To Know Them, We Must Love them

Truth Emerges from Deep Communion

TO KNOW THEM, WE MUST LOVE THEM

In order to understand anyone or anything, we have to love it. Every act of true knowing begins not with intellect, not with data, not with clever analysis—but with love.

I don’t mean romantic passion or self-centered yearning tinged with expectation or sentimentality. The love I mean is the radiant force of compassion, empathy, and lovingkindness.

When we open up our perceptions and sensibilities with love to a marsh frog, black oak tree, or red fox, we declare: “You are a source of truth we aren’t familiar with. You are a portal of blessing worthy of communion. You have teachings and influences we are interested in. We are receptive to your specific intelligence speaking through your special language.”

We are not being metaphorical or poetic here. We are not using fairy tale logic. Our meaning is literal. This is the law of the Divine Hologram: Every living entity is a fractal cell in the Divine Consciousness; is a special case of the One Intelligence expressing itself; is a facet of the Infinite Soul offering a unique gift.

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I’ll tell you an ultimate and primal fact that goes largely unacknowledged: Every living thing LONGS to express its unprecedented genius so that we can take it in. (It's the same ache we all carry: to be witnessed, to be loved, to be known.)

In giving our loving attention to the marsh frog or black oak or red fox, we are expressing our wish to understand it. This allows it, in turn, to give us the tremendous and mysterious gift of its special intelligence, expressed through its unique language.

The gift we receive is double.

The first initiation: We are jolted awake out of our narrow perspective. We slip free from the flatland of habitual consciousness. We see with frog-eyes, think with oak-roots, roam with fox-senses. We become amphibious, arboreal, feral. Our human awareness sprouts new limbs of perception.

The second initiation: We receive the harvest. The marsh frog’s croak may disclose the savvy of living in two worlds; the oak may murmur a gospel of endurance; the fox may smuggle into our dreams a joke that doubles as a revelation. Each offering awakens a corresponding chamber of the Universal Goddess

Yes, each of us is a holographic shard of the Universal Projector, the One and Only Hologram. But sometimes, in order to “turn on” parts of the All-In-One within us, we have to open to those specific parts in the physical world. They remain remain dormant until the outer frog, oak, or fox sings us into remembering.

And this is a crucial part of our strategy to enter into a variety of altered states in our quest to viscerally commune with a myriad aspects of the Divine Consciousness.

If we can learn to speak the language of the marsh frog, black oak, and red fox, and awaken in ourselves the parts of our intelligence that are like a marsh frog’s, black oak’s, and red fox’s, then we have glided into an altered state.

Let’s say we can do this regularly, in little or big ways. Once every day, and more on our freer days, we can open our heart-soul-brain with love in the quest to understand the essence of a marsh frog, black oak, or red fox. And can, thereby, allow the marsh frog, black oak, or red fox to do what comes naturally for it, to do what it was made to do, which is to unveil itself to us in glorious extravagant fullness, with its own love nature bursting.

And so the marsh frog, black oak, or red fox can initiate us into the enigmas of its intelligence, teach us how to experience the world as it does, and bestow on us the power to alter our state of awareness—giving us yet one more tool for knowing the Divine Soul not just conceptually but with gnosis, with visceral understanding.

TO KNOW A PERSON, WE MUST LOVE THEM

The same law that opens us to frog, fox, and oak—or cat, dragonfly, rose, horse, goldfinch, and all the rest—applies to the human beings who cross our path. A person, too, is a fractal shard of the Infinite Soul, aching to reveal their genius if only they are met with love.

To know a person is not to catalogue their traits or analyze their patterns. It’s to open our heart-soul-brain with the same luminous receptivity we offer to the wild intelligences. The gaze of love says: “You are not a puzzle to be solved but a song I long to hear. I will sit close enough to feel your rhythm, patient enough to let your hidden roots speak.”

When we approach a person this way, two initiations awaken:

First Initiation: We are jolted out of the flat caricatures we make of others. We slip free of projections and prejudices. We begin to glimpse their many-sided paradox, their amphibious capacity to be more than one thing.

