Monthly Archives: July 2012

Inner Space Monthly Horoscope for August 2012

Dear Friend and Reader:

The Sun is in Leo through Aug. 22, when it ingresses Virgo. Mercury is retrograde in Leo through Aug. 8 (that began July 14), after which we get the first extended phase in 2012 with no inner planet retrogrades. From midsummer through late autumn, direct motion planets means we finally get a chance to look forward rather than look back. That remains true until Mercury stations retrograde right in the midst of Election Day in the United States, promoting some real soul searching on the meaning of ‘democracy’. However, this is a good one to consider in advance, as the nominating conventions get underway and political party time begins. The Aquarius Full Moon is Aug. 1 and the Leo New Moon is Aug. 17. There’s also a conjunction to watch for, between Mars and Saturn in Libra, on Aug. 15, urging a sense of balance and perspective in relationships and any situation where fairness is an issue.

Lovingly,

Midyear Report Forthcoming

I am now working on your Midyear Report, a 12-sign audio devoted to putting your calling, your cash flow and your career in the same place. Many people are trying to do this, some of them spurred by our challenging economy — which I think presents special opportunities for resourceful people with ideas and energy. Look for an announcement of that soon; it will come out after Mercury stations direct.

Planet Waves

Inner Space Monthly Horoscope for August 2012 | Eric’s Zodiac Sign Descriptions

Aries (March 20-April 19) — Act now to avert an unnecessary standoff in a relationship. Notice that there’s some pressure building. There needs to be a vent for that energy, and it has to be handled consciously so that it doesn’t turn toxic. Notably, responsibility for this situation may seem to rest with a partner; you have been collecting evidence of that. Yet you’re in the scenario as a kind of provocateur. Therefore, I suggest you listen rather than provoke, and take steps to ease the intensity rather than ramp it up. I suggest you be diplomatic and respectful. If you hear yourself saying, ‘But this would compromise my independence’, take a long pause and ask whether you want the relationship at all. If you don’t, sabotage is not the answer. A negotiated agreement is best — though that’s true in any event.

Hello Aries — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Taurus (April 19-May 20) — You seem to be preoccupied with the theme of authority or power. Currently you’re less directly subject to power, and are dancing with its various influences. I suggest you bear in mind the ways that your internal emotional state may be distorting your perceptions. It’s always true that our mind and our senses filter what we perceive; that’s what they’re for. Now the key is to use your intelligence to observe and correct those distortions. One question that may be percolating is: did you feel safe in your father’s home? This question comes with another — what was your reference point for safety? How exactly do you define the concept of ‘secure’? If you’re asking this question well, it’s going to lead to more questions before you start to arrive at coherent information — though it will, if you’re patient.

Hello Taurus — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed) If you would like to hear your Taurus birthday reading, please visit this link.

Gemini (May 20-June 21) — Once again you’re getting a sense of the value of words. Yet I think you may need to increase your perception of that value, equating it with your entire reputation. Promises, spoken commitments, inquiries and statements of fidelity — in many ways your life hangs in the balance on these things. You are indeed judged by your ability to tell the whole truth, and to both speak and write with a measure of objectivity. This all might mean less were you not a Gemini, whose main form of focusing power and transacting life force comes through what you speak and write. That we live in a society where it’s considered normal to lie, not just in advertising and political speech, but also casually in conversations with nearly anyone, emphasizes the point. This is not your karma. Yours, rather, is to embody the truth that you’re as good as your word, and that your word is gold.

Hello Gemini — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed). Your Gemini birthday reading is ready! Click here for an hour of astrology plus a tarot reading by Eric.

Cancer (June 21-July 22) — Take this month and sort out your investments, your cash flow and your overall financial picture. Really get a handle on what you have in assets (including non-cash assets) and what you have to deal with in terms of debt and other liabilities. Look at the whole picture on one page or spreadsheet and see if it tells you anything new. You may not want to make actual changes till later in the month — at least not till after the New Moon of Aug. 17 — though if you do a thorough assessment and set some goals that require you to stretch, you’ll be able to improve your financial situation considerably. If there is one big message here, it’s about aligning your values, your activities and your ideas about money. Your values are the root concept.

Hello Cancer — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed). Your Cancer birthday reading is ready! It includes more than an hour of astrology plus a tarot reading, and has been wildly popular (also great for Cancer rising people). Use this link to order.

Leo (July 22-Aug. 23) — If someone, something or an idea is important to you, treat it that way. Send the message of respect first to yourself and then to the world around you. This is a word we don’t hear enough, and a feeling that is worth cultivating on every level. Respect means ‘to see again’, which means that it’s a form of recognition: you don’t respect someone at first blush; it’s something that comes over time. The central theme of this month is a re-evaluation process, that is, learning to see yourself for who you are. Remember that this is a process of seeing again; whatever you discover is a rediscovery, and what you witness a kind of re-visioning. What you’re doing is something that has become such a rare thing in our society: learning not to forget.

Hello Leo — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed). See below for a description of your 2012-2013 birthday reading, which is available now.

Hello Leo and Leo Rising! I’ve finished your 2012-2013 birthday reading. This is composed of two 35-minute astrology sessions, plus a combined tarot and astrology reading. It covers all of the major astrology happening now — with an emphasis on recovering a childhood dream. I also cover the influence on your relationships, your home environment and your finances. Astrologically this includes Mercury retrograde in your sign, the Leo New Moon, the Uranus-Pluto square, Saturn in Scorpio and more — all in clear, easy-to-follow terms. This report is designed for those born with the Sun in Leo but is equally applicable for Leo rising. Visit this page to get access.

Virgo (Aug. 23-Sep. 22) — You have some amazing career prospects right now, though rather than emphasize your work I suggest you emphasize healing. You’re close to breaking through a barrier that was put in place by your parents or even your much larger family. Again and again you’ve tried to crack this one, with special emphasis the past 18 months. Now, the momentum of your growth, and your commitment to balance, can carry you over barriers that seemed insurmountable in the past. In the end, you know this comes down to loving yourself, and forgiving yourself, and you may even be using these words as you figure out the special thing about this moment in your life. I suggest you look at the one thing you’ve been the most afraid to look at, for the longest, as the source of the deepest healing.

Hello Virgo — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Libra (Sep. 22-Oct. 23) — This is not the month to push your luck, your relationships, or the patience of anyone in a position of authority in your life. It is most definitely the month to use your Libra talent for balance, which I suggest you do in the form of ultra-high consciousness of the balance factors in your relationships. Asking, giving and receiving need to be in proportion. You have a polite way of being demanding, and it’s time you notice that for what it is. One self-study project can be learning how to extend yourself above what you think is expected of you. You’re likely to go through a series of inner responses to the feeling of doing that, which will land you in the place of: the more you give, the more you’ll realize you have.

Hello Libra — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 22) — If I had to describe your phobia-du-jour, these days it seems to be that we don’t live in a fair world. Well, that’s true, though the thing to consider is how you can access justice. That word means fairness, and it has as its root the same concept as adjustment. Therefore, if you’re feeling fear, think in terms of what you can adjust. This will require you to see two or more sides of any situation that you’re in, and be able to reason each one through; said another way, it’s good to be able to argue both sides of the case. Yet then there’s the issue of these emotional spikes you may be having, which can seize you at odd moments. When you get to one of those places, stop and reflect. You can go a long way by being willing to change, and to accept change.

Hello Scorpio — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Sagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 22) — You might want to admit that you’re out of your element. Not totally out — but enough that you don’t have your usual focusing power. You have something else, however, which is the strength of a relationship that may finally represent a departure from so much of what has happened in the past. There is a delicate balance in this situation. You wield a power that you don’t fully understand and may not even be in possession of. Meanwhile, you have those moments when it seems to you that everyone else has all the power. That one perception is the defining theme of your past relationships. It’s not true, though it will seem to be true until you fully possess the influence that is yours. You have a clue what I mean, and I suggest you begin with a gentle, experimental approach.

Hello Sagittarius — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 20) — Mind your ethics. That is to say, your awareness of ‘right and wrong’ needs to be an ongoing study that you reconsider from situation to situation. There is no strict code except the need to question yourself, and to be alert to the particulars. The more involved in leadership you are, the more important this will be; there are various temptations on the radar, such as to take advantage of power to cheat justice in some way. In particular where a joint financial arrangement is concerned, you may feel that it’s possible to get away with anything. It’s not. What is possible is for you to co-create a situation that works for everyone, which in any modern concept of ethics would be the focus. This requires flexibility and, at the moment, you have it.

Hello Capricorn — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) — You may feel like you’re the cause of why an intimate relationship is in the spot that it’s in. Yet people get together based on some form of complimentary karma. The encounter has the qualities that it has for ‘reasons’ that everyone brings. Right now there may be an emphasis on the ways that you are wounded, or the ways that being betrayed (or betraying others) in the past is influencing the situation now. This is true as far as it goes: everyone you’re in relationship to has that part of themselves which engages with that part of you. You’re approaching the moment where it’s possible to heal the past and start anew — though if you’re currently in a relationship this has to be true for everyone, if the encounter is to be beneficial for anyone.

Hello Aquarius — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20) — I suggest you be proactive on a matter involving a contractual situation, taxes or some kind of estate-related issue. In this scenario, preparation is everything, and if you use some foresight and maintain strict ethics, you have every advantage and can profit considerably. First, you can prevent contention or some kind of conflict, by seeing the early signs that you need to take action. Just make sure that it’s informed, cooperative action — cooperation is the key, as is your timing. Make sure that everyone involved knows that they share common interests, though it’s more crucial for you to keep that in mind yourself. As for ethics: mainly this means that everyone acts on free will and respects that of others. Coercion is out of the question.

Hello Pisces — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Mercury Direct, Nessus and Your Cue to Be One

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Dear Friend and Reader:

In August, the sky starts to open up and the energy flows more freely. The obstacle course that we’ve been running since January morphs into the art studio / healing space indicated by the Leo-Virgo line, which the Sun is gradually approaching. If you’ve been having productivity or creativity challenges, prepare to focus and move forward. Granted, this is happening in August when most people would rather be taking it easy.

Moon Rising. Photo by Anthony Ayiomamitis.

Before we get there, though, there are (as ever) some highlights worth mentioning. Currently, Jupiter in Gemini is square Chiron in Pisces. This is an aspect associated with those who devote themselves to social causes; the wisdom attribute of Jupiter and the applied healing / focus quality of Chiron join forces in a provocative way. Start with yourself first and work your way into helping the world. Make your contribution from a solid place. As my friend Scott Kalechstein once said (as if describing this aspect), “get the word in before you get the word out.”

The Aquarius Full Moon is Aug. 1. This is the Moon in Aquarius opposite the Sun in Leo. When you see a Full Moon on the first of the month, that hints that there will be a second Full Moon that month — and that’s called a Blue Moon. I have absolutely no interpretation of this whatsoever; it’s pure trivia. (The Pisces Full Moon happens Aug. 31 — more on that in a few weeks.)

In all sincerity this seems like a reasonable, easygoing Full Moon (it’s trine Jupiter in Gemini, for example, which looks like a relaxed mental and emotional posture). Aug. 1 is a Wednesday, though that would be a great day to plan an extended weekend and (at least here in the Northern Hemisphere) start your midsummer holiday.

Next up is Mercury stationing direct on Aug. 8. It’s been retrograde in Leo since July 14. That will begin the first extended stretch of 2012 with all of the inner planets direct. That condition lasts a whole three months, until Nov. 6, when Mercury stations retrograde on Election Day here in the United States. [I’ll come back to that one as well — let’s just say that event will give us a moment to pause and reflect on the meaning of elections.] If you recall, we covered this in the Top Five Events of 2012 audio series.

Take advantage of this phase of direct inner planets, by which I mean tackle your biggest projects during this brief three-month phase. Use the remainder of the current Mercury retrograde (through Aug. 8) to prepare yourself for what you need to accomplish with all the red and yellow lights suddenly turning green. Summer is a nice time to chill out, though I suggest you keep your focus on your goals and intentions.

Photo by Eric Francis.

On Aug. 15, there is a conjunction of Mars and Saturn in Libra. There are a few ways to look at this aspect; I will sum up by saying that your sense of fairness is the thing to be working with as it approaches. This is not a time to cheat or to take advantage of anyone — it will blow back in your face. Keep your balance and use the energy of Mars-Saturn to develop your goals and as an opportunity to take action on an important professional matter. It might be a tense time in relationships; if someone is acting immature, deal with them on something other than their level.

We then have the Leo New Moon on Aug. 17. This is a special event, as the Sun and Moon will be opposite centaur planet Nessus. Nessus is the third centaur, with two layers of meaning. The first is about understanding the connection between cause and effect, and altering the cycle when necessary. The second is that it relates directly to themes of sexual healing, including the healing of abuse legacies (part of the reason I’ve introduced my four-part series on erotic themes on Planet Waves FM, which began with Wednesday’s edition). The essence of the New Moon opposite Nessus is cultivating an understanding of what is your material in a relationship and what belongs to someone else. Often we take on someone’s abuse legacy, or project our own into the partnership. This is a time to sort this out.

There is one more notable event in August — 1992 QB1 turns 20 years old. I keep mentioning this bit of space dust, which was the first planet ever discovered in an orbit beyond Pluto. That’s in a place called the Kuiper Belt, a vast region of space just past Neptune where there are millions of little icy and rocky planets orbiting our Sun. I promise you that you won’t read about this anywhere else, unless of course someone takes the lead from Planet Waves. I am planning a rousing tribute to 1992 QB1 in a late-August edition.

As you can see, 1992 QB1 is a planet with a temporary designation and no actual name. Dale O’Brien wrote to me and said, “It’s already named! Cue: Be One.” Now that’s an apple from the very tree I’ve been barking up since I heard about this point not long after its discovery.

Enjoy your horoscope, which I’m offering with a few other short features. I’ll see you Tuesday with the Inner Space monthly for August.

Lovingly,

Midyear Report Forthcoming

Shades of Grey: 2012 Olympics Opens Friday

The XXX Olympiad — otherwise known as the 2012 Olympics — opens Friday night in London. The ceremony starts at 9:00 pm London time, which means it’s possible to cast a chart (for viewing purposes, please check your local listings for the time in your area). [View chart at this link.]

The 2012 Olympics were almost in Paris. This neon sculpture of the Olympic rings was erected next to (not around) the Eiffel Tower in 2005, which I photographed while I was living there. Photo by Eric.

This is a slippery chart full of all kinds of cryptic messages. There is tension behind the scenes, on many levels. For example, the Moon is void of course when the games begin (though it makes aspects to minor planets, which paint a nice complicated picture). As well, the ceremony happens just a day before the Sun-Mercury conjunction (the halfway mark of Mercury retrograde). That’s a way of saying that the trickster is in the air, which Mitt Romney just demonstrated on his trip to London (see POL section below).

In our current world, I think that the Olympics are especially necessary. They’re an example of what can be created for its own sake, without the Air Force being sent in, and where the profit motive isn’t particularly successful. They are a testament to actual human achievement for its own sake; a statement of our potential. Woe be unto anyone who turns them into something cynical.

Where Mercury is a factor, it’s helpful to look at what’s happening in the Mercury-ruled signs, Virgo and Gemini. Virgo is on the 8th house of this particular chart (which means it’s associated with money, banks, sponsorship and partnership). Gemini is on the 4th house — (home base, security, father). Of the two the 8th concerns me the most; there’s something dishonest about this Sun-Mercury retrograde setup. We could be looking at some sort of news about the games being rigged — or for that matter, bungles involving news coverage itself.

The 8th in this chart also includes Libra, and there’s a conjunction brewing there — Mars and Saturn. But that conjunction doesn’t happen till after the games end, so this is a setup for something that develops during the games that finally comes out when that conjunction happens. There may be a delayed reaction.

My buddy Astrodem notes that the Aquarius ascendant for this chart has an interesting Sabian symbol — “A man who had for a time become the embodiment of a popular ideal is made to realize that as a person he is not the ideal.” Translation: stern caution about performance-enhancing drugs. One Greek athlete has already been disqualified.

I think it’s possible that we may see something never-before encountered from the Olympics — a sex scandal. I am aware that the Olympic Village makes the old Studio 54 seem boring as a party spot; those kids know how to carry on, they have a ton of energy and this is their big moment. Athletes and sex go together like the ingredients of a peach melba. (As of Thursday night, long after this was written, Stephen Colbert was already doing comedy about sex and Olympic athletes.)

This newspaper headline appeared in Paris the day that London was selected to host the games — and the day that the 7/7 false flag attacks in Tube stations and a Metro bus happened there. That felt a bit ominous. Photo by Eric Francis.

Therefore, I hope this is not a sex abuse scandal (which would translate to some form of rape). There are some dark shades to this chart (Scorpio Moon square Nessus, and opposite the Black Moon Lilith). Where there is sex, there is shadow, and we’re looking right at it with that aspect. It would be lovely if we could relax and have the whole conversation — light, shadow, body, soul; this chart is an invitation.

Last, everyone who worries is wondering about terrorism. The thing that makes me nervous is that London winning the Olympic bid was announced on July 6, 2005, and when that made news the next day, we had the 7/7 bombings in London. That was a ridiculously false flag attack (that day the police were running terrorism drills in the same four tube stations as where the bombs went off). I am not so concerned about terrorism as I am about Terrorism, Inc. — that’s to say, some kind of staged event. However, as the games begin, I can say that I don’t feel that happening.

To the extent it’s possible, today or any other day, this is something we can help with. Holding the whole thing in the light is a real-life exercise in creative visualization. I believe the more chatter there is in advance, the less likely that something weird will happen. The element of blindsiding the public is the essential ingredient in false flag attacks; there has to be shock value or what’s the point?

Now as for all those fantastic athletes showing up from some 200 countries, who have prepared their whole lives for this event, nearly all of them in good faith — well, let’s see how they do.

Greenland Turned to Slush in Four Days

It’s been a hot summer, with record temperatures, droughts and wildfires, being described as the worst since the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. The American corn crop looks like it might fail as a result of the weather, which is expected to push up food prices (chickens and pigs eat corn).

Ice melt off in Greenland between July 8 and 12. This kind of thing has happened before — but has it happened in four days? Well, it just did.

Meanwhile, a massive ice sheet covering most of Greenland has melted over a record area this year, with the melt covering 97% of the ice in just four days earlier this month. This happened between July 8 and 12. While climate change deniers say this kind of thing happens every 150 years or so, they cannot say for sure how long it took — and four days seems pretty quick.

