posted January 02, 2011 09:26 PM
Tuesday: Mercury conjoins the Great Attractor
Published by Genevieve Salerno at 6:00 am under Daily Astrology,Daily aspect |Back to Planet Waves Main Page | Print this Article
Dear Friend and Reader,
We are in the middle of enjoying the conjunction between Venus and Jupiter; a time when the air overflows with big love and dreams, where you want to take your arrow and point it up into the sky and let it fly you don’t care where, as long as you can watch its gorgeous flight. Fittingly, Mercury in Sagittarius is bouncing its way across the Great Attractor. This phenomenon can be described as the senses heightened by a feeling of One-ness, perhaps the same uniformity experienced by a group of little fish in the sea.
Photo by Danielle Voirin.
The Great Attractor is located in Sagittarius. Basically it’s a shapeless shade of mystery so heavy that it is pulling the galaxies towards it. It is believed that the Andromeda Galaxy is headed towards ours at 200,000 miles an hour, lured by the pull of this mighty force waiting just beyond. It is hard to tell what exactly the thing is; many astronomers are more comfortable calling it a quasar as supposed to a blackhole. Personally, I prefer to call it the Giant WTF. For a more serious explanation of what the Great Attractor is, please read The Centaur’s Arrow, an article Eric wrote with the help of Phil Sedgwick.
Astrologically speaking, the Great Attractor seems to present a sense of optical illusion in a chart, or a skewed or exaggerated perception. Sedgwick writes: “The perception is that people on the Great Attractor have unusual appeal or potency. They find themselves in vast circles, accidentally. Or they have impacted masses of people and think they have created no influence in their lives whatsoever.”
Another interesting aspect of the Great Attractor is the fact that no one knows what this thing looks like, yet everything is racing towards it. Do you remember those cartoons with Pepe LePeaux (the Warner Brother’s skunk?) He had this love interest, who was a cat, and he was always running after her, in hot pursuit and as much as he ran towards her, she ran away. The power of attraction and the energy of the hunt comes through with the Great Attractor. Time and space bend and become something different. It is no longer a distance of twenty feet, it’s just distance to be crossed.
Mercury is regarded as the planet of the intellect, the mind and communication. This is partly due to the speed with which it travels around the Sun. When the Greeks met the Scandinavians and introduced their gods to one another, the Scandinavians found a lot of similarities between Mercury and Odin. Odin is the god of poetry, among other things in the Norse tradition. Another name for him is Wanderer.
I suggest that this conjunction signifies a journey of unknown distance. Perhaps it is freeing to know that you have so much more in store for you, perhaps it is daunting to know you have many more miles before you sleep. Either way, the time and space which this journey of the mind will undertake is unknown. Perhaps, since Sagittarius-Mercury can be a bit…scatterbrained, it is an image of the mind-as-rubber-ball, caterwauling through the annals of consciousness, and coming to the realization that the walls, the aisles, the whole system, also represents a part of you. Or does it?
The Great Attractor, in many ways, is an optical illusion. Mercury combined with the Great Attractor is the mirror of perception. To quote Anais Nin: We do not see the world as it is, we see the world as we are.
Merry Met,
Genevieve http://www.linda-goodman.com/cgi-bin/ubb/postings.cgi?action=reply&forum=Astrology&number=1&topic=018991.cgi&TopicSubject=Does+The+Great+Attractor+Have+Any+Meaning+in+Astrology|QUS |
The Great Attractor
Following is an excerpt from The Soul of the Sky, one of the many components of my Galactic Trilogy CD. This article is copyrighted and may be used for classes and handouts, but it may NOT be posted on other websites. To purchase the continuously updated Galactic Trilogy CD, simply click here.
The Great Attractor (Abell 3627)
Tropical Longitude:14 Sagittarius 02 22 (epoch 2000.0)
Latitude: 38 S 54
Sidereal Longitude: 19 Scorpio 18 11
Right Ascension: 243 53 12
Declination: 64 S 55
At a distance of some 65 Mega-parsecs away, in the general direction of Centaurus, a massive galactic anomaly quietly does its work. This enigma slowly sips upon a liquid-like flow of galaxies drawing them into its huge gravitational grip, following in a river-like stream at an astonishing 600 km/sec. This migration of galactic matter includes the extensive Virgo Cluster, the Hydra-Centaurus Supercluster, other groups and clusters and the Local Group - that would be us and our 30 plus galactic companions. For approximately 60 Mega-parsecs both upstream and downstream from us in this river, everything heads in the direction of the galactic cluster, Abell 3627. This astrophysical enigma is both huge and perplexing - thus, its unofficial, official namesake: The Great Attractor!
