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theprettyinthemundane · 4 years

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Greek Culture and Why It’s Essential to Better Understanding the Greek Gods (Examining Pan as an Example)

Everyone knows the Greek gods are Greek, but what does that mean to us? I think that understanding the culture around the Greek gods is extremely helpful for understanding them better and I’d like to use the Greek god Pan as an example to illustrate just how important I think this is. Greek culture (both ancient and modern) is just as interesting and worth studying too, which is another reason I wanted to talk about it.

A quick note: The ancient word was incredibly diverse and covered a long period of time. Even between cities practices, myths, and views could be very different, so it is important to point out that there is no “one way” to see most things, even though there are some general things people do agree on. Even the genealogy of gods sometimes varied depending on location and gods themselves could be understood differently across Greece both in location and time (1, 2, 3, 4). Myths were often stories made to be entertaining, not to accurately and completely reflect how gods were seen in a religious sense, so the view of a god that a myth and religious text portrayed were often different. For some deities, understanding Greek culture better may make the difference between a loose group of unrelated domains vs a constellation of domains that paint a bigger, more cohesive picture of how they were viewed, like how something may be greater than the sum of its parts. This is how I think of Pan and his domains. Of course, it is also important to note that Pan is extremely complex, and this post is not meant to be comprehensive, just informative. With that said, let’s talk about the goat god Pan and Greek culture.

Why Pan? Well, unlike many gods whose origins lay in mythical places, Pan’s origin is Arcadia, a region in the south of Greece (this region has changed since ancient times, but it remains as its own region) (1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9) . Why does this matter? Because Pan was viewed as an Arcadian (god); even in Thebes and in Athens worshipers connected Pan to this region (1, 2, 4, 9, 10, 11). In other words, how the Greeks viewed Arcadia as a region and culture influenced how they viewed and understood Pan.

Then first, we should ask, what is Arcadia?

(credit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arcadia)

(source: 12)

Arcadia (Αρκαδία) is a mountainous region in the Peloponnese whose capital is Tripoli (Τρίπολη ) (12). In ancient times it was seen as a place of harsh wilderness (forests, plains, glens) where most people were shepherds (1, 5). It was “out of the way”, “hard to reach”, even viewed as “spooky” (5) and “uncivilized” (1, 13). This is related to many, if not all of Pan’s domains. In fact, Pan was known as the “ruler of Arcadia” (1, 5, 13) and it was even said that,

“The region was sometimes called Panland - in Greek, Pania. Pan was as rough as the country, half goat, half god…” (5)

Arcadia is the earliest center of Pan’s worship and it was done in formal sanctuaries (1,2, 14). After the Battle of Marathon in 490 BCE, Pan’s worship spread more widely to the rest of the Greek world (1, 6, 9). After this many people (in Thebes and Athens for example) worshiped Pan in grottos or caves (1, 2, 4, 10, 11). This difference actually reflects how people in those places connected Pan and Arcadia; for them, a cave or grotto was a wild place, like Arcadia, and since they had few other “wild” spaces this space kept Pan and his connection to the natural world within their worship. A scholar on Pan noted that “his lodging (in a cave at the Acropolis) marks him as connected to origins”(1) and others have pointed out this as well (10, 11) . This makes it clear that this cultural connection was important for how they worshiped and thought of Pan.

The first example: Pan’s relation to music? That was related to Pan being Arcadian;

“The simple, moving music of the shepherds (from Arcadia) gained a wide appreciation over all the Greek world. In time, this pastoral … music began to inspire highly educated poets …” (13)

“The one quality that softened the brutishness of Arcadian life was music, whether performed by the goatherds or played by Pan”(13).

Music is a fundamental part of Pan and he has been called: “a lover of merry noise” (Homeric Hymn to Pan) “a most accomplished dancer, a god of noise and movement, beautiful dancer”, and a “lord of the dances of the gods” (1). Just as music was a big part of other Greeks viewed Arcadia, it was a big part of how people saw Pan; Pan was even said to have created the panpipes and music was an essential part of his cult (1, 14, 15). In fact, the idea that Pan could manifest as music and in natural sounds was popular at times (9, 11). This isn’t to say music was unique to Pan (it wasn’t) or that music was not used to worship other deities (it was) but that music was an essential part of how ancients understood Pan, so we should be aware of that and the potential significance it has.

Music was an essential part of Greek and Arcadian education, even according to Plato and Socrates (1, 16). While I do not study the classics, I do think that Pan’s connection to music is symbolic of something more than just “pretty sounds” although I do not feel confident enough in my understanding to make any specific connections to his other domains or aspects. Music was essential to the ancient Greeks and was thought to be important for character / personal development, it was thought to deeply affect the soul and I think this is also reflected in Epidaurus’ hymn to Pan;

“The Epidaurus Hymn reminds us that Pan's music and dance restore a threatened cohesion. Dance, laughter, and noise become, in the festival, signs of a recovered closeness (1).” (cohension was threatened by a recent war)

Just as music was thought to affect people deeply, Pan also was associated with panic and mania (related to possession), which similarly has a strong affect on people spiritually and emotionally (1). If I were to make any connections between his musical domain and another domain, I would say that Pan’s domain of music seems connected to his domain of nature since his style of dance was called “animalistic”, he was called a “leaper” and for the fact that he was believed to be able to manifest himself in natural sounds, like was mentioned before (1, 9, 11).

A second example: Pan’s nature as a goat/shepherd and a god of fertility is reflective of Arcadia’s reliance on shepherding to sustain life: Pan has been called “divine-he-goat-shepherd”, “indispensable patron of fertility...” and “keeper and protector of the flocks” (1). Pan was a very positive figure because he was thought to help sustain life itself; as one scholar points out, Arcadia is “first and foremost a land fit for herding.” (1). One noticeably unique thing about Pan compared to the other Greek gods is how he is part goat. Interestingly, Pan was first depicted as a he-goat standing upright, not as a satyr and it seems that Pan was only depicted as a satyr (at least widely) after his cult left Arcadia (1, 17). If one was not aware of how central goats were to Greek (especially Arcadian) society then this may seem random or superficial, but it clearly is not.

Pan was a fertility god, but this domain is concerned with more than just lust and sex (even though these were important aspects of Pan) but also abundance both sexual and platonic; for example, the birth of twin goats (as opposed to a single goat) was attributed to Pan (1). Another example of this connection between sex and (platonic/ nonsexual) abundance is the description of the meaning of a dream where Pan and the dreamer have sex written by Atermidorus in his Interpretation of Dreams in the 2nd century CE:

“If he (Pan) gives someone something or has sexual intercourse with someone, it fortells great profit, especially if he does not weigh that person down” (18)

This theme of abundance and goats/fertility is related to Pan’s domain of rustic music as well: In a hymn found in the Palentine Anthology, a resource that showed the traditions of herdsmen and shepherds, one poem asks for Pan to play his pipes so that the she-goats might give them lots of milk;

“The poet here attributes to the god's music a power elsewhere expressed in the image of a sexual union with animals. The "divine message" (or "sacred voice": hieron phatin) of the syrinx brings about an abundance of milk. (1)”

Pan’s domain of shepherding/goats is also related to his role as a god of hunting. Unlike Artemis, Pan’s domain of hunting was only concerned with the type of hunting shepherds would do, that is, hunting small game and hunting to protect the flock (1). Goats were also associated with hunting because mountain goats were hunted for sport (1). In fact, “Arcadians thought Pan responsible for the abundance, and correspondingly for the scarcity, of meat, whether obtained by hunting or by herding” (1). Without understanding this distinction someone might mistakenly think Pan and Artemis were interchangeable in hunting.

Because we see such a concrete connection here drawn by an ancient Greek, Atermidorus, I think it is more than reasonable to say that the fertility domain was also connected to abundance more generally. Another example is in the story of how Artemis visited Pan in Arcadia and he gifted her hounds which he had bred himself (15, 19). Despite the mention of how the dogs had recently given birth, in this story Pan is “devoid of eroticism”, which further supports this connection between fertility and nonsexual abundance (19.). The hounds represent the fertility aspect of Pan (they recently gave birth) and platonic/non-sexual abundance (Pan gifted them to Artemis and as the author notes, the story is “devoid of eroticism”). Hunting (done by shepherds, associated with Pan) also served to protect the flock, protecting this abundance (1).