Though about half of the ice sheet normally melts during the summer months, the speed and scale of this year’s melt was extraordinary — the fastest in three decades of observation. One problem is that the melt off feeds on itself. Ice is white and reflects heat. When the ice melts, less heat is reflected and more ice is affected.

At its center, the ice sheet is nearly two miles thick. Melting even occurred at the Summit station, the coldest and highest place in Greenland. Ice core records show melting last occurred there in 1889. “When we see melt in places that we haven’t seen before, at least in a long period of time, it makes you sit up and ask what’s happening,” said NASA chief scientist Waleed Abdalati.

While this kind of melt off may happen every 150 years or so, it’s still alarming. The news comes just days after a massive iceberg, twice the size of Manhattan, broke off of the Petermann Glacier, one of the two main glaciers in Greenland. It’s the second time in two years that parts of the Petermann Glacier have broken off after an ice island four times Manhattan’s size cracked apart in August 2010.

Still, climate change deniers are on the march. One such website commenting on an expected rise of the oceans chirped, “An additional foot of sea level rise is about twice the amount the world has experienced since 1880. Our wealthier, more mobile, and more technologically advanced children’s children’s children should be able to adapt to it just fine.”

Romney Slips on Mercury Retrograde; Bum Over Teapot in London

Mitt Romney began his international “charm offensive” with a visit to England with the perfect gaffe — telling NBC’s Brian Williams Wednesday that some of the challenges leading up to the games had been “disconcerting.” Romney’s resume includes overseeing the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, which he promptly outsourced to China.

Mitt Romney’s astrologer forgot that Mercury was retrograde — or left that out of the reading as sabotage. Here, Mitt is outside the famous black door at 10 Downing, speaking with reporters. Reuters photo.

“The stories about the private security firm not having enough people, the supposed strike of the immigration and customs officials — that obviously is not something which is encouraging,” the presumptive GOP nominee said.

Apparently he had not been advised that Mercury was retrograde, therefore, to be quiet and just wave at all the nice people.

His remark prompted a reply from Prime Minister David Cameron. “We are holding an Olympic Games in one of the busiest, most active, bustling cities anywhere in the world,” Cameron said. “Of course it’s easier if you hold an Olympic Games in the middle of nowhere.”

In later comments Romney forgot the name of British Labour Party leader Ed Miliband. Even for Romney, he was in rare form. And it gets better.

After he stepped outside the famous doors of No. 10 Downing St., the current prime minister’s office, he admitted that he had been given a secret briefing with the head of MI6, the British intelligence agency. Aspiring U.S. presidents are not supposed to admit that they met with anyone in the organization, the existence of which was secret till 1994.

The Guardian asked, “Do we have a new Dubya on our hands?” Or as Howard Dean commented Thursday night on MSNBC, all that’s missing from this trip is a visit to the Cayman Islands.

As News of the World Turns (and Pholus Keeps Going)

The Fall of the House of Murdoch continues in its illustration of the ‘small cause, big effect’ indicated by centaur planet Pholus in charts associated with this event. Two ex-editors of Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World — the original scandal sheet, profiting on the misery of others — face 19 charges related to phone hacking, including former top executives of the company. When we covered this last year, we demonstrated how Pholus feels like a runway reaction, and predicted that this scandal would keep going for a long time.

Cover of The Guardian, one of Britain’s left-leaning actual newspapers, from 2010, breaking the story of how News of the World writers hacked the phone of slain teenager Milly Dowler. After publishing her parents’ anguished voicemails in the newspaper, they deleted the messages, leading her parents and police to believe she was still alive. This outraged England and sent the news across the Atlantic, forced the closure of the newspaper and has resulted in nine arrests.

Rebekah Brooks and Andy Coulson are among seven former members of the now-defunct British tabloid charged with conspiring to intercept communications. Between 2000 and 2006, the phones of 600 people were allegedly hacked into — with the erasing of voicemail belonging to murdered 13-year-old Milly Dowler’s phone leading to the paper’s closure in July 2011. Brooks, a former chief executive of the newspaper division News International, naturally denies the charges.

Coulson, formerly British Prime Minister David Cameron’s communications chief, also faces charges linked to the phone messages of Dowler and others. Check that out — the current prime minister’s former press secretary was charged criminally with hacking into the phone of a murdered girl, to sell more newspapers.

Last week Murdoch himself resigned from directorship of several subsidiaries of his News Corp, in a move announced as ‘corporate housecleaning’ in preparation for splitting Murdoch’s newspaper holdings from his entertainment enterprises. Included in that split is FOX News which will be kept with the entertainment division. Some speculate it’s more like a fire sale — and Murdoch and his top staff are holding the matches. While many are downplaying Murdoch’s resignation from his directorships as a public relations gesture, you can be sure it’s a lot more meaningful to him, stepping down from leading the companies he created as the world looks on in disgust.

As we wrote of this incident last year, “Something new seems to be escaping from a structure in a way that can never be reversed: the truth of what went on behind the scenes. With Pluto in Capricorn we have the energy of the unstoppable force, combining with Pholus in Capricorn (in the natal charts of Murdoch and News of the World) to wreak havoc on one of the world’s biggest companies and oldest, most established governments.” What we’re seeing is how the thing we rely on for supposed truth has become an instrument for disinformation and chaos. The consequences are only just beginning to clear out the whole toxic enterprise.

Groundbreaking Gay Activist was Historian of Cinema

If you have HBO or you can cozy up with a friend who does, don’t miss this documentary. It’s called Vito, and it’s about the life of early gay activist Vito Russo, also the author of The Celluloid Closet. He was the first historian of the depiction of homosexuality in cinema, about which his book was written (covering Thomas Edison’s early films up through contemporary cinema of the 1970s and early 1980s). The HBO documentary covers Russo’s life as well as providing many examples of his observations about the early history of film through contemporary times.

Planet Waves FM: Pleasure, Play and Healing

Late Breaking News — I was at Canyon Ranch in Lenox, MA this week, teaching astrology. I gave two presentations — one on the development of the minor planets, and the other on sexuality and astrology. The links take you to high-quality recordings of the seminars. These are both designed for people without prior astrological training. — efc

Author Sheri Winston.

This week’s guest on Planet Waves FM is Sheri Winston, author of Women’s Anatomy of Arousal: Secret Maps to Buried Pleasure. Our topic is pleasure, play and healing. Sheri is a gifted writer, teacher and guest and it was a real treat spending an hour hearing what she has to say. You can reach Sheri at her website.

I open the program with a recap of the news and a short summary of the astrology leading into this weekend’s Mercury-Sun conjunction, which is the peak of Mercury retrograde. I also cover the Sun’s aspects to Dionysus and Kassandra, which we’ve been writing about on this page as well.

Then we get into our conversation with Sheri, which I focus with my questions. As for Sheri’s philosophy, just to give you an idea — here is how she defines ‘wholistic sexuality’ on her website:

Wholistic Sexuality is about connection. First and foremost, your sexuality is about your connection with your Self — that’s your primary relationship.

Your Self includes all of you: body, mind, heart and spirit, past, present and future, genetics and environment — everything that makes you uniquely and completely you.

Your sexuality is about who you are, not who you do (or don’t) have sex with. Whatever you do or don’t do — you are a sexual being. Your sexuality is an inherent, inseparable and vital aspect of you.

I hope you’ll spend some time checking out her site, and I’d love to hear any feedback about my conversation with her in this broadcast.

Planet Waves

Monthly Horoscope for August 2012 | Eric’s Zodiac Sign Descriptions

Aries (March 20-April 19) — There’s this concept from psychology that everyone would benefit from knowing about: projection. Projection is when you see your qualities, issues or challenges in another person. It’s called ‘projection’ because it’s like having a light on your forehead that shines your material onto them, rather than being anything that comes inherently from them. This kind of transaction makes relationships difficult because when it’s happening, it verges on impossible for anyone to take responsibility for what is really their own, and thus open the way to have two people make their way through the world as conscious adults. This month, I suggest you listen to any accusation or claim you might make about another person and ask whether it has something to say about you. If you find yourself in any form of conflict, pause and do what’s called ‘withdraw your projections’. Start with taking full responsibility for being in the situation, and take ownership of your responses to it. Give others the opportunity to do the same thing, without pushing them in any way to do so; your example is enough. You’re likely to discover that this reveals the conflict for what it is, and puts everyone in a position where it can be resolved. The problem with identifying projection is that it can be psychologically uncomfortable and vulnerable. It can feel weird to observe what you’re doing, much less admit it. It’s easier to go on projecting, which only pushes the conflict deeper.

Hello Aries — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Taurus (April 19-May 20) — Love is a gentle experience and needs to be handled delicately. When we say love and really feel it, I believe that most of the time what we really mean is trust. Trust is about being on level ground with someone, and sharing mutual respect. Much of what we call love exploits inequities between people. Though we’re told these are economic issues, I’ve observed that most of them are emotionally rooted. Whose needs are ‘more important’ than the other’s? Who is an inherently more supportive or generous person? Who can handle crisis better? I suggest that as August progresses, in matters of the heart, you go for the slow, conscious evolution process. Make sure that you’re proceeding with trust first and affection second. When your affection runs ahead of your ability to trust someone, that’s the moment to pause, because it’s the moment when you’re most likely to feel like you’re out of control, and thus respond in ways that don’t make sense (to you or to anyone). If your life emphasis is currently on a relationship, I suggest you take a couple of weeks and focus on your own inner emotional needs — the ones that can only be met by growth, not by the presence of another person. Be aware of the unusual intensity that may be gathering around resolving a childhood issue centered on the theme of trust (particularly in communication). This will be far easier to resolve apart from a relationship than as the focus of one — for example, I suggest you address it with a therapist or counselor rather than a lover or partner.

Gemini (May 20-June 21) — You may be inclined to push your luck in a relationship situation. This could translate a few ways, and will apply equally to established situations, new ones or ones that you are reaching for. You may want the situation to develop faster than it’s currently moving, which could involve wanting someone to change or grow. You might be emphasizing the sexual aspect of a relationship when you’re not quite ready for that. You may be feeling frustrated and experiencing an impulse to break free, wishing it could be with someone rather than from someone. I suggest you get clear what you’re experiencing, then proceed to investigate the source of the feeling. The first question is, who is stuck? Who is experiencing inhibition? The chances are it’s equally distributed among the people involved. Take ownership of your part. I also suggest you account for anger. What might look like desire is more likely to be a form of resentment, and it’s likely to predate this situation — all the more reason for you to be well-versed in the deeper roots of what you’re experiencing. Last, I suggest you do a review of your relationship to risk. Go back about two years, and consider the kinds of chances you’ve taken, and why you’ve taken them. Do a little audit of how each of these has worked out, and why you think that is. The game of life is easier to play when you understand yourself, and when you stack the cards in your favor. What you learn this month will help you do both.

Cancer (June 21-July 22) — You seem to be outgrowing something — your physical space, your emotional orientation, a job, a relationship. You may be stoked and impulsive to make a sudden change, though I suggest you take a balanced approach to your situation. The change you make has to be the right change, and at the same time, it’s essential to use a moment when you’re really aware of what you want to change. This is the balance that you must reach, which comes down to knowing your priorities and keeping a focus on matters of timing. You may not be able to act at a moment of frustration, and it would be unwise to do so. Yet a mature person can keep a focus on what they need to shift or rearrange in their lives, and look for an opportunity to do so. At the same time, the world is changing around you, and events that take place a bit later in the year, especially in October, may provide the ideal circumstances — or arrive with even greater changes that obviate the things you want to adjust now. That may seem like a long way off, though in truth it’s right around the corner, and you may be able to get a sense of the trajectory of your life when Mars enters Scorpio later this month. You will, at least, get a taste of the territory you’re going to be entering, and if you’re paying attention you will learn enough to see, and address, certain obstacles well in advance of when you actually encounter them.

Hello Cancer — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed). Your Cancer birthday reading is ready! It includes more than hour of astrology plus a tarot reading, and has been wildly popular (also great for Cancer rising people). Use this link to order.

Leo (July 22-Aug. 23) — The past few weeks have been an introspective time for you, and you may have gotten to know yourself in a whole new way. It seems you’ve made some deep commitments for how to proceed with your life; you’re willing to make adjustments. Flexibility is an excellent property for you to develop, yet it’s easy to have these experiences and then forget them. To remember, I suggest you begin making decisions based on what you have discovered to be true about yourself. That’s the best way to reinforce learning: to use values and self-discovery as a practical tool. This will come in handy mid-month, around the time of the New Moon in your sign, when you face what seems to be an especially significant choice. If you have the feeling that this is about a relationship, you’re correct, though really there are a lot more than two people involved. There is a family or a metaphorical family in the picture, and you have to be clear about how much emphasis to give their needs or their opinions. You might use Mr. Spock’s analysis — the greatest good for the greatest number of people. Or you might decide that what’s best for you is best for everyone by default, because you have to be happy. In any event, this seems bigger than it really is. If you’re feeling pressure, weigh and balance the two sides of the equation for a while and you will have the clarity you need. Trust that you’re well-aligned with your truth.

Hello Leo and Leo Rising! I’ve finished your 2012-2013 birthday reading. This is composed of two 35-minute astrology sessions, plus a combined tarot and astrology reading. It covers all of the major astrology happening now — with an emphasis on recovering a childhood dream. I also cover the influence on your relationships, your home environment and your finances. Astrologically this includes Mercury retrograde in your sign, the Leo New Moon, the Uranus-Pluto square, Saturn in Scorpio and more — all in clear, easy to follow terms. This report is designed for those born with the Sun in Leo but is equally applicable for Leo rising. Visit this page to get access.

Virgo (Aug. 23-Sep. 22) — Your solar chart looks like you’ve been having a beautiful experience of admitting to yourself what you really want, moving through often-impossible-to-access territory, as if you’ve been able to enter a dream consciously and ask all of the characters in that dream what they really think, and what they have to say about you. If your dream activity happens to be more prolific than normal or even if you’ve had one of those ‘big dreams’, make sure you write it down. It seems to me like you’re doing some of the deepest exploration of self-acceptance in many years. There is, however, a chance that this has felt like facing all kinds of unpleasant truths about yourself or your past: things that happened to you that continue to stress you out or knock you off alance, even if in subtle ways. The solution set remains the same: this material is coming up for review and awareness, and you’re situated perfectly to go into those places that you may have never accessed. If you seem to be stalking ‘the truth’ or if it seems to be stalking you, it’s not as dangerous or disturbing in reality as it may be in your imagination. In any event to resolve the material, or even to find out what it is, you have to bring awareness there. I will say this: what happened to you in the past matters, and it influences your life more than you may think. That is, until you do something about it.

Hello Virgo — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Libra (Sep. 22-Oct. 23) — When the time comes to break free from your shell, do it gently. Given the astrology of the past month — particularly, Mars in your sign after spending eight months in one of the most introspective angles of your chart — you seem determined not just to think independently but be independent. Yet going back longer than this, you’ve been struggling with the authority principle: you simply don’t want other people setting your limits, telling you what to do, or rearranging your boundaries for you. And, after spending a lot of time dealing with various shades of lurking fear, you’ve started to adjust the circumstances in your life to reflect this basic truth. As the astrology of August develops, you’ll discover that you’re not done making changes — though as you consider your situation, I suggest you reflect on two things. One is the extent to which you’re adjusting your inner psychological and emotional landscape rather than the world around you. You’re in a challenging maturing process that, at the moment, is compelling you to see that in truth you live your life from the inside out. It’s not always so obvious and there’s plenty of evidence to the contrary, though as you strive to set yourself free from someone or something, remember that most of what you’re liberating yourself from is from you. Second idea — that something is a past concept of who you are. The past is gone, though now you’re finally challenging one of its most enduring emotional artifacts.

Hello Libra — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 22) — Commitment is a dance, rather than a fixed entity. In our quest for permanence in a world that seems to change ever-faster every day, there’s an idea that commitment is about grafting yourself to someone or something in a way that will never change. When you dance with someone, you hold them intentionally but gently, and with enough flexibility to move, and to let go and rejoin in another configuration. I suggest that this is the way to think of your relationships. Remember too that there are two things happening: one is the relationship or arrangement, and then there are your ideas about it. Your ideas will tend to dominate your reality, often obscuring the actual experience they’re supposed to be describing. The good news is that your ideas are flexible, as are you — and that’s your most useful asset this month. Probing a bit deeper, you seem to be unraveling a question: what is your point of contact with another person? What’s the basis of the relationship? Is it a conscious healing process, or is it an obsession with wounding? Is it an experience of emotional exchange, or is it more like a projection? Often one of these will masquerade for the other. This phenomenon is something worth investigating, even if you think you’ve gone down that road before. Your ability to take command of your life, something you now seem determined to do, depends on your knowing and understanding the difference — and using the information consciously.

Hello Scorpio — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Sagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 22) — Your relationships are like seeing your reflection in one of those mirrors that magnifies whatever you’re looking at, which in this case is yourself. Relationships tend to reveal our inner nature to both parties. However, what we see reflected is usually mistaken for some property of the other person involved. Though this may have an element of truth, I suggest you do an experiment where you take full ownership of whatever personal material you’re presented with. Mainly I mean your responses to someone, the choices you make, the words you say, and the ways you feel about yourself — in the context of the relationship. I am proposing that you assume this is all about you — not about anyone else. In case you’re inclined to be self-critical (a quality of your sign that’s described only in the fine print), remember that who you truly are is a lot more than the tally of your faults and your assets. Who you are exists alongside those qualities, though you are not them, no matter how much you may feel like it. One of the happier challenges you have now is to relate to others as that ‘who you really are’ factor rather than all of the details — and when you do that, it’s what you will feel mirrored back to you. The key to this is not to get distracted by judgment of any kind. This may seem like walking across coals, though at the moment, you have plenty of support.

