New Moon in Gemini Newsletter

How to embrace our minds without falling prey to them (as often)

This New Moon in Gemini will test our capacity to see through our own confusion and illusory thinking, reminding us to be discerning and that we must have processes for seeing ourselves clearly.

The 3rd sign in the zodiac, we have our first instance of mutable energy with Gemini. Mutable signs are agile and adaptable, capable of changing their minds and seeing from multiple perspectives. Gemin’s hallmark is curiosity and intellect. Gemini loves conversation and dialogue.

This is a great time to be social, open up inner dialogues, and reach out to a teacher.

Gemini is also known for its dual nature, as its symbol is the twins, classically associated with the Greek myth of Castor & Pollux.

Castor & Pollux were twins with different fathers. Pollux was the son of Zeus, and Castor was born of a mortal father. Even though they bore this fundamental difference, the two were inseparable. In one battle, Castor suffered a mortal wound and Pollux begged Zeus to save him so that they could remain together. Zeus granted this wish by placing them in the sky as the constellation Gemini.

If we consider mythological characters to be aspects of the archetypal self, the story of Castor & Pollux could be a reference to the duality of man, the head, and the heart. We have a part of us that is eternal, unchanging, and divine (Pollux) and we participate in a life that is change, that ends, and that has limitations (Castor).

This is why Gemini has a reputation for being two-faced. Especially when it is unenlightened, Gemini lives in its mind, a sea of change that is understood in terms of its limits. Enlightened Gemini is able to access its vast mental aptitude from the grounding of its heart. When we live entirely in our minds, we are often slaves to our minds, rather than the master of our minds.

Now is a good time to remember that our mind is a tool, and an incredibly useful one.

We ought not repress the power of the mind or give it control. Harnessing the power of the mind impacts our capacity to interact with the very fabric of reality. If we look to Sagittarius, Gemini’s opposite, we see the spiritual truth that mind and brain are not synonymous. Mind is a layer of reality, a kosha or sheath through which consciousness can explore itself.

The meditative practices of Sagittarius can show us, fairly simply, that we are not our minds and our thoughts. Our capacity to observe our thoughts from a place of relative equanimity shows that subject can become object (the observer can become the observed).

Because we seem to experience centralized awareness, we often assume that the experience of mind is one that is centralized within our bodies. Indeed, the rational materialist paradigm would have you believe that consciousness is little more than neurons firing in an advanced brain.

Leo Gura of actualized.org has done incredible work on the problem of Self-Deception. His 3 part series is essential for anyone exploring metaphysics and personal development. He has clearly wrestled and contended with the nature of “his” mind and filtered his experiences through many spiritual traditions and psychological frameworks.

In the first episode, he shows us why it is essential for us to understand the dangers of self-deception. A fairly rudimentary spiritual truth and realization is that we live in an illusion, what the ancients called “the Maya”. Essentially, this reality is not the supreme one. It is a place for the true nature of consciousness to explore itself and participate in a ”Drama”. It is from this supreme, non-dual, place that exploration begins. Non-dual, in this case, means that everything, pain, and pleasure, is essentially all the same in the grand scheme of things.

For the non-dual layer of consciousness, the mind is actually a tool to convince us that this is the only reality. The job of the mind is to make us forget about where we came from.

The mind is designed to deceive us. Its top priority, at all times, is to maintain the illusion, to make us forget where we came from.

This is the big message of this New Moon. We have to be aware of the ways in which we deceive ourselves. Neptune is square to the New Moon, and while Neptune is in Pisces, lines are blurred, confusion reigns, and we are liable - likely - to fall prey to deception.

There are many who point the finger outward, and say, “It is they who are deceiving us”. Or, more commonly, “they’re the ones that are deluded”.

Not so fast. Why does this idea of a “man behind the curtain” seem to persist?

It’s because it is the very nature of the mind. It is the mechanism by which the mind focuses our consciousness on this reality. We are the deceiver and the deceived. We have a nagging paranoia that someone is pulling a fast one on us.

As Leo says in his video (I’m paraphrasing), “If you knew the real conspiracy, the one your mind is pulling on you, even the most elaborate conspiracy theories would seem like peanuts. Nothing”

This is one reason why psychedelic experiences can be so destabilizing for some. Seeing the truth often means that we become aware of all of the lies we tell ourselves.

Then we make assumptions based on those lies, and those assumptions prop up other assumptions, and pretty soon, we’re all completely lost and confused.

We realize we’ve been wrong. We’re not just the man behind the curtain, we’re Dorothy, the Tin Man, Morpheus, Agent Smith, Neo, the Architect, and Cypher, too.

We’re both Jesus and Judas.

We’re Castor AND Pollux.

We have to be both our head and our heart.

How to Account for Self-deception

The most reliable way to become aware of our blind spots is to ask for honest feedback. There seems to be an aversion to this kind of practice in modern spiritual communities since we have to be “sovereign” individuals and we’re not supposed to care how others see us, as long as we’re “authentic”.

We can never see ourselves fully. It is important that we use Gemini’s gift of taking multiple perspectives as best we can to see ourselves.

Ask someone you trust, “What mistakes do you think I make regularly?” “How would you live my life differently?” “What’s my problem?” “What am I doing wrong?”

Tell them not to hold back. Even if they’re 80% projecting, you can learn a lot from the other 20%. Rather than defend yourself, try your best to understand what they are saying.

If you have resistance to this, it’s likely because your ego is trying to shield you from seeing your own self-deception.

Breathe and be curious. If you can stay curious, you will unlock your full potential.

This is the promise of Gemini.

How am I working with this?

Two ways: First, I am actively cultivating a community of men and building trust so that we can be mirrors for each other and hold each other accountable, with love. I am asking for reflections from the people who I know to do this type of work, too.

Second, I have been experimenting with a shadow work exercise for several years called the 3-2-1 Shadow Process. It’s simple, elegant, and highly effective at clarifying if there is any shadow material I am not seeing.

One adaptation of this is to open up a mock “dialogue” with someone you have experienced conflict with, in journal form. Write out both sides of the dialogue, with the intention to see what you are missing, and keep at it.

Often, I’ll write for a while, set it down, and come back in a few days. It can take up several pages each sitting, or just one. Some of these practices have gone on for weeks. If I’m still thinking about it, I’ll keep writing about it.

Don’t worry about hitting the home run. Put in the reps and see what emerges out of your genuine curiosity.

Once it’s all been dragged out into the mock dialogue, you can then write about yourself from their perspective. If you can do this from a place of understanding, it’s possible for breakthroughs here.

Working with a guide is really helpful to the process. If you’re curious what that might look like, reach out for a free 30-minute call.