Welcome to the Wisdom Wheel Law of Cycles # 34

Not one person can make the sun rise or set any sooner. Wise ones work with natural rhythms, and that begins with a heightened Awareness of them.

Excerpted from the Wisdom Wheel Cycles card

Your Study Schedule for This Law

Full moon Mon December 24 2007 begin Week One – East quadrant – Mental, intellectual aspects
Last quarter Mon December 31 2007 begin Week Two – South quadrant – Emotional aspects

New moon Tue January 08 2008 begin Week Three – West quadrant – Physical and intuitive aspects

First quarter Tue January 15 2008 begin Week Four – North quadrant – Spiritual aspects

Next full moon Tue January 22 2008 begin next Law of Sacred-Oneness
Introduction to the Law of Cycles

Time for the 34th Law of Cycles.  This is the first of the final three stepping stones, under the Integrity Law, which anchors the North Direction on the Wisdom Wheel. As you take up the study of this Law, reflect upon the Cycles of your own life and what it has taken for you to come this far.

Like wheels within Wheels, many Cycles are interacting in every moment. There are mental, emotional, physical and spiritual Cycles for instance. Thinking about Cycles as an idea is not the same as consciously living them and feeling them working their changes in your heart and body.

It would be impossible to fully understand the lessons of this Law without experiencing the Law of Cycles firsthand. Where you are in your own personal Cycles will affect how you see this Law, in relation to yourself and everyone else. For instance, when you first pass through the West as an adolescent, you see its challenges differently than you do in your 40’s. When your third passage through that Direction of Death and Rebirth comes along in your early 70’s, your understanding of all it represents will be deeper and wider.

Why does the Law of Cycles belong on the North side of the Wheel? The Northern Direction is where Wind, Breath, Air and Spirit are represented along with Elders, starlight and winter. Each of these things has its own Cycles. The in-out Cycles of breathing, and the human life cycle, begins when we take our first breath and ends with our last. 

The Wheel includes the human Life Cycles and the physical markers of changes, such as puberty and menopause. We celebrate these Cycles in various ways from Jewish bar and bat mitzvahs to our retirement parties. When we are living on the North side of the Wheel at ages 21-23, 48-50 and 75-77 we are offered the chance to view life from the top, so to speak. Those years are a good time to take stock, while sitting in the seat of the Visionaries. This overview perspective, from on high, allows you to appreciate the Whole, and how all the Cycles combined look. You can then see the entire forest rather than a single tree.      

While revolving and evolving over the highs and lows of your Life Journey, everything else is also rising and falling, growing, peaking and declining. The season(s) will continue their faithful Cycles, and the planets will persist in their steady orbits, once we’re gone. Life and its Cycles can be counted upon to outlast us.  

Take the long term perspective as you carry this Law. Try seeing yourself from a distance. Make a list of all the Cycles you can think of and see which ones are your favorites. Don’t forget to include the lunar Cycles you complete each month, while carrying these Laws.  

There are political, economic and academic Cycles plus the Cycles in machinery and technology. They are all manmade. Seasonal Cycles, menstrual Cycles, gestation and all organic and biological Cycles are Nature made. Learning to honor the wisdom inherent in these Cycles help us ‘to go with the flow’ and embrace the natural, universal rhythms necessary to sustain healthy lives.

Each of these Cycles has its own internal regularity. It composes its own circle, just as each obedient atom does, inside its own orbit.  The shape of the Wheel is an indicator of this Law. ‘What goes around comes around.’

What is the opposite of cyclical predictability? Chaos?

And what holds Cycles to their truthfulness? Integrity. The anchoring Law of the North is crucial to the virtue, value and usefulness of Cycles. When a vicious cycle of hurting and harming needs to be undone, what can you do to reset things so they flow in a positive Direction once again?

Ceremonies and rituals can change vicious Cycles into virtuous ones. Intentionally bringing your full attention, energy, and prayer to a situation can shift the Cycles. This is why doing timeless things in a timeless way can reconnect you with the larger Flow of natural Cycles.

Staying connected with larger Cycles, and things that will outlive your physical Self can calm the ego, which is so afraid of death. Expanding your point of view can also help you remember your place and your purpose in the Universe. As a CircleKeeper, it would be good to know as much as possible about the wisdom of such Cycles.   

For homework this month, use the Wheel to further your Awareness of Cycles. Explore your personal Cycles like a detective. For example, what time of the day, the week, the month is best for doing particular things? Are you a night owl or an early bird? Look back over your agenda book and see which activities were done when. Which went well and which didn’t? See a pattern? 

Diagram the fundamental Cycles necessary to support your highest functioning. Include how many hours of sleep you need, type of exercise and leisure activity etcetera. To protect your health and productivity, it is best to consciously schedule your time in accordance with your Cycles.

Include as many dimensions as you can: time Cycles, physical Cycles, sleep Cycles and work/play schedules. Calculate your bio rhythms if you haven’t done so already. (There is an entry about this, and where you can go online to calculate these.) This sort of Awareness can protect you when planning big projects that demand high energy and intense focus.

Do what comes naturally instead of forcing yourself. Don’t eat just because it is lunchtime if you are not hungry, for instance. I discovered my best time to write is in the morning. A mid-day break for food and exercise allows me to switch to an editors’ stance in the afternoons. That is a good time to revise drafts created earlier in the day. Evenings are good for socializing and 9:30 p.m. is my natural bedtime. Reading primes my pump for the next day… and so on.

When these Cycles are interrupted, and I spend too much time on the phone for example, my Creativity goes down and it will take twice as long for me to write something half as good.

Knowing your Cycles helps you protect them when interacting with mechanical, manmade Cycles. Human beings are not machines. We can not treat ourselves as if we were. Without time outdoors for example, artificial lighting upsets our diurnal Cycles. This affects everything from fertility Cycles to the increased risk of cancer.

Nature’s Cycles vary. Sometimes reliable and occasionally unusual, we have to wonder if we know enough about them to judge complex changes like global warming trends which include both natural and manmade factors.

How much impact does human activity have on Nature and her Cycles? We ignore Nature at our peril. When foundational Cycles are tampered with, there are unintended consequences. The Cycles of disease for instance, have been affected by our overuse of antibiotics and now we have super bugs and strains of infections which didn’t exist before.

Now that you have completed 33 Cycles around the Wheel, what have these journeys taught you? You have been 'living by the Laws of the Universe.’ for nearly 3 years now.  What has changed? This experience can never be lost or taken away. More than mental wisdom has been gained by keeping these Cycles. Your spirit, heart and body have also experienced these daily, weekly, monthly and annual Cycles round the Wheel. We hope you feel the satisfaction of Time well spent

As your time on this 1,000 Day Journey nears its end, contemplate what you would like to do next.

- Would you like to begin another tour of the Wheel and the Laws?

-Would you like to create and lead your own study group?

Thank you for seeing these 33 Cycles through!

Many Blessings, Malcolm and Cynthia Davidson

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