Dear Friend and Reader:

For the past couple of days, you’ve been sending in your questions.

Today I have one for you. What do you do with fear? We live with lots of the stuff — from personal anxiety to fear of something serious happening on the planet. How do you handle it? Do you just live with it? Do you meditate, write in your journal, talk to someone, take anti-anxiety drugs or use some other method?

Please send your replies to editorial – at – planetwaves.net. We will post some of your answers anonymously tomorrow.

Thanks for participating.

Today’s Oracle takes us to Aug 01, 2003 - Aries - Weekly

You have come to some surprising revelations about yourself in recent months, but none so stunning as what’s now unfolding. This really has been a lesson in taking that ever-lovin’ Aries bull-headedness and putting it in the pen. Your flexibility, your recognition that ideas move, dance and flow with the currents of dreams, has not only been your spiritual life-saver. It has been your source of life, because life is change. Allowing for movement means granting the space to create your world as you go. It does not matter who, what or where you were yesterday. Today is astonishing, tomorrow is whatever you make it, and fear is purely optional.

Thursday 24 July 2008

Venus (14+ Leo) sesquiquadrate Pluto (29+ Sagittarius Rx)
Venus (14+ Leo) trine Great Attractor (14+ Sagittarius)
Mercury (25+ Cancer) sextile Admetos (25+ Taurus)
Atlantis (19+ Libra) square Varuna (19+ Cancer)
Atlantis (19+ Libra) trine Chiron (19+ Aquarius Rx)
Chariklo (5+ Scorpio) semisquare Logos (20+ Virgo) - Near Miss Only
Mercury (25+ Cancer) sextile Pallas (25+ Taurus)
Apollo (24+ Leo) quintile Hidalgo (6+ Scorpio)
Venus (14+ Leo) trine Juno (14+ Sagittarius Rx)
Venus (14+ Leo) quintile Amor (2+ Gemini)
Sun (2+ Leo) sesquiquadrate Quaoar (17+ Sagittarius Rx)
Sun (2+ Leo) trine Hylonome (2+ Sagittarius Rx)
Eros (9+ Leo) septile M87 (1+ Libra)
Mars (14+ Virgo) square Great Attractor (14+ Sagittarius)
Venus (15 Leo) sesquiquadrate Aries Point (0 Aries)

Dear Friend and Reader:

Today we have two reader questions for you, with replies. For those of you who found Planet Waves through the old Astrology Secrets project on Cainer.com, my fingers are pleased to inform you that I won’t be writing any 5,000 word replies, or at least I don’t plan to. I will do my best to give a concise, relevant response to the questions we select, and Genevieve Salerno will be assisting me in this. Rachel Asher, our associate editor, will also see your questions. Please send them to: questions -at- planetwaves.net with the word QUESTION somewhere in the subject header (this helps us sort the mail). We will not use your last name in any response, though we may publish your birth chart anonymously.

This project is sponsored by your subscriptions to Planet Waves Astrology News. So please sign up, or sign up a friend. Thanks for participating.

Does location have an impact on my writing career?

Dear Eric,

You seem to know the impact of your writing pretty well, so I’ll just try to nudge on past my impulse to gush and fawn in the opening paragraph of this letter. But *thank you* for opening this door. And for the June access as well.

My question has to do with location and sidereal influence. I am a writer and my career has been off-and-on, mostly because I keep fussing with the definition of what I do (variously: grant writer, art manager, muse, diseuse, etc). [Note, a diseuse is a woman who is a skilled and usually professional performer of monologues.-efc] But I am also beginning to think that longitude/latitude might be playing in. If I move, will my focus and traction improve? I have lovers and kids and longterm ties here in Austin, but something here feels dead(ish), unyielding in both my being and place.

Born July 6, 1955, at 5:20 in the afternoon, in Corpus Christi, TX. Just started my 3rd 26-year cycle on this planet. Yippee.

Thank you again,

Mysti

===

Dear Mysti:

Looking at your chart, it seems clear that you are obsessed with relationships, or that they are obsessed with you. The people around you are important to you, and you need deep contact. You seem to have an electrifying presence; this chart is glowing (Moon conjunct Chiron in Aquarius; plenty of Gemini in the 7th house; Sun/Uranus/Mars/Vesta/Jupiter in the 8th house). But more than that, you have a lot of energy to blow off, and you seem to do it through various means of eroticism and emotional contact.

