Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter June 5, 2019

 Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter
 June 5, 2019
 FreeWillAstrology.com

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The people I trust the most are those who are always tenderly wrestling and negotiating with their own shadows, making preemptive strikes on their personal share of the world's evil, fighting the good fight to keep from spewing their darkness on those around them.

Hear the song: bit.ly/ReGeniusYourself

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ASTROLOGY IS NOT A SCIENCE

Astrology is not a science. Nor is depth psychology, mythology, dream interpretation, or poetry. It makes as much sense to criticize astrology for not being scientific as it does to deride a Florence and the Machine song for not upholding the binomial theorem.

The question "Do you believe in astrology?" is like asking someone if they believe in storytelling or art.

Picture a no-nonsense physicist gazing at a Kandinsky painting, with its teeming blobs of mad color and exuberant shapes, and declaring it to be a superstitious eruption of delusion that's not based on a logical understanding of the world.

Like Kandinsky's perspective, astrology at its best roots us in the poetic language of the soul. It has a special capacity to liberate our imaginations and encourage us to think less literally and to visualize our lives as a mythic quest. It helps us loosen and transform our subconscious fixations.

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WANT TO GET YOUR ASTROLOGICAL CHART READ?

If you want your personal chart done, I recommend a colleague whose approach to reading astrology charts closely matches my own. She's my wife, RO LOUGHRAN. She's at www.roloughran.com.

Ro utilizes a blend of well-trained intuition, emotional warmth, and technical proficiency in horoscope interpretation. She is skilled at exploring the mysteries of your life's purpose and nurturing your connection with your own inner wisdom.

In addition to over 30 years of astrological experience, Ro has been a licensed psychotherapist for 17 years. She integrates psychological insight with astrology's cosmological perspective.

Ro is based in California, but can do phone consultations and otherwise work with you regardless of geographic boundaries.

Check out Ro's website at www.roloughran.com

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BE YOURSELF?

You came into this world as a radiant bundle of exuberant riddles. You slipped into this dimension as a shimmering burst of spiral hallelujahs. You blasted into this realm as a lush explosion of ecstatic gratitude. And it is your birthright to fulfill those promises.

I'm not pandering to your egotism by telling you these things. When I say, "Be yourself," I don't mean you should be the self that wants to win every game and use up every resource and stand alone at the end of time on top of a Mt. Everest-sized pile of pretty garbage.

When I say, "Be yourself," I mean the self that says "Thank you!" to the wild irises and the windy rain and the people who grow your food.

When I say, "Be yourself," I mean the rebel creator who's longing to make the whole universe your home and sanctuary.

When I say, "Be yourself," I mean the dissident bodhisattva who's joyfully struggling to germinate the seeds of divine love that are packed inside every moment.

When I say, "Be yourself," I mean the spiritual freedom fighter who's scrambling and finagling and conspiring to relieve your fellow messiahs from their suffering and shower them with rowdy blessings.

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MY PRAYER

I pray to the ancestors with their medicine stories
I pray to the descendants with their elixir stories
I pray to the tale-tellers alive now
who subterfuge their way free
of the dead stories that numb and pound and sicken

I pray that they will reforge me
into a magnet
for visions of unbuyable wonder
and dreams of pregnant rapture
and fables from beyond the brain

May they craft me
into a sweet vessel for creation myths
that are alive with mist and smoke and whispers
unknown to the Internet

May they massage me
into a blissful mess of receptivity
so I can always detect
the dramas and comedies and parables
owned by the solar system
and copyrighted by eternity

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I pray to the chroniclers
who rebirth killed history
I pray to the narrators
who remember stolen memories

I pray to the journalists
who track down
the taboo conversations
that women and children
have explored
in the middle of the night
for the last four thousand years

I pray to the compassionate liars
who disinter insurrectionary enchantments
and restore their dazzling dark joy

May those agitators
and awakeners
and animators
mark me with signs
that my creature teachers
will recognize
in the propaganda-free future

May they infuse me
with resurrected confusions
that sensitize me
to the prematurely solved mysteries
that I need to crack open again

May they make it easy
for the medicine beasts,
the talking animals,
the earth's real gods,
to welcome me
as one of their own

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THE MIRACLE OF THE PSYCHE'S WAYS

"The miracle of the psyche's ways is that even if you are halfhearted, irreverent, didn't mean to, didn't really hope to, don't want to, feel unworthy to, aren't ready for it, you will accidentally stumble upon treasure anyway. Then it is your soul's work to not overlook what has been brought up, to recognize treasure as treasure no matter how unusual its form."

—Clarissa Pinkola Estes

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ASTROLOGY IS NOT A SCIENCE, PART 2

It's usually not productive to engage in a conversation with people who long ago dismissed astrology because it is "pseudo-science." Their minds are as irrevocably and self-satisfyingly closed as an evangelical Christian who already knows forever that there's no such thing as human-caused climate change.