Second Initiation: We receive their gifts—their sly humor that rescues us from despair, their rooted endurance that steadies our own trembling, their capacity for metamorphosis that awakens hope. Each offering is a spark of the Universal Goddess refracted through their singular life.

To know a person, we must love them. Love is the solvent that dissolves the barriers of fear. Love is the riddle that rouses our dormant chambers of recognition. With love, we breathe their air, taste their dreams, and let them alter our state of awareness.

And the gift is doubled: They are witnessed into fuller being, and we are rewilded into fuller knowing.

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RITUAL OF LOVING and KNOWING A PERSON

Choose a space where you can be with the person—face-to-face, in memory, or in imagination if they are far away.

Breathe until you feel rooted and open. Let your body be soft and attentive.

1. Invocation of Seeing

(Look into their eyes, or if they’re absent, call their face to mind.)

Whisper inwardly or aloud:

“You are a mystery I can't own.
You are a flame I will not smother.
I open to you with love.”

Pause and sense the veil of projection thinning, as if your gaze were a window and not a mirror.

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2. Gesture of Listening

(Place one hand on your chest, the other resting open on your knee.)

Say or think:

“Speak in your own language,
not the one I invent for you.
I open to the sound beneath your words.”

Pause and listen—not only to their voice, but to their silences, their breath, their pulse in the room.

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3. Blessing of Witnessing

(Smile gently, or bow your head, or let your body offer any natural sign of reverence.)

Say:

“May you feel seen.
May your genius be welcomed.
May your secret gifts find their way to me.”

Pause and feel the resonance: how your attention itself becomes a vessel in which they can unfold.

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4. Benediction of Reciprocity

(Speak aloud if you can, or whisper inwardly.)

“In knowing you, I am altered.
In loving you, I become more alive.
Together we awaken the One Soul made flesh.”

Take three breaths. Then release them toward the person with a soft exhale of blessing.

LEARNING FROM FROG, FOX, AND OAK

The Frog’s Amphibious Gospel

The frog is a prophet of thresholds. She lives in two worlds at once—water and land, fluidity and solidity, breathing through skin and lungs. To commune with frog intelligence is to experience the sacrament of permeability.

She teaches us to become amphibious in consciousness: to leap between logic and intuition, to breathe both air and dreamwater, to inhabit contradictions without panic. The frog says: “Don’t collapse the paradox. Sing it. Croak it at dusk until the sky shimmers.”

From her, we learn adaptability that’s more than the struggle for survival. It’s joy in metamorphosis, the willingness to keep molting identities in rhythm with the wind and rain.

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The Fox’s Trickster Curriculum

The fox carries stealth and sly humor. To commune with her is to apprentice ourselves to the art of cunning compassion. She knows how to vanish in plain sight, how to slip between shadow and light, how to survive on the margins of fields humans claim as their own.

Fox teaches us how to navigate human culture without being swallowed by it: how to keep our feral spark alive. She smuggles revelations into our dreams disguised as riddles and jokes, reminding us that sacred wisdom may wear a mischievous grin.

The fox says: “Your cleverness is wasted if it doesn’t serve beauty. Your wit is cowardice if it doesn’t risk tenderness.”

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The Oak’s Testament

The oak roots deep and stretches wide. Her leaves drink light; her bark shelters lichens; her acorns feed generations of creatures. She teaches us the intelligence of duration.

Oak wisdom is slow-burning, patient, an incremental celebration. Her gospel is one of shelter and constancy, of being a home as much as being a self. To commune with oak is to practice radical slowness in an age addicted to acceleration.

Oak says: “You are not separate from ancestry. You are not exiled from future. You are a bridge, and your body is soil, sap, and starlight combined.”

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The Triple Initiation

When we let frog, fox, and oak speak through us, we are altered in three dimensions:

• Frog-initiation expands our range of perception, amphibianizing our imagination.

• Fox-initiation sharpens our wit and play, keeping us nimble, adaptable, and uncolonized.

• Oak-initiation roots us into the long cycles of time, granting gravity and continuity.

Together, they rewild us into full-spectrum beings: creatures who can leap, trick, endure, and love with more-than-human intelligence.

