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Posts from the ‘Empowerment’ Category

Apr 27

The Natal Chart
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Your Natal Chart is Not a Prison

Like most people who live in large cities, I have a fairly long commute each day to and from work. The round-trip hour and a half of subway time is devoted to higher learning via spiritually themed podcasts. My commute is sacred. It’s my God time. I listen to my teachers and absorb what spirit has for me to learn.

This morning, as I listened to an archived version of one of my favorite internet radio shows, I energetically tuned into the first woman to call the program for a reading. She was intimately familiar with her own natal chart, so much so that as the guest astrologer, Marguerite Manning, tried to give a reading, the caller threw up blocks to every piece information. More specifically, the information was not connecting with the caller because it didn’t fit into her narrow view of her natal chart and its potential. Read more

Mar 8

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Cleansing the Energy of Your Home

Imagine you’ve walked into the home of someone you’ve just met. There’s clutter everywhere, nothing is organized, and it’s physically hard to navigate between rooms because of furniture and stuff piled everywhere. How would you imagine the energy of that home feels? Unpleasant? Stagnant? Dense? The energy can’t move because we have a hard time moving in the house. It accumulates everywhere much like the stuff piled on every surface. The energy feels low and inhospitable. Worse, if household is prone to fights and outbursts, the emotional energy can get stuck in the house.

Now imagine you’ve walked into the same home, except the person has moved out. Once busting with clutter, the rooms are now clear of any physical trace of the previous inhabitants. How would the space feel to you? Would you want to move your stuff right in? This is the moment where you trust your gut. If the space doesn’t feel right intuitively — if it still feels low, dense, dark, stagnant, unwelcoming — it’s time to clear the energy, which lingers long after the physical stuff has moved. Read more

Feb 18

fullmoon
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Using the Moon to Manifest

Ritual plays an intrinsic part in the human experience. Through ritual we find comfort and meaning in actions or words. A few years ago, when I was in a particularly dark period on my life, I started paying close attention to the lunar cycles within the context of astrology. There was comfort in the marking of the new moon as if I had another chance at a new beginning.

Somehow, probably due to the power of the internet, I learned about new and full moon manifestation rituals. At the time, I was unbelievably broke. My life looked like a bomb had gone off and I needed the reassurance and focus that came with these rituals. I needed to feel like I was in the driver’s seat of my life again. And so during the new moon I wrote out a list — pen and ink to paper — of the things I wanted to manifest in my life. I dated the piece of paper, folded it up, and tucked it away. Two weeks later, during the full moon, I took the piece of paper out of its storage place, placed it in a bowl, and carefully lit the piece of paper on fire, scattering the ashes to the wind. Read more

Jul 31

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Saturn in Libra and the Mirror

For all its niceties and focus on beauty, it would be a little unfair of us to paint the sign of Libra with such superficial strokes. After all, this girl has some real depth beyond a bad reputation for vanity. And Saturn transiting Libra over the next two years reminds us that while she rules over committed partnerships, she also represents what we attract into our lives.

Imagine a full length mirror in front of you. Do you like what you see? Or are you squirming at the thought? Your reflection is a direct indication of what you’re bringing into your life. Powerful people, for example, attract other powerful people. Victims attract other people who reinforce their victimization. So Saturn in Libra’s question for you is this: What are you attracting? Read more

Jun 28

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The Cardinal Climax: A “Karmic Quickening”?

Ladies and gentlemen, we’re in the Cardinal Climax. You don’t have to be hip to astrology or a total wonk to know that something is going on with our world. Earthquakes. Unparalleled man made disasters. Awakenings. Major shifts for which there is no return. The show has only started and the headliner — August’s cardinal grand cross — is about to take stage. Are you ready?

For the past decade, if not longer, astrologers have been speculating about this summer’s Cardinal Climax because it is and truly will be a once in a lifetime event. Financial astrologer Ray Merriman first coined this term back in 1999, recognizing that the outer planets aligning in the early cardinal degrees would signal some sort of upheaval and not just for the markets. While we astrologers might nerd out on aspects and modalities, trading theories about what this time might mean for the world, it’s one thing to write about it and another to experience it.

So now that we’re here, what does the Cardinal Climax feel like? Read more

May 12

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Meeting the Cardinal Grand Cross

A year and a half ago I was in a pretty bad car accident. As a passenger, I remember the moment before the crash when I registered a pair of headlights swerve into our lane — that split second when you realize what’s going to happen and that there is nothing you can do.

It was in that moment that I heard a voice say, “You’ll be okay. Just go with it.”

A feeling of calm assurance washed over me, my body relaxing into the force of metal colliding and glass shattering at 50 mph. Were my angels instructing me? I don’t know. I remember a floating sensation like I was caught in the roll of a wave and not the trauma of a near head on collision. Perhaps the many airbags, my seat belt, and the safety of the car I was riding in helped, but I firmly believe that it was my relaxed state that allowed my body to absorb the impact without serious damage. In fact I walked away from that crash with only bruises and minor cuts. Read more

Mar 26

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Personal Growth and the Cardinal Climax

Previously, I’ve written about the rough and tumble energies that are present in the Saturn-Pluto square and the earthquakes — both personal and physical — that have been disrupting our lives. However that energy is going to take on a new tenor when the planets Uranus and Jupiter join the party in late May 2010, commencing what astrologers have been calling the Cardinal Climax.

Pluto, Saturn, and soon Uranus too, are all in the early degrees of the cardinal signs of the zodiac. The cardinal signs (Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn) are all about initiation and mark a change in the seasons. With this t-square shape of energy, the new forces coming in are aligned in such a way that they’re demanding change. Call it a celestial mosh pit if you will, but the bigger forces at work are all pushing us towards some very deep transformation and healing. It can be very uncomfortable to face our shadow selves — the part of us at our core that represents our earliest woundings — but the Universe is giving us a rare gift. And how many of us are going to step up to the challenge? Read more

Mar 8

What is “Empowering Astrology”?

“A birthchart is a rich, living statement, full of insights, guidelines, and warnings. It describes not a static fate but a flowing life pattern, full of options and risks.” — Steven Forrest, The Inner Sky

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I discovered astrologer Steven Forrest and his books about the same time I realized that astrology was much more than a party trick, something to entertain friends with while passing the time over drinks. Fending off questions about their sun signs, I grew frustrated with the concept that our birthcharts were one dimensional reflections of our lives, good or bad, or a fate carved in stone. Oh you have Mars square Pluto natally? Good luck with that, buddy. You’ll probably die a violent death.

That’s not the astrology I wanted anything to do with. Read more