I am OPTimist

“The world which is described from observation is a manifestation of the mental activity of the observer. When man discovers that his world is his own mental activity made visible, that no man can come unto him except he draws him, and that there is no one to change but himself, his own imaginative self, his first impulse is to reshape the world in the image of his ideal. But his ideal is not so easily incarnated. At that moment when he ceases to conform to external discipline, he must impose upon himself a far more rigorous discipline, the self-discipline upon which the realization of his ideal depends.” ― Neville Goddard, Awakened Imagination

What lies in the consciousness

A new stream, another current, a novel path? A different journey, a diverse perception, an innovative way of thinking– but is it new? Or is it consolidating? Refining? Restructuring? 

Some new ideas emerge, or new ways of implementing them not traveled before…

How about another P.O.V.? 

It is so interesting to know, to know for a fact, that what I have learned thus far is something that I have tried, experienced, and assimilated. And that I can change my mind, as many times as I want, once I verify what is correct for my design. 

Now– do you want to master it? And to know it? 

This is a great experiment (life).

The ways that made me evolve in the last few years…

-Deep Listening

-Asking questions {I never stopped questioning the narrative} 

Looking at how I related to those thoughts that I once believed were what defined me. Finding out that they were just thoughts, I practiced them so religiously that I enacted them as true. 

On May 16, 2019, when Uranus met Venus and first touched my Jupiter at 3°Taurus (where the North Node of the Moon and Jupiter are meeting on 06.01.23), my floor shook.  I felt that if I resisted the strength of the wind, it would break everything inside that held me together (my reality)... so I surrendered… (not without a fight). 

Look at your journals– what was happening around May 16, 2019? Saturn was in Capricorn between the South Node and Pluto, little did we know what was coming 9 months later…

This is important because it was the summer before the lockdown, and somehow our memory has probably been fading, as so many insane events are still unfolding. 

In my case, because of Uranus’ disruptive nature in Taurus, my ground was being shaken, and the belief systems that defined me for a long time started to be uprooted; I was deciding to sell all my storage, give up my NYC’s artist studio, and leave only what I needed and could pack in two days. I could feel the waves of change... I had a sense I had to follow, and so I did. Now I find myself on another, completely exciting, journey. Four years later, almost to the date (one-third of Jupiter’s journey around its cycle), two cycles have ended: one that started in May 2004, when the North Node met Jupiter at 11°Taurus; and another, not so minor, when Jupiter was in the same degree it is today, at end of 2011. (Degrees in the Zodiac carry a frequency that holds a memory with information, which becomes relevant at different times.) 

I can say that the routes I traveled make sense in retrospect. Jupiter is looking for meaning, it expands horizons looking to implement ideas. Now beware of Taurus’ energy, my friends… as stable as it is, it carries an energy of stubbornness.

-Are you the same person you thought you were back in 2019? And the persona you are now, do they resemble, look alike, or have they been radically transformed? We all have Jupiter somewhere in our chart, and that is what has the potential to be transformed, as Pluto squares it along with the nodes. The reflection is about ways of thinking, ideologies, social constructs, belief systems, propaganda, information, data, and experience.

The innovative part of the journey is what I want you to look for– finding the courage to be unique, and embracing your singularity, will support the losses and close structures that are in decay.  The journey can be, and will be, grounded in innovative ways when Jupiter conjuncts Uranus, April 20th, 2024. 

The choices you have already made by letting go of addictive behavior will celebrate a new relationship to the leverage you now have within all kinds of relationships (Feb 21, 2024, when Venus, Mars [rulers of the nodes], Pluto in Aquarius, North Node in Aries, and Chiron meetup).

Also, look at what is closing, dissolving, as Saturn spends time in Pisces supporting this venture, allowing the stagnation and decay to evaporate and to mourn, while also supporting what is emerging - 

Some journeys are very well known, journeys that have been recorded and told as fable stories– these heroes and heroines incorporated confrontations, hallucinations, battles, and moments of insight.  They all went through a path of seeking and experiences. These memories, or scars, defined our lives, allowing each moment to be lived in truth.

There was no holding to ideas so fiercely, for what these heroes found was either death in a Valhalla, the battle where all fundamentalists are carrying blood in their hands, or imprisonment inside their heads with absolute-isms.

Deep inside we all know and sense that we are ONE– it is not just a “religious” or “woo-woo thing”-- it is the truth about what Spirit knows: we are all particles of dust from dead stars that have been shattered at the beginning. And while we carry the idea of singularity in the Maia, we still fight fiercely in the duality of the light and the shadow, perceiving our uniqueness as independent beings, and like lunatics, we fight the dark side aimlessly. 

While all we can do is embrace the light and integrate what is triggering the discomfort. 

But in truth, that is only a lens, an opportunity that can so gracefully lead to one or many (r)evolutions. 