So I expect that any rational ideas I serve up to those folks will have little impact.

But here's a start: Many who deride astrology with kneejerk derision have done no research on the subject. They don't know that four of history's greatest astronomers were practicing astrologers: Johannes Kepler, Galileo Galilei, Tycho Brahe, and Pierre Gassendi.

Most of the deriders haven't read smart astrological philosophers like Dane Rudhyar and Alice O. Howell and Steven Arroyo and Liz Greene. They aren't aware that pioneering psychologist Carl Jung cast horoscopes and believed that "astrology represents the summation of all the psychological knowledge of antiquity."

The deriders don't know that astronomer Martha Maiden, who was a program executive at NASA for years and achieved such prominence that she now has an award named after her (tinyurl.com/y4yz9ypn), is an excellent astrologer. (I know because I went to Duke University with her and we studied astrology together.)

The closest approach that fraudulent "skeptics" usually make to the ancient art of astrology is to glance at a random horoscope column in a daily newspaper. To match their carelessness, I might make a drive-by of a strip mall and declare that the profession of architecture is shallow and debased.

That's one reason why these ill-informed "skeptics" spread so many ignorant lies. For instance, they say that astrologers think the stars and planets emit invisible beams that affect people's lives. The truth is, most Western astrologers don't believe any such thing.

Rather, the planets are symbols of the unfolding evolutionary pattern. Just as clocks tell time but don't create it, the heavenly bodies show us the big picture but don't cause it.

Here's some straight-out logic: Astrology doesn't claim to be a science, so it can't be a pseudo-science!
 

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MORE PRONOIA RESOURCES:

Costa Rica Set To Become The Worlds First Plastic-Free And Carbon-Free Country By 2021
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Can This Breakfast Cereal Help Save The Planet?
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Norway refuses to drill for billions of barrels of oil in Arctic, leaving ‘whole industry surprised and disappointed’
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(Note: I endorse these because I like them. They aren’t advertisements, and I get no kickbacks.)

Please tell me your own nominations for PRONOIA RESOURCES: Truthrooster@gmail.com.
 

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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
 Week beginning June 6

Copyright 2019 by Rob Brezsny
FreeWillAstrology.com
 

GEMINI (May 21-June 20):

Some birds can fly for days without coming down to earth. Alpine swifts are the current record-holders, staying aloft for 200 consecutive days as they chase and feed on insects over West Africa. I propose we make the swift your soul ally for the next three weeks. May it help inspire you to take maximum advantage of the opportunities life will be offering you. You will have extraordinary power to soar over the maddening crowd, gaze at the big picture of your life, and enjoy exceptional amounts of freedom.

CANCER (June 21-July 22):

"I think gentleness is one of the most disarmingly and captivatingly attractive qualities there are," writes poet Nayyirah Waheed. That will be emphatically true about you in the coming weeks, Cancerian. Your poised, deeply felt gentleness will accord you as much power as other people might draw from ferocity and grandeur. Your gentleness will enable you to crumble obstacles and slip past barriers. It will energize you to capitalize on and dissipate chaos. It will win you leverage that you'll be able to use for months.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):

Is the Loch Ness monster real? Is there a giant sea serpent that inhabits the waters of Loch Ness in Scotland? Tantalizing hints arise now and then, but no definitive evidence has ever emerged. In 1975, enterprising investigators got the idea to build a realistic-looking papier-mâché companion for Nessie and place it in Loch Ness. They hoped that this "honey trap" would draw the reclusive monster into more public view. Alas, the scheme went awry. (Lady Nessie got damaged when she ran into a jetty.) But it did have some merit. Is there an equivalent approach you might employ to generate more evidence and insight about one of your big mysteries, Leo? What strategies might you experiment with? The time is right to hatch a plan.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):

Earlier in your life, you sometimes wrestled with dilemmas that didn't deserve so much of your time and energy. They weren't sufficiently essential to invoke the best use of your intelligence. But over the years, you have ripened in your ability to attract more useful and interesting problems. Almost imperceptibly, you have been growing smarter about recognizing which riddles are worth exploring and which are better left alone. Here's the really good news: The questions and challenges you face now are among the finest you've ever had. You are being afforded prime opportunities to grow in wisdom and effectiveness.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):

How many languages are you fluent it? One? Two? More? I'm sure you already know that gaining the ability to speak more than one tongue makes you smarter and more empathetic. It expands your capacity to express yourself vividly and gives you access to many interesting people who think differently from you. I mention this, Libra, because you're in a phase of your cycle when learning a new language might be easier than usual, as is improving your mastery of a second or third language. If none of that's feasible for you, I urge you to at least formulate an intention to speak your main language with greater candor and precision—and find other ways to expand your ability to express yourself.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):

Here's Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano from The Book of Embraces: "In the River Plate basin we call the heart a 'bobo,' a fool. And not because it falls in love. We call it a fool because it works so hard." I bring this to your attention, Scorpio, because I hope that in the coming weeks, your heart will indeed be a hard-working, wisely foolish bobo. The astrological omens suggest that you will learn what you need to learn and attract the experiences you need to attract if you do just that. Life is giving you a mandate to express daring and diligent actions in behalf of love.
 

