Yes, the horoscope itself has a memory! There are at least four channels into it, four key ways we see that memory!

1. Points and planets sensitized in the past for the future When a particular planet or point is engaged with a major Arc or transit … and perhaps again a year or two later, a response sensitivity seems to build up at that planet or point, to the degree that the probability of re-occurrence increases for contact a third time or a fourth, fifth, sixth! The horoscope remembers, focused at that sensitized location.

We acknowledge this without giving the issue serious thought: we say, “Well, every time something opposes that 12-degree span (4-16 Leo) in Israel’s 10th House (with Moon, Pluto, and Saturn there), the probability of scandal or change of government regime is very high!”

My 7-Pisces area is such a hotspot, corresponding to dramatic change with any outer-planet touch. Tr Saturn square: publication of my first book in astrology, 1972; tr Uranus square, major relationship change; tr Saturn conjunction, major life relocation; tr Uranus conjunction dramatic relocation … and so it goes –Surely within your horoscope, such hotspots exist, response memories which have enormous presence in your life development. Our clients have those spots too, and we should be alert to finding them for higher probability projection into the future.

2. The experiential behavior patterns routinized in childhood How does a Grand Trine develop its extraordinary defensive self-containment? How do the behaviors symbolized band together? Why is the defense system needed? It persists our entire life; only understanding its development can alleviate the self-protecting vigilance and free up fresh energies for the rest of life development.

Another example: how does a singularly dramatic aspect develop its presence to pervade life development without let-up? –Robert Downey, Jr., for example has one angular statement (and it’s within the parental axis) in his horoscope: the exact opposition of Neptune to his Moon, ruler of his 12th! There is no way to avoid seeing addiction as a possible lifelong vulnerability. Do we see mother as well? –His parents were divorced when he was 13, and Downey moved cross country with his father. He was addicted to drugs already at age 8!

Those significances are perpetual (aided by the permanence, the resistance to change, of the Moon in Taurus) for Downey. The horoscope remembers all that and calls it up every single time Downey relapses yet again into addiction, with his grand career threatened to the core.

3. Dreams and their life in the past If you have Neptune in the Ascendant, the chances jump sky-high that you dream in color, that your dreams have enormous emotional content. But even if you don’t have that Technicolor trait, you may have major dream content, perhaps even recurrent plots, that occurs over and over and over again in your life development.

I have consulted with clients who have recurrent dreams of the fear of failure, anxiety about dying, flying to nowhere and not knowing where to return! These dreams are there to discharge anxiety (that threatens to wake us, as one reason). When the tension mounts more than our symbolization mechanics can camouflage, we do waken … and it’s the same way every time.

We can figure out why the dream is there, what it’s trying to say, but what keeps it there in our psyche? Our horoscope remembers the lesson the dream is trying to tell us. Usually such excitation occurs under Neptune challenges; suppression is weakening for dark light to emerge.

4. The genetic pool harboring somatic and systemic vulnerabilities We know the signature I’ve discovered about the inter-relationship of Venus and Jupiter suggesting ever so reliably in the American culture the presence of diabetes in the individual’s gene pool … not in the individual necessarily, but in the storehouse of traits remembered by the body, remembered by the horoscope.

What about other diseases, other vulnerabilities? How does the horoscope hold on to these, poised for a releasing trigger like Saturn to the Ascendant, etc.? [Please see Tyl–The Astrological Timing of Critical Illness.]

And we must remember the ancient tenet for all of this: that it is the Fixed Star lore and animation that establish areas of response in our Solar System. It is the Pleiades [“The Weeping Sisters” ] around the 28th degree of Taurus that condition that area; the horoscope remembering that. It is the constellation Persi holding the fixed star Algol [thought consummately evil] conditioning the 25th degree of Taurus, with the horoscope remembering!

Referring to the first example above, one can say all too easily that this 7-Pisces area in my horoscope is so sensitive because it’s my Midheaven! –But that’s precisely it: It’s a very, very responsive point … being my Midheaven doesn’t necessarily explain things further! –Or, “Oh well, that’s because it’s at your Sun/Moon midpoint.” That’s not an explanation; that’s referring to a highly sensitized location!

The point is that the horoscope is remembering what it learns through our growth dynamics: the pains, the joys, the fears, the confident skills, the hope for reward, the management of failure. All this helps us traffic analytically within a horoscope with more respect and care. –The horoscope lives because we acknowledge the memories accumulated in it.