Libra Mystery School Lessons

If you’ve hung around me long enough, you know that Libra is a sign or rather “Mystery School’ that I am highly drawn towards. It holds so many mystical components that are directly relevant to the experience of being human. Perhaps a large part of my fascination with the Libra Mystery School is because I am part of the Pluto in Libra generation, and my son Tanner was born at 1 degree Libra, just past the Equinox on September 24th. And he really struggled with the shadows in this sign.

So in honor of all of these qualities, and the fact that the Sun has just moved into this sign heralding the Dark Half of the Year, AND the Lunar Nodes are here infusing us with their evolutionary codes, specifically the South Node who requires decrease and purging of unhelpful Libran qualities. AND lastly, because we will have our first eclipse in Libra in the next two weeks, I thought I might presence a few things.

Libra as a Sun Sign rules the psychological act of projection. On one hand, Projection is a necessary function of the psyche. It is how we map the world and move confidently within it.

However, there is a place in which projection becomes problematic. When it is filled with certainty and our own personal lensing. Rather than being permeable and flexible.

Robert A Johnson describes projection like this; “when we awaken to a new possibility in our lives, we often see it first in another person. A part of us that has been hidden is about to emerge, but it doesn’t go in a straight line from our unconscious to becoming conscious. It travels by way of an intermediary, a host. We project our inner gold onto someone, and suddenly we are consumed with that persona. The first inkling is when the other person appears to be so luminous that he or she glows in the dark. That’s a sure sign that something in us is changing, and we are projecting our inner gold onto someone else”.

Projection takes place most often in relationships. It is essentially the act of casting our inner gold onto someone or something else. And having another person or thing act in the place of God for us, until we ourselves are able to hold our inner gold in that area of our lives.

This mechanism reveals what we are attracted to. For instance If we live a mundane, routine life, we may be attracted to a partner who is outgoing, spontaneous, and adventurous because we ourselves desire to embody these qualities.

It shows us what we admire, and what we desire to become. We need projection to be able to dream and even to relate. (this is deep, I can’t possibly cover it in one post).

Projection that begins in admiration, becomes problematic when it is unconscious and there is no agreement about when the appropriate moment has come to take our gold back, and we continue to allow someone to hold it long after the sell by date.

When we don’t move out of the “projection of God” stage of our relationships and begin to see people as diverse, variable, and human.

I struggled with this in my relationship with my husband. He came from a very patriarchal culture, with rigid cultural roles around what men and women do in relationships. He related to me through the projection of “wife”, and how that projection was supposed to feel “heavenly” to him. Instead of relating to me as Damascena, a complicated, fallible human.

I’ve even come to feel that our culture’s current understanding of “empathy” is inherently a teaching on projection. “Put yourself in their shoes, and respond from that place”.

It lacks curiosity. And it is in fact curiosity that breeds empathy, and breaks down unhelpful projections. It is curiosity that allows us to move past projections, and meet people in their humanity.

Interestingly, this same function that Robert Johnson outlined above works with our inner lead as well. Essentially it is the same mechanism in reverse. When we feel an activated sense of disgust with someone or something, we can be sure something within us is striving to be made conscious so it can be transformed. In the meantime, this lead can rot like fruit left too long on the vine if it isn’t moved and worked with. This becomes the act of demonization.

Demonization is judgment (ruled by Libra) that lacks equilibrium and context. It seeks to portray it’s target as all bad. As only a demon with no human-like or decent qualities. With no complexity, or variability.

Demonization arises when we haven’t taken back every last piece of our inner gold from someone or something. And it is now touching on something within us that hasn’t been fully integrated. When we are rejecting some part of ourselves or our experience.

Demonization goes beyond discernment, and “good judgment”. Unfortunately this is a commonplace trait within our immature culture. It is what we do when we “cancel” someone. Canceling is a trait of the Death Mother. A shadow quality of Black Moon Lilith. “Demon” was projected onto Lilith when she didn’t behave the way God and Adam expected her to behave. We projected the qualities of a monster into her, and exiled her.

If we notice demonization active within ourselves, it’s helpful to ask what part of us we are rejecting?

It was in studying projection we got the famous line from Jung, “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”

Really deepening with mechanism of human projection will reveal much to us about the Hindu concept of Maya. The idea that the world is an illusion. A projection of the psyche.

I mention all of this to display how important it is to make our own capacity to project conscious within ourselves. It is a vital stop on the path of awakening. And on the path of having more organic, fulfilling relationships with others.

For me, It has been through moving out of projection based relationships, and ways of navigating the world, and working with the words attunement and curiosity this year, that has really helped me have deep, authentic connections with those I love and work with. It has been nothing short of revelatory to meet the world as it is, rather than how I am.

Art by Koi Cosmos on Shuffle