I’m hoping I have more connection to this symbol than I have had with the few previous ones. At 24° Aquarius, ruled by Pisces in a twelve=fold sequence, we find that A Man, Having Overcome His Passions, Teaches Deep Wisdom In Terms of His Experience, a constructive use to which difficult past experiences can be put as examples for those who are striving to overcome their passions. This doesn’t vary much in theme from those we’ve been exploring of late, the on specificity here being that every kind of experience can serve a spiritual purpose. This might be comforting to know if and when one feels they have been off some sort of axis, for even our so called down moments provide wisdom to impart. One might argue that they provide the most. I for one always feel most vulnerable when things are going well, that is to say when one is living some paragon version of their life. To me that seems tenuous and doesn’t provide much in the way of learning. We are often at our best when we are at our worst. Just as I find sticking to some sort of moral or spiriual model of perfect living can bring out the absolute worst in people. I think of those who become to married to organized religion or even self-help programs. There is something about drinking any flavor of Kool-Aid that narrows or closes the mind making people most judgmental, when compassion is meant to ensue.

Pisces is the sign of Love and Compassion, the cosmic mutable-waters via which we are purified, washed clean, the obstacles to our Soul-self being dissolved or made to vanish like mist. It’s in the picking ourselves up and brushing ourselves off that we learn the most. And, guess what? We are always picking ourselves up and brushing ourselves off. Those you know who feel they have some magic pill or program or self-image of perfection are the ones with the least to give. The twelfth house of Pisces is associated with strangers, the forgotten and disenfranchised, those in most need of said wisdom and compassion and for whom any of us can serve as an example. The young too need our special attention as does anyone strugging to overcome the compulsive drives of their emotional or biological natures. Our achievements are not our own but meant to stand as inspiration to others. The individual with this particular degree of the Zodiac highlighed in their chart will likely have this as a major theme in their life.

Everybody wants to keep it when in fact they should be giving it away, not to the detriment of the self, but to the benefit of the many. I have spent a good many years writing horoscopes and sharing them for the love of it. It’s the same with this Blague. I spend half my year producing performing artists and a non-profit festival in Provincetown. Even when I perform my own shows I give the money away. And I don’t might trumpeting the fact. I’m proud of the fact I spend time and energy in this way. And in truth I get a whole lot out of it. I get way more than money. I get a feeling. I get the feeling that I’m making some kind of difference. That adage about the rich man not having less a prayer of getting into heaven that a camel does getting through the eye of a needle. It’s true. It’s not a judgment, it’s a warning. Because greed is a disease. And material success can be spiritual downfall. You have to fight not to have it effect you.

The twelfth Pisces house is the poubelle, the trash, the bin. It’s the return of the material to waste but that’s not the end of it. That is the ultimate source. That which rots is the source of new life. There are things being bred in the trash bin. And metaphorically speaking, it is the cast-off, the discarded, the rejected people whose purpose then becomes distilled, it becomes the vehicle of their ressurection, it is the fuel for the fire of their passions. We are all those people at some point. And in the meantime we must participate in others’ rise from the trash heap as best we can.

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Today’s image might be the stragest of them all thus far. At Aquarius 23° we find A Big Bear Sitting Down And Waving All It’s Paws. This is a double Aquarius image, ruled by that sign in a twelve-fold sequence. It explores the connection between discipline and disciplehood. Like the previous image which provided children with some comfort, providing assistance to their growth and development, here we have a lesser being in the form of the bear who is able to achieve a level of activity that mimics human behavior and one that nonetheless takes discipline on the part of the bear and on the part of the human that would have instructed it. Self-discipline is had under proper training.

The bear symbolized our nore natural, if not beastly instincts which can be transcended via the personal trainer that is God or Soul. Again, it’s a combination of not having an image speak to me in a way that it inspires reams of response together with the fact I’m experiencing a bit of Sabian fatigure that dictates my keeping this a bit short today.

