#and bridging the gap between conflicting ideals and a desire for closeness

[acharyaganesh123]

Vividness Of Moon In The Seventh House

The placement of the Moon in astrological houses holds a profound influence on an individual's personality, emotions, and experiences. When the Moon graces the seventh house of a birth chart, its energies intertwine with the dynamics of partnerships, relationships, and interactions with others. The seventh house, traditionally associated with Libra, governs marriage, partnerships, collaborations, and open enemies. Let's delve into the vividness that the Moon brings to the seventh house and its implications on one's life.

Emotional Significance:

The Moon is often referred to as the luminary of emotions, nurturing, and sensitivity. When positioned in the seventh house, it casts a gentle and harmonious light on one's relationships. Such individuals tend to be deeply in tune with the emotions of their partners and are naturally empathetic listeners. Their emotional fulfillment is closely intertwined with their partnerships, leading them to seek a sense of security and belonging in their closest relationships.

Harmony and Balance:

The seventh house's association with Libra signifies the pursuit of harmony and balance in relationships. The Moon's presence here emphasizes the need for emotional equilibrium in partnerships. These individuals often possess an innate ability to navigate conflicts and misunderstandings with empathy and diplomacy. Their emotional intelligence allows them to bridge gaps and restore harmony within their relationships.

Romantic Idealism:

Moon in the seventh house infuses romanticism and idealism into one's perception of partnerships. They yearn for deep emotional connections and are often drawn to partners who evoke strong feelings of nostalgia and comfort. These individuals cherish the idea of companionship and are willing to invest time and effort into nurturing their relationships. They often have a romanticized view of love and may seek a partner who embodies their emotional ideals.

Need for Partnership:

The Moon's presence in the seventh house highlights a fundamental need for companionship and partnership. These individuals thrive when they have a significant other to share their lives with. They may feel incomplete without a close bond or connection, seeking emotional fulfillment through their relationships. However, this dependency on partnerships can also lead to challenges if they neglect their own emotional well-being in the pursuit of satisfying their partner's needs.

Intuitive Bonds:

Moon in the seventh house enhances one's intuitive and empathetic capabilities within partnerships. They can sense their partner's emotions even when unspoken, allowing them to provide unwavering support during challenging times. This intuitive understanding creates a strong emotional foundation in their relationships, fostering a sense of trust and closeness.

Open Enemies and Emotional Turmoil:

The seventh house also governs open enemies or opponents. With the Moon's influence, conflicts and disagreements can evoke intense emotional reactions. Individuals with this placement may find it challenging to detach emotionally from conflicts, leading to periods of emotional turmoil. It's essential for them to learn how to manage their emotions effectively, especially in adversarial situations.

Conclusion:

The vividness of the Moon in the seventh house imparts a rich emotional landscape to one's partnerships and relationships. These individuals are driven by a deep desire for emotional connection, harmony, and understanding. Their intuitive empathy and nurturing tendencies contribute to the strength of their bonds with others. However, they must also navigate the delicate balance between emotional fulfillment through partnerships and maintaining their own sense of self. As they learn to harmonize their emotions and embrace their innate nurturing qualities, they can truly shine in their relationships and experience profound emotional growth.

[missingn000]

the phantom guardian chapter twenty-five

[thezodiaczone]

March Forecast for Libra

A busy month is in store for you, Libra! The Sun is marching through Pisces and your sixth house of health, fitness and organization until March 20. You’re inspired to get your life running like a well-oiled machine again. With spring right around the corner, these sunbeams will motivate you to get out into nature, eat fresh food and get active after a sedentary winter. The March 17 Pisces full moon could jumpstart any new habits or systems you hope to get in place.

If you’ve been reeling from the eclipses of January 31 and February 15, March could help you start to make sense of it all. This year has sent most of us off to the races—and with these eclipses igniting your houses of fame and group activity, there haven’t been a lot of quiet moments to work through all the energy that’s gotten stirred up. Some Libras have been too busy shaking hands and kissing babies to even set their feet on solid ground. Other Libras could be staggering from some early spring fever or a new romance. Whatever’s gotten stirred up, you haven’t had a chance to process it until now.

Not that March is a slow cycle by any stretch of the imagination! Just like in January, there will be TWO full moons bookending the month. Even better? The second one, on March 31, lands in Libra. And two planets, Mercury and Jupiter, will turn retrograde—a cosmic slowdown that you might actually welcome after all the hubbub.

