One Last Ride on the Big Wheel

This is the twenty-fourth (and last) part of my essay series “Inner Work with the Planets”. If you haven’t read the earlier parts yet, I suggest you start with part 1 to get the most out of this essay.

At long last, we have reached the end of this essay series – and boy, what a ride it has been!

Starting out in January, we’ve walked a long and winding road together. From material life on earth up there to the fixed stars and beyond, we’ve seen and experienced it all.

In particular, we’ve ascended through the spheres of the seven classical planets together, and more than once: first to get to know the planets and their coins, and then again to discover the meaning and importance of such an ascent, and how we can put it to good use.

We’ve also investigated a sizeable amount of Hermetic concepts, have dived into the history of Hermeticism and the Hermetic treatises, and have meandered down more than one tempting rabbit hole, only to emerge on the other side hopefully a little wiser, but definitely a little dustier and covered in cobwebs from squeezing through these rarely traveled nooks and crannies.

Throughout all of this, I’ve continously suggested stuff for you to do (besides reading these essays, of course): Mostly things to contemplate and to reflect upon, but also specific techniques for your inner work with the Hermetic planets, from simple journaling through discursive meditation all the way to spiritual practices.

And to top things off, in the last essay, we even went on a foray into some completely different system of spirituality, just for fun.

(Travelling to foreign places expands the own horizon, after all, and helps us to see that which is closer to us from a new perspective…)

But now, finally, we’re at the end of the series. And looking back at all the fun we’ve had, and all the topics we’ve covered, one last question remains to be answered. This question is simple:

Now what?

By this, I don’t mean what I’m going to post about next (although we’ll get to that further below). Instead, the question is what you are going to do with this essay series, now that you’ve almost finished reading. Or rather: What you could do, as the choice is, of course, yours! 🙂

In order to answer this question, we’ll need to circle back to some things I wrote about in earlier essays…

At the very beginning of this series, I promised to present to you an obscure approach to “improve” yourself and your life, namely how to use Hermetic ideas of the planets to do inner work – and I very much hope I have fulfilled this promise:

“The series starting with this post will cover some (hopefully!) interesting, entertaining, and useful ground about a somewhat out-there topic, namely how to use Hermetic ideas of the planets to do inner work.”

“Inner work”, in this context, means the work you do inside of yourself, in order to change yourself and the outer world.

(This is oftentimes called “self improvement”, or “self development”, or the like. But as I told you back when I introduced the term inner work, I don’t find these terms very helpful, and thus chose to go with “inner work” – after all, it happen inside of you, and it’s most defnitely work!)

If you should have started out reading this essay series with a clear goal in mind (“Wow, Regine says I can improve my life that way, and there are some aspects of it which desperately need improving, so I’ll give this a try!”), this focus on the inside might have been confusing at first.

After all, the changes you were after are, more likely than not, real, tangible changes in your life. A different job, a good relationship, less stress, more productive habits (or getting rid of less productive ones), and so on.

These are practical things, after all. Couldn’t and shouldn’t you approach them from a practical angle, then?

Well, yes and no. If you want to have a clean bathroom, you’ll need to get to work with your cleaning utensils (or alternatively earn enough money and hire somebody to do it for you – both practical tasks, too).

But the path to a cleaner bathroom starts neither in your bathroom nor in your cleaning cabinet – it starts inside of you: You have to make a decision. You have to prioritize it over other things. And you have to pull through.

The actual action with cleaning agent, mop and cloth is downstream of the inside action – and a lot further downstream for that matter.

This becomes even cleaner clearer when we don’t talk about cleaning your bathroom just once, but about establishing different habits. Say, a habit of cleaning it more regularly.

(Apologies to all my readers whose bathrooms are spotless at all times. Please adapt this example to suit your own needs, and your own dusty corners, either literally or figuratively speaking… 😉 )

If you’ve ever tried to change a life-long habit, you know how incredibly hard this can be. And that is after the hardest part has been done already!

Because you need to even become aware of this habit first, then of other options to handle the same situation, both of which can be tough all in themselves. Then you need to get over whatever has been tying you to this habit, and decide to do something else instead – in earnest, that is.

And then you still need to change the actual habit by a. catching yourself when you’re falling into the old habit, and b. actually pulling through with the new one.

As you can see, the actual action with the cleaning cloth, i.e. that which can be seen from the outside, is the easiest part by far!

