For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one.
A note to readers:
This is a reprint piece from 3 years ago, written from Berlin when I had just discovered my father was diagnosed with terminal cancer. In recent days, I've come to know of many significant deaths in my community - a few relatively unknown, yet no less meaningful, individuals have left the planet to return to stardust. These include animal friends as well. And some important figures, like the great coyote trickster visionary, Larry Harvey, whose founding of the Burning Man project was one of the great wonders of my world.
For the past two years, I have worked as a grief and bereavement counselor for a hospice organization. I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to assist these individuals in Facing Death. In honoring the Great Transformation, I offer a deep bow to my late father, Uwe Wolf Reese (1934-2016). And a eternal thanks to all my teachers, my elders, and to the visionaries who have left this physical plane yet continue to guide, support, inspire each of us. Aho Mitakuye Oyasin.
It is appropriate that I write this from Berlin, a Scorpio
metropolis with its city charter signed on October 28, 1237. Anyone with a smidgen of
history under their belt knows that Berlin has faced its share of darker days
over the years, especially during the 20th century.
If we want to be fully free, truly alive, we face the fact
that it won’t last. Nothing does. We have only the Now to love, to laugh, to dance, to
cry. To hold our beloved’s face in our hands, gazing at them, really seeing
them. How long has it been since you’ve looked – really looked – into each
other’s eyes? Are you seeing a projection of who you want them to be? If you
see them for who they are, as they are, you’re bound to fall in love with them even
more.
Erin Reese
is an author, spiritual guide, astrologer, and modern psychic reader based in the San
Francisco Bay Area. She works with clients all over the world. For
readings and spiritual counseling by Skype, phone or email, contact her
directly. She can be reached at erin@erinreese.com.
- Kahlil Gibran
A note to readers:
This is a reprint piece from 3 years ago, written from Berlin when I had just discovered my father was diagnosed with terminal cancer. In recent days, I've come to know of many significant deaths in my community - a few relatively unknown, yet no less meaningful, individuals have left the planet to return to stardust. These include animal friends as well. And some important figures, like the great coyote trickster visionary, Larry Harvey, whose founding of the Burning Man project was one of the great wonders of my world.
For the past two years, I have worked as a grief and bereavement counselor for a hospice organization. I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to assist these individuals in Facing Death. In honoring the Great Transformation, I offer a deep bow to my late father, Uwe Wolf Reese (1934-2016). And a eternal thanks to all my teachers, my elders, and to the visionaries who have left this physical plane yet continue to guide, support, inspire each of us. Aho Mitakuye Oyasin.
The fear
of death follows from the fear of life.
A man who
lives fully is prepared to die at any time.
- Mark Twain
This week and beyond, we are under the impact of the recent Full Moon in Scorpio, fixed
water sign of transformation and rebirth. Scorpio is always intense; this sign
implores us to go deeper, and then plunge even further, down to the bone. The
springtime Sun is happily chirping and singing in the opposite sign of Taurus. And we are confronted
with the paradox of living life to its fullest while experiencing a part of
ourselves that is passing away.
It is appropriate that I write this from Berlin, a Scorpio
metropolis with its city charter signed on October 28, 1237. Anyone with a smidgen of
history under their belt knows that Berlin has faced its share of darker days
over the years, especially during the 20th century.
But it hasn’t always been
horrific Walls, Reichstags and Kristallnachts. Seductive Berlin is comfortable in
its own skin, embraces counter-culture, art, sex, grit, and brings us closer to
the marrow of existence. That’s its appeal. Like Scorpio, the city transforms
herself over the centuries. The Wall went up, the Wall came down, and Berlin keeps on
turning poison into nectar by facing the shadow head-on.
 |
| Psyche, Berlin Alte Nationalgallerie |
This is the tone of the Full Moon in Scorpio, when Luna pushes
our experience to the quick. We can’t ignore our most intense emotions – they’re
rising like flood waters. We feel the pain, and investigate. Find out what is
underneath. Eventually, it will give way, and therein lies pure energy – light and
dark and truth and awe and agape. Ashes to ashes, we see the life that shines
through in death. Only by staring death in the face, and not turning away, can
we truly live. We are transformed through Scorpio, a phoenix emerging from the
ruins. It is thorough. There are no half measures here. Scorpio redoes the
whole kit and caboodle.
Death – the point of no return – is what truly plunges us
into the Now. We undertake an entire renovation project of our house, from the
ground up. A friend commits suicide and we are shocked into the Present. Extreme
moments of life occur side by side. A relative has a beautiful new baby boy at
the same time you discover another family member has cancer. At that moment,
these people become more real to you – hyper-real. Your lover is moving abroad –
they have a job they can’t pass up. Until then, you must have more physical
contact, more sex, more touch. Every moment spent together becomes critical.
Life and death.
If we want to be fully free, truly alive, we face the fact
that it won’t last. Nothing does. We have only the Now to love, to laugh, to dance, to
cry. To hold our beloved’s face in our hands, gazing at them, really seeing
them. How long has it been since you’ve looked – really looked – into each
other’s eyes? Are you seeing a projection of who you want them to be? If you
see them for who they are, as they are, you’re bound to fall in love with them even
more.
In order to truly live, we must know Death. Scorpio teaches
through the realization of impermanence and the profundity of irreversible
transformation. We exist in the space between. In this breath, we are here. In
this moment, we are alive.