Conserve your energy at the very beginning of the month, when March 1 delivers a full moon in Virgo and your twelfth house of healing, closure and endings. You could be busy wrapping up a project or working behind the scenes. What’s holding you back—and what are you still holding onto? If you’ve been clinging to a painful situation that’s past its prime, this full moon can help break the pattern. With this potent lunar light in your transitional twelfth house, it’s better not to try to control the outcome. The universe may reveal its plan—and a method to the seeming madness. Be still and watch for the big reveal, which will supply all the guidance you need. You’ve been swimming upstream long enough, Libra, and where has that gotten you? Leave struggle behind already!

Have you been unsure whether you should trust a certain person? Their true intentions could be revealed in the light of this full moon, which can spark an outpouring of pent-up emotions. And with open-hearted Jupiter forming a flowing trine to your ruler, romantic Venus, you could also attract someone who’s soulmate material. Swept away much, Libra?

Keeping your feet on solid ground could get a little slippery starting March 8, when expansive Jupiter turns retrograde for its annual four-month backspin. Jupiter will reverse until July 10 through Scorpio and your second house of work, money and security. Since October 10, the red-spotted planet has been zooming through this prosperous part of your chart, pushing you to take risks and grow. Your confidence has been on the rise, and this may have magnetized new opportunities for financial stability. Global Jupiter could even have brought in a long-distance work opportunity or client.

Exciting as it is, it’s been a lot to take in, and now you might welcome a pause to process and integrate. If bills and paperwork have piled up on your desk, or you’ve got one too many unfinished projects, use this time to catch up. Be discerning about what you take on—you could accidentally bite off more than you can chew.

Since retrogrades can bring back the past, an old client or employer could resurface. Or be proactive and reach out to former colleagues, mentors and alumni. These connections could lead to an unexpected opportunity. During Jupiter’s U-turn, one source of income could slow down or even end. Necessity is the mother of invention. You might take a “bridge job” or do a freelance gig to fill the gaps. Jupiter returns to direct (forward) motion on July 10 and remains in Scorpio until November 8, which will help you make up for lost time. Use this retrograde to tweak your plans, revamp your budget and streamline your systems. Then you’ll be ready for the exciting prospects that arrive this summer and fall.

On March 20, the Sun moves into Aries and your seventh house of partnerships. A dynamic duo could turn official, for either love or business. With el Sol in your opposite sign, the next four weeks are ideal for restoring balance to your closest ties. Save your best energy for the people who have your back through thick and thin. If an S.O. or close friend has been getting the scraps (you’ve been busy and time’s been tight), use Aries season to reconnect and get back on the same page.

Relationship repair work may become a priority when Mercury spins retrograde in Aries from March 22 to April 15. A key bond could also hit a rough patch. Mercury is the planet of communication, travel and technology—and when it turns retrograde, all of these areas can go haywire. Prepare for some crossed wires in an important relationship or possible breakdowns around a business negotiation. Most astrologers advise against signing contracts during a Mercury retrograde phase, and this applies doubly for you because of its placement. Hash out the terms and use this three-week period to conduct due diligence. if you’ve overlooked something, you’ll be glad you took the extra time to investigate. It could even be worth the investment to have a lawyer look over any binding agreements before you sign.

Mercury retrograde can notoriously dredge up the past, and this time, a former flame could resurface. Have you swept a conflict under the rug? For couples, this can be a fruitful phase to work through sticky issues with a therapist—or to try direct communication! Your peace-loving sign hates confrontation, but avoiding it doesn’t make it go away. Sometimes you’ve gotta deal to heal.

There’s a lot going on, Libra—and March is certainly NOT going out like a lamb. All your efforts will pay off at the end of the month, when a rare second full moon lands in YOUR sign. On March 31, the year’s only Libra full moon hosts a cosmic coming-out party. A solo venture or passion project you’ve been toiling away at for the past six months could come together with a flourish. La luna hands you the proverbial mic, so make sure you’re ready to bask in the moonlight! Practice that elevator pitch and be prepared to self-promote when you have the floor. This assertive full moon can help you speak up where you’ve been holding back. Take a deep breath and bravely raise your voice!

Love & Romance

Where to begin? There’s so much amorous activity simmering, you may seriously look into cloning yourself to take full advantage of it! Red-blooded Mars is blazing through fiery Sagittarius and your third house of friends and local activity. Chemistry could heat up with a platonic pal or someone you randomly meet during a night on the town. Attached? Stoke your own lusty libido by getting out and remembering how it feels to go on actual dates. Dress up and do something surprising—novelty is sexy!