Thus, in order to achieve meaningful outer change, you’ll need to do the necessary inner work first. And consequently, while the goal of this essay series is to help you to improve your life, it focuses almost entirely on the inner work which is the basis for said improvements.

As so often in life, though, falling into the other extreme has its own pitfalls:

When change is warranted or needed in your life, it can be very tempting to do some more inner work first, since you’re just not quite ready yet, and have not yet overcome all of your inner conflicts and whatnot, and they definitely prevent you from starting.

But of course, once you’ve worked your way through this last set of personal issues and have resolved them for good, you’ll be ready to rumble and will start with that bathroom! For sure this time… 😉

(If this would be you, stop meditating, put your journal aside for the moment, save this essay for later, and get busy dusting and scrubbing – now!)

But, in an ironical twist, even in such cases the actual work starts on the inside – it’s just that the person in question has used the idea of inner work to avoid the kind of inner work which is actually needed.

So how do you go about achieving the necessary or desired changes, whatever they might be?

If you’ve ever dipped even a small toe into the big pond of self improvement, you’ll have noticed there are many ways to improve your life. Many methods and techniques, many approaches, many beliefs and many viewpoints.

Why, then, does this essay series about “Inner Work with the Hermetic Planets” take the approach it does? Why have I put so much emphasis, time and again, on you figuring out your own planetary coins, and on contemplating the planets, their traits, and how they manifest in your life?

After all, we could have started with specific, practical techniques for inner work, and then would have spent this past year on specific, practical improvements in your life.

Instead, we’ve examined planetary coins in your soul’s pockets, talked about the Latin origin of the terms vices and virtues, and have done some impressive works of handicrafts on planetary ladders.

(Although admittedly, this last pastime was tremenduous fun, and on top of everything else, you also got some challenging physical workouts out of it!)

In order to answer this question, we’ll need to take a step back and dive into the foundations of Hermeticism one last time…

For the old Hermeticists, human life on earth was an intermediate phase, quite literally: Wedged between our initial existence as divine souls before our ascent into material incarnation, and our return to the Divine after our ascent back to it, life as humans is an important phase of our existence, to be sure – but it’s only a phase.

Here on earth, in our dual nature as both material, physical beings and as a divine soul, we can experience Creation to its fullest as well as be creators ourselves.

But in the end, and no matter how many incarnations it takes, we long to get back to where we belong, up to the Divine.

(Well, according to Hermetic thought. Your personal mileage may vary.)

Now, during all of the series, we’ve talked a lot about the way back up there: About our ascent through the planetary spheres. About what comes “above” them. About letting go of the vices of the planets during our ascent.

What we’ve never spelled out explicitly, though, is how to actually achieve this ascent (apart from some mumbling about Hermetic rituals and about living decent lives and conducting ourselves well).

(Or at least I think we’ve never talked about it. In my poor brain, things are a bit murky at this point, content-wise. Although not murkier than could be expected, given how this series came to be…)

But there has to be more to this, hasn’t there? Why do some people who are still very much human, warts and all, ascent back to the Divine after their physical deaths, while others aren’t ready yet and go take another ride on the merry-go-round of incarnation?

In some earlier essays, I stressed that we don’t really know whether Hermeticism was a living (and lived) tradition, or “just” a philosophical framework (although the term “just” really doesn’t do things justice here. As far as philosophical frameworks go, it has a lot to offer, too!).

Based on the material handed down to us, we can’t say for certain whether there were actual pratitioners of Hermeticism back in the day – and if so, what exactly their practices were, what they did and didn’t do, etc.

What I didn’t go into back then are certain specific aspects of the Hermetica – aspects which make me, personally, assume that indeed Hermeticism used to be practiced and lived.

One of these aspects are three things which, taken together, constitute the Three Pillars of Hermeticism. (I only just coined this term, but it does have a certain ring to it, doesn’t it? 😉 )

These Three Pillars are demeanours which keep being stressed throughout the Hermetic texts. Sometimes more directly, sometimes subtly between the lines, they show up throughout the treatises, oftentimes in the form of Hermes the Thrice-Greatest teaching or emphasizing them to his pupils.

(Actually, in quite a few passages of the texts, it’s more “hammering home” than “emphasizing” – which, I suppose, goes to show that no matter the age or place, humans gonna human, and some lessons might take a while to sink in with us…)

Taken together, these Three Pillars are the basis for a life lived in accordance with the Hermetic principles and ideas – and for a life which, we can reasonably presume, will eventually lead the pratitioner back up to the Divine where he or she belongs.

