Gate 40: The Gate of Aloneness

This line asks whether, once the work is done, you can truly rest and be alone. In its exalted expression, the ego can be alone and enjoy what the work has brought forth. In its weakened expression, the ego cannot stand being alone for long, and deep rest does not come.

Liberation requires recognizing what holds you back. This line asks how clearly you see the influence of others. In its exalted expression, being alone sharpens your eye for what others are worth and where they get in the way, and whatever was hindering your liberation is set aside. In its weakened expression, loneliness obscures how much others get in the way. Then the very thing that slows your liberation ends up being lovingly tended.

After a release, you hold back so as not to stir up opponents. In its exalted expression, the ego takes pleasure in what it has achieved without boasting about it, and in this way sidesteps resistance, even if that leaves you lonely. In its weakened expression, the ego tends to push itself to the front and demand attention.

After a deliverance, the work turns to putting things in order: do you choose with care, or do you eagerly gather as much support as you can? In its exalted expression, a sensitive mind chooses wisely and organizes in a way that lets the deliverance last and keeps the ego independent. In its weakened expression, unchecked eagerness cares more about how many helpers there are than about whether they are suited to the task. What has been achieved may become shaky over time, and the ego feeds on organizing others.

Here, deliverance means firmly rejecting everything harmful. In its exalted expression, you only let up once the victory is complete, and you keep the strength of the Ego intact because you do not tolerate harmful ties. In its weakened expression, out of loneliness, the Ego clings to relationships that harm it and makes concessions, hoping to get rid of them later.

Before liberation can succeed, the forces holding it back have to be stripped of their power. That is what this line is about. In its exalted expression, a generous authority removes from their position only those whose removal is justified, in order to protect the group. In its weakened expression, the power of the Ego easily slips out of control, and judgment no longer distinguishes between individuals and entire groups.

In all its variants, this cross is about community and the agreement that holds it together. People are meant to connect and build something larger together, from the family all the way to institutions. Read spiritually, this includes today’s worldwide cycle, in which community, organization and institutions have mattered most since the 17th century. On a mystical level, it ties in with the search for God and its opposite: Gate 37 stands for the hope of being touched, Gate 40 for doubting that touch and for the question of whether you are only needed as a worker.

When the Sun is in Gate 40, the cross sits in the gate of being alone and saying no. Care and attention are checked for their price: What do they cost, and how much of your own effort are they worth? Because the agreement grows out of feeling, its foundation can shift with the wave, and later it is unclear what exactly was agreed.

When it comes to planning, this variant brings resistance with it. It asks how much work is being demanded and what comes back in return, and it takes part in the planning without letting itself be absorbed.

A Right Angle Cross shows a personal theme: your path belongs to you, and the people you meet color it without steering it somewhere else. Rather than a claim or a destiny, it is something you live out when you follow your Strategy and Authority.

This cross is a settled No. The people who carry it turn down much of what is brought to them, whichever direction it comes from.

With the Sun in Gate 40, this becomes deep skepticism that ranges from “I already know that one” all the way to “I don’t want it in the first place.” Everyone else wants to get moving, but one person stubbornly stays put.

Overall, this stance takes on the role of a brake when progress runs away with itself. That is where the value of the No lies.

Juxtaposition Crosses are rare. Your path here is fixed and your own, a bridge between a personal and a transpersonal theme, much like a train on its tracks. In this view, someone who stays with you for a longer stretch can ride along for part of the way. This is not a prediction; the meaning becomes clear over the course of your life.

In the first variant of this Left Angle Cross, with the Sun in Gate 37, migration means expansion and conquest. When the Sun is in Gate 40, the other side comes into view: migration as escape.

People with this cross often leave only when they have to, and until then they deny the danger. If you wait too long, you may find the way out blocked. Migrating to conquer and migrating to escape what you fear are equally part of being human; neither form is better than the other.

The forces behind this cross do not let up. When you move away from a threat, you can open up new spaces along the way.

A Left Angle Cross is a transpersonal theme that is fulfilled only in connection with others. This path needs people who fit with it and help carry it. This is not fate; the meaning of the cross reveals itself over the course of your life.