The other half of the cosmic-lovebird duo, vixen Venus, is finishing her annual jog through dreamy Pisces until March 6. Before she moves on to impassioned Aries and your partnership zone, she’ll lock lips with expansive Jupiter in seductive Scorpio on March 1, inspiring you to leap before you look. If you can manage your expectations and just enjoy things as they’re unfolding, you’ll come away richer for the experience. But if there’s no way this thing is going to go the distance, don’t even kid yourself for one of those red-hot minutes.

Once Venus starts loping through Aries from March 6 to 31, you could meet a person with long-term potential, perhaps someone you feel an instant kinship with. Easy conversation and a sweetness between you are promising signs. Attached? If the state of your union leaves something to be desired, the “new leaf” energy of Venus in Aries can help you hit the reset button. It might not be as simple as declaring it reborn—you might need to work with a professional or hash out some sticky issues to get things back on track.

Your adventurous side sparks up on March 11, when Mars swings into a triggering trine with unpredictable Uranus in spontaneous fire signs. Interactions will simmer with electric chemistry, but just beneath the surface lurks the potential for some serious head-butting. What have you been holding in for too long, Libra? Uranus can inspire you to speak up and voice your opinions. But with these two hotheaded planets fanning each other’s flames, you could swing a bit too wildly in the outspoken direction. Remember, the goal is to build a bridge, not incinerate it!

On March 17, Mars will trot into Capricorn and your domestic fourth house until May 16. Strong emotions and desires can gust up, possibly prompting you to move forward with baby plans or moving in together. Make sure you’re ready before you take the plunge. Acts like these are hard to “control-X” delete. That said, if you’ve been dragging your feet on a commitment (as Libras are wont to do), Mars can motivate you to finally just go for it.

Key Dates

March 13: Venus-Saturn Square Love interrupted? Watch out for the unexpected resurfacing of some old fears or negative family patterns, which threaten to disturb the smooth flow of your love life. Even if your partner tries to bring you around, you might not be able to talk about what you’re experiencing. Take time to process the feelings, but don’t do anything rash or irrevocable.

Money & Career

“Multitasking Maven” may become your new moniker this month, Libra. With the Sun in Pisces and your orderly sixth house, you’ve got a lot of projects cooking at once. You’re ready to tackle them in a systematic and organized way. But as quickly as you knock items off your to-do list, new ones crop up. Prioritize so you don’t get overwhelmed.

With intensifier Mars in Sagittarius until March 17, your communication house is a hub of activity. Keep your devices charged and explore new ideas. You’ve got nothing to lose by going for coffee or hearing someone’s pitch. If you think there’s a possible synergy, explore it! On March 11, an opportune trine between Mars and innovator Uranus might bring a partnership offer or an exciting chance to join forces on a cutting-edge venture.

Explore thoroughly before jumping in, even if you’re excited. With enterprising Jupiter turning retrograde in Scorpio and your money house from March 8 to July 10, this is no time to rush or gamble. A couple of opportunities could turn out to be duds, but you’ll learn a LOT by going through the due diligence anyway. All is not lost—in fact, you’ll be happy you took the time to thoroughly research.

With Mercury, planet of technology, media and communication, also retrograde from March 22 to April 15, be painstaking with your negotiations. Leave no stone unturned! If you can hold off on sending or signing offers now, do so—at least until you’ve thoroughly read the fine print. If someone truly wants to work with you, they won’t make you feel hurried or hassled.

Key Dates

March 2: Mercury-Jupiter Trine Your imagination will be in fine form under this productive sync-up, so try to shuffle your workflow to allow you to engage in the more creative aspects of your work. Is there a writing project that you’ve been putting off, waiting for inspiration to strike? This might be the day you’re been expecting!

Love Days: 13, 19 Money Days: 25, 6 Luck Days: 23, 31 Off Days: 1, 20

[garywonghc]

Everyday Life Is the Practice

by Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche

SIX TIBETAN REALMS OF REBIRTH

Leaving everyday life and committing yourself to formal meditation practice is one way to enter the dharma, as demonstrated by the many yogis practicing in remote places and monks and nuns living a simple monastic lifestyle. Perhaps in your own life, you are considering this approach. You may be retired and financially secure and can clearly decide that this is the time to completely commit your life to practice, renouncing your ordinary lifestyle. For most of us in the West, however, it is hard to leave our lives in order to practice dharma. In fact, to do so could cause harm to our family and loved ones. So we have no alternative but to bring our dharma practice fully into our lives, which is just as valid an approach as leaving our life behind to practice dharma.

