Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter September 21, 2011

Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter
SEPTEMBER 21, 2011
FreeWillAstrology.com

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If you haven't actually read my book PRONOIA IS THE ANTIDOTE FOR PARANOIA, you may be surprised at a lot of the stuff it contains. It's a genre-bending thing that doesn't fit into the neat expectations and prejudices of either my critics or fans.

It's available at Amazon: bit.ly/Pronoia
or Powells: bit.ly/PronoiaPowells

Here's a piece from the book:

FURTHER EVIDENCE

In our quest to insinuate pronoia into dinner table discussions taking place all over the world, we bring the following pieces of evidence to your attention.

Exhibit A

The bible of the mental health community is a 943-page textbook called the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, or DSM-IV. Published by the American Psychiatric Association, it's a standardized catalog of psychological disorders that therapists use to evaluate and treat their patients.

Surprise! This ultimate word on the state of the human psyche describes countless pathological states, but there's not a single entry referring to good mental health.

You might imagine that shrinks would be mildly interested not only in fixing what's wrong with their patients but also in helping them cultivate what feels good. But how can that happen if the feel-good states aren't even recognized as important enough to name?

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Exhibit B

David G. Myers and Ed Diener authored an article called "The Science of Happiness." "What causes happiness?" they inquired. "This question not only went largely unanswered during psychology's first century, it went largely unasked." They note that from 1967 to 1995, essays on negative emotions far outnumbered those on positive emotions in the psychological literature. The ratio was 21:1.

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Exhibit C

Even those supreme perpetrators of pop nihilism, The New York Times and The Washington Post, have a better ratio than the psychological literature. They average only 12 negative stories to every one that might be construed to be non-negative. Most other daily newspapers maintain a similar proportion.

Many of their non-negative stories, however, cover success in sports and entertainment. For example: The Atlanta Braves won their eighth straight game; the new book by Malcolm Gladwell is pretty decent. Remove these feel-good stories from the equation, and the media's Curse Quotient rises closer to that of the psychological literature.

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Exhibit D

In his book Omens of Millennium, Harold Bloom hints at the "reductive fallacy" that serves as a shibboleth for intellectuals. Picture yourself, he says, in conversation with a bright, literate acquaintance who asks you about someone you know well: "Tell me what he or she is really like." You reflect a moment and give a brief description of your impressions, but your acquaintance isn't satisfied: "No, I mean really like." And now you grasp the actual question: "What is the very worst thing you can say about him or her that is true?"

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Exhibit E

Thousands of amazing, inexplicable, wondrous, and even supernatural events occur every day. And yet most are unreported by the media. The few that are cited are ridiculed.

Why? Here's one possible reason: The people most likely to believe in miracles are superstitious, uneducated, and prone to having a blind, literalist faith in their religions' myths. Those who are least likely to believe in miracles are skilled at analytical thought, well educated, and yet prone to having a blind, literalist faith in the ideology of materialism, which dogmatically asserts that the universe consists entirely of things that can be perceived by the five human senses or detected by instruments that scientists have thus far invented.

The media is largely composed of people from the second group. It's virtually impossible for them to admit to the possibility of miracles, let alone experience them. If anyone from this group manages to escape peer pressure and cultivate a receptivity to miracles, it's because they have successfully fought against being demoralized by the unsophisticated way miracles are framed by the first group.

At the Beauty and Truth Lab we're immune to the double-barreled ignorance. When we behold astonishing synchronicities and numinous breakthroughs that seem to violate natural law, we're willing to consider the possibility that our understanding of natural law is too narrow. And yet we also refrain from lapsing into irrational gullibility; we actively seek mundane explanations for apparent miracles.

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Exhibit F

Wes Nisker wrote a book called If You Don't Like the News . . . Go Out and Make Some of Your Own.

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Exhibit G

Have you personally encountered evidence of any of the following phenomena?
1. bliss that flows toward you because you've made a habit of expecting it and cultivating it;
2. good news that's really interesting; fascinating stories that provide an antidote to the media's obsession with hardship, anguish, deterioration, and death;
3. states of emotional wealth and psychological health: raw material for the manual that will be the corrective for the DSM-IV; the missing half of the story;
4. mirabilia: mysterious revelations, rejuvenating prodigies, ineffable breakthroughs, beguiling ephemera, sudden deliverance from boring evils;
5. plain old everyday miracles;
6. the good news you've gone out and created.

