Equinox Musings - Balance (II)

Once more I’m drawn to write at this time of year [name], when the hours of daylight and darkness are the same, all over the world.

Whether we are slowly embracing the autumn hues or feeling revived by the fresh air of spring, we’re all invited to contemplate what Balance means for us.

‘Balance' and ‘Libra’, the zodiac sign that starts on the day of the September Equinox (this year on Sunday 22nd) are both words that find their origin in Latin.

‘Balance’ stems from the late Latin ‘Bi-lanx’, which means having two scale pans, whilst ‘Libra’ also refers to a pair of scales. I actually just found out that the abbreviation for pound - ‘lb’ - comes from the same word, as it was used to refer to an ancient Roman unit of weight!

Wherever you look, whichever situation you’re in, there always seems to be an invisible pendulum at play between two opposites: light and dark, past and future, high and low, hot and cold, inward and outward, happiness and sadness, pleasure and pain, yin and yang etc etc.

And the balancing act is a constant adjustment between such opposing forces.

When we watch something or someone in balance, we may have the impression that they remain still and static, when they are in fact nothing but actively engaged.

I was wondering why I craved a digital detox so much before we went on holiday, I now have some answers.

To start with, it felt much needed to unplug from a world that constantly demands your attention.

But beyond that, I felt drawn to reconnect with the ancient wisdom of the Tarot.

I’d been following crumbs for a while…

For Free Flow Friday, the weekly practice (a creativity and problem solving session) in my Facebook group, I’ve been using the Intuiti deck, which is based on the Tarot and Gestalt therapy.

Then a few months ago whilst in France, I stumbled upon an unusual colouring book (in a clothes shop in the quiet town of Aurillac of all places!) that I bought. It’s a book to colour your own cards from the Tarot of Marseille, the most famous version of French Tarot.

Fast forward a few more weeks, and I received an invitation to join an online course on the Jungian perspective on Tarot. It almost felt like I got the permission to study something that is still often seen as esoteric and woo-woo, whilst getting some further guidance for my colouring book.

Then as we flew back to the UK last Sunday, trying to block off the shrieks of a toddler behind me, I put the headphones on and dug out a report from my phone archives. I’d purchased it a while back, but never quite got into it. It’s about the correspondence between astrology and Tarot. It would appear that my top Major Arcana is the Chariot.

According to Carl Jung, the Major Arcana are the Tarot representation of the universal archetypes, which reside in our collective unconscious.

With the Chariot as my top Arcana, I find myself invited to balance all aspects of my life, drawing on my inner strength to make things happen.

The Chariot card is loaded with visual references to the theme of Balance, from the central position of the rider, who is looking straight at you (neither looking at the past or the future, just the now). They are flanked by 2 animals (horses or sphinxes, depending on the deck you use), you can also see the moon and the sun, a spinning top etc.

Looking back, I realise how often I’ve talked, written, or pondered about Balance in my life.

For example, I remember my first ever life coaching session some 11 years ago. I was invited to ask a question that would shape the direction of the coaching. I queried about how to be a good mum, a good wife, a good daughter, sister, colleague, friend.

I can see now that I was pretty overwhelmed by all these roles that a ‘successful’ woman would play in the early 21st century, and that the cracks of my impending burnout were starting to show…

In this latest reflection on Balance, the message seems pretty clear to me: I am invited, more than ever, to balance my rational side and my intuitive side - not only in my personal life through enjoying hobbies like studying the Tarot and other modalities like astrology and numerology, but also in my professional life.

As much as I’ve enjoyed using my analytical and logical skills throughout my career and kept learning about new technologies and processes (recording the final episode of “Me, Myself and AI” next week!), I now, more than ever, feel the need to better balance these traits with my intuition, my imagination and my creativity.

The right side of my brain wants to be on a level playing field with the left side!

I’m really curious to see how this will play out in the evolution of my services, yet I know that drawing up more on my intuition is the right way forward for me and more importantly for my clients.

It feels like it will unlock a part of my talents that was dormant, and I believe that this will enhance further the quality and the impact of my offers.

If this chimes with you and you’d like to discuss this further, do reach out and we’ll find a time that suits both of us.

Until then, I leave you with this quote from Oscar Wilde, which concluded the latest interview of George Clooney (the planning, rational one) and Brad Pitt (the intuitive and instinctive one) in this month’s edition of GQ: “Everything in moderation, including moderation”.

Oh and the rather mind blowing image at the top of this email was shown to me this week by my AI partner in crime, Jack AM Austin, when we were talking about what I did on holiday.

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