Earth Medicine, page 18
6.9 MINERAL TOTEM: Topaz
Topaz is an aluminium fluorine silicate found in granite and other indigenous rocks. The soft, golden brown topaz is a delicate stone but it has great strength within it.
It was considered to be the stone of expansiveness which promoted the giving forth of the potential within and stimulated an inner glow in the person who wore it.
Topaz was thought also to induce a feeling of hope, like that which comes from watching the golden glow of sunrise as it marks the dawning of a new day and a new beginning.
Topaz was reputed to cause tension to flow away. In particular it was thought to absorb and disperse the negative vibrations of a troubled mind and was therefore considered to be a protection against depression and insomnia. One method of dispersing worries was to lie down with a topaz resting near the Third Eye chakra between and just above the eyebrows.
Topaz is a stone of encouragement for Brown Bears for it helps to dispel feelings of restriction and opens the mind to a recognition of new opportunities opening up before them. It stimulates both hope and joy within them and helps them to radiate these qualities to others.
6.10 POLARITY TOTEM: Wolf
Brown Bear people can be so self-reliant that they bear their own disappointments, griefs and sorrows in isolation and sometimes to the point where their own energy system can become blocked and they feel thwarted and despondent. They can find help by looking to their balancing totem, Wolf, and learning to rise above the material attachments of day-to-day practicalities by seeking the higher view that a more spiritual perspective can give them.
Like Brown Bears, Wolves have a tendency to keep themselves to themselves and like to withdraw from the world into their own clearly marked territory, but they are swift runners and have a capacity to climb the ‘highest mountain’.
Bear people may need to recognize that the climbing they may need to do is of the mind and the spirit, and that which they may need to hunt is spirit development rather than the acquisition of material possessions alone. Their ‘close-to-the-ground’ practicality needs to be balanced with Wolf’s spiritual far-sightedness.
6.11 PERSONALITY EXPRESSION
Adult
Hardworking, practical, eager, careful, plodding Brown Bear finds it difficult to let up from a round of constant activity.
Brown Bears have an eye for detail but easily lose sight of the main issue. Indeed, they can be quite perplexed when confronted with a problem, and have to break it down into smaller parts which can then be tackled one at a time.
It is the little things in life, and often issues which some other people might regard as relatively unimportant, which cause Brown Bears much anxiety. Sometimes this may be because Brown Bears find they cannot express themselves as clearly as they would like and this causes them problems, particularly in emotional relationships.
Brown Bears often find themselves on the receiving end of orders and of running about in the service of others. Since they are concerned about how other people regard them and are so considerate of others, they often allow themselves to be put into situations where advantage is taken of their warm-heartedness and generous nature.
On the one hand, Brown Bear are thoroughly dependable, working hard and long, and often taking on more than they can safely manage in their desire to fulfil other people’s expectations. On the other hand, they can reach a stage where they no longer want to do a particular task and pretend to be ill or make some other excuse rather than attempt to resolve the issue through discussion and negotiation.
Brown Bears tend to minimize their own talents and ignore their potentialities, sometimes because they allow their own active minds to create so many possibilities that they lose sight of the original idea before they can even begin to develop it.
Brown Bear people are creatures of habit, and it is not just a matter of schedules or the routine of storing things away in a particular place. They will even prefer to holiday in the same place because it has become familiar to them and they know their way around.
They are good-natured and show a surprising reasonableness over whatever is demanded of them, and make valuable friends. Brown Bears are essentially ‘helpers’, and are seemingly content to be in subordinate positions rather than in giving orders to others, though they generally prefer to be self-employed or to work on their own rather than alongside others whom they might find objectionable.
Positive traits: Discriminating. Meticulous. Analytical. Modest. Painstaking.
Negative traits: Fussy. Hypocritical. Finick. Fastidious.
Vocational possibilities: Art. Accounts. Bookkeeping. Journalism. Law. Medicine. Publishing work. Mechanics. Politics. Television. Radio. Stenography.
Child
The Brown Bear infant is generally more contented than most babies – what some people might describe as a ‘good baby’. In their childhood they are easy to handle and seldom troublesome.
The Brown Bear child has a gentle disposition. It likes routine and orderliness because they provide a sense of security which is necessary to its well-being. Disorganization, confusion in the home or lack of clear authority at school can so disorientate the Brown Bear child as to cause not only anxiety but illness. The Brown Bear just needs to know where it stands.
Parent
Brown Bears usually make responsible and conscientious parents. The Brown Bear mother can be fussy with her children over neatness and tidiness and she can get upset if they come home dirty or tread mud over her clean floors. But though firm, she has a tenderness that usually elicits a willing response from her children.
Brown Bear fathers taken their parenthood seriously, too. They will make sacrifices in time as well as money in order to encourage and help their offspring with studies and with hobbies and sporting interests.