While you might expect me to say that sex is good for creativity, there arrives that point where the distractions of relating and processing relationship material can diffuse even your abundant energy. These relationships clearly feed you and I would guess from that Moon conjunct Chiron that people gravitate toward you, and they will no matter where you happen to be. You know the old saying, wherever you go, there you are.

The thing about location is that it shifts one’s realty. It confronts you with who you are; travel does this, and living different places does it as well. You have a 9th house Pluto and you live pretty close to where you were born (and I do I know that Austin is not Corpus Christi). That Pluto tells me you might be as obsessed with travel as you are with relationships. I wonder how much traveling you’ve done, which would help you get to know yourself outside the context of one-to-one (or two- or three-to-one bonding as the case may be).

Moving locations would shift the emphasis of your chart, but it would also reorient your mind and put you in a position of needing to adapt. That, in turn, would stir the pot and get you thinking in new ways. And unless you are Emily Dickinson, this is almost always good for writing.

However, you raise the issue of how you define yourself. I would say that you’re probably caught in a kind of psychic hall of mirrors of trying to see how others define you; or of attempting to define yourself differently for different people in order to have their approval. In the end, who cares what you call yourself? You don’t sell writing with a business card, you sell it with good writing. An editor looking at your story about ancient Egyptian sex cults doesn’t care that you like to go bass fishing with your friends once a month. They care about whether your ideas are coherent and your piece is on time.

If you’re a professional writer, you need to master the writing business; and you need to focus on projects that represent your interests and will also pay the bills.

I think that from a financial standpoint, you have two things you need to watch. Your 2nd house Ceres in Capricorn is saying that you have a survival mentality, that is, you have defined eating as the bottom line. Usually you need to go past that in order to thrive. Second, you have the Moon conjunct Chiron in the 2nd house; and by itself, the Moon in that house can represent some extreme financial cycles.

But a 2nd house Chiron suggests that the deeper issue involves self-esteem. Do you feel you have the right to be a writer? If you did, you might feel you had the energy and focus to create projects that work as part of the writing business. And if you did that, you would probably find some good sources of income.

I suggest you write about the subjects that get you going the hottest. You know what they are.

Thanks for your question. Please let me know if my response was even vaguely relevant.

===

How do I break my old patterns?

Dear Eric:

Thank you for offering your insight. I was born Feb. 14, 1955 in Salzburg, Austria. I don’t have a birth time however my mother remembered it was in the am, as the shift of nurses were changing.

Question: I can see what I want to change. I can feel the energy of the change, the possibility of such changes are sitting and waiting…that is what it feels like.

I don’t know how to break my old patterns, and they are breaking me down causing more difficulty maintaining the “old”. But I am still keeping the “old” despite the pain ….

I would appreciate some guidance on how to make the changes…how to move through the old patterns…

Warm Regards,

Ann

===

Dear Ann,

I am not sure what patterns you are talking about. I have my theories based on your chart (you have the Moon and Juno conjunct Saturn in Scorpio, which is a heavy emotional cast; and it is square your Sun/Mercury, making it difficult for you to discuss your feelings even though you want to). It would help a lot to have a single example of a pattern that you are thinking of.

I am also not sure what methods you are using to break out of your patterns, or what your concept of your own psyche is, which would tell us how you might navigate your inner territory. All these things make a difference in how one might go about shifting their state of existence.

Finally, what we call patterns often protect us from what is new. They are like armor. Whatever their job is, they probably have one; they do something for you, and if you can connect with that purpose, you may decide you no longer need it. But everything in this world has a purpose, whether it be constructive or not.

This all being said, I think that what you’re really dragging around is your mother’s negativity. In particular, she seemed to be extremely negative toward sex, and it’s clear enough that you were (like a lot of people) programmed with the idea that the only sexual relationship was or should be marriage (this is Juno in Scorpio mixed in with all this influence).

Your dad, for his part, was a very different kind of man. But he did not express his feelings easily, and neither do you; you have the same influence from both parents, though it has different origins. Your father seemed to be more progressive than your mom, but he kept his mouth shut so as not to get mixed up with her. Nobody talked; you did not learn how to express your basic feelings as a kid, much less lay the truth on the line of who you are and what you need.