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At Aquarius 22°, we encounter an enrgy of growth and development. A Rug Is Placed On The Floor Of A Nursery To Allow Children To Play In Comfort And Warmth is the Sabian Symbol for this day and it points to our being aided, like children are, when we seek to grow emotionally and spiritually. When we do so we are never alone so long as we don’t take the world for granted nor believe society owes us some kind of favor.

The rug provides just a bit of thin comfort and ease. We don’t need much, except for an attitude of appreciation. There isn’t a whole hell of a lot to say about this image. So I think I will move on.

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A Disappointed And Disillusioned Woman Courageously Faces A Seemingly Empty Life is the Sabian Symbol at 21° Aquarius and it speaks to our ability to meet emotionally upsetting experiences in human realtionships with strength of character and personal integrity. Funny that this symbol coincided with an artist friend going on a rant on Facebook about not feeling appreciated as an artist, wondering if s/he should give up. I definitely think that if people are doing what they’re doing for anybody then themselves then they’ve already given up. And, in terms of relationships, we can’t expect anything from anybody, really, ever. This is, in some way, the other side of the Sabian coin from the big businessman at his desk last week; as we have to look at male/female metaphorically. In that image the man was managing a complex of enterprises, dealing mentally with success and reversal of fortunes in turn. Here, the woman figure represents the emotional level of coping with disappointment and facing disillusionment of goals and ideals and dreams, particularly in close relationship. Who hasn’t felt that.

Perhaps an individual with this degree of Aquarius highlighted in their chart might be overly sensitive on that score with the paradoxically ability to buck up and transcend issues of failure and rejection and plain old regret. This is symbol of the kind of inner strength and compassion one might need to face inevitable failings. This figure has the ability to learn through her emotional crises and to have it build strength and character.

It is thus all about resilience, which is a subject of study in our household right now as Stella is in the midst of her masters degree in psychology. I know this much from speaking to her: That it’s about the depth of our failures as much as it is about how resilient we are in the face of that which mightn’t have panned out as planned. It shouldn’t keep us from having hopes and dreams and we should expect the best all the while; but when life or relationships fall short, it’s really how we roll with it.

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Although George Bush in a crotch harnass has completely ruined the phrase Mission Accomplished for me—forever—that is the major message of today’s Sabian Symbol at Aquarius 20°: A Large White Dove Bearing A Message, the answer of spiritual agencies to thorough, sustained and victorious individual efforts. The first thing that comes to mind are the myriad jubilant live or social media expressions of sobriety I see friends or “friends” celebrating because they all carry the message of miraculous payoff, one way or another. (Though the sign of Cancer has naught to do with this image, it and its astrological fourth house are steeped in flood myths—where that dove makes a final appearance—which I have always posited were symbolic of recovery, promise and deliverance.) I think the word sustained in the keynote, yes, along with thorough is what equals the victory; and though it’s easy to deride ourselves for where we haven’t been thorough or sustained, any one of us falling off of some wagon or other all the time no matter what wagons we remain on, it is more challenging to see that very wagon we consistently ride. So today is a good day to ask yourself: What have you been vigilant about—not hyper-vigilant mind you, because that typically ends in tears—and wherefore have you signalled to the Universe that you’re doing your part and, at least, meeting it 50/50 so it can then reach out a hand to you (cue Dove)?

