Astrology and a Packet of Garden Seeds

The natal chart is basically a map of potential. Like the picture on a packet of garden seeds, it shows what you might become. The Contemporary Astrologer’s Handbook (Astrology Now)

Fate and Free Will – Map to Birmingham or Kalahari Desert

Perhaps the best way of viewing the fate and free will question is to turn to the subjects of maps. After all, the birth chart is quite literally a map for a particular moment. Talking metaphorically imagine you were born with a map of Kalahari Desert and that I was born with a map of Birmingham. One might say that the Kalahari is your fate and that Birmingham is my fate. Our choices and potential are different. I have roads and canals that I can go up and down, and shops I can frequent but just because I have the various features on my map it doesn’t mean that I will use them or, if I do, that I will do consciously. In your map of the Kalahari you have different choices; choices of country, choices of game park, choices of whether to keep cattle or hunt wild game, choices as to whether you listen to the weaver birds or notice the acacias. So we have at least to some degree of free will but our choices are circumscribed by the perimeters of our particular map. Such perimeters might be described as our fate. The Contemporary Astrologer’s Handbook (Astrology Now)

The Ascendant = Driving Along in My Automobile

If the analogy of a vehicle is a good one for the ascendant and First House, then the Sun in our chart depicts us in the role of the driver, whereas our Moon casts us in the role of the passenger or maybe even as the baggage! The Contemporary Astrologer’s Handbook (Astrology Now)

The South Node Report Card

The South Node is our Souls report card. It tells what subjects we have passed: the South Node says, ” Congratulations, you have passed Gemini Level I, ” For “incompletes” and less impressive marks, look to Saturn for further instruction and retesting, not to the South Node. The Complete Node Book: Understanding Your Life’s Purpose

More Gardening

Transits signify periods of growth. If we wish to use the transit period for our growing, we need to begin when the seeds of the transit are planted…Many students attempt to interpret a transit when it is basically over, for they begin to work with it when the crop is being harvested. The unpleasant crop harvested from a difficult transit occurs when we haven’t been aware of the effect of a transit soon enough. I use a ten degree applying orb. In that way the energy can be transformed with knowledge and understanding. Transits: The Time of Your Life

The Ascendant/Doorway of a House

It’s like the doorway to the house. No matter what’s going on in that house, the first thing you see is the door. Some doors are open, welcoming, inviting, painted in cheery colours. Other doors are silent, closed, with a little peephole so whoever lives inside can check you out first before you’re let in. Some doors are large and grandiose, like palace entrances. Others are small and unobtrusive. The door isn’t really any index to the inside of the house. There are houses where you’d never notice that shabby little door, but the inside is beautiful. Others are very flamboyant outside, but small and unobtrusive inside. Never judge a house by it’s door. But the door reflects how that person wants you to see him. So, we have the sign of the ascendant. Astrology for Lovers

Transits/Hands of a ‘Cosmic’ Clock

So the movements of the Sun, Moon and planets – and the stars behind them – can be seen as the ‘hands’ of a cosmic clock. The astrologer is someone who has learned to tell the ‘cosmic time’. Through reading a horoscope, meaning ‘view of hour’, he or she can divine the nature of what or who is happening, and when further ‘influences’ will occur, and what they mean. But, in this context, the word ‘indication’ is actually more appropriate than ‘influence’. This is because clocks indicate the time, they do not in themselves influence what is happening or make things happen. And the most potent moment in cosmic time is when someone or something comes into being – birth. Hence the importance of the birth chart, for that is truly ‘your time’, and all other ‘times’ are related to it. The Instant Astrologer
 
The Psyche Delivering Fruit

As Astrologers, we can wind up in a lot of trouble if we think we can impose our wishes on the rate at which things grow. You are wanting to hear me say, ” Yes, you are free. You can sort out your complexes whenever you like, regardless of the chart”. Indeed, you are free, to work with your developmental pattern in any way you choose, including transforming things that are dark or stuck. But as far as getting the psyche to deliver its fruit when it is not yet ripe, any gardener can tell you such tactics don’t work. The Horoscope in Manifestation: Psychology and Prediction

Saturn/’Wet Blanket’

And not all unconscious issues are unpleasant. Sometimes one finds that perfectly lovely configurations in a chart are very unconscious. The ego does not perceive them as lovely, or one has been taught to see oneself as unlovely. Then some of one’s best resources may be hidden away in the darkness. This latter is known as the wet blanket syndrome. For example, we might see a chart with a lot of planets in Capricorn, and angular Saturn opposition Sun, and Mercury square Chiron. And along with these placements is a delightful Venus-Jupiter conjunction in Sagittarius, but it’s invisible. The person doesn’t seem to exhibit the joyful, self indulgent, and adventurous spirit we associate with the two ‘benefics’. Where has it gone? Most likely it has been suppressed, by both parents and the ego, and it is being projected. There might be a lot of envy toward other people who seem to have everything: “It’s alright for some, with looks and money and plenty of time to indulge themselves, but the rest of us don’t have it so easy”. Or the person may perceive the Venus-Jupiter wholly negatively and stomp around saying, “Irresponsible, self-indulgent people! The Horoscope in Manifestation: Psychology and Prediction

