.

.

The theme of Leo’s journey is the son’s search for his Father. In so much of the Western experience, the son experiences a lack in guidance from the father, or there is no father in the home. Lacking a fathers guidance , the son sets out into the world to discover for himself what life is all about, but he is deceived into accepting the values and authority of society’s leaders about how he must behave, what his values should be, and what he must become.

.

Being immature and insecure about himself, he searches first for love and acceptance in the world of men and finds he serves masters who use him for their own ends. He learns he must put his own needs below those of his “superiors.“ He is young, eager to please and idealistic, and so he does not question those masters he fears may reject or disapprove of him. As a result, he misses his opportunity stand up for himself and claim his power when the opportunity does come.

.

Leo’s flaw is his immaturity and idealism, and his unwillingness to recognize and accept his own imperfections as he aspires upward in society. And so he has no compassion for others whose flaws he encounters. He uses women who care for him. And he demonizes those who disagree with him as “wrong headed” or “evil.” He is rigidly one-sided about most issues. And whenever he does try to see things differently than others, he finds that he meets with disapproval and rejection from his compatriots and masters. As a result, he is held in place, compromising himself and his truth by feeling guilty and self-doubting.

.

As Leo ages, life teaches him that all men (and women) suffer. Others are really not so different than he. If he doubts or wonders what is right and what is wrong, so do they. He gradually comes to consciousness that we all are wandering through life trying to find out how to live well and meaningfully.

.

Leo’s journey is to become his Father, the Father who is loving, compassionate, and wise enough to guide him through life. In this journey, the Son becomes the Father in much the same way as in Capricorn and Aries, except those archetypal journeys denote other gains. Leo’s need is to become his own man…in essence he will create himself as an individual. Who it is he is creating will not be someone others will applaud, for he will constantly question society’s values and choices. And so, he learns the loneliness of the King who shall serve his people, yet not receive their love in return.

.

Two myths are needed to describe the issues in Leo. The first might be Herakles and his Battle with the Nemean Lion. The second is Parsival and the Fisher King.

.

In Greek myth, the Twelve Labors of Herakles mark the twelve tasks of the human being as he circles the wheel of Fortune/Life. There are 12 signs of the zodiac, and each sign carries mythic archetypal lessons or tasks to be accomplished in the development of the human being. Herakles represents the all too human “ego” or “conscious mind”, who is attempting to understand life and learn the lessons of his existence.

.

One of Herakles 12 tasks is to conquer a lion who is ravaging flocks and who, it appears, cannot be killed with any weapon. Arrows and spears bounce off his hide, and all who encounter it seem unable to control him.

.

Herakles first tries arrows, but they bounce off its hide. Then, he attempts to club it to death. But that too fails. The lion however is hurt and flees into a cave with two mouths. So Herakles stops one of the mouths up with boulders, and then enters the other to grapple with the beast by hand. Finally, he succeeds in strangling the animal. Flaying the hide, he then wears the lion skin as his outer garment for then on.

.

The myth can be understood as a metaphor. The lion is the young man--the son--who is unconsciously driven by his instincts rather than reason. He attempts to live his life, meeting his needs, narcissistically, but he is met with hostility by society which wants him controlled. He is fiery, passionate, warm-blooded, sexual, rebellious, irresponsible, and ruled by his emotions. His unruly demands and impatience with the rules of family and society brings disapproval from everyone. Herakles is “ego-consciousness” brought to bear upon the natural instincts to take what one needs and to bring those unruly narcissistic instincts under control.

.

Herakles kills the Nemean lion and thereafter wears its skin. He, metaphorically, becomes the lion with his instincts tamed.

.

The lion is also the Child Within us all, narcissistic, innocent, impetuous, warm, curious, natural, impatient, and naturally guided by instinct and desire rather than reason. When that Child meets with adult unapproved, he withdraws into himself (the cave with two mouths), hurt and feeling unloved. Often, it is his parents who confine and punish him, making him feel that his own needs are not worthy, not permitted. And so he learns to put his own needs below that of others. His parents “strangle” his life force and vitality. He is not permitted his own needs.

At some point in life, he discovers that life for him has lost its meaning and value. He turns from his life in society and begins a quest to find the Father-spirit within himself: to discover the meaning to life and rediscover how he should live it. The Quest is the Hero’s Journey…what was called by Joseph Campbell “The Monomyth.”