Typically, it is out of crisis, a crux, or crossroads (Gemini duality) that we take a turn toward some kind of recovery (the following sign of Cancer), that’s just one of the metaphysical truths expressed by one tiny slice of circular patterning found int he unfathomably wise Zodiac—it really is a system, more on that later.* While, in a twelve-fold system of which, as you may know I’m a strong enforcer, this Aquarian oracle would be ruled by Scorpio. Let’s mediatate on that (think fast, Quinn); aha! I’ve got it: Just as the previous Libra-ruled Aquarian symbol showed the need for Libran equipoise in meeting the challenge of karmic effects in the form of fires ranging out of control, drawing upon body, mind and spirit to meet what might be the greatest, but perhaps last vestiges, of karmic challenges, putting said fires out with calm and grace and total acceptance, whilst drawing on full metaphysical and indeed archetypal strength: we may have indeed arrived and a place of balanced karma—the Scales of Libra being a measurement thereof—with nothing now blocking us, energetically, from the receipt of divine assistance and acknowledgement. We have done our (conscious) work and met the Universe half way, open to receive and accept. Scorpio (subconsious) which represents the mysterious, occult realm can therefore send us a sign, a message, that a certain connection is being made in the profound innerworld for which it stands. As above so below: such that the dove bearing it’s message—of peace? olive branch?—is coming from deep inside ourselves for is that not where the soul resides, just as it does so, most macrocosmically, with the divine collective? Is that pathway to the Aquarian mass spiritual consciousness not had through some internal inside-out wormhole within our selves where inner and outer space are indistinguishable? We are delivered in the Cancerian flood-myth model of the Dove; but here we take it up (or down) a notch. The olive branch or message the Dove carries is that of inner peace, of accord, or reconciliation within ourselves, the coming together of those heretofore conflicted, in crisis, parts of ourselves.

In the previous image the parts of ourselves are united, Unity being an energetic expression of the Venus-ruled sign of Libra. Today the parts of ourselves fuse into one, unified, Merger being the cosmic energy of Scorpio whose eighth-house rule of such notions as sex, death and other people’s money all express ways in which we combine with another individual, with the infinite, or into a shared resource, respectively. The two main mottos of Scorpio are “I desire” and “We have”, and we are really employing the spiritually royal We here. We are not seeking to balance our physical or mental self with our spiritual self; the dove signifies that all these elements of self have merged not only together but, as a result with the infinite. Scorpio is the 8th sign ruling the 8th house and the figure 8, called the lemniscate is a symbol of infinity. We have arrived. Mission Accomplished indeed. We’ve just gotten word from that flying columbine that the connection has been made and it reads: “peace be with you.”

Dane Rudhyar labels this image Certification. And it reminds me of the Scarecrow, Tin Man and Lion (all symbols of our metaphyscial levels of being) all being awarded certificate commemorations for the workings of their mind, heart and nerve/muscle; as every step we taking in our spiritual journey really is a recovery, a victory over “forces of inertia or destruction.” Wherever we overcome, the divine presence makes itself known. And it tells us that we are seen and that we are not alone. The true desire of Scorpio is that of the divine presence yearning for itself in us and in removing karmic blocks to that true yearning our desire can merge, becoming one with our destiny.

Wow, today’s writing felt good and flowy. Namaste.

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A Forest Fire Is Being Subdued By The Use Of Water, Chemicals And Sheer Muscular Energy sounds like the thin plot of porn to me; but it’s the Sabian Symbol at 19° Aquarius. Like Smokey says, most forest fires are caused by we careless humans. And as someone who feels like he’s always putting out fires I get it when Dane Rudhyar, I’m sorry “the Rudh”, says that every individual, at least once in his lifetime, if not repeatedly (hi!), may perhaps have to face spectacular reactions to seemingly insignificant acts. I think I need to check my Moon placement because I think it must be at this degree. [Hang on I’ll be right back] Okay, nope. I have my Moon at around 2° Aquarius. I don’t know my exact time of birth because my parents didn’t give much of a flying fig. Sad but true. It made me realize I never checked the Sun Sign for my Sabian Symbol (how self-effacing am I? Jesus!) Libra 4° and it sounds very much like me. But I digress.

Careless actions causing spectacular circumstance. You’ve heard that tune before, no? The road to perdition is paved with them—I had to look up perdition after typing that to make sure I wasn’t just writing a word that sounded like what I meant but it turns out it was if not spot on then close enough. We, the fire-putter-outers, are the grown-ups here. We are the ones whose faith is tested, but we are the ones who exude Grace (I told you this was an Aquarian word!) under pressure. A nod to my Sun Sign, this symbol is ruled by Libra in a twelve-fold sequence and the sign of the Scales is all about balance, equipoise, and plain old poise. We can’t be freaked out when facing a fire; we have to calmly put it out. Would that we didn’t have to but we do. Not to say I’m not also a fire-starter—I’d be the first to admit that. We are all both except those who aren’t. The keynote of this symbol is the skill and courage necessary to bring under control the destructive potential of carelessness of karmic “visitations”. Suddenly I see Edina from Absoultely Fabulous muttering, inaudibly, what are these? (air quotes) what do you mean? (air quotes)…

