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Change
Your Chart - Change Your Life
©
Jessica Adams 2008
 Astrologers
have many different chart techniques to work with, just as
professional knitters have any number of patterns. We can use natal
charts (Placidus or Koch), solar charts, sun-sign solar charts,
horary charts, Vedic charts or, make it up yourself!
People
are often shocked when I suggest the last option, but it is just as
real and valid as any other divination system you use today. At what
point did the natal chart become the Holy Grail of astrology? People
often call the natal chart the 'real' astrology but it is a human
invention - an artificial map of symbols which aren't really there -
as much as a Tarot spread, or even the pattern made by chicken bones
on the floor of a witch doctor's hut in Africa!
Experiment
with your chart options and you will be amazed at how many
alternative perspectives you can find on the same person, and same
situation. There is no 'real' or 'unreal' Astrology - just a
different angle. The typical horoscope wheel looks uncannily like a
human eyeball - an amazing piece of synchronicity, given that all it
represents is one field of vision. Choose a horary chart and you are
looking at the world through a 17th century lens! You are seeing your
life today as William Lilly might have seen it: through the eyes of
someone who moved in a world of stolen fish and missing servants -
rather than the internet and space travel.
A
sun-sign solar chart shows you the 20th century media view of your
life. Headlines and information-grabs. Facts, not psychological
interpretations. Try it yourself - it's a devastatingly accurate,
speedy and simple way to scan your life, and the lives of your
clients. Put the Sun Sign on the Ascendant, and use a whole-sign,
equal-house system. Using Aries as an example, Aries is on the first
house cusp, Taurus is on the second house cusp, and so on. Capricorn
is on the tenth house cusp or midheaven.
Pop
in the transiting planets and points. In the first half of 2008,
this means any Aries person has Pluto and Jupiter in the Tenth House.
Endings, beginnings and opportunities in career. Simple! Sun-Sign
Solar Charts use exact mundane aspects only (no orbs) to tell their
story. As Jupiter in Capricorn forms sextiles with Uranus in Pisces
throughout the course of 2008, Aries people will have professional
opportunities together with some kind of backroom revolution. A
secret, confidential, radical change.
Try
it for yourself now. Put your Sun Sign on the Ascendant, draw a
horoscope around a tin of Milo (or whatever substance you prefer) and
see what is happening in your life. Those Jupiter-Uranus sextiles in
the first half of 2008, and again in November, should show themselves
clearly and simply in your life, within a day or two of the mundane
aspects becoming exact on the calendar. The USA is a Cancerian, born
on the 4th of July. For the purposes of Sun-Sign Solar Charts, that's
all we need to know. Sibley isn't in the picture!
Time
and place are irrelevant - we just know America was born under the
sign of the Crab, so in 2008, its partner-countries (like Great
Britain) and its enemies (the usual suspects) will play a huge
role in its affairs. Why? Because Jupiter is passing through
America's Seventh House of partners and open enemies! The sextile to
Uranus is picked up in the Ninth House, so we can be sure that
foreigners and religion are involved, possibly education and
publishing too so watch this space!
Another
favourite technique of many astrologers I know is the consultation
chart. Forget the natal chart your client was born with - or even
his/her solar chart. Just cast a horoscope for the nano-second that
your client/customer sits down, and read it as you would read any
other astrological pattern. Typically, you'll find a stellium (or
cluster) of planets and points in one particular house. That will
automatically tell you what is on his/her mind. Even if you have one
client after another in the course of a day, you will be astonished
to find that the same sign/degree positions for the planets tell a
remarkably different story for each customer/client.
Too
nervous to try it yet? Practise
on famous people in the news. Cast a consultation chart for Hillary
Clinton or Barack Obama and see what the story is. Project into the
future if you like. Intention is everything in divination. Tell
yourself you are going to cast a chart to peer into November 2008.
Never mind the transits and progressions to any of those dodgy natal
charts for the USA, Clinton or Obama! You are practising divination
instead. What does your present-time consultation chart tell you
about November this year, and the likely outcome of that election?
Alongside
Sun-Sign, Solar Charts and Consultation Charts, you also have huge
mileage from what I nickname a Universal Chart. It's particularly fun
to try if you were born with a difficult natal chart. Have you lived
with that hideous Saturn-Uranus opposition forever? Were you born
with some nightmarish T-square between Pluto, Venus and the Moon?
Take heart. Check your Universal Chart.
Draw
around your Milo tin (or other favoured substance) again and put
Aries on theAscendant. This is your personal chart, and we will be
noting the position of the planets and points on the day you were
born, but we don't care about your actual Ascendant or Midheaven for
this reading. Use a whole-sign, whole-house system again, and plonk
the planets and points in according to their traditional sign/house meaning.
Aries
planets go in the First House. Taurus planets go in the Second
House. Gemini planets go in the Third House. Cancer planets go in the
Fourth House. And on it goes, until you have finally placed any
Pisces planets and points in your Twelfth House. No aspects - just
read the planets and points by house position, and allow your
intuition to help build the picture for your client, or yourself.
Using this method, for example, Princess Diana (another dodgy birth
time, another wobbly natal chart) has her Moon in Aquarius in the
Eleventh House. How perfect is that? The patron of dozens of
humanitarian groups with the Moon in her Universal Chart placed
firmly in the Eleventh!
Everyone
knows that Bill Gates is the world's most famous computer
squillionaire. He has the Sun in Scorpio. In the Universal Chart, his
Sun is in the Eighth House. How simple is that? He is well known for
his business, financial and philanthropic interests. Set yourself
free and experiment with the Universal Chart. If you don't like it,
go back to the Natal Chart! If you love it, throw the Natal Chart in
the bin and forget you ever had a problem with your Pluto!
One
point: The Universal Chart, like The Consultation Chart, does not
respond to transits, so don't try putting Transiting Jupiter in there
to see what kind of 2008 you're going to have. It won't work. But as
a kind of life-map, both of them are excellent alternatives to the
natal reading.
In
the years to 2020, I believe we'll be experimenting with increasing
kinds of chart alternatives, and with the arrival of Neptune in
Pisces, we may begin to read more intuitively, and less like
astro-robots. It should be possible to read the year 2020 with 2020
Vision (which also happens to be the
title of my new book!) That means two
chart techniques instead of one. Enough already with the 'my
Astrology is the real Astrology' angle! If we are going to be good
and useful practitioners, we need all the ammunition we can get.
With
a little experimentation you should soon begin to see what works
best for you. Perhaps you will stick to natal charts for your
clients, but double up with a solar chart (Sun by Sign/Degree on the
Ascendant) or try a Sun-Sign Solar Chart too. Maybe you'll do triple
readings, getting three angles on the same situation and the same
person! The main point is, to understand that all horoscope wheels
are just differing lenses, they describe various viewpoints into the
same truth. If one makes you feel uncomfortable - or, if it has
truthfully never done much for you in decades of living with it -
there is absolutely nothing stopping you from trying another one!
Have
fun
Jessica.
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