Hello Sagittarius — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 20) — Handle issues involving authority like you’re on the bomb squad. Rule one is, assume the thing is real. You don’t want to provoke any conflicts with anyone who has authority over you, such as traffic cops, the IRS or your boss. If you’re in a position of authority, carefully mind your ethics, your sense of fairness and most of all, your boundaries. If you practice a policy of holding the line, you will know where the line is. This is vital information if you find yourself arriving at a situation where you have to cross a boundary of some kind, exceed your authority or stand up to someone because the ethics of the situation demand that you do so. Do not do this casually or unconsciously. Rather, hold off on using this particular expression of power for when it’s clear that it’s your best (but not your only) option. That may happen once and once only in the next month. Meanwhile, if you feel anything like this brewing, I have one other suggestion. Additional information that may influence your thinking will emerge after Mercury stations direct on Aug. 8, and a second revelation is coming with the New Moon of Aug. 17. In the situation you’re in, knowledge is power, and you don’t have to impress anyone in order for that power to work. Your primary job is to know the facts, and to see the patterns develop as more information becomes available — which it will. Till then, bide your time.

Hello Capricorn — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) — Pay attention to everything in your life that seems to be running in a cycle. There are two kinds of cycles to watch for. One is when something keeps happening repeatedly, such as the sensation that you keep having a similar kind of experience because you don’t ‘get the lesson’. The second is when you’re involved in a series of events wherein one thing leads to another — and the buck stops with you. When you have experiences like this, it can be frustrating and distracting, though apropos of your current astrology, it can shake your faith in your ability to make long-term plans and carry them out. You might feel like you’re involved in a pattern that specifically makes believe that something you can envision and want to work for is unavailable to you. This is the time to challenge your beliefs, rather than feel like you’re limited by them. One indication that you might be up against a belief that you want to challenge is that you’re angry, though the anger isn’t directed at any one person. It’s more like being ‘angry at God’. This is another way of saying ‘angry at existence’, which I would say is a fertile state of mind — the kind of mental or emotional space where you know you want to make a change, but you may not be sure what change you want to make. Perhaps this question will help. You are someone who lives with a purpose, but do you have a mission?

Hello Aquarius — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20) — Many have commented on the dualistic nature of Pisces — you know, the two fish swimming in opposite directions, though connected to one another. This property runs deep in you, though it has its origins in the angle of your chart occupied by Gemini, the angle involving security and your emotions — which aligns with the sign of the twins. For the past 18 months or so, you’ve been making special progress resolving various splits within your emotional body. As you’ve done this, you’ve encountered those inner divisions in a more direct way, with the purpose for this being recognizing your situation and doing something about it. Now, you’re starting to see that these divisions that dominated your life for so long are beginning to heal. Elements of your nature that seemed to oppose one another are now more harmonious. Your living spaces are starting to feel more like you want them to feel, and you’re more at home there — the most significant living space being your presence within your own skin. There’s a real gift here for you, as you embark on a time when you’re much more likely to be in harmony with yourself than at odds with yourself. You will save time and energy, it’ll be easier to determine what you want — and to pursue that specific thing. And there is most certainly something that you want, which is the feeling of a settled life and a true home. The more you feed your passion for this, the more realistic it will seem as a creative goal.

Hello Pisces — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Planet Waves FM: Pleasure, Play and Healing

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Dear Friend and Reader:

My monthly sign interpretations for August will be distributed Friday. I wrote the horoscopes last week, working slowly and carefully over four work sessions. My monthly horoscope is an unusually in-depth analysis of your astrology and that of the people close to you. I recommend reading your Sun and rising signs (at the least). You can find your ascendant by visiting Astro.com — though you do need your birth time for that. It’s also helpful to know your Moon sign, particularly given that we have a Moon sign horoscope that publishes monthly.

The Sri Yantra, which represents the co-mingling of the masculine and feminine divine. This one is from Nepal, c. 1700. Gouache on cloth 20 x 24 in.

Covering the current astrology we have two pieces from Daily Astrology & Adventure — one on the Sun’s ingress into Leo, and another on the Sun’s aspect to asteroid Kassandra.

In today’s short edition I’m here to preview tonight’s Planet Waves FM (the first of a series of programs). For many years I’ve both wondered about the concept of ‘tantric sex’ and also been on the prowl for anyone who really understands the concept in a way they can relate it to others, shorn of jargon and pretense.

So I asked my friend and neighbor Sheri Winston, herself a sex educator and author, if she knew anyone and she recommended Patricia Johnson and Mark Michaels. I wanted not an academic description but rather a discussion with people who were both informed and living their path — and I hit the jackpot.

Tonight, however, I start a special four-part series on sexuality with an interview with Sheri, who introduces the topic of pleasure, play and healing. This is a friendly, informative one-hour conversation that includes how to focus your quest for connection, pleasure and creativity. Look for that tonight on Daily Astrology & Adventure. In the intro I cover the current astrology and make contact with a few recent news events.

Next week, we’ll move on to the somewhat more complex subject of tantra. That word represents a whole cosmology, not just a set of Eastern erotic techniques (that’s called the Kama Sutra). In a 90-minute interview that I will divide between two programs, Patricia and Mark describe in an accessible way the ideas and life-path associated with this difficult-to-describe term. Speaking with them this past Friday afternoon, I felt like I was handed a missing key to my understanding of the world.

One other thing, from the recent past — in case you missed our announcements, I went down to New Orleans in May and covered the United Astrology Conference (UAC), a once-every-four-years conference. While I was there, I did many interviews with some of the brightest astrologers I know, as well as healers and other thinkers. That’s been posted to a permanent archive on Planet Waves, which I think you’ll appreciate.

Thanks to your subscriptions and product purchases, Planet Waves FM is presented without commercial interruption. Use your imagination and consider what it would be like to be pelted by advertisements for 20 minutes out of every hour, then relax and appreciate the uninterrupted calm. Here is an archive of recent programs.

I will see you Friday morning with the monthly horoscope, a look ahead at the astrology of August and a short reading of the chart for the 2012 Olympic games, which begin Friday night.

Lovingly,

Dark Knight of the Uranus-Pluto Square

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Dear Friend and Reader:

It’s been a trying week.

Both the Moon and Mars moved through the Uranus-Pluto square, forming a grand cross on Wednesday shortly before the Cancer New Moon. With much of the United States engulfed in stultifying heat and humidity and many other places in drought, the weather as well as the astrology was wearing on the spirit.

Scene outside movie theater in Aurora, CO early Friday morning after the shooting and gas attack. Photo by Karl Gehring / The Denver Post.

As I wrote in Tuesday’s edition, the astrology had an emotional and potentially violent tone to it. Mars in Libra formed a square to Pluto in Capricorn (an aspect known for violent tendencies and emotional outbursts). Nearly simultaneously, it formed an opposition to Uranus (known for erratic behavior, shocking events and accidents).

The three planets formed a T, known as a T-square. The Moon then passed through this, completing a grand cross in the cardinal signs as the Moon approached its conjunction to the Sun (the Cancer New Moon) overnight Wednesday to Thursday. That New Moon began a new cycle — though the question is, a new cycle of what? This week there were three notable incidents of terrorism, one of which happened Friday morning.

For those of you in the United States who woke up and turned on your TV or the Internet, you were welcomed into the day by the news of an attack in Aurora, Colorado. This took place during a screening of The Dark Knight Rises, a hit movie based on the DC Comics character Batman that premiered earlier in the week. At the late-night show, a 24-year-old gunman released a canister of toxic gas into the dark theater, then opened fire on the crowd. He killed 14 people and injured another 50 — and was taken into custody after the attack.

The chart has Taurus rising, which points straight to Venus in Gemini (That’s because Venus rules the Taurus ascendant, wherever it may be placed in the chart. The ascendant ruler describes the issue in question.) Looking at Venus is a reminder that overnight Thursday to Friday in US time zones, Venus passed by the exact degree and minute where it made its transit of the Sun in June, bringing out some of the energy latent in that event.

There may be more trouble to come. Venus is about to make aspects to three slow-moving points. Over the next day or so, Venus will make a conjunction to outer planet Chaos, and oppositions to Pholus (release of energy) and Ixion (amoral conduct; anyone is capable of anything) in Sagittarius. Once again we have centaur Pholus prominent in the chart of a mass shooting event (recalling the Tucson shootings of early 2011).

The perpetrator was clearly mentally ill, though like many of these people, seemed to be venting collective rage, as well as frustrated egotism. The most immediate aspect following the event was the Moon making a conjunction to retrograde Mercury in Leo. In our obsession with superheroes, what we actually create are anti-heroes (also known as terrorists).

Damascus Bombing Wednesday: An Inside Job

Earlier in the week, a bomb was detonated inside a meeting of Syria’s top military officials, shattering the government and weakening the military’s hold on the government there. The country has been engulfed in a domestic war for 16 months, though many outside forces are involved.

Map showing the locations of Syria (to the left, south of Turkey), Iraq and Iran (to the far right). Get out your magnifying glass and you can see Israel, toward the left, west of Jordan.

This bombing was the rebels (called the Free Syria Army) making their move to oust the Syrian government, which is lead by Bashar al-Assad. However, the incident took place inside the official government’s military headquarters, so it was by definition an inside job. The astrology suggests that the identity of the perpetrator is obvious and carried out the attack under the cover of broad daylight.

The next day, Iraqi officials confirmed the Free Syria Army had taken control of many of the Iraq border crossings, including the Abu Kamal border crossing on the Damascus-Baghdad highway, one of the most important trade routes in the Middle East. For the first time the government-controlled Syrian army tanks rolled into Damascus in response to the bombing and simultaneous fact of rebel forces moving closer to the government’s headquarters.

Then at one of the border crossings, Syrian rebels executed 22 Syrian soldiers as Iraqi soldiers watched. The message of this seemed to be, don’t even bother trying to stop us.

To understand the significance of Syria, take a look at the map. It’s located to one side of Iraq and Iran is located to the other. Iran and Syria are allies, and Iran and Iraq have long been enemies.

Chart for the Syria bombing has a full 9th house (note the planets highest up), suggesting that the attack was religiously motivated — and that it could have an international influence. Eris, the red oval with the arrow, is in the 8th house, indicating death and disruption for their own sake. The two blue planets are Pallas and Uranus, suggesting a political disruption.

(Recall the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s, for which the United States provided weapons to both sides: Iraq was officially our friend, and received weapons above boards; Iran was our enemy but received weapons secretly from Reagan and Bush, in what became known as the Iran-Contra scandal.)

It took several of us a while to find the time of Wednesday’s bombing. I finally obtained a close time by calling the AP foreign desk, which provided a close approximate time, confirmed by other news reports which characterized the time as “mid morning.”

The chart, which you can see here, has the feeling of kicking through wet cardboard. All of the angles (for example, the ascendant and the midheaven) go into mutable signs, which says they have nothing solid to grab hold of. As is being reported elsewhere, it confirms that the Syrian government is extremely unstable and could easily collapse. The chart also has a full 9th house, pointing to the religious obsession that seems to characterize every act of violence in our era of history.

It seems that most people don’t have the common sense to understand that God doesn’t blow people up, though admittedly I stopped reading The Bible because it was too violent.

The Independent’s Middle-East correspondent Robert Fisk has suggested that the Syrian government will not fall as fast as some people expect, and the astrology suggests he may be right. While the mutable signs can lack solidity, they can also represent slow processes. In other words, this could be a stalemate situation for a while.

What we need to watch is the stability of the whole region, which appears to be under siege. Many interests seem to be pushing for a war against Iran. If that happens, the problem here is, at what point does everything go out of control? Said less politely, how willing are these battling forces to risk nuclear war?

Israelis Killed in Bulgarian Suicide Bombing

Speaking of Iran — there was one other act of terrorism this week. A suicide bomber set off a bomb on a bus filled with Israeli youth outside a Bulgarian resort, killing six and injuring at last 32 others. And it seems like this event is being used to create a war against Iran.

The Associated Press reported that, “Israel suspects archrival Iran of being behind several of those assaults. The two nations have long been in dispute over the nature of Iran’s nuclear program. Israel has warned it will use military force to curb Iran’s program if it must because it believes Tehran wants atomic weapons — a charge Iranian officials deny.”

The Israeli premier, Benjamin Netanyahu, said that once again, “all signs point to Iran,” adding, “This is an Iranian terror attack that is spreading across the world.” Netanyahu also added a direct threat: “Israel will react strongly to Iran’s terror.”

One problem with the theory that Iran was behind the bombing is that he presented no evidence for his statement; and the suicide bomber had an allegedly fake Michigan driver’s license. There’s some dark humor in that, but it’s not really so funny. Not this week, anyway.

Lovingly,

Sun Enters Leo — Conjunct Dionysus

But first, through the weekend, the late Cancer Sun squares 1992 QB1 in Aries. This is the planet without a name, the first planet discovered orbiting our Sun further out than Pluto. I’ve been tracking this one since Robert von Heeren handed me an ephemeris one day in the spring of 1998, when I met with him several times in Munich, studying the new discoveries. QB1 is rarely ever mentioned by astrologers, much less written about; few astrologers have ever heard of it.

Second century AD statue of Dionysus, kept in the Louvre in Paris.

The first thing to know about QB1 is that it opened up the realm of space beyond Pluto. Long before Eris was discovered in 1995, astronomy had demonstrated that there were indeed other planets in what is now called the Kuiper Belt. Beyond Pluto to me says life and consciousness beyond our limited notion of death. Planets beyond Pluto point the way past what I call the ‘death works’ phase of history — you know, the one where those so inclined can get whatever they want by threatening to kill.

QB1 has a life-affirming quality, and I associate it with various shades of healing the fear of death, sexual trauma, panic over change and the strange alienation we often feel from ourselves (as a result of these and other factors of life). I think of QB1 as relating to a kind of healer that so far exists mostly in my own mind.

Back in April when the Sun was conjunct this point, I covered 1992 QB1 in an audio edition, about which I wrote: “I associate this planet with people who help others cross thresholds — birth, death and orgasm. I describe the concept of what I call a thresholder, which I am describing in my fiction, though I’m sharing the idea here today since the Sun is conjunct 1992 QB1.”

Alternately, you can think of 1992 QB1 as representing a deeper presence of self within yourself, the one who exists beyond everything to which you’ve been subjected in this life. QB1 is about getting to know this inner self, as if you’re gazing into a psychic mirror within you that only you can see. I describe this in greater detail in the Cancer birthday write-up below.

On Sunday, the Sun ingresses Leo. When it gets there, it makes a conjunction to the asteroid Dionysus. This is a reminder that humans need to transcend ordinary consciousness. Indeed, that may be the thing that makes us human — the ability to see beyond the obvious, to conceive of and experience the cosmic realms, and to feel the divine within ourselves. There are a lot of ways to get there, though the use of a substance of some kind, whether wine or psychedelic mushrooms, has followed humanity for millennia. Terrence McKenna has suggested that early humans’ encounters with mushrooms are what gave rise to consciousness that we are human.

In any event, this is part of the human story, and Sun-Dionysus, plus other factors, calls for consciousness and a sense of balance about anything related to this subject.

Meanwhile, Mercury is retrograde in Leo. That reaches its peak Saturday, July 28 with the Sun-Mercury interior conjunction.

That aspect is a turning point and also the midpoint of the Mercury retrograde experience. At the moment Mercury is conjunct Achilles, an asteroid that’s about false lack of confidence. I don’t mean false confidence — we all know about that or, well, some of us do. I mean not owning up to what you know, what talents you have, or the experience that should have earned you your own self-respect.

And Mars is still close enough to the Uranus-Pluto square to be sending a cautionary note about being reactionary. Mars in Libra is close to asteroids Astraea (justice) and Athene (law), suggesting that it’s essential to maintain a sense of fairness and balance.

The Karmic Fire of George Zimmerman

Earlier this week, a female relative of George Zimmerman — the Florida resident who shot and killed unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in a high-profile incident in February of this year — accused Zimmerman of having sexually molested her over a 10-year period.

George Zimmerman.

She had originally come to officials early in their investigation of Martin’s shooting to testify that Zimmerman and his family were known to make racist statements when she was growing up.

In newly-released police recordings, the female relative states, “growing up, him and his family have always made statements that they don’t like black people if they don’t act like white people.” Her current accusations are that Zimmerman began molesting her when she was six and he was eight, and that the sexual abuse lasted until she was 16.

I missed it at the time; there seemed to be no possible sexual angle on the shooting of an unarmed teenager by a neighborhood watch captain — but sad to say, this is all over the chart for that event, which appears in this Planet Waves edition. The 12th house retrograde Mars suggests he was hiding more than his gun — and that packed 8th house is about a lot more than shooting someone.

Olafur Rides Again (or Iceland Gets Serious)

Iceland, whose economy suffered a near-total collapse as a result of banking fraud, has hired a bounty hunter to go after banksters. Special prosecutor Ólafur Þór Hauksson is a former local police lieutenant appointed by the Iceland government to track down those likely to have been instrumental in tanking the country’s financial infrastructure — and bring them back alive.

Hauksson: The posse rides at dawn.

This process begins with Mercury retrograde in Leo — which is suitable astrology for finding the thieves (ruled by Mercury) who took the gold (Leo) in the recent past (Mercury recently turned retrograde). And it’s a revolutionary kind of venture, apropos of Mars spurring off the Uranus-Pluto square this past week.

Hauksson’s job description includes investigating “all suspicion of fraud and offences committed before 2009,” and then to “bring the lawsuits against the suspects to court ourselves.” This is a totally new method which allows the investigators to follow the case carefully, in order to compete with well-funded and well-prepared defense attorneys.

Hauksson oversees a crew of 100 or so researchers who cross international borders with full cooperation from the respective governments. By comparison, the American way of dealing with bankers who contributed to the recession looks more like the gang who couldn’t shoot straight, or rather, leaving the foxes in charge of the hens.

Obama calls Romney ‘Outsourcer-in-Chief’

At least President Obama is having fun with this: The Boston Globe has revealed that Mitt Romney continued as the head of Bain Capital for three years after he has been claiming he’d resigned. His name appeared on SEC filings in those years, leading him to claim this week that he had “resigned retroactively.”

These three years, 1999-2002, coincide with a phase in time when Bain was apparently sending many of the jobs in companies it had bought (and in some cases, whole corporations) overseas, boosting up profits for the job creators. In prior statements, Romney has claimed to have worked at Bain for 25 years, which would have to include 1999-2002 since his starting point is not in disupte.

Like many of Romney’s stances on issues, his story about this period has evolved over time. Christopher Rowland, Washington bureau chief for The Boston Globe, said in an interview on Democracy Now! that Romney’s departure “was really billed as a part-time leave of absence in 1999. He left suddenly to go to Salt Lake and run the Olympics.” Toward the end of his run for governor in 2002, he was confronted about Bain’s outsourcing policies, which is when he said, “Hey, I wasn’t there. I left in 1999.”

