Astrology is a larger expression of this same chicken and egg metaphor. The ancients saw that if Above and Below are reflections of each other, then all things must contain the same essential ingredients. (But as to the perennial question – what came first, the chicken or the egg? – that discusson belongs in another book!)
To the ancients the Sun and Moon were the gods who illuminated and ruled over the starkly contrasting worlds of day and night. So by analogy the same gods are seen to dwell within us, illuminating our own days and nights, our own minds and hearts. The Sun, which lights our days, represents the state within us of being wide awake. This ‘noonday’ level of consciousness enables us to be deliberately conscious, focused and attentive. In this state we know ourselves as separate, alert individuals, attempting to make our way heroically in the world, even though we may wonder why we sometimes bungle it so badly. Nevertheless, we consciously keep trying.
In terms of recent research on the brain, the Sun relates to that level of consciousness which is traditionally associated with a masculine approach to life: the left brain’s activities of reasoning, manipulating objects and numbers; the ability to think in three dimensions, to orient oneself, to plan, organize and pursue specific goals.
The Moon, by contrast, represents the feminine level of our personality. The ancients knew that the Moon ruled the world of night and the mystery of the unconscious, of dreams, imagination and the ebb and flow of our emotional needs, responses and sympathies. At this level we are in the realm of the feminine and all matters related to the right hemisphere of the brain, such as sensitivity to sights, sounds, smells; verbal fluency; and interest in people and relationships. The Moon is our connection with the larger world of what some would call Soul, that principle by which we are connected through body and feeling to all life. The Moon is our ability to respond to our own needs and to the needs of others for nourishment, protection and affection.
To put it on a postcard, we could say that the Sun shows our more individual side and what we are like when we make wide-awake, conscious decisions about our life, what interests us and where we are going. Whereas the Moon shows our natural, gut-level, instinctive response to life, our emotional needs and our approach to looking after ourselves and the needs of others. And the vital thing to remember is that, whether we are male or female, we each have both Sun and Moon sides to our nature. To clarify further what these two different sides actually mean for us in real life, let us look at some real-life situations.
THE SUN AND MOON IN EVERYDAY LIFE
Imagine you are at a party. At most parties the aim is to make everyone feel at ease and sociable and, without realizing it, more in touch with their Moon level. Hence, parties are usually held in the evening, as the Sun is setting or has set, and the time of carousing begins. Nourishment is provided – plenty of food, drink, music and probably soft, muted lighting. These are all lunar things which encourage us to feel relaxed, more intimate, and in touch with our spontaneous feelings, or in other words our Moon side.
Now, imagine that you have had a bit too much to drink and you are drifting along with the mood, and are generally a bit ‘out of your head’. Suddenly someone behind you drops a glass which smashes on the floor. As this happens you find yourself ‘pulling yourself together’ and ‘getting back into your head’. You may shake yourself and blink your eyes so as to ‘wake up’ and be able to size up the situation and take appropriate action, such as stopping people stepping on the broken glass, or helping mop up the spilt drink. If the situation is potentially dangerous you may actually turn up the lights to ‘shed more light on things’.
This scene illustrates a shift of consciousness from the relaxed, cosy, soft-lit Moon level, to the more purposeful, bright-lit, focused, decision-making level of the Sun. Indeed, whenever you hear someone saying ‘pull yourself together’, you are hearing the instruction ‘move from your Moon level (where you have become over-identified with your feelings and emotional responses) into your Sun level (where you can have more conscious, decisive control of what is happening to you)’. If, while you are reading this, you take a moment out to say ‘pull yourself together’, you will probably find that as you do this you will pull your shoulders back and straighten up your spine. You are, as it were, taking possession of your body or, as we say, ‘becoming more self-possessed’. It is interesting to note that, astrologically, your back and spine are ruled by Leo, the Sun’s natural sign. So when we say of someone who is weak-willed that they are ‘spineless’ or ‘lacking backbone’ we are suggesting that they are lacking solar qualities.
To give another example of the way we switch levels in daily life – imagine you have just had a serious talk with your bank manager about your overdraft. With good Sun-level conviction you have assured him or her that you are working hard to get your debts paid off. Outside the bank you meet an old friend. You start talking and soon you are deep in the lunar world of your mutual memories and shared experiences. Then out of the corner of your eye you see the bank manager coming down the street. Immediately you recognize that you are ‘wasting time’. You straighten your back, ‘pull yourself together’ and briskly ‘go about your business’, back into your Sun level again. For most people such shifts of consciousness occur repeatedly throughout the day. With a bit of deliberate self-awareness you can catch yourself shifting between these levels.
We most obviously experience this shift when we wake in the morning from the lunar world of dreams. We gradually become conscious that it is time to get up and that there are things that have to be done. The more important the things are that have to be done, the more quickly we are likely to wake up and get going. (Indeed when there is a ‘big day’ ahead some people find it very difficult to surrender to the Moon level and her healing sleep.) This shift of consciousness represented by waking up is, for most people, normally around dawn as the Sun is beginning to rise in the sky. With sunrise, our own consciousness begins to rise, and we gradually leave the world of lunar unconsciousness behind.
Each of these cases illustrates the very normal process of moving our centre of consciousness from a responsive, reactive Moon mode to a purposeful, decision-making Sun mode, or vice versa. Each level serves an important purpose in our natures; each has its own strengths and weaknesses, its own desires and aspirations, and each will tend to pursue its own interests irrespective of the other. This is why so many people find that they are in conflict with themselves. One side pulls us one way, the other side pulls another. When this happens, we feel inclined to ask ‘Which is the real me?’
The answer, of course, is both. Ideally we need to be more aware of both, and to be more adept at recognizing when one is dominating to the detriment of the other. Indeed, as we shall see, the more we can accept, understand, and work with both these Sun and Moon levels, the more we will move towards that ‘inner marriage’ of the lord and lady within us, of which the great alchemists and philosophers have always spoken. We are this inner marriage all the time; there is no hard and fast separation of these modes in the way we actually live our lives. But is it a good marriage, or does one side feel like divorcing the other all too often?
You will find some of the ideas associated with Sun and Moon listed on the next page.
Some Ideas Associated with the Sun and Moon
| SUN | MOON |
| Day | Night |