Conclusion: Without the context of Arcadia as Pan’s origin, it is hard to have as deep an understanding of him, which I think shows us why culture is also important to learn about. Without this context people may misunderstand Pan’s domains of fertility/shepherding, hunting music, and nature as disconnected or random, however by understanding Pan’s cultural context (Arcadia / Greece) a clearer and more meaningful image can be seen. These elements are closely related and interrelated, which I think is important because seeing these domains as “somewhat connected” is significantly different than seeing them as “interconnected”.

Here’s a table to summarize what I think we can better understand about Pan with this knowledge:

A disclaimer: This isn’t meant to be all encompassing as Pan is an extremely complex god. I have only focused on the way Pan was viewed by some ancient Greeks, more was written about Pan later. Pan also was not simply a “positive”, or “friendly” god, he was also perceived as terrifying and that aspect of Pan shouldn’t be forgotten or underappreciated. This post was designed to show how important culture is and so I have focused on aspects of Pan that help us see this clearly. That said, I do feel I have touched on most of Pan’s major domains (fertility/shepherding/goats, hunting, music/dance, nature, and panic). I have tried to give a better sense of Pan using context, not take anything out of context, so if you think I have made a mistake or misunderstood anything then please let me know. I am not a classics student, so there is a chance I misinterpreted something along the way. This post serves two purposes: to demonstrate how Greek culture is important for understanding the Greek gods and to shed some more detailed light onto Pan (which requires the first bit). I also do not think everyone interested in Greek gods or mythology needs to write long posts like these, I just want to emphasize that thinking holistically is important. We should just be aware of how everything is interconnected and be open to learning more about different things that can help improve our understanding.

Citations:

1 : Borgeaud, P., & Atlass, K. (1988). The cult of Pan in ancient Greece (p. 58). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 13: 9780226065953

2: Ogden, D. (Ed.). (2010). A companion to Greek religion. John Wiley & Sons.

3: Zolotnikova, O. A. (2017). Becoming Classical Artemis: A Glimpse at the Evolution of the Goddess as Traced in Ancient Arcadia. Journal of Arts and Humanities, 6(5), 08-20. Doi: 10.18533/journal.v6i4.1157

4: David Gilman Romano, & Mary E. Voyatzis. (2014). Mt. Lykaion Excavation and Survey Project, Part 1: The Upper Sanctuary. Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, 83(4), 569-652. doi:10.2972/hesperia.83.4.0569 doi: 10.2972/hesperia.83.4.0569

5: WILLS, G. (1998). The Real Arcadia. The American Scholar, 67(3), 15-27. Retrieved May 31, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/41212784

6: GARTZIOU-TATTI, A. (2013). GODS, HEROES, AND THE BATTLE OF MARATHON. Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies. Supplement, (124), 91-110. Retrieved May 31, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/44216258

7: Yioutsos, N. P. (2014). Pan Rituals of Ancient Greece: a multi-Sensory Body Experience. In Archaeoacoustıcs: The Archaeology of Sound, Publication of the 2014 Conference in Malta (Vol. 57).

8: Parker, R. (2011). Analyzing Greek Gods. In On Greek Religion (pp. 64-102). Ithaca; London: Cornell University Press. doi:10.7591/j.ctt7zgrm.7

9: Haldane, J. (1968). Pindar and Pan: Frs. 95-100 Snell. Phoenix, 22(1), 18-31. doi:10.2307/1087034

10: Yioutsos, N., Kamaris, G., Kaleris, K., Papadakos, C., & Mourjopoulos, J. (2018). Archaeoacoustic Research on Caves dedicated to Pan and the Nymphs in Attica, Greece.

11: Yioutsos NP. (2019) Pan Rituals of Ancient Greece Revisited. In: Büster L., Warmenbol E., Mlekuž D. (eds) Between Worlds. Springer, Cham. Doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-99022-4_7

12: Arcadia. The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica - https://www.britannica.com/place/Arcadia-region-Greece

13: Ruff, A. (2015). The Classical Origins of Arcadia. In Arcadian Visions: Pastoral Influences on Poetry, Painting and the Design of Landscape (pp. 1-14). Oxbow Books. Retrieved May 31, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt19704rw.5 , eISBN: 978-1-909686-69-4

14: Yioutsos, N. P. (2014). Pan Rituals of Ancient Greece: a Multi-Sensory Body Experience. In Archaeoacoustıcs: The Archaeology of Sound, Publication of the 2014 Conference in Malta (Vol. 57).

15: Rinkevich, T. E. (1973). Comic structure in Theocritus 1-7 (Doctoral dissertation, The Ohio State University).

16: Stamou, L. (2002). Plato and Aristotle on music and music education: Lessons from ancient Greece. International Journal of Music Education, (1), 3-16.

17: Campbell, G. L. (Ed.). (2014). The Oxford handbook of animals in classical thought and life. Oxford Handbooks. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199589425.001.0001 , ISBN: 9780199589425

18: Stewart, C. (2002). Erotic Dreams and Nightmares from Antiquity to the Present. The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 8(2), 279-309. Retrieved May 31, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/3134476

19: Faulkner, A. (2013). Et in Arcadia Diana: An Encounter with Pan in Callimachus’ Hymn to Artemis. Classical Philology, 108(3), 223-234. doi:10.1086/672004

Homeric Hymn to Pan: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0138%3Ahymn%3D19

#pan #pandeity #greek gods #Greek Mythology #Ancient Greek Religion #hellenic gods #Hellenic pantheon #I hope you all find this helpful!#hint: if you go to sci-hub dot tw you can copy/past the doi to get the paper for free! It's a super helpful resource!#feel free to send me asks and I can try to find you papers on stuff that youre looking for : )#sorry the table is blurry #I tried to fix that but yeah

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boycottyashahime · 4 years

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Hello! Anti-Sessrin person here. You said if this couple becomes canon it will ruin Sesshomaru's character development. I would love it If you could elaborate on that because you're always so eloquent and smart. It's ok if you don't feel like it, though. Have a nice day!

I've actually been looking for an excuse to sit down and write out a cohesive post on my thoughts about this. Contrary to what the shippers want to believe, my interpretation of Sesshoumaru and Rin's relationship doesn't have anything to do with my moral objections to child grooming. I happen to think there's plenty of evidence for a filial interpretation in the text.

First, I'd like to preface my little essay here by saying I'm going off the manga alone. I haven't seen the anime in a long time, because I dropped it when I got a little tired of trying to reconcile the inconsistencies between the two mediums. So, if you read this and have an impulse to say, "hey, what about that thing in episode such-and-such...", keep in mind that I probably just don't remember what you're thinking of.

So, let's go back, alllll the way back, to Sesshoumaru's first appearance. Here's a guy who tears off a dude's head for no other reason than to get the attention of his subordinates to demand a boat. Here's a guy who's spent a long time looking just about EVERYWHERE for his father's remains, not to pay respects, but to plunder them. Here's a guy who feels ENTITLED to rob his dad's grave for treasure he deserves simply for being his father's son.

Sesshoumaru begins his journey as a selfish, spoiled, entitled brat. He doesn't fit the usual profile of a kid throwing a tantrum on the street because he wants the expensive toy sitting in the window; he's very posh and very reserved, but fundamentally, his motivation comes down to the simple fact that he wants Tessaiga. It doesn't even really have anything to do with respect and admiration of his father, otherwise he wouldn't have been so eager to rifle through dear old dad's bones to get at a sword when he had another heirloom right there at his hip. Only Tessaiga was representative of the sheer destructive force he wanted to wield, so he ignored the fact that his dad didn't seem to want him to have it.

