Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter
NOVEMBER 23, 2011
FreeWillAstrology.com
+
Interviewer: "Rob, if life is such a miraculous web of magic,
why is it that most of us don't feel that way so much of the time?"
Hear my response to that question in this 11-minute interview:
bit.ly/thngOT
+
The piece below is excerpted from my book PRONOIA IS THE ANTIDOTE
FOR PARANOIA
available at Amazon: bit.ly/Pronoia
or Powells: bit.ly/PronoiaPowells
A Global Array of Further Pronoiac Resources
In recent years, the doom and gloom prophets have become even
more strident and brazen in blurting out their cacophony of curses.
Joining them in the mad rush to shower condemnation on the entire
human enterprise have been millions of emboldened everyday complainers
who've also become addicted to the sick thrill of chronic rage.
I'm sometimes tempted to view the growing hordes of fulminators
as a black magic army flinging hexes and maledictions on everything
they see.
But whenever I brush up against that fear, I stop my mind from
its careening and refocus my inner eyes. Breathing out the jive
and breathing in the love, I survey all the evidence I've been
gathering of an antidotal force rising up.
When the first edition of my book on pronoia came out a few years
ago, I felt isolated in my seemingly eccentric invitation to celebrate
the glory we're surrounded by, to name the thousands of ways that
the universe proves its love for us, to notice all the miracles
and help we receive.
But I soon realized that I was by no means a lone crank crying
in the wilderness. I became aware of an ever-growing rebel crusade
-- swarms of pilgrims and activists and artists and creative optimists
who had signed on to the conspiracy to shower blessings, devoting
themselves to the work of not just saving the world but making
it more beautiful and mysterious and interesting.
I wasn't under any illusion that they were suddenly arising because
of my influence. Rather, my sense was that my book was just one
symptom of an energy that was awakening in the whole world. I
was a current in the flood.
For years, I've been compiling data about other currents in the
flood, making them known through my free weekly email newsletter.
A Beauty and Truth Lab researcher named Darin Wilson has created
a good-looking website that is archiving these pronoiac resources.
The posts are categorized and tagged, and there's built-in search.
You can find the site here: pronoiaresources.com.
You might want to bookmark it so you can drink in its blessings
whenever you're feeling assaulted by the media's routine blasts
of nausea.
Please note that when I praise all these purveyors of beauty
and truth and love and justice, I do so simply because I like
them. My endorsements are not advertisements, and I get no kickbacks.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
MORE PRONOIA RESOURCES:
BRAZILIAN POVERTY SHRINKING
Over the last two decades, thanks largely to government policy,
the poverty rate in Brazil has halved. With this, income inequality
has also fallen sharply, declining on average by 1.2% a year.
tinyurl.com/79uf2r6
CRIME SHRINKING
How the Plummeting Price of Cocaine Fueled the Nationwide Drop
in Violent Crime
tinyurl.com/7ojb4xv
COST OF SOLAR ENERGY IS SHRINKING
We're just a few years from the point at which electricity from
solar panels becomes cheaper than electricity generated by burning
coal. The progress in solar panels has been dramatic and sustained.
tinyurl.com/83rj3bp
tinyurl.com/7mfx8nl
tinyurl.com/828e4gc
Please tell me your own personal nominations for PRONOIA RESOURCES.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
Week beginning November 24
Copyright 2011 by Rob Brezsny
FreeWillAstrology.com
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):
"It is a tremendous act of violence to begin anything,"
said Sagittarian poet Rainer Maria Rilke. "I am not able
to begin. I simply skip what should be the beginning." I
urge you to consider trying that approach yourself, Sagittarius.
Instead of worrying about how to launch your rebirth, maybe you
should just dive into the middle of the new life you want for
yourself. Avoid stewing interminably in the frustrating mysteries
of the primal chaos so you can leap into the fun in full swing.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):
The Golden Gate Bridge spans the place where San Francisco Bay
meets the Pacific Ocean. It wasn't easy to build. The water below
is deep, wind-swept, beset with swirling currents, and on occasion
shrouded with blinding fog. Recognizing its magnificence, the
American Society of Civil Engineers calls the bridge one of the
modern Wonders of the World. Strange to think, then, that the
bridge was constructed between 1933 and 1937, during the height
of the Great Depression. I suggest you make it your symbol of
power for the coming weeks, Capricorn. Formulate a plan to begin
working toward a triumph in the least successful part of your
life.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):
It's an excellent time for you to get an entourage -- or if you
already have one, to expand it. For that matter, it's a perfect
moment for you to recruit more soldiers to help you carry out
your plot to overthrow the status quo. Or to round up more allies
for your plans to change the course of local history. Or to gather
more accomplices as you seek to boldly go where you have never
gone before. So beef up your support system. Boost the likelihood
that your conspiracy will succeed.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):
If you expand your concept of what you're capable of, you will
receive a specific offer to move up a notch. If you perform your
duties with intensified care and grace, you will be given new
responsibilities that catalyze your sleeping potential. The universe
doesn't always act with so much karmic precision, with such sleek,
efficient fairness, but that's how it's working in your vicinity
right now. Here's one more example of how reasonable the fates
are behaving: If you resolve to compete against no one but yourself,
you will be shown new secrets about how to express your idiosyncratic
genius.