What the Great Attractor is remains a mystery. It clearly reveals relativistic characteristics - those of warping time and space while bending light with its massive gravity. But it lacks the event horizon required for it to be a black hole. This point demonstrates the radio source energy common within a Quasi-Stellar Object (Quasar). It shows strong retreat tendencies through its extreme red shift. Contradictorily, it has a huge ultraviolet contingent, just outside the range of blue to violet light. The variability of visible light shows in its notably broad absorption beams.
The enormous gravity of the Great Attractor actually bends light around it. It bends the light so much, that a glimpse of what is behind it can be taken. This quality of gravitational lensing provides clear behind the scenes insights, while simultaneously offering other refractive illusions. All we truly know is that it’s big.
Several interesting factors immediately jump about the physical operation of the Great Attractor (GA). First, it recedes from us at a fantastically high velocity, as indicated by its red shift. At the same time the extreme ultraviolet energy coming from beyond the opposite end of the light spectrum renders an approaching appearance. While this complex point actively recedes, it summons an energy of “come hither.” Once engaged, this pull exceeds anything known. The attraction to this point possesses a seductive tone, but in a classical Sagittarian mode. There’s something about it. It seems to possess this energy - it’s mysterious, it’s captivating, it might even be a direct personification of the Creator! Regardless, it knows something you have to know. One thinks, “While the path into the Great Attractor might tear me apart with unimaginable tidal forces, flood me inside and out with radiation of unknown proportion or whatever, I simply must seek out this knowledge.” If fact, the knowledge factors of this enigma are so strong that one will risk the factuality of their own beliefs in the interest of pure knowledge. Issues of rightness, wrongness and fallibility fail to matter here. The matter is knowing the way it all really works.
It’s an inescapable force, or so it seems. A factor that emerges within the GA is that of free will. Do we have free will and consciousness? Or do we remain subject to the immutable laws of the physical forces of nature? Given the massive gravity of the GA, it would appear that the latter principle will hold up in the Universal realms. Once engaged, there is no hope. You will be swept away. There is no control. No act of volition can alter this fact of life. Something interesting does precede the gravitational capture. That notation comes in the form of curiosity.
Curiosity is a curious thing. To be curious one must fixate attention on a specific factor. Once tuned to a set frequency of attention, the investigative inquiry sets course of pursuit. The same agenda applies with the Great Attractor. It sends out an intriguing prod. Its message covers a gamut of frequencies. It’s hard to miss. And, it captures interest and draws attention, exactly like it has done in the astrophysical community. Here, lies the critical point. A choice occurs, in which one agrees to fix attention to a specific frequency. One responds to the intriguing invitation of this huge anomaly. Attention to this fact helps immensely. This prevents the sensation of being circumstantially captured by a “fact” of life. The Great Attractor symbolizes the most interesting informational flyer put out by a cult. Once inside the walls of such a consciousness dictatorship, escape remains difficult to nearly impossible. The same idea applies to those who believe they attached themselves to the absolute truth as rendered by the very Mouth of God to their selective ears. The correctness of a political, social, philosophical or intellectual quest all fall subject to the same intense draw. Initially, needing to know how life really works creates the best engraved invitation one might ever see. Curiosity creates a conscious choice. And according to the Great Attractor, it is worth risking personal rightness and righteousness.
Here’s the dilemma. Usually, the initial attraction occurs with a precise attunement to a specific frequency. The Great Attractor, like many galactic points, emanates freely in all spectrums. To be fully attuned requires internal responsiveness to all frequencies. Consciousness lies in the inclusion of all frequencies. “Rightness” prevails in maintaining but one specific, critical spectrum as the focus of one’s obsession. And with the Great Attractor’s wide-ranging nature, a case can be made for anything. No matter if polarized by attachment to consensus reality or not, it makes sense in the eye of the beholder.
All the worlds’ religions make this point. They all have the way of seeing God that fits the mind set of the region, the necessity of life according to geography and what the Earth renders, which includes the finding of artifacts or inspiration from nature. Is one religious doctrine more right than the other? With the nature of religious war as the cornerstone of human history, it would seem that people believe they are more right than others. In the aftermath of September 11th’s attacks in New York and Washington, one talk show had religious leaders discussing the saneness/insanity of the right view of God issue. The Muslim Cleric remained open to the doctrines and views of others. So did the Jewish Rabbi. There was one Christian Minister (not intending to be a blanket statement about Christian leaders or believers) who insistently reported that the Jews and Muslims are wrong and “Won’t they be sorry on Judgment Day?” The extremes of the Great Attractor became undeniably and shamefully clear.
