The 29th degee with the 0 degree. Photo from http://www.divinedolphin.com/

I don’t know much about degrees. I know very little. I have heard of and read about critical and anaretic degrees but that’s all. It was a comment my friend Carl Karas made on my one of my Facebook statues recently that got me thinking about them. He mentioned how wistful I sound and he referred to my anaretic degrees. I have Mars at 29 50’ Taurus and Uranus at 28 59’ Libra. :: sotto voce:: I want to whine about this quinqunx but I’ll leave that out for now.

So anyways, what Carl said got me thinking about the 29^th degree. Astrologers I respect think it is in fact a significant degree. I’ll add a link at the bottom of this post and you can check it out there.  But you read so many varying things about it: it’s the penultimate degree of a sign so the expression is strong; it is almost into the other sign, so the expression is weak; it can’t make up its mind and then it plunges into some rash action.

What I think is that unless you were born with a planet there that is Rx or about to go Rx, that planet is going to progress very soon into the next sign. Especially if it is the fast-moving bodies we’re talking about. Picture this: You’re born with the Sun at 29 Scorpio and at Age 1 your progressed Sun moves to 0 Sag. Or you’re born with Venus at 10 Sag and at around Age 20, it progresses into Cap. You’re going to feel and remember that one, if your romantic and relationship style and needs undergo a change when you’re a young adult.

Some of us like to say, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” I like to say it myself. And yet, I have changed. We do change as we age. I would think when the progressed Sun changes signs, that’s a big shift. April has written something terrific about that, you can click here to read it. Do read it. And while you read it think about the fact that a lot of planets in your natal 12^th are going to eventually move to your 1^st and boy won’t everyone notice!  Because the shift from one house to another is important too.

But to go back to the point I was trying to make, I think the anaretic degrees are tied to the fact that they very soon progress into the next sign. Hence all these diverse opinions about it. My progressed Mars will move into my 4^th soon, but for all my life it has been in my third. I was born with it in Taurus and it moved into Gemini when I was about three months old. If I track my drives, one way or another, they are tied up with communication. Sure, I fantasize about being a farmer, carpenter, potter but what I do all the time is read, write, talk and I even listen. The only time you’d detect my Taurus Mars is when you’re trying to convince me, after a hard day at work, that getting out of my comfy jammies and going for a drink or a movie or play is more fun. I won’t. I do flit about but it is very planned and purposeful flitting about. So, yeah, I am a natal Mars in Taurus.

In Nov 2013, my progressed Mars will hit my IC and leave my third house forever. Apart from an event foretold by a progressed planet hitting an angle, I’m curious about what this change of house (do note the inadvertent potential pun) will mean. Probably my activities will become more focused in and around my home. Which makes sense. I want a home office.

***

I first read about critical degrees in a Carol Rushman book. She said they are tied to the Vedic lunar mansions.  Here’s a quote from the lovely Anne Heese’s CafeAstrology page:

“0, 13, and 26 degrees of the cardinal signs (Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn); 8-9 and 21-22 degrees of fixed signs (Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, and Aquarius); and 4 and 17 degrees of mutable signs (Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, and Pisces). hese are considered sensitive, and sometimes strengthening, points. If a natal planet is found in a critical degree, that planet is emphasized and assumes more power in the life of the native due to its placement.”

And here is some info on the lunar mansions: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakshatra

I’m too tired right now to see how they’re derived from the lunar mansions and too tired to even research it to see if it is true. But if you see a connection, do let me know. Also, if you have stories about either your anaretic or critical degrees, do share. I have a whole bunch of critical degrees in my chart and I really like what Bob has to say: http://www.solarcharts.co.nz/Critical%20and%20Anaretic%20Degrees.htm

And here’s the link I promised on the anaretic degrees: http://cafeastrology.com/criticaldegrees.html

***

Christine, it was your email saying you miss my posts, that has me writing again. Thank you.

Touching someone's heart or looking into their soul is sacred. Do it with care and reverence.

Because I’m awfully lucky, I have a copy of Richard Idemon’s Through the Looking Glass: A Search for the Self in the Mirror of Relationships. The book is a transcript of a week-long seminar that Richard did and it has been edited into a book by another person I love to read, Howard Sasportas. In fact, it is the transcripts of seminars that Howard Sasportas and Liz Greene did that I really love more than the books either one of them wrote individually. Astrologers, all three of them, but also psychologists. And great minds. We owe them a lot.