Mayer to Birth a New Yahoo? Just Google It.

On the same day that Yahoo announced it had hired Google executive Marissa Mayer to be its next CEO, Mayer herself announced that she and her husband are expecting their first baby in the fall. A Gemini (quick-witted multitasker) with an Aquarius Moon (technology oriented, and thinks of the world as one big family), Mayer made waves in Silicon Valley as Google’s first female executive. She is said to be responsible for that search engine’s simple, white home page (though she was just 24 when that page was introduced, so it probably wasn’t her).

Marissa Mayer.

Given that only 20 Fortune 500 companies have female chief executives, and out of those, only three are still in their childbearing years, many are seeing this move as a coup for women everywhere who interview for jobs while pregnant. “We finally have reached a point where a woman could be pregnant and stepping into that kind of big job,” said Sharon Vosmek, chief executive of Astia, a nonprofit group that advises female entrepreneurs.

“Her age makes it exciting, not just because she’s quite youthful but because she’s also in this prime stage of life when so many women feel they have to step out or step back.”

Powering Mayer’s ascent through the Google ranks has been her natal Mars-Pluto opposition (from Aries to Libra). That aspect also spells radical collaboration: people who can stand up to her power get to work with her.

Others in the business world see Mayer’s pregnancy as irrelevant to the question of whether or not she can turn Yahoo around in its struggle against Google’s supremacy. This is her first child; most first-time mothers in our post-extended-family era have no clue what this is like, though she’s in a position to hire a team of nannies to do all of the staying up all night for her. But money can’t buy the love new parents feel for their children, nor bribe away the guilt of having to leave a new baby to go back to work. Hopefully Mayer can use her Gemini and Libra placements to keep it all in balance.

Planet Waves monthly horoscopes provide a broader perspective that surveys the themes of the coming month and often, the weeks that follow. The revised version of the Planet Waves July monthly horoscope (originally published Friday, June 22) was published Saturday June 23. Inner Space for July was published on Tuesday, June 26. The most recent Moonshine horoscope by Genevieve Hathaway (for July) was published on July 3. Please note a change in the publishing pattern. For a few months we were publishing the monthly horoscope on Wednesday evenings, but that was proving to be too confusing. We have shifted the monthly to be incorporated into the Friday issue after the Sun has entered a new sign; Inner Space still publishes on Tuesdays. — efc

Planet Waves FM: Cancer New Moon + Elisa Novick part two

In this week’s edition of Planet Waves FM, I cover the New Moon and the cardinal grand cross. We take a song break, offered up by an English recording artist named Pasco Tom who is a magnificent guitarist and plays a rather special instrument.

Elisa during Tree Love: The Heart of the Forest. Photo by Eric.

Then, you can listen to part two of my conversation with Elisa Novick. By the way I have a habit of pronouncing her name with an E like in grEEn when it’s more like elle-lisa. Speaking of, you may contact her via her website — Thriving Planet.

Elisa happens to need a Word Press maven to help her answer questions about things like style sheets. Any volunteers out there? Please contact me directly — at dreams@planetwaves.net.

Note — the recording is in stereo. If you can only hear one of us, turn on your other speaker or put your system into mono mode.
Oh — and you can listen to part one of our conversation here. And here is the discussion from October 2011. One last, in case the tree thing gets you going, here’s our article from Beltane wherein Elisa opens up that topic. Note the PDF that’s associated with the article — you’ll love it.

Here is your current edition in the Old Player (an antique Flash player that works better for some people) and remember, you can find us on iTunes.

Planet Waves

Friday, July 20, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #911 | Eric’s Zodiac Sign Descriptions

Late Cancer Birthdays

As the Sun makes its way across the last degrees of your sign, it makes a powerful aspect to a planet that hardly ever gets mentioned, and which doesn’t even have a name — 1992 QB1. For those born in the last days of Cancer (approximately July 19 through 22), this point is square your Sun, and the message is one of making contact with the deepest layers of who you are. I call the process of 1992 QB1 “coupling” — not in the sense of getting married or hooking up, but of encountering who you are deep within yourself, and bonding with your inner being. This encounter might feel like meeting yourself for the first time. Potentially this will emerge from a sense of struggle, like you’re backed into a corner — then you get to pass through a kind of bridge within yourself and have that inner meeting. One theme is sexual: to some degree we’re all alienated from ourselves, particularly as concerns our sexuality. One of the most pronounced, and unique, themes of QB1 is healing that alienation, which is another way of saying seeing ourselves and making peace with who we are, deep beneath any layers of guilt, shame or scarring. Feel for that healing impulse, and spend some time naked looking in a mirror.

Early Leo Birthdays

The Sun’s ingress into your sign Sunday comes with a reminder to be aware of three themes in your life, however they may manifest: alcohol, avoidance and devotion. Run through each of these themes and note the progress you’ve made since your last birthday. Personally I am of the belief that intoxicating substances (as they are often called) play a vital role in human consciousness. While many opt for strict rules or, alternately, overindulgence, I advocate cultivating a sense of fully conscious appropriateness. Terrence McKenna has suggested that it was psychedelic mushrooms that spurred pre-historic humanoids into divine or cosmic consciousness. We have all noticed that people have a desire to transcend, though what often happens is that this healthy tendency is captured by the impulse to avoid. Now that we live in a culture where everything is a drug (and usually, a crude one, designed as a numbing influence), we have a hard time locating the boundaries, and adjusting them as necessary. Perhaps the bigger question, then, is what gets you to transcend your ideas about who you are? What do you do that liberates you from your known mental and emotional tendencies, and shifts your perception into a new vision of yourself and the world? For all Leos, though particularly for those born in late July, this will be a central theme of your coming solar year.

Note — I plan to have your 2012 solar return report done early next week.

Aries (March 20-April 19) — You have the gift of healing, though you may not think of it that way. Yet an unusual event or development in your life may help you understand how this works. All healing involves release from the past. Often it happens when we reach a point where there seem to be no viable options — and then suddenly one manifests. You could say that the process begins with refusing to admit that something is a ‘no win’ situation. The sense of a trap is an illusion, and it’s the one that you have to see through — though it’s also a hint that you’re close to the solution. Then, ask for help from your higher power. Another thing to remember is that healing comes from within. If the healing situation is about you, then that connection would be from within you. If you’re assisting someone else, the connection that resolves the situation comes from within them, and that’s where you need to look for it. In other words, remember to focus on an inner relationship no matter who is involved.

Hello Aries — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Taurus (April 19-May 20) — You may be feeling the desire to cut loose — to do all the things you might not ordinarily do, because your boundaries are too firm (or said less politely, because you’re wound a bit too tight to try). Remember that this is an emotional impulse rather than, say, an intellectual one. Tapping into it will require that you let go of one of your ideas about what it means to be safe — or rather, one of your false ideas. People make up a lot of ritualistic notions about what protects them, ranging from their lucky T-shirt to not having sex before the third date. Try to be mindful of when you’re leaning on something like this. There’s also something about the fear of consequences based on a past situation that seemed similar. Yet does it really apply? And were the consequences that bad? Anyway — all of this may end up being academic, as you follow an impulse to set yourself free. Remember to keep some condoms and the number of a taxicab company in your pocket.

Gemini (May 20-June 21) — You seem to be brooding over something when, by all rights, your life should be going pretty well. The central issue seems to be a struggle over something that’s shaken your confidence in yourself. I would ask, however, whether it was your actual confidence that was shaken — or your false confidence. I know that it’s not typical to think, Wow, that sequence of events really took a toll on my false confidence, but if you ask me, that’s the basic scenario. One aspect of this is doubting how smart you are, or how useful your knowledge really is. You would go a long way through clarifying those questions. You will go further by developing and deepening your mind. By this I mean reading and writing. Modern society’s concept of intellectual nutrition is the equivalent of high fructose corn syrup. This isn’t good for anyone, but you in particular need more — and you need it now. You need to read, you need to write, and I suggest you do so daily: not about yourself, but about the worldly subjects that interest you the most. Then, you’ll figure out how smart you really are.

Cancer (June 21-July 22) — Recent events have served to level the playing field of your life, giving you a more accurate perception of who has what power, and why. One result is that you’ve figured out you’re more influential than you think, which is a good thing because we’re talking about your existence. This would be a good time to consider any additional encumbrances that you have. It no longer serves you to be carrying around all of the unfinished business of the past — or to live with the feeling that you are. While you may not be able to resolve everything, all at once, there are one or two core issues that bind together nearly everything that troubles you. Over the next few days you will be able to recognize what these issues are and how they influence everything else. By focusing on what’s most important, you’ll be able to unravel what has seemed like a knot with no beginning or end. One clue I can offer is that this involves your sexual confidence. This question holds the key to your self-esteem, and your ability to see others at eye level.

Hello Cancer — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed). Your Cancer birthday reading is ready! It includes more than hour of astrology plus a tarot reading, and has been wildly popular (also great for Cancer rising people). Use this link to order.

Leo (July 22-Aug. 23) — What is the role of jealousy in your life? The question comes up right around when the Sun enters your birth sign this weekend. There seem to be two competing forces at work: the desire to include as many people as possible, and the desire to exclude whoever you don’t really like. Said another way, one energy source is guiding you to be open, loving and experimental and another energy source is saying, take control. These are incompatible, and you may be having some trouble figuring out which is the trustworthy one. If you set aside the subject matter and just sniff the energy, it will be a lot more obvious what to choose. Also, notice that you may be dealing with a prejudice about someone or something, rooted in a recent past experience. If you let that judgment go, you will find this situation a lot easier to understand. As for jealousy, how would you live if you and the people close to you were immune? Tell yourself the truth — what would you do?

Hello Leo — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed). Note — Eric plans to have your 2012 solar return report done early next week.

Virgo (Aug. 23-Sep. 22) — I know it’s the peak of summer where most of my readers are, and that’s not exactly good for motivation — though you’re in a point in your life when it’s time to make serious progress on your professional development. You may be doubting this very thing, or be caught in some kind of paradoxical thought-loop about what you want to do, what you don’t want to do, and what you need to do. I have mentioned before that you tend to have a kind of double life where your career is concerned; that fact alone leads you to waste time wondering what to do. I suggest you set aside that mostly intellectual debate and start making some progress toward one actual goal. If you cannot decide what is the most important thing, work on one thing that you know is meaningful toward you, and stay focused on it till your birthday — then re-evaluate. The thing you choose to pursue may be a new inspiration that emerges from owning up to a fear lurking in the back of your mind. Pay attention — this could set you going in a very interesting direction.

Hello Virgo — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Libra (Sep. 22-Oct. 23) — There is a difference between justice and revenge, and now is the time to sort that out. You seem to be angry at something or someone — perhaps a situation where a partner is playing it so cool that you can see your breath even in the afternoon heat. It’s important that you keep expressing your feelings, to someone you trust who is willing to listen and give honest feedback. You’re running the risk of your anger building up over the next few weeks, then bursting out suddenly — all in all, an unhealthy scenario. This isn’t necessary, if you can stay in contact with your feelings. Look for opportunities to vent pressure before you find yourself in a spot so tight you don’t know what to do with yourself. ‘Venting’ would include creative expression, sexual expression, some form of physical activity and — probably more important than anything — sharing how you feel in a safe place with someone you trust is objective and has no agenda for you.

Hello Libra — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 22) — Your current situation is presenting you with a test of your leadership abilities. That translates to putting to work a skill set that includes communication, negotiation and psychology. The first step is going to be sorting out the motives of everyone involved (including your own). Then you need to go one level deeper and understand the insecurities of everyone involved (including yours). Basically, there’s a risk of those insecurities taking over the situation, unless someone can see through that and sort things out. That would be you. Now, you won’t be any good at understanding the motives and the insecurities of others unless you understand your own, so that’s the place to start. You also need to be the one who holds the overall goal clearly in mind. One last thing — for the foreseeable future, beware of the involvement of alcohol in the workplace, and among anyone in the company after work. Pay attention to this. Clarity is not optional.

Hello Scorpio — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Sagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 22) — A partner or friend may be exceptionally reactive over the next few days, and I suggest you avoid doing what aggravates them. I am not suggesting you walk on eggshells — only avoid doing what you know will work against everyone. That said, you cannot control anyone else and you may simply need to back away and allow them to have whatever kind of reaction or response they are going to have. In that case, your patience and willingness to make space for them will be helpful. For whatever reason you seem to present some difficult challenges for this person. You put them in contact with some of the things they fear in themselves the most — though if they can get past that layer, their experience of you will be an actual experience of spiritual growth. Be patient — and practice the very flexibility and open-mindedness that you keep insisting they show to you.

Hello Sagittarius — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 20) — Make sure that fairness is on top of your list of things to aspire to over the next week or so. You want to be fair, and also give the impression of being so. Do not seem arbitrary. Include as many people in your decisions as you can. It’s a fact of your situation that you must take charge, though there are several ways to do that. Particularly in the business world, we live in a time of power exercised for its own sake — and you now have the power to replace that with something better. I suggest you apply your political skills and think for the future. Know who your best allies are, and put them to work for you. You’re approaching a point where you will need to make a decision where you may not have the flexibility to be as open as you do now, and the goodwill and trust that you build over the next few weeks will help you significantly when this time comes.

Hello Capricorn — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) — There’s a strong emphasis on getting clear in your relationships, and this will come into focus starting Sunday when the Sun enters your opposite sign Leo. Until then, I suggest you focus your energies on getting clear with yourself, while you have the time and space to do so — or rather, the inclination. You’re aware of needing to work through something deep that’s about you and nobody else — and stepping into taking action. It’s too easy to project this inner situation into a relationship, then lose track of what’s really going on with you. There’s something in your chart that suggests you’re moving beyond treating your relationships like a drug, or a kind of religious cult experience where you are the devotee. This is a matter of power — or you could say it’s about owning your power. It’s essential to maintain awareness of the difference between the idea and the reality. If you’re trying to manage your feelings (or those of someone else) with avoidance of any kind, that is not the reality.

Hello Aquarius — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20) — The Sun’s annual trek through Leo is your invitation to focus on two things — your healing needs, and getting your work in order. Both are so fundamental to your wellbeing that you have the ability to set the tone for the rest of your solar year by focusing yourself on these two basic goals. Here’s a short sketch of some goals indicated by the astrology: First, I suggest you do a review of the role of any drugs or substances in your life, from tobacco to drugs to alcohol to prescription meds. Assess the degree to which they harm or help you. Second, there’s a question about balancing work and recreational time. Pisces is not only a productive powerhouse sign — you draw a good amount of self-esteem from getting the job done well. Yet you can take this a bit too far sometimes, and now is the time to balance that out. Finally, there is a question of balance in your relationships. The scales of give and take don’t seem to be level. The time to correct these situations is sooner rather than later.

Hello Pisces — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Moon in a Grand Cross: An Edgy Tuesday

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Dear Friend and Reader:

I’m here with a short note about today’s astrology. At the moment the Moon is in Cancer (sensitive, receptive, moody), making many aspects to planets you may be familiar with: the Uranus-Pluto square, which currently includes Mars in Libra. Mars, Uranus and Pluto are now in a very close alignment — and today the Moon is aspecting all of these planets at once.

This is emotionally edgy astrology. I would not be surprised if even the most level-headed person was feeling out of sorts, reactive, pissed off or sad today.

You can also harness this energy and focus it, though that will require some mental override, just as we’re at the beginning of a Mercury retrograde. It is an option, though it will take clarity and honoring the values that matter to you the most (signified by Mercury in Leo). Borrowing some common sense from A Course in Miracles, remember that what matters matters, and what doesn’t matter does not.

The aspects are peaking now and the sensation associated with them doesn’t start to cool down a bit until later today, though where the emotions are involved, the settling down period can be longer. Here are a couple of other elements in the sequence as it unfolds over the next day or so.

Soon after the Moon passes through the cardinal grand cross, it trines Chiron in Pisces (water sign to water sign). This provides an opening for healing. That might come in the form of figuring out what was really bothering you, making amends, opening up emotionally where you were previously responding by shutting down, or finding yourself in smoother waters. Do your best to pass that forward.

Chiron in Pisces is involved; music will help.

Also remember that the Moon is at the end of its monthly cycle — the New Moon is late Wednesday night or early Thursday morning in most of our readership areas (Thursday at 12:24 am EDT). This suggests that a cycle of experience is coming to a close. Work out your emotions, wrap up your business and get ready to invoke a new vision.

While you’re at it, make sure you get enough food, air, water and human contact. Spend some time at home; we’re talking about the Cancer New Moon here.

See you with a regular edition on Friday morning.

With love,

PS — don’t miss part 2 of my interview with Elisa Novick tonight on Planet Waves FM, available on Daily Astrology & Adventure.

Who Was Woody Guthrie?

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This week’s article includes an audio presentation on the life and music of Woody Guthrie. It includes an interview with Guthrie, plus 11 songs, with guest appearances by Bob Dylan, George Harrison, U2 and others. It’s downloadable and can be played on any kind of device. — efc

Dear Fellow Traveler:

Who was Woody Guthrie, really?

I ask this acknowledging how little we know about the human experience — where we come from, where we are, the true history of our planet, and what the purpose of our journey here is. One thing we can say for sure is that we experience considerable adversity here, and that there’s often a reluctance by many people to offer our support to those who are struggling.

Woodrow Wilson “Woody” Guthrie.

We do a lot of turning the other way. We do a lot of pretending that this or that is not my problem, it’s your problem. We tend to see ourselves as separate from the people around us, preferring to emphasize what’s different rather than what we have in common — and we suffer for it.

For that reason, we need messengers, and from time to time, one shows up and we actually listen to what they have to say. Woody Guthrie, who would be 100 years old on Saturday, came to teach us something about our experience here, and how we can open our hearts and minds to the people we might not notice, or prefer not to notice. And amazingly, many people noticed. By the time of his premature death of a rare genetic disorder in 1967, he was a well-respected figure in American music, and considered the progenitor of American folk tradition, the inspiration for many musicians to write their own protest songs, and a source of encouragement for many activists to speak up against injustice.

In his human form, Woody was a poet, singer, songwriter and author who collected songs from the back alleys and backwoods of the United States traveling among freed slaves and their children, and farmers displaced from their land by foreclosure. He lived among Indians, hillbillies and city folk — all the while collecting songs and their endless variants.

