The Birth Chart - Self versus Others

Recently, I have begun trying my hand doing readings using Natal Chart Astrology.  Over the years, I’ve learned a bit here and there to get myself started, and now primarily employ my “intuitive research” to take it further.  By not studying too much, I allow my guides to bring to me what they want me to know about a person’s chart.

Looking at birth charts is like looking into the Akashic Records.  There is information there concerning a person’s gifts, purpose and potentials in this life. Allow me to paint a picture for you to help you better see what I am discussing.

A birth chart, on paper, looks like a circle divided into 12 segments. Your chart is therefore a 2-dimensional snap shot image of the sky the moment you were born.  However, rather than it being the view of the sky from the ground looking up, it is a view from the North looking towards the Southern horizon.  To the far left is the Eastern horizon and to the far right the West.

If you were born at sunrise, the sun would be on the far left just on the horizon.  If you were born at noon, the sun would be directly above at the top of your field of vision.  Since the birth chart looks at the whole sky and not just what we see from the earth, if you were born at midnight, the sun would be directly below at the bottom of your field of vision.  If you now draw a circle from the left, up to noon, down to the West and around the bottom, you have the birth chart.

With each passing minute, the whole circle rotates clockwise rising in the East and setting in the West.  Along that circle are the 12 zodiac signs. Within the circle are marked each of the planets, the sun and the moon based on where they were the moment you were born and what sign they were in.

This circle is also divided up into 12 houses.  The difference between the signs and the houses is that while the signs rotate based on what time of day you were born, the houses do not. The 1st house, for example, is always just below the Eastern horizon. The next 6 houses are those below the horizon counting from East to West.  Just above the Western horizon is the 7th house, and then the 8th through the 12th counting from West to East.  So the sky rotates clockwise, but the houses are numbered counter-clockwise.

Most recently, my attention has been place on two houses in particular, the 1st house and the 7th house.  The 1st house is ruled by Mars, modeled after the sign of Aries and is primarily concerned with Self include self-expression and potential. The 7th house, which is directly across from the 1st, is ruled by Venus, modeled after the sign of Libra and is primarily concerned with Others, especially partners and spouses.

As I mentioned earlier, if we are on the earth looking South at the moment of a birth, we can only see the top half of the sky.  Also notice that this means we can clearly see everything in the Others house, but we cannot see anything in the Self house. A part of my mind questioned why this is and then on Sunday, while participating in some readings, I receive the following insight.

This “setup” is by design!

It is human nature to not easily see aspects of self. Yes, we think we know ourselves, but how well do we really know ourselves?  Have you ever had someone tell you something about yourself that you never noticed prior to them telling you?  “Oh my God, you are right!” you might say, “I never realized that before!” And yet it is also human nature to see Others easily.  How often have we thought, “her problem is so obvious, if only she could see it!”?

Why would it be setup this way?

I believe it is setup this way for a reason.  It is the same reason we are all here together, rather than being in a realm of our own.  Surely we could learn what we need to learn about ourselves by being in a separate reality of our own making, but we aren’t.  We are all in the SAME reality, yet making up our part of it.  Surely it takes a lot more work for the universe to maintain this combined reality than the separate ones.

Let’s look at how things work here.

Let’s assume we (you and I) are more aware than most people.  We have studied the Law of Attraction and we know, or at least are coming to know, that we create our own reality.  We also know that we are not doing as well as we would like, and so we began a study of self in order to improve our results.  We figure if our thoughts (and nothing else) create our reality then to better understand our thoughts is to better understand our creating.

Through observation, we notice something is missing from our life (or notice that something is not the way we would like it to be).  So we ask (in prayer or meditation) to better understand this.  What are we then shown?

Well, we are shown Others.  It is just like the birth chart.  Self is hidden under the horizon, but Others is not hidden.

Allow me an example.  Spirit started doing something for me a few years ago.  They started giving me “double vision”.  Most times that I had “drama” with another person, I would have the same (or very similar) drama playing out with two DIFFERENT people.  What is the only thing in common to those situations?  ME!  By having the same drama twice at the same time with two different people, I couldn’t help but accept responsibility.  I couldn’t even try and blame the others.