This is important, because at first, Sesshoumaru doesn't seem to think of his father in terms of the guy's intentions or the steps he takes for the sake of his sons. Like most rich spoiled kids, Sesshoumaru views the Inu no Taishou in terms of his prestige and how that priviledge can be appropriated for selfish ends. Sesshoumaru wants Tessaiga not because he needs it, but because it's a birthright, and reinforces his legitimacy. When it's clear that Tessaiga seals Inuyasha's youkai blood, keeps him from going berserk, Sesshoumaru loses interest in Tessaiga - it's just a crutch for Inuyasha, and there's no prestige in taking it from him or using it for himself.

Sesshoumaru doesn't start to REALLY consider his father's intentions for the swords until later in the manga, when it comes out that Tenseiga was originally part of Tessaiga, and Inuyasha was meant to get the Meidou Zangetsuha attack eventually as well. It's at this point that Sesshoumaru starts to question if daddy actually HATED him, to give him a rather neat power disguised in a lame shell, but only to develop it so Inuyasha can have it instead, even after Inuyasha already got Tessaiga in the first place. It kind of looks to Sesshoumaru that Inuyasha gets all the powerful cool shit their father left behind, and that there might have been some favoritism coming down HARD on Inuyasha's side.

Above, you can see Sesshoumaru has two interlinked but distinct issues that are addressed throughout the story - his lack of compassion and empathy, and how tied his identity is to his father's favor and prestige. These two are somewhat separated in the narrative; there's a kind of pause in Sesshoumaru's development while a bulk of the middle of the story deals more with other characters and their development, but there is a little bit of a thematic connection between the two halves.

We'll start with the development of Sesshoumaru's compassion since, well, that's where the story begins working on his character. Right before Rin shows up, Toutousai let's Inuyasha's group in on the sword Sesshoumaru carries around and what it does, indicating that Tenseiga requires a compassionate heart to function. A bit ham-handed, but RT isn't very subtle most of the time, so we'll allow it. This sets up the next few scenes in which Sesshoumaru is unable to move and must play captive audience to a little girl doing the literal opposite of what he's used to. Sesshoumaru's habit is to show up and kill things, with no thought to the years of history, relationships, thoughts, emotions, etc that he's snuffing out. But while he's reclined injured in the woods, Rin demonstrates actual LIFE and the preservation of it, that part Sesshoumaru never gets to see. It's made all the starker by how BAD Rin is at caring for herself, let alone the strange monster she found in the woods. She does exactly nothing to help Sesshoumaru, despite how hard she tries, and is even injured by others in her attempts. She is the very picture of vulnerability, the opposite of the strong and capable Sesshoumaru.

This is a stark contrast, because anything less wouldn't be enough to create the necessary awareness of Rin's struggles that Sesshoumaru needs in order to use Tenseiga on here. And I know I've said this before, but I really cannot stress enough how obvious I think the symbolism is when Sesshoumaru uses Tenseiga for the first time; a phallic object gives life to a child, and the object's owner looks after that life throughout the rest of the story. He's not very good at looking after it, and it's clear that he's not sure about taking responsibility for Rin at first, because she pleaded for him to come back for her when he and Jaken left her behind to requisition a sword from Gaijinbou. To me, it's reminiscent of a teenager who knocked someone up, and ended up having to learn to give a crap about the result.

But, even if you don't accept that symbolism as particularly significant, Rin being a child, and human, and weak, unable to survive on her own, are important characteristics to how Sesshoumaru's compassion develops. Sesshoumaru is one of the strongest characters in the series, and he rarely has to worry about his own safety. And since he's in the habit of just murdering everyone he comes across if they're in his way, he's never had to worry about the safety of anyone else, either. When Rin comes into the picture, though, Sesshoumaru is faced with the uncomfortable reality of vulnerability in general. Through her earnest and incompetent attempts to foster survival in a world that can and does crush her, she's opened his eyes to how the disadvantaged, those without a powerful youkai lineage to rely on, have to struggle.

Rin herself has nothing to offer Sesshoumaru within this context of supreme vulnerability. She's not a friend, because she can't offer mutual support or use a skill to their benefit as a team. She's not a lover, because, well, she's a child and sexual/romantic attraction are conditions that wouldn't allow Sesshoumaru to extend his compassion beyond just her. As a mostly helpless kid, Rin has to rely upon Sesshoumaru and his power to survive, and Sesshoumaru employs his strength to keep her alive, getting nothing but a sweet smile out of it all. She gets all the benefits, he has all the obligations. This is PURE compassion - using one's advantages to another's benefit because you care about them, and not because you derive something from it as well.

This is why making Rin into Sesshoumaru's lover is a REALLY thoughtless take. It puts conditions on the compassion and muddies the message.

Moving onto Sesshoumaru's continued character development in the latter part of the story, the sword drama starts back up with slow, when Toutousai shows up and offers to reforge Tenseiga into a weapon. Sesshoumaru discovers that because he got angry enough to break his primary weapon in defense of Kagura's honor, he's triggered the next evolution of Tenseiga into something that can murder. Which is what he wanted at the beginning, yay! I want to point out here that Toutousai says Tenseiga noticed a change in Sesshoumaru's heart - anger for the first time for the sake of another. This implies that what Jaken said about Sesshoumaru getting tangled up in the fight against Naraku because Naraku kidnapping and using Rin to manipulate Sesshoumaru hurt Sesshoumaru's pride is actually accurate; he just really hated the thought of Naraku trying to use him, even if it was a failed attempt.

After going through HELL to develop the Meidou into a full circle (literally), Sesshoumaru then learns that the Meidou belongs to Tessaiga and Inuyasha, and that it's supposed to be handed over. Now, part of Sesshoumaru's angst over this idea, I think, is not just "did daddy love Inuyasha more?", but also the assumption that Inuyasha would have to KILL him in order to retake the Meidou Zangetsuha into Tessaiga. Thinking that your father meant for your little brother to kill you at some point to take your stuff is a pretty disturbing thought, to be entirely fair to him. This is why, when Sesshoumaru jumps into the meidou to take back control of the Naraku-possessed Tenseiga and breaks it deliberately, he spends the rest of the time in there moodily resigned to disappear. He genuinely believes that his father meant for him to die at this point, and even after they get out of there, he seems genuinely depressed.

This is Sesshoumaru's lowest point as a character. He's lost something he thought his father had meant for him, at his father's own wish, and he can't help but question why his dad would give him something just to take it away and give it to Inuyasha. It looks for all the world like favoritism, and since the Inu no Taishou is dead, there's no asking him what the hell the meaning of all this is.

This is all leading to one of the most infuriatingly ridiculous scenes I have ever seen in a manga - when Magatsuhi has crushed Sesshoumaru and everyone thinks he's been killed/absorbed, Magatsuhi is blown apart and rendered unable to reform by the shiny new sword clutched in Sesshoumaru's newly regrown arm. I could talk your ear off about how having Sesshoumaru stop being an amputee is erasure of consequences for his actions, or how being given back an arm is kind of a slap in the face for actual amputees, and where the mother f*ck did that sword come from anyway, but that's not what this essay is about, so I'll just keep all that to myself. The point of this is articulated by Toutousai when he says that Sesshoumaru had to let go of Tessaiga and his father's heirloom to stand on his own as a daiyoukai.

We've already gone over how Sesshoumaru is one of the most powerful characters in the series, who rarely has to worry about his well-being. He's just really strong without having to try. Sesshoumaru had already learned that he didn't need Tessaiga ages ago - he knew this when he learned that Inuyasha needed Tessaiga to keep from tearing himself apart eventually. But when he thought he had been passed down something from his father that was truly meant to be his, only to put all this work into it so that Inuyasha could have it, that embittered him again. It's not that he wanted the sword necessarily, but the thoughts and consideration of his father, who seemed to be putting everything he had into Inuyasha.

But his previous experiences protecting and considering someone (in some cases, multiple someones) weaker than him should have tipped him off. During the very battle in which he got his new arm and sword, he was actively helping those around him avoid Magatsuhi and keeping them close because he had a plan and the strength to carry it out. He was willing to take the extra step to protect Inuyasha and friends before trying to take care of Magatsuhi though, and that was the point. He put everyone else's needs ahead of his own, even Inuyasha's, and he did it without even thinking.