Life on earth is a lease, a contract with spirit, as we wake up from the nightmare of duality that keeps painfully separating our bodies, by nominating and dissecting genders, ideologies, and disguising the fear behind mask-personas that are purely mental constructs. Like in ancient Greece, where you could be shamed and stoned to death, all these static belief systems arrive as cancel culture. The fear is real. 

But not mine– you can cancel me all you’d like, for I neither can, nor will, abide by your conditions!

When one knows and surrenders to their design, there is only flow: - Bruce Lee’s quote here ___ (place holder)- Be water, my friends-

The more labeling, the more separation, the more suffering, and the more loss of hope.

The stream is the journey, the wind helps the sails, and the knowledge of the stars finally orients us correctly to the position our crystal has been in from the beginning of time– this holographic image of the whole universe, that you are, the fractal mirrors ALL THAT IS, at all times. 

opportunity (n.) "fit, convenient, suitable, favorable," from the phrase ob portum veniens "coming toward a port," in reference to the wind, from ob "in front of; toward" (see ob-) + portus "harbor" (see port (n.1)).

Luck vs decision making 

I don’t believe in luck, but in making the right decisions, opportunities abound. But are we choosing what is correct for our singularity? [By the way, to the curious mind, Human Design is the practice to understand, to know your design so you can make the right decisions based on your authority and type.] 

I have been facilitating study groups in the last year or so - they differ from workshops. It makes me feel I don’t have to carry the weight of the group - instead, leading by example, Venus in Gate 45.5, I encourage everyone to create a relationship with their individual sense of values and provide support to the tribe with educational resources. 

Jupiter, as the teacher, can be projected as the guru, and also as the disciple…

I sent this video message to my friend ELLERY JAMES ROBERTS on December 4th, 2022, we had a conversation that morning that I wished I had recorded, so later in the day, I felt inspired, and I created the video below. It was sent as an open dialogue/invitation, although today I see it more as an inner dialogue, a statement of an era that unbeknownst to me was about to close. In retrospect, I had just started to become quite conscious about the shift I was going through. I also see it as a reaffirmation of a path I embarked on this life with only one thing in mind: [R] evolution.

Today, almost 180 days later, I am in the midst of a Synthesis, as I am still integrating my recent past, where I have been so focused on learning to relate differently with what I value, to my resources, educating myself with new technologies, amplifying and diversifying among multiple themes, and alternative views. My curiosity has no ceiling, as I open my mind wider, and wider, the knowledge is proving to be extremely connected to the source, and everywhere I go, I see the trinity, the law of three, natural law always finds the way back to me, in harmonious, and synchronistic ways. 

I can only look up, raise my hands in prayer mode and give thanks with a huge smile and a sense of humility that at times I shed some tears down my cheeks, mind you these tears are full of joy.

In full alignment, the timing with its frequency vibrates in resonance sending various validating codes. 

I Surrender& Trust the Universewill give me what I needI am Grateful for the Life& Our Moment here on Earth.

Written & Produced by Lost Under Heaven

Before-after you hear-read the video message, I would like to invite you to watch-listen to Ellery and Ebony’s Lost Under Heaven’s new trailer (above) of their upcoming album Something is Announced by Your Life!, which releases June 2, 2023.

I hold dear the friendship I have created with both of them, individually and separately as it has offered me the space to inquire, deepen, and engage in collective growth filled with inspiration. I am grateful for their creative expression in this lifetime. I am elated to have minimally contributed to the creation of this album, and I fully support their courageous initiative of producing the record themselves with no middlemen! Be curious and engage with their offerings. 

Music is extremely important in my life, it is akin to the Divine Absolute and there is no harmony without numbers and no Logos without correspondence (ratio). 

Last thoughts of 2020:

-Christ as the archetype of the self - Carl Jung

-The second coming of the messiah means the advent of individuation...

-It is at a crossroads, where the individual stands today: inner or outer authority?

-Malevich’s cross and his manifesto are intended to underline the significance of felt sense.

I will elaborate further:

The cross has a long association with religion and mysticism. It is a simple form that contains strong echoes of religious doctrine and devotion.

Representing the sublime or the divine may take figurative and non-figurative forms-

The cross has a long association with religion and mysticism. It is a simple form that contains strong echoes of religious doctrine and devotion. Similarly, the idea of a crossroads or a cross street contains a reference to change, uncertainty, and the need for a decision. A cross is at once threatening, laden with associations of death and penance in the religious canon, and conversely, full of opportunity and a new beginning in the public consciousness.

Let’s remember his manifesto: where he exposes the felt sense or the emotional body to be one that embodies the perspective

By 'Suprematism' I mean the supremacy of pure feeling in creative art. To the Suprematist the visual phenomena of the objective world are, in themselves, meaningless; the significant thing is feeling."

