16
So the new agist says to a person that they created their terminal illness, so they can stop it if they want to. Sorry, that is just a poisonous philosophy, with a stupid smile on its face. Usually said with the kind of creepy sweet voice that drips into the unconscious. It is an insult to human suffering.

I wonder if anyone has any knowledge of the history of astrology, when did this bullsh*t philosophy creep into its supposed traditional fatalism? I suppose astrologers just found it easier to parrot the new age movement?

17
Thanks for your responses waybread, Fleur and Michael.

waybread wrote:
So many people, experiencing a rough spot in their lives, ask astrology to give them some hope. It is as though that request should naturally illicit a response that offers them a happier future. But the purpose of astrology isn't to tell people something like, "Well, yes. Your bad luck will disappear in 3 weeks time," although occasionally this happens. Astrology isn't like the Make A Wish Foundation. Ideally, astrology gives you the simple truth about you and your future.

It is far better to mentally prepare for tough times than it is to hope that they will never happen or recur.

I think astrology works best as a tool for self-awareness.
OK. So if the point of astrology is to tell the truth about the future what then is the point of telling the truth about the future? In other words, why bother? Assuming the truth/future is immutable what is the usefulness of knowing it?

I guess I should have added to my original post that I was also under the impression that astrology could be helpful to people, including me, in terms of personal growth or finding useful outlets for their energies/personality, etc. However, according to Mr. Lilly my chart is a dud. There?s virtually no fruition of any kind. Out of nine ?good? houses only one has any promise at all. Conventional wisdom says that if it isn?t promised in the natal chart it won?t happen, regardless of timing.

The horoscope with its house divisions is the way it is because these are the fundamental concerns of virtually every human being. Far from being a Make-A-Wish proposition, I just want(ed) the same things as everybody else but now I?ve been told that nothing will ever happen in that regard. So what is the use of being told that? To me, it seems to be a recipe for despair. As someone who has spent considerable time attempting to assist people undergoing crisis I can tell you that hope is not only critical to survival but to well-being.

And far from simply being a rough spot, what Lilly says is true thus far in my life - I don?t have and never have had any of those things. So now that I?m self-aware, what do I do? There is, apparently, no point in attempting to do anything; how does one mentally prepare for that?

If I live as long as my grandmothers did, that means I?ve got thirty to forty years of nothing ahead of me, an idea which seems not only fatalistic but nihilistic as well.

Now, I can see at least one reason why you might want to be fatalistic and that is to keep the astrologer employed - anxiety is a very useful tool for keeping people hooked - a great deal of marketing strategy is based on it. Kind of like the doctor breaking your leg and then offering to fix it. I?m not suggesting that that was Lilly?s or anyone else?s point in doing astrology but I think it needs to be considered if we are going to think critically about astrology and how it?s practiced.

So to me, traditional astrology seems inhumane at the very least and morally ambiguous at best.
The Moon is opposing Jupiter. Don't get involved, it's their problem. Jim Critchfield

18
moonbright, you seem very bitter and disappointed. Maybe you're not like this often, but this is what I read in your posts.

Hope can be beneficial for people, but it can also be the great enemy of happiness right here, right now. I think it's best to see what bits and pieces of happiness we can stitch together now, rather than to blame ourselves, "bad luck," or other people for our blighted hopes; or to pin one's future happiness on hopes that may never materialize. Hope is useful when it has some prospect of being fulfilled, not when it's a false hope.

If there's one thing we learn from astrology, it is how different people are, with different motives and ways of conceptualizing themselves and their experiences.

Consequently, maybe some people are so constituted as to want no information about their futures. Maybe other people want predictions only if the predictions all happy-happy and nicey-nice.

I am just the opposite. I view the future in two ways:

1. The ordinary way in which I'd look at a weather forecast. If I had incurable cancer, I'd want to know about it. If I'm having a house guest, I'd appreciating knowing what day she's planning to arrive.

2. The extra-ordinary way, which gets us into divination of a future that may be a really long-range forecast. I don't practice a lot of this. I'd rather say that there are good and bad, likely and unlikely times for something to happen. If I look at a horary chart, I might say, "Yes, I think that you and your BF will reconcile," but to me, the chart is of this moment or a past moment. I don't like putting a date on predictions, other than to do my usual spiel about choice-centered astrology.

I do not take a fatalistic, deterministic view of astrology. I think people generally make choices, and that those choices influence future outcomes. I do not think astrological predictions are infallible. Once in a while, I think there is such a thing as God's Plan.

If Mr. Lilly would think your (natal??) chart is a dud, then why read Mr. Lilly? If "conventional astrology" thinks your chart has no promise, why not read an astrologer who seems more empowering? It took me a long time to want to learn traditional astrology, it seemed so doom-and-gloom. So learn modern astrology. Or Vedic. I should do sidereal astrology, actually-- I'd pick up two domiciled planets that way, and lose my sun in detriment and Jupiter in its fall.

I'll bet my chart is more of a dud than yours is. In traditional astrology, I have no essential dignities in my planets, except for Mercury in Egyptian terms (he wipes out in Babylonian terms.) All of my planets are tied up in squares and oppositions. In whole signs, I have a major 12th-6th house emphasis that ties up my sun, moon, Mercury, and Venus.

Poor me.

Why do you even listen to people who tell you mean, disempowering stuff about yourself? You don't need that. Throw that advice in your trash bin, where it belongs.

One modern book I highly recommend is Steven Forrest, The Inner Sky, a very wise and funny book. Also, the older books on modern astrology by Robert Hand, such as Planets in Youth and Planets in Transit.

With all due respect moonbright, please stop being so hard on yourself. Look around you. What is the autonomy that you do have? Find something that you are able to do that gives you joy. Or do something that gives somebody else joy. Something little is fine. Baby-steps on the journey of life are a wonderful idea.

I have never taken a penny for the horoscope readings I do for people. It's one thing to feel sorry for yourself, but you don't have to impugn other people's motives.

So please drop your fatalism. It doesn't seem to support you.

Some of my best advice comes from my refrigerator magnet: "Life is not about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself."

Astrology suggests how we might create ourselves, but if it doesn't suit you, so be it.

why

21
When I was about 14 I lived near a public library that had a huge collection of books on occult matters. I read books on astrology. I read sceptical books like Arthur C CLARKE'S book about media sensationalism where he says that Bermuda Triangle is the same as anywhere else where planes and ships go down.

But as to why. I like the charts of events. Rather than individual's charts. There's some blog out there for just about any event! I even found one for a car crash a few years ago in my city [Melbourne]. Some men were killed in a tunnel [citylink] when a truck had a flat tyre and exploded. Some of the more interesting events that I have read about for charts :

- the wrongful conviction of Lindy and Michael Chamberlain.
- Chernobyl diasaster
- Challenger space shuttle disaster
- Madeline McCann
- Beaumont Children disappearance / kidnapping.
- first landing on the moon
- 9 11

There is a site called true crime where hundreds of crimes are analysed with charts and experimental astrological methods.

Sometimes I agree with the analyses; sometimes I don't. I am fascinated in particular by geo spatial methods. For instance I read a 9 11 analysis that worked out by astrology that the attack was masterminded in the Philippines.
[but I stress by that that in no way am I saying that any Philippines person was in it; rather that the meetings to plan it happened to be held there]

Events that I would like to read about if someone did charts:
Dyatlov pass incident
was AIDS man made?
Russell Street Bombings [major criminal/terrorist incident in Melbourne in the 80's ]
Rise of China as a super power.