Toutousai just articulated what Sesshoumaru should have already intuitively known by that point. He never needed his father's heirlooms, the swords, his dad's power. They were unnecessary for him from the start. Inuyasha needed a leg up, because his own BODY could kill him after a while. But Sesshoumaru always had the capability of being great on his own. He just needed to finally separate his ego from who his father was and become his own person; stand on his own as a great youkai. While I don't agree with the execution, I can get behind the big lesson - don't rely on your daddy's wealth and influence to prop you up, and do the work to build a personality and identity of your own.

Which is ANOTHER reason why making Rin into a lover would be a thoughtless take. It would walk back Sesshoumaru's final lesson about being his own person apart from his father.

So, there you go. A comprehensive post regarding my take on Sesshoumaru's character development. I could add in a bit about Sesshoumaru coming to understand his father's consideration and the lengths he went to for the sake of protecting Inuyasha by having to give similar consideration to Rin, but I think this post is long enough, and that one statement on that aspect pretty much sums it up. Let me know if you would like me to elaborate on any of this, or if you would like to argue any of the points, I'm up for it. Might take me a minute to respond, mind you, but hopefully it won't take as long as it did to draft this behemoth.

Take care.

#inuyasha #rin (inuyasha)#sesshomaru #sesshoumaru #character analysis #character development analysis #i pulled out all the stops for this one #anti sessrin #i know this doesn't match the perfect prince characterization Sesshoumaru usually gets #but i just calls it as i sees it

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bbq-hawks-wings · 4 years

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Series Review Pt. 2/3

Part One

Part Three

Continuing the trend, lots to read under the cut.

In part one we established that the central conflict of the series as a whole is not so much a black and white “good guys side vs bad guys side” but of a much more complex societal problem stemming from individual choices and series of choices made by individual people and the impact those choices have on others. This is the heart of the current conflict between Hawks and Twice.

Twice and Hawks share many things in common and have been shown to develop a genuine friendship in their shared time in the PLF. This, however, has not changed the fact that they are still functioning from opposite sides of the central conflict - at least the institutional facet of it. Each of them has taken up a position fundamentally opposed to the other in attempts to bring about their prospective “big picture” futures, but that comes with the added emotional baggage each carries from the events that have happened to them in their respective pasts.

The visual direction of the scene enforces this concept. Each one is seeing the other literally from a different angle and in a different light. Twice is on the ground prone in a room where the only exit is blocked while Hawks stands alert and at attention over him, obscuring the only source of light entering the room.

From Twice’s perspective Hawks’ face is obscured- the harsh light from behind casting a dark shadow across any features that would clue him into what Hawks is feeling - and he has to use the context clues he has available (posture, words, immediate events) through tears and adrenaline to interpret how to respond to Hawks. He’s been so suddenly thrust into this situation he literally and metaphorically can’t properly tell which way is up from where he lies. (Note how Hawks’ silhouette is sideways and looming over him in the same direction as Twice would be seeing from his place on the ground on page 13.)

From Hawks’ perspective Twice is knocked off balance and panicking like a cornered animal, completely unaware of the larger situation at hand and how they arrived here. When the perspective of the camera shifts and we can see his face again for the first time we get a completely different picture of what’s going on. Importantly, we can see in the change in perspective a closeup (usually used to highlight the key emotion) of Hawks’ face, complete with a somber and compassionate gaze that Twice is incapable of discerning right now.

Read this section through again twice. The first time use only the frame from Twice’s perspective and the second time read it with Hawks’. This is something I’m actually intrigued to see the anime handle because depending how deep the divergence in perspective goes, even the vocal performance may be different depending on the camera angle.

Twice sees a sociopathic, unempathetic monster who has used, abused, and thrown away his sincere offer of friendship to get what he wants and then has the audacity to try to convince him to play the fool again to get Twice to betray his friends for an easy way out. Hawks sees a person who feels betrayed and scared so Hawks is trying sincerely to explain to him what has been going on in order to be transparent because that’s the only way he can think to communicate the fact that he still values Twice, ending on the note that he believes that while Twice has crimes to answer for, he is still a good person who deserves to have a real shot at a happy life and that Hawks is personally invested in making that a reality if he’s willing to take the offer and trust him.

Hawks is operating as an enforcing tool of the law, but while he believes that law is set in place for general stability and safety it takes a human to human connection and cooperation to save someone to whom the law is blind. On page 16 when he says, “I don’t want to fight you, Bubaigawara!” he’s identifying with him not as the villain Twice, but as a person with an identity and will separate from the personae he’s crafted for himself over the years. Hawks would probably use his own real name to try to hammer this point home if there was a way to naturally do it. If Bubaigawara continues to resist and fight Hawks cannot make the case to others that he deserves a second chance.

The exact memory that comes to Hawks’ mind is Twice’s words, “Anyone who helps his friends can’t be all bad.” Hawks is trying to say in this scene, “I’m your friend! I’m trying to help you! I know you see me as the bad guy, but I want to be your hero so please let me save you the only way I know how! Please trust me!”

He needs the cooperation, but Twice resists and Hawks has no other choice but to operate as law enforcement for the sake of the greater good. Twice has chosen to be a “villain,” so Hawks has to be a “hero.” All those feathers were for Twice in the case Hawks needed them, and now Hawks has to subdue the Sad Man’s Parade alone as well as Dabi whom neither knows is on the way.

That’s the bad news, but the good news is that hope is not lost.

This is where I repeat my mantra of “we won’t know specific, individual fates until they happen." However, I think there are notable observations to keep in mind as we watch these final battles unfold.

Coming off of the discussion with Twice and Hawks, many including myself (and arguably even Twice) have gotten hung up on whether Hawks will choose to join the League eventually. Where we are now, I think it’s become a moot point almost not worth discussion anymore. If he does, we’ll see it soon; but Hawks seems to recognize that as long as the core complaints of the individual League members - and any of their sympathizers, for that matter - are not directly addressed, some other criminal force will come alongside and clash with them continuing the cycle of bloodshed and violence as influential leaders focus on gaining power until they are absorbed or achieve their end goal of complete anarchy and societal destruction. (Remember, he’s been following the League and their movements at least as far back as Kamino.) We saw it with the MLA, we saw it with the Shie Hassaikai, and even with Stain - along with the League of Villains, it began with a guerrilla group of revolutionists seeking to right a societal injustice; but if and when a separate opposing force of revolutionist outsiders cannot agree with them a battle ensues until one is subjugated and the strength of the loser is granted to the victor. Until the underlying issues are addressed, this cycle will only continue.

This is also to bring up the fact that the League of Villains is genuinely strong in terms of interpersonal loyalty but as an organization with foundational core values and a unified end goal has been fractured and shaky since the beginning. We saw those particular cracks most prominently just before the fight with Gigantomachia when lack of outer conflict began to highlight the inherent lack of unity in the LoV, only to be interrupted once again when some outside force stirred up a reason for them to work together for survival. Remember, all of the current members of the League of Villains were initially attracted and recruited because Shigaraki falsely appropriated Stain’s ideology. Dabi has stated he wants a world where heroes are obligated to their families first and that thinking of the misery he’s left the survivors of killed heroes “drives him crazy.” Toga wants a world where she has a network of unconditional support without feeling repressed. Twice wants a world in which he can trust others and be trusted and useful despite his bad luck and occasional mistakes. Spinner has clarified he needs a cause to believe in and fight for that supports outcasts like him, and Mr. Compress’s reasons for joining the League are simply to challenge the current status quo instead of mindlessly embracing it.

Shigaraki’s nihilistic dystopia of “burn everything to the ground” is not necessary to achieve any of these goals, and if enough confidence in alternative solutions and doubts in Shiguraki’s loyalty grows in the minds of each member of the League it could genuinely fall apart at the seams, though that isn’t to say that the League isn’t an incredibly tight knit and loyal group - quite the opposite, they’ve constantly shown to be willing to risk life and limb for each others’ sake - just that they’re more concerned with tearing down the current order than restructuring a cohesive new one. However, if the context around their unity has genuinely shifted to center around Shigaraki himself as a symbolic leader as it's been implied since the fight with Gigantomachia and the MLA, this will be clarified very quickly.