Re-planting Seeds and Cultivating Fields/Natal Potential

The horoscope of an individual’s birth reveals the essential balances and imbalances of that person’s life pattern; that person’s Karma. We call the natal horoscope the “blueprint to life” for it reveals the seeds the individual must (re) plant in life and methods by which he may or may not cultivate his fields. It will show the potential extent of his subsequent harvests. Alan Oken’s Complete Astrology

Rectifying a Chart/Diagnostic Work

The Astrologer who rectifies a map is like a physician who specializes in diagnostic work. When a patient exhibits an unknown ailment, the doctor looks to the symptoms, examines the patients medical and family history, makes certain tests, and comes up with his opinion on the nature of the disease. He then prescribes the appropriate treatment. If the patient responds favourably, the diagnosis can be considered correct. The same goes for rectification. After closely examining the natives life and physical appearance (and, if possible, the charts of the native’s immediate family), the astrologer suggests a horoscope pattern and “prescribes” the House positions. Alan Oken’s Complete Astrology: The Classic Guide to Modern Astrology

Houses Rooms

In natal astrology, it sometimes helps to think of the houses not as actual houses, but rather as “rooms” that are inside each of us. Each room has a special purpose and is reserved for certain types of experiences. Think of it this way: when we’re hungry and want something to eat, we go to the kitchen, not the bedroom or the study; and we don’t usually sleep in the bathroom or the dining room. It’s the same way with the house in the birth chart. The sixth house is our office-it’s where we go to work. When we want to go out and have fun, on the other hand, we go to our fifth house. We meet up with our friends in the eleventh house, and our family in the fourth. Astrology: Understanding the Birth Chart

A Bead Necklace/Human Intervention

We can take any birth chart, and we have no idea what the individual has made or will make out of it. We don’t have a coherent story. We only have a mass of fragments. It is something in the individual that makes these fragments into a story, like placing isolated beads on a string to make a necklace. Have any of you ever worked with beads? There, on the table, is a pile of ceramic beads of various sizes and shapes and colours. There is no pattern. We work out how many of each we have, and then we say, “I’ll think I will put a blue one first, and then three green ones, followed by a big amber one. Then I’ll have another blue one, and then another three green ones.” The finished necklace has order, design, harmony, intent. Before our intervention the beads did not. Apollo’s Chariot: The Astrological Sun

Banging on Doors 

With Uranus in the 7th, a stable relationship may sometimes seem like living in a house in which all the doors are locked. Even if one is not conscious of one’s own psychic claustrophobia, something inside wants to start banging on those doors. The knowledge that they are all locked is very unpleasant, so one begins to rattle the handles and shout! “Let me out!” If someone opens the door and says, “Look this door is open, you can leave when you like,” the chances are that one won’t need to leave. Because one knows one is free to go, one may well decide to stay around. But the moment someone says, “You are not allowed to leave. You have to stay. We have a marriage certificate, a mortgage, responsibilities towards the children, and your mother to look after, and what will people think?” then the impulse to get out can become quite compulsive. The Art of Stealing Fire

Uranus/Onboard Computer

Uranian foresight isn’t really intuition in the colloquial sense; it is something else. It is an ability to plug into a larger system, so we immediately know the rules governing a particular system. It is rather like the on-board computer which one gets on certain cars. If one is travelling at a certain rate of speed, and one’s journey is two hundred miles, the on-board computer will work out the estimated time of arrival instantly, which will keep changing according to the fluctuations in speed. There is something computer-like about the way in which Uranus functions, which is why the planet often associated with computer technology, and why people with a strong Uranus are often gifted at computer programming and engineering. The Art of Stealing Fire

Saturn’s Bill is Due

The actual meaning of Karma is “substance”. We accrue substance through our actions and choices throughout life. Each time a critical point in the Saturn cycle is reached, we must face what kind of substance we have accrued. If we meet this challenge honestly, and work at what has been poorly built, then the next turn of the cycle brings our “just rewards” in productive ways. If we avoid the confrontation, then the next turn of the cycle brings a bigger bill, with accumulated interest; and eventually bailiffs come to claim the debt. And Saturn’s interest rates, unlike those of Bundesbank, are never because of political expediency. They remain fixed, because they are a reflection of our mortal limits. The Art of Stealing Fire

Saturn/First Sexual Encounter

In our course of the Saturn cycle we are struggling to do something that we don’t really know how to do, which gradually builds that inner ground. I can’t really think of a better parallel than the sexual act. The first time we try it, we usually make a ghastly mess of it, because we are trying to remember what we saw in an X-rated film, and what our friends told us we are supposed to do. We are paralysed with shyness and fear, and the expectation of failure, so we consider it a miracle if anything happens at all. Then we say, ” Was it good for you?” which is really a dumb question, since it has been a disaster, it is likely we will be told the truth. Compare that to relating to the person with whom we are making love. It is not unlike where we start with Saturn, and where, with some insight, hard work, and humility, we actually wind up. The Art of Stealing Fire