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MORE PRONOIA RESOURCES:

SMART PEOPLE ARE CONSPIRING BEHIND THE SCENES TO ENHANCE LIFE ON THIS PLANET
21 Scientific Research Projects That Could Change the World
tinyurl.com/44kd2hn

ANOTHER ORDINARY EVERYDAY MIRACLE
Heroes risk their lives to save a motorcyclist beneath a burning car
tinyurl.com/65alawn

GOOD ENVIRONMENTAL NEWS
Huge Boost in Fish Numbers in Cabo Pulmo National Park
tinyurl.com/3exeqnr

(Note: I endorse these because I like them. They are not advertisements, and I get no kickbacks.)

Please tell me your own personal nominations for PRONOIA RESOURCES.

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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
Week beginning September 22

Copyright 2011 by Rob Brezsny
FreeWillAstrology.com

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):

Your theme for the week comes from travel writer Stephen Graham in his book The Gentle Art of Tramping: "As you sit on the hillside, or lie prone under the trees of the forest, or sprawl wet-legged on the shingly beach of a mountain stream, the great door, that does not look like a door, opens." I can't wait to see the expression on your face when a portal like that appears for you sometime in the near future, Libra. I expect your mood will be a mix of surprise, humility, vindication, joy, and a pleasant kind of shock. By the way, you won't necessarily have to be out in nature in order to become aware of the opening door. But it will probably be crucial for you to simulate the state that nature evokes in you. That's why I suggest you rev up your aptitude for innocence and make sure your sense of wonder is turned on full blast.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):

More than a 100 years ago, a team of British adventurers led by Ernest Shackleton trekked across Antarctica, attempting to reach the South Pole. They ran out of supplies and had to turn back before reaching their goal. In 2006, modern-day explorers discovered a cache of stuff Shackleton had been forced to leave behind, stashed in the ice. It included two cases of whiskey. Some of the century-old liquor found its way back to England, where it was quaffed by a few daring souls eager for an exotic taste. I suspect you may soon stumble upon a metaphorically similar curiosity, Scorpio: something like old spirits preserved in ice. My advice: Try a small sample and wait a while to see what effect it has before imbibing the whole thing.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):

Punk musician Wesley Willis was fond of greeting friends and audience members alike with a headbutt. So prolific was he in employing this ritual that he developed a permanent callus on his forehead. Now would be an excellent time for you to make this tradition your own, Sagittarius. Just think of all the affection you'll generate and all the great conversations you'll stimulate by ramming people! JUST KIDDING! I was exaggerating a bit. It's true that now is an excellent time to ramp up your friendliness and expand your social reach. But you probably shouldn't engage in full-tilt headbutting unless you're extroverted, gregarious, and so extravagantly charming you can get away with it.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):

In Japan you can buy Vaam, a sports energy drink that contains hornet saliva. It acquired a legendary reputation after Japanese marathon runner Naoko Takahashi said she used it to propel herself to a gold medal at the 2000 Olympics. Vaam's creator, biochemist Takashi Abe, claims there is scientific evidence that it works as well for humans as it does for wasps, which fly as much as 70 miles a day. According to my reading of the astrological omens, the cosmos will be infusing you with a metaphorical version of hornet saliva in the coming weeks, Capricorn. You'll have the power to go further and be stronger for longer periods of time.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):

I gathered together a panel of renegade astrologers to investigate your imminent future. By a unanimous vote, they designated you, out of all the signs of the zodiac, as the one "Most Likely to Exceed the Boring Limitations of Good Taste," as well as "Best Candidate to Slap the Conventional Wisdom Upside the Head." That sounds fun. I hope you make good use of the freedom that those roles entail. By the way, the general consensus also suggested that you are primed to find valuable stuff in out-of-the-way borderlands or in off-limits haunts where no one else even wants to look.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):

You're on course for a warm, wet, soft collision with the enigmas of the libido. I urge you to give yourself fully to the exploration, even if it stirs up feelings you have no names for. In my opinion, the best way to use your intelligence right now is to undertake a rigorous investigation into the heights and depths of your passion . . . to experiment with new guidelines for your instinctual nature . . . to make yourself extra receptive to the spiritual teachings available through erotic communion.

