Weekly Roundup #3
Virgo, Pisces, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius
Hello friends! There turned out to be a lot of Virgo in this one. You may also have seen I’ve started publishing my weekly newsletter for subscribers. In the following weeks we’ll be working on better understanding Saturn. But for now:
ENTREES.
1.
Rainbows are Sagittarian. So is lightning. Sagittarius is in everything vast, heavenly, divine, transcendent.
2.
Zodiacal Symbols by Rudolf Steiner. Aries top-left, Taurus below, then around the Zodiac.
Gemini is two little messenger angels, Scorpio a man submerged beneath dark waves surrounded by danger, Aquarius a big angel (being the most adult of the Air Signs, Air Signs being generally angelic). Virgo is protecting something precious. The Sun, Leo, is the image of fertility itself. Pisces something glimpsed in darkness.
3.
Bad Sagittarius is guys who take LSD once and spend the rest of their lives lecturing everyone about weed cures cancer, binaural beats, Twin Flame, reincarnated Lakota Rainbow Warriors, Nordics, DMT, Alex Grey Obama painting; get angry when you question them, can't take a joke
Entheogens, Stoned Ape theory, Terrence McKenna, Tim Leary, starting your own religion, SHPONGLE, psytrance, ponytails, embroidered vests, "disclosure", JACQUE FRESCO, blowing weed smoke into newly born infant's face at Phish concert, NLP: SAGITTARIUS.
(What’s good Sagittarius? Adventurer, wizard, teacher, open to anything, humble & generous.)
MAIN.
Virgo’s Virtues
Millennials who are very cavalier about not having children are in for a shock when they enter their 40s & realize life is only half over. What do you do at that point? Keep trying to be sexy & have fun? I expect to see a lot of sadness & confusion about what to do at that point.
The Sun enters Virgo. This post results... Virgo's purview is the bitter truth, pinning down the uncomfortable facts everyone is avoiding so they don't cause trouble down the line. Another example:
While Gemini covers all the news that's fit to print, all the bubbly and exciting gossip, all the gee-whiz technological achievements, Virgo focuses on the bitter, earthy facts of necessity and the bottom line.
Maybe Virgo sounds boring... maybe it sounds like a killjoy, and it can be, but it's often very sweet. Virgo is who you want looking after you when you're sick, or fixing your car. They do a solid job. They're the only thing preventing most restaurants from collapsing, I’m told.
Virgo roots out the problems most people would rather sweep under the rug and fixes them. This makes people uncomfortable. The "KAREN" is the Virgoan boogeywoman of this Piscean era... she won't let things slide, she wants to see the manager. But she gets things done. We need her.
NOTE: Virgo Rising women often have this highly transformed appearance... the choppy, high-maintenance hair. Virgos must always be toiling away on some little detail... (NOTE: The hair can be longer, less choppy, but still high-maintenance. Virgo can also produce health & fitness freaks.)
Pisces and Virgo.
Pisces is the Sign of paranoia because it is the Sign of the hunch and faith in the validity of a particular mood. One's feeling of suspicion MUST be correct - it only remains to find out how. One is never wrong per se - there is always something more complex at work. Thus it corresponds to the 12th House, whose domain traditionally includes “dealing with secret enemies”.
Virgo deals with situtations in which something is clearly and objectively WRONG. Pisces' standard is purely internal: It must trust in its hunches despite all evidence to the contrary. It must hold firm in the face of every attempt to deceive it. Thus its ties to the concept of "gaslighting," which has entered the vogue since the Neptune Pisces era (2012-2025).
Pisces is both sides of gaslighting: The effort to trust one's conscience despite attempts to deceive, and the effort to act as if things are a certain way until people start believing it. This is the field upon which Pisces struggles.
Pisces' bad side is believing that someone is gaslighting you when in fact they're not. Sometimes the hunch is not right, sometimes the mood is misleading. One fails to transcend their harmful feelings. A person who believes they're being gaslighted cannot be reasoned with. Healthy Pisceans seek to be free of arbitrary, destructive moods. This emotional clarity thus mirrors Virgo’s sobriety.
Pisceans trust the mood (or vibe), because the mood guides them to new revelations which confirm its validity. Thus it is Ruled by Jupiter, the planet of revelation, and Exalts Venus, the planet of mood.
How can Pisceans know which moods to trust? Quiet, introspection, and questioning their conscience. Sorting through which feelings are just feelings, or unhelpful, and which are truly guiding them towards the truth. They do this with the same meticulousness which Virgoans reserve for the facts. Pisces is really as picky as Virgo, in its own way.
Virgo can master the facts, but on its own can’t put them into perspective. Pisces can get the right perspective, but can’t on its own master the facts.
Pisces understands the following: If you approach someone as an enemy, you will constrain them towards being an enemy. If you come as a friend, they are that much more likely to be friendly.