The first of these pillars is Reverence. What this term means, here, is not reverence for some of the polytheistic deities of antiquity. Their existence is acknowledged by the Hermetica, but apart from the planetary deities, they mostly appear as extras in the big Hermetic movie of Creation, and don’t gather much attention from the authors of the texts.

(One notable exemption is the Kore Kosmou, but as I stated earlier, it also differs from the rest of the Hermetica in other ways, and thus should probably not be considered part of the core Hermetic treatises.)

Instead, Reverence in a Hermetic sense is worship of and veneration for the Divine Creator, for the Source of all that is. Time and again in the Hermetica, Hermes Trismegistus urges his pupils to revere The One.

On the practical end, there are even prayers to this Divine Source included in the treatises (or parts thereof, as some of the texts haven’t come down to us unscathed).

Incidentally, this is one of the reasons which makes me believe that Hermeticism used to be a lived and living tradition – there would hardly have been a reason to include specific prayers in philosophical texts, if nobody actually prayed these prayers…

The second pillar of Hermeticism is Virtue. Now, I should probably say that “Virtue” in this sense is not the exact same as what I have called “planetary virtues” in this series.

Instead, Virtue in a Hermetic sense means to live a decent life in general, to do the things which are good and right – or, in Hermetic terms, to create down here on earth just like the Divine creates on a much grander scale, by making manifest divine Truth, Beauty, and Goodness.

There are clear parallels here to virtue ethics back in antiquity, but to go into them would lead a bit far for this series (and I did promise you this would be the absolute last essay, so… no going down this tempting rabbit hole today, alas! 😉 ).

For the purpose of our series, it suffices to say that the Hermetica stress the importance of living a decent and virtuous life, which includes developing the planetary virtues, while dumping their vices.

The practical instructions for this pillar are much fewer and farer between than for the Pillar of Reverence, though. In fact, one has to read between the lines a bit to connect the dots between the Pillar of Virtue and the planetary coins – and then figure out ways to apply this to one’s life, just like we did in this essay series.

(Whether there used to be Hermetic teachers who helped their students in this regard is anyone’s guess, and also whether they used a “standard” set of Hermetic methods or whether each teacher had their own approach to this. Alas, no leaflets inviting Hermetic students to a weekend workshop on self improvement have been handed down to us…)

As you can see, this gap is one of the things I’m attempting to fill with this essay series… 🙂

The third pillar of Hermeticism is Knowledge.

It isn’t by-the-book knowledge we’re talking about here, though – simply learning Hermetic wisdom or astrology by rote won’t even get you to the sphere of the Moon, let alone up to the fixed stars.

It’s also not procedural knowledge, i.e. the knowledge of how to do things, and also not the knowledge of what is “good” or “right” in human terms.

Instead, the Pillar of Knowledge is the personal experience of the Truth, and of the Divine – which, incidentally, by its very nature can’t be put into words, and thus this kind of Knowledge can only ever be highly personal.

In the Hermetica, this pillar is oftentimes explained as getting to “know” the Divine, with a focus on experiencing the Divine Source – to the extent this is possible to us in our human forms.

While very popular nowadays, the notion of “experiencing the Divine in everything”, i.e. also in Creation and thus in the world arond us, isn’t in the focus of the Hermetica. Rather, it’s implicitly suggested in the texts (if everything is part and creation of The One, then The One can be experienced and “known” in everything, of course).

What is most interesting to us, though, is that we, too, are part and creation of the Divine. Which, in turn, means that “knowing” the Divine also encompasses knowing and experiencing the Divine in us. Or, as the Oracle of Delphi famously put it, “Know Thyself”.

(As astute reader, you will probably have noticed that this, too, ties in neatly with the content of these essays…)

As far as practical Hermeticism goes, i.e. Hermeticism as a lived and practiced tradition, some of the Hermetica hint at operations or rituals which would get the practitioner (typically a student guided by his teacher) closer to the Divine, let him experience the Source (to the extent possible to us humans within our dual nature, of course) – and which, consequently, would also let him gain Knowledge of himself.

There is even one Hermetic text we talked about earlier which contains a more or less complete version of such a ritual – another bit of evidence that these things were actually practiced by Hermeticists, and not just written down as theoretical considerations.

