Cross of Habits

Full breakdown

Gates: 5 Fixed Rhythms, 35 Change, 22 Openness, 47 Realizing. Gate numbers: 5/47, 35/22.

The Cross of Habits deals with some of our earliest values, held in Gate 5. Gate 5, the gate of patterns, is also the gate of ritual — this is where rituals get established. Taking the same road to work every day, and countless habits like it, become ritual over time. This is one of the more eccentric Juxtaposition Crosses — these are people of habit, taking exactly eleven steps to the bathroom, never twelve, boiling an egg for exactly three minutes and forty-seven seconds. Live with someone like this and there's nothing you can do to change it.

Habits matter enormously to all of us, and most of ours come from conditioning. Not everyone has Gate 5 defined, so life itself conditions them instead — following certain patterns is part of how we function, visible in something as ordinary as a nine-to-five schedule. Imposed habits like that give us a real sense of order.

Out of that order grows the potential for love — Gate 5 points toward 15, the gate of love for humanity. Their whole focus is getting into the flow and staying there, and entering it properly starts with behaving correctly. In this Cross specifically, habits are what give people that sense of flow. They're unshakeable, and they return to their habits again and again because those habits give them a feeling of constancy — that life is dependable, something they can actually lean on.