Even for most other villains we’ve encountered through the series this violence-first upheaval of society is not necessary to realize most of their goals. Gentle Criminal sought to shake up heroes’ apathy and overconfidence in their strength - La Brava following him closely because of her unwavering loyalty to him as a person - and even Stain was not opposed to the concept of heroes, just an institution of heroism that breeds greed and apathy instead of elevating the ideals of heroism.

There have been exceptions like the Shie Hassaikai (who sought a complete erasure of quirks from the human genome) and the initial ideology of the Meta Liberation Army (a world ruled by the strong with completely unimpeded use of quirks) that would have required an entire shift in society on a cultural, governmental, legislative, and economic level; but for most the heart of their issues with society is an issue of the heart - that is, a cultural shift is necessary first and foremost to alleviate the problems each of these criticisms address.

This drastic but necessary change has been difficult to achieve up until this point because most of the mouthpieces for these cultural criticisms are either not weighty enough to carry traction without the threat of violence or are held by those motivated by personal vengeance who are not guaranteed to sit and talk about peaceful options even if the opportunity was presented to them. The “outsiders” are so deeply ostracized in the current social and political climate that they can’t get a word in edgewise to those “inside” who go mostly unaffected by the shortcomings the outcasts are attempting to bring to light. This is where the series’ proposed solution enters the stage.

#bnha meta #mha meta #BNHA Chapter 264 #MHA Chapter 264 #bnha spoilers #mha spoilers #long post

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sylleboi · 5 years

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𝕻𝖎𝖈𝖐 𝕬𝖓𝖉 𝕸𝖎𝖝 ︱ 09/09/19

𝕮𝖔𝖑𝖑𝖆𝖌𝖊

During our second day of the course, we were introduced to making collages, inspired by the way that the surrealistic artist Hannah Höch creates the majority of her artwork. Collages are a practice in which you collect pictures, shapes, etc. in a variety of different kind of mediums, and then putting them together to create something new. You can use different aspects of other peoples artwork/things that somebody else have created or produced, to make your own piece of art with a different meaning to what the initial meaning might have been.

To try this out ourselves, we cut out three random and automatically made shapes out of printed and patterned paper. Each one of us then laid out our three shapes onto a table at the end of the classroom. Now we could select three new shapes that you hadn’t made yourself from the selection laid out on the table. Once we had chosen our three new shapes cut out by other students in the room, we started looking through magazines to find objects, faces, body parts, letters, etc. to cut out and put together in a new but preferably odd way, to fit the theme of surrealism. A second theme that you could adapt was anthropomorphism, which could be done by cutting out different bodyparts from animals. For each shape, we made one character, leaving us in the end with three different and incredibly abnormal-looking creatures that we then sketched in a different style and then named. During the last bit of the lesson, we went over and evaluated what we had come up with and wrote down a few words that we thought described our sketches the most accurately.

𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕭𝖗𝖎𝖊𝖋 + 𝕴𝖓𝖙𝖗𝖔𝖉𝖚𝖈𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓

We continued elaborating a bit on the Exquisite Corpse game, now going over what we had done previously and evaluating what we did and why we did it. Through this, I was taught the importance of taking notes for you. Not only did I learn how it’s important to write down everything you feel is important information to keep in mind for the future, but also how helpful it can be to actually illustrate it in steps. It doesn’t only help with remembering it, it also makes it easier to figure out what is what once all my notes start building up throughout the course.

The picture above is a digitalized version of what I chose to illustrate in my notes on the Exquisite Corpse game, which just shows the way to fold the paper and how to draw each bit before giving it to the next person to continue.

𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕭𝖗𝖎𝖊𝖋

We then went over the Brief. This mainly included learning about visual language. This included both understanding what visual language involves as well as learning about how you can apply visual language to context.

Here is a visual mind map sort of thing of what visual language includes:

Now, what do the individual words actually mean? Welp! I was smart enough to take notes, so here goes!

Tone: Tone, also known as shading, is an important aspect of drawing. It is used to guide and direct the viewer's eye. With shading, you can create different moods for your audience to pick up on. Light values often feel open, lighthearted, fun, calm, relaxing, welcoming, inviting, warm, gentle, etc.

On the other side, dark values can often feel uneasy or create an atmosphere of mystery, sadness or something ominous.

Connected to tone is the concept of contrast. Shortly put, it is the difference in light and dark values. Low contrast means that there isn’t much difference between the light and dark values. This can create a calm or subdued mood. High contrast results in very light and very dark values to be next to each other. That can create the mood and feel of excitement, conflict, agitation, drama or distress. Using contrast is incredibly useful for directing the viewer’s eye because naturally, out eyes move to where the highest level of contrast is.

Colour: An example of what colour could mean in the context of art and visual language, could be how stereotypically the colour red symbolizes something evil or bad, but let's break it down a bit more;

Colour is a very important factor in visual storytelling. Like tone, colour is most often used to create mood and emotion, as well as directing the eye and emphasizing different parts of the image or frame. There are fundamental tools that artists use to apply colour efficiently in their art. One of the first things that might come to mind is the colour wheel:

So why is the colour wheel so useful, and why do art teachers in secondary school never shut up about them?

Well, they allow us to clearly identify visually similar colours (which are also known as analogous). These colours are what you’d describe as fitting together. They complement one another really well, and the colour wheel makes it easy for us to see which ones do exactly that. They are close to each other on the wheel. An example of this could be red, orange and yellow.

Contrasting colours are further apart, and an example of this being blue and green.

Finally, there are also complementary colours which are opposite each other on the colour wheel, so an example of that could be red and green.

With the use of contrasting and complementary colours, it can really aid to direct the eye and our attention. Notice how super vibrant this combination appears to the eye? It’s almost as if they clash.

Like mentioned before, analogous colors do the opposite; notice how natural and cohesive they feel? Like they belong and/or fit together.

Like mentioned earlier about the red colour often signaling danger or something bad, each color on the wheel has its own individual influence psychologically. Here are some examples of this;

This colour comes across as being calm and relaxed:

Now, comparing this to this vibrant red colour, it appears much more alarming and alert!:

Shape: Similar to lines, shapes can be connected to feelings and what you read when you look at the different shapes. To give some examples to explain this, triangles can convey speed, action, and tension:

Circles normally appear more friendly:

Squares appear strong, reliable, and stable:

Shapes can also be seen when looking at or studying composition, as you can with for example lines. Shapes can be organic (curved edges and continuous) and geometric (sharp edges and angles)

Line: With line, you can do more than you’d think. You can essentially, when breaking it down, tell a story from a single line. Lines can have many different qualities. Some examples of this could be that you can change the direction in which the line is going and which way it points. You can also change the weight of a line to be either thin or thick. You can also vary the shape of the line as well as adjusting the pressure at which you are drawing. With these different quantities kept in mind, you can apply them to convey meaning.

To give some examples, you could make a line with the feeling of being nervous or distressed like this:

You could make a line with the feeling of being angry:

Or a line which expressed a feeling of being calm:

All of the principals shown above are all used to convey scenes, feelings, characters, and environments in films, drawings, animations, etc.

Form: This could be connected with things that are 3D, (threedimensional) meaning there is an aspect of extra depth that you can’t normally archive with 2D. This is emphasized by light and dark values. (low and high contrast)

Texture: There are two types of textures;

- Implied texture is basically texture that appears to be there, but it’s an illusion.

- Actual texture is texture that exists and can be felt by touch.

𝕰𝖛𝖆𝖑𝖚𝖆𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓

During the evaluation of the class, we talked a bit about why this might be a useful thing to do the Exquisite Corpse in the future. I personally thought that it was very freeing to do. It allows you to let loose with ideas without having that inner voice nagging you saying “This isn’t good enough, that could be better.” The collaborative snapshot of the game definitely gives you inspiration for future ideas and art since you can compare what you did with what everyone else did. Of course, that could result in some toxic thoughts rather than anything that could be useful for oneself, but that is an inner battle every artist in every field has to fight over time.

