The Year of the Fire Monkey! (Feb 8, 2016)
Many of you used to receive “Chinese Astrology Updates” from me. I stopped sending those when my friend, teacher, and founder of my acupuncture college Liu Ming passed away last April. I’d been giving an annual talk on the Chinese Years at the Jacksonville New Years festival for the last 8 years based on his Oakland talks. This year with his being gone, and not giving the talk at J’ville, I’ve had a kind of reprieve from my self-imposed lecture series. Seems I’m still inspired by this stuff, so I’ll present what I can now for myself and any of you that find it interesting.
Ming presented this so uniquely well and with so much humor – its hard to really follow up on that even a bit. Outside of his information, I’ve perused the usual website info, Chinese astrology books, talks and writing given by other acupuncturists… Nearly all of it reads like “Hongkong Grandma” versions. Fine in a folksy way, about finding advantage and what to ‘do’ and how it ‘will be’. Pretty lightweight overall. Nothing has that combination of scholarship and big View-teaching quality I had experienced in learning about how this fits into a larger understanding of Chinese spiritual thought. I’m trying to get a sense of some of that across here. (Ming’s double-set lifetime work on the Daodejing and Yijing has just been released, must-haves really)
So. What are these Animals? Monkeys and Dragons and all. They are images and personifications about the character of ‘Qi’ (energy) as a Wave that is divided up and described by understandable attributes, related to animals as we observe them to be. As experienced over time a wave of Fate forms, initiates, grows, develops, fluctuates, and lets go. It can occur in hourly or monthly or yearly cycles. This wave is divided in classical Chinese geomantic thought into 12 parts – labeled as yearly, monthly, daily, and hourly Animal qualities. The first of the 12 is the ‘Rat’, which has an Analytical quality. This year we are onto the 9th of the 12 is the ‘Monkey’, which has an Imaginative quality.
Combining the Animal with an ‘element’ (one of 5 elements) and an alternating active/quiet phase (yin/yang) makes up a 120 year cycle. This year being the 33rd, or Yang Fire Monkey, in the sequence. This particular cycle is considered useful in that it covers the time period of the ultimate longevity of a human existence, and that’s where we find ourselves.
For thousands of years this have been observed, and recorded historically – to show up in events, dynastic progressions, war and peace, epidemics – and be reasonably accurate in the general ‘feel’ and outcome of the year. From a larger View, the ‘Monkey’ qi we experience in any year depends on how we conduct ourselves, individually AND collectively. There’s some Confucian sensibilities mixed in with all this.
To the ‘classical Chinese’ spiritual mindset – fate/freedom are sides of the same coin, and alternate in our Experience of life. Fate operates on myriad levels (including the qi of the year) and we can use it, adapt to it, struggle with it, observe it – and expand our relative sense of freedom, or difficulty along the way.
The Chinese Year is celebrated in a very festive way in Asian communities around the world. (I had a great time hanging out w/ the Lion dancers in Penang, Malaysia 24 years ago for the Monkey). A big party happens – local astrologers give their forecasts and pave the way for general understanding of what’s on the ‘Qi menu’ for the lunar year to come. It’s the banquet of easily and readily available qi….and….how do you like it? If you’re a Pig, or a Dragon, or a Rat? How digestible is it for you? How might it work out in terms of health, and society? In terms of where the success and power is available, what becomes popular or is in style?
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from Liu Ming on the Monkey:
“The Monkey talked about in Chinese Astrology is well known to the Chinese peasant as a god. The Tibetan and Zhou people both have fables of a Monkey ancestor. The most famous Monkey in China is the wily Monkey who aids a monk in bringing the Buddhist sutras from India. All the images portray the Monkey as godlike but with the weaknesses commonly associated with humans (desire). This is the perilous balancing act that gives us an understanding of the Monkey character. Poised between the profound and the mundane, Monkeys are capable of a broad awareness of their environment. Nothing is lef to convention. For Monkeys the greatest danger is selfish fantasy, the evil sister of visionary wisdom. Monkeys fluctuate between materialism and austerity. Material possessions must not block a Monkey’s need for flexibility
Fire Monkeys (born 1956, 2016, 1776) are organized, industrious, and frank characters. They have strong sexual energy and work on their appearance. They are late to settle down. Their fortunes are good (though their motivation may be inspired by escaping hardship) and they are successful in business. They are particularly capable of avoiding negativity, but they will unfortunately need this skill. though vigorous they are susceptible to wind disorders and they may have coronary problems
When qi-charged Monkeys are: curious, capable, funny, adaptive, intelligent, resourceful, innovative, playful, imitative, responsive and heal fast. When qi-deplete: manipulative deceptive, cunning, erratic, crafty, frantic, nervous, compulsive, anxious and possibly criminal”
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The Fire Monkey Year jumps right in on the heels of the Wood Goat year. The Wood Goat brought, relatively, youthful innocence and peacemaking (the Paris accords). In a natural progression from the Wood Goat and a ‘can’t we all get along’ mentality comes the Monkey. The Monkey is related to the “Metal element”- so Fire Monkey has kind of a “Firey Metal” quality – which is the control cycle on the 5-element wheel – Fire melts Metal – but its not an inherently ‘dangerous’ year. The Fire Monkey is a very sparky (Fire) and eclectic/eccentric/trickster (Monkey) year – new testing, innovation – stirring it up in different ways – and seeing how it holds together!