[Initially published in a private social media group]

Enjoy the North node + Jupiter conjunction at 3° 30 Taurus, which happens to conjunct my natal Jupiter at exactly 3° 34! I am having my 5th Jupiter return, a typical Jovian cycle’s duration is 12 years.

NOte: it is a long one, I won’t post anything next week, enjoy!

Masks off

A few weeks ago I was packing to go for a week down to Bogota where the average temperature is 15°C [60°F], and since I moved to Miami Beach my average temp is 26 °C [80°F]. When I was choosing what to pack and wear in the colder weather, I paused in surprise and asked: 

-Whose are these garments? Who is the person wearing these clothes? LOL!

I could not recognize the now Monika with the Monika that lived in NYC and spent 27 winters there!

So the persona I had embodied was no longer vibrating at the same frequency now, after 33 months [almost three years], and that brought a huge smile to my face! ‘Evolution’ means growth to maturity and development of an individual living thing, also felt as a detachment, a growing out, growing up, letting go, innovating, mutating…

How many Personas have I consciously left behind, shed, and disembodied so drastically, and at times smoothly and less violently? Two? Three? Four? Does it have anything to do with celestial alignments, sine wave oscillations that meet again and again, such as Saturn's returns [every 28.5 years], or lunar nodes returning and passing through specific angles every 18.6 years? Fractions of that perhaps? 

Well, I feel these geometric events that happen as harmonious or not so harmonious serve as validators and reminders of what surrendering to my Geometry is.

The last lunar eclipse was very potent, the cycle of the last 18.612958 years (6,798.383 days) completed yet again another revolution in my chart. 

What did I release? The masks I had to wear just to be! (Or I thought I needed to be!) Gabor Maté calls these behaviors adaptations– at times one has to adapt to the environment because one does not feel safe and is lacking a connection to one’s essential needs, so one trades this connection for validation as a way to survive what is, thus there is no authenticity. One is acting out, wearing a mask, a persona. 

The deal is to start recognizing the adaptations and to work with them as one changes the ideas held behind that make their behavior endure. Changing a point of view, for instance, is an incredible event that supports evolution.

“The persona is what we would like to be and how we wish to be seen by the world. It is our psychological clothing and it mediates between our true selves and our environment just as our physical clothing presents an image to those we meet. The ego is what we are and know about consciously. The shadow is that part of us we fail to see or know.” ― Robert A. Johnson, Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the Psyche

On Nov 8, 2022, there was a lunar eclipse (full moon) at 16°of Taurus - Scorpio axis, Uranus was between the Moon and the North Node opposing my Neptune. The nodes were at 13° at the same axis, the dissolution of multiple personas I had worn started to be felt, and by May 5th, 2023, [178 days later] the lunar eclipse opened again another portal between my natal Moon at 12°18 Scorpio (just learned it aligns with Alphecca fixed star) and my natal Neptune (16° Scorpio). This time the full moon in was at 15° Scorpio.

Both celestial bodies are each at one side of my 13°Scorpio MC, which refers to the public persona. It felt as if the last 9 months had been a preparation for a new platform I am about to embark on. There is no defined shape, as I will work together with Jupiter entering Taurus and squaring Pluto– this is an opportunity for the collective to allow new views to shape new fields based on the now moment. Tradition is important, but as evolving specifies we can’t survive if all ideals become stagnant. 

The work I consciously started during 2017, is pretty integrated by now; Jupiter has gone ¼ of its 12-year cycle around the Sun, making sure to remind me to be open-minded. I can see it in my life, my face, my frame, my attitude. A friend in Bogota remarked about how different I look and behave.  In essence, it is still me, with less baggage and more joie de vivre!

If you see the drawing below, you’ll find 4 cardinal points that refer to 4 aspects of one’s journey: what drives it moment by moment (the Ascendant); what gives it emotional security (IC); the projection of the other is the beginning of shadow work as a synthesis (descendant); lastly, the public persona one portrays in society is what can be found at the top of the sky (MC). 

All social constructs demand humans to engage in pursuing a social status, to aim for social recognition, but this is a huge misunderstanding. Humans are looking for validation, and connection, not approval, and until this is integrated, one becomes a slave to outer authorities.

The persona is that which in reality one is not, but which oneself, as well as others, think one is.

C.G.Jung [“Concerning Rebirth,” CW 9i, par. 221.]

Authority, soverignty, and freedom

No certification or accreditation given by someone else will ever define my experience on this earthly plane

I say the above with a humble heart.

No teaching or teacher holds absolute power, for my path is made of practice and curiosity, which I have been able, somehow, in the most intense of ways, to nurture and develop as one of my strengths.

As a seeker and devotee of empirical practice, three years ago I left a stage that had become unsustainable; masks and costumes could no longer hide the pain of not being authentic. In the liberation path I let go one by one, external credit, acknowledgments, and found that my sense of value and authority comes from inside. 

