All of us as individuals, as well as a collective, suffer from a wounded feeling function.
Per Robert A. Johnson, feeling is “the capacity to value or to give worth to something. People who have a finely differentiated feeling function bring grace and good feeling with them; one feels valuable in their presence (Johnson, The Fisher King and the Handless Maiden: Understanding the Wounded Feeling Function in Masculine and Feminine Psychology, p. 4).”
The wounded feeling function manifests in a man (or masculine side of a woman) in part through sexual activity and/or inability to create.
In a woman (or feminine side of a man) it shows up in part as feelings of uselessness and/or inferiority.
Here in the United States, feeling is our inferior function as a collective, which makes us suffer from this profound psychological wound all the more. See my blog post here for how that has played out.
It seems most every challenging astrological transit highlights the unique ways each of us wounded in our feeling function.
The recent Full Moon in Aquarius is another example, where the intense Tower-type of energy that was part of it was focused on, yet there is a healing energy here as well that I want to emphasize.
Aquarius is an air sign, but has a strong water component.
The Star card is associated with Aquarius and perfectly captures the watery nature of Aquarius. Manilius described Aquarius as “The youthful Waterman, who from upturned pot pours forth his stream” and transforms “the flow of water so as to spray the very stars.”
There are 8 stars on the card—eight is the beginning of a new cycle, level, or octave. Stars can only be seen at night, so this is a lunar style of guidance.
Here are 8 keys to healing distilled from Robert A. Johnson’s book (here is a link to a much more condensed version in an Instagram reel, if you prefer):
1.) Do the inner work. As Jung said, we will make it as a society “if enough individuals will do their inner work.”
2.) Serve something greater than your self. Jung said the meaning of life is to relocate the center of gravity of the personality from the ego to the Self.
3.) Be still. “Solitude is the feminine equivalent of masculine heroic action” (Johnson, p 79).
4.) Make the conscious conscious. Symptoms appear when vital psychic contents are repressed. True healing means reclaiming them.
5.) Take responsibility for your wounds. Jung said that addressing the problem of wounded feeling is the new heroism.
6.) Develop a connection to the archetypes. Especially through dream work, the unconscious, and the symbolic life.
7.) Don’t try to use outer things or thinking to heal the wound. “No outer things—new car, better vacation, more money, or a new wife—can assuage this fisher king wound. It is a wounding of the very capacity for feeling and cannot be cured on any other level. No physical object or thinking can reduce the suffering and wounded feelings or restore the generative capacity of the fisher king (Johnson, p. 25).
8.) Understand that your strength is greater for having been through dark times. The Star card is number 17 and immediately follows the Tower in the sequence, representing healing after a terrible time.
What the Star card says to me most of all: “A healed person is automatically a healer.”
Consultations:
Astrology | Tarot | Tarot and Type
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