Fortune, Destiny, God

Something that I sometimes wonder about in relation to this study is the idea of destiny. The reason that anyone studies this particular unconfirmed field is to try to get a heads up  on a future which is already dead certain. What I mean by this is that somehow, there is a destiny which is already fact and that although our lives are only in the making, although our lives are incomplete and lacking at the moment, the idea that there is something definite in the future is tantalising and promising.

But, no matter how much I study, I will never fully “know” the future. I will never understand that I might be different at some future time, just as I had been different in the past. The scope of emotion that I have experienced in life, I would never have dreamed of in childhood. As a child there was no worry, no sadness, no disappointment, but those things came just as they come to all.

A chart though contains more potential than what is lived at the moment in which one looks at it. This is part of the reason for study. It´s the fact that you can find things that you would have never before dreamed of. There is more potential than what you are able to garner in one look. What is there in this life that is worth living for? What is there in the chart which makes this life worth living for? In part it requires you to remain open and unconscious about the possibilities, but in a like manner, cautious about the possible dangers. For there is the same possibility for harshness as there is for joy.

In some ways the stars appear to look a little like Heaven. According to the ancient Greeks, Heaven and Hell were in fact one place, and your life in the afterlife could be pleasant or it could be nasty, (carrying a large rock which always roles back, or carrying water with a sieve), depending on actions and deeds on Earth.

Let´s say though, for argument´s sake that there is no real afterlife, that for all purposes, this is the only life that we get. In this case, the Heavens are a kind of reflection of what´s going on down here. Only studying the paths of the demigods, (the planets) may give us clues as to the paths that we ourselves are likely to take. Heaven obviously does continue, and according to the ancient tradition, the gods, (though I don´t deny a prime mover), the gods as represented by the planets are in fact jealous of our mortality, because it makes our lives so much the more precious.

Our lives really are precious, in the case that there is only one life. But, what say, if your life is more like a tragedy? There is no chance at a replay. This is where I get stuck. This is where I find I can´t escape despite my best efforts. In one sense, it should then be our duty to have some faith, that all will eventually work out the way it ought to. Perhaps the fact that it is impossible to know all that a life contains from the start is another small aid in getting through the tough times.

What kind of life is rewarded? What kind of attitude is given happiness? The rewards that come to those that are of the nature of Mars are immediate, they are probably pleasurable and exciting, but they are gone just as fast, and the down side is that of danger. The rewards in life that come to those of the nature of Saturn or Venus will probably not be apparent at the beginning, it looks grim or shoddy, or inadequate, but it probably lasts right until the very end. With this view in mind it does not profit us to look at what other people get in life and compare notes or even try and garner what might be your own fate through similarity of planetary force.

Jupiter trine Venus persons might be incredibly lucky, they might have a permanent party, all of the friends they could wish for etc. etc. and this is cause of much misery for the Venus-Saturn person who must sit next door listening to other people having fun while contemplating the reasons for not being popular, for being a social reject. Bu perhaps in ten years time Saturn-Venus will have someone love them solidly, and permanently and despite all imperfection, while Jupiter is on the next empty and soulless relationship based on appearance and excess.

What does destiny say about the life as a whole rather than the life as viewed from the perspective of someone only interested in the “now”? IT is said that “God created Heaven and Earth.” In heaven we see the stars and planets, which in my opinion are what the ancients believed to be gods, and which in a sense are in fact forms of higher power, demigods perhaps. The final word though, the final word is that if there is a singular thought that runs through everything, then there can´t truly be anything that is bad, or rather there can´t be anything that isn´t pre-destined, or part of the plan and therefor it cannot be bad.

What is the meaning of the suffering that I go through now? Or that I went through two years ago? According to the stars it changed my attitudes in certain ways by being a transit to my third ruler. What was the meanin of that mental suffering? In one sense it was a stretching of the mental muscles. And it is a well known fact that muscles do not grow unless they are trained through the strenuous if not at times painful exercise. “No pain no gain…” A lot of people interested in the stars look at a transit and are glad that it´s over once it´s over and consider it as one would consider a tragic act of random fortune. I´ve stipulated here that there is no random act of fortune, because the stars are put there by God, whoever he may be, benevolent or not.

So what does this have to do with anything? It´s the idea of destiny, the idea of suffering the pains of life by “being good” in order to reap the rewards in the “afterlife” or more to my taste, the life which we haven´t yet lived, but which is definitely projectionable and visible on the horizon. To suffer loneliness will create the appreciation for company, not just the appreciation, but the desire and the need for partnership. To suffer stupidity or to suffer powerlessness will give rise to talent, to adaptability. The idea is not that the FATE of our lives is random, cruel and unprecedented, but that because it comes from one  mind, that there is reason behind the current suffering in whatever from it may take.

