Organizing Blocks of Synthesis

It seems for the most part, that it takes astrologers the longest time to get past the magic of measurements. It’s very hard to see past the spell woven into the esoteric and occult trappings of astrology: it is knowledge for the special few, and they don purple robes when they discuss it!

But measuring everything in sight, while perhaps an essential, early stage of practicing what is taught, gaining an orientation to interplanetary dynamics, soon too easily becomes the badge of the fledgling astrologer, “the identifier”. And this is when the rich understandings of individuation and development are fractured into descriptive codes. –The astrologer-to-be must realize that knowing how to throw a baseball in many different ways is one thing, pitching an intentional strike is quite another.

Look at this male’s horoscope: October 25, 1881 at 11:15 PM in Malaga, Spain. It belongs to Pablo Picasso.

• My goodness! Look at that bunch of retrogrades in the 10th Wow!

• But, holy smokes!, there aren’t any squares among the planets, just the Sun and Saturn to the Ascendant! Yeeks! I knew a man who had that once, and boy!

• And look at that North Node with the Moon! That’s really special!

Nothing has been accomplished.

It’s so easy to look for and point out the different, the unusual, the unique. We see astrologers searching for people with the same patterning or occurrence –which diminishes the uniqueness, by the way– to tell them what it means! Not much thinking or observation going on here. Astrology quickly becomes a parlor gotcha-game based on memorized specifics.

–When this happens, hope for growth starts to fade.

Astrologers on their way to skill can gain so much by learning how to choreograph their assessment of a horoscope –and that is what the early, demanding Lessons in the Master’s Certification course are all about, by the way—utilizing knowledge of principles and how they work together within the social framework. Let’s see what can be done with this horoscope … and two more, using a few of the keys available to all astrologers (see the DVDs as well; BOOKS)

1. There is conspicuous Northern Hemisphere emphasis suggesting much unfinished business in the early home. –This is a key, key, key observation in every horoscope: what is the first impression, it will permeate all other measurements to come!
2. The source of the unfinished business here will involve Saturn-rx phenomenology (the father relationship) and the early stresses on the Self-worth profile [Saturn-rx opposed the Sun, within the parental axis, the Sun ruling the self-worth 2nd.] –The social patterns emerging with and through this complex are very well-established and known.

3. Because of the probably out-of-the-picture, disdained, or absent father situation, the female, maternal influence will ascend [Moon conjunct the Nodal axis; making a suggestion of difference between North and South invites burn-out and preoccupation with moot irrelevancies].

4. The mind-set trafficking within the female-dominated upbringing [which, empirically we learn perpetuates itself into adult life almost always] will be severe, even depressive, about issues of being loved [Pluto opposes Mercury, ruler of the 3rd and 11th].

5. And the life development working through these formative filters seeks to know why things are as they are, building on a strong, swaggering philosophical curiosity, using knowledge and opinions to carve a place for himself, fulfilling some kind of life-purpose (Ascendant ruler Sun in Scorpio, reigning need Moon in Sagittarius, with the resourceful and vaunted Jupiter-Pluto conjunction).

And that’s enough for the first stage of organizing synthesis. –With practice and with a vocabulary that can express substantive thought, this process takes about 30-60 seconds!! The astrologer is seeking out the positioning of the individual within extremely well demarcated and understood patterns of social development.

Then, with a second breath, more can be suggested. Through Midpoints for example: MH=Venus/Neptune, Asc=Neptune/MH, Sun/Saturn; Neptune=Sun/Pluto, Jupiter=Venus/Mars. All echo the basic personality orientation. –And the third breath, a vocational profile orientation: Mars and Venus, co-ruling the Midheaven: Mars.Moon.Jupiter.Venus*; MH=Venus/Neptune. Artistic communication; didactic art.

Here we see Picasso emerging from a family of an artist father whom he despised, brought up in household of five women, etc…

The final step would be to project rapport Arcs to the Angles and to the Sun and the Moon, and then to punctuate development time with strong transits similarly projected.

Enough. That entire process in the hands of someone skilled and practiced should take 25-40 minutes.

Quite a difference, eh? The skilled astrologer doesn’t ooo and ahhh at the remarkable, but, instead, accepts it, organizes it, relates observation to observation, and brings a structure of potentials to the reality experience of the client. The horoscope comes literally and figuratively to life.

Try another one: Timothy Leary, Harvard Psychology lecturer of ‘60s-’70s Flower-Power fame: October 22, 1920 at 10:45 AM in Springfield MA. Ignore looking for juicy details or detailed measurement for which you (supposedly) really know the answer.

