Sabian Symbols: Canoe approaches safety

Canoe approaches safety

This universal idea is best expressed through planets in

Libra 10 (9° - 10°)

POISE AND CALM REFLECTION
Adventures bring new experiences, yet quiet time enables assimilation, appreciation and a realisation of what has occurred
"Poise and calm reflection"

There is yang and there is yin. Life is struggle and surrender alternately - we push then we relax and accept. We wake at dawn and sleep at dusk, we have exciting projects and relationships, and they all end. During periods of stress and danger it is helpful to know as a certainty that 'this too shall pass' and there will be relief. Wryly we may also observe that periods of calm relief are only nourishing temporarily - until dire boredom sets in. We need relief from that too.

Rudhyar:  
HAVING PASSED SAFELY THROUGH NARROW RAPIDS, A CANOE REACHES CALM WATERS​

​Watch the video

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Having passed safely through narrow rapids, a canoe reaches calm waters

Competency

Humanity has a genius for coping and finding ways to succeed

There is a dimensional difference, which indicates an accumulation of wisdom through experience, between trust that is well-founded and blind trust in sheer good luck. The love of risk and adventure can be nothing more than primitive stupidity.

Or it can be a very conscious self-challenge, designed to improve our skills. We can ask ourselves whether such skills are in fact apt and are developing our resources on the road to success, or whether the love of risk comes out of some other, less serious, motivation, such as thrill-seeking.

Humanity’s genius is sometimes invested in nothing more telling than pleasure itself – for example for the feeling of self-love that comes out of skilfully overcoming danger. A whole new industry has arisen around this theme, which includes white water rafting, bungee jumping and sky diving.

Yet, however insignificant or indeed trivial it may seem, such a practice serves the race itself by constantly creating fresh new challenges. As with everything, if entropy is to be avoided, the genius we have for coping with unexpected threats and finding ways to succeed also needs to be practised and renewed.

What once were survival skills, and perhaps nowadays are used only for leisure, serve the same function as ever – to develop powers through the commitment to achieve a goal. Without an external aim we tend to let our abilities and finer qualities atrophy, whereas to experience danger will pull more out of us than otherwise we could access.

Even in daily life there are constant demands that call upon us to come up with a useful response when we have no previous history to guide us. We come to depend upon an inventive level of creative resourcefulness that is, in fact, quite remarkable – but which we tend to take for granted.

All experience therefore is validated according to our willingness to accept the associated risks. We recognise that life is, quite simply, a dangerous activity and, like it or not, we need to deal with that.

​Canoe approaches safety

Advanced Level: Elven Star Analysis

​Although we can find relevance in some way to all 360 degrees, each degree resonates particularly, and mysteriously, with the 6 other points of its Elven Star and clues, from the 7 Words System, and the Sabian Journey, are shown in the text below. This fifth degree of the Expression "Reflection" is the Progression principle.

The scope of Libra 10 is "Poise and calm reflection", and its means of expansion is Pisces 14, "Protect yourself from unwanted, intrusive energies". Its preferred path, Leo 18, "Demonstrating knowledge of magick", leads to its principle challenge, found in Capricorn 22, "Redefying the meaning of success and failure".

Awareness of its spiritual purpose is described in Gemini 27, "Stepping into involvements that enable growth", which generates the feedback found in Sagittarius 1, "Processing the lessons within our mistakes and struggles" and thus the evolutionary gateway offered by Taurus 5, "Letting go of grief and sorrow". 

​​(This list will differ slightly from your Elven Star points unless your degree is exact, such as Taurus 15:00 not Taurus 15:39)

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