The things that are most lacked will be the things that are most compensated. It seems that humanity tilts itself in the opposite direction from where it is, whether it is instant or whether it takes years. It´s the idea that everything is not realised that is important to keep in mind. It´s what we don´t have now, and ask for and pray for that may be ours tomorrow or later on in the future. One of the steps towards this materialization is that of imagination, of thinking and creating a blueprint of what it is that you want to create. Persistence pays, this is why Saturn is associated with achievement, with things that last, with a very moderate amount of happiness each day for the rest of your life.

This dialogue isn´t finished yet, because the full extent of it´s possible realisation isn´t apparent and because the mind that has written it isn´t satisfied with the philosophical clarity which it is meant, or designed to bring. Part of it is a reason in order to have faith that the present time is how it is meant to be as a foundation for greater future things. Part of it is a reconciliation with the apparent seeming randomness of life. There is nothing random, and it is difficult to believe this. When as individuals we strive and struggle, it is impossible to think that those struggles are in fact destined in the same way that other things in life appear to be destined. When you feel pain, you do not accept that the pain is in fact part of the plan. Pain is inconceivable to be part of some divine plan, it´s practically incomprehensible. Though, as an argument it might be said that the birthpains of a mother make her realise that a child is serious business, and the pain is part of the reason for the protection she eventually gives.

There is more to this…

Essential Dignities

“Ordinary characters searching for or coming in contact with extraordinary beings or finding themselves in extraordinary circumstances.”

There is an illusion going around in modern astrology or at least, a giant misconception. The mistake has been made by people reading old texts and understanding “debility” to mean weakness. It is true that debility in the English language is synonymous with weakness, incapacity, or even disability, but the astrological signification of essential debility could not be further from the truth.

When a planet finds itself in fall, or in detriment, or peregrine, it does not signify “weakness”. Say the Ascendant ruler in a birthchart is peregrine. Is the person, their health and their life “weak”, physically weak? The Ascendant ruler is primary signifier of the human body, of the mind and of the state of the person, but a planet situated here is not necessarily weak.

Many times in Christian Astrology, there are references to planets without essential dignity being signifiers for “low born” persons whether they are 7th rulers and thus signifying the wife or husband, or whether they are Ascendant rulers signifying the asker in any question. What Lilly was describing using these judgements was not the “physical strength” that a person might have, but their basic social standing and more pertinently, their “blood” or “birth”.

A person born with their Ascendant ruler in essential dignity is privileged, they are born privileged in certain respects and get the best of what the sign in which that planet is has to offer. Throughout their lives they will always be in surroundings which are congenial to them, this is all that essential dignity really signifies. People who are happy with life because everything that they want comes to them at the right time, or that they are simply without real need are the essentially dignified people. Does it signify that they are strong, in a physical capacity or in character? To me it would be good reason for complacency if not laziness, which would eventually lead to weakness.

In similar fashion, when a person finds themselves in exile, it is not they are weak. The matter of being in a situation which is contrary to your desires or contrary to your essential nature would require on the part of that person a real fight, and in fighting, in struggle there is strength. In struggle there is achievement.

Essential debility such as for example Scorpio Moon signifies an emotional person finding themselves in a place of fear and death. As an example we might think of a young mother going down to a crypt in a Gothic novel. She obviously appears vulnerable in those circumstances, it´s not the protection afforded by a warm heated house. The surroundings don´t particularly fit the character, and that´s why it´s seen as “essentially wrong”. The notion of the need to survive rather than to protect may take over, nasty things can happen in a cold dark place with none of the comforts. But does it mean that the woman is weaker than she is in her essential dignity? What it means is that she must do everything in her power to get by, it means that she must act and she must be the guest of Mars rather than the mistress of her own home. Essential debility doesn´t mean less likely to achieve anything, it means more grit, and less opportunity to do as you please when you please. It means that you do things the hard way.  

In a sense, essential debility can be a great thing. The story will always be about a person that must struggle through adversity and what appears to be a difficult or alien situation. But this story is often far more interesting than the story of essential dignity. Suffering is not weakness, suffering is not getting everything that you desire, it´s not being satisfied and it´s doing things and making adaptations to that environment. A peregrine planet is far more interesting than an essentially dignified one, it signifies a person who has to search for happiness not having it where they are.  Though once again, it doesn´t mean that a planet in it´s sign is happy either, it simply means that it´s comfortable there.

To Know the Future: And to Make it Happen

There are pros and cons to Astrology. As a science or an art for those who are worried about the future it can give you some degree of control in life. There is a life written out in the birth chart, and there are events which are clearly explainable in the transits and progressions. Part of me wants to justify looking into the future and anticipating the future by saying that we “need to be prepared for it”, and that if one knows that it will definitely be raining a week on thursday, then one can buy a good coat and an umbrella, and not make plans for that day.

Last Saturday I saw the Sun transit my natal Scorpio Saturn with Mars closely square it. I knew from past experience that whenever this transit occurs, I have a bad time of it, whether I try to or don´t. I knew I should have stayed in and moped around the house, but I didn´t, I chose to go out and party, albeit with caution. The night was not fun, I drank too much tequila too quickly and I ended up at home by midnight anyway. When I woke up the next day, I was miserable, but I knew that the transits gave an aura of inevitability, that what I knew was going to happen, happened despite my enthusiasm and determination to ignore them.

