Dear wanderer,
Have you ever had one of those synchronicities that just won’t leave you?
The other morning, as I was walking to the bus stop, I noticed a wagtail from the corner of my eye as it was rushing across the street. For a whole day, this brief interaction kept nudging at me. And then, last night a tower of Peregrine falcons appeared in my dream. This morning, as I was doing my weekly Tarot spread, one of the cards I drew was Nine of Pentacles which depicts a woman holding a Peregrine falcon on her left arm.
But before I dive into the lessons of these divine signs, I want to pause for a moment and talk about a few changes that you may have already noticed if you’ve walked this journey with me for a while.
As a 3/5, my way through life is all about experimentation and changing things up. That in itself is rooted in my deep need to follow what lights me up. For a while now, what’s lit me up has been the synthesis of astrology, Gene Keys, Tarot and self-inquiry. This synthesis has been percolating in me for the past year.
When Human Design found me at the beginning of 2021, I felt this instant urge to share it with others. Then life drew me to astrology and that urge resurfaced. Then the Gene Keys entered my life along with Tarot and I knew I’d found the missing pieces. Astrology, Gene Keys, Tarot and journalling have become integral pieces to embracing my wholeness.
The vision for Knot So Wild first came to me all the way back in autumn 2020. I had this desire to talk to others who’d never really “fit in”, who had always felt different, and who had no desire to conform to society’s norms. I had grappled with low self-esteem, self-doubt and seeking external validation most of my life, and I felt it was important to share my voice about it all. Thank my 5th Line there.
However, that vision back in 2020 was way too ambitious. I did not have all the pieces or the tools I needed. I had not gathered my own wisdom through my own experimentation process. The last year has been that experimentation. It has led me to my process of Sacred Work which is founded on the four pillars I mentioned above.
Astrology and Gene Keys are the tools that help us learn about ourselves. Tarot helps us cultivate unconditional self-trust. And self-inquiry through journalling connects the dots and maps out our magical path through this life.
With all that said, Knot So Wild - Letters on Creative Living will from now on live on Substack. That means a few things. You will still receive the letters straight into your inbox. But the cool thing is that there is now more of a community element to these letters. If this resonates, you get to interact with other readers in the comments section of each letter. Plus, you can access all the letters in one place here on my archive page. If you’re a new subscriber, you get to read the previous letters you might have missed prior to subscribing.
Substack does have an option to put your newsletter behind a paywall. I will not be doing that. For now, at least. But if you do feel you want to support my writing I have created a Buy Me a Coffee page where you can, drum roll, buy me a coffee. You might have heard about my love affair with coffee.
If you have any questions, please reach out and I am happy to answer them.
Now, let’s go back to the birds who have revealed a few important lessons this week - learning to listen to my heart and cultivating unconditional self-trust.
The seeds of that lesson were sown last year. Rewinding back to spring 2021, I thought I'd found the secret that no one else knew about. I'd stumbled upon True Sidereal astrology - using the live sky as the basis for astrological readings, also known as constellational astrology.
Little did I know that a year on and I'd be embracing my Tropical chart. My 3rd Line had to go through experimentation. As I’ve talked about it before, 3rd Lines are all about trials and errors, experimentation, change, and letting go of what's "normal". This is and will always be my pattern, no matter what I'm doing or questioning. It is my inherent need to find out the truth for myself, my truth, through my lived experience. And at times this means I need to embrace my stubborn and rebellious side that gets so rigid when it sets my mind on something.
I see now how my shadow of Seriousness held onto a dogmatic way of thinking. My ego was above everyone else's truth. To me, everyone who believed in Tropical astrology was on the wrong path. They didn't see the truth. In my mind, they were in denial. They were in some sort of a conspiracy. What I failed to see in all my Seriousness was this:
Obsessing over one universal truth and trying to prove others wrong stops us from embracing what's actually helpful to us as individuals and the collective.