1. Clearly a Southwest Hemisphere emphasis: vulnerability to being swept up into events, exploited, even pushed around by society. This will call for some kind of over compensatory, self-defensive, dare we say, ‘retaliation.’ [Leary was a constant disciplinary problem at home, through many universities, etc.]

2. The Sun- Moon blend shows a tremendous social energy and humanitarian thrust … to help people… and thereby define how beautiful and creative (three quintiles) the Self is.

3. The reigning need to be special, unique (Moon in Aquarius), is intensified by Uranus-Moon; and camouflaged (or as we find in his reality, drugged) by the quindecile from Neptune; an obsession of proving oneself special and ‘ideal’ [Mercury-Venus square Moon-Uranus].

4. The sexual profile would figure into the whole individualistic ‘movement’ through the busy Moon ruling the 8th and Mars (opposed by Pluto) ruling the 5th; with Mercury-Venus in Scorpio in the 12th, etc.).

And that’s enough. –To begin our consultation, I think I would have said to Leary, “Tell me how you help people … and how that helps you!” He would have loved it! and the story would unfold; how things were twisted into excesses by alcohol, sex, drugs, etc..

[Note: Leary died of Prostate cancer; see the natal predisposition so clearly through Mars opposed Pluto, ruler of the 12th; see The Astrological Timing of Critical Illness.]

And another: Yoko Ono, widow of John Lennon and an avant-garde art celebrity in her own right: February 18, 1933 at 8:30 PM in Tokyo.

1. The Hemisphere emphasis is to the North and West: unfinished business in the early home pushes the Self out and away into the world to relate in a way that establishes personal uniqueness (Sun peregrine in Aquarius). She ‘dances’ to a different drummer.

2. The peregrine Sun rules the 11th: deep concerns about being loveable will permeate personality development (the peregrine planet usually dominates the horoscope in terms of the House(s) it rules). The need to have opinion impact on others … on the world will be considerable (Moon in Sagittarius, in the 3rd, square with Mercury and Mars).

3. There is the suggestion of a deep struggle with sexuality during this process of development: the clash of early restrictive teachings and pressing experimental needs (Uranus, ruling the 5th squared by Pluto –note Pluto ruling the self-worth 2nd; Venus, ruling the 8th, conjoined by Saturn).

4. The role of the mother should be carefully discussed: Saturn with Venus, ruling the Ascendant, rules the 4th, and Mercury conjoins the Nodal axis.

And that’s enough. –Anything more at the outset simply reveals the fear the astrologer has about having nothing to say to the client!

****In the points of synthesis organization for each of these horoscopes, every key building block of developmental experience is outlined. The major point here is to get on with the process of becoming, not to wallow in the redundancies of measurement fragments. The points hold together with creative connections. They support intelligent conversation.

Then, as we proceed further, we work with punctuations of developmental time –through Arcs and Transits. We learn how values were/are put into order by the client within time: look at Sun=Saturn and MH=Sun at 7 for Picasso … was that the time when he saw the distance from his father, etc.? How did a deep spiritual sense come to be born within his earliest works, at age 13 with Neptune=Pluto; anger and rebellion at 23 (Mars=Ascendant), etc.

For Timothy Leary: look at the very special times at ages 6-9 with Mars=Pluto and Saturn=MH, respectively (family tensions leading to father abandonment). And then some precocious resolution of lovableness issues, getting on with people, aware of his charisma, at age 10-11 with Uranus=Jupiter, ruling the Ascendant, and Venus=Ascendant !

And with Yoko Ono: age 12 with MH=Pluto, when theretofore being privileged of family status and education, life-fortunes turned to total loss (due to WWII, March 1945) for the mother-dominated family (father imprisoned). Then Saturn=Sun at 20: beginning her art career in New York City [Sun rules the 9th] in highest avant-garde fashion… then tr Pluto opposed the Sun at 23 (first marriage; annulled, and then reinstated), etc.

—This entire essay is devoted to organizing deductions into meaningful concepts that are conspicuously holistic. There is a system to it that puts your thoughts to work in the best way. Synthesis skill allows you to present astrology to make a difference. –You can become the best astrologer you can be.

[Further study: Synthesis & Counseling in Astrology; The Creative Astrologer; Solar Arcs; the two DVDs– 15 Indispensable Keys to Analysis and the Magic of Solar Arcs.]