So, in looking at my relationship with these others, I could figure out what was happening within myself that was causing (attracting) the situation.  We could summarize it this way:

By objectively observing our relationship with others, we can better come to know ourselves.

Right now, someone is saying this to me:

“Know thyself!”

I think Socrates is here with us guiding this understanding!

If you Google “Know Thyself”, you will find some very inspirational writings.  The Greeks caught on to this concept a long, long time ago.  They considered it the key to happiness.

So how does this subject fit in with other things I’ve discussed in this blog.  Well first, you may recall when I’ve spoken about The Lovers card.  To review, The Lovers card signifies the choice between two paths.  It also means romantic love.  How does it mean both?  By signifying the ultimate choice, the choice to experience God within Self or to experience God through Others.  It is the same God either way.  Really, the only option is to experience God because we cannot not experience God with God being All That Is.  So the choice is an illusion, yet so is this entire realm.

Looking at the birth chart again, consider this.  The birth chart shows the heavens that surround us (at the moment of birth).  This plane of existence that we live on is the surface of the earth. It is the line running through the center of the chart, the horizon. We are here, walking the surface of the earth and are facing West. We come from Self and head towards Others.  This is again the Fool’s Journey.  As time passes, more of Self emerges behind us rising from the Easter horizon while more of Others descends to the West.  Why would these coincide?  Because as we come to know an aspect of ourselves, we no longer need that aspect to be reflected in others.

Think of it this way, when I have a "button”, I don’t know it until someone else pushes it.  However, once it is pushed, it gains all of my attention! That’s what pain is.  So when others “hurt” me, they are merely pushing a button to get my attention.  Once I “figure it out” (intellectually and/or emotionally), which could take an entire lifetime, I only then allow that experience to set, to stop happening within my plane of existence because I “learned” what I needed to learn.  The button goes away and even if others do the same thing, it will no longer bother me.

Here is another correlation to recent blogs.  The 1st house (Self) is ruled by Mars.  Thus Self is related to the Male Force.  Why?  Because Self is what we do!  We express Self.  We cannot express anything else.  We may express a false self, a believed self, but that is still an aspect of Self until it isn’t.

And, of course, the 7th house (Others) is ruled by Venus and represents the Female Force.  It is through Relationship with Others that we receive, at least in the most noticeable ways.  As long as we are in tune with the illusion of separation, we are Self and everything else is Others and thus we fulfill our Self by connecting with Others. 

However, we can always shift that perspective.  When we move beyond the flat surface of this reality, we can see the entire chart; we can see all of Self and thus fulfill ourselves from the inside.  And one way to do this is to commune with God through mediation.

And, since space is an illusion as much as time is, there is no difference between inside and outside. When we move to this greater perspective, All That Is is as much here and now as anywhere and ever.  Thus everything we desire is here and now and accessible to us.

Your nighttime dreams feel real until you wake up. This reality here on earth feels real until you wake up (also known as dying).  Some day, you’ll know just how much of an illusion this place really is.

In the mean time, play!  Imagine!  Pretend!  And that is all it takes!  It is an unseen shift on the inside (below the horizon) that creates shifts in what we see, and what we touch, out there!

We are meant to interact with Others on our journey to discover Self.  Others is not just other people, but things, everything.  We are meant to be in this physical realm and playing this physical game.  There are all kinds of evidence to answer any question we can come up with.

Ask and you shall receive.

And I hope you have been enjoying these weekly blogs. It was my intension for 2010 to publish an entry every week and so far, I have done just that.  I will soon be heading out of the country for a while, so will not publish another entry until sometime in March.

Until then, happy manifesting...

Fate, Free Will and Sacred Contracts

Before I begin this week's blog, I would like to thank all of you for your thoughts, comments, support and love.  The response to last week’s entry was heartwarming!  My Dad is out of the hospital now and improving.  His journey, of course, continues, and we are grateful!