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redscullyrevival · 6 years

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I finally saw The Last Jedi and I liked it - what I wasn’t entirely anticipating is that I also really enjoyed it! I will now commence bullet point blabbering about the film below the cut and it shall not be spoiler free.

I now understand all the raging nerd-hate this movie has been getting - this film aimed to straight up burn this motherfucker down, huh?

Loved it.

Personally I was very… underwhelmed with The Force Awakens. It was a fun romp and I loved the new characters and the nostalgic twinge of the familiar but oh boy the entire thing felt far too beholden to the pedestal of A STAR WARS FILM! in slow steady blinking lights.

The Force Awakens has that octane Abrams pacing but it is also just so damn stiff. So ridged. And obviously deeply afraid to wander off the path.

I understand that the first re-introduction to such a beloved franchise playing it (excruciatingly) safe made sense; but I was still upset with the final product, with the final choice to deliberately aim to be nothing more than what I’ve seen and felt before.

The Last Jedi on the other hand turns out to be a long, cozy, chat about how A STAR WARS FILM! should be struck down so something new can grow.

Hallelujah!

The visceral attack this film must feel like to a particular kind of Star Wars fan is no doubt very intense and in all honestly I do have some pity for folks who found this new film to be dismissing the legacy they feel connected to in deeply personal ways.

*clappy hands*

But oh, I loved it so much!

Every twist and turn, every aspect of this film pushes the anticipated rhythm of A STAR WARS FILM! away; all the momentum the film gains is for the final purpose of rejecting everything easy and expected, for pushing past, well, the past.

Hot damn, the nerds are kind of justified for once.

The Last Jedi came for them! It went so hard! The more someone had dug themselves into the belief that STAR WARS was a solid thing they knew and understood on a fundamental core level then the deeper the cut would go as the film raged on.

The anger, the hate from certain fandom circles makes total sense.

Because this film done changed the Star Wars.

And it was about fuckin’ time.

So prepared was I to sit through The Empire Strikes Back: The Remix that the intense gut fans-hate-it reaction the film got opening friggin’ day got me all kinds of delighted, how I saw it such a reaction signaled that this new film would be something actually new.

And the fresh air of The Last Jedi comes from some pretty drastic subversion of A STAR WARS FILM! It is down right beautiful.

Ultimately, if the choice to change Star Wars was just to grim dark and edge it up then it’d be pretty terrible I agree, but The Last Jedi managed to alter and course correct massive change without breaking the frame of the how and the why and to whom these STAR WARS stories are told.

I mean, in my opinion anyway.

I felt the film put a lot of care and love into explaining to the audience what was right and natural about change, explaining that strength could be found in letting go of our nostalgia and expectations and opening up to new experiences in old sandboxes. I felt The Last Jedi was an oddly gentle film that knew it was going to frighten some while igniting others and did it’s best to show it’s good will towards signaling hope and legend and legacy into a shared experience.

*shrug shrug shrug* YA FEELIN’ ME?!

I know I already have a spoiler warning above the cut but now I am going to really get up in this film and push my eyeball up against it’s eyeball and hey if you wanna see all particulars feel free, but this is now specific spoiler territory, thanks and happy holidays:

I was so enthralled with Finn and Rose’s quest and I was ecstatic when it didn’t work out.

The two went on a space goose chase for a daring rescue mission and got into ruffian escapades and thought on the fly and were brave and funny and were livin’ that STAR WARS life - and they failed spectacularly.

Their mission, their rip’roarin’ escapade, was in fact a brash and ill thought out plan that almost got absolutely everyone killed.

Precious, lovely, daring, and confident Poe Dameron was a horrible leader.

His belief in a desperate gamble; his total confidence that he was in the right and the stuffy Vice Admiral didn’t know when to take a risk; the audience knowing his qualities as sure fire STAR WARS leadership was all for nothing and people died for it.

I said HOT DAMN!

This film made General Organa and Vice Admiral Holdo, two older women who don’t run around with blasters in hand but who have no less twinkle in their eyes the true leaders of the resistance. The true bearers of the spark of rebellion. It was their matured tried and true mentorship that ended up saving them all - not the cocky charisma of a younger good looking man.

Also Leia is confirmed Force Sensitive™ bringing to an end decades long old guard fans bickering and moaning over if she has pretend magical powers or not and why if she did that’d be “not right”.

(Seeing Carrie Fisher bathed in moonlight was emotional)

And then, oh man, Rey’s parents? Wonderful, soulful, bright and strong Rey? Because she is in a STAR WARS film and can use the force everyone including people who’ve never seen The Force Awakens assumed her parents were a part of the legacy, a part of the grand scheme.

NOPE.

In fact, to really drive it home just so fans can’t possibly be confused, Kylo Ren tells her “You’re nobody. You don’t belong in this story.”

He said that with his mouth words!

But there she is all the same, good old Rey. And she’ll remain. Without being so and so from extended universe’s kid or a character only in some comic book or Luke’s secret child or whatever.

Rey is just a character made to be there and to use the force because, hey, it’s a STAR WARS MOVIE! We needed someone to be the Luke this time around so why not Rey?

PS we shattered Luke’s lightsaber and made Rey indebted to jack squat of this franchise. She searched for her purpose and her parents and only found the strength of herself and her own choices. Peace out!

That tickled me senseless, having the cultural institution of STAR WARS being full on assaulted for two and a half hours.

That tickled my pickle.

The Last Jedi is hyper self aware media, but it was still fun. It was still a good time but it laid down hard and fast with changing the lifeblood of STAR WARS that even I, who is nowhere near as big a fan as someone you could probably hit with a stone’s throw, admit to feeling some uncomfortable chafing at times while watching.

STAR WARS is a legit cultural institution by the way, I didn’t just say that for the fun of it - that’s absolutely 100% true.

Star Wars as a media, as a franchise, has an ebb and flow of patterns, style, symbols, and motifs that dictate a tonal cohesiveness which designates something as recognizable as STAR WARS.

What I’m doing when I all caps “Star Wars” is I’m trying to defer attention to the known concepts and ideas of Star Wars media as a whole cultural institution and experience rather than just invoking a cluster of films, only I’m trying to do all that just through the written word.

Star Wars is a film and STAR WARS is all that which defines the franchise as well as our shared cultural understanding of said franchise, ya fell me? That’s how I approach talking about this kinda stuff online anyways. I feel most will understand what I’m doing with the capitalization and all that but hey, now ya know ‘fo sure.

Anyway

Shit y’all! Luke Skywalker is a funky sore spot huh? Loved that too.

Lets get to that Kylo Ren:

Kylo Ren’s entire set up is that he ain’t Vader and fuck, ain’t that the truth. But in a good way. Duh Kylo Ren is not Vader, he is a different character. And, now, he isn’t even remotely similar to Vader as a STAR WARS character.

Everything about Kylo Ren is opposed to Darth Vader; while he gain’s definition with this new film Kylo Ren didn’t even remotely start out as a mysterious villain like Vader originally did.

We all knew, in that STAR WARS fashion, that Kylo Ren had to be tied to the legacy. We all knew that he had to be tied to the lifeblood of the franchise. And Ben Solo absolutely is.

We knew this before Han ever revealed it through dialogue and that’s why it wasn’t a big reveal in The Force Awakens. Of course Ben Solo turned to the dark side and is Kylo Ren. Of course. Of course he has some weird Vader obsession, the character needed to emulate Vader so as to take up his mantel in the narrative and in the franchise. We needed a baddie in a helmet, stat!

But oh, look what has happened though, oh man:

Luke Skywalker in a moment of fear almost murdered his own nephew -because he is in STAR WARS.

We all know if there are Jedi then there is a light and a dark side of the force; we all know that if you are a master of and a teacher in the ways of the force you open yourself and your students up to a choice; and we all know that fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering.