There is so much treasure in Through a Looking Glass. The chapter on love where Richard talks about the four concepts of love that the Greek knew is something we all need to read and understand. Don’t they say that to understand all is to forgive all? Well, I think understanding also leads to the beginning of self-healing and I’d recommend this book just for that.

When I started my relationships’ classes with Dawn, one of the first things she taught was to look at the missing element or modality in a person’s chart because they will be strongly drawn to people who have what they are missing. Any good astrologer will tell you that before you do either prediction or synastry, you should look at the person’s chart and understand it well. Transits, progressions and synastry don’t happen in a discrete units, they interact with the chart and you have to read them like that. Which is why I don’t do readings: it’s too much work.

To get back to the point, Richard says the same thing: look at the chart, look at the dominant function, the inferior function, the singletons and which aspects predominate. By function he meant: element, modality, signs, house orientation and yin-yang balance. Look at that you’ll have a fairly good idea of the areas where someone over-compensates, represses and projects onto the other. Projects and draws them into their ambit.

So I sat down like a good Virgo Mercury and drew up these tables. I had the music going and also did a lot of other things while doing this: third house Mars quinqunx Uranus, restless, restless!

This is me:

Notes on Aspects: Squares are dominant. Followed by oppositions and trines.

I think my modalities are fairly balanced. But when it comes to the elements, you can see Air is an inferior function. This is going to matter, as we’ll see soon. But moving on, it’s a yang chart dominated by oppositions and squares. So, not exactly a gentle, easy-going person and bored easily by placid forms of relating. It’s a chart heavy on the social, which means a lot of focus is on relationships. Note how both by sign and by house, my chart has an inferior Universal function. But there is Neptune, a singleton in the ninth, in a Universal house and sign. Richard talks about how the singletons and inferior functions can either be projected via a relationship or can dominate our lives. And he talks about their creative potential. And so here you see my Neptune, in my blog, in what I write about: universal pain and healing. And since it is in the ninth, an eternal search for personal meaning which is then shared.  Neptune is ruler of my Ascendant and what I share comes from a very personal place indeed.

And pasted below is my husband’s table.

Spouse:

Note on Aspects: Square and trines dominate. Closely followed by sextiles. There are no oppositions.

How lovely. Again, fairly balanced modalities. But we get somewhere when we look at his elements. He’s big on Air and pretty low of Fire. And what does he do? He goes and marries a very Firey woman who’s low on Air. If you were to make a cartoonised version of our courtship, it would go like this:

Me: Gee, he’s so smart and knows so many things!

Him: Gee, she’s so sunny and positive about things!

These things still work for us. And just like the table shows, I am more yang than he is but he gets his way more often than I do because of that singleton Moon of his which knows how to sulk!

 ***

Since I was in the mood for doing tables (it’s so soothing), I made two more. Dear friends of mine, both. Here’s the first one:

Close Friend #1

Notes on Aspects: Heavy on squares followed by sextiles.

What do you think about her? If I let you see her chart, you’d see it has a very eastern orientation. So even though she has all those planets in social signs, her main preoccupations is focused on the self. Very gentle usually, she loses all connection to fear sometimes and owns that singleton Mars. Richard says women sometimes project the masculine planets and this is a very macho Aquarius Mars in the seventh, the house of projection onto others. And she draws very masculine macho men into her ambit.

What is someone who is a homemaker by instinct? Someone who loves to cook and clean and grow things? Is it water (she’s heavy on Cancer) or it is the manifestation of her Earth singleton? Perhaps the former. Because this friend of mine can be unusually let-fate-take-its-course when it comes to job-hunting and the whole work-money-making scene. Moreover, she has sacrificed in this area to personally take care of loved-ones who were ill.

One more friend chart and we’ll be done. I don’t know how well I’m doing (lack of Air!), but plod along I must to compensate for it.

Close Friend #2

Notes on Aspects: Squares dominate, followed by oppositions.

What do you think about him? What do we have here? Fixed, Earth, yang with a heavy emphasis on the Universal. Low on Water. Yeah, that’s him. If you want to go have a chummy conversation about something minor and loaded with feelings, he is not the one you should go to. You should go to my friend mentioned before. With her heavy Social-Personal and Water orientation not only would she be interested in listening to you, but she’d get you. And cook for you in the bargain! (God, she’s amazing!)

But you don’t always want to talk about your feelings or be fed, sometimes you want to see through another lens. A bigger lens. A lens that sees the world both pragmatically and passionately. You want to look out from your little well and have someone show you what a big world it is out there; a world facing crucial issues both on the national and global level. You need friends like that, too. Friends who bump you out of the little personal or social ruts you have dug for yourself. It’s amazing but a conversation with him always changes my mood for the better.