The ideal of the Great Attractor shows itself in the views of the Muslim and Jew on the talk show. Certainly one possesses their own attunement to their personal view of God and spirituality. The emission lines of the Great Attractor remain “broad.” Broad contrasts with narrow. A narrow view (or opinionated nature) does not fit with the Great Attractor. A broader, more inclusive of all variables, view works with more infinite precision - not to mention wisdom. There is not one simple answer. Perhaps each point of focus is only a fragment of the hologram of understanding, which should still be able to read accurately, concisely and inclusively. As the hologram of truth, any one position contains the essence of every other position.
Those possessing GA contacts, thus serve as a point of objectivity. They seek to enlighten others to the fact that there is yet another way. Often to do this, they will polarize. The point is: to make the point. The point will be made. Sometimes the point is purely Sagittarian offering a puncturing insight. Other times the point is a bit more subtle, perhaps circuitous or round about in its nature. The essence of GA insists that multiple points be understood in all of the available far-reaching realms of energy emanation. Then, and only then, can one be secure in opinion or belief without worry of being contaminated by short-sighted, biased points of view.
One of the more phenomenal aspects of the GA is its capacity for gravitational lensing. The mass of this thing remains incalculable and incomprehensible. Suffice it to say it’s more than likely bigger than anything known. How big probably will remain an unknown fact. One thing we do know: gravity bends light. Something massive possesses great gravity. The pull of the GA is so strong it can actually bend light around it. In fact, it could pull a light beam so far around it that the appearance would be one of literally being able to see behind it! While this occurs, a wide range of light scattering can occur. This creates refraction patterns around the gravitational core - the object’s center of mass. As it rotates, as most gravity bending objects do, the pattern shifts in a kaleidoscopic manner. While the light refractions remain intriguing, they also contain illusionary effects. The standard lensing patterns bear names like: radial arc, giant arc, Einstein Ring and the Einstein Cross.
Not all light from such a source in space reaches an observer. According to one definition offered: the only light to reach an observer is that light bending through the correct angle. The implications of attitude, knowledge, wisdom and consciousness in that light suggestion are as massive as the Great Attractor itself.
Another interesting technical note is that when the source of the light and its center of mass stand aligned, the resulting light display is the Einstein cross. This could go many directions symbolically. The obvious would be creating absolute unity at the core - in this case, perhaps we could assume the soul’s essence contained perfectly in the center of mass of the body all the while including the influence of things coming from every corner of the cross (direction).
The most amazing factor of the lensing is that we can literally see around something. The “just around the bend” phenomena occurs. When driving on mountain roads where visual impairment exists at every turn, a “sense” of what might be coming can keep a driver safe. After all, a Sagittarian principle does apply to driving: It seems so restrictive to have to stay within the lines painted on the roadway trying to define safe lanes. The natural curvature of the road and the full use of centripetal forces can be better applied by not staying within the lines. Being able to do so safely would be an ultimate factor of determination.
This “Around the Bend” effect deals with precognition in real time. The immediate environment can be read. Or can it? With light and the time it takes to travel even a minimal distance, wouldn’t the perception be past tense? For those wondering why psychics cannot get the timing thing right in your future, this might be a starting point. A critical point arises here. If you do see around the bend to perceive an oncoming obstacle or hazard, you adjust. Within the adjustment is correction. You determine a course of action to ensure safe passage. The question is: Can you allow yourself to heed the warning, or will the attachment to “correctness” in one form or another interfere?
Recently, the world experienced such an effect through the politics of the United States. It’s a bit of a Sagittarian safari to make the point, but here goes. In Cuba, a little boy was born on December 6, 1993 in Cardenas. His name is Elian Gonzalez. An estimated birth time of Noon provides him a Sun at 14 Sagittarius 30 or so, within a tight conjunction to the Great Attractor. In November 1999 he and his mother (and some other refugees) set out for the United States on less than optimal vessels. During the voyage, Elian’s mother drowned in the ocean. He was nuzzled by protective dolphins toward the coast of southern Florida where the US Immigration Service intercepted him at sea.