Key: Give the monkey your puzzle that you can’t solve- could seem big, intractable, confused, Don’t tell him how to do it – let him play and scheme and seem to be doing it in a convulted and backward way – and then… seemingly magically.. somehow hand it back to you resolved. Might take a few months of development as the year goes on.
It’ll be an interesting year with all kinds of entertaining dynamics – and starts off very quickly as the juggling and possibilities ensue. (In my case, I found things almost instantly shuffled around and I was fortunate to find a new clinic to practice in).
Easy to see the Monkey already playing and jumping in with the political situation in America- will the one who acts most like a Monkey win? Or perhaps the Monkey is really in all of us, the electorate, and not really the candidate. Squabbling, play-acting at arguing, acting out-of-the-mainstream, that kind of thing. A lot of threats, saber-rattling, acting absurdly – usually short lived – not usually grudges or vendettas. A sense of humor is a large part of the monkey too – and probably helpful to keep in mind that it’s very much how the Monkey operates. It’s all good if you’re not in the wrong place at the wrong time for that unexpected and short-term explosion. The danger is usually short-lived.
As far as technologies, we’ll be checking out how things work by breaking them down a little – firing them up and risking small explosions on different levels (Apple vs. FBI). Machinery involved w/ electricity has trouble and quirks this year – so don’t invest in those kind of technologies. However its an absolutely great year though for new and unusual start-ups, trends, going back to school.
Environmentally – lightning, fires, more warming of the planet. There will be explosions, solar flares (affecting machinery).. and crop increases. Hard on the rivers and waterways – so accelerating the need for new and eclectic solutions to climate change. On the qi-depleted side (depending what species you are, I guess) pesky things get the upper hand – like mosquitos.
On the health level – its a great year for alternative medicine. Generally healing occurs quickly – and we’re out of the ‘cancer’ predisposition of the last few years. Approaches that are not conventional will be very popular. Anything out of the mainstream, unusual, eccentric, could find itself easily accepted. So along with acupuncture and great herb prescriptions, fire up those Rife machines and Orgone accumulators perhaps (and laugh all the way to the bank!) 🙂 It may actually work this year. I’d advise keeping a warm belly and a cool head – innovative is good but nothing that will accelerate the possibility of insomnia which is also a real possibility this year.
The year creates opportunities for new artistic forging, unusual new possibilities. Great for actors, costume-parties, weird styles and odd-ball behaviors. The year is so sensation oriented, entertaining, and eclectic – look for new and innovative music really catching on.. ‘Burning Man‘ might be a must-see…or a must-avoid event!
It’s generally recommended to be generous to enhance the Qi of any year. Especially fitting would be to make a donation to groups involved with providing educational opportunities for artists and young people, anywhere in the world.
And of course there’s the part in the presentation where your ‘Year’ (as part of your general ‘Character Fate’) is given its Fortune in relation to the qi of the Fire Monkey year! For example, the Dragon and Rat classically have a good year, the Tiger needs to chill, that kind of thing. And for that kind of general personal advice, a little like Sun sign Western Astrology really, I’d guide you to just getting Somerville’s book. This is of course the fun and chatty part everyone listens to at the end of the talk – will it be my lucky year? Maybe I’ll have that part more together next year. Meanwhile us Rats finally have a great year ahead – yes!
It will be a great year if we use it to embrace creatively things that can strengthen us on even a planetary collective level. The qi is there to overcome, with humor, the ‘do-or-die’ feeling about the larger environmental situation, and try new things n a way not seen in quite some time. The Monkey allows us the opportunity to have a great deal of fun with this while at the same time having the energy to embrace perhaps radically new solutions. Or at least laugh as we are fooled once again! Rather than being in love with our gadgets (which might be behaving erratically anyway) we could get out and play and explore. We are monkeys in a lot of ways. Maybe taking ourselves less seriously is just the ticket.
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All the best in the New Year!
Ken