For artists who usually live off accolades, it is indeed a road uphill, Trust must be found within the Divine; creativity unfolds and emerges as a confirmation of harmony. I look for integrity and as such, I am given opportunities to manifest large pieces of work that require time, for research and production, many times inquiring about new technologies. I also thrive in engaging with the needs of the community. My creativity is multifaceted and can generate many faces and dimensions, for in each endeavor, I commit 100%.

Since I follow my bliss, I have been asked to leave groups I had lovingly cared for. I have left others I no longer feel connected to, and instead of filling the gap with noise, I let the sound of my frequency reverberate. There is grace in accepting what ​​is. 

I have realized that the work in this lifetime is to just be me, and to only be available to those who are already committed to themselves and value the energy I can generate in a caring manner. Otherwise it will be like depleting the cauldron that is slowly cooking the nurturing elements.

I also took a deep dive into understanding everything about the nature of my reality– how it operated mechanically, and magically… and one amazing thing is how potent both sides of the spectrum are, the material and the spiritual and everything in between.

-Are you aware of your Personas?

-Are you willingly w…

Two unusual examples of the Gemini type in the field of letters are Dante and Bernard Shaw. Dante wrote his Inferno so that he could show in luminous verbiage all his enemies roasting in the pits of perdition. The Shavian humor has about it the bite of shallowness. It is not the deep laughter of the gods who understand all, but the shallow titillating laughter of mortals who understand not even themselves.”

― Manly P. Hall

PILGRIMAGE

To follow Dante in his pilgrimage is to follow the path of the human psyche, the human condition, and the experience of our existence. Dante offers a view of the hero’s journey from darkness to awakening, later known as the Jungian notion of individuation. Dante’s path is lyrical, literal, esoteric, anagogical, allegorical, deep, and sometimes moralistic. 

Witnessing it, one discovers stage by stage the process of living according to one’s design, illustrated as a political critique of the role of the individual in society. Dante tells the story of a protagonist (himself) who meets his hero (Virgil, the Roman poet), who becomes the voice of reason; the pilgrimage is a metaphor for self-inquiry. Virgil operates as a guide and creates in Dante an inner dia-logos, such as a relationship one can have with a journal, or with a therapist that listens and observes as one walks near the abyss. Virgil, as the other, creates a space where insights emerge for Dante (and for the viewer, who is the witness). 

The Divine Comedy accounts that individuals must take responsibility for their deeds and aim for ethical and moral virtues to live purposeful lives. I resonate with this part, and the way Dante uses allegory as a device, the poem contains a compelling socio-economic and political examination addressing corruption and justice in familiar ways that seem extremely relatable to the roles we have constructed and what is expected for the individual in society. In my view, Dante Alighieri, if alive today, would have been a Bitcoiner.

God spoke to him in a dream: “You live and will die in this prison so that a man I know of may see you a certain number of times and not forget you and place your figure and symbol in a poem which has its precise place in the scheme of the universe. You suffer captivity, but you will have given a word to the poem.”

[...] Years later, Dante was dying in Ravenna, as unjustified and as lonely as any other man. In a dream, God declared to him the secret purpose of his life and work; Dante, in wonderment, knew at last who and what he was and blessed the bitterness of his life. Tradition relates that, upon waking, he felt that he had received and lost an infinite thing, something that he would not be able to recuperate or even glimpse, for the machinery of the world, is much too complex for the simplicity of men.

Translated by J. E. I. Inferno, I, 32:: J. L. Borges

Virtuosity, Dante becomes Virgil for later writers

Fideli D’Amore Dante through Borges’eyes 

To observe Jorge Luis Borges follow Dante is to witness a path of admiration and pure enchantment; while Borges did not speak Italian (I do), he read the poem many, many times in the original text. As he mentions in his Seven-night lecture, the translation could serve as a stimulus for the reader to approach the original; he continues to say that Dante’s poetry is much more than what it says. Is Borges [or am I through him], stating that the pure comprehension of the beauty of this magnum opus is attained abstractly, rather than logically? 

The four mathematical arts are arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy; these anciently were termed the quadrivium, or fourfold way of knowledge.

Sir John Hawkins, "A General History of the Science and Practice of Music,1776

Borges says poetry is about intonation and accentuation.  Often untranslatable, for me, it is about feeling it, and finding patterns I can correlate with my present experience, of what I am in the midst of discovering… 

Borges adds that reading Dante like Shakespeare is a musical event, because each line must be read aloud, as music corresponds and generates an emotional response. Borges goes on to make a case about Dante as a hermetic wizard, and as a reader, one must de-cipher its hidden meaning:

Dante is already in Paradise, unaware of what his destiny awaits (including hard times); he compares his strength and principles to the 4 phase tetragono “Delle mi fuor di mia vita futura parole gravi, avvegna ch'io mi senta ben tetragono ai colpi di Ventura.