There are certainly times when you can leave your daily working life — times for learning and for personal retreats — but these events should not be the primary emphasis of your spiritual development. Such special occasions are opportunities to gain a clearer idea of how to practice and to find some perspective as you reflect upon how you are going to integrate practice into your life. But you should not depend on them to grow and achieve liberation.

A conflict may emerge for those of us who pay bills and have children and have an ordinary, beautiful life. We feel creative and self-motivated within our ordinary life. We also know the value of formal practice, yet that sometimes conflicts with family or job responsibilities. On top of that, we don’t even know if we are making progress in our practice, because we feel we are not doing it enough. Many times, with the pressures of daily life, we find ourselves saying “Oh, I didn’t do any formal practice at all last week. I am a bad practitioner. I committed to do this, and now I just dropped everything.” We feel bad about ourselves and our path.

So we end up with a big gap between the reality of our everyday lives and our formal meditation, and big gaps like this are a problem. Because we are consumed by the fact that we are not practicing enough, we don’t apply the antidotes we learned to counteract our habitual patterns. We don’t deepen our experiences of practice. Overall, we are uncertain how to judge the success of our meditation practice. We are not skillful enough to bring the practice into our lives and build a bridge between dharma and the challenges of everyday life, including the many relationships it involves.

To illustrate this gap, I give the example of a friend of mine who wants to have a loving relationship with her mother. Fighting and arguing between them has been a pattern for a long time. Since her mother is quite old, she wants to change this pattern of arguing. She is now determined to make a change. With this in mind, she plans for a wonderful time with her mother on a weekend visit, thinking “I’m going to try my best, take some time off, and spend quality time with my mother. We will go out for dinner and a movie. We’ll relax together and enjoy each other’s company.” On Friday, as she leaves work and drives out of the city, she encounters lots of traffic and arrives late. When she arrives, her mother opens the door with, “You’re late,” followed by, “Oh, what have you done to your hair?” That is just enough to awaken the old karma, the spontaneous manifestation of the same mother and the same daughter, and they are back in the same argument. Sparks fly.

GOD REALM

This experience shows that my friend was not really engaging deeply enough in her practice for the change she desired to spontaneously manifest. Intellectually, she wanted it to, but internally things hadn’t really changed. If they had, perhaps she could have responded to her mother’s comments with humour, exaggerating her comment and laughing. “Oh yeah, Mom, my hair. It’s very civilised all week, but come Friday it goes wild.” Some humour, something that changes the direction, is often all it takes. If her practice had ripened in her, or touched her as deeply as her mother’s comments had, she could make that shift. Or perhaps she would not even hear the comment. She would be focusing on putting her bag down and washing up rather than listening for and identifying herself entirely as a target for her mother’s comments.

If we were following the path of leaving daily life in order to practice dharma, perhaps we would be focused on renouncing negative emotions, such as anger. And certainly, if you don’t have anger, you’re not missing anything. But if you do experience anger, it doesn’t help to pretend it’s not there, or to suppress it. Rather, consider how you can give some space to it, because it is already in you, and cultivate its antidote, which is love. Then your anger can actually become the foundation for the achievement of wisdom.

One of the well-known practices in the Bön Buddhist tradition is called the six lokaspractice. While it is a formal meditation practice done on your cushion in a quiet setting, I introduce it because discussing it will help to address how each of us can work to have the results of our formal practice manifest in everyday life. According to the Bön tradition, the six lokas, or six realms, are the actual dimensions of suffering which make up samsara, or cyclic existence, and beings migrate from one to another of these realms through countless lifetimes. It is only through the attainment of buddhahood that one is free from this cycle of birth and death. The underlying cause of the suffering of all of cyclic existence — of each of these realms — is ignorance, or not recognising one’s true nature as open, clear, and perfected. Until you do, you are reborn in a realm if the root cause for that realm drives you as you transition through the bardo, or the stage between one life and the next.

Anger is the root cause to be born as a hell being; greed and attachment leads to the hungry ghost realm; ignorance and doubt are the seeds to be born in the animal realm; jealousy is the root cause of the human realm; pride results in the demi-god realm, and a balanced array of emotions in blissful self-absorption causes one to be born in the god realm. These emotions may be familiar to each of us as troublemakers in our everyday lives. Psychologically, from one moment to the next we may experience ourselves transitioning from one realm to another, driven by conflicting emotions. Certainly, as we look at our families, corporate organisations, and countries, we can observe each of these realms playing out as the various manifestations of human suffering. In fact, the human realm is an ideal place to work with these emotions, to cultivate their antidotes, and to recognise one’s true nature.