And so the walls started coming down. The cracks started appearing in my Tower of Truth. My Tower of Truth was no longer serving me. I did not have my best intentions in mind. I was spiralling down into this hole of forcing myself into a specific box and I no longer knew why. My heart and mind were disconnected, and my mind was the more dominant force.
It is no coincidence that The Tower is my Tarot card for this year. I had to burn it all down to start building a more solid foundation. The truth is I was so attached to something different, something outside the box. And the more attached I became, the less I was able to admit to myself that I had succumbed to my Seriousness.
I was so attached to this idea of proving everyone wrong. I was literally chasing the truth down the rabbit hole of countless books, websites, and ancient texts. My mind was set on this truth and I was willing to dig it out. Except that I didn't. I had selectively read texts that supported my truth and closed the door on any other viewpoint. I did not want to hear about the alternatives.
"Whenever you become over-serious about your opinions you immediately find yourself having to defend them."
Richard Rudd on Gene Keys 17
My astrology teacher Britten LaRue opened up the door to the alternative - my Tropical natal chart.
During our astrology reading, I realised that it didn't have to be either/or. It could be both because both charts revealed something, stirred a truth within me that was lying dormant, hidden away in the corner, shaking from the fear of being burned at the stake. I had put it there and I was willing to burn it down.
I had disconnected myself from my joy. It was no longer about exploration and discovery. It was about proving the world wrong. I was so selective about what I wanted to see, so fixated on what allowed me to play into my own agenda, which was proving the credibility of True Sidereal astrology and the bogusness of Tropical astrology.
I was willing to remain close-minded to something that has opened up a magical door within me.
This doesn't mean that one form of astrology is above the other one. What this means is that we as individuals get to decide what's true to us, what's helpful, and what allows us to accept our wholeness. It is about tools that help us embrace both our shadows and gifts because we can't have one without the other. We can't see one without the other.
It is the Shadow that reveals our Gift and wakens the potential of our Siddhi.
My Libra Sun is here to remind us of that - creating a world where we all embrace ourselves and each other fully and wholeheartedly. Libra as the symbol of Scales, is here to balance our darkness with our lightness, to create beauty and harmony not just within but also out in the world. Libra is all about cooperation for the greater good. And the way to it is to start noticing and accepting our flaws, become more tolerant of them and through that open up the magical door to the wisdom they hold.
My teacher Britten lovingly refers to this as "holding ourselves in our totality".
Through that path of self-acceptance and self-validation, we can then extend that to others, and create a more tolerant and compassionate world.
My Pluto is also in my 2nd House Libra. Pluto is the underworld, the hidden, the taboo, the stuff we don't like looking at, less alone talk about. Pluto is our path of transformation, our cycle of death and rebirth, which we may experience multiple times over the course of our lives. Pluto, as stated by Demetra George, is our capacity for self-transformation and self-renewal.
My astrology teacher Britten has a beautiful chart of houses as spaces of self-healing. The self-healing of the 2nd House is about our self-worth. To me the healing of the 2nd House is about cultivating unconditional self-trust: knowing and acknowledging my inherent worth; embracing all the sides of my being; validating my own existence; relying on my inner knowing for answers, and letting go of the attachments that keep me stuck in the patterns of my Shadows.
This to me is my Sacred Work. Right now, it is all about healing my Libra Sun and allowing her to express her true radiance without the need to constantly seek external validation for her worth, her words, her opinions, and her ideas. This is directly linked to my Chiron, the Wounded Healer, in my 10th House. As you may know, the 10th House is all about our public persona, who we are out there in the world, and what we bring to the collective.
Since the 2nd House is an Earth house, this to me implies that my self-healing is about grounding myself in my physical body and celebrating my own worthiness, and trusting that those who are drawn to my Sun will welcome my warmth. Through that, I am able to find Inner Peace, which is the self-healing of the 12th House, where my Leo, the ruler of my Sun, happens to be.
You might start to gather that your natal chart is all connected and that you are the expression of all of the signs and not just your Sun sign. If you’re open to it energetically, you may even start to notice how your Gene Keys profile adds a whole new layer to your self-knowledge.