What you may or may not know is that through mathematics, we find patterns based on connections that configure aspects (phases) in relationships; the frequency, or time, of these dimensions, is what harmony is all about, and using the celestial bodies results as a verification device.

For Dante, a single moment is enough– Borges has been admiring an encounter that actually belongs to Dante in the middle ages: that of presenting every occasion as a cipher of a life.

In the beginning, we read the poem with the hope of someone who doesn’t project or expect anything, like a child, surrendering ourselves to it.  Then it will guide us through the circles, and it will go on beyond space and time. This opera will perhaps turn into a sweet song of liberation…

I don’t know if Dante’s intention was to write the masterpiece using the Tuscan dialect, unknowingly converting it to lingua franca after his death. Though The Divine Comedy was not translated into every dialect, it became widely read, laying the structure for a cultural unification in terms of the language that would later be called ‘Italian’. This alone is a very Aquarian characteristic.  He used the technology (skill) of language to be spread to all people (Aquarius), not just the erudite, and led the path toward the subconscious (a very Plutonian trait).

Borges loved Dante; I am enjoying this relationship, and I have been listening to the original text. What a joy!  The reason I humbly attempt to create a relationship between these times and Dante’s was first expressed in the article I wrote a couple of weeks ago (see button below), and with the astrology of this year, I feel compelled to bring some lyrical textures to inspire you, my readers, to a beautiful journey.

 This is the oldest of mysteries. I will say no more for now… Both Dante, Borges, and even Calvino are winking at me in a mischievous gesture of re-cognizance

Pluto retrograde and upcoming lunar eclipse

Lyrical dimensions - circles - structures

As with Dante’s circling journey, which travels down the bowels of Mother Earth, this year shows the potential of being an incredible support if one allows the energy from the celestial bodies to assist on the journey of individuation.

Moved by the poetry of the circles that were used as a metaphor in Dante’s exquisite poem, with the extreme beauty and symbolism, which are reminders of vibrational spaces and stages needed to sense the illusion as we evolve -

The limbo - where desire leaves us clinging, like when we scroll the screen for more and more, or we indulge in numerous vices -  

Dante, during his exile, used writing as a tool to heal.  How to measure one’s value concerning others and the rest of the Universe (one verse)?

I would like to bring some poetry to the situation, a lyrical way to approach this decadence.

Dante’s Divine Comedy can serve as a metaphor for the different cycles we go through to reach the light, peace, (whatever you would like to call your journey).

-How to leave this space of limbo, the place where both pagans and no pagans can live as they attend the game of the light?

Dantes’s descent into the underworld is akin to Pluto’s abode in darkness, a place to confront all limitations and fears. Before ascending, he starts in a dark forest, and in his pilgrimage, he meets yet another poet, Virgil, who resonates as his Logos [reason].  As he climbs hills, wild beasts emerge and he finds a way into the darkness, confronting hell (the inferno within the depths of the Hades). 

Pluto retrograde in Aquarius, squaring the nodal axis in Taurus/Scorpio, is an incredible event– quite rare, for in order to be living a sovereign life in community and full of joy, one must face the fears and obstacles that any relationship can create: the relationship to self (Taurus, Venus, 2nd house, essential needs and values, material appreciation, and manifestation); the relationship to the other person, situation or thing (Libra, Venus, 7th house); the beginning of the synthesis when one can integrate the shadows that are created via expectations; and, last but not least, the relationship to the collective (Uranus, Aquarius, 11th House).  At this juncture, the individuals have learned to negotiate their needs, and have leverage, so when they enter the realm of the others, they shine and feel liberated, serving the community as authentic selves. Pluto is the ruler of the South Node, with the Full Moon at 15 degrees Scorpio (lunar eclipse), which will end mid-July.

The retrograde motion of both the lunar nodes and Pluto have a very individuated quality; Pluto will re-enter Capricorn a couple of times before the end of 2024 (initially on June 11th, 2023) and the lunar nodes will enter 29 degrees of Libra-Aries right after.  The tension is present, it feels like a knife on your throat– any faux pas and it can go the wrong way. 

Many old ways are being left behind, and many challenges that are happening now with the eclipses, showing as some shadows, are revealing the light, the way to embark.  While we are still in the process, and as hard as it feels, one only has one option: keep rowing, remember the weeping boat analogy.  

The theme is to know how to relate to self, relate to others, embrace the individual you have come to be, and contribute. As much as the focus is on the material realm, it is not about hoarding, but liberating ourselves from being possessive of ideas, which impairs our ability to improvise and allow the innovation, the new.

Position and orientation

Something magical happens when one is flowing down the river of life, not holding on to anything, just navigating down, feeling the wind caressing the skin…

Eager to meet the fresh new air, 9 ½ months ago the opportunity to orient the journey was suddenly present.  It urged us to initiate something– sudden orientation; sudden grounding to the monopole (that which integrates the anima - animus); Uranus, the lord of the skies, met the path of destiny; the North Node of the Moon and Mars, who is all about initiating at gate 2.