DEMI-GOD REALM

In this six lokas practice, the practitioner examines and reflects upon the causes and conditions of the various forms of suffering in cyclic existence. Through visualisation and mantra, the practitioner burns, clears, purifies, and overcomes the causes and results for each of the realms of suffering. Through this practice, we are reminded of the truth of impermanence, we deepen our compassion for the suffering of all beings, and we clear away the obstacles to realising our natural mind, which is Buddha.

Here is a simple description of how the practice works. If you are working with the purification of the hell realm, for example, where the suffering is caused by anger, you reflect deeply on the times in your life when you have acted or spoken driven by anger. You would then take refuge and rouse devotion in the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha; purify anger and the potential for anger to manifest in the future through a visualisation practice and mantra; and cultivate love, the antidote to anger.

Self-reflection on our negative actions of body, speech, and mind is essential to the practice. We can use the ten precepts — ten actions to be avoided and ten virtues to be cultivated — as a very useful guideline to support self-reflection by considering how we violate the precepts with our body, speech, or mind. For example, we may reflect upon our negative speech by thinking “Driven by anger I spoke harshly to my mother. I am aware of the suffering this action caused. In my spiritual development, changing that behaviour would make a difference.” The precepts allow us to be more definite in seeing and working with our negativity.

You could look at the ten actions to be avoided in relation to greed, the root cause for the suffering of the hungry ghost realm, as you seek to clear the causes and conditions of this realm of suffering. Look at your actions in the past, remembering those times when you were stuck in your version of the hungry ghost realm, feeling incomplete and empty and needing so much to be filled up. You may realise that you gossiped because of an underlying feeling of being inadequate and hungering for attention. Reflecting upon the suffering of yourself and others caused by this action and developing sincere remorse, you can now connect to your inherent open awareness.

This open awareness is represented by the Buddha, and is also at the very foundation of your being. When we take refuge, this is what we are truly taking refuge in. It is this open awareness that allows you to look very closely at the suffering that arises in your life due to being driven by greed and attachment. Then, after reflecting on the nature of greed and how the realm of the hungry ghost manifests in your life, and reflecting that countless others are suffering in this way, you apply the skillful means of visualisation and mantra. The causes and conditions of the suffering are penetrated, destroyed, and purified, and the antidote of generosity is cultivated.

As important as your hour session of meditation is — reflecting on the causes of the hell realm and cultivating the antidote of love, or reflecting on the greed of the hungry ghost realm and cultivating the antidote of generosity — the time when you really grow spiritually is when you are challenged in your life. You grow when your mother opens the door and greets you in that familiar way that invites you to either manifest the seeds of your anger or to exercise your awareness. In the same way that you build muscle when you lift weights, your wisdom muscle is built when you are challenged in life. The challenges are not easily found in a comfortable retreat setting. But they are certainly found in everyday-life settings.

In daily life, there are many times when we unexpectedly encounter problems, and we don’t always greet these encounters joyfully or with strength. Sitting on our meditation cushion is a good time to bring these situations to mind, and then to look directly at those encounters, with the support of our refuge in the Buddha as open awareness. In order to bring the fruit of practice into the realities of everyday life, it is important to look deeply and directly at yourself, to examine your actions of body, speech, and mind. The teachings and practices give you ways to overcome and transform negative emotions, so you can examine yourself with confidence. It is not the case that the closer you look the scarier it gets.

You also do not take this opportunity for reflection as a means to over-analyse your behaviour or to develop guilt. You look closely and directly because you feel like a warrior. You can look at your life with strength, with power, with motivation, and with a solution. Because you have a means to transform your life, you actually feel grateful when you can see your stuck places, rather than being fearful, overly intellectual, or guilt-ridden.

ANIMAL REALM

By looking closely with the bravery of a warrior, we can grow and transform the self that encounters issues and problems in life. We can shift from being driven by anger or greed or ignorance to abiding in the open space of awareness. We may discover that in this open space of awareness, the antidotes of love, generosity, clarity, openness, peacefulness, and joyful effort naturally and spontaneously arise.