6.12 ROMANCE AND SEX
Because Brown Bears don’t find it easy to express their deepest emotions, and hide their true feelings under a cloak of apparent casualness, they are often misunderstood. They are often embarrassed by the tide of feelings that well up inside them and in trying to overcome them they may appear aloof and even cold. So it usually takes time for Brown Bears to establish lasting relationships, but once they do find their true love their devotion and loyalty will never falter.
Brown Bears are gentle and tender lovers, taking their love-making slowly and considerately.
They have a strongly moralistic attitude, and though marriage and family are important to their sense of security and to their own psychological stability, they are likely to seek separation or divorce if their partner kicks over the traces once too often.
Compatibilities: Brown Bears are compatible with Goose and Beaver (those born between 22 December and 19 January and between 20 April and 20 May).
Spiritual sexuality: (−) The basic spiritual sexuality of Brown Bear is feminine, which indicates that they are inclined to be introverted, receptive and nurturing.
6.13 HEALTH
Stomach upsets, problems with the bowels, and skin eruptions suffered by Brown Bear people are likely to be the physical effects of inhibitions and limitations which they impose upon themselves, often through an abnormal concern over small and comparatively unimportant details which they allow to grow into big issues.
Mental upsets are likely to manifest in the stomach so Brown Bear are prone to stomach ulcers and colitis. The hands and feet are vulnerable areas also, particularly to injury.
6.14 AFFINITY COLOUR: Brown and violet
Brown is the colour of the soil and of rocks and therefore of substance, so people of this colour will have a materialistic attitude to life. It suggests toil and effort and productivity, so people associated with this colour are generally conscientious, hardworking and reliable, and show a certain stamina in their undertakings.
Brown indicates a need for physical security and for ‘belonging’. A harmonious home or a den of one’s own to which they can withdraw and feel safe and comfortable is essential for Brown Bears.
In its lighter hues, brown indicates warmth and a desire to help others less fortunate and especially the underdogs, or to undertake jobs that others are reluctant to do. In its darker hues it indicates inflexibility, inertia, obstinacy and a closed mind.
Like green, brown is a ray of balance. It is an ‘earthing’ colour whose emphasis is on practical qualities.
Brown Bears are also influenced by violet, a colour at the spiritually orientated end of the spectrum which helps to link the physical with the non-physical, the objective with the subjective. It is a colour that augments the spiritual aspects of the individual to correct imbalance that can result from overemphasis on the purely physical aspects of living.
Violet is the colour of the sensitive – of the person quickly affected by the moods of others and by the atmosphere of one’s surroundings and whose need is to take time to ponder and reflect before being committed to a line of action initiated by another, or before pulling out of an environment in which one feels trapped or restricted.
Violet is also a colour associated with enchantment and fantasy. It is when Brown Bears begin to fantasize or seek an escape from practical reality by living in a nebulous dream world, that they need to seek the balance that brown, at the more ‘physical’ end of the spectrum can provide them with.
6.15 ADVANTAGEOUS TIMES
Best months of the year for Brown Bears are from 22 August to 21
September, 22 December to 19 January, and 20 April to 20 June.
Best day of the week is Wednesday.
Best times of the day are from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.
6.16 OUTWARD (CONSCIOUS) AIM AND INNER (SUBCONSCIOUS) DESIRE
Brown Bear’s conscious aim of striving for the best ways of dealing with physical and practical things is, in fact, an expression of a subconscious desire to locate the seed of spirituality that lies hidden in matter. This sifting through the experience of day-to-day practicalities is a search for the perfection of an inner reality wherein lies true security.
6.17 SPIRITUAL ALCHEMY
In Brown Bear, Earth is the force expressing itself through the form of work and service and Water is the force that causes flow from one experience to another, sensitive to the sentiments and feelings of others and drawing value from them. The emphasis is on the need for balance, for as Earth needs water for fertilization, so Water needs Earth to be of use. But they must be in balance. Too much Earth will lead to dryness and unfeeling, too much Water and Earth turns to mud and is unstable. In balance there is growth and fruitfulness and joy.
The directional influence is positive and hot moving to warm (+ +) and the elemental polarity is receptive with water (−) and Earth (−). The spiritual sexuality is feminine (−) so the personality leans more to passivity and receptivity. The combination is thus (+ +, − − and −).
6.18 Life-Challenges
Brown Bear people need to learn not to allow their desire for stability and dependence to become inflexibility and stubbornness, otherwise their growth and development will be hampered and they will find themselves caught on a cycle of repeating problems and difficulties.
Part of the purpose of some life-experiences is to demonstrate the need to balance the ‘dream’ with the practical realities of everyday life and by so doing learn to discriminate between what is true value and that which has served its purpose.
Must cultivate: Optimism. Tolerance. Lucidity.
