Do we need gods to help us escape capitalism?
The landscape of the 9th house goes far beyond the pearly gates and gilded walls of academia; it also encompasses that which academia produces (and gatekeeps): worldviews. Ideologies. Grand unified theories.
We need these things in order to form our own independent belief systems—for many in the global North, college is where this process first occurs. Sometimes this is a separation from the belief systems you were raised in, but sometimes it’s a strengthening of them.
Some people undergo this process through traveling the world and experiencing cultures that differ from what they’ve always known; this, too, is a 9th house exploration. For some, this is where they derive their theories of How The World Works and, perhaps more pertinently, How The World Should Work. This kind of grand unified theory can come from cultural relativism, or from an instilled sense of nationalism. That’s what makes some things so sticky to parse.
For a large majority of people, their viewpoint on the world is shaped and reinforced by the religious structures in their life—also a matter of the 9th house, where you will find that which is ordained by a higher power, that which is prescribed by an authority figure, that which is performed in front of others. It is public ceremony rather than private ritual, more often than not “legitimized” by a patriarchal power structure—at least in this modern epoch.
Churches and capitalism both raise the same questions: what do you believe, and how do you believe it? Are your beliefs an abstract—derived from expectation, something that simply lives in your heart? Or are your beliefs made apparent through your behaviors? How deeply do you allow your actions to be influenced by your beliefs?
I’ve been reading Mark Fisher’s Capitalist Realism, and one of the early chapters describes the culture of disavowal: a practiced distance from belief in the form of behaviors, which capitalism necessitates for its survival. If you simply “believe capitalism is bad,” you’re still free to keep participating in consumer capitalism. There’s a disconnect between your beliefs and your actions, and that’s just how capitalism wants it.
If capitalism relies on this culture of disavowal and ironic distance from beliefs, then the internal shift away from capitalism might have to begin with believing in something and allowing your actions to reflect that belief.
We don’t need gods to tell us how to behave or dictate right from wrong. But we do need beliefs in the form of behaviors, derived from our own ideas of right and wrong. Capitalism is How The World Works, and part of that functioning relies upon the abstraction of belief and an emotional distance from anything that looks like fanaticism. To envision How The World Should Work and bring that vision into material reality, it begins with shifting what processes we ceremonialize and prescribe—and, in order to do that, we must first shift our relationship to belief from the abstract to the material.
If this is landing, it’s a big part of what we’ll be doing in Subverting Capitalism Through the Houses—tracing where capitalist realism narrows each house and reshaping the houses as tools for liberation.
What you’ll receive
- 20+ page guide with house-by-house distortions, reframes, and reflection prompts
- Live 90-minute session (orientation, a few deep dives, open Q&A)
- Recording + transcript for your own tempo
Sliding scale: $15-60
Buy it here.