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VISIONS OF FROG, FOX, AND OAK

You wander into the twilight marsh, mist rising. The air thrums with an unseen choir. The frog breaks the silence. Her voice is a resonant pulse that flows from the mud and the stars at once.

Frog says:

I am the seam between elements, the hinge where worlds embrace.
To know me, you must stop pretending you are one thing.

Breathe with lungs, yes, but also with skin.
Leap with legs, but also with imagination.
Exult in the joy of metamorphosis.

I will baptize you in the holy amphibious gospel:
that you are not fixed,
that you may live in paradox,
that you may become many without losing your one.

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From the edge of the reeds, a rustle: fox appears, tail blazing, eyes two coals of sly fire. She circles you, weaving spirals in the grass, leaving the scent of wild fennel and rain.

Fox says:

I smuggle wit into your despair.
I am the riddle that saves your life.
I am stealth braided with tenderness.

The humans build their fences,
but I slip through with ease,
for the earth was never theirs to own.

To know me, you must outwit despair.

You must wear cleverness as a mask
only long enough to protect the raw song of your heart.

If you allow me, I will be a prank that cracks open revelation.

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On the hill overlooking the marsh, rooted like a cathedral, is Oak. She rises, vast and steady, branches spread as if they are maps of your future. Wind moves through her leaves with the voice of ancestral drums.

Oak says:

I am the keeper of time too wide for clocks.
I drank the rain your great-grandmother prayed under.
I will shade the children of your unborn descendants.

To know me, you must slow your racing blood
until it matches the heartbeat of roots.

I will teach you how to endure storms
without forgetting the sun,
how to give shelter without losing yourself,
how to make your body into a refuge for others.

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Closing Benediction

The three voices braid into one:

Together we awaken your amphibious wit and rooted laughter,
your slow-burning feral grace.

Carry us in your blood,
and you will walk as more-than-human,
a hologram of the Infinite Soul made flesh.

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Links to all my other stuff: linktr.ee/robbrezsny

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Images are from my unpublished Tarot deck

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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY

Week of September 18

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): A supple clarity is crystallizing within you. Congratulations! It’s not a brittle or rigid certainty, but a knack for limber discernment. I predict you will have an extra potent gift for knowing what truly matters, even amidst chaos or complication. As this superpower reaches full ripeness, you can aid the process by clearing out clutter and refining your foundational values. Make these words your magic spells: quintessence, core, crux, gist, lifeblood, root. PS: Be alert for divine messages in seemingly mundane circumstances.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): The ancient Mesopotamian goddess Inanna was called “the Queen of Heaven.” Her domains were politics, divine law, love, and fertility. She was a powerhouse. One chapter of her mythic story tells of her descent into the underworld. She was stripped of everything—clothes, titles, weapons—before she could be reborn. Why did she do it? Scholars say she was on a quest for greater knowledge and an expansion of her authority. And she was successful! I propose we make her your guide and companion in the coming weeks, Libra. You are at the tail-end of your own descent. The stripping is almost complete. Soon you will feel the first tremors of return—not loud, not triumphant, but sure. I have faith that your adventures will make you stronger and wiser, as Inanna’s did for her.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): In ancient Rome, the dye called Tyrian purple was used exclusively for garments worn by royalty and top officials. It had a humble origin: murex snails. Their glands yielded a pale liquid that darkened into an aristocratic violet only after sun, air, and time worked upon it. I’m predicting you will be the beneficiary of comparable alchemical transformations in the coming weeks. A modest curiosity could lead to a major breakthrough. A passing fancy might ripen into a rich blessing. Seemingly nondescript encounters may evolve into precious connections.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Bees can see ultraviolet patterns in flowers that are invisible to humans. These "nectar guides" direct bees to the flower’s nectar and pollen, functioning like landing strips. Let’s apply these fun facts as metaphors for your life, Sagittarius. I suspect that life is offering you subtle yet radiant cues leading you to sources you will be glad to connect with. To be fully alert for them, you may need to shift and expand the ways you use your five senses. The universe is in a sense flirting with you, sending you clues through dream-logic and nonrational phenomena. Follow the shimmering glimmers.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): At the height of her powers, Egyptian pharaoh Hatshepsut declared, “I have restored what had been ruined. I have raised up what had dissolved.” You now have a similar gift at your disposal, Capricorn. If you harness it, you will gain an enhanced capacity to unify what has been scattered, to reforge what was broken, and to resurrect neglected dreams. To fulfill this potential, you must believe in your own sovereignty—not as a form of domination, but of devotion. Start with your own world. Make beauty where there was noise. Evoke dignity where there was confusion.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): In the high Himalayas, there’s a flower called Saussurea obvallata—the Brahma Kamal. It blooms only at night and for a short time, releasing a scent that legend says can heal grief. This will be your flower of power for the coming weeks, Aquarius. It signifies that a rare and time-sensitive gift will be available, and that you must be alert to gather it in. My advice: Don’t schedule every waking hour. Leave space for mystery to arrive unannounced. You could receive a visitation, an inspiration, or a fleeting insight that can change everything. It may assuage and even heal sadness, confusion, aimlessness, or demoralization.

