Creative Connections & Client Communications
Counseling Insights, November 30, 2008Not Everything is Astrological!
–Don’t be afraid of that!!
Why do so many astrology students measure incessantly, look for magic measurements somewhere, try to hog-tie human development with the “sure things” of their measured descriptions? –Why don’t they put the miracle measurements they already have to work, to guide understanding and strategies in life development? Why don’t they ‘practice’ astrology … relate astrology to the human condition?
The answer is that astrological measurements are out there; they’re objective; they’re easy to talk about. —On the other hand, applying astrological measurements to individual life development is something entirely different; it is the art of astrology brought into focus. Being an astrologer requires that you have something to say beyond astrology, something from inside.
Not everything is astrological! –Using the astrological guidelines we have, we must turn to developing significances for the process of our becoming, to strategizing personal growth, to forming relationships, and to achieving vocational productivity. Those considerations are human, social, practical; they are not astrological.
For example: seeing a closed circuit of self-sufficiency symbolized by a Grand Trine measurement, which works to defend the Self and puts off relationships … THAT’s one thing; but being able to talk about this, to distill WHY the defensiveness became necessary in life, is quite another! –With understanding, that defensive construct can be relaxed; it is probably no longer necessary; and the routined behaviors can be broken up refreshing the developmental system with differently directed energies.
We have to be able to talk about the interpretative art of astrology intelligently, objectively, helpfully. But this is a departure from astro-Talk and therefore is insecure ground for so many. We give too, too much time to measurements and too, too little time to how the measurements signal individual significances for development.
Even those astrologers who do talk with clients, if they were to take out from the discussion all the astrological jargon they are using –which is meaningless to the client and only serves as security padding for the astrologer– think how much time and space would be opened up for the astrologer to say something significant !
Another example: we see the singularly simple measurement (which took a long long time of empirical investigation to deduce and confirm) of Mars just above the Ascendant, within perhaps 13 degrees, suggesting “hidden anger” (probably formed within the early home life experience at the age equal to the number of degrees remaining to the Ascendant). This hidden anger will almost always pervade the entire behavioral system and season so many dimensions of personality expression and development.
The measurement is one thing; the significance, the individual meaning, the role the anger plays in life development is quite another. –Can the astrologer talk about this? Has the astrologer studied a book or two (psychological or psychiatric texts) about anger? Is the astrologer prepared to liberate the system from so much weightiness? –No astrology will come to the rescue. Making sense of it all is up to the astrologer working closely with the client.
Environmental influence affects measurement meaning. One of the most reliable measurements in astrology is the Arc or transit of Uranus to the Ascendant. So reliably often, so much so that it is a ‘norm’, this time period is accompanied by relocation. But for people living in New York City, for example, that breaks down; one is anchored to where one lives more in this city than in other less tight, less intense, less expensive cities. City operations decrease job mobility; family real estate holdings are more of an anchor. –This applies as well to London and many big cities in Germany, etc.
For this powerful Arc or transit, we must look to other windows of individual assertion. What we know about reality tempers what we know about astrology; other dimensions of meaning come into play. –Are we aware of this in our work? Is our not knowing a deterrent to applying astrology well to the human condition?
When we come to discussion about future development potentials … in six months, a year, two years … we astrologers need all the help we can get! That help comes from assessment of the client’s reality circumstances [what is practicable, possible] which is related to the astrology in formation. This assessment is focused by the client … NOT by the astrology. –The question that brings client and astrologer together to focus the astrology is quite simply, “What do you project for yourself now in the next year or so? The reply focuses the interpretative level of analysis. What is possible. What is probable … and when.
The answer here will bring the future astrology down to earth. The client and astrologer become partners in time and they work to see what can happen. They focus realistically what willl happen.
Otherwise, we are just trying to vindicate astrology –“Isn’t that cool, how that describes you?” —and ourselves in the process. It all too easily becomes a game of “gotcha.” –And that’s how astrology used to be.
In our new era of human studies, we must remember that planets don’t do anything; that people do. And we astrologers, armed and enriched with our knowledge, work with people and their realities. –And we work with their Hopes. Hopes define the future that can happen. We astrologers are part of those projections, even more than the astrology is. We have to have something to say in order to bring astrology down to earth.