Pisces lives to create ambiguities and resolve them in its favour. Virgo lives to destroy ambiguities and maneuver its way deftly through the facts towards the best outcome. Both win by finding gaps and opportunities which they can take advantage of.
Virgo in Art.
Venus Virgo Paul Laffoley displays its characteristically meticulous attention to detail, many discrete bits heaped up. Each complete in itself. Perfection in the details.
Venus Virgo David Partridge presents a mural of 100,000 nails hammered into plywood. Virgo pins things down and hits the nail on the head!
Venus Virgo Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn shows us more of its neatness and precision, each penstroke visible, soberly distinguished.
How to Study Astrology, Book Reviews.
My advice to anyone seeking to learn astrology is that you'll learn it by reading charts, not reading books. Study the basics, read the charts of people you're interested in and try to connect features of their chart with features of their life. Just keep doing that forever.
The only books I recommend for beginners are Grant Lewi's Heaven Knows What and Astrology for the Millions. Both employ a woefully incomplete system of astrology, but they are so firm in their foundations and strong in their observations that they are very valuable.
I regard Lewi as the first really modern astrologer, directly and rigorously matching personal observation to astrological factors, rather than handing down received wisdom of dubious origin. He rises above the truly dismal state of contemporary astrology at large.
Lewi's observational talent is so strong that I can still derive insights from his work, three years after beginning my study of astrology. The books aren't perfect, but they're the only thing I'd recommend for natal astrology. Now let me survey the alternatives...
Ghostwriting for Evangeline Adams, Aleister Crowley wrote a textbook of astrology. As usual, Crowley is concerned with weaving a seductive narrative, but once you look past this, the fundaments of his work are fairly thin. He makes demonstrably false claims with total confidence.
While Crowley does have some interesting things to say about the Signs and Planets, they are mixed in haphazardly with misleading and incomplete statements - hence they are worthless unless one has already got the personal experience to compare them to. The work is useless as an introductory text. At best it can help you to put words to things you’ve already seen.
Probably the most respected name in "serious" astrology today is Robert Hand. While he is a genius and his books on transits and composites are currently the best available, his introductory textbook (Horoscope Symbols) is an incoherent mess.
There are countless other astrologers for whom I have no time, as sweet as they may be in person. Demetra George, Steven Forrest, Liz Greene, etc. Textbooks lack the most basic concepts, such as Rulership, without which one cannot properly read a chart.
The basics of "Planet in Sign" astrology are so powerful that one can get a lot done even without knowing anything else. People with the Sun in Taurus, Capricorn, etc. do behave in certain ways. This is observable. But it can go so, so much deeper than that.
I believe I am the first person to produce a really rigorous, standardised framework for astrology. Whether this is conceit on my part is up to you to judge. I've presented the very basics of it on my wiki, here, but there's still a lot to articulate. Working on it!
A reader asks:
A lot of people recommend William Lilly's Christian Astrology and Chris Brennan's Hellenistic Astrology - what do you think of them?
I don't dismiss Chris Brennan's work but I can't say it's left an impression on me. I am completely against traditionalism as an end in itself in astrology. Direct experience contradicts it, however pretty & internally consistent the tradition may be. But it is worth looking into.
I respect Mr. Brennan for his efforts and the sacrifices he's made in pursuit of knowledge. As for William Lilly, I can't say I've ever derived any useful insights from his work either. Perhaps a failing on my part, but I've found my own approach more fruitful. I don’t deny his skill as an astrologer.
I don't think it's necessary to read Greek or Old English to get to the meat of astrology. I believe it's all around us, all the time. We only need to learn the basics of how astral factors correlate with events here on Earth, and in our own lives. And then to observe.
Direct observation & reasoning are a better friend to the astrologer than all the old books in the world. That ancient knowledge can only be a guide to seeking our own direct experience of astrology's workings.
Capricorn and Aquarius in Art.
Capricorn can be technically accomplished and heartless. Aquarius can be perfect but without character. That said, I think the below (by Benjamin Robert Haydon) is a fine example of what Capricorn looks like when it works out: Classically polished. Marmoreal. Steely.
Another example from William Blake, aslo Venus Capricorn (both indeed have Saturn Aquarius ruling it, lightening its gloom and giving their works an airy tinge):
Squarepusher is a wonderful example of the cold Aquarian sound... He has Venus in Aquarius. Icy.
Compare Squarepusher above to Tokujin Yoshioka below... Icy Aquarian. Listen to the sounds while looking at the pictures for a full-spectrum Aquarian experience.
That’s all, folks! See you next week, and remember to subscribe for my series on Saturn.
Would Sag/Aquarius be present in the sparse 'hypermodern' aesthetic in science fiction. (e.g. Villeneuve's 2049 and Dune?)