Ah, but let’s look at his table a bit more. What does it say about his relationship needs? This is not an overly-emotional type. This is stubborn, pragmatic person whose interests and pre-occupations lead him to work on a scale that puts the personal and social second. Look at that lack of water. Maybe someone heavy on Water will hook him and infuse his life with the element of feelings and make it more well-rounded.

Conclusion: This is Step 1. Just the elements, modalities, signs, houses, singletons. Step 2 is analyzing the chart for aspects, looking at the ASC-DSC, the ruler of DSC and how it placed. Richard says the most important planet in relating is the Moon. I agree. So you would look at that, too. You would look at the IC-MC, Moon-Saturn, Sun-Moon, Venus-Mars. Unravel the parental story, the personal myths… everything! And then you would look at chart synastry. Is it only then you’ll get a good idea of the relationship, its strengths and weakness.  If I am a highly independent person obsessed with my goals and no time for anything else and you are a very emotional person in need of much healing through love and relating, then we have to factor that in the reading. Your Mars may be turning my Venus on (or is it vice-versa? Or is it mutual?), but if I am never there or hardly there, how does that help us? Your needy hurt Moon may decide to find someone else’s Venus to turn on with that Mars; someone who also nourishes your Moon by cuddling, feeding and tucking you in.

***

I find relationship astrology one of the most fascinating branches of astrology. In fact, I find relationships fascinating. But having seen my heavy orientation in the social signs and in the social houses, I know you are not surprised.

LINKS TO READ

Here are links from a lady who studied with Richard and the first link explains how to draw these tables. Check out the links if you’re into astrology, psychology and relationships or give yourself a great gift and buy his book!

http//www.astrologyclub.org/articles/singletons/intro/singleton_intro.htm

http//www.astrologyclub.org/articles/inferior/inferior.htm

Venus is going through my twelfth; and we’ve all just come out of its conjunction to Neptune and Chiron.  It’s still in Pisces, the sign of its exaltation.  The sign of surrender, of dissolving of the self into the infinite void.  I don’t know what Venus in Pisces is really like, but I have been thinking about love and here’s what I wrote while she drifts in my twelfth, while she drifts through the sign of the Fish:

Love cannot be forced, manipulated or extracted. Do any of that and you kill the magic, you break the fragile bubble that is love. It flows freely and picks its own direction. And all you can do is surrender. Maybe it’ll flow over you and then away; or maybe it’ll flow by you; or maybe you’ll be one of the lucky ones and it’ll bathe you in its glory forever.

There’s a great need in people for love, for romantic love. But I think we’re approaching this the wrong way when we pin it on someone and we pine. We pine, we suffer, we stumble, we curse, we cry. But why? I don’t see it like that anymore. I see it as an impersonal force that operates through us.  It doesn’t matter who you pin it on or whether you direct it at someone or not. It doesn’t matter whether we’re genetically programmed for it to perpetuate the species or if it’s a mystical surge in God’s heart that finds its way in ours.

If you think of the vastness of space and the endlessness of time, you’ll see you’re just a speck on a blue dot hurtling through time headed for eventual oblivion. You’re surrounded by forces so large that you can barely comprehend them. You aren’t even in control of your own breath; your heart might stop any minute.  But through this vast space, in these large currents that buffet you, you have felt love, yes? You have longed? And I hope, as you did, you gave blessings to the ones you loved and to the force of love itself, which as it flowed through you, divinized you. Took you out of your limited compass of self and swelled your heart so large that all humanity was bathed in your tenderness.

Love is not a terrible thing, longing is. Love is not a terrible thing, manipulation is. Love is not a terrible thing, but trying to force it into shapes it resists is. Terrible because it causes suffering and love should not be suffering. It should be a double blessing: for the one who feels it and the one who receives it. And we can make it like that. We can make love like that.

Bless it when it comes to you and let it go when it wants to leave. No matter what happens, you’ll always know that small speck of the Universe you might be, but something monumental, timeless, seeking, haunting touched you, too.

P.S.  I’m calling this post “On Love” because I’m laughing at myself. Have you read Gibran’s “On Love”?

Beloved Dotty (Pic by Ria Ray)

I’m in a little village at the foothills of the Himalayas right now. I cannot tell you how lovely it is here. The mountains radiate calm and serenity. The air is clean and perfumed. The pine trees are tall, dark and perfect. I’ve been here for about two weeks and all I’ve done is brood over death and loss and decay.