(Interestingly enough, this so-called “Discourse on the Eigth and the Ninth” implies that the previous two pillars, Reverence and Virtue, can get the practitioner all the way up to the seventh sphere of Saturn, i.e. the last of the planetary spheres. But in order to ascend any further towards the Divine, to the sphere of the fixed stars and beyond, Knowledge is required, i.e. the personal “knowing” and experiencing of the Divine.)

Thus true Knowledge, both of the Divine and of oneself, is one of the pre-requisites of becoming ready to ascent back up through the planetary spheres for good. How such Knowledge can be achieved?

Well, the things we discussed in these essays are a decent start, to be sure – but in the end, true Knowledge means getting to know and to experience divine Truth and Beauty, personally, and there is only so and so much Knowledge which can be gained purely by contemplating something.

(For example, you can contemplate cowpies all you want, but personal Knowledge of cowpies is something else entirely.)

Does this mean the exercises I suggested in these essays are useless from a Hermetic point of view – no matter how much they might help you to improve your life in practical terms, that is?

Quite the contrary! Remember that as of now, i.e. as of me writing this and you reading it, we’re still of dual nature. And while our divine part can get to know the Divine, our material part can only work through material means.

In the end, it takes both sides of this dual nature to achieve Knowledge in its fullest – and we can well start with getting the material side in order, especially as this will have other benefits as well!

(Besides, there is a reason we all came down here, into the material world, in order to experience Creation and to create ourselves. Ignoring the lessons to be learned here, and our work to be done here, will not help us get out of incarnation any faster – which, of course, is exactly what the planets are there to teach us…)

So Hermeticism rests on the Three Pillars of Reverence, Virtue, and Knowledge. Within this series, we’ve focused on the latter two, and have done so from the point of view of our material existences – i.e. how to live a better life here on earth.

We’ve also tried to experience and to perform Hermeticism as a living and lived tradition. This means we haven’t just read the Hermetica as interesting and intellectually stimulating philosophical texts, but as something which can actually have an influence on your and my life, right here and now.

(Although, granted, with one notable exception we’ve mostly left the spiritual side out of the equation in this series, which is also why I haven’t talked about Reverence as a core Hermetic practice so far. I’ll have a few more words to say about the spiritual end of things further down in my outlook, though.)

But I think these Pillars of Virtue and Knowledge, especially the more practically-minded end of knowing and experiencing yourself (as part of the Divine), are worth exploring all on their own for the positive influences they can have on you and your life here and now – even if you should not be inclined to ever practice Hermeticism in a spiritual or religious way.

What, then, are the results you can expect if you continue to do the kind of inner work I’ve outlined in these essays (or actually start doing it, in case you haven’t done so yet)?

Over the course of this series of essays, we’ve talked a bit here and there about the results you might achieve, and about how the planets could help you to achieve them. But as you might have noticed, I have consistently been somewhat vague about any potential effects, and about what you can expect to gain if you put in the work.

This was done on purpose. (In case you were wondering! 😉 )

Just like your birthchart and thus the planetary coins you carry with you are unique, so will be the results of your inner work. What it will do for you depends both on your status quo, i.e. on the place you start out from (which very much includes said planetary coins of yours!) – and on what you put it to use for.

(Of course, it also depends on whether you put in the work in the first place. Just sayin’…)

In the end, one of the goals of any kind of Hermetic work is Knowledge. Or, in the case of the inner work with the planets which I’m suggesting here, specifically a better knowledge of yourself, in all your material and divine glory.

To what use you will put this knowledge in your life is yours to decide, and solely yours.

You could use it to build a more solid foundation for your life. Or to clean out certain corners of yourself. Or to engage with things (or people) differently. Or (shocker, I know!) to engage with yourself differently. To act in other ways. To think in new terms. To feel things differently, or to experience your existing feelings differently.

You can do all of it, or none of it. It really is up to you to which uses you put your newly acquired Knowledge – and in which practical areas of your life.

As you can see, even though I gave my crystal ball an extra polish, it’d be somewhat hard for me to predict any practial improvements you might see in your life.

What I can predict, though, is that you will see results over time if you put in the work. And this, dear reader, would be a good reason to do so, wouldn’t it? 🙂

So. With this, we have well and truly reached the end of this essay series. I did promise you we’d “cover some interesting, entertaining, and useful ground about a somewhat out-there topic, namely how to use Hermetic ideas of the planets to do inner work” – and I hope I have fulfilled this promise and your expectations!

(Either way, I’d very much appreciate any comments you care to give about the series – praise, criticism, and anything else, too. They will be especially helpful to me in turning it into a book, and are thus highly appreciated! The comment section can be found at the very end of this page.)