That is what I suggest you do. I suggest you talk about all the most difficult things first, which means finding someone to talk to about them. There are probably a lot of very bright people in your circle of friends, but you have to find someone with whom you have no fear and who you know will not abuse the power you give them by divulging everything, and I do mean everything. A very open minded therapist would be a great start — preferably somebody without a Ph.D., unless of course you trust and adore that person. Whoever it is, you need to choose a therapist you want to become like, because that is basically what happens.

You are basically sinking under the weight of all that you have not said. And that may be the pattern that is the most difficult of all. Writing to us here counts as a good start. Keep going.

===

Readers may send their questions to questions -at- planetwaves.net with the word QUESTION in the subject header. Not all questions will be answered. Please keep them short, concise and most of all, relevant to our readers. Please include your full birth data written out, for example, Feb. 30, 1801, rather than 2/30/01. Please include your time of birth! This feature is sponsored by your subscriptions to Planet Waves Astrology News! So please sign up and if you’re already a subscriber, please sign up a friend!

===

Today’s Oracle takes us to May 14, 1999 - SCORPIO - Weekly

For all the hype about sex in our culture, it remains one of the great mysteries of human existence. In Greek mythology, the prophet Tiresias, who had lived for years as both genders, was blinded for revealing that women derive more physical pleasure than men during sex. This may be true, in many cases, but it also remains true that despite their depth and power, few women are conscious of what they possess within themselves, and, not surprisingly, few men can fathom the depth of female emotional experience. Unusual aspects suggest that these difficult boundaries of awareness and communication can now be stretched in some new directions.

Wednesday 23 July 2008

Venus (12+ Leo) square Psyche (12+ Scorpio)
Venus (12+ Leo) trine Ixion (12+ Sagittarius Rx)
Apollo (23+ Leo) quintile Chariklo (5+ Scorpio)
Venus (12+ Leo) semisquare Hades (27+ Gemini)
Arachne (10+ Libra) septile Hylonome (2+ Sagittarius Rx)
Pallas (25+ Taurus) conjunct Admetos (25+ Taurus)
Mercury (23+ Cancer) quincunx Neptune (23+ Aquarius Rx)
Sisyphus (13+ Libra) trine Nessus (13+ Aquarius Rx)
Mars (13+ Virgo) quincunx Nessus (13+ Aquarius Rx)
Venus (13+ Leo) opposite Nessus (13+ Aquarius Rx)
Venus (13+ Leo) sextile Sisyphus (13+ Libra)
Mercury (23+ Cancer) septile Amor (2+ Gemini)
Sun (1+ Leo) sextile M87 (1+ Libra)
Vesta (7+ Taurus) quintile Varuna (19+ Cancer)
Mercury (23+ Cancer) square 1992 QB1 (23+ Aries)
Vesta (7+ Taurus) semisquare Uranus (22+ Pisces Rx)
Eros (8+ Leo) square Asbolus (8+ Taurus)
Saturn (6+ Virgo) sesquiquadrate Eris (21+ Aries Rx)
Amor (2+ Gemini) opposite Hylonome (2+ Sagittarius Rx)
Sun (1+ Leo) quintile Sisyphus (13+ Libra)
Apollo (23+ Leo) trine 1992 QB1 (23+ Aries)

We are seeking astrologically related questions for reply in this blog. I’ll personally respond to your queries each Wednesday. Please keep your questions short, direct and clear, and relating to your own life (in other words, please don’t ask me to “tell you about your boyfriend”). Include your full birth data. I may publish your chart, but I’ll only give your first name. Not all questions will be answered — only the most relevant to our readers. Send to editorial -at- planetwaves.net. Thank you! –efc

Dear Friend and Reader:

There is no diet that can get you to lose 50 pounds in a week, but if you use the power of eclipses, you can take a week and create a pattern that will help you do just about anything you want or need. Most people feel stuck in their own lives to some real (and frustrating) extent. We live in patterns, and eclipses help us shift the existing modes of existence and welcome new ones. If we used eclipses as conscious leverage points to get unstuck, we would not feel so wedged into our own lives.