Kylo Ren being a direct response to Luke friggin’ Skywalker is as far from Vader as you can get but fits just so right within the cleansing fire that is The Last Jedi.

The hero of the first saga ignited the villain of the next.

That ain’t very STAR WARS and something tells me that is the biggest kick to the crotch for a lot of folks.

I, of course, dug the hell outta that choice.

Kylo Ren is actually interesting now. Mischief managed.

The very not subtle social commentary the film was dishing out was a pretty pie to boot. Bit on the nose but hey, ain’t that STAR WARS at least? Didn’t even have to dig this time around, gems sitting right on the surface.

… Damn, I’m tired. I still have plenty to talk about though. Hmm, well, lets close this out on a different note (and that’s a pun):

The music of STAR WARS is bonkers recognizable. Like, I keep saying Star Wars is a cultural institution that uses motifs and symbols as devices for defining itself, right? Yeah, the use of music in this film is a pitch perfect example of that.

The Last Jedi seamlessly flows from theme to theme, with specific well known scores highlighting emotional call backs and in-story referenced characters - the use of music is the most traditionalist aspect of this new film (they even shook up the editing this time around - shock and awe).

Smart though, if they fucked with how STAR WARS did music then even an impassive twerp like me would be pretty upset.

For my money, the musical score is still the best thing about a good old Star War.

#star wars #spoilers #ignore me

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lovehaswonangelnumbers · 4 years

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New Post has been published on https://lovehaswonangelnumbers.org/venus-conjunct-jupiter-and-the-galactic-center/

Venus Conjunct Jupiter And The Galactic Center

By Astrobutterfly

On November 24th, 2019 Venus is conjunct Jupiter. Venus and Jupiter are the brightest “stars” in the sky, symbols of the splendor and timelessness of our existence.

The two will embrace in the evening sky, just after sunset. Venus and Jupiter are the first two lights to turn on after the sun has set, inviting the other billions of stars to follow suit. If you live in a place where there’s not much light pollution – and if it’s not too cloudy – Venus and Jupiter’s meetup is a ‘must-see’.

There’s something magical about observing the planets, about having a direct experience with the ‘gods’ of the sky.

Astrology has become so abstract (thanks to the development of ephemeris and astrology software), that we don’t even know what Venus looks like. We don’t even know how to spot her – even if she is the 2nd brightest object in the night sky after the Moon.

The difference between knowing that Venus is conjunct Jupiter and actually seeing Venus and Jupiter is the same as the difference between talking about beauty, love and abundance and actually experiencing beauty, love, and abundance.

Venus and Jupiter rise approximately half an hour after sunset and are visible for about 2 hours. Venus and Jupiter appear closest to the horizon and the first ‘stars’ to rise in the evening sky. To eliminate any doubt, you can use a sky app to spot Venus and Jupiter (there are many free apps out there, I use SkyView Lite).

The app actually highlights the planets to differentiate them more easily. Here is a photo of Venus and Jupiter I’ve taken with the app:

Venus Conjunct Jupiter – The Most Sought-After Transit

Venus and Jupiter are the most beneficial planets in astrology, and their yearly conjunction is usually the most sought-after transit of the year.

Venus conjunct Jupiter happens once every 13 months on average, and some Venus-Jupiter conjunctions are especially beneficial. This is when either Venus, or Jupiter is in the sign of its rulership or exaltation.

2019 is also one of those magic years because Jupiter is in the sign of its rulership, Sagittarius. This year we’ve been blessed with 2 Venus-Jupiter conjunctions. The first one occurred on January 22nd, in the morning sky, at 15° Sagittarius.

And now the final Venus-Jupiter conjunction in Sagittarius is in the evening sky and will continue the theme of the first conjunction, bringing it to its highest form of manifestation.

Similar Venus-Jupiter conjunctions recur in periods of about 24 years when Venus and Jupiter return to nearly the same place in the sky.

The previous Venus-Jupiter conjunctions from the same ‘family’ occurred 24 years ago on January 14 and November 19, 1995. If possible, try to remember what was going on in your life back then to get an idea about what to expect this time.

Venus Conjunct Jupiter And The Galactic Center

The Venus-Jupiter conjunction is at 28° Sagittarius, very close to the degree of the Galactic Center (27° Sagittarius).

What are the odds to have both Jupiter and Venus conjunct the magic degree of the zodiac? Very very low. This makes the Venus-Jupiter conjunction an absolute magnificent transit. I don’t always get excited about ‘special’ transits but this one is truly unique.

The Galactic Center with its massive black hole is the big cosmic eye, the all-seeing eye, the all-knowing eye. The place where everything originated from. The truth of the matter.

When a planet is conjunct the Galactic Center, it translates the cryptic message of the Galactic Center into something that we, Earthlings can understand and make sense of.

And on November 24th, we have not only one, but two planets connecting us with the Galactic Center. And isn’t it amazing that these two messengers happen to be the most beneficial planets in our solar system?

Venus and Jupiter conjunct the Galactic Center will help us see the big picture, the master plan of the Universe.

With Venus conjunct Jupiter crossing the center of the Galaxy, we will gain clarity about something very fundamental about our existence. Something universal, yet personal.

Thanks to this wonderful alignment, you can have a big ‘a-ha’ moment about your meaning and purpose in life, about the reason you’re here.

And it doesn’t have to be something metaphysical or transcendental. You can finally understand for example, why things haven’t been working in your career, and what to do instead. Or you can gain clarity on what your ‘superpower’ is – something you’re so good at, something that comes so natural to you, that you don’t even think of it as a skill.

Venus Conjunct Jupiter – Your True Beliefs

Jupiter is a wonderful planet that gives us hope, meaning and a sense of togetherness.

Jupiter is a social planet, and we need Jupiter to function in society in a healthy way. But the ‘side effect’ is that sometimes we get trapped in Jupiter’s dogma.

We may think that our beliefs are a true reflection of who we are – only to slowly dissociate ourselves from our true values and feelings – and end up lost and confused, with no sense of personal identity.

Unlike Jupiter, Venus is a personal planet that is directly connected to the center of our being. Venus represents our true values . Your true values are nothing else but a reflection of what we like and dislike. Of what it feels good and what doesn’t feel good.

Maybe you like sour foods. Maybe you hate cilantro. Maybe you’re attracted to partners of the same race. Maybe you’re attracted to partners of a different race.

It’s nothing wrong with what you like and dislike. Your likes and dislikes are truly personal, and a reflection of who you are, with your unique biology, psychology and evolutionary demands.

When you’re in touch with your feelings, when you’re in touch with your natural preferences, when you’re in touch with your values – you are in touch with Venus.

Sometimes we act from Jupiter, and society’s beliefs and interests take center stage. Other times we act from Venus, and we may focus a bit too much on what we want, without trying to find a sense of cohesion with the rest of the world.

Venus conjunct Jupiter is your chance to align your inner values (Venus) with the beliefs of society.

When Venus (your personal values) aligns with Jupiter (the society’s belief system) we reach alignment between our inner values and society’s values.

Does your view on economics, politics, religion or other social issues reflect the truth of your values, the truth of who you are (Venus) or it’s a reflection of societal stereotypes that keep being passed down from one generation to the next?

If you feel that your lifelong beliefs don’t motivate you anymore, if you feel they don’t reflect the truth of who you are, keep in mind that there’s nothing wrong with saying “I’ve changed my mind”. Even if you may seem inauthentic. Even if other people might judge you.

We can only find our true meaning and purpose when we act from your true values. And Venus conjunct Jupiter conjunct the Galactic Center is the best time to reach that inner agreement that will help us do just that.

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knowthewayblog-blog · 7 years

Text

Be System Oriented and Achieve Great Success.

If you want to be successful in anything, you need a System. This is part 2 in a series based on Scott Adams’ book How to Fail at Almost Anything and Still Win Big. Click here for part 1 where I describe why Goals are for Losers and Systems are for Winners.