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Free Will Astrology's

EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

feature advice you can use
to transform yourself
and fine-tune your life
in accordance with your soul's code

. . . and maybe even help you get access
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They're available by phone at 1-877-873-4888 or 1-900-950-7700.

They're $6 if you access them on the Web, or $1.99 per minute over the phone.

"With your Expanded Audio Horoscopes, I feel like you have somehow burrowed into my unconscious mind and smuggled out the secrets I was keeping from myself."
- Tara R., San Antonio, TX

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ARIES (March 21-April 19):

"I have a simple philosophy," said Alice Roosevelt Longworth, a self-described hedonist who lived till the age of 96. "Fill what's empty. Empty what's full. Scratch where it itches." That's not an approach I recommend you pursue all the time, Aries, but I think it could be both wise and fun for you to do so in the coming weeks. Given the upcoming astrological omens, you have a mandate to find out where the most interesting action is, and dive in with the intent to generate even more action. The catalysts need another catalyst like you.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20):

A guy on Reddit.com posted a photo that made me think of you. He had been out walking in the wilds of Ontario, and found a single ripe peach growing on a scraggly, skinny tree in the middle of an abandoned quarry. There were no other peach trees in sight, let alone peaches. I suspect that when you find beauty and sustenance in the coming days, Taurus, they will be in similar situations: unexpected and unlikely. That doesn't mean they'll be any less sweet. (See the peach: http://bit.ly/lonelypeach.)

GEMINI (May 21-June 20):

If you've ever been to a flavor-tripping party, you've eaten "miracle fruit" -- berries with the scientific name Synsepalum dulcificum. They coat your tongue with a substance that makes all subsequent foods taste sweet. The effect lasts no more than an hour, but while it does, lemons, radishes, and pickles may as well be desserts. Be alert for a metaphorical version of the miracle fruit, Gemini. There's an influence coming your way that could temporarily make everything else seem extra delectable. As long as you're aware of what's happening, it will be a quirky blessing.

CANCER (June 21-July 22):

Born in Austria, Susanne Wenger became a high priestess of the Yoruba religion in Nigeria. When she died in 2009 at the age of 93, she had devoted the last 50+ years of her life to protecting and beautifying a sacred forest in the Osogbo area. It's hard for most of us to imagine loving a place as much as she did, but that's what I'm encouraging you to do. According to my reading of the astrological omens, you will accrue unforeseen benefits by becoming more deeply connected to a special patch of earth. To do so will awaken a dormant part of your soul, for one thing. It could also advance one of your lifelong quests, which is to feel ever-more at home in the world.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):

"Personally I'm always ready to learn," said Winston Churchill, "although I do not always like being taught." You may soon find yourself sharing that paradoxical state of mind, Leo. It's time for you to receive the new teachings you have been unconsciously preparing yourself to absorb. But at least in the early stages, these useful lessons may get on your nerves or make you squirm. Stick with them. Keep the faith. Sooner or later, your crash course will become enjoyable.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):

"Our job is to become more and more of what we are," says poet Marvin Bell. "The growth of a poet seems to be related to his or her becoming less and less embarrassed about more and more." Whether or not you're a poet, Virgo, I would like to apply this gauge to your own growth. The way I see it, your power to claim your birthright and fulfill your destiny will ultimately hinge to a significant degree on your ability to shed all residual shame about your true nature. And guess what: There has never been a better time to work on that noble project than right now.

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HOMEWORK:

Who's the person you'd most like to meet and have a drink with? Why? Testify at Freewillastrology.com.

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Submissions sent to the Free Will Astrology Weekly Newsletter or in response to "homework assignments" may be published in a variety of formats at Rob Brezsny's discretion, including but not limited to newsletters, books, the Free Will Astrology column, and Free Will Astrology website. We reserve the right to edit such submissions for length, style, and content. Requests for anonymity will be honored with submissions; otherwise, reader names, screen names, or initials will be used. Please be sure to note your preference when sending to us. We are not responsible for unsolicited submission of any creative material.

Contents of the Free Will Astrology Newsletter are Copyright 2011 Rob Brezsny

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