Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter http://ezezine.com
Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter
April 16, 2008
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http://FreeWillAstrology.com
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"Prayer is not an old woman's idle amusement. Properly understood and
applied, it is the most potent instrument of action."
- Gandhi
"I can't understand why people are afraid of new ideas, I'm afraid of the
old ones."
- John Cage
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My book
*PRONOIA IS THE ANTIDOTE FOR PARANOIA:
How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings*
is available for sale at http://tinyurl.com/qaj62
Here's an excerpt:
HYPE-OCALYPSE
Rank your favorite doomsday scenarios in order of preference.
____A new ice age
____Destruction of ozone layer
____Dramatic upsurge in earthquakes, volcanoes, and hurricanes
____Universal drug addiction
____Mass starvation
____Takeover by monsters created through genetic engineering
____Genocide of the imagination; lethal proliferation of dangerous images
____Terrifying, contagious superstitions spread by apocalyptic pop
prophecy
____Insects and bacteria conspire to cull planet's most dangerous
species
____Multinational corporate criminals create a single, globe-spanning
totalitarian state with concentration camps that are the setting for
popular reality TV shows
____Mutated flu strain becomes unstoppable plague
____Extraterrestrial invasion
____Cataclysmic degeneration of language into incomprehensible babble
and cliché
____Anthrax and LSD dumped in water supplies
____Revolt of super-intelligent machines
____Stupidity becomes popular
____Mass hypnosis by evil political and religious leaders
____President, suffering from mental illness, goes berserk and nukes
Mecca, Moscow, Beijing
____Virus from outer space
____Virus from inner space
____Essential natural resources run out
____Global addiction to porn results in accidental mass suicides through
excessive masturbation
____Psychic terrorists administer mass brainwashing that causes millions
to buy so many products they can't afford that they become destitute,
can't afford health care, and die from diseases caused by eating junk food
out of garbage cans
____The Internet births itself as a sentient global brain, but it's so riddled
with spam that it becomes a god-like cripple suffering from the Artificial
Intelligence version of Alzheimer's
____Earth is hit by comet, asteroid, or mini-black hole
____Wealthy philanthropists give everyone in the world $100,000,
causing mass insanity
____Sun goes supernova
____Breakthroughs in disease control make it hard for people who are
tired of living to die, leading to a pandemic of depression
____The devil possesses everyone in the world
____Nuclear war
____Other
(describe)______________________________________________
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My docu-fiction memoir
*THE TELEVISIONARY ORACLE*
is available for sale at http://tinyurl.com/2ftyq6
and can be read online at http://tinyurl.com/3c2j4x
(Scroll down the page to find the link to Chapter 1)
Here's an excerpt:
Please answer as many of the following questions as you can. Work with
ferocious intensity and/or gentle reflection. Don't push on till you're
exhausted, but try to come as close to total combustion as you can.
Be innocently truthful and spontaneously thoughtful, or else gratuitously
sarcastic and recklessly flippant. If you find yourself responding with ideas
that you used to believe but don't any more, abandon them and start
over.
Take advantage of this rare opportunity to be creative and authentic for
no reason. Don't save yourself for "something better."
Send answers to sacreduproar@sbcglobal.net.
1. What did you dream last night?
2. What image or symbol represents the absolute of your desires?
3. In what ways has your fate been affected by invisible forces you don't
understand or are barely aware of?
4. Tell a good lie.
5. What were the circumstances in which you were most dangerously
alive?
6. Are you a good listener? If so, describe how you listen. If not, explain
why not.
7. Compose an exciting prayer in which you ask for something you're not
supposed to.
8. What's the difference between right and wrong?
9. Name something you've done to undo, subvert, or neutralize the Battle
of the Sexes.
10. Have you ever witnessed a child being born? If so, describe how it
changed you.
11. Compose a beautiful blasphemy that makes you feel like crying.
12. What do you do to make people like you?
13. If you're not familiar with the Jungian concept of the "shadow," find
out about it. If you are, good. In either case, give a description of the
nature of your personal shadow.
14. Talk about three of your most interesting personalities. Give each one
a name and a power animal.
15. Make up a dream in which you lose control and thereby attract a
crowd of worshipers.
16. Name your greatest unnecessary taboo and how you would violate it
if it didn't hurt anyone.
17. Give an example of how smart you are in the way you love.
18. What ignorance do you deserve to be forgiven for?
19. What was the pain that healed you the most?
20. Make a prediction about yourself.
EXTRA CREDIT
In the ancient Greek epic, Odysseus and his men become stranded on an
island belonging to the sorceress Circe. In a famous scene, Circe uses
magic to turn the men into pigs. Later, though, in an episode that's often
underemphasized by casual readers, she changes them back into men --
only they're stronger, braver, and more beautiful than before they were
pigs. Tell an analogous story from your own life.
EXTRA EXTRA CREDIT
Discuss and act out the following:
To survive war, you must become war.
- Rambo
To survive love, you must become love.