ARIES (March 21-April 19):
"Basic research is what I am doing when I don't know what
I am doing," said rocket scientist Werner von Braun. I think
it's an excellent time for you to plunge into that kind of basic
research, Aries. You're overdue to wander around frontiers you
didn't even realize you needed to investigate. You're ready to
soak up insights from outside the boundaries of your understanding.
In fact, I think it's your sacred duty to expose yourself to raw
truths and unexpected vistas that have been beyond your imagination's
power to envision.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20):
In Woody Allen's film Midnight in Paris, the Ernest
Hemingway character says, "All cowardice comes from not loving,
or not loving well enough." Given the state of your current
astrological omens, Taurus, that is an excellent piece of advice.
I suspect you are going to be asked to call on previously untapped
reserves of courage in the coming weeks -- not because you'll
have to face physical danger but rather because you will have
a chance to get to the bottom of mysteries that can only be explored
if you have more courage than you've had up until now. And the
single best way to summon the valor you'll need is to love like
a god or goddess loves.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
MY OTHER HOROSCOPES
Factual information and reasonable thinking alone are not sufficient
to guide you through life's labyrinthine tests. You need and deserve
regular deliveries of uncanny revelation.
One of your inalienable rights as a human being should therefore
be to receive mysteriously useful omens on a regular basis. In
this spirit, I offer you the free weekly horoscopes you read in
this newsletter.
If you ever want more, and think it's worth paying for, try my
daily text message 'scopes or my expanded audio 'scopes.
Go here to access them: RealAstrology.com.
The weekly forecasts are also available by phone: 1-877-873-4888
"I don't much believe in astrology. But that doesn't seem
to get in the way of me deriving a whole lot of benefits from
your expanded audio horoscopes."
- A. Arrosto, Indianapolis
"You have an amazing aptitude for cutting through the lies
I tell myself. Thanks for the gentle shocks."
- T. Preneris, Toronto
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
GEMINI (May 21-June 20):
"When I see your face, the stones start spinning!"
wrote the poet Rumi, as translated by Coleman Barks. "Water
turns pearly. Fire dies down and doesn't destroy. In your presence
I don't want what I thought I wanted." I think you need to
be in the presence of a face like that, Gemini. You've got to
get your fixations scrambled by an arresting vision of soulful
authenticity. You need your colors transposed and your fire and
water reconfigured. Most of all, it's crucial that you get nudged
into transforming your ideas about what you really want. So go
find that healingly disruptive prod, please. It's not necessarily
the face of a gorgeous icon. It could be the face of a whisperer
in the darkness or of a humble hero who's skilled in the art of
surrender. Do you know where to look?
CANCER (June 21-July 22):
"All my life I have longed to be loved by a woman who was
melancholy, thin, and an actress," wrote 19th-century French
author Stendhal in his diary. "Now I have been, and I am
not happy." I myself had a similar experience -- craving
a particular type of women who, when she finally showed up in
the flesh, disappointed me. But it turned out to be a liberating
experience. Relieved of my delusory fantasy, I was able to draw
more joy from what life was actually giving me. As you contemplate
your own loss, Cancerian, I hope you will find the release and
deliverance I did.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):
If you traveled 300 million years back in time, you might freak
out in abject fear as you encountered dragonflies as big as eagles
and cockroaches the size of dogs. But since you're quite safe
from those monsters here in the present, there's no need to worry
yourself sick about them. Similarly, if you managed to locate
a time machine and return to an earlier phase of your current
life, you'd come upon certain events that upset you and derailed
you way back then. And yet the odds are very high that you're
not going to find a time machine. So maybe you could agree to
relinquish all the anxiety you're still carrying from those experiences
that can no longer upset and derail you. Now would be an excellent
moment to do so.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):
To prepare for her role in the film The Help, actress
Jessica Chastain forced herself to gain 15 pounds. It was tough,
because she normally follows a very healthy diet. The strategy
that worked best was to ingest a lot of calorie-heavy, estrogen-rich
ice cream made from soybeans. To be in alignment with current
cosmic rhythms, it would make sense for you to fatten yourself
up, too, Virgo -- metaphorically speaking, that is. I think you'd
benefit from having more ballast, more gravitas. You need to be
sure you're well-anchored and not easy to push around. It's nearly
time to take an unshakable stand for what you care about most.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):
In a famous Monty Python sketch, a Hungarian tourist goes into
a British tobacconist's store to buy cigarettes. Since he doesn't
speak English, he consults a phrase book to find the right words.
"My hovercraft is full of eels," he tells the clerk,
who's not sure what he means. The tourist tries again: "Do
you want to come back to my place, bouncy bouncy?" Again,
the clerk is confused. In the coming week, Libra, I foresee you
having to deal with communications that are equally askew. Be
patient, please. Try your best to figure out the intentions and
meanings behind the odd messages you're presented with. Your translating
skills are at a peak, fortunately, as are your abilities to understand
what other people -- even fuzzy thinkers -- are saying.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):
There are modern Chinese painters who use oil paints on canvas
to create near-perfect replicas of famous European masterpieces.
So while the genuine copy of Van Gogh's "Starry Night"
is worth over $100 million, you can buy an excellent copy on the
Internet for less than $100. If you're faced with a comparable
choice in the coming week -- whether to go with a pricey original
or a cheaper but good facsimile, I suggest you take the latter.
For your current purposes, you just need what works, not what
gives you prestige or bragging rights.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
HOMEWORK:
Are you ready for an orgy of gratitude? Identify ten of your
best blessings. Tell me all about it at Freewillastrology.com.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
|