Funnily enough, as far as expectations for this series go… When I started out with it in January, I had a rough idea of what to write about, and my grand “plan” amounted to “well, I think this should probably be enough content to cover eight essays, one for each planet plus an intro”.

But as we all know, no good plan survives the first contact with the enemy! 😉

So here we are, 24 essays later, and, hopefully, all a little wiser.

(I sure know I am, and more than a little – don’t start an essay series without at least a rough outline, even if it’s just about a seemingly “small” topic!)

Further up, I started into today’s essay raising the question “Now what?”. As attentive reader, you will have noticed that I haven’t really answered this question, at least not explicitly. 😉

But I seriously think at this point, you don’t need the answer spelled out anymore, do you?

By now, you’ve either decided to dive into this inner work with the Hermetic planets (which is absolutely awesome and commendable, and I’d love to hear from you in the future!).

Or you might have decided to put it aside for now and to return to it later (which is perfectly fine, sometimes other things need to be done first).

Or you might have decided that it’s not for you, which is also perfectly fine – if there is one thing we should have learned from this series, then that there truly is no one-size-fits-all!

Either way, and whatever your personal path is, I wish you all the best on said path!

As for my personal answer to “Now what?”, I do have several things lined up…

First in line, of course, is a new essay series which will start in the new year (on Sunday, January 18th, 2026, to be precise). What it’s going to be about? Well, I’m not quite ready to tell you yet. 😉

Suffice it to say that we’re going to cover another interesting, entertaining and thought-provoking (and somewhat out-there) topic. We’re also going to have some hands-on experiences (more hands-on than bending planetary ladders!), and loads of opportunities for inner work, if you are so inclined.

Oh, and we’re going have a lot of fun again in this new series, this time of the sparkling and bubbling, tasty, and potentially explosive kind! 😉

So don’t forget to check back in on January 18th – or sign up for my mailing list to be notified when the first essay goes online.

Second in line are some offshoots of this series on “Inner Work with the Hermetic Planets”, two of which I’ve already mentioned in passing:

First, I’m in the process of turning these essays into a book. I’m not sure yet how long this will take, given my other commitments here on The Hidden Things, but the plan (cough, cough) is to finish it as soon as possible, and then to get it into publication.

Either way, I will announce any news both here on the blog and in an email to the mailing list. If you’d like to be notified once the book is available, it might be best to sign up for my emails (make sure to check “Essays and Other Stuff”, as this is the sub-list to which the announcement will go).

The other thing I have mentioned before is a set of Hermetic planetary rituals I’m working on. They’ve had to take a bit of a backseat recently for other reasons, alas, but slow and steady wins the race, and all that. 😉

These rituals focus on the spiritual aspects of the Inner Work with the Planets, and thus connect the more practical work of this essay series with the spiritual realms of Hermeticism.

I’m know yet sure how I’m going to publish the rituals, i.e. where and in which format – but again, they will be announced both here on the blog and via email to the same list. Thus if you’d like to be notified…

And thirdly, some of you have inquired about a course and/or meditation topics based on the content of this series. Both are things I’m seriously considering, but as of now, they aren’t my highest priority (simply put, I need to get some other stuff off the ground first, including the next essay series).

I.e. while such a course on “Inner Work with the Hermetic Planets” might be forthcoming, and maybe also a series of meditation topics, it won’t happen right away, alas.

(To the people who asked, sorry about that. I’ve seriously considered it, but have had to accept that it would be more work than I can handle right now. And I’d rather get the rest of the stuff actually done, thus any course on this topic has to take a backseat for now, much as I’d enjoy creating it!)

So this is it in terms of “What now”, as in “What is Regine going to do now”… 😉

And with this, we are indeed at the very end of the series. As promised, what we’ve discussed over the course of the past 24 essays certainly is somewhat obscure – even in occultism, a deep-dive into the Hermetic view of the seven classical planets isn’t exactly a mainstream amusement.

I hope the series hasn’t just been somewhat fascinatingly out-there, though, but also interesting and entertaining to read – and even more so, I hope both the series and my concept of Inner Work with the Hermetic Planets have actually been useful to you, and will continue to be useful (and used… 😉 ) in the future!

I’m looking forward to your comments below, and I hope to see you again for the new essay series in January! 🙂

All the best to you for your inner work!

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Image: Boris YUE on Unsplash