- The Televisionary Oracle
Send answers to sacreduproar@sbcglobal.net
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To read news and features from my book, go here:
http://tinyurl.com/lhwx2
You can buy the book here:
AMAZON
http://tinyurl.com/qaj62
POWELLS
http://tinyurl.com/3dsx6q
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OTHER PRONOIA RESOURCES:
BREAKTHROUGH EMOTIONS
*Scientific American* says "You Can Learn to Be More Compassionate"
http://tinyurl.com/ys9qxv
MAKING BEAUTIFUL POSSIBILITIES OUT OF ABSURD IMPOSSIBILITIES
10 Impossibilities Conquered by Science
http://tinyurl.com/6d6rcx
NEVER SAY NEVER
*Physics of the Impossible: A Scientific Exploration into the World of
Phasers, Force Fields, Teleportation, and Time Travel*
by Michio Kaku
http://tinyurl.com/3n3jrl
"IMPOSSIBLE! Preposterous! These words are often thrown about when
people declare certain things to be scientifically ridiculous. Aliens cannot
reach the Earth in spaceships, they proclaim, because the distance
between stars is too great. Telepathy is impossible since the brain does
not emit or receive messages. And it's impossible to instantaneously
transport an object from A to B because you cannot know the location
and momentum of all its atoms -- teleportation would violate the
Heisenberg uncertainty principle.
"Yet if you carefully analyze these examples, you realize that they are
merely impossible today or in the near future. The real question is, are
they impossible with technologies that lie decades, centuries or even
millennia beyond ours? Perhaps these 'impossibilities' are merely very
difficult engineering problems. The late Arthur C. Clarke once said, 'Any
sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.'"
(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 April 17
Copyright 2008 by Rob Brezsny
http://FreeWillAstrology.com
Grammar key: Asterisks equal *italics*
ARIES (March 21-April 19): A reader from Fiji is encouraging me to pay a
visit. "Fiji is heaven on earth," she says. "You'll be ecstatic here." While I
have no doubt that's true, it's hard for me to imagine being any more
ecstatic than I am when I travel to Hawaii. It, too, has resemblances to
paradise. And the plane flight there takes five hours less and is $600
cheaper than the jaunt to Fiji. Do I really need a more heavenly heaven on
earth than, say, Waimoku Falls Trail in Maui? I expect you're facing a
metaphorically similar situation, Aries. The question you may want to ask
yourself is this: Should you pine and aim for a state beyond perfection, or
will mere perfection serve you just as well?
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): *The Washington Post* solicited ideas from
readers about innovative strategies for wasting time. I'll offer you a few in
the hope that they'll inspire you to take a major break from the Big
Pressing Issues you're obsessed with. It's high time, in my opinion, to give
yourself an enormous amount of slack . . . to forgive yourself for not
being perfect . . . to dissolve any guilt you feel for not having
accomplished all your life goals yet. In that spirit, consider the following
time-wasters: (1) Send letters to the editor about grammatical mistakes
in the classified ads. (2) Make yourself the world's top expert on a person
randomly chosen from the phone book. (3) Keep a logbook in your
bathroom to verify that the toilet bowl cleaner really does work for 1,000
flushes. (4) Set the Guinness record for time spent reading the *Guinness
Book of Records.*
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): In her book *Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All
Creation,* biologist Olivia Judson extols the male members of the fruitfly
species Drosophila bifurca. Although they are barely one-eighth of an inch
long, their sperm can be up to 2.3 inches long. If a man were capable of
the same prodigious production, his sperm would be as big as a whale.
Metaphorically speaking, you Geminis now have the ability to generate
phenomena on this scale. That's why I hope you will devote all your
ingenuity and resourcefulness to creating an intricate, beautiful
masterpiece, not a humongous, complicated mass of confusion.
CANCER (June 21-July 22): Lewis Thomas was a physician who wrote
elegantly about biology in books like *The Lives of a Cell.* I want to bring
your attention to his meditation on warts. "Nothing in the body has so
much the look of toughness and permanence as a wart," he wrote. And
yet "they can be made to go away by something that can only be called
thinking . . . Warts can be ordered off the skin by hypnotic suggestion."
(tinyurl.com/3clzc5) Thomas regarded this phenomenon as "absolutely
astonishing, more of a surprise than cloning or recombinant DNA."
According to my astrological reckoning, Cancerian, you currently have a
comparable marvel at your disposal. Using the power of your mind, you
can shrink, dissolve, or banish a wart-like vexation.
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EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES
In addition to the horoscopes that come to you in this newsletter, I create
audio horoscopes for your inspiration. They discuss themes and cover
material that I don't have room to deal with in the written horoscopes.
They're $6 if you access them on the Web, or $1.99 per minute over the
phone.
Try them at http://RealAstrology.com.
By phone: 1-877-873-4888 or 1-900-950-7700.
"I always feel like I know myself better after listening to your audio
'scopes."
-June R., Austin, TX
"Your audio horoscopes calm me down when I'm too manic and pep me up
when I'm down."
