This is a post that I expect to get a little bit of flak for but I’ve decided to channel Lilith and do it anyway. One thing I’ve noticed in my study of Lilith is a that there’s a strong tendency to try to look for the positive in her. People come up with all kinds of interpretations. Lilith is the womb, they’ll say. Lilith is creation. Lilith is a Divine seed. I’ve even seen books proclaiming that Lilith is about community sharing and togetherness, which given that she ran away and told the Creator to where to shove it, I think that’s a bit of a stretch.
There’s a strong desire to make Lilith something beautiful, something soft, something more palatable. We make her a little bit spooky but in a mystical, magical, Instagram aesthetic sort of way. I think that really does us and her a real disservice. Because Lilith is meant to make us uncomfortable. That is her job. And when we deny our discomfort, we deny her purpose.
It’s understandable that we try to make her a little softer and more palatable. She fits into our lives better that way. But look at the irony here. Lilith’s myth is that Adam and the Creator attempted to make her palatable so that she could fit into their mold. And when we try to make her beautiful we do the same thing. And she rejects that in the strongest possible terms.
Lilith is dark. If there any definition that I could give for her, any way to boil her down into most basic essence, I would say that she is the dark feminine. She’s harsh. She’s frightening. She is not nurturing. She is not motherly. She is not soft. In astronomy, what we call Lilith is a void, a wobble, an imperfection. She is the fly in the ointment, the squeaky wheel. She’s not anything that any of us want to embrace, and that is entirely the point.
I don’t mean to say that nothing good can be done with her energy. In fact very much the opposite. I think that there is a great deal of good to be done by working with Lilith, but only when we recognize her for what she is. Lilith is wound, a weapon, a furious war-cry, a primal, feral howl carried on the wind. She is beautiful for the rot she reveals. She shows us what is broken, unjust, and wrong. And it is only when we embrace this discomfort and stop trying to dress her up that we can actually work with her properly. Accept the shadow. Step into the dark.
Do you embrace darkness? How?
It’s interesting the idea of what women are for.. I just read this post by this 21 year old girl who this guy skipped out on and she decided to keep the baby. The things she said about the pain and weirdness of motherhood were so profound and sad. About how she was pressured to insanity to do different things regarding breastfeeding. How the baby must have felt so weird leaving the womb.
She’s so much younger than me and so reflective. I’m just trying to get extra sleep. I avoid doing my laundry on time.
I don’t think women are there to fulfill Jungian tropes only. I think they are also there to reflect life and fuck shit up. Some evolutionary psych types would argue against it. I hope they’re wrong. We all want a hero’s journey despite our genitals.
Sometimes women are there to fuck shit up.. or to be outside the narrative. When I think of la loba.. she is neither connected to life or death.. she is old but life giving.. she is not on a hero’s journey.. she knows where she is and what her purpose is. Yet she does these creative productive things connected to destruction. What is more beautiful than giving a spent thing a second chance?
Not related to this but it’s so funny how some dumb women like me take long to get wise. Or how our monkey minds can live the same life but obscure its real levels with shallow thinking. We ignore a lot of pain and realities. Also the moment itself while our heads spin when we drink our coffee. It’s the full moon and I am a dumb bitch. But I want to try to at least TCB.
I guess it’s nice to know there is a part of women that is not only dedicated to keeping the home fires going. That stereotype depresses me to bits.
Very interesting so I have no flak, but I disagree with boxing Lilith.
She is many things, and what she represents to each individual maybe just one of those many elements including wound, womb, creation etc. What ever element she stands for you, it will be STRONG, perhaps even dark (as in not much light) so much so all her other qualities, elements fade, become unrecognizable, dormant as if nonexistent.
I am not going to go into the psychology of the word “dark” – but what is dark or blackened we struggle to see, and is often met with great trepidation, fear. The fear emotion when roused can easily lead to labels such as negative or evil as a way of self preservation.
Lilith the dark feminine, represents a lot of elements and yes she can be positive if we release the fear that boxes us in only seeing her wound or maybe as a wounder.
My Lilith is in Capricorn, square moon in 8H and in 12th house.
Powerful woman. She reveals the nasty side of a lot of women I encounter, especially in power structures.
I have had mostly female bosses due to my profession, but a lot of them had issues with power. The larger the organization, the nastier they became. They were the destruction of myself.
But most importantly…. They showed me who I was to work to not become into myself.
There is a beauty when you see things like that. In this ugly world, Lilith is someone who calls out the Bitch In A Suit and cut me till someone makes me aware of I can accept it for the shit it is – or I offers me the possibility of giving them the finger.