What any “future seer” does not see and will never see, are that there are more possibilities than they can justifiably narrow down to make true predictions. Not only that, but in making predictions they are in fact modifying the outcome.

One thing that I have had admiration for, one thing that I have had a long-lasting desire to do in life, was to exploit potential to its full. What I mean by this, is that whatever a chart describes, one ought to try and flesh it out in life to its maximum possible potential. This I believe is something that the stars can help us with. If you know that a planet in a sign signifies the potential for something, for example Mercury in Gemini, then this very knowledge ought to be the impetus to exploit that planet to its fullest. With this placement it would be far better to read and to write extensively, to become knowledgable and mentally sound rather than to waste it on things that are not so useful, like gossip or magazines. That placement has potential for knowledge, and for intellect, the choice then is whether to use it in order to be cunning with people, or to use it in order to make yourself someone that is interesting to talk to.

To know what your future potential is, is one step to making a decision about what your future will actually be. For someone with a Libra Venus in the 1st house making decisions is not easy. Many different options go through the mind, both consciously and subconsciously, there are physical problems and there are psychological wounds, there are things that can hold you back in life and hinder you. But once you know the astrological signification of things, once you understand the nature and inevitability of what goes on in the Heavens, then it becomes easy to decide on what you want, because it is written in the chart anyway.

Personal chart analysis has taught me that things that I wanted to do, but couldn´t because of fear are possible no matter how much you are afraid of them. The fears that held me back can be described by Saturn in hard aspect to the Ascendant and to the Sun/Moon MP. But, take fear, turn it into seriousness and persistence, and everything that you are held back in becomes reality, you just have to want it, and will it. Sagittarius Jupiter in the 3rd house is the sign of a teacher, there is a stellium there too, but in essence the potential was there for me to teach enthusiastically in religious or higher education, in foreign parts, and I´ve done both and am currently teaching in University level. The first thought of being an English teacher may have been in school at age 15 or 16, so it has taken me ten whole years to crystallise the germ of that thought, and it may take me the rest of my life to exploit the potential of that planet to its fullest potential. The fears kept me back, but the potential, is something that I worked out about a year ago while studying astrology. I worked out that Sagittarius Jupiter in the 3rd house makes an excellent foreign language teacher placement. Virgo Mars in the 1st house means that I also look like the part, despite the disorganised mess that I have to fight every day in the form of Neptune square to it.

In the future, I can see further developments in life despite the inhibitions that Saturn has brought to my psyche. The planetary placings are more powerful than the fears that hold us back. What one desires in life, what one really wants in life is always going to be based in the heavens, and written in the chart. What I had given up on many times during that ten-year period, I had achieved  with progressed Sun conjunct progressed Jupiter illuminating the MC from the IC. Other things that have been difficult for me in the past, but that I have also had a desire for since an early age might be signified by Libra Venus. The simple meaning of this placement is a loving marriage or a beautiful wife, or a considerate but indulgent other half. The first house means that this is probably one of the most important things to me, or it is destined to be. This is an area of potential that I haven´t realised for the same reasons as the Jupiter potential not being realised. Fear and caution, inhibitions, not having enough faith in myself or in others. But this is an Angular and Cardinal placing, it is in domicile, and it is also in harmonious aspect. I can stop being fearful in relationships and begin to trust that the heavens have decreed that I am destined to have someone love me according to the nature of Venus in Libra.

Life contains a vast amount of pre-destiny. But the odd thing that I have found in a personal sense, is that what I have desired and wanted, for long enough, despite personal fear, has become reality. There are personal traumas, which I have gone through, and I din´t in a million years wish for them, but they were inevitable also, in a sense they were necessary in order to achieve the things that I had wished for. These little personal tragedies might be viewed now in retrospect like looking at the water in the sea-going out before a big tidal wave.

I might even go as far as to state that what you truly want in life, what you wish for and what you dream of, can be found in the natal chart. If it wasn´t written in there, you wouldn´t wish for it in the first place. The more Angular a planet the more conscious the dream will be, the more essentially dignified the more likely that the dream will be realised in the way that you want it, or in the way that is fitting to it.

In essence what I´m saying is that it is possible to get a clearer idea of potential from looking at a chart. But it´s when that potential is matched with real desire, that you can make things happen. Obviously there are things that are less easy to achieve, and the specifics of great achievement are probably only one in a hundred million, and may even be discernable by midpoints, and other tiny little details of a chart.   Those great achievements are not important, what is important to each individual varies, but what is important and desired in life ought to be prayed for, worked at, and brought about by will. Finding its potential in the chart is just one step to making it happen, but finding it in the chart is also like finding God´s seal of approval. Once you find that certain things are destined, you can stop worrying. (Or worry less if you have strong Virgo influences).