I was fired up, with courage unafraid I made some radical changes – and now, after all these months, I can look back and know that I have started synthesizing the power of the Trinity. 

–If one is oriented towards the right path, there are no worries, for one is in tune with the frequency that vibrates with their fractal family, who they have been recognizing in awe– 

Uranus returns to the same gate at line 2.6 as last August.  Two instances to look back to see where you were then, and later, by November 8, 2022, – orientation?  Or total dislocation? If your journey changed direction then, well, this sounds great…

The eclipse falls at a very important angle, 45 from the 0 point Aries – activations during the lunar eclipse. Mercury retrograde in Taurus is revisiting all the work done by Uranus in the last 5 years, and when Jupiter comes through later in the year, we will all know how to use the new skills and resources to contribute to the new earth. Something incredible was left behind– let’s be grateful to the skies and for our eagerness to show up. 

Mars squaring Jupiter and Venus entering Cancer–whatever you are rebirthing has a shape, and there is excitement. The valor needed to embrace how this new phase feels at times is anxious and insecure, yet it has the potential to expand in aspiration-generating value, by connecting to our emotional needs.

I feel it.

Do you?

Bring on the change, like Dante, the future, as we sail, feels solid and steady…

“Our economic systems were not built for a world driven by technology where prices keep falling. They were built for a pre-technology era when labour and capital were inextricably linked, an era that counted on growth and inflation, an era where we made money from scarcity and inefficiency. That era is over. But we keep on pretending that those economic systems still work.” ― Jeff Booth, The Price of Tomorrow: Why Deflation is the Key to an Abundant Future

The Corrupt Society

The bench of the banking “business” + Dante’s’ question of free will and moral responsibility

Money exchangers developed facilities for exchanging local and foreign currency, operating in market squares, originally occupying benches, which were later replaced by tables (money-lenders “bank", “banque" (Old French “banc"), Italian “banca", from Late Latin “bancus"). 

The word “bankrupt" also stems from the same time, when money exchangers physically broke their lending tables when things went south, signifying that business was not merely suspended but visibly and unequivocally short-lived. It derives from “banca rotta" (bench + broken) from Latin “ruptus", the past participle of “rumpere" (to break).

Dante’s concern about the relationship between political and ecclesiastical authority was known in the third book of the Monarch [Mon. 3.16.7–9], exposing that power in the temporal earthly realm is neither derived from nor dependent on spiritual authority. A human being consists of soul and body, its nature partakes of both the corruptible and the incorruptible. Uniting two natures, human existence must necessarily be ordered to the goals of both these natures.

Today, usury is the practice of charging exorbitant amounts of interest on a loan, but in the Middle Ages, it was considered usury to charge any interest on a loan at all. The 7th Circle is concerned with various sins of violence. In this canto, Dante and Virgil enter an area reserved for sinners guilty of usury. The idea is to keep separated the branches of government with the banks and the church, to have each individual decide and care for their relationship to authority, value, and faith.

All the blind faith has made people less accountable, for they still trust institutions to take care of themselves.  Now, reading about the collapse of banks in the paper is becoming more normal, but what is not normal is to accept that this is the way it should be…

REVOLT, now BITCOIN solves that “banking” problem 

Dante criticized the misuse of power by the political leaders of his time, and he was exiled from his native Florence for his political beliefs; the Divine Comedy is a response to this event, employing allegorical figures to condemn the political and public figures, proposing a new form of government based on virtue.

The origin of the word corruption has to do with something gone stale, no longer pure, beyond accountability, bending morals, and driven by greed.  In the Commedia many figures of great social responsibility dwell in Hell; the last 3 tiers of hell are the core of what has gone stale and crooked– heresy, fraud, violence, and betrayal.

A strong message that Dante conveys is a warning not to subdue secular authority in favor of religious authority because power, when left unchecked, often corrupts. Other themes are keeping obedience to outer authority, abandoning inner command to figures that portray leadership in realms of government and religion, and forgoing natural law by losing the common sense that could make a life lived meaningfully. If only one were like Dante after entering hell, and learning the importance of making a commitment, which is the first step towards social action.

THE PROPER RELATION of individual states (cities or kingdoms) to the empire and the separate and distinct functions of ecclesiastical and secular authority discussed in chapters one and two provide the political framework for the Comedy. Within that framework, each cantica presents a different but related model for human society.

Paradise is the ideal society in all its essential elements working harmoniously; Purgatory is a society in transition, moving from self-centeredness to concern for and commitment to others, but not yet organized within an effective structure. Hell reveals what society is when all its members act for themselves and against the common good. The souls here are condemned not just for their selfish motivations but also for the effects of their actions on others.