Must avoid: Scepticism. Melancholy. Sloppiness. Nit-picking. Pettiness. Procrastination.
6.19 PRIMARY FUNCTION AND LIFE-PATH
The primary function of the Brown Bear is discrimination. Their life-path is one of processing what comes to them through life-experiences to discover what is of true value and to be retained and absorbed and ingested for future use, and what is superficial and can be eliminated.
But the path leads them beyond that innate ability to take things apart to see how they work. Its purpose is much more than that of satisfying curiosity. It is to discover the details that go into a creative idea so that they can be improved on and perfected.
Just as a tree puts down roots in order that it may have the capacity to form branches and thus explore the space around it, so Brown Bears tap the soil of their life-path in order to discover new ways of service and to extend their own sense of self.
At this stage of the journey on the Wheel of Life there awaits a realization that wisdom is not learned through struggle and conquest but only through the passage of time. It comes with the recognition that whatever is being searched for is to be found within the territory of one’s own experience.
It is a path that leads to the acceptance of being content with what cannot be changed and to the exertion of energy only on those things that can. Wisdom comes through knowing the difference.
A prime purpose of this path is the acceptance that patience is a preliminary to solid achievement.
6.20 THE I CHING TRIGRAM: Chen. The Arousing Thunder.
Those born during the Harvesting Time are on the south-south-west direction on the Wheel of the Year.
The Arousing Thunder trigram represents expanding activity. It indicates growth that brings improvement. It suggests the arousal of creative potential and the liberation of ideas.
It emphasizes the importance of concentrating on a single, dominant idea or desire in bringing thoughts into manifestation and completion.
6.21 HOW TO COPE WITH BROWN BEARS
Appeal to the practical side of their nature. Show an interest in their work and concern for their welfare. Help them to see their ideas in terms of practical realities. Be logical.
Brown Bears don’t like uncertainty and unpunctuality. So don’t keep a Brown Bear waiting. They respond to genuine concern and affection and to gentleness. Get too emotional too quickly and Brown Bear is likely to turn and run.
2.7
Crow
SUMMARY
7. Crow
7.1 BIRTH MONTH: 22 September – 22 October
7.2 EARTH INFLUENCE: The Falling Leaves Time
This is the first cycle influenced by the spirit of the West and is the time of autumn when everything in Nature slows and there is consolidation as the internal structures are strengthened in preparation for the season of sleep and renewal which lies just ahead.
It is the time when the trees shed their leaves and when animals move to their winter locations, or begin to store up body fat for their period of hibernation, and when birds migrate to warmer climes.
Introspection is a quality of this time and people whose birthdays are during this period are influenced to drawn upon their inner resources and to look within rather than outside themselves for the solutions they seek.
7.3 SOLAR INFLUENCES
The Autumn Equinox around 22 September is another point of balance in the solar cycle when day and night are again equally matched to mark a ‘change of gear’ in the natural scheme of things. But whereas Nature was poised to spring into action at the Spring Equinox, it now prepares for resting as the Sun’s power wanes and the contractive phase of the yearly cycle begins to predominate.
Anciently, this was a time of thanksgiving and of contemplation – of gratitude for what has been gathered during the fruitful times and of contemplation as the Wheel of Life turns towards the seasons of external barrenness and one looks to the strength that comes through the nourishment from within that sustains us. The related Sun sign is Libra.
7.4 INFLUENCING WIND: West Winds
DIRECTION: South-west
The west winds of autumn come with strength and power, and in human terms are the winds of maturity for they have a more definite direction, like the middle years of human life, compared with the blustery winds of trial and error that are experienced in young adulthood.
They are the winds that turn one away from engrossment in purely physical activity to contemplate not so much what has been achieved but what has been learned from the experience.
The West Winds bring a clearer dense of direction and purpose – a clarity of mind for knowing where one is going and the comforting assurance that there is a supporting power behind you.
The influencing power of the West is concerned with consolidation and introspection. It helps in turned the mind from the material to the more spiritual aspects of life, and to making use of what has been gathered from the efforts of past activities.
It is a power that strengthens the resolve to discover one’s own inner strengths and weaknesses and to put them to the test. And it provides the courage to reach out and to explore hitherto unknown realms.
The West is associated with autumn and with dusk, both of which herald periods of renewal. It also reflects the quality of maturity, and represents the middle years of life.
The totem animal of the West is the black-furred grizzly, the strongest of the bears, which busies itself in the autumn in preparation for the hibernation of winter.
The Amerindian regarded the grizzly as inward-looking because it appeared to be thoughtful about its actions, and tribal stories related how the animal was not only able to look within its own heart but also within the hearts of others and thereby acquire understanding.
The grizzly is a powerful animal, and as a totem reflects the selflessness of idealism, the wisdom of introspection, and the strength that comes from the spirit.