If you are ripened through your practice, if you have allowed your practice to touch those places of weakness in you, when anger arises in daily life, you will not be driven by that anger. In the best case, anger becomes the fuel for the spontaneous expression of love or kindness, or at the very least, you may find some space to host that anger without being driven by it.

In order to love fully, you need to understand the wisdom of emptiness, which I often translate as openness. Openness is the ground of our being. But how do you actually become more open in the face of anger? I have clear advice: keep silent; don’t act. Usually we think acting out is a way of taking care of things when we are angry. “I really have to speak up about this!” Instead, create space by not acting. Give more time. You may think that not acting sounds too simple, but that is my advice. If you are able to give time, you will create space. If you are not able to give time, if you are not able to not act, you will have driven actions, driven speech, and driven thoughts, all of which result in the ten negative actions to be avoided. Instead, guide your actions, speech, and thoughts with the antidotes and with the ten virtues. Guide yourself rather than being driven by your emotions. To make this possible, you must give time, even though it is sometimes very hard. When people are angry, they have to do, do, do! How fast you feel the urge to act is often the clear message that it is not time to act. The thought “Now I have to act” is a clear message that you need to allow more time and space. And when you give space, you often make the amazing discovery that you don’t have to say or do anything. Have you felt that?

If your practice is ripened, awareness is spontaneous. If your practice is not that ripened, a little conscious effort is useful. When you reflect on your life, you try to prepare the causes and conditions for ripening. When you take personal time to practice, you build the foundation and reflect, so you are ready, or almost ready, to change something in your life. When a situation that challenges you arises, you apply a little extra effort to shift your behavior and make the change. Once things change, the benefit of change itself brings power to your awareness, and the next time a challenging situation arises, your awareness is stronger, and you need less effort to shift your behaviour. In this way you experience the completion or the result of your practice in your everyday life.

HELL REALM

The gap between the opening of your heart in your practice and seeing the fruit in results in your daily life is a very important gap to bridge. We have already discussed reflecting upon our challenges and bringing this reflection to the cushion, looking directly with open awareness at our emotions and conflicts. When we have developed our practice of reflecting with openness, we must keep creating bridges between our practice and our behaviour, so that we can make changes in our lives. Perhaps we experience love, but it is only half-ripened, and so a little encouragement to manifest that love would be nice. If you can manifest love in your kitchen or your workplace or with colleagues or with your family, if love can manifest in those particular situations where it seems necessary, that will be a practice. It is not a formal practice, but definitely it is a practice. I would give more credit to those times when you are conscious and aware even when you are challenged and pushed. In those cases, your spiritual muscles are exercised. When you pay attention to the difficult places and are able to shift them, that is great joy. You can see right in front of your eyes the areas where you have difficulty and the shifts you are able to make.

Perhaps as you have grown through your meditation practice, you have learned to be nice where otherwise you were not. Think of that as a practice, instead of thinking, “I missed my practice, my half-hour of sleepy meditation, this morning.” What is the big deal of missing that meditation when you have been kind to somebody in that difficult situation? Consider the success of your day rather than the failure of missing a session of practice. It is important to think, “Yes! I am practicing!” The idea of feeling guilty and inadequate because you are not on the cushion doing your silent meditation is not useful.

I’m not saying formal practice is not important. It is. But we can expand our notion of practice in order to bring the results into everyday life. If we look closely at our lives, we always have time to practice. Do I need to meditate quietly in order to create a little extra problem to work with? No, the long line for the security check at the airport is perfect. I can get agitated and manifest my six realms there — and in many other places — quite easily. In terms of the practice, that time is completely available to practice the virtues and the antidotes. That time becomes wonderful practice as you live your everyday life, conscious and working with the situations of life, and your formal practice supports you to make the changes that benefit you and others.

[birthperson33-blog]