The rule goes that if Immigration catches you at sea, they send you back. Once a refugee sets foot on dry land, they can stay. But Elian lost his mother, was adrift and alone. So Immigration brought him to Miami. Now his feet were on the ground. The difficult factor beginning here is that none of the hard core rules of immigration law applied. With the massive Cuban population in Miami, the child immediately became something of a patron saint symbolizing all their strife and hardship. Certainly, he became an icon of a seriously flawed immigration policy in which exceptions could be made, politically pressured and perhaps even purchased. After a series of complicated and highly charged meetings, Elian was returned to his father in Cuba. The sensitivities around his deportation stopped just short of igniting a powder keg of reactions in the Miami Cuban community. As an aside note to Elian’s story, as Pluto passed by the Great Attractor in late 2001, the Miami home where he stayed and was captured by Immigration, became a museum.
In the aftermath of Elian’s story, it became apparent that Immigration needed to solidify its position. Oddly, the opposite seemed to happen. In January 2001, Pluto made one of its contacts with the Great Attractor. US Immigration intercepted an individual named, Mohammed Atta, on a visa inconsistency. Detained in Customs, US inspectors puzzled over what to do. Ultimately, he was released. Later in the year, he was stopped for a vehicle violation. The visa inconsistency again flagged the system. Again, nothing happened to detain or deport Atta. On September 11, 2001, Mohammed Atta allegedly piloted the first hijacked aircraft into the World Trade Center towers.
Nearly two years before 9/11, the gravity of the flaws in the immigration policies of the United States became blatantly observed. The suggestion was that the absolute letter of the law be followed - and in that remaining consistent with the pure essence of Sagittarius. In the instances of Elian Gonzalez, they blew it a few times, then ultimately followed the letter of the law. The outrage and criticism softened the resolve. Had the letter of the law been followed, Atta would have been deported on either one of two occasions. We’ll never know if that action would have prevented the attacks of September 11th. Maybe they would have happened anyway. But Atta would not have been flying one of those planes. And if the other hijackers on the FBI’s watch list been dealt with in a letter-of-the-law way, it would have been even more difficult for the attacks to have occurred. So does that now justify the racial, ethnic and theological profiling leaking over the clear boundaries of civil rights? It’s complicated and simple.
Despite the controversy over whether US Intelligence ignored warnings, US Immigration ignored warnings. Regardless, the lensing was there, and as clear as could be.
But within the ability to see behind is the resulting refraction patterns. These pretty pictures offer illusionary images - or are they holographic representations of reality? The haunting question of how does one trust precognitive impressions comes to light. Is this a real image of what is to yet unfold, or is it an aberration of light? Is it smoke? Is it a clear view in a mirror, which might be reversed?
These Great Attractor issues shadow anyone employing the foresight of its essence. Oddly, foresight and hindsight go hand in hand. Astrologer, Robert Hand, has his Sun conjunct the Great Attractor. His effort into the translation of classical astrology texts paves the path of the future of astrology. The extreme ranges of the GA peacefully coexist in such an effort. Per his reporting, some of these ancient texts possess more metaphysical awareness than the essence of the “upstart” humanistic movement of astrology occurring in the 20th Century. And he reveals that many of the cross-cultural astrology texts bear striking similarities.
As a point of contrast, the eternal, Strom Thurmond, Senator from the great state of South Carolina ran for the U.S. Presidency on a segregationalist platform in the 1940's. His birthday provides him with a Sun directly on the Great Attractor. Philosophical recklessness, bigotry and hatred can derail the lofty agenda of the GA, all the whilst attracting quite a philosophically inflamed and rapid crowd.
Meanwhile, the distinction between real and aberrant riles the cattle back on the proverbial ranch. Is one psychic, or delusional? It’s been said that a fine line exists between the dreaded psychotic break and the desired spiritual awakening. So fine is the line that these events can be indistinguishable. So what is it that this person in such a state of molt is actually doing? Maybe it depends upon the point of view, the focus of the spectrum and the angle of the lensing of the moment. In a lecture, Robert Hand once quoted the quote that goes, “Sanity is knowing what not to tell your therapist.” The actual process of spiritual evolution begins with such contradictory displays of light and the shed effects can be scary. Like shadows cast upon a wall by a dancing fire, the shapes run the spectrum between angelic forms and demonic entities. The Great Attractor points out that the observer is the one with the only meaningful perspective in what matters. Even those standing immediately next to an individual do not catch the same light beams. They might entirely miss the perceived gravity of the situation.