Here are 10 Tips to be a Winner

1. Apply a systems mindset instead of a goal mindset to everything you want to accomplish. For example: Losing twenty pounds is a goal, but eating right is a system. Running a marathon in under four hours is a goal, but exercising/running daily is a system. In business, making a million dollars is a goal, but being a serial entrepreneur (creating businesses over and over until one hits big) is a system. There are endless areas to apply a systems mindset. Many of my future blog posts and videos will be more detailed about specific systems anyone can follow for these things, but I’ll quickly go over some ideas:

Relationships - 1. Be healthy and fit - workout regularly 2. Be interesting - take up some hobbies, travel 3. Learn to flirt - Talk to lots of girls or guys and figure out what works and what doesn’t. 4. Remember your goal is not to get a date or make the first person you talk to fall in love with you (Goals are for Losers). 5. Make it a systematic way of finding someone to spend time with, so rejection isn’t a big deal.

Exercise and Health - Do something active every single day - schedule it. I do push ups and pulls first thing in the morning, and run or do some quick Interval Training right when I get off work. Check out the 1 Minute Workout. For eating healthy get a calorie app or follow a simple meal plan. Atkins is a popular eating system that does work wonders for individuals or are very over-weight.

Online Businesses (YouTube, Podcasts, Mobile apps, Social Media) - Systematically create niche content and put it out there. That’s it. Don’t worry if it sucks at first and gets zero views. Keep at it, and you will get better and better and eventually something will Click.

Real estate investing - Buy property that needs work, fix it up, then rent it out or flip it and repeat. I recommend reading some books on the topic first, and be wary of seminars and investment schemes.

Stock investing - The simplest systems are long term and involve buying and holding a portfolio of solid fundamentally sound stocks for a number of years. "Value investing," is the hallmark of Warren Buffett. Another stock investing system is William O’Neil’s CANSLIM from best selling book How to Make Money in Stocks.

Career advancement - Scott gives an example of a gentleman he met on a flight who switched jobs systematically learning new things and advancing at each stop until he became CEO.

Money saving and management - The envelope system - Read Dave Ramsey’s, Total Money Makeover. The basic idea is keep budgeted cash in separate envelopes for different categories of your budget. It allows you to see exactly how much money you have left in a given category by the cash that remains on hand.

2. Just google it. We live in an age where you can instantly find a System for anything.

3. Copy others. Tony Robbins said,

”If you want to be successful, find someone who has achieved the results you want and copy what they do and you'll achieve the same results.”

There’s no shame in copying what an already successful person did. Two of the best channels for personal development, Fight Mediocrity and Practical Psychology inspired this channel.

4. K.I.S.S. no not the band... Keep It Simple Stupid. Simple Systems are best. You can optimize later after some success, but Keep It Simple Stupid is the clearest route to succeed. Optimizing might allow you to complete several urgent tasks on the way to another but optimizing is often also complicating which makes things exhausting and stress inducing. Complicated systems also have more opportunities for bugs or errors. In a computer program a bug can either create unwanted results, or completely crash the system. Complicated programs have more bugs and take longer to fix if a system crashes. Simple programs hardly if ever crash and if there is an error, it is easy to find and fix.

Simplification frees up energy, making everything else you do a little bit easier. You are more likely to do something that is simple, and more likely to put off or never do something that is complicated.

5. "Every skill you acquire doubles your odds of success." Scott Adams discusses the idea of a "Talent Stack" often is his blog. You don’t have to master everything to get a benefit, often a working knowledge by reading a book, or watching a YouTube video is all you need.

Here are some skills that apply to everyone. How to Fail... goes into more detail for each one, so I’ll just mention them here.

Public speaking

Proper voice technique

Psychology

Persuasion

Business writing

Accounting

Conversation

A Second language

Golf

Technology

Design

If you become merely good in most of these areas, there’s a good chance you will be successful.

6. "The More You Know, the More You Can Know". That is Scott Adams’ Knowledge Formula. The more concepts you understand, the easier it is to learn new ones. Think of learning as a system in which you continually expose yourself to new topics, primarily the ones you find interesting.

7. Don’t confuse the benefits of persistence with the actual odds of succeeding. The Dilbert Guy says,

The minimum requirement of a system is that a reasonable person expects it to work more often than not. Buying lottery tickets no matter how regularly you do it is not a system.

The odds of hitting the jackpot are too high to be worth it. Odds and luck, however, are important ideas that we’ll discuss another time.

8. Passion Is (mostly) Bullshit. We hear all the time that Passion in what you do is key to succeed. But

"It’s easy to be passionate about things that are working out. That distorts our impression of the importance of passion. Passion fades as a venture you were initially passionate about Fails."

But the excitement and passion increase for the ventures that succeed. We also enjoy things we’re good at. And tend NOT to enjoy the things we suck at. For instance, Now that I am fairly good at solving the Rubik’s cube I really enjoy doing it. I mix it up and resolve it a couple times a day now. People who can’t solve one often say I hate those things.

"A great strategy for success in life is to become good at something, anything, and let that feeling propel you to new and better victories."

Success can be habit-forming. Cal Newport's best selling book So Good They Can't Ignore You, also maintains that passion is overrated.

9. Energy is more important than passion

Personal energy is anything that gives you a positive lift, either mentally or physically.

Our personal supply of energy is limited so we need to manage that energy carefully. Being healthy and fit and happy is key to having energy. Success takes energy. Energy to overcome obstacles, energy to continue trying when we fail. Without being healthy and fit it’s nearly impossible to get the positive mental and physical lifts we need to succeed. That makes Good health a baseline requirement for success.

The concept of Qi (ch’i) found throughout Asian cultures translates as "material energy", "life force", or "energy flow". It is the central underlying principle in traditional Chinese medicine and martial arts. This is the symbol for Qi

氣

Fun fact - I got that tattooed on my arm when I was 19. Qi is said to permeate everything and links our surroundings together. It is the flow of energy around and through the body, forming a cohesive and functioning unit. Qi is necessary to activity and it can be controlled by a well-integrated willpower. When properly nurtured, Qi is capable of extending beyond the human body to reach throughout the universe. When it accumulates there is life. When it dissipates there is death... It can be strengthened through meditation, practicing martial arts, yoga, exercise and eating right. Acupuncture is used to treat many ailments, its purpose is to fix the flow of Qi through the body. I’m not super spiritual but the idea of an energy force that I control is useful. Obviously Qi isn’t a scientific concept and most medical professionals will tell you that chinese medicine and acupuncture are bullshit. Some people might think it’s stupid, and that’s ok. None of that matters when it comes to your personal energy. If an idea works to help you feel more energetic, gives you a positive lift, either mentally or physically, and helps you be successful, than why not go with it. Some people get energy from listening to music or singing, some from a massage, some people get energy from church or meditation. Whatever it is you get energy from who am I to judge? Except Drugs. Drugs are Bad Kids. Don’t Do Drugs. Seriously.

10. A flawed system is ok as long as you’re moving in the right direction. Nobody starts out with a perfect plan or system. If the system doesn’t seem to be moving you in the right direction, change one part of the system. If you change multiple parts at once you won’t know which worked or which caused the catastrophic failure. I realize the “right direction” is vague and you won’t always know which direction you are headed and whether to stay the course or not. Scott Adams says

“One predictor for success is that customers clamor for the bad versions of a product before the good versions are even invented. Consider the iPhone. The first version was a mess, yet it was greeted with an almost feverish enthusiasm. That enthusiasm, and the enormous sales that followed, funded improvements until the product became superb. The smartest way to discern your best path to success is to try lots of different things. For entrepreneurial ventures it might mean quickly bailing out if things don’t come together quickly.”

For some endeavors I think the best path comes down to gut feeling and your tolerance for risk. For other endeavors, there is no wrong direction or path as long as you’re moving.

If you enjoyed this or got a little bit of value out of it, it would be awesome if you hit that Like button.

And if you want to see more please subscribe. In the next one... The next Key to Succeed - Failure is actually a good thing.

#how to be successful #how to fail at almost anything and still win big #how to become rich #how to become a billionaire #how to make money #systems thinking #scott adams #book review #success #motivation #process over results

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