I was thinking this morning about the archer.

Over the last few years I’ve found the astrological zodiac a helpful sort of map of the inner terrain. A person needn’t believe in the efficacy of astrology as a system to find that it nonetheless elucidates many of the tasks we master and the psychological ground we traverse on our way to becoming self-aware, self-determining people who can work out our own salvation (albeit ‘with with fear and trembling’). It also makes useful representation of the dilemmas we face serially, cyclically and/or simultaneously.

The archer I was thinking of is the centaur taking aim with his bow and arrow, which is the symbol for Sagittarius. On the zodiacal wheel, it sits opposite Gemini, represented by the twins whose dual energy is perpetual restlessness. Looking at both signs, a dilemma is immediately apparent: is it better to choose one thing or two? Better to keep all options open, or narrow down the focus to a single point?

Ideally, a person would find a way between the horns of the dilemma by acknowledging the lure of each, and giving each its due, but that’s easier said than done.

I’m feeling the push and pull at present as I consider how to proceed in my work with Rosa Mira Books. My objective is to create a sensitive conduit for writing that (in my estimation) needs to be published; writing that would leave us poorer if none of us had a chance to read it. My means of doing that is to publish digitally, which allows (potentially) for immediate global circulation of the work.

That objective is the bull’s-eye. The rings around the bull’s-eye might encompass my secondary objectives: bringing notice and income to the author, and over time providing myself with a trickle, or even a stream, of income.

However.

Preparing that work for publication is costly and time-consuming and at this early stage is far from recompensed by subsequent sales. So I find myself casting around for alternative ways to meet costs. The rat and I have a pretty happy relationship. I enjoy drawing him, and it seems that he’s a poser and dresser-up from way back … and yet, and yet … I can’t help wondering if my happy evening doodlings are the best use of my time. Does it mean the arrowhead is swaying wildly about and likely to miss the target by a merry mile? It’s ebooks I mean to circulate, not rats.

However.

Perhaps it’s a road I’m on, as well as a flight path (and kinks in the road add interest to any journey). Perhaps I can do two things (or more) in aid of the one thing; play with pencils by night then stand up and take aim at the reading world by day. What do you think?