“Visitations”. Well, let’s deconstruct that one shall we. Aquarius is under Uranus rule which is the planet of sudden and extreme circumstance and change. People of the sign, men especially, do seem like they are from a galaxy far away—in Sextrology the male Aquarius sign is called The Visitor; and they are an unpredictable lot who can act suddenly extreme. The love you one minute and they are nowhere to be found the next. Fickle? No that’s not the right word. They are extreme and swing like a pendulum, now you see them now you don’t. Typically they are seeking to preserve an image of themselves in other people’s eyes and when intimacy sets in, you see, they fear that others will see deeper into, if not through, them, so they often nip would-be close relationships in the bud for fear of some kind of soul exposure. But again I’m off on a tangent here….

As is typical, I point to people of a certain sun sign as illustrations of the energy of that sign—people are the most poignant example, expression (personification) of the energy of the sun. And so the sudden switches an Aquarian might make illustrate the unexpected change and mutations of the Uranian Aquarian. But to look upon sudden change, in the sense that this symbol is wont to express it, as a karmic correction, more sweeping and spectacular an effect than the cause might seem to warrant, and, moreover, as a visitation really animates, literally gives life to, the karmic retribution. What we write off as careless comes back to visit a thousand fold. While today’s oracle is really how we cope with that phenomenon.

And thus this is an oracle of “Indomitability” a wonderful word that combines the the detached, unemotional energy of Aquarius with the talent and delicacy of Libra to create that perfect state of grace, in the lower-cased sense, whereby body, mind and spirit are mobilized as a metaphysical team that makes for superheroism. This requires a combined faith in self and in those superior powers we’ve been courting all along, connecting self with Self.

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These hundred-year-old Sabian Symbols are surely preinternet, so it’s important to think from that head at Aquarius 18° with A Man’s Secret Motives Are Being Publicially Unmasked because we didn’t have the power of hacking, or checking the history on, this man’s computer. Still the diviners of these oracles knew that it would become increasingly difficult for modern wo/man to keep secret his privacy, past or profound motivations. From our modern perspective we know that the struggle between societal power and the rights of the individual typically see the former win out. Even before there was a CIA, government or other powerful agencies had the means of dredging up damaging details on just about anybody. The Rudh connects this to modern psychiatry being able to otherwise unearth what lies beneath an individual’s conscious through analysis. Well, that brings us to the fact that this oracle is ruled by Virgo, the analytical sign, in a twelve-fold sequence.

And we are back to the Dr. Faustus-like adept, that figure being a well-worn archetype of the Virgo man in my book (literally my book Sextrology). The adept can likewise penetrate the secrets of life through analysis and any number of techniques requiring “altering substances” a nod to Virgo’s mutable-earth status. Yes we might be talking drugs here, while certainly the response of the muscles and nerves. The adept must function in secret, you see. That is the meaning of the word occult: hidden. He needs the protection (of that watchdog in the previous image) and also some psychic protection via his so-called elementals. And yet what we are seeing here is an unmasking which is the only way any of us would know about any adept or alchemist roaming the earth. I hope to meet another one one of these fine days. It’s beeen awhile. Hello, can you hear me? I’m down for a coffee.

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A Watchdog Stands Guard, Protecting His Master And His Possessions is what awaits us at Aquarius 17°; just when we thought these Aquarian images were going to get all sorts of crunchy granola, we are finding them to be all business and gated-community-like. Admittedly, this symbol being ruled by the sign of Leo makes sense, as that sign is all about the establishment of ones castle and his keep and the autonomy one provides oneself and the protection one can then offer others. This is a symbol of backlash, I believe, showing the need to counterbalance the communal energy, not to mention property and living, associated with Aquarius. Leo is, afterall, the opposite sign of Aquarius. Something will have to be off limits and auntonomous, even if we are speaking metaphorically here. Nomatter how touchy-feely liberal we get we will still want to vouchsafe our privacy, no? Of course we come up against this time and again, both individually and societally. It’s a matter of the liberal versus the libertarian, both seeking to throw of the yoke of something, mainly, oppression by plutocratic and governmental forces, respectively, both of which fall under the heading of society—that old chestnut.