.

The Myth of the Fisher King tells Leo’s story of the Quest. The myth has been expressed elsewhere in this Journal, so the reader may read it there. In essence, the tale is of a king who is wounded in the genitals, and castrated becomes an invalid king, His land deteriorates into a Wasteland, disappearing into another world.

.

A young knight named Parsival, raised by his mother alone in the forest--for his father had been killed fighting battles for his king--ventures into his castle one night and witnesses a ceremony with the Holy Grail. The Grail heals everyone who asks for healing, but the King receives no justice, no healing. Parsival, however, is unable to bring himself to ask, “Why?” Who is it that the Grail serves that it should heal others but not the King nor the Land?

.

Keeping silent, he sleeps after the ceremony, only to awake in the morning to find the castle gone and himself alone. Parsival realizes that he has been tested and failed the test somehow. It will be 20 more years before he receives another opportunity to be tested to see if he is mature enough to stop being ruled by guilt and social approval and compassionate enough with himself and others to not judge himself as too unworthy to question authority.

.

An old man, when once again he is admitted into the King’s presence and witnesses the Grail Ceremony, he rises and questions the justice of what he witnesses. “Whom does the Grail serve?”, he asks. “Why is this man not healed of his wound?” And with that step, the King is healed and rises from his bed.

.

Parsival’s journey was necessary because he had no father to teach him how to live well. He had to learn through experience instead. He was like the young lion, guided by his instincts and desires and without the experience to tame his passions and need to be loved and admired. He had to grow up and find out that society would never grant him his individuality and his power, no matter how long he waited. He would have to take his power by questioning authority. He would have to learn that a mature individual must be willing to stand alone and live by his own Truths.

.

Young men raised by their mothers alone or with ‘distant fathers’ can emerge from childhood as ‘castrated men’…eunuchs…--wounded in their self image as males, guided by their need to be loved and told what to do rather than to take their own power and live by their own rules and values. Like the Fisher King, they are wounded males, locked into social conformity, powerless, and unable to feel alive within their bodies.

.

When at last Parsival questioned authority and turned away from the guilt which had controlled his actions for so many years, he became the Father. In fact, the healed Fisher King soon revealed that he was Parsival’s own Grandfather. Although the King’s Land quickly is restored, the Old King dies within three days, and Parsival became the Grail King, inheriting the responsibility of bringing healing to the People.

.

And so the Son became the Father. And the two were made One. Within each human are all the dualities of the Universe, good and evil, right and wrong, males and females, old and young, son and father, love and hatred. And within each of us, each duality must be confronted and balanced. Society will always ethically choose one extreme of a duality over the other, project the other upon its “enemies” and so unbalance every individual and create fateful conflicts in its citizens lives. Life then brings a fateful encounter for each of us that will thrust each individual over to the opposite extreme at some point in their life as their shadow resurges and calls the person home to themselves.

.

The “Son seeking the Father” is a voluntary search for balance and compassion in in life. Leo’s deepest urge is to search for the Self, the central value in Life--which in mythic terms is the Search for the Father. Leo’s Father is the Life Giver, symbolized by the Sun: a merciful, compassionate father-god embodied in human values, who heals the wounded soul of the seeker and guides seekers into their own wisdom and individuality. This Father, Leo must discover within himself, for if it is not in him, it is not to be found, and the immature son will age into cynicism and bitterness at the cruelty of the world.

.

To project this inner need onto someone in the outer world, is to create one’s own guru or Master, and to burden that individual with fulfilling your inner ideals--an impossible task. The Guru is within, in the mind and ideals of the seeker, and must be manifested within himself. Then, he becomes the Life Giving Father, the King who serves his People even when they refuse to return his love for them.

.

This is a concept of a Father-god who must be renewed constantly to keep Ham alive and in this world, and must be embodied in outspoken questioning of outer authority by a strong, independent individual who can stand against the disapproval of society and who can advocate for compassion over judgment, justice over exploitation, healing over punishment, love over cruelty, and intimacy over impersonalization.

.

The Sun is the Significator of the Spirit of a Man. It is his essence and I am-ness. It rules his need-to-be. It represents his Will and his Highest Expression. The Sun expresses a person’s determination, his dignity, his self confidence and vitality, his loyalty, fortitude and optimism.