Dante’s point is that as civic beings, we are responsible not only for our actions but also for their results. The people he presents were all men and women of prestige and/or power, people in a position to influence others either directly or by example, and in one way or another, they all failed. The suffering, the violence, and the anarchy of Hell are a result of their failure to act up to their responsibilities or their outright abuse of those responsibilities.

Selfishness, greed for money, power, or pleasure, is the basis of the injustice that reigns in Hell, as charity is the basis of the justice that operates in Heaven.

The Political Vision of the Divine Comedy by Joan Ferrante

-Do you see why Dante is invested in sovereignty and would have supported a network that operates with numbers that are as sacred as Pytahoras and others held true?

you know I am talking about Bitcoin…

Time’s speed

I have become aware of many historic repetitions, and although I have that awareness I am still observing patterns and finding connections in between, in seeing every single opportunity there is to just breathe.

How dare I say these times are a simile of the times when Dante wrote his seminal work, the Divine Comedy, a brutally beautiful work of art that resonates in time? We are in the same frequency, as Pluto was in Aquarius back then, and Saturn was in Pisces– radical confrontations with corrupted institutions that give form, dissolving the past and allowing an openness to innovation, evolution, and a clear transformation of the timeline.

-why are we here if not to evolve?

Can we realign with our frequencies, the ones that shattered the crystals of your core design, and that are imprinted in your natal structural design? Your unconscious vessel that offers your evolution to take place as you move along the perception of all that is?

"Nothing rests; everything moves; everything vibrates." "Everything is dual; everything has poles; everything has its pair of opposites; like and unlike are the same; opposites are identical in nature but different in degree; extremes meet; all truths are but half-truths; all paradoxes may be reconciled.

The Kybalion

-Are you noticing the change?  Are you still vibrating in the frequency of fear? 

-What would be the worst thing that could happen if you embrace the darkness?

-Are you aware that there is a part of you that has been showing courage and is ready to let go of the vulnerabilities that at times seem to freeze you, or take you back to what is familiar, not necessarily the best outlet?

The time for really showing up is here revealed – no more masks… and it feels so free.

Sevens, threes, nines, and l’amoroso uso della Sapienza, the loving use of wisdom

The composition and structure of the poem, a spiritual journey towards the sublime, is divided into three: Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso.  Each contains 33 cantos, mirroring the medieval theology of the trinity, and the hermetical triad. 

-The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit or the One, the Nous, and the Logos. 

Its impetus is to show the horrors the soul goes through during the process of awakening to the light, and the darkness encountered during the hero’s journey of individuation. 

The symbolism and connection to numerology persist throughout– he encounters 3 beasts, a three-headed dog (Cerberus), a three-faced Satan; 3 women pray for Dante, and there are 3 rings within the 7th circle of Hell.  Dante travels through 7 terraces of purgatory, and 7 deadly sins are pictured in the 9 levels of Hell.

The number seven refers to harmonics, as there are seven deadly sins and seven terraces in Purgatorio. And nine is the number of the circles of hell, as well as the spheres in heaven. As for the love of knowledge and the more hermetic content, I shall explore that in the future, and I will add more about the redemption of love, Beatrice, as a metaphor for the connection to the Divine… and even his relationship to the secret societies, as La Fede Santa [the Templars] and the Sufis, and a mysterious group of ‘poets’ known in the literature as the Fideli D’Amore (the faithful to Love)...

O you possessed of sturdy intellects, observe the teaching which is hidden here beneath the veil of verses so obscure”  Dante, Inferno section (IX, 61)  

I say that by heaven I mean “science” and by heavens “the sciences”

Convivio II, xiii, 2

For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

ὅπου γάρ ἐστιν ὁ θησαυρός σου, ἐκεῖ ἔσται καὶ ἡ καρδία σου.

Matthew 6:121

Dear reader, bear with me on this winding road of unchartered waters. At times delusional, at times mystical, these territories are where we use our objectivity to observe, verify and discern, so the instincts, intuition, and emotions, which are coded beautifully in our bodies, will guide this upcoming journey that seems bleak and hopeless. 

Shall we keep surrendering to the will of devices we have naïvely trained and believed were working on our behalf (such as our dear mind that is shaped by the conditions that exist in the environment)? 

Monika Bravo I AM OPtimist is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

By weaving allegories, using archetypal images, and literal and direct quotations from the sages that have lived before me, I share [in a non-linear fashion] what I have been able to contemplate thus far. 

Remember it is just the perspective from my crystal, each one of you has your own, so use it wisely as we are co-creating reality in unison where we will meet in resonance or dissonance. 

I have divided the text into 2 parts and one Interlude, take your time and enjoy! (2nd part drops soon)

PART 1

Amuse bouche

Pluto in Aquarius, a rare state of observation

Where are we now? How much do we know? And where are we going?

