With the Sun in Capricorn and the Moon in Libra, let’s learn more about maintaining personal balance realising this will require some honest, hard work.
Ready?
Existential philosopher, Jean Paul Sartre, taught that by learning to carefully read our everyday emotions, we become more active, conscious participants in our actions and decisions. He also taught that these emotions come in cycles. The simple rule in our emotional lives is that which goes up must go down and vice versa; elation eventually will be followed by disappointment that, if you fail to find your balance, could easily turn into depression or despair. Equally – and this is good part – it goes the other way. When we are at our lowest point, the only way is up.
Key to this is both recognising and accepting the direction of your emotional trajectory. This allows you to gain an increased ability to articulate your sense of who you are in relation with the world around you. In turn, this gives you more opportunities to make conscious, active choices. In Everyday Mysteries, Existential Dimensions of Psychotherapy, Emmy van Deurzen-Smith has identified a standard cycle of emotions moving from the bottom (guilt/shame) through to the top (joy/gratitude) and back down again (sorrow/ resignation).
Takeaway point – anger is both the lynchpin as well as the most dangerous of all these emotions. Anger is panic response demonstrating the weakness of your position. When we feel we’re about to lose someone or something we value, we get angry. This triggers the response to pull out all the stops to blow up everything to make this cycle of loss stop. Sometimes it works – often it doesn’t – but the more balanced your response to anger (i.e. remaining calm whilst self-assertive), the better the result.
Moon Tracking 