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MAYBE JOY AND PLEASURE ARE ESSENTIAL SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCES

Assume that your drive to experience pleasure and happiness isn't a barrier to your spiritual growth, but is in fact essential to it. Proceed on the hypothesis that cultivating joy can make you a more ethical and compassionate person. Imagine that feeling good has something important to teach you every day.

For inspiration in practicing this approach, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES. They're four-to-five-minute meditations on the current state of your destiny.

To listen to your Expanded Audio Horoscope online, go to freewillastrology.sparkns.com

Register and/or log in through the main page.

You can also listen over the phone by calling 1-877-873-4888.

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The cost is $6 per sign on the On the Web. (Discounts are available for bulk purchases.)  You can also access them for $1.99 per minute by phone.

The Expanded Audio Horoscopes work on most smart phones and tablets.

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"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

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SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):

When he was twenty years old, a German student named Max Planck decided he wanted to study physics. His professor at the University of Munich dissuaded him, telling Planck, "In this field, almost everything is already discovered, and all that remains is to fill a few unimportant holes." Planck ignored the bad advice and ultimately went on to win a Nobel Prize in Physics for his role in formulating quantum theory. Most of us have had a similar experience: people who've tried to convince us to reject our highest calling and strongest dreams. In my view, the coming weeks will be a potent time for you to recover and heal from those deterrents and discouragements in your own past.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):

Not all, but many horoscope columns address your ego rather than your soul. They provide useful information for your surface self, but little help for your deep self. If you've read my oracles for a while, you know that I aspire to be in the latter category. In that light, you won't be surprised when I say that the most important thing you can do in the coming weeks is to seek closer communion with your soul; to explore your core truths; to focus on delight, fulfillment, and spiritual meaning far more than on status, power, and wealth. As you attend to your playful work, meditate on this counsel from Capricorn author John O'Donohue: "The geography of your destiny is always clearer to the eye of your soul than to the intentions and needs of your surface mind."

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):

Aquarian biochemist Gertrude Belle Elion shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1988. She was instrumental in devising new drugs to treat AIDS and herpes, as well as a medication to facilitate organ transplants. And yet she accomplished all this without ever earning a PhD or MD, a highly unusual feat. I suspect you may pull off a similar, if slightly less spectacular feat in the coming weeks: getting a reward or blessing despite a lack of formal credentials or official credibility.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):

Today Mumbai is a megacity with 12.5 million people on 233 square miles. But as late as the eighteenth century, it consisted of seven sparsely populated islands. Over many decades, reclamation projects turned them into a single land mass. I foresee you undertaking a metaphorically comparable project during the coming months. You could knit fragments together into a whole. You have the power to transform separate and dispersed influences into a single, coordinated influence. You could inspire unconnected things to unite in common cause.

ARIES (March 21-April 19):

"I don't think we were ever meant to hear the same song sung exactly the same way more than once in a lifetime," says poet Linh Dinh. That's an extreme statement that I can't agree with. But I understand what he's driving at. Repeating yourself can be debilitating, even deadening. That includes trying to draw inspiration from the same old sources that have worked for you in the past. In accordance with current astrological omens, I suggest you try to minimize exact repetition in the next two weeks: both in what you express and what you absorb. For further motivation, here's William S. Burroughs: "Truth may appear only once; it may not be repeatable."

TAURUS (April 20-May 20):

Peter Benchley wrote the bestselling book Jaws, which was later turned into a popular movie. It's the story of a great white shark that stalks and kills people in a small beach town. Later in his life, the Taurus author was sorry for its influence, which helped legitimize human predation on sharks and led to steep drops in shark populations. To atone, Benchley became an aggressive advocate for shark conservation. If there's any behavior in your own past that you regret, Taurus, the coming weeks will be a good time to follow Benchley's lead: correct for your mistakes; make up for your ignorance; do good deeds to balance a time when you acted unconsciously.
 

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HOMEWORK:

To connect with me on social media, go here: freewillastrology.com/social

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Submissions sent to Rob Brezsny's Astrology 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 submissions for length, style, and content. Requests for anonymity will be honored. We are not responsible for unsolicited submission of any creative material.

Contents of the Free Will Astrology Newsletter are Copyright 2019 Rob Brezsny

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