Bringing Communications Back Down to Earth

Digital Mobile Radio Substantial frequency radios can bridge a over and above-line-of-sight gap throughout functions in contested environments. With the growth and fielding of satellite communications through the U.S. military, today’s warfighters hardly ever use substantial frequency communications inside of and between units. Global functions have enhanced desire in large frequency communications as an alternative to connecting through satellites on present and long term battlefields. U.S. armed forces models already possess a big sum of the radio gear suited for employment at a variety of levels of the battlefield and for humanitarian reduction as a redundant signifies of outside of-line-of-sight communications. Prior to the arrival of tactical satellite communications (SATCOM), substantial frequency (HF) radios had been the commonplace communications strategy. Outside of-line-of-sight communications of voice or data has constantly been a problem for fastened station, cellular and deployed warfighters as well as initial responders. As SATCOM created, nonetheless, it speedily grew to become the chosen long-distance backbone of most voice and knowledge transmissions. As the use of HF severely declined, tools was remaining on the shelf and training all but halted. The positive aspects of satellite communications are nicely known, but the down sides are hardly ever noted. In any communications situation, a redundant capacity to transmit and obtain messages outside of line of sight is a requirement for leaders who insist on masking all avenues for achievement. In addition, today’s warfighter is currently being challenged with satellite-denied environments. Since HF has been relegated to a lower priority tier of instruction and deployment, the capabilities required for its effective use gradually have eroded. Knowing sign propagation and strategies of antenna work have light, as has the functional use of present HF radios. At the same time, the cadre of skilled HF instructors has retired and has not been changed, ensuing in a lack of truly skilled staff with a powerful background in the use of high frequency equipment during the armed services. When environmental aspects such as climate or terrain eradicate or degrade SATCOM as an choice, warfighters have to be properly qualified to use other methods of interaction. Redundancy is still a essential to good results when requirements exceed the abilities of a single technique of communications. The ability to continue to communicate even with limits gives an benefit in excess of less prepared operational forces or governments. The variety of satellites available to handle communication specifications limitations the use of SATCOM. For the duration of conflicts, armed forces satellites are augmented by professional satellites, which are more susceptible to interference. In a contested surroundings, the desire for SATCOM often exceeds the supply, so an accessibility priority program is proven. This is not the circumstance for HF communications techniques, which do not require prioritizing only further or an alternate established of frequencies or networks to aid communications are necessary. Proper use of HF will relieve the demands on SATCOM and complement connections. Nevertheless, very good spectrum administration is even now necessary. Relying intensely on SATCOM also poses other challenges. The greater part of today’s satellites are commercially owned, and all satellites are susceptible to jamming, eavesdropping, hijacking, antisatellite weapons, electromagnetic pulses, cyber or infrastructure attacks, and spoofing by possibly good friend or foe. As a end result, warfighters need to be well prepared to put an HF community into operation speedily as a redundant, or in some situations principal, communications approach. In addition to electronic warfare and cyber attacks, rugged terrain, foliage and unpredictable temperature patterns can inhibit signals, triggering them to be intermittent or even blocked. HF can conquer hard terrain troubles by configuring an antenna program that makes use of the approach of in close proximity to vertical incidence skywave (NVIS) propagation. This strategy is particularly used for shut communications inside of a selection of up to approximately 600 miles, specifically in mountainous or jungle terrain. NVIS normally utilizes frequencies in between 2 megahertz and 10 megahertz (MHz). Though weather conditions and the setting can improve regional noise stages on HF to varying degrees based on the locations of the spectrum utilized, today’s radios have greater sounds filtering and error correction than past tools. For the armed forces, HF has typically been regarded as tough and less than trustworthy. Numerous tactical commanders do not want to deal with what they understand as a static-ridden, sign-fading, numerous-interference and sunspot-impacted frequency band. Nevertheless, technical advancements have corrected numerous of these issues. For instance, automatic url institution is a single of the most considerable enhancements due to the fact it allows the radio to locate the ideal sign path among stations for current and altering conditions routinely. Vocoder engineering, amongst other advancements, can nearly remove track record noise. U.S. govt and military organizations possess a remarkable amount of spectrum that falls into the higher frequency selection of 2 MHz to 30 MHz. As a result, the newest wideband technologies can offer greater slices of bandwidth that can be utilized by HF radios at a considerably increased degree of information throughput than formerly accessible. Minimal fielding of this functionality is underway. Other complex advances in substantial frequency communications consist of embedded encryption, advanced algorithms, frequency hopping and wideband procedure. In addition, current developments in engineering comprising silicon carbide and gallium nitride integrated circuit materials can handle much more electricity in scaled-down packages and are much more suitable more than a wider frequency selection, and improved antennas empower link at reduce energy ratings, conserving essential battery existence. Other improvements include radios that operate in reduced likelihood of intercept/lower probability of detection modes at quite lower energy options and usually below the noise ground. HF gear can be very easily cross-banded to other radio platforms with plug-and-enjoy products. This includes HF to SATCOM to really large frequency, ultrahigh frequency, Wi-Fi, cellphones, landline and even two-way handheld radios. This functionality extends the assortment of line-of-sight radio gear to hundreds or hundreds of miles, like past line of sight. Situation reporting by means of HF has been utilised for a lot of many years. In addition, the gear can be used to interact with worldwide allies, nearby or regional friendly forces, and very first responders who have tiny or no SATCOM capabilities. Advances in navy antenna styles have improved communications and are adaptable to any manner of radio products. Antennas that comply with dimension, excess weight and functionality requirements are accessible with lightweight rollup masts for easy transportation as nicely as fast set up and restoration by warfighters. The route ahead for the military to enhance functions in a contested environment or to rebuild a redundant strategy of beyond-line-of-sight communications is to capitalize on present assets and reintroduce HF radio and antenna work training into a working amount of understanding for the operators.