The more I let this idea of our Sacred Work percolate through me, the more I am feeling into its power, its possibility, and its healing properties. As a dear friend recently wrote in one of her letters, we have to do that work ourselves but we don't have to do it alone. My hope is that these letters make you feel less alone in your story, but also give you the courage to look at your own Shadows with tolerance and gentleness.
Your Sacred Work may look a lot different to mine. In fact, it most likely will. Not only does it depend on your lived experiences, your conditioning, and your childhood, but also on your natal imprinting. You can start to feel into it by looking at where your Sun is in your chart.
What house is it in?
What sign is it?
Where is the ruler of your Sun?
Does it connect with any other planetary body through an aspect?
What does the sphere of your Life’s Work add to it?
How do the two correlate to each other?
My Pluto in the 50th Gene Key, in Line 3, with its Shadow of Corruption, its Wound of Shame and its gift of Equilibrium has also something to do with my attachment issues. I see now how my Seriousness fuelled my strong opinion about the validity of True Sidereal astrology and the invalidity of Tropical astrology. Slowly, as I am deepening my contemplations on the Shadow of my Life’s Work, I am opening up the door to "a state in which opposing forces or influences are balanced" - a definition of Equilibrium by Oxford Dictionary.
These contemplations allow me to see how my Scales have also been out of balance. I thought the world was corrupted and that someone had to liberate us from the lie that we had been told, the Corruption that the world of astrology was living in, and the denial of the masses. I was acting from the Shadows of Gene Key 13 and 17, the wagtail and the Peregrine falcon, the Shadow of Discord and Opinion. And as Rudd says, when we have strong opinions, we immediately feel like we need to defend them.
Even when I was participating in Britten’s “Charting Your Course”, I found my mind defending Sidereal astrology. I was so attached to my own opinions of it which meant that I felt a deep disconnection from the community I was part of. I could not discern the voice of my heart from the voice of my mind. Until that magical reading. It pulled me out of the Shadow frequency and showed me the Gift of Discernment and Far-sightedness.
I was invited to let go of that attachment to one universal truth and instead bring myself back into equilibrium and focus on the truth that's helpful to me and to others. Once again, my Seriousness had been running the show. I had lost touch with my joyful self, the self that loves following her bliss, the self that lives for exploration and discovery, the self that is inquisitive. I was reminded to stop being so serious.
I'm also being reminded to hold these contemplations with lightheartedness and play. Who's to say any of it is true outside of my own experience, or even within it. Who's to say it isn't my mind wanting to make sense of things. Our minds are like that. We as humans need to define things but the secret is to not get too attached, to simply enjoy being in this body on this earth, meeting each moment as it comes.
And so when these magical synchronicities happen, when certain birds appear on my path, I pause. I reach for the Gene Keys and open myself up for quiet contemplation.
I’m reminded time and time again that all of life is interconnected. The things we take for granted are often here to show us the way. If only we were open to the art of listening.
When we open these secret passages to all things magical, life reciprocates. We are simply the channel through which magic pours in and back out of us. This is the re-enchantment of the world that Richard Tarnas talks about in his book “Cosmos and Psyche”.
When we allow this magical channel to open up, everything in life comes to us to support us on our journey. Messages come to us through birds, Tarot readings, and through quiet contemplations. And they all link back to our individual natal charts and holographic profiles. Because ultimately we are magic and our path through this life is enchanted with Delights.
Where in your life are you allowing your mind too much authority?
Where in your life can you invite in more gentleness and cultivate the art of listening from your heart?
Where are your opinions too rigid? How can you soften the edges?
I’d love to hear your revelations and a-ha moments. If you feel called to share, either reply to this letter or connect with the community here.
Til next time, dear wanderer.
Love,
Silvia
P.S. This song by By The Coast feels very appropriate to share with you in this letter. It’s called “Magic”.
P.P.S. If you feel called to support my writing, you can always buy me a coffee. My pottering self would be beyond grateful.