The conflict between brilliance and sheer madness goes on. Throughout history many creative geniuses went in and out of sanity by the bell curve of distribution of human behavior - appropriate human behavior. This staying inside the box mentality insists upon its foothold. Oddly, the current trend in corporate structure is to highly pay consultants who think outside the box.
This effect of the Great Attractor cues in on another noteworthy astrological effect. One day I made a comment and a joke to Rob Hand about his Great Attractor-Sun connection. Naturally, he already knew about it. He returned his own comment observing that this is also the axis of the nodes of Uranus. True it is. The South Uranian Node (heliocentrically) directly aligns the Great Attractor.
This nodal addition highlights the extremism of the Great Attractor adding the free-spirited, “must maintain my individuality” theme at all costs tone of Uranus. Certainly, eccentricity prevails. The one showing the eccentricity gets away with it, especially if promulgating the best of universal knowledge - again, all without bias.
Given that Sagittarius holds the reputation for remaining uncontainable while in an interpersonal relationship, this degree promotes the most enthusiastic support for that trait of all of the degrees of Sagittarius. Words like subjugation, irrepressible, independent, non-confining, space-allowing and the like often receive dramatic declaration within the expression of this zodiacal longitude.
Ironically, once these people show what they know, others flock to them like flies to melting ice cream on a hot summer day. The Sag quickly points out how sticky it all gets.
Should one hold strong GA connections, these attributes directly apply in the real world. Others make the assumption that GA people have something important to say. Ideally, the GA person grasps the gravity of that situation all by themselves. It’s easier that way. Self-realization helps. They do not need to experience crowding as the mechanism for understanding their input to life. Simply and graciously, they receive the accolades rendered to their insight and knowing.
Diana Stone, an astrologer doing a keynote at a Norwac conference, while jokingly referring to Robert Hand’s other lives, mentioned that he knew everything in those lifetimes, too. Some connected with the GA have their lights on a high beam. Others, like Strom Thurmond (and maybe General George Armstrong Custer, too) historically set their lights persistently in low beam mode, or so it would appear.
Elian Gonzalez noted to the world those immigration policies, not only in the United States but other countries as well, need rectification. This issue does not even begin to address the subjugation of Cubans to a dictatorial government. That’s another Great Attractor story of being able to see beyond the obvious and remaining blind.
As a more personal example, an elementary school teacher with the Sun on the GA consistently receives compliments, praise and thanks from parents and students alike, for the constructive influence her innovative teaching methods provided. With visualizations (a school system acceptable version of mediation), interesting outside classes rich in culture and philosophy, she offered potentially transforming ideas - and more than they would have received in many other classrooms. Her students and their parents report that her classes were not just a positive influence. They changed the life of the child and those of the parents. Truly transformative, she helped them see around the bend, prepares for the future and make life-altering changes of a positive nature.
A participant in a lecture reported that her husband, with the GA on his rising sign, remains perplexed as to why everyone at work insists that he know answers to difficult questions. Not sure if he’s equipped to answer the questions, though he is, he retreats.
The GA shows up in the mundane world as well. Jupiter in the Titanic’s collision with the iceberg is within a degree of retrograding back to the Great Attractor. The unsinkable sank. The infallible failed. What that does to the confidence of human knowledge is staggering. The best state of the art human engineering - a function of knowing - failed. As Pluto (conjunct) and Saturn (opposed) hovered about the Great Attractor in November 2001, a state of the art airliner fell apart in the sky. Its tail came off. Then, the engines and parts of the wing separated. This does not happen. The jury is still out as to what happened and what technical or procedural revisions that will come from this. The jury is also out as to whether the general public will ever know the full truth of this situation.
The Great Attractor reminds us all that knowledge must evolve in order for us to be aligned in any moment with full consciousness. The GA notes that we cannot forget the past. Clear perception of “now” sets the stage. We cannot ignore the forthcoming. Equally, maybe even more significantly, the view of the moment and its perception of in front and behind remains the most important view to hold clearly. Is this view clear and accurately insightful? Could the view be distorted?
Only the Great Attractor knows. And the GA reveals the present state in full, unlimited and wide-ranging attention. Where should the view be placed? Can that view be upheld while understanding that all points of view simultaneously exist? Perhaps seeing Einstein’s Cross would be ideal. Center the source of your light within the matter of your life. What matters clearly focuses your truth. http://www.philipsedgwick.com/
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"The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched, they must be felt with the heart”
`Helen Keller quotes
Lindaland
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