This week, we have another reader-submitted question.  It is:

Everyone talks about the Law of Attraction...and I'm wondering how exactly that fits in with Sacred Contracts, fate/destiny and maybe even free will.

What I struggle with a lot is this:  If something doesn't happen, does it mean that I didn't want it bad enough or that it wasn't meant to be?  To clarify, when I say "want it bad enough", I'm referring to doing the "making it happen" kind of thing, not just sitting and pining for it.  I can be left feeling like a failure and not sure whether all my efforts would have yielded it at all.  Perhaps it wasn't "meant to be" and I'll be shown why later?

It may sound like a childish question, but just writing it lets me know how emotionally charged a question it is for me.

I’ve sat with this question for a little over a week (when this was first written) and the information has been coming in bit-by-bit.  When it wants to be written, it wants to be written, even if it is 3:30 in the morning!

Just yesterday (nearly 2 weeks ago now), spirit said this to me (and through me to a friend I was having a discussion with) the following...

When you are in the middle of a situation that you are not happy about, and you find yourself unsuccessfully “trying to make it work”, consider this:  Most people, (let’s say 10 years ago), manifested an entire experience before taking the first step.  Their cumulated thoughts and emotions about the particular subject created a complete script.  Then one day, they walked into that script and began living it.  Most people (10 years ago) simply react to what shows up with the same vibration that was presented to them, so the script pretty much goes as planned.

Let’s think about it this way.  We have some experience (a relationship, a job, money, etc.) that we desire.  Every time we think about it, it is like putting a marble in a jar.  The color of the marble matches the thought/feeling.

Over the years, we think and think about what we want.  Some of our thoughts are blue and some are pink.  Let’s say it’s relationship that we’ve wanted for years now.  Our jar is likely to be quite full of marbles at this point.  So the Universe takes those marbles and arranges them into a script.  If 60% of the marbles are pink, then 60% of the time, the scripted relationship is fated to feel like pink.  The other 40% are blue and so 40% of the time it’ll feel blue.  All of this gets created before we even meet the person.

Now the particular script need not use up all of the marbles we’ve placed in our relationship jar, yet it does draw from them.  So the script not only states how the relationship will transpire (how it will feel), but what is learned and how long it will take.  When the relationship showed up, this person (from 10 years ago) pretty much took each moment and reacted to it.  When they got a blue marble, they created a new blue marble and put it back in the jar.  When they got a pink marble, again they created a new one and put it back in the jar.  Nothing gained, nothing lost.

And that is how it worked, more times than not, 10 years ago.  And that is what we think of as fate.

Why is it helpful to think about this now? (Or how can we look at this in a way that is helpful?)

Well, for one, there is still a lot of this happening now.  Fate still feels like fate.  So, when you are already in the middle of some scenario in your life, and it is not going well, thinking that it is already done (fully manifested) can help you stop “trying” so hard.  One of the biggest blocks to manifestation is “trying to make it happen”.  So, consider it done (at least for now) and stop trying.  It is going to be what it wants to be because it was created a while back (and based on a lot of marbles).

The point is to allow it to be whatever it is and to not react to it at all or at least lessen the reaction to it.

You will pass the lesson when you lessen your reaction to what shows up.

Don’t make what is happening “mean” so much about who you are now, what you are doing, or what’s in store for you.  You are walking through a script of your own making, but which was made by who you USED to be. It is going to run its course, so relax and make the best of it.  If it is going to “succeed” then it already has, and if it is going to “fail”, then it already has.

By not reacting to it, we stop putting back a marble of the same color we pulled out.  It is up to us.  We can get a blue marble out, and put a white one in, or a yellow one.  We don’t have to just reproduce a blue one.

Now, let’s relate this to the question as it was specifically stated.  Our querent speaks of “wanting it badly” and the “effort” spent in trying to “make it happen”.  These words express frustration. 

So, look at this current situation and say, “This is done.  I have (non-physically) scripted this (particular experience) a long time back, and now I am just walking through it.  I need not try.  I need not expend effort to change its course because it is already fated to be what it will be.  So I now choose to walk through this and get what I need to get from it, to see what I need to see from it.”

