The part of life that’s hidden is more interesting to me then what is seen in public. I am talking about the effort a person a puts in behind the scenes. I am talking about their suffering.
I am talking about people who care for their elderly parent. I am talking about a older waitress who comes home and has to soak her feet. I am talking about the kid who studies feverishly so that he might be accepted into college.
I am talking about the dancer who trains all his or her life, to make what they do look easy on stage.
Do you think about things like this? Or are you more interested in the surface, or the end product?
Take something like the Grammy’s. Who thought it all up? What motivated them? How hard was it was it for the “It” girl to choose her gown?
What is beneath the bravado? How did this or that person get their nerves of steel? How did those spelling bee kids learn all those words?
I think this interests me most, because most of my life is hidden!
What’s your hidden life like?
Well, having Mars in Cappy sextile Sun-Saturn conjunction in Scorpio, I think that I actually like the hard work behind every accomplishment. True, many will see the prize I got, but very few will not about the blood, tears and sweat 🙂 I invested in it.
Lucky! My Mars in Taurus is square my Saturn in Scorpio. If I can get anything done in the first place, it’s because I left behind my need for perfection and I’m looking to solve problems. How is your Saturn return coming along?
Absolutely. Behind the scenes is what makes it!!
Well I am a mystic and I understand and drink of the deep mysteries of life. I can unfortunately hear the words of a demon , a person who need intercession, and have seen angels and saints alike. I am chosen but for what I do not know yet.
Danka, the investment, I like that term. I’m that way with shows I work on. I’m always a little sad when show opens because the process is over. I’m glad it gets seen (most of the time 😉 ) but it is the work that goes into it that is the joy and pain for me. I try to teach that to my kids, but I’m not sure it is innate in everyone.
The story behind the scenes always enriches the work of art. Dancers, musicians, artists, actors, writers spend hours honing their craft so that when it’s viewed by the public it is perfect in it’s creation. What makes a person who they are? Their background, upbringing, choices…these are the bricks and mortar of each human being.
Never let them see you sweat…I sometimes have a great fear come over me..can be about anything . I am not very self confident , but try so hard to overcome and appear confident and sure of myself. It is embarrasing and I do seem to grow out of as I get older, but it is still there.
We all have a Story to Tell. We just don’t need to tell the whole World. There are a select few who glimpse inside my soul.
The difference between the outer image and the hidden life that led to it can be fascinating. The image can be so…mesmerising; glamorous. Impressive, put-together. Elevated. It’s really interesting to me how much I read into the image. But the hidden life behind it is the depth and texture and sometimes a whole different picture.
That happens on an individual and a social level I think. I’m interested in the cleaners and the dustmen and those who remain unseen, those who hold up the whole thing. They are the hidden life of the image of the whole.
Some people don’t seem to let anyone see their hidden life. I’m thinking of the young women of my girlhood, who would get up before their boyfriends to put on their makeup. I wonder where they are now and if they have a greater ease with being seen as they are.
My hidden life…I’m comfortable behind the scenes with my work. I think that’s where the interesting work is. Yes everyone has a story I suppose, although my life’s been so interior I hardly have a language for it. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to hear it.
That beautiful Rilke poem comes to mind, about a person being a country never explored.
Rambling a bit here. *sheepish grin*
What about Oscar Pistorius?
It’s a heck of a thing to consider.
Yes! It really is, fascinating. Perfect example of a pretty big inner/outer gap.
Conversely, people who have the courage of self to be exactly as they are in the spotlight when they have lived in a way that’s kind of taboo somehow – also fascinating.
Well, let’s say they have that ability.
How did they get it?
I can allways see the work behind the seen. But I ahve seen my mom can never see the hard work behind the scene. Sometime I pointed it to her. She was a dreamy girl. But how to implemnent the dream, she didn’t want to put effort. I sometimes ask, why she can’t see the hard work behind the seen?? I really don’t know.
Being one of the worker bees that makes the “magic” happen, I never take that for granted. Would this quality, to be interested in/part of the behind-the-scenes, fall into 8th house territory?
