Why Pisces Pull Away...

Photos used under Creative Commons from torbakhopper

​Like unborn souls floating in the dark waters of the womb, Pisces live in a world of the "in-between". Somewhere between life and death, Pisces are forever torn between reaching full awareness in the light of consciousness or regressing back to the comfort of the dark unconscious. They live in both worlds, endowing them with a wider, more creative perspective than any other sign, but burdening them with the chaos of never really being completely present in either. It's experienced by those who share their lives as a pulling-away quality. 

​Because they float endlessly between both words, they seem to come and go. It's an endless cycle of leaving one person or situation when anxiety or stress creates a wave that pushes them away and coming back when a trough of peacefulness creates a welcoming energy that entices them to return. It isn't done consciously and it isn't meant to hurt those they love. It's simply the state in which they exist. Each water sign experiences this dynamic on some level. Each is symbolic of the end of a period, and represents a death in preparation for new life. As the last personal sign, Cancer is symbolic of the death of a person's need to be self-serving in order to fully develop as an individual in preparation for living through relationships in the next set of relationship signs. As the last relationship sign, Scorpio represents the death of the ego itself in preparation for being a universal sign where we live as merely one part of the greater world.

As the last universal sign and the last sign of the zodiac, Pisces represents our actual death and exit from the living world in preparation for being reborn as a new individual person in the first sign, Aries. In this way, all water signs live in a constant defensive posture, fighting against what is ultimately a certain death. Cancer defends against losing its individual wants and needs. Scorpio defends against losing its ego, but Pisces defends against losing life itself.

No other sign represents a deeper or more confusing state of existence. The sign of Pisces is symbolic of the transition between life and death and it is best represented by the time spent in the mother's womb. In the womb, we are alive, yet not born. We exist, yet we are still being created. Hearing and sight are muffled. We rely on feeling. It's a completely different form of existence where there is no struggle between right and wrong or good and bad. It's a world of subtlety and nuance, of feeling and emotion. It's safe there and there's peace. It is a sort of limbo between the spiritual world and the living world. The Pisces symbol of the two fish swimming in opposite directions represents this vacillating energy, which goes back and forth between the two worlds. 

Pisces know they are required to participate in the world of the living. Yet, they yearn to return to the safety of the unconscious spiritual world where there is no pain, no struggle, and no responsibility. Their lives are a never-ending search for peace. By never going too far in either direction or at least always visiting both worlds alternatively, they struggle to find peace. This ambivalent vacillation is frustrating to most people who must endure this odd behavior. Others see it as a constant tendency to pull away. They pull away from commitment, from relationships, from work or anything else that threatens to become too real. Like the rhythmic swing of a pendulum, the further they swing into reality, with all of its stress and problems, the further they swing back and escape into the unconscious world of their imagination, of dependency, dreams, drugs or delusions. It makes them seem flaky, spacey and irresponsible.

Therefore, Pisces has a unique position in the order of the zodiac. Their struggle isn't between two stages of development like Cancer and Scorpio. It's between life and death itself. So, whereas a Cancer goes back and forth between their needs and your needs, and a Scorpio goes back and forth between satisfying their ego or denying it. Pisces goes back and forth between ​the world of the real and living to the pseudo, death-like world of their unconscious imagination and dreams. With a spectrum of focus so broad, they seem to pull away as they vacillate between these two extremes. But, it's not meant to offend, and it's nothing personal. It's simply the world in which they live.