healing Crisis” or Ego’s Resistance to Change, without hampering the Request. We’re courting Ego Death here, and the Organism has a very deep Drive to Survive; the Ego’s job is to keep the Soul’s Physical Vehicle Alive, and it Reacts Vigorously to threats!)
There are a couple of ancillary “Rituals” or suggested additions to the PIAVA process. The process is designed to Trigger the Intuition and Soul-Connection, so to use it we have to get the mind and its Birdcage of Understanding out of the way. To do that we “Change the Subject,” or do our best to forget that (and what) we just PIAVAed.
Test this with your lost car-keys or anything else that you’ve misplaced or that has gone Walkabout. If you “look everywhere” for them and can’t find them, PIAVA to find them. When you Change the Subject, you’re very likely to “happen upon them” in a place where you never would have “thought” to look.
Yesterday for instance when I came in from Gardening I noticed that my new clippers weren’t where I have become accustomed to putting them. I often set a tool down in the Garden and then forget to return for it. So I checked the other places I may have put it, then retraced my paths through the Garden as best I could remember. No clippers. So finally I asked Ganeshi to “Remove All Obstacles” to finding my clippers. Almost immediately I had a clear picture in my mind’s eye of the clippers slipping to the bottom of the box that I was putting my harvested Nettles into. Clippers found, Soup delicious.
The general observation is that when we have no Unconscious blocks to a Manifestation, the Universe will Respond directly to a PIAVA. When we do have Unconscious blocks, or Conflicting Goals, the Universe will show us the blocks instead. It uses the Fisherperson example – give someone a Fish, and they’ll eat; teach someone how to Fish, and they’ll sit around in the boat drinking beer all afternoon, then maybe they’ll get to eat, if the ballgame didn’t scare away the fish.
So the third part of the PIAVA process is, after a suitable hiatus, “Paying Attention.” If we haven’t directly Manifested what we PIAVAed, or gotten some useful information about it, within a day or two, we want to review what we PIAVAed while we Ask what occurred, between the PIAVA and the review, that was Unusual or Unexpected. That will be a clue to our block or Conflicting Goal(s). Since the blocks and Goals are likely to be Unconscious, the clue will probably be in the form of a riddle or a funhouse mirror, a role reversal, or another befuddlement.
So we may have to PIAVA that we come to Understand the relationship between the original PIAVA and the Unusual or Unexpected Event. For instance, suppose you PIAVAed World Peace and Equal Rights, and the next day your fellow countrypersons elected a Misogynist and Racist to be your Fearsome Leader. “Great Spirit, what the heck does that say about the sort of Self-Sabotages the Unconscious might be perpetrating to World Peace and Equal Rights?”
And off we go from there, Exploring the Unconscious Wilderness…
