But this is not about that.
This is about the new zodiac.
It all started this afternoon when I saw a post on Facebook from The Washington Post titled: New Zodiac sign dates: Don't switch your horoscope yet
According to this blog, since the ancient Babylonians invented the zodiac thousands of years ago, "the moon's gravitational pull has slowly moved the Earth in its axis, creating about a one-month bump in the stars' alignment".
That means that all of the zodiac signs that people have known, loved, and relied upon to tell them whether the day will be good or bad, happy or sad, sunny or cloudy (it might as well), or just generally tell them if they are this or that kind of person, are actually WRONG.
Not in every case, I for one am still proudly a Taurus, although I am now on the cusp. (Let's face it, who doesn't like a little hypocrisy in their criticism.)
Well thanks for that.
Its been a grand ol' time watching the ripples spread through FB. Some people gaped in disbelief. Others (the minority) grappled with their inner turmoil but eventually embraced the horror. Still many scrambled to grasp on to something - anything - they could in order to prove to themselves that it wasn't true.
But no reaction came close to this one true gem of a refutation:
For all of us old enough to give a fuck, the new zodiac poses absolutely no threat because it only counts for people born after 2010 (2009 in some accounts)
...
Wha???
Okay, wait a minute. Where the f*** did this load come from? How the f*** is that (ir)rationalization supposed to work?
1) Supposedly the zodiac reveals some underlying cosmic scheme that dictates even the intimate details of our lives and personalities, correct?
2)And the "new zodiac..." states that because of the gradual shift in planetary alignment taking place over thousands of years, we have mistakenly believed that the signs occurred at the same time every year as when the zodiac was first constructed.
Are we now, in order to make everyone - who just realized that, one way or other, they've been qualifying aspects of their personalities with a load of horse shit - feel better, convince ourselves that the earth suddenly shifted orbit at the beginning of this year so that only people born this year and later fall under the new zodiac system?
I don't get how that works in any way other than pure fancy. Furthermore, none of those promoting it have been able to give any rationale either. So let us simply call it as we see it.
But wait a minute. If the stars and planets are right, they're right. Right? So if we say that they're only right as long as it makes us comfortable, isn't it - short of assuming a sudden, massive (as far as celestial movements are concerned), planetary shift - tantamount to indirectly admitting that all of this horoscope stuff is base, fantastically perceptional horse puckey anyway?
Wouldn't it just be easier to admit that you may have been the wrong sign all along, or ignore the new zodiac completely, than to go through all of these mental and emotional gymnastics to end up at the same result, with 100% the same amount of rational thought supporting the conclusion in either case? Not really, actually, given human nature.
Or (even more reasonably), maybe we should all just admit that its all crap.
False Perceptions
Now, this is all very interesting because it gets me thinking about attachment to false perceptions. Even I, upon hearing this, became more than a little bit perturbed:
"Good god, my boyfriend is a Libra?... Oh, but at least my dad is no longer a libra. But dammit: almost all of my ex's are still libras, which makes my boyfriend... one of THEM."
This was the irrational part of my brain speaking, in response to which my rational brain was able to identify the stupidity and apply a proper remedy. Namely asking:
"What are you going through?"
In short, my rational brain was able to identify the fact that the only reason I was so terribly disturbed was because my irrational mind is attached to the false concept of being a Taurus. I am attached to the belief that somehow this title "Taurus" embodies me, that somehow the title "Scorpio" embodies my boyfriend, and that any change in this situation spells the certain doom of our relationship. It was that attachment that caused me to feel unnecessary discomfort and suffering. But looking at it through the dharma mind - identifying it and its causes, contemplating it, identifying a remedy, and applying it - I was able to figure out how to quell my feelings of disturbance.
This was an interesting moment for me. It always is. There are a great number of things in my life about which my rational mind is aware that I am afraid to contemplate. This is because then I would have to change things in my life that have become routine and comfortable, regardless of how much negativity they cause. In many cases these things lie at the very base of my suffering. They make me act (and think) compulsively, irrationally, in ways that are detrimental to my life, happiness, and well being. My rational mind is aware of this too - but still I often shy away from them because it is frightening to confront myself.
It is moments like these that remind me just how attached I still am to the world of signs and concepts. Just how much work I still have ahead of me. But they also remind me that I am capable of moving forward. Just the fact that I can see these things means that I am one step closer to remedying them.
"When there is wrong thinking and one knows it is wrong thinking, it is already right view. When there is right thinking and one knows it is right thinking, it is already right view. What is wrong thinking? It is thinking that leads to desire, hatred, and harming...
What is right thinking in which not all the leaks have been stopped? It is thinking that leads to giving up desire, hatred, and harming... That thinking gives rise to merit, but still leads to attachment."
-Mahacattarisaka Sutra
(Discourse on the Great Forty)
In closing, here's a little something that I put up on my facebook page. I used to love this quote and apparently still do. It popped into my head while I was contemplating my reaction to all this, so I'll let it close this case:
King Lear Act I, scene ii.
EDMUND
This is the excellent foppery of the world, that,
when we are sick in fortune,--often the surfeit
of our own behavior,--we make guilty of our
disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as
if we were villains by necessity; fools by
heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and
treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards,
liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of
planetary influence; and all that we are evil in,
by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion
of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish
disposition to the charge of a star! My
father compounded with my mother under the
dragon's tail; and my nativity was under Ursa
major; so that it follows, I am rough and
lecherous. Tut, I should have been that I am,
had the maidenliest star in the firmament
twinkled on my bastardizing.