From the top of the mountain, with a gaze of an eagle, I can see a generous valley between two rivers, a place I will keep planting and nurturing seeds of sovereignty, hence sowing the wisdom needed to fulfill a precious empirical life.

I see it without detachment but with objectivity, for we have never felt this energy during this lifetime, and for that reason, it is precious [Pluto just entered 0° Aquarius on 3/23, it takes 248 years to get back to the same spot]. I am taking my time to enjoy the nuances that I am capable of noticing.

One obvious one is how the masks are suddenly falling off everyone’s faces… If we want to, we can see things as they are.

I can sense clearly who I need to connect to and who I don’t need to be connected to.

Things will feel weird for a bit and then we will be thrown back and forth to a familiar place that is just so familiar… but not necessarily a good environment to grow in, as Pluto will go back and forth from Aquarius to Capricorn to finally culminate the entrance at the end of 2024.

This is just a taste of the next 20 years folks, an amuse bouche, a sample of how it feels to be sovereign and be gathering creatively together, or the taste of how by not being sovereign leaves one removed, with no willpower of our own, at the mercy of others. 

At times I may sound loud and angry– yep! Anger is my favorite e-motion; it runs through me as a driver for change. I channel its energy by initiating, being curious, asking questions, and engaging. And when I do so, I become a peaceful warrior that aims to be transformed. 

I am guarding a domain, the one that speaks about individuality and freedom. So at times, I speak as if I am shouting and with tons of passion. Well, you sense it right– it is my root, my drive expanding, provoking, enduring, connecting to fractals that are also with the willingness to do the work. I love it!

-One has to verify in order to trust-

Pluto in Aquarius is not about holding hands in community, it is about confronting the shadow of not being sovereign!

so let’s get our act together before 2027…

No more bargains, I do this for you, while you get this in return, we do what we have to do INDIVIDUALLY, while we mutate, so we can THRIVE collectively.

- IT HURTS - Damn if it does! the solar eclipse on the 19th/20 of April is an Amuse bouche

A weeping boat versus a rowing boat. The night becomes dark, lighting strikes…

I can hear/see a boat full of weeping people crying for their fate, confused, bitter, disempowered, and still demanding to be saved. The boat is sinking, making matters worse, as everyone rocks it in desperation, blaming the water, the weather, and the captain, incapable of being accountable, this boat of weeping peeps can’t see things clearly, for fear has made them numb and incapable of moving. The fates will bring, at last, a bigger wave, or a sign, and those who still have it in them will get the hint. I can't tell you about the others, I can't seem to see them anymore on the horizon…

Weeping and cursing they come for evermore, and demon Charon with eyes like burning coals herds them in, and with a whistling oar flails on the stragglers to his wake of souls.

Inferno, Canto III

In my boat we all are very busy rowing, we are riding the waves, flowing and in unison, aligning with the frequency (time), creating a song that resonates inside and outside of the vibrational space. 

As time unfolds, I can see a field full of brave warriors and mavericks creating an ecology where sovereignty and individuality are king or queen, each steering its path creatively, sharing not just stories, but motivations of hope that stem from a desire to evolve. 

The word government stems from steering a boat; when one is in the capacity to make decisions with accountability, one does not leave its fate to the elements.  One would know how to navigate even the most horrendous storm…

Other crippling devices [part of Pluto in Aquarius’ shadow] may show up:

If you think that AI tech (CHAT_GPT-4) will solve your life, pause + contemplate, and become aware of the fact that in the meantime you can learn a new language/practice, learn to code, learn to read time (Astro -HD - financial charts) or learn anything, damn it!

Learning encourages the synapses in your frontal lobe to further develop. Frequency + repetition are factors in skill development.

-Instead of training a machine to take over your life - (like iPhones have already), learn to use and train the highest technology ever created instead: your body. Technology serves as a tool, not as a solution to any lazy dilemma. Ultimately is about awareness

Of horizontal structures

As with Bucky Fuller’s Geodesic Domes [structures that validate themselves as cohesive energy, the distribution of weight across the dome is the most efficient you can think of; stress is equally distributed along the entire structure], there is no hierarchy based on greed and we understand the nodes and lines that connect the geometry of our beings akin to Indra’s net.

For many millennia the one great spiritual effort of mankind has been to realize the full and actual significance of two basic ideas. 

The first was that the world of change should not be considered (and feared) as a chaos of energies senselessly forming and dissipating themselves, but instead, as an ordered realm of universal activity in which motion is inherently periodical or cyclic — even when it does not appear to be so to our superficial senses and, even more, to our disturbed and fearful emotions. 

The second basic concept is that, if one knew how to define cycles properly, one would see that each cycle could be considered as the life span of one specific type of entity retaining specific characteristics, biological or psycho-spiritual, during the entire cycle.

Dane Rudhyar

My [bitcoin] rabbit hole 

For me, Bitcoin …