-Arthur T., Cleveland, OH
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LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): This would be a perfect time for you to write your
ultimate personal manifesto. I'm talking about composing a sweeping
statement of the core ideas that fuel your lust for life. To get you in the
mood, take a look at the following lyrics from Danny Schmidt's song
"Company of Friends." "I believe in restless hunger . . . I believe in private
thunder . . . I believe in inspiration . . . I believe in slow creation . . . I
believe in lips on ears . . . I believe in being wrong . . . I believe in
contradiction . . . I believe in living smitten . . . I believe our book is
written by our company of friends."
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): "The Japanese believe that crying babies grow
fast," wrote John Flinn in the *San Francisco Chronicle,* "and that the
louder an infant wails, the more the gods have blessed it." The
astrological omens suggest that a similar principle will soon hold true for
you: The more you sob and blubber, the smarter you'll get. The louder
you howl and moan, the more likely you'll be to attract benevolent
influences and unexpected help.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): In order for some plants to thrive in the
tropical forests of South America, they need bats to eat their fruits and
poop out their seeds while flying around. Biologists call the bat excrement
by a more lyrical name: seed rain. It's not too much of a stretch to invoke
this relationship as an apt metaphor for your life right now, Libra. Like the
bat-dependent plants, you now require the help of fertility agents whose
work may be a bit messy.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): It's the Week of the Fabulous Smirk. Not the
Week of the Arrogant Smirk or the Vengeful Smirk or the Hateful, Whiny,
Passive-Aggressive Smirk. Rather, the Smirk that Passeth All
Understanding. The Wise, Charitable, Forbearing Smirk. The Uber-Smirk
that says, "I've figured out what everyone's hiding, and I love them
anyway." You are ready, Scorpio, to explore the Divine Smirk that arises
naturally when you have outwitted an obstacle that was obscuring the
truth from you; when you have finally seen through the delusion you were
under and guessed the secret you weren't smart enough to see before.
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AUDIO HOROSCOPES
In addition to the horoscopes that you're reading here, I create audio
horoscopes for your amusement and inspiration. Find out more at
http://RealAstrology.com.
The audio horoscopes are also available by phone at 1-877-873-4888 or
1-900-950-7700.
"Your audio horoscopes work better than my therapist and cost me five
percent of what he charges." - Chris M., San Francisco, CO
"You've helped me remember important things about myself that I'd
forgotten." -Ruth V., Toronto
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SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): This would be a good week for you to
compete in a flamethrower competition. You'd probably win. Why?
Because according to my analysis of the astrological omens, you currently
have an unprecedented knack for playing with fire. You would most likely
also be victorious in a marshmallow-roasting contest or a jump-over-the-
bonfire tournament. And you would probably do surprisingly well in any
activity that might be described as "sitting in the hot seat."
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): "The great theme is not Romeo and
Juliet," said poet Anne Sexton. "The great theme we all share is that of
becoming ourselves, of overcoming our father and mother, of assuming
our identities somehow." This is certainly your great theme, Capricorn.
And it's especially important for you to devote yourself to it now. You're
at a turning point in your life-long transformation. You're being presented
with a clear-cut choice between sinking back into the ill-fitting yet
comfortable mold that others have shaped for you, or else striding out
into the frontier in a brave push to become a higher, deeper, more
complete version of yourself.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): "We only hear questions that we are able to
answer," said Friedrich Nietzsche. Luckily for you, Aquarius, there are two
big, long-simmering questions for which you have recently begun to sniff
out the answers. That means you're now able, at least potentially, to hear
those questions. I have three pieces of advice to help ensure that you
actually hear them. First, wash your brain out so it's got more free space
in it. Second, give your listening skills a tune-up. Third, meditate on Edgar
Allen Poe's idea that "Those who dream by day know many things which
escape those who dream only by night."
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Back in 1995, I began seeing a
psychotherapist whose influence ultimately improved me in a thousand
ways. At the end of our first session, she handed me a note as I left. It
read: "If you don't articulate your conscious desires, your unconscious
patterns will come true." She gazed at me firmly and said, "Don't come
back until you've proved to yourself that those words are true. All my
work will be of no use to you unless you take them to heart." It took me
exactly 23 days to prove to myself that what she'd written was true. Now
I offer you the same challenge, Pisces. Spend the upcoming week in
intense contemplation on the hypothesis, "If you don't articulate your
conscious desires, your unconscious patterns will come true."
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HOMEWORK: What's the bravest thing you ever did? What do you imagine
will be the next brave thing you do? Testify! Go to
http://FreeWillAstrology.com and click on "Email Rob."
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WANT TO GET YOUR CHART DONE?
I'm not doing personal charts, but I highly recommend my astrological
colleague, RO LOUGHRAN. Her approach closely matches my own. In our
many discussions about astrology over the years, we've had a major
influence on each other's work.
Ro utilizes a blend of well-trained intuition, emotional warmth, and a high
degree of 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.
Ro is based in California, but can do phone consultations and otherwise
work with you regardless of geographic boundaries.
Ro's website is at
http://YourSoulJourney.com
She can also be reached at roloughran@comcast.net
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P.S. I totally respect your privacy. I'll never sell or give away your address
to anyone.
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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;
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Please be sure to note your preference when sending to us. We
are not responsible for unsolicited submission of any creative
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Contents of the Free Will Astrology Newsletter are Copyright
2008 Rob Brezsny
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