So, that is how “fate” works.  Fate is not really fate, it is just that something has been created, non-physically, in the past, and when it arrives, physically, it is so well formed as to be what it will be.  That is why Pre-Paving is so important.  So much of what we experience is manifested before we live it.  The anticipation of a thing (event, experience) is paramount!  If you dread or worry, you anticipate something unpleasant, but that is still anticipation.

And remember, this is how it was (10 years ago), but not necessarily how it is now and going forward.

At this point I want to take an aside.  Spirit also gave me some information for myself.  They told me that for a while, I overreacted to situations.  When I got a soft blue, I reacted with a strong blue and when I got pink, I created bright pink in response.  As a result, the lows got lower (or at least felt lower) and the highs got higher!

In a sense, I created a split in my experience.  For me, the 60/40 ratio might have been fairly consistent for a long time, but when things were good, everything was good, and when things felt off, it all felt off.

It was like living two different lives and alternating between them.

I was very intrigued to learn of this.  It completely explained why my life has been the way it has been!  All of this came pouring out of my mouth as I talked with my friend and was all new information about my life!

And then, they also reminded me that now I am reacting less to both the highs and the lows, so this split is coming back together.  Hmm, interesting.  Well, enough about me!

So, today, the “free will” part is so much more powerful than it used to be (10 years ago).  The time to manifest is so much shorter that we can literally make it up as we go!  But how do we do this?

First, remember in the above scenario, the reaction was the same as what showed up.  Good things made us happy and bad things made us sad, so we pretty much just followed the script (energetically) and kept creating the same marbles we got.

Yet, now, as we let go of reacting and instead choose to be who we want to be, in light of (or in lieu of) whatever shows up, we no longer simply follow the script any longer.

Let’s say that today, instead of always reacting to blue marbles, we sometimes don’t react at all.  That means that even if we are not creating any more pink marbles than we were before, we are creating less blue ones, and thus the next relationship (or whatever experience we are creating) will have a greater percentage of pink!

Sometimes, we are so attached to getting pink, that even when we get a white marble, we create a blue one just because the white marble was not a pink one.  This too changes as we let go.

And you want to know a secret? Just because we create a blue marble, doesn’t mean we can’t take it out of the jar before it manifests.  Our thoughts and feelings are constantly interacting with our jar.  We can affect the marbles before we experience them!  For example, we can create gold marbles!  These are magic and have the ability to lighten up the color of the marbles around them no matter what color they were to begin with.

You don’t have to get rid of the lows.  You can still have bad days, bad thoughts, bad feelings, and get what you want.  You just need to let all that go!  I can want something “so bad” one day, entertain the same old negative thoughts about it that day, forget about it (within an hour or two) and then GET what I wanted the very next day!  It really does happen that quickly!

It is not yet happening that way for everything.  And what I get might not stay around a long time, but the universe is showing me what is possible.

So “free will” shifts the physical manifestation of the “fated” relationship AND, at the same time, pre-paves the future with better energy!  That’s why Abraham always says it doesn’t matter where you are, only that you turn “down stream” and go with the flow.  A little shift in this regard gets the movement towards better and better experience and it adds up quickly.

So, with a small shift, our percentage “good” will increase with each manifestation.  Yet, this also means that more things have to “fail”! Why?  Because what we created in the past is no longer as “good” as we are!  For example, the current experience dynamic we’re in is 60% good, but we’re now responding positively 70% of the time.  That means the next one will be 70% positive.  That also means this current 60% experience just might not be able to keep up with us and will drift away.

This is not just about people, but anything.  A job.  A friendship.  A home.  It can happen with anything.  You shift yourself higher, then watch how the old (whatever) starts to fall back.  If you run back to keep it going, you’ll lower your energy to match it.

And that’s the Free Will part.  We get to choose how to respond to whatever shows up and that response is significant to our present and future well being.

So what about Sacred Contracts?

Well, Sacred Contracts are no different than fate, they just were typically created, non-physically, before we got here (before we were born).  But Sacred Contracts are not really contracts at all! Not the way we think of them here.  They are NOT binding!  You are free to opt out at any time.  In fact, you are encouraged to do so! 