The new moon in Scorpio was in my eighth and the themes of this sign and house permeated this time for me. Perhaps not surprisingly because we came here to visit family and found illness, old age, a wounded beloved dog and vandalism to the place my husband calls home. But even before that, even before travelling, I worried about the safety of the cat I was leaving behind, my parents who are abroad, our journey through the mountain roads.  

We were walking home this evening, having bought black cardamom to help my sister-in-law’s nausea, when we passed this tiny road-side shrine. I saw a boy tending it the other day and today there was a flame lit. ‘Jot’ the Punjabis call it. And all I could think was, “I know what you are trying to tell me! This is a world of impermanence.” I was bitter because I knew time would rob me of the people I love because they are aging, they are sick, their bodies are failing. This is so not me. I have always been about faith and prayer and belief in God. But we lose our innocence with time because we know that eventually no prayer helps, that faith is wasted, that people we love will die, things we love will decay. Nothing can stop it.

But Scorpio is always about transformation and it also about regeneration. I’ve spent some of this evening reading Jessica’s articles of the eighth house and our ancestors: http://www.moonkissd.com/2011/11/01/the-eighth-house-the-ancestral-legacy-part-1/ And an article written by Patricia Walsh on a similar theme: http://www.healthepast.com/id6.html Perhaps, it was this and perhaps it was Mercury and Venus finally moving to Sagittarius, but I came out today of that  gloomy subterranean place I had been wandering in for so many days.

Himachal in Summer (Pic by Ria Ray)

Yes, there is loss. My dear friend Elisa put it beautifully when she said, “What I know is that contemplation of inevitable impermanence is lifelong contemplation. Unlike some ideas we assimilate rather quickly.” So this is a world of impermanence but we can love what we have now, those we have now. And even though it will all decay in time, we can still build with love and passion. And tend and nurture and protect and guard. We’re alive now, the living legacies of hundreds and hundreds of people who came before us. Here we are trailing love and sorrow, triumphs and tragedies in a blaze of living light as our ancestors, who have long departed, watch us. As we will, perhaps, watch the living legacies we leave behind. It doesn’t end. Life creates life and we live on in our children, in our work, in the memories of those we loved and those who loved us. And that is the return to innocence.

I am the Sun. It is the heat generated in my core that makes all life possible. It is my light that makes this world and other worlds visible to you. I am all pervasive, visible to all; and even the blind who do not have sight feel my warmth on their face. When my heart collapses and my end comes, so will yours: my death is your death. I burn with a splendid fire and my power is so strong that planets pay their homage to me by spinning around me. I need no borrowed power, the energies of creation burn within me. I need no borrowed light, I am the light.

It is no coincidence that the Sun is exalted in Aries, a sign whose sacred words are “I am.” It takes great courage to announce who you are and there is nothing riskier than displaying your true self because rejection then can become a mortal blow to the soul. But once you announce who are, once you take a stand, then everything else falls into place. The world reorients itself around you and you see who your true allies are, and those who are your foes and what you need to do becomes clear.

The Sun is the ruler of Leo, a fixed fire sign. With time, the sun-ruled learn the true potency of their heritage. Just like the Sun, there is an inner flame that burns deep and strong in their core. This is their birthright and one of their tasks is to understand that this flame is sacred and needs to protected at all costs. To find lasting happiness and peace, Leos need to learn that the validation they need so much has to be sought within. Their path needs to be one that leads them to a journey within where they become acquainted with the core values they were born to represent: courage, honor, loyalty, integrity and inspiration.

The sign of the Lion is associated with the heart and that explains the charisma of the Lion. When they operate from their heart, when they promise, “I will,” in the face of great odds or trying circumstances, when they fuel their inner flame with their courage, the flame becomes incandescent and a leader is born, a hero appears. And it is this heart-centric implacable integrity of purpose that defines the magnetism of the sun-ruled.

Once they slay the dragons of self-doubt by manifesting into being their inner vision; and conquer their need for external validation by staying true to their values and finding inner validation, it is then that they can walk through fields of sunflowers with yellow and orange banners bearing their crest waving in the wind. Leos who have found their core can then look at the setting Sun and be thankful that their day is done. The light of the setting Sun gleams russet on their magnificent hair which blows free and wild in the evening breeze.