.

The Sun may be expressed in its highest nature or its lower, which is the shadow expression. When positively expressed, the Sun gives self-consciousness, strength, authoritativeness, individualism, power, leadership, confidence, courage and faith. If negatively expressed, the Sun drives self-will, cruelty, austerity, arrogance, willfulness, aggressiveness, dictatorialness, egocentricity, overbearingness, and pessimism.

.

In Western myths, the Sun has a masculine character, but in others cultures and times, it represented the feminine issue.

.

.

Leo must express who she is in the world: to express the mind. Leo can’t keep within herself the secrets others hold dear. So she opens herself so that all may see who she is. She opens her heart and lives from her heart. This is the rising of the Leo heartful personality in full bloom. The sign of Leo marks the high point of the ego’s development on the zodiac.

.

Leo loves life. She must advocate for it, love it, live it fully. Any time she discovers within herself a trace of fear of life or the world, she hunts it down and obliterates it mercilessly. Life is Good. In fact, Leo opens and begins to trust the World, as a child might; curiosity, excitement, loving, Leo runs to meet us, spontaneous, naïve, and innocent. She is brave, heartful, self-reliant, confident, and expressive. Many Leos are dignified, self-respecting, courageous, honest, direct and fully dependable.

.

Ruled by the Sun, Leo exults in performing for others and creative activities. Dancing, singing, storytelling, and drama all are turf for Leo’s high life. She is the center of attention; one would almost think she was a Queen, or he a King. She is the clown, the child, the actor. She is a doer, and she uses her Will like a magic wand, opening doors and manifesting what she wants, and making things happen. With her open heart, Leo wants all those she loves to be as happy as she wills herself to be.

.

.

Behind Leo’s flamboyance, however, is an inner child who is not so sure of herself. Outwardly, she radiates self-confidence, self-reliance, pride in herself, even arrogance; but subconsciously, she is still that little girl trying to please mother and dad with how smart and talented she is.

.

Mom and Dad might always have laughed and clapped for her performances, but in the “real world” people sometimes don’t appreciate the Queenly Leo. Many people will see in her clowning “silliness”, or in her performances “pretension”, in her flamboyance “pride”, and in her playful attitudes an “absence of seriousness” required for business and the real business of life: work! When Leo does not receive the love she requires to flower, her ego cannot withstand the rejection, and she withers.

.

Whereas her complement across the zodiac, Aquarius, suffers from a shadow aspect of ”self-pity”, Leo suffers from “self-importance.” And in both cases that quality is based upon self-doubt. Self doubt stems often from her early childhood when her parents ran down her efforts to do or perform. “You can’t do anything right!” may have been heard too often in the home, or “You’d better work harder or you’ll fail. The world is a hard place. You can’t count on anyone out there.” Aquarius responded by detaching from interpersonal relationships and becoming an intellectual with an inferiority issue. But Leo worked all the harder, became aggressive in making people like her, and dedicated herself to the game of life competitively. Her way became the way of the Will. She had to perform for the people to show how good she really was.

.

But self-importance is a mark of low self-esteem, self love, or self acceptance. If Leo cannot get someone to like her the way she is, she’ll try something else. She may even surrender her self and her self acceptance to be liked. Or she’ll reject those who reject her in anger and confusion. She will feel fear and walk away. She will neglect her responsibilities. She will attempt to control others instead of working with them cooperatively. In the dark, Leo can be perceived as egotistical and bombastic.

.

Or Leo may become so wrapped up in her own self-importance and ego that she believes others can’t do things as well as she can. Then, she becomes caught up in trying to do it all. She won’t delegate. And she becomes destructive and over-controlling in her organization.

.

.

Leo must learn some of the lessons Aquarius knows by instinct. Leo must learn to be detached from outcomes so that rejection and social disapproval don’t wound so deeply. She must learn to control her ego inflation and practice humility. She must become more “statesmanlike” in her relationships with others and serve that which is above selfish interest. At the same time, she must hold onto to those other very positive qualities Leo is well known for: heartfulness, courage, honesty, self-expression, self-reliance, action, a light-hearted attitude about life, and her love of life.

.

Source:

.

Liz Greene, The Astrology of Fate

Steven Forrest, The Inner Sky

Isabel M. Hickey, Astrology: A Cosmic Science

Introduction