Sagittarius Season & The Orisha Obatala
This week, our astrological season shifted into Sagittarius. Sagittarius is depicted as a bow and arrow, ready to soar. It is also represented by the centaur holding that bow and arrow and the story of Chiron. We look to this avatar of Chiron as a wounded healer, a term coined by Carl Jung. Why? The story of Chiron is one of someone who alchemizes their deep wounds into medicine, ultimately healing many people along the way. Sagittarius is a fire sign and as I’ve mentioned in the past about other signs, each one has their light and shadow. Sag’s light looks like mindfulness, philanthropy, honesty, freedom in their authenticity, Explorative, Lively and wise. Their shadow can look like leaning more into its fire element and being a bit hot headed, perhaps holding grudges, lashing out, moving from a place of anger, isolating and over indulging. Lets remember that we ALL have sagittarius in our charts and in our medical astrology make up- so we can relate to some degree.
In my spiritual path, Sagittarius is associated with Obatala and Oxossi. Both are very wise and cool headed Orishas but I’ll first speak about Obatala and how his medicine can help us come into balance with these shadow aspects.
Obatala or Oxalá is the oldest Orisha in the pantheon. Obatala has many paths or caminos in ATR beliefs but is always associated with having a cool head, a calm spirit and being very wise. They are also connected to the technology of creation and of justice. We believe that Obatala was the first Orisha to come to earth– to create the land on which we step. Before Obatala descended onto earth from his golden chain, the only deity present was Olokun, the Orisha of the deeeep waters. Earth was an ocean, deep and massive. Obatala poured sand from his seashell and land was formed. He traveled to earth with a few sacred items and a black cat. He soon became lonely and asked The Creator, Olodumare if he could have companions. We believe that Obatala formed each early human from clay and Olodumare breathed life into them – just as it continues now.
The womb, the home of the fetus is ruled by Yemaya but it is Obatala that forms the human’s body in that womb (Creation). Obatala is known as the King of the White Cloth, purity and wisdom are two of their children’s characteristics. Obatala can assist us in calming inner turmoil. They can help us to chill out on vices, sparks our inner wisdom to shine through and help us relieve an anxious mind. This short breath work practice I shared in our newsletter is very much a tool to tap into our inner calm and to the asé of Obatala.
Stay tuned for next week's post on Oxossi and a pataki about their asé
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