I think “work behind the scenes” is a Virgo thing. They often work (below the horizon) to make others look good.
The suffering that’s not known about or fathomed, I would give to the 8th house (privacy and psych),
Hidden suffering / sacrifice I would give the 12th house or Pisces.
they’re probably fuelled by a good dose of narcissism to keep the disconnection and don’t crack to pieces..but don’t they? 3 years ago I had the chance to meet Sting thanks to a friend of mine who had a relationship with him in the 90’s.He regularly has young escorts sent over his hotel room while touring(two of them were with us in the backstage, with their pimp,holding a supervip pass), and at the same time the perfect marriage show still goes on with his wife… his manager,who collects the girls, says he’s afraid of dying.
behind the scenes,absolutely!that’s to me what the scenes are meant for
Our modern society is all about surface (which is so thin).. – persona, the Mask people have to wear. In crisis it comes off.
@Elsa “I think ‘work behind the scenes’ is a Virgo thing. They often work (below the horizon) to make others look good”
Absolutely!!! And with a Leo husband and a Leo boss, I am living proof of this 🙂
Add in the elderly: a very Neptunian flakey Pisces Mom and two pretty disorganized, hot under the collar Aries in-laws, and I seem to be doing an AWFUL LOT of behind-the-scenes work to make this whole nuthouse function.
8th house Jupiter, 5th house Venus in Leo. Inside, I am optimistic about the future, and I really like pretty things and prettying myself up, but if you saw me in the flesh right now you’d say “Damn! That woman looks pretty freaking exhausted and beaten down!”.
Yet, there a lot of people who think I don’t do much, or what I do isn’t that important. As if planning, organizing and constantly evaluating so that things don’t fall apart isn’t important 🙁
The only one who gets it (occasionally) is my Cappy Dad.
I am not sure how I wrote “Absolutely!” but it came up “Moderately!” Weird.
I’m deeply interested in the core of life as well. My greatest desire in life is understanding.
I have sun conj pluto and a Scorpio stellium. I also have neptune int he 12th.
I’ve only started thinking about this recently, I guess it makes sense with all those retrogrades in the sky. I especially like when you asked, “How did this or that person get their nerves of steel?” Do they have a solid sense of self? Grounded in their knowledge, their limitations and strengths? Maybe they’re optimistic despite those limitations? Maybe they’re prepared for the next opportunity and ready to pounce on their luck?
I wonder how their horoscopes would show that capacity.
I think there’s always something about other people we’ll never understand, no matter how close we are to them or how loving. And there is also something about ourselves we’ll never understand either. There’s a mystery to being a human being. We should respect that.
Investment and sacrifice can often seem so tightly entwined I can almost get a glimpse of that ethereal dance between Saturn and Neptune but never understand it. The roads and paths taken, that looking back are almost overgrown and barely visible and you wonder how you made it through because you can’t go back anymore, only forward.
So true, and nice visuals. I can really relate.
Elsa said: “The part of life that’s hidden is more interesting to me then what is seen in public. I am talking about the effort a person a puts in behind the scenes. I am talking about their suffering.”
That’s also the most interesting part to me. I don’t care to see your travel photos. I want to hear about what was going on in your heart during that trip. What hit you. What transformed you.
I don’t want to hear about the latest concert or hockey game you attended. I want to hear about YOU. What’s going on INSIDE YOU. Your DEEP struggles. How you cope. Your strategies. Your needs. Your questions without answers. Your aha moments.
I like people who share their struggles and efforts and processes (trials and tribulations, the journey) online and in person. Because you get to know the REAL, *FULL* person.
For example, my parents have an entirely different perception of my brother “John” than I do. Because there are things he shares with me and not with them. So their “John” is an entirely differently man than mine.
I hate small talk. Always have. I’m always chafing to get to the nitty-gritty. What are you TRULY going through? HOW do you do it? What has you stumped? What have you conquered and how?
Show me the full breadth of your human-ness. SHARE IT with me.
What an amazing and special gift that you provide for the people that need it. Its not common to meet someone who acknowledges others in this way and allows them to access that level of their experience.