Today as of 6:55 am EDT, the Sun has arrived in Leo. Leo is the sign of the Sun, our central source of power, light, heat and awareness. All of the energy we use on Earth comes from the Sun: be it in the form of trees, oil or solar power. Leo is a fixed sign, aligned with three others on the fixed cross of the heavens — Taurus, Scorpio and Aquarius. It represents the peak of summer in the Northern Hemisphere and of winter in the Southern Hemisphere, though winter tends to be a lot warmer on the south side of the planet than up in say Alaska, Finland or Maine.

This year’s Leo season arrives with a pair of eclipses; this happens twice a year, each year’s sets of events always coming a couple of weeks earlier than the prior ones. (The lunar nodes, which tell us approximately where the next eclipses are going to happen, move retrograde on average, so the eclipses get earlier. They are currently in mid-Leo/Aquarius.)

Eclipses bring shifts in continuity and they help us establish patterns and cultivate the future in a direct, immediate and dependable way. They are convenient (or at times, not so convenient) times to make changes that take root. If you want to use the influence of these eclipses now, make choices and conduct yourself in such a way that what you want to create is set in motion by the time the events occur. In general, the energy pattern you establish at the time of eclipses is the pattern you will hold onto for the next six months or a year.

Setting one thing in motion generally means ending something else; so this is an equally useful time to get unstuck. Leo represents one’s sense of identity, one’s expression in the world, one’s sense of glory, of value and — most significantly — of duty and responsibility. So the central question of a Leo eclipse is, how do you define yourself? Yes, internally, but mainly, by what mode of expression? Can you focus your identity sufficiently to express that identity?

As for when — we will experience a total eclipse of the Sun in Leo on Aug. 1. It is exactly square the asteroid Vesta, which itself represents the expression of creative and sexual energy and more to the point, the reason we would choose to make that expression. Are we doing it “for its own sake,” or “for some other purpose”?

The eclipse is also conjunct Mercury in Leo; and Venus in Leo is opposite Neptune, suggesting that we ask ourselves the question, what is real and what is not, where our affections are concerned? The answer (in Neptune style) may take some time to work out, because it tends to take us a while to see through the idealism of Neptune.

The Leo total solar eclipse is pretty extraordinary, in part due to the fact that solar eclipses in this sign have been quite rare in recent decades. Also, a few hours after the Moon eclipses the Sun, it eclipses Mercury. So we have the image of the seed of a new idea in a new era of time, which is predicated on closing a chapter and forgetting an old idea.

Often, we want to welcome the new without letting go of what is old, what no longer works, or no longer has a purpose. Keep your eyes open for developments on both sides of that equation.

By the time of the Aquarius Full Moon and lunar eclipse on the 16th, this idea can develop into a full-on vision for what is possible — and mind you, that may mean embracing the reality of something that seemed unlikely or impossible just yesterday.

Very truly yours,

Today’s Oracle takes us to Jul 05, 2004 - Capricorn - Weekly

This is anything but a casual time in your life. But if you’re feeling a sense of urgency about the meaning of relationships, please keep your sense of humor. No, you don’t exactly have control over events and yes, the past year of your life has seen a demand for attention to integrity. If you’ve been purging people from your dance card, the more power to you; if someone truly meaningful has appeared, that’s a good sign as well. The important factor is taking the changes as they come, and remembering to laugh. Only a light heart can love.

Tuesday 22 July 2008

Mercury (20+ Cancer) septile Mars (12+ Virgo)
Sun (29+ Cancer) sesquiquadrate Juno (14+ Sagittarius Rx)
Mercury (21+ Cancer) sextile Sedna (21+ Taurus)
Mercury (21+ Cancer) sesquiquadrate Pholus (6+ Sagittarius Rx)
Sun (0 Leo) trine Aries Point (0 Aries)
Sun enters Leo (direct)
Eros (7+ Leo) sesquiquadrate Uranus (22+ Pisces Rx)
Eros (7+ Leo) quintile Admetos (25+ Taurus)
Venus (11+ Leo) sesquiquadrate Galactic Center (26+ Sagittarius)
Mercury (21+ Cancer) semisquare Saturn (6+ Virgo)
Mars (12+ Virgo) sextile Psyche (12+ Scorpio)
Mercury (21+ Cancer) square Eris (21+ Aries Rx)
Mars (12+ Virgo) square Ixion (12+ Sagittarius Rx)
Mercury (22+ Cancer) trine Uranus (22+ Pisces Rx)
Apollo (23+ Leo) opposite Neptune (23+ Aquarius Rx)