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PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): The human heart beats 100,000 times per day, 35 million times per year, and 2.5 billion times in an average lifetime. It’s the most reliable “machine” ever created, working continuously and mostly without special maintenance for decades. Although you Pisceans aren’t renowned for your stability and steadiness, I predict that in the coming weeks, you will be as staunch, constant, and secure as a human heart. What do you plan to do with this grace period? What marvels can you accomplish?

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Hindu goddess Durga rides a tiger and carries weapons in her ten hands, including a sword, axe, and thunderbolt. Yet she wears a pleasant smile. Her mandate to aid the triumph of good over evil is not fueled by hate but by luminous clarity and loving ferocity. I suggest you adopt her attitude, Aries. Can you imagine yourself as a storm of joy and benevolence? Will you work to bring more justice and fairness into the situations you engage with? I imagine you speaking complex and rugged truths with warmth and charm. I see you summoning a generous flair as you help people climb up out of their sadness and suffering. If all goes well, you will magnetize others to participate in shared visions of delight and dignity.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Born under the sign of Taurus, Maya Deren first expressed her extravagant creative urges as a writer, poet, photographer, clothes designer, and dancer. But then she made a radical change, embarking on a new path as experimental filmmaker. She said she had “finally found a glove that fits.” Her movies were highly influential among the avant-garde in the 1940s and 1950s. I bring Deren to your attention, Taurus, because I suspect that in the coming months, you, too, will find a glove that fits. And it all starts soon.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): In medieval times, alchemists believed mercury was a sacred substance and divine intermediary. They knew that it’s the only metal that’s liquid at room temperature. This quality, along with its silvery sheen (why it’s called "quicksilver"), made it seem like a bridge between solid and liquid, earth and water, heaven and earth, life and death. I nominate mercury as your power object, Gemini. You’re extra well-suited to navigate liminal zones and transitional states. You may be the only person in your circle who can navigate paradox and speak in riddles and still make sense. It’s not just cleverness. It’s wisdom wrapped in whimsy. So please offer your in-between insights freely. PS: You have another superpower, too: You can activate dormant understandings in both other people’s hearts and your own.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): In the western Pacific Ocean, there’s a species of octopus that builds its lair from coconut shells. The creature gathers together husks, dragging them across the seafloor, and fits them together. According to scientists, this use of tools by an invertebrate is unique. Let’s make the coconut octopus your power creature for now, Cancerian. You will have extra power to forge a new sanctuary or renovate an existing one, either metaphorically or literally. You will be wise to draw on what’s nearby and readily available, maybe even using unusual or unexpected building materials.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): I invite you to contemplate the meaning of the phrase “invisible architecture.” My dream told me it will be a theme for you in the coming weeks. What does it mean? What does it entail? Here are my thoughts: Structures are taking shape within you that may not yet be visible from the outside. Bridges are forming between once-disconnected parts of your psyche and life. You may not need to do much except consent to the slow emergence of these new semi-amazing expressions of integrity. Be patient and take notes. Intuitions arriving soon may be blueprints for future greatness. Here’s the kicker: You’re not just building for yourself. You’re working on behalf of your soul-kin, too.

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