We Don't Stop Playing Because We Grow Old

The Third House of astrology stands for Blog Posts. It's quick communication. As compared to long-form writing that is associated with the Ninth House.

A book would give you all the space. You could take an idea, and let it run like a river. Allow it to unfold. Change. And find its way.

In a blog post, the moment you hit the last full stop, is when you feel you've only just seen the idea for what it's worth. Every week after I post, I sigh. Because of the immense potential I let go off, all the time. When it's time for the next post, it's a whole new sky, and a lot of water's run under the bridge.

I began by thinking I don't really have much to say. But short-form writing is a practice that is an education in itself. It opens your eyes to the richness of the world. A world full of ideas. Interwoven, interlaced and interlocked.

I'm happy to say that this is my 52nd post. It's been a year since I started.

And it's going to be one more year of posting.

After which, I intend to move further into a life IRL. Spending more time offline, since last year, has been wonderful for me. And I hope to take this trend further by June next year.

Thank you for reading throughout last year. Special thanks for making me think deeper. And I hope you stay for the next 52 posts as well!

Journeying Along

The caravan of the Sun has now moved into Gemini. The Third House.

An infant who has only known his parents, now expands his world. It begins to include co-borns. Cousins. Playmates. Peers.

The neighbors.

Schoolmates.

And later in life teams and cohorts.

Ruled by Mercury/Buddha, it is the house of the mind. Thinking. Buddhi, the intellect.

The house of steps and sequencing.

Of Upadesha, Lekhana, Samvada, Ghosha. Instruction, Writing, Conversation and Announcements.

Of meetings and messages.

It's the house of short journeys. A walk around your neighborhood. A short, quick trip somewhere.

And it is the house that denotes your Parakrama. Your courage.

Why Courage ?

Because it is the house of stepping out.

A young child stepping out in the neighborhood. Finding friends.

Out of the security of her/his parents. It is the world opening up. With all of its unpredictability.

These are the first steps into the mighty adventure of life.

Showing up in the dynamics of one's peer group. Interacting and jostling for space with siblings and cousins. Experimenting. Testing boundaries.

Play, is the primary way we, as children, learn. And it's how how we begin to make sense of the world.

Stepping forward

It takes courage to start a conversation. To make a friend.

This is the house of mercurial friendships. Have you seen kids at the park? They strike up conversations with complete strange kids. They don't seem to have any ice to break. They play as though they've always known each other. And then ,very easily, they say bye.

Then as we grow older some strange kind of calcification seems to take place. We imagine that simply striking up a random conversation with people, say on the bus, or the grocery aisle, would mean inviting too much trouble into our lives.

We've let the art of chatting and then saying bye easily, rust a little.

Walking Together

Group-play is a lot of fun. Everyone brings in their own dynamics. Later when we work with teams, we trade the fun aspect. And we choose to only keep score of who gets the credit.

We make a sequence of all the things that could go wrong.

What if we were brave? Can we handle everything going right, instead?

Communication: The Heart

Why do we need to be brave?

We could live life completely in the isolation of the 12th House. Never stepping out. Never striking a conversation.

But there is something deep down in our hearts, that makes us want to reach out.

When we first showed up on Earth, why did we communicate?

People may say we first communicated, so we could organize ourselves to hunt and gather food. And we could keep ourselves safe.

But there must have been the initial shock of existence. Before we knew we needed food and shelter. We must have looked around at each other, and said something.

We must have stepped out and touched each other. Tried to understand.

Surely we did.

Even today there is evolutionary evidence, that we had a great need to communicate. You can observe it in the discomfort we feel when we sit in silence with each other.

Deeper friendships where silence becomes a language of its own, comes later, perhaps in the Eleventh House.

For now, we must open our eyes to the value of simple communication. Just simply communicating. We could remember how we made friends as children.

The Communication Crux

People complain that it's a world of loneliness today. The internet was supposed to bring us together. And now, it's locked us up in separate cells.

Initially, social media was exciting. All of a sudden you could reach out to everyone you've known. And everyone you want to know.

It was sold as a way to connect. But then why did it flop so badly? Why did it turn into such a disappointment?