It’s the soul of Woody Guthrie that does something a lot deeper, embodying an authenticity and selflessness that seems to be coming from just a bit deeper than the usual place, or maybe a bit beyond the world as we think of it.

Woody Guthrie in New York City, where he seemed to be very much at home — living in Brooklyn (right near the beach), Manhattan and Staten Island at different times.

Yet Woody was truly a man of this world and of the American experience. He was born in Okemah, Oklahoma on July 14, 1912 — on the day that the French Revolution is celebrated. In the spirit of that revolution, Guthrie understood the struggle against economic inequity and the way in which the game seems to be rigged against a fair outcome. Woody was an example of what it means to speak up for what is right, or simply what is true.

His travels took him to New York, where he lived in Brooklyn, Manhattan and Staten Island, and where he wrote his most famous song — ‘This Land is Your Land’ — in Pete Seeger’s kitchen, outside the town of Beacon, along the Hudson River.

Woody’s story is best told in music, and I’ve prepared a special edition of Planet Waves FM which includes some of his songs, a 1944 interview with Woody from BBC radio, versions of his music performed by contemporary artists, and my commentary. I also take a look at Woody’s astrology, giving a few other details than the ones I cover in this article. One theme of the audio presentation is how the folk tradition evolves from one generation to the next. To demonstrate this I play covers of Woody songs by such notables as Bruce Springsteen and U2.

I don’t think Woody would have been too surprised to see the way that the American experiment turned out. All of the issues he was writing about in the 1930s and 1940s are the same ones we’re facing today: economic struggle, banks running out of control, the profit motive driving everything, the stock market being little other than a casino where addicts gamble away the wealth of the country, people being foreclosed out of their homes, and one war after the next.

But he might be very surprised to see the way his music endured. His son Arlo once said that when his dad was in the late stages of Huntington’s disease, he taught him to play ‘This Land is Your Land,’ just to be sure that someone would remember it. Well, we all do.

“This Machine Kills Fascists” blazing off of Woody’s guitar, as ever. Photo courtesy of Woody Guthrie Archives.

As you’ll hear Bruce Springsteen explain in the audio presentation, ‘This Land’ was written as an angry song, a reply to Irving Berlin’s pompous ‘God Bless America’.

Of the many comments I’ve read about Woody Guthrie this week, Chris Hedges best sums him and his mission.

“Cultures that endure carve out a protected space for those who question and challenge national myths. Artists, writers, poets, activists, journalists, philosophers, dancers, musicians, actors, directors and renegades must be tolerated if a culture is to be pulled back from disaster. Members of this intellectual and artistic class, who are usually not welcome in the stultifying halls of academia where mediocrity is triumphant, serve as prophets.”

He continues, “They are dismissed, or labeled by the power elites as subversive, because they do not embrace collective self-worship. They force us to confront unexamined assumptions, ones that, if not challenged, lead to destruction. They expose the ruling elites as hollow and corrupt. They articulate the senselessness of a system built on the ideology of endless growth, ceaseless exploitation and constant expansion. They warn us about the poison of careerism and the futility of the search for happiness in the accumulation of wealth.”

And Chris concludes, “They make us face ourselves, from the bitter reality of slavery and Jim Crow to the genocidal slaughter of Native Americans to the repression of working-class movements to the atrocities carried out in imperial wars to the assault on the ecosystem. They make us unsure of our virtue. They challenge the easy clichés we use to describe the nation — the land of the free, the greatest country on earth, the beacon of liberty — to expose our darkness, crimes and ignorance. They offer the possibility of a life of meaning and the capacity for transformation.”

Where do we find this in Woody Guthrie’s chart? Let’s take a look. His birth time is not known; the chart we have is a proposed rectification, wherein I give him Sagittarius — the sign of the traveler — in the ascendant.

This is my proposed rectification of Woody Guthrie’s natal chart, giving him Sagittarius rising — a visionary, a teacher and a traveler. Woody’s strong Cancer signature mimics the United States Sibly chart, which also has many planets in Cancer in the 8th house of shared resources — “this land is my land, this land is your land.”

I’ve oriented the chart with Jupiter (the teacher and benefactor) rising, as well as Juno (a champion of social justice) in the ascendant as well. I’ve put Vesta, the keeper of the flame, as the most elevated planet (in the audio, you will hear what his daughter Nora has to say about coal holders, the members of the tribe who carry the burning ember to the next campsite).

Woody was born with many planets in the sign Cancer, the sign of home. You could say he was an idealist, with all of those planets, including the Sun, the Moon and Venus, clustered around Neptune. Or you could say that his passion for life and for humanity was driven by a kind of mysticism that was veiled by his plain talk and somewhat aloof personality.

Yet just beneath that somewhat scratchy, sleep-with-his-boots-on layer was the sustained passion that can only come with strong water placements. Those include Chiron in Pisces, which he has square Jupiter — one of the aspects that points to a quest for social justice. These social justice markers show up all over his chart — for example his square between Juno (usually associated with marriage, though also an indicator of social consciousness) conjunct Jupiter and square Chiron. Though Woody had three wives, his first love was standing up for humanity.

He has Mercury in Leo (which has returned for a long stay in that sign at the time of his 100th birthday) suggesting that his words are as good as gold — or perhaps an example of the only true gold. His Mars and Ceres in Leo propose that maybe the only other truly useful form of gold is food.

We need Woody Guthrie today. We need his perception, his sense of fairness and most of all his willingness to speak up against injustice. We need his example of how necessary it is for those who feel the calling to tell the truth.

Fortunately, nearly all of his words and music survive, though more than that, the thing they would speak to in the human spirit is alive within each of us. As his contemporary, novelist John Steinbeck said of him, “There is the will of a people to endure and fight against oppression. I think we call this the American spirit.”

In case you’re inclined to confuse the American spirit with Bain Capital, repealing ‘Obamacare’ or the local shopping mall, I suggest you investigate the Declaration of Independence and see what you find there. Or, you can listen to the magnificent words and music of Woody Guthrie, which I’ve put together in a 75-minute presentation. That page includes instructions for listening on any kind of device, including burning to CD.

It’s an honor to share this with you, and I’ve learned a lot diving into Woody’s music and legacy the past week putting it together.

Lovingly,

Mercury Stations Retrograde This Weekend

We’re about to begin the fourth inner planet retrograde of 2012 — Mercury stations retrograde in Leo at 10:16 pm EDT Saturday. This will be an eventful retrograde because Mercury will cover the early degrees of Leo, putting it into aspect with many planets — Venus, Chiron, Uranus, Pluto, Ceres, Jupiter, the lunar nodes and Neptune. Then on Aug. 8 it will turn around and aspect most of those planets again, moving in direct motion.

Composite image of Mercury by MESSENGER spacecraft in 2008. Yellow impact craters from asteroids show freshly ejected material; craters with blue show that fresh material was ejected from beneath the surface, indicating volcanoes. Photo: NASA.

This weekend we also have a lot of hot activity on the cardinal cross. The Sun in Cancer makes a conjunction to Varuna, square to Eris and square to Saturn. This may feel like figuring out you’re hemmed into a situation you want to get out of, but are not quite sure how to do it. The thing to remember is, this has gone on for a while, and even if you decide you want to take action, it would be better to avoid that the weekend Mercury is stationing; rather than lurch, spend the next few days sorting out the issues, and see where you stand by the middle of next week. Mercury stationing retrograde tends to shake out information, which you will then need to evaluate.

Additionally, Mars in Libra is now very close to a square to Pluto in Capricorn and opposition to Uranus in Aries. That will only add to the tension, and it could precipitate events prematurely — definitely keep your cool if the pressure is on. There is a path of correct action; let the astrology feed your courage and resolve while you use your mind to figure out what is best for you to do — and please, aim high.

Many aspects means many points of contact, and where Mercury is involved, plenty to think (and talk) about. With Mercury retrograde, the subject matter becomes inwardly focused and will tend to have an orientation on resolving the past. You may find yourself reviewing the past few months, reconsidering how you feel or what your opinion is, and making some decisions about what you want. The thing is, when deciding what you want, it helps to make that from among choices that you really want.

Leo is the sign of gold and the gold standard: the reference by which we measure material value, and by metaphor, spiritual value. In its conceptual form (as an astrological sign) it could represent both, and the retrograde could be a valuable time to sort out some of your material values in our time of profound change, and what we think of as economic crisis. It would be helpful if we acknowledged how much of that economic crisis really amounts to a crisis of values.

That’s to say: what’s really important to us, and do we do anything about it? Do we see our spending habits as a reflection of our values? Do we recognize that we exert power every time we direct our cash flow? Mercury will be trekking through the central aspect pattern that’s influencing all of us right now — the Uranus-Chiron-Neptune-Pluto configuration. Mercury influences our individual thought patterns, and now it’s in a long phase of contact with something much bigger than any individual. This is a fine opportunity to consider where we really stand and an invitation to change our minds about what we learn.

The Cancer New Moon is just past midnight EDT on Thursday, July 19.

Fukushima Children Get Lifetime Radiation Dose

A Japanese study has found some children who live near the Fukushima nuclear plant have received lifetime doses of radiation to their thyroid glands, one of the organs that’s most sensitive to radiation. Meanwhile, radiation continues to dump into the Pacific Ocean, many fish are migratory, and all the world’s oceans are interconnected.

Scientists from Japan’s Institute of Radiological Sciences used existing government data to measure the internal radiation exposure of more than 1,000 Fukushima children, who were exposed after the nuclear plants melted down after an earthquake and tsunami. The Japanese government has been claiming that more than half of the children had zero exposure, though the independent study found that on average they did receive thyroid gland doses of internal radiation. Several children were judged to have received an equivalent lifetime dose to the thyroid. But the government says it does not plan to notify the parents out of fear of creating anxiety.

Jill Stein: Green Party Candidate for President is Earthy Taurus

We’re used to elections being a choice between bad and worse — which is a good way to maintain cynicism and disinterest in the political system. The United States does have parties other than the Republicrats, though you rarely hear of them. One is the Green party, which for years was represented by Ralph Nader as its candidate for president. Nader is no longer running, and someone named Jill Stein is the presumptive nominee.

Jill Stein, a Green Party candidate for president, during her campaign for governor of Massachusetts in 2002. Photo by Michael Manning.

Stein was born in Chicago and is now a resident of Massachusetts, where she’s run for a number of different offices (including governor) but so far has only won a seat on the Lexington town board. Her platform includes the Green New Deal, which includes Americans having the right to a living wage and a clean environment. Stein would seem to have the astrology of a Green Party candidate — she has the Sun in Taurus in an exact conjunction to retrograde Mercury — she is someone who can think for herself. And she has Saturn, Juno and Mars in Virgo, suggesting an authentic motivation to care for the Earth. Like Woody Guthrie, she has Jupiter square Chiron, one mark of a true social crusader.

In an interview with the organization PR Watch, she said recently, “Of the trillion dollars we spend [on health care] every year, 75 percent of that is spent on chronic diseases that are preventable for half the cost. So I would just add as ancillaries to that; forgiving student debt and making public higher education free is a key part of this, and of course downsizing the military and bringing the troops home as well.”

A New York Times interview with Jill Stein in February 2012 stated her criticism of President Obama. When asked if the president is deserving of credit, Stein stated “As we found on issue after issue — the war, reappointing George Bush’s secretary of defense, sticking to George Bush’s timeline on Iraq, expanding the war, expanding the drone wars all over the place. And how about bringing Wall Street in, the guys who created the problem, among his first appointments. It was pretty clear right then that this was going to be business as usual on steroids. We’re certainly not more secure, more equitable, more healthy or safer internationally, with what Obama has brought.”

On July 11, 2012, Stein selected anti-poverty activist Cheri Honkala as her running mate for the Green vice-presidential nomination. Though it’s hard to think of this as being more than a token gesture, use your imagination and consider what would happen if these women had a voice on the national stage — even as candidates who are taken seriously.

Report on Penn State a Study in Enabling Behavior

One thing I’ve noticed working with many clients unraveling their childhood sex abuse is that there’s generally someone in the household who knows what’s going on. How is it possible that a stepfather can abuse a child in the house for years with the mother home, and the mother has no idea what’s going on? Well, there are a lot of ways this happens, and we found out about many of them with the release of the report on the Penn State scandal by Louis Freeh, a former federal judge and director of the FBI under Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

Minor planet search showing Hebe right in the mix of many planets in the mid-mutable signs, including Pholus and Ixion, which describe a legacy of conduct without the concern for consequences, or what you can think of as amorality — a sign of our times.

In a household, the person who serves as the enabler is just as responsible for what happens to the child as the perpetrator is. The world seems to agree that this is probably true in the case of Penn State as well, though the real test is whether those who helped out will be prosecuted.

I am still researching the report and the associated astrology, though in simple terms the document — released in Philadelphia at 9:00 am on Thursday, July 12, 2012 (according to the university’s website) — concluded that everyone knew, and did nothing out of concern about bad publicity for the university’s powerhouse football program. Last month Jerry Sandusky was convicted of 45 counts of child sexual abuse, most of which occurred in his home or in Penn State facilities.

When studying the chart of an abuse situation, one of the first points to check is asteroid Hebe, the cupbearer. Hebe’s glyph includes a triangle, which Martha Lang Wescott reminds astrologers to think of as the Karpman triangle when they draw the shape — the diagram that helps us understand abuse situations. Though the triangle technically covers victim-persecutor-rescuer, the third position can also include “let me help you” kind of enabling behavior. The helpers in this situation ranged from a top vice president of the university, the police, the director of the athletic program and the famed Joe Paterno, the football team’s coach. There was also a far-reaching conspiracy within the Happy Valley community to make sure that its main bread and butter, and source of its self image — college football — stayed in business. And Sandusky raped most of the kids at home, while his wife was in the house. She says she had no clue.

In the chart, we find Hebe square a troubling outer-planet aspect that’s been developing for years — Pholus (pressure release; addictive situations; multigenerational legacy) conjunct Ixion (amoral conduct; anyone is capable of anything), both in Sagittarius. This conjunction seems to be one of the hallmarks of our times, when we have to figure out again that there’s such a thing as right and wrong. Hebe shows up in aspect to other planets along the Sagittarius/Gemini axis that keep coming up (generally when the Sun passes through a mutable sign).

One thing to understand about abuse situations is that they seem to be fed by the energy of repression — that is, of secrecy, and of sexual energy having little in the way of healthy outlets. Then once the scandal comes out, it seems to open things up but in truth there is little that will hold down sexual energy or discussion of the incident as effectively as public disclosure, which can in turn feed future situations rather than move them in the direction of resolution. It might seem like there is no way out — but there is. We will have more on this issue around the time of the Leo New Moon next month.

About that Safe, Effective MMR Vaccine Everyone Gets

People who refuse to vaccinate their children are often considered a little freaky, as if they’re risking their health and that of every kid in school. But now two former employees of Merck Pharmaceutical, a British multinational, are accusing the drug company of using improper testing methods and falsifying data to make the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine appear highly effective when the opposite is true.

Workers make openings in chicken eggs in preparation for a measles vaccine.

Former Merck virologists Stephen Krahling and Joan Wlochowski say that they “witnessed firsthand the improper testing and data falsification in which Merck engaged to artificially inflate the vaccine’s efficacy findings,” according to Courthouse News Service. The allegations are contained in a 2010 lawsuit, which was confidential until late June. The case has not been decided yet.

In a second lawsuit, a federal anti-trust class action was filed by Chatom Primary Care. Again, according to the Courthouse News Service, “Merck has known for a decade that its mumps vaccine is ‘far less effective’ than it tells the government, and it falsified test results and sold millions of doses of ‘questionable efficacy’, flooding and monopolizing the market.” This is another way of saying that the vaccine ‘works’ as long as it drives in profits for the company (which is just the only definition of ‘works’ in the chemical or pharma industries).

Merck is the only manufacturer licensed by the FDA to sell the mumps vaccine in the United States, and if it could not show that the vaccine was 95 percent effective, it risked losing its lucrative monopoly. Chatom claims that Merck went to great lengths to prop up the bogus figures even though it knew that the attenuated virus from which it created the vaccine had been altered over the years during the manufacturing process, and that the quality of the vaccine had degraded as a result. An attenuated virus is a live virus that’s had its toxicity reduced.

Merck’s response is that none of the lawsuit’s allegations relate to the safety of its products, which avoids the issue of the deception about the product’s effectiveness. This is the same MMR vaccine that has been accused of causing autism, though those claims have not been fully documented. Numerous agencies and organizations have said that there is no relationship between the vaccine and autism — but bigger lies have survived such scrutiny.

Even if Merck’s MMR vaccine were to cause autism, the company is shielded from liability. Dr. Joe Mercola notes that, “Merck lost many billions when their drug, Vioxx, killed tens of thousands of people and was taken off the market in 2004. If any of their vaccines killed similar numbers, or even more, they would not be held liable in damages for a single cent because Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court have completely shielded big drug companies like Merck from civil liability for vaccine injuries and deaths.”

Planet Waves FM: Conversation with Elisa Novick

This week Elisa Novick returns to Planet Waves FM. Elisa is a master healer who has a very interesting story to tell. The program begins with an overview of the current astrology, including Mercury stationing retrograde, Sun square Saturn and a few other points of interest. [Tech note to listeners: the interview is in stereo! If you can only hear one of us talking, connect your other speaker or figure out how to put your system into mono.]

Elisa Novick.

This week’s edition is part one of two is part one of two with Elisa — our whole conversation is about two hours and 15 minutes. In this first segment, we cover the vast topic of learning to listen to your inner spiritual guidance. This is something that nearly everyone seeks and for some reason relatively few people find. Our conversation might make it seem like a more practical matter.

We find out something about how Elisa started off in her spiritual practice and how she got to where she is today (when some of her best friends are what we would call plants!). This is an unusually candid discussion of how much it’s possible to learn, and why you might want to learn it.

As with all things spiritual or which we’re told are spiritual, I suggest you bring your discernment and your curiosity with you. The two work together: if you encounter an idea that you’re questioning, or have a response you’re wondering about, your curiosity and discernment can blend into a light that will allow you to see into places in yourself you haven’t necessarily encountered before.

We last heard from Elisa in an article from our Friday subscriber series, about Beltane — called In Praise of Trees. Don’t miss the really exciting PDF connected to this article. We will be back with part two of this week’s interview next week.