There are billions of us here.  If you opt out of your side of a contract, and the other side still needs to learn the lesson, someone else will be put into your place. THAT’S the perfection of the universe.  Every move is anticipated and accounted for.  No one specific contract is needed for anyone.

So often, when we think of Karmic relationships, we think of the bad stuff.  “I was fated to be with a man who would fail me in this way.”  Well, maybe you did have a contract to date one, or even marry one because on the soul level, you needed to learn something from them and they needed to learn something from you.  But you can learn as fast as you want and are not tied to their learning.  So when you’ve learned what you needed to learn, you can shift your life.  And in so doing, you just might be inspiring their learning in a way you couldn’t before.  But remember, they get to choose their part, so they just might not come along with you.  That’s where the letting go comes in again.  As you grow, you just might have to let go of those things that are no longer supporting you.

So now, to close, I want to write about what was actually the first message that showed up.

Spirit wants us to know that we have more information about our futures than we realize. Take any subject, something you want to manifest in your life, and think about it. What is the first thought/feeling that jumps in? 

Do you feel optimistic?               “It’s gonna happen someday.”
Do you feel frustrated?               “I just can’t seem to make it happen.”
Are you angry?                            “I’m tired of it being this way.”
Or are you excited?                    “It is going to be awesome, I just know it.”
(The list goes on…)

The first impression, the first thought/feeling that comes up is where you are right now.  The better it feels, the closer it is to happening and happening the way you want it to.

Think about it for a little while and see where it goes.  Does the frustration increase as you think about it or does it decrease?  If it increases, that means that old tapes are playing.  You started off optimistic, but then your vibration waned as the old tapes played.  (Are these thoughts about deservability, by chance?)  And if you started off on the low side, but found that you felt better as you thought about it, then you have learned some good techniques for guiding yourself along.  You are training yourself to think positively about things you are not positive about just yet.

And just for the fun of it, let’s say the old tape is about worthiness or deservability.  Nothing achieved in this realm is deserved.  NOTHING.  Don’t believe me?  Look around.  Does anyone in your life have what they deserve, really?  Don’t you see signs everywhere of people not getting what they deserve (either good or bad)?  Some people are mean and never seem to get what they deserve, and then some of the good guys never get what they deserve (what they earned) either.

We don’t get what we deserve. We CREATE what we get, through ATTRACTION, through expectation and anticipation. Good deeds don’t even help if we did them out of obligation or some other fear based thought.

The less we make it about what happens, the more we “make it” happen.

I got exactly what I wanted?  That’s nice.
I missed the mark by 40%?  No big deal, that was the old me that created it.  The new me has already moved on to a better place.
It still hasn’t happened yet? That’s okay, I have plenty to entertain myself in the mean time.  I think I’ll throw a few more good vibes into the script before it gets here so it’s that much better!

Okay, and one last piece.  If it feels like work, it’s probably not the right thing to do.  It shouldn’t feel like work or effort.  In fact, some things in my life manifested with hardly more than a fleeting thought.  One day, I thought, “It would be nice to have xyz,” and then I forgot about it.  That thought would come back now and again, but not with any attachment.  Then one day, it just showed up.  I did NOTHING to make it happen on the physical plane.  It just showed up all by itself.  [Yes, someone else made it happen physically, but I wasn’t involved.]

If there is a lot of emotion around what is not happening, spend time feeling good about your life as it is.  Don’t waste energy trying to make it happen, just find the best in what is.  One day, I finally found relief around a few subjects when I realized that if I never became other than what I was, that was okay.  I could live with the successes I already had and the status quo.  It was amazing how much was lifted off of my shoulders.  I stopped feeling like a failure because what I was trying to do was not happening.

Some of those things have still not happened, but that’s just fine because I’ve learned to enjoy what comes as it comes better.  I still worry and pine here and there, but less so.

And remember, you are not alone.  Lean on those around you.  Ask for what you want and you just might be surprised the responses you get.

Big Hugs to All!