What is Astrology and How does it help us?
The universe, or in particular from human's eyes, the night sky was completely unknown in the old days. So people projected their fantasies into it---this is somehow the origin of Astrology. So in a way, Astrology is the accumulated fantasy and imagination being projected into the night sky and thus it is a reflection of our deep mind and subconsciousness. So when we are doing an Astrology analysis, what we are doing in fact is that we are analysing our "fantasies and dreams" through stars, which develops deep insights in our subconscious mind. Astrology is deep down psychology, but wears a fantasy or mythical coat on the outside.
There is no doubt that what we see, touch and understand is a small fraction of the universe, which created everything from scratch. Meanwhile, everything existing in the universe operates by the universe' rules. Life itself is the same. Our fate is, at least, partially written in the stars.
Some people might argue, how the hell is one's fate, even just partially, written in the stars? This is maybe what we could call the universal regularities. Even thousands years ago, people believed the movement of the planets and stars had some correlation with our lives, and thus we depended on the observation of the stars to decide when to do planting, when to do harvesting, when rivers might flood and even when the demise of the King could happen. It is this fantasy night sky above we have been observing, gave us guidance the clues. We found laws in it, and we worked together.
World famous psychologist Jordan B. Peterson said "Astrology is astronomy in its nascent form; just like alchemy is chemistry in its nascent form.", which is very true. Astrology has its theories just like any type of science, but it is also a type of intuitive study. The retrograde of Mercury, or the Saturn return has no direct effect on us if we try to use what we already know as physical science to explain; however since everything in the world is under the universe, the invisible law that the Universe has upon us has guided our ancestors throughout history. There is something embedded in our subconscious mind that is maybe not directed, but more reflected by the stars. This means the planets, sun, and moon do not cause things to happen to us. Rather, it is all happening in sync. Rather than “cause & effect,” what goes on in the heaven is descriptive of what is going on down here. It’s as if the heaven is a cosmic mirror of what we experience down here in time. As astrologers, we observe and take full advantage of the information revealed, using it to reach our full potential. That is the beauty that has been observed over thousands of years. As above, so below.
19th Centruy Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Carl Jung, who founded modern analytical psychology, also said,
"Astrology would be a large scale example of synchroism, if it had at its disposal thoroughly tested findings. But at least there are some facts adequately tested and fortified by a wealth of statistics which make the astrological problem seem workthy of philosophical investigation. It is assured of recognition of psychology, without further restrictions, because astrology represents the summation of all the psychological knowledge of antiquity."
So does it mean that everything is pre-destined and we don't have willpower to change? Of course not.
Astrology is not a theory to determine how we WILL live our lives, but more of a study to analyse our tendencies so that we could have more focus and clarity in terms of how to OPTIMISE what we have been given in order to improve and learn our lessons. This is also why sometimes I don't particularly agree with some motivational speakers when they try to push an idea or quality to the audience. Everyone's life lesson is different and everyone's gift and challenges also differ. For example, courage and determination are great attributes. But is you life about learning these qualities so that you can become successful, or is it opposite, meaning you must learn objectivity, humbleness and must cultivate a sense of group/partnership to find happiness? Astrology is a very useful tool to guide us through this self analysis for the purpose of reflection and improvement.
In predictive Astrology, we also use different technics such as TRANSIT and SECONDARY PROGRESSION to predict certain important turning points in life. Natal birth chart (the alignment of the stars at the moment you were born) reveals your root and what you have brought to this life time; the predictive chart would give us more practical information year by year, month by month for some of the critical moments. In my personal experience, Secondary Progression technic is very accurate in predicting the moment we meet someone important--a husband/wife, our best friend, or any soul level connection person. Combining both natal and predictive charts will give us a more holistic view of what to look forward to as well as what to focus in the near future.
For people who don't know much about Astrology, please do allow me to point out one common misunderstanding about it. We all have seen “Astrology Column” in magazines: “xxx will happen this week if you are an Ares; xxx will not happen next month if you are a Virgo.” In the most critical terms, this is called false Astrology. As we could imagine, there are 7.5 billion people on earth, since there are 12 zodiac signs, each sign would be shared by roughly 600 million people. How could these 600 million people experience the same situation in the same month? It is obviously not making sense, even to astrologers. Real astrology is a very intricate study about the relationships, alignments and positions between 8 different planets (or more if we include fixed stars and asteroid stars) as well as how those stars are interacting with the position of the earth at the time someone is born. This first of all includes where the Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto(Yes, we are not excluding Pluto in Astrology!) are; and where someone is born on the earth and what time this person is born (to decide the eastern horizon ascendant line, we will go in to details in the future chapters)…Even with the same planet in the same sign, there could be completely different results. For example, you and your friend might be both Leo, but you two could have nothing in common. Why? Does your friend share the same Moon sign with you? What about Venus and Mars? Even if you two were born on the same day (this could mean you two have most planets in the same signs), do you have two different rising signs? If you read some magazines and felt the astrology column does not resonate with you at all, don’t worry. In the future blogs I will teach you everything that you need to know about basic astrology and how to take advantage of it to improve ourselves.
Letao~the Kingdom Healer