I can relate. I think its funny when someone will describe a conversation with me as deep, but from my perspective it was barely scratching the surface. But it was meanigful for them because theyve maybe never been allowed to expand in that way or be that honest without being judged.
The best is when it’s a mutual gift. When the sharing is equal both ways. That beats any orgasm for me. 🙂
But I also value such exchanges even when they are unbalanced, as you so aptly described. We are not all “made” the same (astrology has taught me that) and we are also not all at the same “place” in terms of personal evolution. But the encounters can still be enriching and enjoyable.
(I’m still “floating” from my recent fluke encounter with a man and his dog in a semi-secluded area where I had gone to be alone. He had too. We ended up connecting and going deep. I hope I run into him again!)
I’m a 12th house Sun, Chiron is there too
My 10th House is in Pisces, with Jupiter there, so my life is hidden, mostly.
I even have Neptune in the 7th House.
Thank you so much for this. You put beautiful words to something I know very well, and it seems many others here understand it too. I love the way you write – your voice is like a dear and wise friend, which I expect you probably are for those people fortunate enough to know you personally.
The private life is the real life.
I’ve always had a deep respect for privacy and fiercely guard my own. I often remind myself (and others) to cut other people some slack because you just don’t know what their lives are like. And, as you said, the private stuff isn’t always shameful or anything – it’s often the development phases that help us emerge with greater skills and understanding, and these are by necessity a “loner” thing, though not necessarily feeling “lonely”
I’ve been thinking a lot about all this recently, so your post hit a chord with me. I’ve been going through a rather long hard phase in my life, with more going on under the surface than most people knew. I’m starting to sense that it’s nearing completion and I’ve been taking stock of what’s been lost, what still remains, and what I’ve learned from it all. I don’t know what transits/progressions might be associated with it all, but nothing in my 12 house that I can see.
But my natal chart itself is like a study in private challenges and transformations, and almost anything will make me “go to ground” a bit. Strong 1st house Scorpio stellium, and a 4th house Aquarius Saturn that isn’t at all like many astrology books would say. My childhood was wonderful and protected in a good way. Home was good, safe, and a perfect place to learn and go through all those positive development things you spoke of. Home is still that for me. Saturn, for me, acts as a protector – the guardian at the gate, keeping my private life happy and generally free from unwanted intrusions. Although square to Scorpio, they work together, if you understand what I’m saying. My public life is pretty much all 10th and 11th – Leo and Virgo. For better or worse, in conflicts between public performance and private security- the private security always wins.
Thanks, Elsa
You’re welcome, sky. You sound like an interesting character. 🙂
Isn’t the IC about the hidden life? This Aries full moon conjuncted my Chiron which is exactly down there.New beginnings with my family of origin,I hope and need.
Please delete this comment if I’m not supposed to mention this here, but this post made me think of a book I recently came across, ‘The Inner Lives of Medieval Inquisitors’.
I understand this post is about something else. It’s like they say ‘It takes 10 years to be an overnight success’.
Sometimes I get down about how much hard work I’ve done behind the scenes but I’m waiting for the payoff.
Over the past 6 years I have overhauled my way of cooking and eating to be more traditional. I can whip something up from scratch a lot easier now. Understand how different foods go together, react to what kind of cooking. Ask me 5 years ago about spices, roasting a chicken, growing my own veggies, no clue! But now I do know about those things and so much more.
I’m not there yet but I cook everyday, multiple times. It has become my life’s work to understand traditional cooking and homemaking, having grown up so far from anything even remotely having to do with it. I can even foresee writing my own (personal not for public) cookbook. This is going to be my legacy to my children. How to take care of yourself well. The good stuff of life – food and family and friends. How to source real and good food, nourishing food.
Anyway no one sees it but me, and to a degree my husband. It involves a lot of reading and experimenting and lots of time alone in my head. I love to talk about it but it’s not always an interesting conversation to anyone but me. So it stays hidden. But I’m learning so much and the times when I can share ideas are great. And people love the bread I bake which makes me happy. So if they don’t know how hard I’ve worked to get it right, hey maybe they just think I’m a genius haha. As long as everyone’s fed and healthy 😉