My mother was an unempathic, stoic woman. She has a 4H Capricorn. No Freud needed, I can see why I was deprived nurturing, and why I have Nn in Cancer, 5th house.
I hope my next boss is a better man than any of my female managers has been. I cut ties with my mother last year. I think it’s time to move off the previous track now…
*They showed me who I was to work to not become into THEM
(correction)
I also prefer male bosses.
also capricorn denies themselves of any indulgence. saturn restricts, so they chose power over love.:/
elisa that’s a great point.. sometimes they choose it over food and sleep :/ or going out
I was also deprived of nurturing from my parents, so I understand, I have Capricorn. but I was shown nurturing and love by grandparents,so it wasn’t a lost cause. I never became interested in career and power that way (like a boss woman or Oprah way) lol. Unfortunately, I do attract powerful men in the past. So it worked that way for me; through “others”, the way that Jacklyn Onassis (ironically she has Lilith Capricorn) was always married to powerful men. but is there love? for many of them? that is the question.
ohh Jackie O actually has cusp Aquarius Lilith. Hmmmm. (still Saturn ruled) well explains why she married a gemini sun 😀
I like to call the Black Moon the North Node of emotional expression. As such – it seems overdue for a divorce from the constraints of Lilith….
I think unconscious Lilith is the worst. Softening her image up is worse than her actual energy. You put it perfectly Midara, when you said that God and Adam tried to make her more palatable. She is not Love and Light lol. She eats babies and she will fuck you up.
Conscious Lilith is dark but has purpose. Sometimes rage is appropriate. She encourages us not to deny our rage. She will eat our babies (our creations) until we access that rage.
I think those that live the Lilith archetype understand that she is messy, and she will not be subdued or muted. Thats not her lesson. Her lesson is to embrace chaos and the totality of who we are. I feel like shes kind of the dark horse that draws the chariot that Plato talked about. The point isnt to tame her.
She is conjunct my Sun and so I think this life is about learning about her themes. Obviously I dont have them mastered or else I wouldn’t have her so prominent in my chart.
What about Lilith in male charts?
That is really interesting.
That is why I suggest a divorce between the Black Moon and Lilith. There are Black Moon males everywhere – Carl Jung – Mick Jagger, Jordan Peterson…..
The interpretation still fits. Just like women still have Mars in their charts and Men still have Venus. Plenty of men have that darkness, that forbidden quality. And plenty of men work to expose rot in the system. There’s just a deeper resonance with the feminine.
Also, positive is not always “good”. Our culture is so obsessed with morality to its own detriment.
To answer your question of how I embrace my darkness. First, Im honest with myself about how I feel. Second, I acknowledge (at least the potential for) the “evil” in myself.
I am dealing with a situation of “revealing rot” right now and I am SO INSPIRED by your words, Midara! I feel like I’m being called to stand up for myself and draw a boundary in an unhealthy relationship and now that I’ve read your post I realize how helpful and powerful Lilith energy can be. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still responsible and accountable for my words and actions but I’m embracing the facets of the dark goddess – your post was so timely and encouraging, thank you!
Welcome, WomanWelder! 🙂
To get in touch with, and express the lil bit of wicked/naughtiness in ourselves (our shadow) is very psychologically healthy. Allowing this to come out consciously is so much better then the volcano erupting and spilling out the lava. My naughtiest moments are my best moments. Sooo much fun ?
Excellent insights on Lilith and completely representative of my experience of her. She’s complex and intense and, unfortunately, I think many people project her onto others rather than absorb what she has to offer.
“Lilith’s myth is that Adam and the Creator attempted to make her palatable so that she could fit into their mold. And when we try to make her beautiful we do the same thing. And she rejects that in the strongest possible terms…In astronomy, what we call Lilith is a void, a wobble, an imperfection.”
It makes such a huge difference to know what myths are feeding your tale, or your tailbone. In your description, the myth feeds of a creation story prevalent but not solely true for all humankind. My Indigenous stories tell of other ways of beginning. Yet, I am living in a time and world where Adam and his Creator would do that imposition thing. For me, reading the astrology and astronomy adds to my personal ‘wobble’ of imperfection as I sort through the myths that fuel an old woman with a First House Lilith story arc.
Language is powerful … both oral transmission and written I embrace darkness by embracing languages ancient and contemporary definitions; come up with synthesized applications and look to the young who have (as Elsa said in one of her Newsletters? or posts, “Loosed” things for me). So many ways to wobble. Look at how many more definitions have been added to GL.
This is such a perfect little explanation of her. She drives me to be better by not being flexible. She’s steadfast in her ways and in her command. She’s a brash woman that will explain things just the way they are and commands that you too see the world and respond accordingly. She is the goddess you seek to stand your ground.