Dawne Kovan’s Blog

Every morning, if I have the time, I like to do a Sudoku puzzle – and no matter what the difficulty level, I happily fill in the numbers until successful completion. I prefer to do the game online because it enables me to add and remove mistakes, etc, without cluttering and messing up the page, as in the newspaper versions.

For those of you who are not familiar with Sudoku – it is a Japanese number game designed to test and develop logical thinking. It is made up of 9 blank boxes, each of which has 9 blank squares within it. Depending on the difficulty level, certain squares will be filled in already for you. Each of the 9 boxes then must be filled in with the remaining digits – 1 to 9 – one only of each digit. The across and the down rows will also follow the same rule – one digit per row. And that’s it!

However, I have struggled for some time with the “hard’ and “very hard” categories, until I realised that the devil is in the detail. Each blank square in each box can have a number of values determined by the numbers already in the box or rows up and down, and the remaining numbers needed to complete them. So, it is vital to fill in the blank squares with the correct possibilities carefully and accurately – if not, you will throw the sequence off course and be unable to complete the game.

This morning, as I completed today’s “hard” category puzzle, I realised that here in front of me was a metaphor for life. I was learning something beyond a simple game of Sudoku – I was learning the most important lesson that life could teach me.

Read the rest…

From Edgar down in Oz. (This link opens in a new window)

A full Moon Lunar Eclipse has just taken place in ambitious Capricorn last July 7, which in case you didn’t notice yet, emphasizes your career and worldly activities, while the Jupiter/ Neptune conjunction this weekend July 11-12^th keeps your idealism and optimism in full bloom.

There is not an ounce of cynicism in this spiritual pairing!  As feisty Mars enters communicative Gemini on Monday July 13, you have everything you need to sell an idea or convince anyone of anything!

You’ll have plenty of exciting ideas and stimulating conversations as Mercury, communications, plays favourably with Uranus, your friends and new meetings to go to, all this week! The Communicator, Mercury, enters dramatic Leo on July 17 — definitely a time for bold ideas. Make sure you break out of old patterns as the Sun, solar power energy, excites forward-thinking Uranus, for unexpected new social adventures by next weekend.

The Venus, romance and art planet, challenges Saturn, so don’t be too verbally critical for the next 10 days and it also means it is time to assess your most important relationships. Then, July 22 brings a solar eclipse in the last degree of Cancer and casts a huge spotlight on the security, family and home issues that are so important to this sign.

This Solar Eclipse is, and will be, the longest one for ages and carries enormous changes to all those ethic groups under dictatorship ruling powers through Russia, Iran, Pakistan, India and most of all China which is a Libran based Zodiac sign, currently under enormous challenge by Pluto thru Capricorn. This means that Australia under the sign of Capricorn is going to be tested in its relationship with China as already being reported. The challenge for China is to see itself in a changing world and the need to be more responsive and flexible.

The 11^th to 30^th October has Mars over this point to trigger the most progressive changes ever seen in China’s history! This is the year that could see the most earthquakes in Asian history!

It will also herald a change in the political leaders (in particular the Liberal Party) of ACT and South Australia and possibly the Northern Territory which are under Capricorn energies! We shall await the outcome of the present difficulties (under Mercury’s rule over the trickster email issues) with interest.

Just as the ancient Chinese curse suggested, we are living in interesting times – all of us – and that includes you, me, the people next door, the Prime Minister, the US President, and the person who empties our garbage bins – or ‘buckets’ as they are called here in Fife, where I am right now.

And the way we respond to what’s going on in the world comes out of who we are. So, if we are filled with dread by the reports of doom and gloom in the various news media, then we need to change the dread into some other feeling that can enable rather than disable us.

We have an old maxim that the leopard cannot change its spots – and maybe it can’t because it has a leopard’s consciousness that keeps it camouflaged in the jungle  in order to survive. We humans are different in that we have another kind of consciousness, however, the above maxim is repeatedly churned out and it keeps us believing it. This in fact means that most people have no idea that they can actually change anything about their lives, least of all themselves – and in fact, don’t even realise that there exists a self to change. I think that’s where the panic can set in – if we feel cut off from ourselves – then how can we be effective?

The show that’s keeping us all enthralled on our screens and in the newspapers may not be as serious as they try make out. I know that many people feel they have less money right now and fewer options than we thought we had last year – however, unless we’re living in a war zone, no one’s dying and there are no bombs falling from the sky attempting to annihilate us.

So, the question has to be – what do we want? And how can we make it happen?

This is being bandied about in all the “Self help” media at the moment – and I think that while these are fair questions to ask, they may also miss the point.

What’s more to the point is to ask – what is the meaning of my life? Why do I feel so ineffective? And how can I stop feeling as if I’m on that hamster wheel just going round and round until I fall off it?

Read the rest…

Solar Eclipse by Edgar Winter – my Australian AstroPal – with thanks

The next new moon Cancer ‘Eclipse’ at 29 degrees in that sign is the 22^nd July!

Now the age bracket of those born 1935 through to 1941 are about to feel the effect of that ‘Eclipse’ strongly from now over the next 2-3 months at least!

They were born with Pluto in the sign of Cancer at the tail end of that sign or early Leo in the first couple of degrees.

This was the generation (aged now 67 to 75) born at the end of a fearful depression and the beginning of WW2! With similar world events at hand it would be helpful for that generation to lift up the hearts of those depressed now and tell them that they succeeded and came through against all odds. To keep healthy they need to be in good unpolluted, unspoilt environment and assisting friends or charities that need their services.

The group centred around the year 1941 may have throat or afflictions affecting the Thyroid gland and metabolic system. This in ‘metaphysical’ language was a time of being restricted and unable to speak freely and there was a possibility of chemical or radiation poisoning. Also it was a time of stubborn resistance to change and seeking others help so this reacts strongly around the neck, throat and lung areas of the body.

Anyway that is what the planets are saying now and you may find some with those planetary correspondences.