[powerfulwomeninthemedia-blog]

The Brontë Sisters: Proto-Feminists Under Guise

“Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts as much as their brothers do; they suffer too from too rigid a restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer” (Brontë, 101)

           So writes Charlotte Brontë through her titular character in Jane Eyre, a feminist statement that resonated as loudly in 1847 as it does today. Charlotte, along with her sisters Emily and Anne, are today hailed as feminist literary icons, leaders of popular and classic Victorian literature with a knack for writing fully-fleshed, intriguing, and realistic female characters with compelling stories. The Brontë sisters themselves were acutely aware of their role in the literary cannon, perhaps not as feminist writers, but as female writers entering a male-dominated field; their work, both as the Brontës and as their androgynous alter-egos, the Bells, began the bridge the gap between gendered literature and continues to illustrate the importance of feminist work in the field of literature.

           The prejudice in 19th-century England against women in vocational fields is evident in the personal writings of the Brontë sisters, who on more than one occasion put down on paper their reservations and emotions about their roles as authors. In an 1837 letter, Charlotte wrote of a certain guilt associated with her craft, “I have endeavored to observe all the duties a woman ought to fulfill, confessing with shame that I don’t always succeed, for sometimes when I am teaching or sewing I would rather be reading or writing!” (Dutta, 2311). This passage generates an idea of a woman writing as a selfish act, or a pastime incongruous with society’s ideal expectations of her. Indeed, as academic Sangeeta Dutta writes, each of the Brontës’ novels were “a story of a quest, of entry into the world of education and employment…and [the] desire for a loving relationship” (Dutta, 2312). In their novels, the Brontës attempted to strike an elusive balance between the maternal and wifely roles society expected of them, and their desire for independence through their writing, a conflict still encountered by working women today accused of choosing career over family.

           The degree to which the Brontës were aware of the effects their gender would bring onto their work is shown b the fact that they chose to adopt the androgynous pen names of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell while publishing their books. Only in the preface to the posthumous second edition of Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey did the last surviving sister, Charlotte, explain to audiences that the authors were three women. “We did not like to declare ourselves as women,” she wrote, “because—without at that time suspecting that our mode of writing and thinking was not what is called ‘feminine’—we had a vague impression that authoresses are liable to be looked on with prejudice” (Biographical Notice). The sisters’ conscientious decision to publish under the guise of men (or, at the very least, not women) was a form of ensuring their work reached the public without a lens of gendered discrimination diffusing its intent and prose: the Brontës were aware of the possible consequences of publishing as women, and chose to avert these problems by disguising their gender.

           Though the Brontës did not announce themselves as feminist writers, their works are undoubtedly proto-feminist in nature, “derived from [their] persistent effort to define [themselves] and [their] female protagonists autonomously; resisting pre-determined cultural formulations, and responding to the powerful demands of [their personalities]” (Dutta, 2311). Jane Eyre chafes against the confines of institutions which expect her to sit still and subserve, exclaiming with undoubtable spirit, “I am no bird, an no net ensnares me” (Brontë, p. 6). Wuthering Heights’ Catherine embodies both a roughhousing, troublesome girl on the moors, and a sophisticated debutante ready for marriage and home life. The Brontës’ female characters shun societal expectations and forge their own paths through their independence and quiet rebellion; these are the same emotions that run high through female readership today and keep the Brontës close to the heart of the female literary cannon.

 -Carmen Borca-Carrillo

Works Cited

Brontë, Charlotte. Biographical Notice of Ellis and Acton Bell. September 19th, 1850.

Brontë, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Richmond, 2012.

Dutta, Sangeeta. “Charlotte Brontë and the Woman Question.” Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 26, no. 40, Oct. 5, 1991, pp. 2311-2313, 2315-2316.