Taurus Uranus 1: Profit, Performance, & Akrasia

Uranus will be variably in tropical Taurus 2018 – 2026, supporting a global impulse of innovation in food/agri-tech, family systems, and the finance sector. However, instead of writing an article about it focused purely on astrological jargon, and in true alignment with the practical earthiness of Taurus (think a cow slowly and peacefully chewing away lounging about in a meadow), I felt it more prudent to write a series of articles which support us individually to enhance those bullish factors of the reality of our day to day lives: performance, sustainability, enjoyment, and endurance. Taurus represents the Venusian impulse to accumulate around us that which is worthy; the practical aspect of it speaks of the simple truth that a life in alignment with our values and sense of worthiness, is the most sustainable and most enjoyable way to live – and achieve – what we want out of life. This weekly series of articles will aim to provide snippets and inspirations so that we gird up our loins, pull up our socks, and get busy with our life that now calls us to attention. 

PROFIT

I think there is no other concept in business that is more aligned to the Taurus archetype than the concept of Profit. Because essentially, a large part of what a good business is is what you are able to keep, and how efficiently that storehouse is used to further growth in the business. In other words, marketing focuses a lot on what you make as a business, and how you make it, but doing so without a firm idea of what you want to gather to oneself thereby, can lead you quite a ways off target.

One of the ways that people and business focus on what they would like to keep and grow from, is with a focus on Profit, which is simply bringing in more cashflow than one spends. If an operation ceases to make a profit, it is no longer a business – very soon the operation runs out of resources and essentials, or more creative businesses attempt to shore up shortfalls by the profits of other businesses on portfolio. But lets keep things simple here – if there is no profit, there is no business. If employees cant be paid, if the baseline costs cannot be met, if investors cant be convinced the operation is worthwhile, the business usually closes down. Finance is a Taurus archetype. Commerce is probably more Virgoan. Taurus says, “me caveman, me need meat, me do punch chest, grunt grunt” and then goes out and looks about how to acquire what is needed or how to sustain it and store it efficiently once it is acquired. Away from Aries individuation, Taurus is essentially the Hunter/Gatherer consciousness, instinctual to us all and upon which we base a lot of our pain vs pleasure decisions in life.

The storage archetype of Taurus also plays through when we talk about Profit. Having the material security of Profit, allows a business to store enough capital against future shortfalls and emergencies. The bull conserves energy for when it is needed most. Being profitable also means a business should be able to plan contingencies for uncertainty and necessary forced changes in operation.

Now, as Taurus is the exaltation of the Moon, naturally people have taken the concept of what a business is even further; a business is not just its profit, the aim of business is to maximize (or better, optimize) profit. Profit (or the optimization of it) is an important material success criteria in any undertaking.

Now, what if you’re not a business person? Well, the concept of Profit can also be linked to the idea of Recurring Return. For whatever activity you begin, are you gaining more than what you’re putting in, are you growing more than you otherwise would be, are you improving your current and future security against future uncertainties? Will this activity provide you with some result that is improving your life consistently enough to justify you pushing through with it?

Exercise: Make a list of the recurring activities you do on a daily basis, and qualify each of them based upon the Profit obtained. Is it worth your energy and time? Do you receive more than just satisfaction from doing it? Is it helping you prepare for future uncertainties? In the next article, we will discuss one way in which you can assign a number to this decision.

PERFORMANCE

Taurus is known for its stubbornness but also endurance. It can expend a lot of energy in avoiding something. Naturally, Taurus is linked to the 2nd house of food and finance – two areas of life whose habits of consuming (both food and spending money) are notoriously difficult to change. The Food and Financial Industries are at the core of our lives, and always have been, and always will be.

In working with the Food system in our personal lives, how we eat what we eat, how we process it, our Performance with food, plays an integral role in determining how the body recognizes nutrition and accumulates food as itself and how much of the food is discarded (or accumulated) as waste. The quality of the food that is accumulated as the body is determined by the Performance of the nutrition process.

Similarly, the body being an accumulation of food in a sense, is also affected by the Performance of mobility – which we call exercise.

In fact, everything that the body can accumulate as itself becomes extremely important to pay careful and considered attention to as they impact the overall Performance capability of the body.

Therefore, the quality of food, sleep, exercise, sunlight, etc – the manner in which these are ingested or taken into the body, and the manner in which all these are processed or digested and discarded – all these impact the body’s overall ability to Perform in every day life.

When it comes to the body, Performance and Responsiveness (to life) go hand in hand. If the body can Perform optimally, then we are naturally connected to and responsive to life around and within us, and life becomes infused with a natural feeling of bounty and joy of living that is Taurus.

Exercise: Focus on improving how you acquire, prepare, take in, digest, and discard all things which can be accumulated by the body to improve its natural performance and responsiveness to life. A body that is unresponsive is clinically dead. Focus on: food, sleep, exercise, and sunlight. Optimize these processes of the body’s accumulation to align with the most physical significations of Taurus: having and enjoying life through a vitally charged body.

AKRASIA

Now we can spend some time talking about the Taurus archetype as it pertains to behaviour and psychology. Today we are going to spend some time discussing the stubborn or inert aspect of Taurus: the resistance to do something, or rather, resistance in general.

Akrasia is the experience of knowing or feeling that one should do something or that taking some action would actually be in our best interest – but we dont do it. Its not the same thing as laziness, and its not the same thing as procrastination. Procrastination is when you have decided to do something and dont. Akrasia is when you know there is something that should be done but not sure what it is and simulatenously have a resistance to finding out what that something is. Who said the Taurus archetype cant be complicated? LOL

With Akrasia, there is this perpetual buzz of “should” lurking in the background, and that feeling continues without leading to either an action or a decision. The natural consequence are the Taurean characteristics of frustration of energy, or indolence.

We usually experience Akrasia when we are faced with the prospect of having to change our creature comforts, or change our habits. No wonder Akrasia is a Greek term meaning “lacking control”…over oneself.

So when you’re faced with the prospect of “getting something done”, there are a number of triggers to Akrasia that happen. The next time you investigate this “resistance”, you will find at its heart are one of the following factors

• the end result is idealized to the point where you believe you can never achieve it even if you tried so why bother
• someone else told you “should” do it
• you cant clearly define what it is you actually want
• you have convinced yourself that if you do the task you will end up where you dont want to be
• you’re not sure how to get from where you are now to where you need to be in order to start doing the task
• there is something else you can do right now instead of the task that gives you immediate satisfaction or comfort
• the benefits of doing the task are vague or you dont understand how it impacts you directly

Exercise: In the first exercise, you listed the tasks you do daily and interrogated them for alignment with your worthiness and growth over time. Now, make a list of the tasks you are unsure about, the tasks which you have been postponing, or resisting, and go down the bullet point list above and try to figure out what the cause of akrasia is for that task. Can you think of ways in which you can get more information, or support, or advice to help you move past the blocks?