Dear Madame,
I’m sure you’ve gotten this question before, but since the Ashley Madison site was hacked, I’ve been dying to know: can you look at a birth chart and just KNOW that person is likely to commit adultery? I guess the real question is, can you tell if someone’s a liar?
— NOT on “THE list”
Dear Non-listed Querant,
Here’s an old trick I picked up from a gypsy when I was a wee girl. It’s a sure ‘tell’ if you want to know if someone’s a liar or capable of lying.
What you do is this. First, you sit them across from you and let them get comfortable in the seat. Be calm, be friendly but not overly friendly. You don’t want to tip your hand. Make light conversation. No need to pull out the voodoo or the woo-woo; you don’t want them to feel the slightest bit anxious.
Next you ask them to breathe deeply and then exhale. Ask them to do this three times (or ‘thrice’ if you’re feeling fancy). Then ask them to lay the arm of their preferred hand on the table and close their eyes. Explain that you will not poke or prick the arm, but the client will feel a gentle touch of your hands.
Now, with your own preferred hand, turn the arm so that the inside wrist is face-up or to the side. Calmly lay two fingers across the inside of their wrist, near the largest vein you can see.
Does your client have a pulse? Then you have a liar or a potential liar.
Works every time. Guaranteed.
(Certain yogis or holy people are capable of meditating themselves into a state where their pulse cannot be detected. They’re easily exempted from this test because, you know, who’s gonna sign up for an adultery service when they’re too busy keeping basic, internal homeostasis?)
Trust the old gypsies and me: anyone is capable of lying, and by extension we are all liars. But we recognize degrees, right? There are the whoppers: living a double life as an international spy while posing as a Bunko-obsessed, Friday ‘date night’ loving insurance salesman, for instance. And then there are the quotidian lies, the little social lubrications, like camouflage, we use in our daily lives to make our way through a sometimes hostile, often indifferent world. But even camouflage (as any duck will tell you) is deception with intention.
So, to astrology. First, anyone can lie. Second, you cannot look at a fellow human’s chart and know for sure how spiritually or ethically ‘evolved’ they are.
But you can spot potential problems or challenging qualities. When it comes to deception and self-deception, a transit of planet Neptune is unparalleled in its capacity to transform the most sober Stoic into a veritable Lord Byron of poetic excess.
Naughty Neptune’s work in a natal chart is similarly challenging. Neptune’s effect is like a ‘blur’ brush in Photoshop: all the little distinctions disappear, along with the imperfections. It glamorizes and softens every edge. You’ve got something going in that part of your life, but damned if you can see exactly what you’re looking at because it’s been Photoshopped, sometimes past recognition.
Remember that our charts reflect not only ourselves and our potential, but also the conditions, assumptions, and cultural/family patterns we inherited. Astrological charts look backward and forward in time. The blur works both ways.
When we see Neptune we might be looking at how we are deceived or deceive others, as well as how we perceive we were potentially lied to in the past. Where did we get ‘Photoshopped’ in our own upbringing? Was it a gentle blurry softening, or a total rubout? Hard aspects (the square, opposition) especially emphasize the effort brought to bear on the matter and heighten the potential of prevarication. As we are lied to, so are we likely to develop an unconscious habit of lying to others in return.
How can we trust what we can’t see clearly? Right. And so it goes.
Once we ‘wise up’ to now-obvious deceptions, we respond. Typically we respond with mistrust. Lacking trust in that area of our lives, we build protective barriers. ‘We won’t get fooled again’ is the motto and the justification. No one’s gonna make me a sitting duck! Damage control is what some call it, and in a public figure or person of influence both the control and the damage can make or break whole generations.
But harm is not the only possibility with Neptune. We find other paths — therapy, astrology, art, education. We can make choices.
So if you’re looking for a liar, you can find one in any chart. Really. There’s nothing special to it. Neptune’s always somewhere; we can’t pull him out of the chart. What’s really interesting is our work to build compassion and coherence in our lives alongside the blurry bits.
With a pulse,
Madame Zolonga