Not only is the Sun in Leo as I write this, but the Moon is about to conjunct it, giving us our annual Leo New Moon. My friends have been writing about this and now that my post is done, I will go read theirs. If you want to know, this is what’s on my reading list:

http://www.astroinquiry.com/2011/07/new-moon-watch-enantiodromia-the-golden-moment/ 

http://www.bigskyastrology.com/new-moon-in-leo-something-special/

http://www.bluemoon.bz/moon-dujour/

http://www.moonkissd.com/2011/07/30/leo-new-moon-say-yes-to-you/

http://www.facebook.com/notes/andrew-smith/new-moon-in-leo-and-a-second-loop-in-time/10150324577425021

I’m fascinated by how you soul-bond
With your laptop
your papers
and your phone

And by how you’ll go to a dictionary
To nail the nuance of a word
But miss the heart of the person who said it

But it isn’t so bad
I can always cheer you up
By reminding you of something you once read
And then you’ll run to look it up

And you can always cheer me up
By rhyming me a rhyme
Quoting me a quote
Finding me a pun

I guess it kind of makes up for those times
When I wish you would just be quiet
And look into my eyes
And enter my stillness.

One of the things Mike pointed out was that Neptune had just turned retrograde and was on its way to square my Mars again. I was reading recently that Mars is our will to power and you need it to engage in life. I have a highly aspected Mars and I identify with it more than anything else in my chart. Mess with it and you mess with me (and my chart) in a big way and here’s Neptune casting its foggy, damp, life-sucking influence all over the one planet I need the most.

I brooded over it for days. I know that when the lower Mars-Neptune vibe operates, you can succumb to substance abuse, misguided action, erratic energy levels. I’m not in favor of any of those options and I also know that Neptune can spiritualize Mars. So, I thought, if this aspect is in effect, it has to operate, it needs an outlet. Maybe I can guide how it will manifest for me. I don’t have to lie there like a victim, face-down on the carpet communing with lint and feeling excessively sorry for myself. Music will do it for me, lift me up. As does prayer, yoga and meditation. My friend Anthony Picco says that you can turn squares into trines. Here’s something he wrote:

http://cosmictuesdays.wordpress.com/2010/01/12/drugs-alcohol-spirituality-the-symbolism-of-neptune/

I spent some time this evening, while I was filling my neglected weekly pill box with vitamins listening to Jeremy Neal talk about spirituality and astrology. I loved it; you can check it out here:

http://chirotic.wordpress.com/2011/07/02/three-dimensional-astrology-part-two/#comment-2263

Oh, and if you want to know more about the dates of Neptune’s back and forth movements, here’s the link for Steven Forrest’s July Newsletter:

http://www.forrestastrology.com/Newsletters/july-2011-newsletter

P.S.  I also saw Steven Martin do the funny hamburger scene in Pink Panther. One thing led to another and I saw a few episodes of old Pink Panther cartoons. I especially liked this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6AO9PjLFGQ

If you are feelings the blahs, I recommend all the links in this post. Stay well.

It burns the soul
And makes the heart yearn
For just a little bit more of you

And afraid
Of that light and of that passion
That run so very deep.

But have you ever been close to someone with this moon? Or rather is someone with this moon close to you? If they are, then have you noticed the Scorpio Moon pattern? Inevitably, if you spend enough time with them, they’re going to pull you deep into the intense emotional zone they live in. A moon driven to intensely look at and examine every emotion is going to make you do the same. They will take whatever it is and peel each layer and keep peeling till you’re both exhausted and sweating and naked. They get off on it, they need it. This intense communion of truth and revelation.

But if it’s not your style or if it’s something you feel uncomfortable with, then look away if you find a Scorpio Moon looking straight at you. Don’t engage them. It’s a subtle moon and it’ll pick up on your desire and leave you alone. But if you are drawn to them, then know that you’re headed into deep emotional territory. They feel things deeply, keenly and swim down into deep dark places where the pressure is unbearably intense and there is no escape.

Always aware of death, they are that much more aware of life and have no fear. No one knows more that this moon that life is fleeting, our time limited and they don’t want to waste it on trivialities. If you like it light and fun, then run now. But if you’re not scared yet, then with no other moon will you feel so intensely, go so deep, be so aware, feel so connected. Is it true that people feel invisible, feel like no one notices them, feel disconnected, lonely? If you feel like that, and are feeling brave, hang out with this moon for a while and you’ll be seen.

Stand and stretch
Stretch as much as you can
And then stretch more
Stretch till you can’t anymore
And then let go and release

Be alone with nothing
And no one around
And then see where that takes you
And if the vacuum comes
Let it consume you

Whittle away everything
Pare down to essentials
Just this breath and nothing else

And then see if it is actually there
The urge to survive.