Elisa does private counseling, and she teaches some informative classes. If you can, get to the Hudson Valley for the next Tree Love workshop! You can reach her through her website Thriving Planet. If you’re curious to hear the interview we did back in October, here is the link.

Here is your program in the old player, where you’ll find the full archives of Planet Waves FM and a downloadable zip file. Here is another archive of recent programs (with descriptions).

Enjoy! And please share your thoughts, reflections and any questions you may have on the blog post connected to this edition.

Planet Waves

Friday, July 6, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #910 | Eric’s Zodiac Sign Descriptions

Cancer Birthdays: At the Crossroads of Taking Action

If you have a birthday in the vicinity, you’re at the point of taking action, including after a long delay — though as Mercury stations retrograde you may be feeling hesitant. Don’t let that get in the way of making your decisions about what you want, getting organized and then paying attention for the right moment to take action. There is considerable activity in the cardinal signs (all of them — Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn), which may be giving you the feeling of ‘life coming at you from all directions’ — or alternately, the sensation of getting the parts working together. Though it’s too much to describe in detail here, there are actually two different cardinal cross structures — one involving the Sun square Saturn and the other involving Mars square Pluto and opposite Uranus. Sun square Saturn is your ability to focus the emotional discipline that you need at this time in your life, and also comes with a reminder that the playing field is leveler than you think. You have to try out the game and see how you do. Second is Mars coming into the Uranus-Pluto square — that’s like a fire being lit under your ass, including the emotional strength to take action. This energy can be devoted to any aspect of your life. There are two keys: one is microfocus on your timing. Consider carefully what action you take at any given time. Second is that with so much Mars power, you don’t need to exert much energy — a little less than you think would be sufficient. Guide things more than direct them; focus your energy rather than pushing the river and you will get consistently surprising results through the next year of your life.

Aries (March 20-April 19) — You may feel like you’re backed into an emotional corner, though I strongly suggest you not react that way. Instead, consider what your current circumstances are describing, and ask yourself: is it time to sweat this out, or is it time to make a change? There comes a point when persistent frustration can no longer be considered as something that will pass — especially if the years are passing faster than the situation. The deeper question is, what insecurities stand between you and making a decision? I suggest you be patient and carefully examine all the facts. Make a timeline and see how far back you can trace this. Then I suggest you design a plan that will take you through the end of August to implement. Timing is everything; the pressure you may be feeling now is likely to increase over the next week, and with Mercury stationing retrograde over the weekend, you really want make clear decisions with your mind rather than your emotions.

Hello Aries — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Taurus (April 19-May 20) — Over the next week you may get a taste of how complex an emotional situation is, though the outer circumstances are truly the superficial layer. When you start asking yourself the right questions, you will discover that the real subject involves your self-esteem. A central question is not how much someone else values you — rather, it’s how much do you value yourself, and are you able to live and breathe that value? As you move through the events of the next week, quietly ask yourself that question over and over again. You can also inquire whether you feel like you’re associating with people who really do honor the best things about you. While you’re doing that, it would be healthy to inquire whether you notice and appreciate the qualities that others offer you. Sincere and openly expressed gratitude is a remarkably accurate measure of self-esteem.

Gemini (May 20-June 21) — It’s time you recognize the value of your words. Indeed, I suggest you consider that what you say and how you say it are your most precious assets. If you were to keep that firmly in mind, you might say less, and you would ensure that any promise you make is something you’re fully prepared to honor. While Mercury is retrograde for the next few weeks, I suggest you consider any commitments you have that you haven’t come through on yet, and make a plan for what to do about them. You can renegotiate rather than renege; the most vital thing is that you have a clear understanding with whomever you have an arrangement, or with anyone to whom you’ve made a promise. If you go through your life systematically and settle your affairs with people, you will proceed differently when making commitments in the future. And remember — everything you say is a kind of promise.

Cancer (June 21-July 22) — You may be feeling hemmed in or backed into an emotional corner. If that’s true, it’s essential that you keep your cool and take stock of your situation before you react or even respond. What you may be perceiving as a negative situation could easily be an opportunity for cooperation, lending itself just as well to a creative response. That’s all a matter of perspective — and how confident you are. I would propose a litmus test for your own life: if you have options, you’re safe, and your situation is workable. If you don’t like the options you have, be creative and think of new ones. If nothing else, the astrology of the coming week or so is designed to spur you into action on some of your most meaningful goals. This can feel like having a fire lit under your ass, or it can feel like responding to the call of destiny; the choice is pretty much all yours.

Hello Cancer — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed). Your Cancer birthday reading is ready! It includes more than hour of astrology plus a tarot reading, and has been wildly popular (also great for Cancer rising people). Use this link to order.

Leo (July 22-Aug. 23) — Mercury has been in your sign since June 25, and it will be there through Aug 31 — longer than two months, owing to the fact that it’s about to be retrograde for the next 24 days. If I may suggest something bold, this is an excellent opportunity for you to use and develop your mind. You would be amazed how rarely this happens. If you are doing something and you encounter resistance, stop and use your mind. One thing to avoid right now is anything with the feeling of pushing a rock up a hill. If you want to accomplish something but you feel like you lack the confidence, stop and think. If you do, you’ll notice that you have more than enough experience to achieve what you want — if you remember to use what you know. The extent to which so many people forget or refuse to keep their mind in the ON position is astounding, and you will benefit handsomely from remembering.

Hello Leo — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Virgo (Aug. 23-Sep. 22) — One key to happiness is learning from your mistakes. This is a skill in itself, and indeed it may even qualify as a talent. The extent to which you master that skill reflects how serious you are about living your life fully. Learning is one of the best ways to save time. When you have a reason to learn something, do it well: truly get a grasp of the subject matter. At the moment, I suggest you slow down where a career or professional matter is concerned, pause making decisions, and study your relationship to authority. That means people who seem to have authority in your life (including benefactors) and situations where you’re personally responsible for something. The lesson? How not to be guided by your insecurities, or said another way, how not to be afraid of yourself, or your power to make decisions. If you make a mistake, figure out what went wrong, and start over.

Hello Virgo — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Libra (Sep. 22-Oct. 23) — First of two thoughts: I suggest you consider the value of your image. It may actually be worth something, and more meaningfully, worth something to you. How you’re perceived actually has a bearing on your life. You may be involved in a series of adjustments to make sure that how you present yourself to others is consistent with who you actually are; your current solar chart is a study in sincerity. Being authentic saves energy — a lot of it, too. Second: this is the time to appreciate your friends, and let them know how much you care about them. Of all the things or circumstances in the world that have actual meaning, the people who have demonstrated that they’re there for you are at the top of the list. Count yourself among the most fortunate people on Earth if you understand the concept ‘trust’ and if you have even one person you know in your heart is a friend.

Hello Libra — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 22) — You can turn the mental or emotional pressure you’re feeling into a brainstorm. The psychic radar known as astrology looks like you might be stressed, even to the point of panic attacks. Don’t be fooled by the subject matter: remember that energy is energy, and the first skill of the Scorpio Jedi is directing all energy into a constructive, creative or healing force. By all energy, I mean everything from passion to anxiety, from desire to curiosity. The key is going to be remembering this when the energy manifests in some form you would not prefer — and keeping your head on. Meanwhile, I would maintain a good vibes posture. Walk away from arguments. Remind yourself how safe you are (and if you’re not, make a decision), and remember that the light you hold around yourself shines out into the world.

Hello Scorpio — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Sagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 22) — Your life would be a lot easier if you start from the premise that you don’t understand the changes someone else is going through. This will get your past perceptions, opinions and ideas about the relationship out of the way, and grant you the ability to do the one thing that rarely ever happens: to see someone else clearly in this moment. You may seem to be the one that’s changing, though a lot more is going on than that, no matter what anyone else may say or accuse you of. It’s way too easy to go into blame mode when it comes to intimate encounters with others, and you can do yourself a big favor by setting that aside, and noticing when others are doing it to you. In fact, you are changing, someone close to you is changing, and the whole relationship seems to be taking a step into the abyss. This will be less stressful than what you’ve been through recently.

Hello Sagittarius — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 20) — There’s no debate that people are free: both you and the people close to you. This is true no matter how trapped anyone may feel, by whatever they think is trapping them. I suggest you take some time over the next few weeks and consider the agreements you have with others, or what Carolyn Myss calls ‘sacred contracts’. Those are all up for review now, which does not mean cancellation but rather a clear evaluation. Consider the commitments you have to others, the commitments they have to you, and where these promises intersect with your life path. You need to ask some basic questions, such as, does this agreement serve to benefit everyone involved? Under what circumstances was the agreement made? What was its purpose and does your arrangement still serve that purpose now? This is an approximately one-month review phase, so you actually have time to think — and to feel — your way through the questions.

Hello Capricorn — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) — It would be just brilliant if you spent some time hanging out with the idea that sex is an experiment. That’s a way of saying it’s a direct experience, driven by curiosity, which tends to have an outcome that’s uncertain till you get there. Part of the experiment is how the experience changes any of the people involved. When sex is alive within an alive relationship, that state of change is going to be pretty much continuous, and you’re about to get a taste of that. Rather than responding with the famous ‘fixity’ of Aquarius, I suggest you adapt the flexibility of Gemini and the multiple viewpoint property of Mercury. Over the next few weeks you’ll have the ability to look back over the whole story of the relationship, and the potential to work through some of the unresolved material — though as with the rest, I suggest you proceed in the spirit of an experiment.

Hello Aquarius — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20) — Take advantage of any factor you have available to make your work easier and more efficient. The place to pause is when you feel yourself exerting excess effort. The moment you get there, stop and rethink what you’re doing, and how you’re doing it. You may decide that something isn’t necessary; you may discover that you’ve already solved a problem; in some instances, changing the order in which you do a series of tasks will lead to considerably improved efficiency. There’s a deeper theme, though, which is the value of your work. If you really understood how useful what you do is, and how much what you do benefits others, you would think about it differently. You are due for a pay raise, though this isn’t the kind that’s coming from a boss or the accounting department; it’s coming from the recognition of your value, and making a series of adjustments honoring that fact.

Hello Pisces — Eric has written a new description for your sign that you have access to from this link (no password needed).

Pholus the Centaur: Small Cause, Big Effect

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Dear Friend and Reader:

In prior editions of this column I have mentioned Chiron, a planet orbiting our Sun that was discovered in 1977. Chiron, named for one of the wise (as opposed to rogue) centaurs of Greek mythology, addresses matters of holistic healing and is therefore directly related to homeopathy and all forms of alternative medicine. Around the time of Chiron’s discovery, many people were hearing of these modalities for the first time, and the trend has continued to the present day.

In 1992 a second small planet was discovered orbiting our Sun and assigned to the centaur class — called Pholus. Named for another of the wise centaurs, Pholus has different properties from Chiron. Its action is quicker. There is often a connection to curiosity as an emotional state related to this planet, which can seem to drive events forward in an unexpected way. And of all the centaurs, Pholus is the one with the most distinct multigenerational effect. Wherever you see it working, get out the family tree to figure out what’s really going on.

Pholus can address issues of intoxicants or toxins, ranging from the ones intentionally hidden in food (high fructose corn syrup) to the ones that sneak in through various side doors (synthetic hormones such as dioxin or mercury, or Prozac showing up in the municipal drinking water).

One of the astrologers to do early work on this point, my friend Robert von Heeren, came up with one of the most brilliant astrological key phrases I’ve ever worked with. He said that Pholus is the small cause with a big effect. For example, Pholus can represent seemingly minor turns of events that set off bigger developments. It represents the catalytic agent (something used in a trace amount, but indispensable to the reaction). Pholus is often involved when circumstances run out of control, like when pressurized reactions breach the containment structure. It’s also making an appearance as a healing agent in the News Corp scandal.

In the medical art of homeopathy, it seems to be the perfect metaphor. One of the criticisms that people have of homeopathy is that “there isn’t any of the actual stuff in the remedy.” Were you to analyze a potency of arnica, you would not be able to find the arnica. What you get in those little white pellets is the energy picture of arnica. Yes, doctors around the world are rolling their eyes in their heads. But speaking of heads, if they bumped theirs on something, we all know that arnica would help ease the pain and speed the healing process.

Samuel Hahnemann in 1841.

I think of homeopathy as being related to Pholus because it’s the perfect demonstration of the small cause with a big effect. True, that depends on the talent of the practitioner, but one nice thing about homeopathy is that generally the wrong remedy won’t hurt you because it’s not toxic. Samuel Hahnemann way back in the 18th century set out to invent a way to preserve the medicinal qualities of substances but without the negative effects. He was a German doctor who lived from 1775 to 1843.

Then as now, conventional medicine was toxic, and Hahnemann understood this. He considered it so harmful that he quit practicing medicine and supported his family of 11 children as a translator. At the time, he wrote:

My sense of duty would not easily allow me to treat the unknown pathological state of my suffering brethren with these unknown medicines. The thought of becoming in this way a murderer or malefactor towards the life of my fellow human beings was most terrible to me, so terrible and disturbing that I wholly gave up my practice in the first years of my married life and occupied myself solely with chemistry and writing.

Check that out — then as now, doctors were prescribing medicines with toxic effects that they had not studied, which were hurting the patients.

When he was working as a translator Hahnemann became curious about cases of poisoning. He wanted to know the specific symptoms of each case of toxicity he could find. His theory was that the substances that could cause the symptoms could also help resolve them. This was the root of homeopathy — the idea that like cures like. But for that to work safely, he had to invent potentization, which means liberating a substance from its toxic properties through the process of successive dilutions.

The result of this invention was a very small cause with a potentially fantastic effect: healing. When homeopathy works, it doesn’t just resolve the physical issue; the material can be resolved on the emotional and mental levels as well, something that ‘traditional’ medicine can barely conceive of. Yet if a medical theory doesn’t acknowledge the connections, how can it address them?

It turns out that Samuel Hahnemann has Chiron conjunct Pholus in his natal chart. This is a conjunction so rare that it only happens once every 110 years. This is in the sign Capricorn — one of the most dense and grounded signs there is (energetically speaking). It’s about the structure and nature of matter. It’s as if Hahnemann was tapping into the nature of matter itself in inventing his new branch of medicine. Capricorn is also about tradition. With Chiron and Pholus in this sign, you can be sure that he felt a calling to both honor tradition (like cures like is a very old concept) but that also he was in a position to directly alter the tradition of medicine.

This he did, and for that we who value homeopathic remedies are eternally grateful.

Yours lovingly,

PS — Here is a link to an old article of mine — Astrology as Homeopathy. Think of homeopathy as astrology projected onto the physical world, rather than the celestial spheres. They are similar systems working in parallel, and studying one can open your mind to how the other one works.

Cancer 2012

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Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Dec. 14, 2012 #930 | By Eric Francis
You have taken considerable territory in your professional life this year, and even if you don’t feel that way, I assure you that the space is open. The key is balancing being different, innovative and iconoclastic with sufficient grounding that you can count on yourself to get the job done well. Yet there is also something here about recognizing the power that you perceive others to have, and in particular, their power over you. Simply put, most of the time, they have that power because you think they do. The most important thing you can do to ensure your longterm success and happiness is see all the ways in which the world really is built on level ground. I know this can take some careful looking, though mainly it requires maturity. Emphasize the human dimension. All these people around you have one thing in common — they are people. This is the reason they are approachable; it’s why you can get over your habit of being intimidated by talent, reputation or power. You may not have the same potential as everyone you meet, but they can remind you that you have your own potential.

Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Dec. 7, 2012 #929

You can get a lot of work done this week — in fact, you may be able to wrap up everything you have planned for the rest of the year. However, I would encourage you to slow down, prioritize the top most important projects, and focus on quality. That translates to maintaining your intellectual and spiritual impeccability, in a moment when you may be in a minor crisis over doing just that. There’s no irony involved; moving through this territory carefully is the whole point of the astrology you’re under. I can sum it up fairly simply — when in doubt, get real. That is to say, get real about what you’re thinking, what you’re feeling and most of all, what you want. There is a chance that with a little reflection you will see that it has less to do with what you accomplish and more to do with existing with full awareness at the intersection where pleasure meets healing. This is a bold space, and the thing to be bold about is your imagination. Pleasure is healing, and you can allow this idea to soak into everything you touch.

Planet Waves Inner Space Monthly Horoscope for December

The year ends on a passionate note — with an aura of finality and transition. Use this energy to bring to a close what is ready to end, and to rise to the occasion of what you want to create. Once again the story of your life is finding your confidence in the presence of those who seem to outshine you, or have more power. Yet you possess something that is all your own, which is authentic sensitivity. Don’t hide this under any veils of denial — keep your feelings where you can access them. Remember above all that you’re driven by the desire to nourish and care for the world. In that same spirit, make room for others to take care of you. Receive their gifts graciously. Remain open and you will start to see all of the good things in store for you.

Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Nov. 30, 2012 #928

The recent eclipse in the most sensitive angle of your solar chart looks like it stirred up some, well, I was going to say energy, but what I really mean is information. Secrets do not stay secrets forever, and I suggest you celebrate this cosmic truth. The beauty held for you in things being revealed — within yourself, by others or to others — is about being a unified critter. Concealed information splits you into pieces. Divisions within your life and those of the people around you tend to pit you against yourself. In a time when relationships matter to you more than ever, you need to be your own best friend, which means operating with one agenda that is tuned to your own best interests. The eclipse comes with the lasting message that you cannot keep secrets from yourself. You cannot divide your character, and you cannot be anyone other than who you truly are. I think from now on, this learning agenda will be a lot easier.

Planet Waves Monthly Horoscope for December | By Eric Francis
Standing in for Weekly Horoscope #927

The world is your mirror. It is therefore the place to extend any compassion or appreciation that you have discovered on your journey to wholeness. Selflove emerges from your center, though if it’s to be meaningful — indeed, if it exists at all — it will extend beyond you into the gentle embrace of the people around you. One indication that you’re doing this is that you find yourself treating people on equal terms. The usual hierarchies and pecking orders of life give way to the understanding that we are all on the same journey, that we all contribute to one another’s lives, that we all reflect one another. While I am not suggesting that there is absolute equality among all of your relationships, they are a lot less different from one another than you may imagine. And the one thing they all have in common is you. In this way, the compassion that you offer to yourself extends out to others the moment that you feel it — unless you feel threatened and choose to hold back. I suggest you notice if you’re doing that, because when you hold onto defensiveness, attachment, fear or guilt in ‘someone else’, you’re really holding onto it within yourself. They want to be free from their pain, and want to be close to others, just as much as you do. For anyone to feel secure in this world is as meaningful as your own need to. If you think you take risks, consider that others may take even greater risks. If you want the privilege of vulnerability, extend your hand. Take off your glove first.

Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Nov. 16, 2012 #926

Remember that sex is an experiment. It’s also an interesting morph of expressive, relational and introspective. It’s not always easy to get your partner onto this page, or to find someone who is — and it’s easy enough for you to forget. Yet right now this experiment is calling you in a profound way. It’s as if your fantasies are aching for exploration and expression, yet you are wavering in your balance between ‘external’ and ‘internal’ focus. This may manifest as questions about what you will and will not say — about what you want, need and want to do. I recognize the potential delicacy of this situation, and the edge you may be perched on. What I suggest is this: get clear with yourself in words, over a series of days. Describe to yourself what you want, preferably in writing or recorded, that is, in a form you can retrieve. Then take the leap and share it with someone you trust. This may or may not be the person you would prefer to explore with; the first step is to transcend your inhibition about sharing. If you notice fear or shame, work with these things consciously, and tap the erotic energy they contain.

Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Nov. 9, 2012 #925

Next week’s total solar eclipse is a reminder that you have a potent desire nature, and that it’s directly connected to your emotional body. For you this eclipse is a sexy chart, full of tension, curiosity and craving to explore. There’s also the theme of what you allow yourself to have, what you share with others, and the subtleties of the ways you withhold. Indeed, this chart is like an experiment in the differences between allowing and denying; offering and actually giving; wanting and receiving. I would caution you that this subtle discussion is often plastered over with various social rules (not wanting to be seen as a slut), culturally-acceptable motives and values that deny the emotional and sensory levels of experience (such as being turned on by money), and a general prohibition on curiosity. This is the day, the week and the season of your life when curiosity is your best friend. And if you have another best friend or two, you can create a space for, and share, that curiosity. It’s a force of nature — as are you.

Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Nov. 2, 2012 #924

Humans excel at keeping secrets from themselves; this is called denial. At the moment, all sorts of alarm bells may be going off, cautioning you to affirm your truth rather than ignore or minimize it. You will hear them if you are listening. They may manifest as fear, insecurity or even as panic episodes. You may also be speaking to yourself in physical symptoms (potentially relating to your lungs or thighs), or a sense of nervous restlessness. Any of this might be easy enough to push back under the surface of consciousness, though instead of doing that, I suggest you listen to what your mind and body may be saying to you. Stuffing the messages down will not help, while letting them out may be challenging or even painful at first — and then come with a great sense of relief. There seems to be some emotional issue that you’re struggling to face, but which is looming on the horizon as some destination you will inevitably reach. It’s not as bad as you think — and in truth, the actual confrontation is with yourself, not anyone else.

Planet Waves Monthly Horoscope for November 2012 #923

If you find yourself going deeper than you feel safe in an erotic situation, remember one word: healing. That will help you focus, and it will give you a basis of both purpose and communication. You can pretty much assess everyone and everything on the basis of their affinity with this concept — including yourself. There’s the phase of this experience where pleasure itself is a kind of necessary balm. Yet the experience continues from there. The whole experience is a vehicle to take you deeper into a kind of hidden realm, which may involve dealing with certain matters that (for example) your parents did not address and which were passed on to you. Yet there is something deeper than your immediate lineage that you’re about to address, and that is part of the reason why you may be feeling out of your depth (particularly around the time of a total solar eclipse on Nov. 13). You seem to be dealing with something much larger than yourself, and if you know that, you will both not feel so overwhelmed and you’ll also have a line of approach to the territory. You seem to be involved with a situation that started with the intent for one thing, then in a series of steps you didn’t know you were taking, became something else, as if you encountered a kind of emotional or psychic undertow. To proceed from here, you will need to take one step at a time, making one decision at a time, based on the best available information you have.

Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Oct. 19, 2012 #922

It can take some perspective to figure out how much damage religion has done to you — especially if you don’t think it’s done much damage at all. In my view, the most serious problem with religion is the way that it takes control over the most sensitive matters of the human experience: for instance, sex, death, cosmology, values about money and who is allowed to relate to whom. This is all packaged up as God’s will. The question of the hour is, how would you have your life be, if all of those rules were suspended? What would you believe, if nobody told you what to believe, or tried to enforce your views with guilt? By the way: the presence of guilt in any area of life is clear evidence that religion has been through the territory. That any of these aspects of life could be made into a moral issue is evidence of the same thing. I’m aware it can feel destabilizing to challenge any of this, and often guilt is the first emotion to rush in. This time, however, I suggest you greet it with some healthy skepticism.

Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Oct. 12, 2012 #921

You would have no need to feel secure, were you not in some way feeling threatened. It’s a lot easier to figure out what will make you feel safe if you’ve addressed the nature of what you believe makes you unsafe; in fact you might decide that there’s no threat and that you need nothing at all. Reassess your situation sooner rather than later, because you’re investing a lot of energy into avoiding something that’s not actually a problem, and potentially creating a situation that could become one. Describing your solar chart another way, you seem to be obsessed with structure, as if you want to put a container around something that would otherwise be free. There is an alternative, which is to open up communication on the theme or topic that you think needs to be confined. These probably feel like opposing impulses within your psyche, and that may be causing you some conflict. Once you open up communication, first with yourself and then with anyone germane to the discussion, your sense of conflict will ease back.

Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Oct. 5, 2012 #920

Sex is one of the most powerful forces on Earth, and arguably the one used most recklessly. The time has arrived — and you may have felt it coming for a long time — to keep a handle on this power, to use it in a focused and mature way, no matter what anyone else in the world may be doing. Typically people jump between extremes of purism and thoughtless indulgence. You need more than a ‘middle way’. Rather, sex and sexuality offer us the most when they are experienced as natural, integrated into life in a holistic way. When sex becomes about the transaction of power rather than the expression of creativity, you can be sure things are out of balance. The solution to this would be waking up your imagination, though also understanding the ways you might be feeling insecure that would lead you to seek power in the first place. In relationships, I suggest you go for containment rather than commitment. That’s another way of saying that instead of making promises or holding anyone to theirs, explore within a space that you consciously share.

Monthly horoscope for October 2012 standing in for Weekly Horoscope #919

Heed early warnings, especially where sexual boundaries are concerned. This isn’t about saying no; it’s more like saying maybe, until you understand your environment and everyone’s involvement in your life. Then, do what’s appropriate based on your understanding of your situation. At first this may seem like you’re having a limit placed on your fun. Actually two other things are happening. One is a limit being placed on the new karma you incur based on choices you make. Whatever you encounter is sufficient for a moment of reflection, and to put you on notice where you need to be more vigilant. Second is that you are about to discover ways to channel your vital force in a more structured way. In a sense, you have to get organized about what you want, and make sure you are also aware of what you don’t want — then make your choices using this as your guide. The thing to bear in mind all the time is that whatever theory of relationships we may subscribe to, sex leads to something deeper. That depth could be love, and it could be a diversity of other means of human bonding, connection or entanglement. Saturn is the lord of time, and it’s essential that you use time to your benefit, in order to save time. Taking a little while to test the true nature of your relationship to another person, before you dive in, would be well advised in this moment and for the next couple of years.

Planet Waves Inner Space Horoscope for October 2012

Risk and reward — the time has come to balance these. This includes being willing to take risks for the rewards that you want, as well as being willing to delay gratification while you take the necessary steps to keep your life functional while you build what you want. What both of these have in common are the idea of a conscious, long-term goal. There’s the implication that you have a diversity of responsibilities, and that these must be taken into account simultaneously, when they seem to conflict. The ability to embrace contradiction and paradox is one mark of maturity, and this is a core theme of your life now. To do this, you can no longer assess things strictly based on how they feel; adding logic is what will actually get you from one place to the next.

Friday, September 21, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #918

You’re ready for some deep nourishment — which is different from your average, everyday kind of nourishment. The best way to have this need fulfilled is to admit you have it, and remain open and aware, rather than in a state of frustration. I know there’s a taboo against admitting need — whether we (as in we humans in Western society) fear being perceived as that dreaded thing ‘needy’, or whether we fear some compromise of our image as being fully satisfied. Forget your outer image, and I suggest you be mindful of the interplay of you and your self-image. It’s time, I believe, for you to acknowledge directly what you want, and what you know will nourish you, first to yourself and then to someone with whom you may share something so intimate. If you enter territory where there is shame, embarrassment or guilt, you know you’re in the right place. These things are almost always veils thrown over what is the most meaningful, what is the very hottest and ultimately, over who you know you are inside.

Friday, September 14, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #917

Focus your mind, and center yourself emotionally. I understand the challenges of doing so, given the current planetary setup. It’s as if you’re living underneath an invisible reservoir of things to do that keeps spilling its contents onto your head. What is not increasing is the time you have to accomplish all these things, so I suggest you ramp up your level of organization and basic maintenance. You’re wrapping up one phase of accomplishment (though it may not feel like that yet) and are about to take up a whole new agenda. Based on this information, I suggest you begin to set aside all new activities associated with the old agenda, focus on wrapping up what you’ve taken on, and then prepare to move on to a new phase of experience. Focusing your mind will work; criticizing yourself will not, and it’s vital that you not only know the difference, but act on it. Devote yourself to what must be done each day, and make sure you feed your spirit along the way.

Friday, September 7, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #916

Current aspects provide the perfect environment for making substantial progress on anything that involves thinking, organizing and problem solving. If there are any writing projects you’ve been wanting to do, this is the moment not just to start but to fully engage yourself. You have access to at least two distinct levels of your mind, that I suggest you consider individually. One involves what you can think of as ‘everyday’ material, perhaps related to business functions and creative writing you would have others see. Another level offers you access to some of your innermost secrets, and this is readily accessible right now. If there’s something you’ve always wanted to say that you could not, or that you’ve struggled to get clear, try again in earnest now. I suggest you explore this particular dimension with no thought of the censors, and with no concerns that it might be read by someone else. The point of this experience is an unfiltered, direct expression of who you are and what you have to say.

Inner Space Horoscopes for September 2012

You’re accessing a deeper level of feelings, whether they emerge from within you, or you consciously reach down into yourself to access them. This will start slowly and then reach a peak toward the end of the month. Remember that any fool can be intense. It takes a mature person to guide intensity into something beautiful and useful. If you can do that, you will access a deeper level of your potential, which will serve as an invitation to much deeper pleasures to come. Maturity involves making choices; those choices are best guided by priorities that are in turn guided by your values. This is a fancy way of saying do what is right for you. However, since most people find that impossible, I thought I would break it down into a few steps.

Friday, August 31, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #915

If there’s any tension between you and someone in a position of authority, check whether the playing field is level. Or rather, get an understanding of the ways in which it’s not level — in particular, noticing whether you slant things in a way that doesn’t work for you. You may not want to ‘play the game’, though does it really work to sacrifice your standing with people you perceive as being in a position of authority? How does that reflect on those who look up to you in any way? I suggest you consider carefully how your actions set you up for how you’re treated by others. Being rebellious is pointless at this time in your life; being inventive, innovative and most of all collaborative will work beautifully for you. One way to see how pointless top-down models of authority are is to see what it feels like when people rebel against you, then you recognize that you set that example. The way to be authentically powerful is to begin with respect: for people, for their feelings, for commitments, and most of all, for yourself.

Moonshine Horoscope by Genevieve Hathaway, standing in for Planet Waves Weekly 914 for Friday, August 17, 2012. Edited by Eric.

For all the care you provide for others, you desire the same in return. Well, you may not desire it so consciously but you know you need it. I suggest you begin the search for emotional sustenance and security where it matters most — from within. Taking over responsibility as your own primary emotional nurturer means assuming the role of mother, though in a friendly way. I suggest you not worry if you didn’t have the best role model of what a nurturing mother looked like growing up. You innately possess the instincts and natural understanding of how to love well. Love and affirmation are a feeling; a state of simply being which does not require you to ‘get it right’. These are organic processes that move you half way there just by attempting. Look first to yourself for acceptance and confirmation of worth, while reminding yourself you are precious and your vulnerability is beautiful. The idea here is not to push your self-sufficiency but rather to get you into receiving mode (from yourself first). Then as for your secondary support system, your tribe, consciously choose those individuals based on values that matter to you, not whether they are conveniently around. Determination of these people involves laying yourself bare to them in doses and seeing how they respond. Those to keep close are the ones who consistently walk with you through your emotional space, leaving their judgment at the door. — By Genevieve Hathaway

Friday, August 10, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #913

There is creativity and there is mature creativity; the difference is akin to that between infatuation and solid friendship. While you cannot fake or force maturity, you can access the parts of yourself that are the most centered, and where you’ve learned the most from experience. One clue that you’re there is that you will feel a focused sense of authority over yourself, rather than a push or quest to be someone or something. Another is that you will respond with sensitivity to the circumstances of others, no matter how difficult or painful they may be. That’s usually natural for you, though you might not want anything or anyone to harsh your mellow. The best way to do that is to transcend the source of drama within yourself. Returning to the theme of creativity: in a similar way, I suggest you draw from a deep spot, and resist any temptation to be casual or glib. The result will be something truly authentic that will change you and — perhaps just a little — change the world.

Friday, August 3, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #912

How are you feeling after this week’s Full Moon? There was, and still is, a theme of focusing your financial plans, and getting clear in any contractual or tax matters that you may be looking at. Taking action sooner rather than later will save you energy and effort. The interests of more than one person seem to be involved — check in with your relationship to a group, family or organization. Though you may be tempted to put the needs of others above those of yourself, this isn’t the week for that. I am not advocating unmitigated greed; I am suggesting that you keep your priorities in order, and make sure that your books are balanced and your financial house is tidy before you devote yourself to the needs of others. There would be one exception to this: you may be depending on the success of the whole group or organization for your own success, in which case I suggest you focus your priorities to that worthy objective.

Inner Space Monthly Horoscope for August 2012

Take this month and sort out your investments, your cash flow and your overall financial picture. Really get a handle on what you have in assets (including non-cash assets) and what you have to deal with in terms of debt and other liabilities. Look at the whole picture on one page or spreadsheet and see if it tells you anything new. You may not want to make actual changes till later in the month — at least not till after the New Moon of Aug. 17 — though if you do a thorough assessment and set some goals that require you to stretch, you’ll be able to improve your financial situation considerably. If there is one big message here, it’s about aligning your values, your activities and your ideas about money. Your values are the root concept.

Friday, July 20, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #911

Recent events have served to level the playing field of your life, giving you a more accurate perception of who has what power, and why. One result is that you’ve figured out you’re more influential than you think, which is a good thing because we’re talking about your existence. This would be a good time to consider any additional encumbrances that you have. It no longer serves you to be carrying around all of the unfinished business of the past — or to live with the feeling that you are. While you may not be able to resolve everything, all at once, there are one or two core issues that bind together nearly everything that troubles you. Over the next few days you will be able to recognize what these issues are and how they influence everything else. By focusing on what’s most important, you’ll be able to unravel what has seemed like a knot with no beginning or end. One clue I can offer is that this involves your sexual confidence. This question holds the key to your self-esteem, and your ability to see others at eye level.

Friday, July 6, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #910

You may be feeling hemmed in or backed into an emotional corner. If that’s true, it’s essential that you keep your cool and take stock of your situation before you react or even respond. What you may be perceiving as a negative situation could easily be an opportunity for cooperation, lending itself just as well to a creative response. That’s all a matter of perspective — and how confident you are. I would propose a litmus test for your own life: if you have options, you’re safe, and your situation is workable. If you don’t like the options you have, be creative and think of new ones. If nothing else, the astrology of the coming week or so is designed to spur you into action on some of your most meaningful goals. This can feel like having a fire lit under your ass, or it can feel like responding to the call of destiny; the choice is pretty much all yours.

Friday, July 6, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #909

Mars has changed signs into your solar 4th house — the one associated with your security base and living environment. This is an excellent time to get control over your physical spaces — though while you’re doing that, it’s also time to consider the issue of safety within your physical spaces. Let’s take that concept as a full-spectrum idea. This includes the emotional dimension and the quality of communication you have with anyone who so much as enters your private space. It includes doing a check for toxic substances: I recommend a purge of your garage, storage closets and under-sink areas. Every one of those products is more dangerous than you think. Mostly though I suggest you consider whether you are emotionally and sexually free. You may be feeling a push in this direction — and you may encounter some resistance, whether it’s from within yourself or whether it comes from a relationship partner. Follow your instincts, and understand what any resistance is really about.

Inner Space Monthly Horoscope for July 2012

You now get an extended opportunity to see what you’ve been missing. You’re used to keeping yourself entertained with certain stories about who you are and about the nature of your personality and certain deeper psychic levels. You’re about to discover that no matter how well you thought you knew yourself, you were missing approximately half of the story. What’s more interesting is that you’re likely to remember that you’ve actually thought of this all before; you just forgot that you noticed it or figured it out. Therefore, take a circumspect approach to everything. Check in with as many viewpoints as you can think of. Some of your best guidance is going to be coming from your dreams, which will be an effective way to look into your blind spots and dark corners.

Friday, June 29, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #908

The bigger the challenge the higher you will rise to meet it. This is a moment of full engagement for you, though notably it’s subtler than it is dramatic. Indeed, drama is the last thing you want right now, and the first thing to defuse. Once you’ve done that, go for the soul connection. This feels like a point of contact that goes deeper than what people say their goals are, transcends appearances and even ideologies, and reaches to a level of core understanding. Normally we preoccupy ourselves with every other dimension of relating to people. The planets are aligned such that you are positioned for a breakthrough on understanding what this whole business of soul relationships is about. I don’t exactly mean your soul ‘mate’ because you’re likely to have more than one. I mean a perspective on existence that is readily accessible to you right now, and which has the power to ease your way in life like nothing else can.

Friday, June 15, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #907

You may be familiar with that edgy region of consciousness right between the dream state and ordinary awareness. You’re working that edge these days, as the Sun makes its way toward your sign, preceded early next week by a truly interesting New Moon in late Gemini. You are in fact between phases of your life, though the more exciting thing is how a crack between the worlds is opening up and inviting you to peer inside yourself. The message that’s coming through right now is that you’re connected to everything, and at the same time, you have your own unique role to play in the world. You’re likely to get some specific information about this over the next few days. Don’t worry if it doesn’t seem to be a ‘large’ role — you are in possession of specific information that will be useful to others. Bide your time and take careful notes: you are approaching a real discovery.