The promise was false.

On social media, you can't just have a random conversation. We tend to scroll the person's profile, before we even want to engage with them. And we build a pretty comprehensive idea of them, before we even know them. That steals the beauty of a random conversation.

If it's catching up with friends we lost touch with....then the entire conversation becomes a news update. Post which we run out of things to say. We could stretch it further to making meeting plans. And then cancel them.

The algorithm cheated us. It prioritized noise.

Everyone is announcing. All the time.

And yet the FOMO culture is not letting you delete your account. Even if you know it's stealing from you.

The Nature Of Communication

Mercury is a neutral sign.

It denotes a communication that's of a similar nature as well.

However there's a marked difference between social media, and simply socializing.

While you initiate a conversation with someone at a tea shop, it is purely novel. The person is a mystery.

The interaction works on a certain easy-breezy metric. Perhaps it's about the news. Perhaps it could be about anything at all.

It's unpredictable.

You know the kindness of strangers....there is something to be said...about the lightness of these interactions, that allow certain truths to uncover.

No expectations. And a chance to know a different perspective.

While working with a team, you're not sitting around discussing the meaning of life. You are keeping it cool. You communicate what you need to. You keep the ball rolling.

With your Siblings, cousins, immediate family, and peers, meetings and communication often center around gossip. Some people like to act morally superior. They speak of gossip in very disparaging terms. While in reality, I am famous for making the quote "Gossip is the lubricant of Society."

If you don't believe me, ask any anthropologist.

Speaking with your team, or family, can happen online as well. It's the immediacy of the relationship alone, that surpasses the medium.

Sandhi. Assimilation

It's important to make a note before we venture further into Third House territory.

The Third House is communication with a great emphasis on listening.

But even before we learn to listen, we need to assimilate the lesson of the Second House. We need to work on our voice.

People tend to think that finding their voice is a very mysterious, mystical thing. In reality, it is quite ordinary.

There's no one in the world like you.

Identical twins are not experiencing the very same things. Even Siamese twins, joined at the hip, have their heads turned in different directions.

Your unique perception, develops your voice.

Do you think it's selfish to say, first develop your own voice, before you begin to listen to others.

Or do you think that it's a question of self-awareness. A way to allow your natural way of being.

Your voice needs expression. You can't hide it in fear of being judged.

That's like covering a plant with a plastic bucket.

Expressing it, brings a lot of feedback from the world. Will you give up? Or will you try different ways?

How can you strengthen your voice?

You speak up. For yourself. For someone else.

How do you train your voice?

You use it. And in that process you learn not to abuse it.

You learn when thunder is needed. And when honey will do.

You stop expecting a life where you make no mistakes.

Once you let things be.

The Third House, then, helps you in clarifying your voice. By the process of writing. Speaking. By listening and learning.

The Week Ahead

It's the week of the growing moon. Mars and Mercury at the end degrees of their current positions. Both will transit into new houses this week.

It's a week of ending old cycles. And beginning anew.

Today, as we speak, Jupiter has gone into his fast-forward movement. It's setting a time of a different energy of events to gain momentum. June is pretty tame, when compared to July. August things heat up. First two weeks of November seem pretty crazy. And of course when Rahu-Ketu change signs in December, we are going to witness, a whole new chapter in intensity.

This energy is not going away soon. It's going to last until 2032, at least. 2035, probably.

Personally, according to astrology, I was said to have an incredibly challenging 2025. With 2026 only a shade better. It's true. I faced a whole lot of challenges, from the end of 2024 itself. It's the challenges that helped me make changes. And astrology that gave me insights to carry on. Advaita and Taoism helped me find the center of the storm.

You will navigate your challenges as well. It is these times of great energy, that act like a churning. They stir things up. And they also sort things out. You only need to start by believing in yourself.

The third house is quite a jolly house. Now, is a good season for us to awaken our third house abilities.

To show some courage. Open ourselves up to the world. To step out. To say the first "Hello!" And to have fun, and not worry about who gets the credit.

I hope you enjoy this wonderful week. See you in the next one.