Friday, June 8, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #906

You have many opportunities for exchange open to you. Don’t worry if at first they don’t seem like the kind of plunge into the impassioned abyss that you’ve been longing for. When you’re wading out into shallow water, remember, it can get deeper suddenly and unexpectedly — and it’s likely to do so. Yet you won’t be out of your depth as long as you stay in communication with yourself and anyone with whom you’re closely involved. Communication begins with the prefix co, which means it should go both ways. Be responsive to what your own psyche is telling you. Be responsive to your environment. And notice what the people in your environment are telegraphing as individuals and as a group. The group dynamic is the one to watch with utmost attention — there’s a lot going on there, and you’re a more significant influence than you may think.

Friday, June 1, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #905

One of my Book of Blue model friends, an actor and artist named Heather Fae, and I made up a mantra during a photo session one day: Free Phantasy. We decreed that the realm of one’s erotic imagination is rightfully an anything-goes space. Anyone you want is subject to the whims of your imagination, as is anything you want, no matter how inappropriate or unavailable it may seem. Within the space of consciousness, we have an innate right to think and feel whatever we want. It helps if we dare to allow anyone to think or want anything they want about us. We don’t have to advertise this fact — only admit that it’s likely to happen and not waste energy resisting. When we allow the imagination to run wild, it’s inevitable that we’ll arrive places that violate various social morals or ethics. Most people spend enormous amounts of energy pulling back or censoring themselves, which in turn can lead to conflict and even paralysis and sickness. Anything goes means anything: darkness and shadow are part of our psychic experience on Earth, and can be sources of pleasure and authentic healing of a deep inner split that you no longer need — and that in truth no longer exists.

Inner Space Monthly Horoscope for June 2012

Going deeper into your relationships is starting to come naturally to you, depending on one basic approach: being more yourself. Gradually over time, this has worn down your resistance to expressing and receiving actual feelings, as well as what seemed like the resistance of others in their approach to you. Now something else is emerging: healing an inner split that you may be discovering, even as it resolves itself. Indeed, the discovery is the sign that you’re making the progress on healing, so you have no need to worry about it. The reunion of you with yourself will manifest most noticeably in your relationships, where old problems with attachment, dependency and over-use of structure will seem to melt away. Though this transition might not happen overnight, it has started already — and you’re close to the tipping point.

Friday, May 18, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #904

Sunday’s solar eclipse will help you let go of the negative expectations that have dragged you down for so long. I realize that life is not exactly a walk in the park these days, with all the stresses we face and far too much uncertainty, confusion and stupidity in the society of which we’re part. Yet you can support your own cause by allowing your fears and insecurities to be drained out of your psyche, as this eclipse suggests they can be. If you want to facilitate the process, do your best to relax. For now, all you need to do is allow. At least for the next few days, ease off on the pressure to achieve. If you have to do anything, do it in the most relaxed way possible, and when you can, gradually recognize that the things that have been sources of anxiety in the past don’t have to exist today. Practice being bigger than them, which should be easy, because you are.

Friday, May 11, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #903

This is the weekend to spend as much time as you can out of the house. Circulate and socialize. Be your natural, expressive and emotional self. Notice the people around you and notice who notices you. Take any opportunity to be around people you’ve never met before, and stand in your confidence as you make one discovery after the next, and open yourself up to being discovered. If you’re someone who digs the Internet, take at least two or three occasions and put out something vividly real about yourself — what you consider your best creative work, your true vision or your deeper feelings about the world and where it’s going. Share your talent for the pleasure of doing so. We are in the midst of some rare astrological conditions that will help you send a vividly clear signal to exactly the right people. And while you’re doing that, keep your ears on and listen for what comes back to you.

Friday, May 4, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #902

This weekend’s Scorpio Full Moon is an invitation to new adventures. The thing about adventures is that they’re not predictable, and there’s often a mix of experiences — though as you’ve learned in the past, it’s silly to let that stop you. It seems like one challenge you’re facing involves acknowledging what is past, and allowing it to be so. Any factor of ‘this cannot be’ or ‘I cannot have this’ is very likely the result of your reaching backwards, rather than embracing the future with an open heart and an open mind. There is also a fear factor involved, or rather what more accurately looks like the fear of fear. Said another way, negative expectations always work against you. While it’s a good idea to ground your positive expectations in something solid, the negative ones serve no useful purpose. They do reveal something useful about your relationship to history, or what may turn out to be ancient history.

Inner Space Monthly Horoscope for May 2012

Something special happens this month — the Scorpio Full Moon coincides with Beltane, to the day. The chart looks like you become a magnet for many things that exist outside you or your personal space, that you would like to invite into your life more closely. This is absolutely positively the time to stay visible and be social, and to approach anyone you’re attracted to with confidence. Not everyone is going to respond — but that leaves many other possibilities. Keep the conversation moving. There’s an old rule about cocktail parties, where you’re supposed to circulate and not speak to anyone for more than five minutes. This allows you to taste the energy of many different people, while keeping the social environment light and flexible. From these encounters you will notice who you want and who wants you. Go for mutual — really, truly mutual.

Friday, April 27, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #901

As the week progresses, spend time out of the house meeting new people. You are in a period of forming new bonds and connections with individuals, groups and the environment that contains them all. I understand the world is filled with a lot of groups whose purposes range from meaningless to having ideals and values that do not support yours. Yet you only need to discover what will actually serve you, which is relatively little in contrast to the whole. And, there is another process in motion — a subtle shift is bringing more individuals into contact with an idea you embody. You could say there’s a tribe bonding together around unhindered acceptance of each other’s true self as the thing of mutual value. Proceed from a place of seeing each new person you meet as a possibility for connecting with a larger group united by the idea of caring for one another. — by Genevieve Hathaway

Friday, April 20, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #900

This weekend’s Taurus New Moon describes how your financial opportunities are expanding. Taurus is situated in one of the houses in your chart most closely associated with sources of income, and this is an area of your life that has been flowering during the past year — or at least the potential is there. I am aware that money is a huge sticking point for many people, and it’s not any easier when every time you look at a news website there is more economic bad news. If you’re the exception to the rule, it won’t be because you’re lucky — rather, it will be because you know what you want, and you know an opportunity when you see one. When you do, I suggest you act promptly, make a commitment and take action. You have already thought this one through five ways from Friday. You have sorted out the details; you understand the risks; you know what’s required of you.

Friday, April 13, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #899

There’s no crisis — only a minor disturbance, and from that, you can learn a lot about how to use a challenge to create an invention. You seem to be working out some kind of mental puzzle — maybe several of them — which all point back to one basic idea: how you think. It’s special for an entity to be aware of its own awareness. It’s a kind of reflexiveness that distinguishes certain kinds of individuals, in particular, the ones capable of conscious change, because they are capable of being self-aware. An untrained mind is cumbersome. You are starting to learn some mental discipline, and you may have discovered that mostly means guiding rather than pushing yourself. As one born under such an intensely emotional sign, a significant element of discipline is the ability to detach a little, and not be carried so far, so fast, by your stream of feelings. Yet all of this is secondary to one truly useful discovery you’re about to make about yourself.

Friday, April 6, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #898

Consider yourself a torch-bearer — not in the symbolic sense, but rather in the sense of someone who is carrying both energy and a visible light in the world. You may not be certain in the ways you’re doing that, though I assure you not only that you are, but also that you can do it more effectively. The key concept here is devotion — the force that moves you from within, with beautiful dependability. You may have to clear a lot of things out of the way to do this; certain things you want to do may lose priority as a result. Yet you’re able to focus your efforts on something that matters to you and to many other people. I would propose you’re doing a better job of this than you think, and that you have the opening to devote some of your energy to the things you’ve set aside. Make sure that one of these is the thing that’s supposed to be the number one priority to a Cancerian — your home.

Inner Space Monthly Horoscope for April 2012

If you’ve ever wanted to advance your career, or launch a major new project, the time is approaching. Through April you have a series of gateways that are related to an idea or revelation you had in late March. This may not be a new idea, though what I see is that you’ve finally figured out how to put the pieces together into something that’s quite original for you. It’s crucial that you implement your plan in stages between now and late June. Don’t try to do it all at once; start with the basics, or with one solid core element, and gradually begin to refine and modify as you build. You can expedite matters by working within a small group, if that group is focused clearly on your goal, and understands it well enough to help with the refinements.

Friday, March 30, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #897

What are you the most devoted to? You can measure partly by way of noticing what you do every day — and by what you want to do every day. Both are dependable metrics. Yet I would put the question another way as well: what are you willing to give up everything for? For what activity, mission or purpose would you trade it all in? I mean this mainly as a thought exercise: if there is indeed something that would be so amazing, so much fun, so incredible, that you would ‘sacrifice’ everything in your known life, you should know about it. Then, once you know about it, you might want to find a way to get moving on that aspect of reality without having to give up everything — just what you don’t really want. You might want to make a list of what you would gladly give up just for its own sake. I recognize the time pressures we’re all under, and how inflexible life seems to be here at the dawn of the Age of Aquarius. Yet change happens. We do create goals and sometimes we even get there. Remember that.

Weekly Horoscope #896 for March 23, 2012 — by Priya Kale.

Professionally, you are breaking new ground, yet you may still have doubts about an opportunity that is being presented to you. Or it may be that others still have their doubts about the viability of an idea or your plan of action. Trust yourself and your power in a situation, rather than seeking acceptance or validation from others. You have what it takes to be real, and that is expressly what this task calls for — for you to be yourself. Also look closely at your mother’s ambitions for herself, and the things that held her back from achieving some of these. You are your own person and don’t need to give in to or subconsciously recreate the same power struggles that she did. You are a trailblazer and have a unique contribution to make to this world. As you stand in the prime space between the past and the future, you’re beginning to figure that out for yourself. In letting go of what you once thought success meant to you, you are freeing yourself to live your true potential. — by Priya Kale.

Friday, March 16, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #895

Success is an ongoing experiment — not a destination. Remember that this week, as the experiment proceeds in some interesting directions. To facilitate this, I suggest you stay vocal and visible. Announce your existence to anyone you want to make contact with, particularly people you look up to or admire. I suggest that the transition be a respectful approach to a colleague or potential collaborator rather than ‘fan mail’. Investigate organizations that you might want to be involved with — merely on the basis of the affinity that you share with them. If you look, you will see people, or networks of people, with whom you want to share your energy. None of this may get immediate results (but then it could very well). The one key is approaching from a place of openness and curiosity rather than attachment to an outcome; you’re in an environment of ‘expect the unexpected’, which actually means that the likeliest outcomes are not on your list. This one fact is good for at least half the fun.

Friday, March 9, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #894

In the current political debate over sex there is the underlying assumption that sex isn’t spiritual. Have you noticed that? Making pleasure a moral issue in any way denies not only that it has some inherent right to exist, but that you’re somehow questionable as well. That might be true were we to define ‘spiritual’ as ‘that which does not approve of sex’ (or the emotion of desire). But if we define spiritual as ‘all that’s natural and real’ and factor in the spirit of freedom that’s supposedly our guiding principle as a society, that would clearly point to other conclusions. You’re someone for whom these connections are inborn, intuitive and interesting — sex is so much better when the natural associations are allowed to be what they are. There are all kinds of control agendas afoot right now, and your role is to subvert their action within your own life. Whether you tap into the highest levels of ethics or the most elementary common sense, liberty means leaving one another be. It also means you’re free in the midst of any debate, and not merely free to be powerful; I mean free to choose your pleasure.

Friday, March 2, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #893

Be on the lookout for news about your professional life for the next few days and indeed the next few weeks. You’re in an extended phase of developing both your career aspirations and your reputation. And now the immediate astrology is making contact with the longterm astrology and there is a synergistic effect developing. I have a few suggestions for how to make the most of this. One is consider your goals a work in progress. Second, focus on what you’re the most devoted to. That may mean what you do the most of (that’s one way to tell what you’re the most devoted to) or it may mean shifting your priorities a little so that you give some of your energy to something you want to do or create, and be persistent about that for a while. This may be something you gave up at a certain point in the past, and now want to reconnect with or devote yourself to. I suggest you consider some of your most persistent desires and make sure that they are getting some of the energy they deserve. Keep the flame alive; add the fuel a little at a time, and tend the fire around the clock.

Inner Space Horoscope for March 2012

Achievement does not come easily to you; you care too much about your fellow humans to lie, steal and cheat — the usual ways people find ‘easy’ success. That said, you’re in a moment where something special is about to open up, and it looks a lot like some kind of vibrant, beautiful success at something that’s deeply personal to you. But I would add a few words of caution. It’s still possible for you to make mistakes, and small mistakes can go a long way toward taking the momentum out of much greater possibilities. Therefore, no matter how brilliantly you’re doing, pay attention to every step and every communication. I’m not saying be stilted; I am saying be aware, correct your errors promptly, and understate your achievements. Pride is unbecoming of true success, and the world is watching.

Planet Waves Weekly Horoscope # 892, for Friday, Feb. 24, 2012

Pisces is the sign in your chart associated with faith and with long journeys. A New Moon in this house is setting your sails on a journey likely to take you across the oceans, be they metaphorical or literal oceans. This is a spiritual quest unlike few others in your lifetime, leading you to places you may only have dreamed of or that you didn’t even know existed. Whether this is literally or metaphorically, think of yourself as an explorer on a quest for a higher sublime truth. What you need to take with you now is an open mind, a sense of perspective and a philosophical approach on all that is emerging which will allow you to absorb a greater truth, elevating and expanding your consciousness; this will act as a beacon of light and wisdom leading your way forward. Enter this phase with the curiosity of a child without preconceived notions of what you might find. As long as you are willing to explore your ambitions, you will discover abilities within you that you didn’t even know you had. You can also trust you have and will make friends along the way, who are supportive of you and above all keep faith in a higher power that guides you. You are being liberated and if you could go anywhere, where would it be? This much freedom can be scary, but it is also empowering if you remember that ultimately your journey is your destination. — By Priya Kale for Planet Waves

Friday, Feb. 17, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #891

With the Sun about to enter your sympathetic water sign Pisces on Sunday, there is some relief on the way, though till then I suggest you keep your focus on partnership issues, particularly where a group or organization is concerned. You may have figured out that there are too many people in your life for your comfort, and too many of them have access to you and your resources. You cannot just walk away but you can get clear in every situation where there is a need to be clear. Once the Sun changes signs, that’s your clue to spend some time away from the reservation and see what’s going on somewhere else. This will provide a change of scenery and put you into contact with people more in harmony with your nature. One advantage I’ve discovered about getting near the ocean is that it’s possible to see out to the horizon. You can look at the water and in a glance, know the conditions of the atmosphere. Whether you do this metaphorically or physically amounts to the same basic thing.

Friday, Feb. 10, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #890

This week’s Full Moon may still have you feeling like you just got off an entire afternoon on the teacup ride. Clearly, you’ve taken a few steps to renegotiate some of the more sensitive situations in your life, yet you likely figured out how much more you have to change. One particular situation where push came to shove contains a lot of good information for you, and I suggest you do some data mining and make the most of what you learn. There is something fundamental you can discern about your own nature and that of someone close to you. We may be talking about your relationship to a group. The truly important thing to focus on is how to make sure that your values, opinions and sense of presence do not take second place, or get swallowed by, some entity seemingly larger than yourself. Yet the way to distinguish yourself is not with how ‘different’ you are, but with the power and beauty of your gradually awakening sense of self-worth.

Friday, Feb. 3, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #889

There is a difference between the mental sciences — reason, rationality and authentic intellectual creativity — and spiritual exploration. The two rarely work independently of one another. We all know this. Intellect without some inspiration will put an insomniac to sleep. Inspiration and even love without some grounding in cohesive thought can lead to huge struggles and misunderstandings. You may feel some inclination to experience these two elements of life as separate ‘things’. Yet since both are products or results of consciousness, they point to something deeper. What is that something? We’ve all heard the expression, “I think, therefore, I am” — though often without realizing how brilliant it is. We could add, “I feel connection, I experience beauty, I sense something larger than myself — therefore, I am alive.” Yet what is back there, deep in you, doing all this thinking and experiencing and feeling and noticing? It all points back to something, and that something is trying to get your attention.

Friday, Jan. 20, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #888

You may be concerned that if you want to renegotiate a partnership situation, you’ll be giving up the whole thing. Whether this is true, or whether it’s an idea you have, amounts to the same thing — a feeling you have that could influence how you make an important choice in a partnership. I suggest you look at your history and see if you can find parallel moments, or one parallel moment, where you encountered a loss because you wanted to make a change, that would be helpful. Yet there seems to be something else going on: your need to let the past go. That this is easier said than done is not news to anyone, but discovering why it’s so challenging would qualify as an actual breakthrough. Here is a clue: What we call letting the past go involves two parts: one is reckoning with what happened, and the second part is embarking on something else. Which is harder for you?

Friday, Jan. 13, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #887

A conversation this week is deepening your understanding of a relationship, revealing a sweeter reality than the one you’ve been clinging to. We tend to subconsciously base our expectations of relationships on the roles enacted in our childhood by caregivers, that is, until we get tired of running the same old dramas. What is the subconscious imprinting you need to let go of? You cannot control others, nor can you erase the past. But you can consciously let go of expectations, past resentments, anger, and fear and acknowledge your desires and needs to yourself first. Then you can be warm rather than scalding, and ask for what you need rather than demanding it and creating tension. You are in a process of building trust. Be less critical, keep an open dialogue and you can have the financial support, as well as the deep intimacy, trust and acceptance you need from a sexual partner and those to whom you are connected in flesh and spirit.

Friday, Jan. 6, 2012. Weekly Horoscope #886

Pay close attention to what aspects of a relationship or partnership situation are working, and which are not. You don’t want to wait around to find out what happens when you’ve got all the information that you need. Meanwhile, there are ways that you can contribute affirmatively toward a positive outcome. Much of what you’re dealing with in one particular involvement are your ‘hidden tendencies’ coming to the surface — tendencies which I would imagine you would let go of, if you could. The time has come to evaluate everything you say and everything you do on the basis of whether it adds or detracts from your quality of life and your quality of work. Many factors are compelling you to rise to the occasion of your life, as it is today — not how it was yesterday, or how you wanted it to be 10 years ago.