The purest communism the world has ever seen was, ironically, in America in the 1960s via, well, communes. But they, and communism in general, does not work. It seems that in trying to eschew totalitarianism it only flips around again. Remember the pigs in Orwells Animal Farm. I’m always struck by the fact that both Uranus and Saturn rule Aquarius, the planets of the avant and old guard. Though Uranus is the primary ruler, there is always that anchoring of Saturn—he’s like the watchdog in this image, or the big business man in the previous one. Why? Because Uranus’ energy alone is so radically ideological that it might not be effectual. It is arguably the Bernie Sanders of the Zodiac. Ohhh, grrr. Did you just say that. Yes I did dammit. I find Trump and Sanders (not to be confused with French and Saunders) to be so polarized as to be parodoxically the same in that they are preaching to audiences who want to hear the words they utter; while neither of the two have actual plans to execute what they propose. The right doesn’t want the Bern to take their toys away; and the left doesn’t want the Trump to screw them out of their due either. And so we need a watchdog either way you see.

Okay let’s go deeper; because Dane Rudhyar has more to say on this subject in that he sees an occult reading of this symbol as well. Cool, right? You’re down for some occult action, yeah? Me too: The watchdog is thus in place to keep out any psychic intrusions or even those of dark magic. Now, as we journey toward this end of the Zodiac, in case you haven’t noticed, we are dealing with more non-material and etheric forces on a grand scale, whether it be personal revelation or a whole upper-case Book of them. So as we wax more supernatural we need that much more protection. The Rudh (that’s my new nickname for him)….the Rudh speaks of subhuman entities or “elementals” that the adept employs to protect him as ventures furter out into inner space—”far out” is such an Aquarian expression—but this just makes me think of creepy o’l Dr. Faustus, although he was courting actual demons. Elementals. Okay. I think we mean more like genies and spirits of fires and wee beings that Shakespeare would have loved to entertain. The Rudh likens these beings to guardian angels but, jeez, I dunno if I would call Clarence an elemental per se. (If you don’t know who Clarence is we have nothing further to discuss.)

Whatever the metaphysical level this oracle exists on, we are seeing a need for protection and security so that we might be able to exact an agenda that, hopefully, is beneficial to others. Any dimestore new-agey buddh-ish has heard the phrase “I dedicate my actions to the benefit of all sentient beings”—oh, it was a phrase that used to get thrown around a lot trust me. Anywig, sometimes it might be easier to do the right thing when you know you’ve got your own literal or figurative fido watching the door. I mean, the greater the adept or even the creative the more protection they might require. I know some very famous friends that learned that lesson the hard way. Then of course, Madonna has body guards, too, and she doesn’t do much for me or really anybody I know. But I don’t know that many people.

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With this following symbol scholar of all things Sabian, Dane Rudhyar puts forth the concept of “organation” as opposed to “organization.” That, here in the sign of egalitarian Aquarius, at 16° A Big Businessman At His Desk suggest the ability to organize the many aspects of an enterprise invlving a large group of human beings in a new(-age) way. For, on the surface, this is an image of the single, probably white, individual scion of the patriarchy making unilateral decisions that affect the masses. The evolved notion is that this same figure might be making a merger, mobilizing troops or sending a mission to Mars in a way that doesn’t profit the few, but the many. How this could be a Cancer ruled image (in a rolling twelve-fold sequence): is in the viewing of humanity as a single organism, thus the wholistic organing, not the mere organization, theme, here. And not just mankind as a separate organ, but one that is working in concert with the myraid other flora and fauna and mineral organs on earth to make a single earthly organism or, why not go further, a single universal organism.

Cancer, ruled by the Moon, the Mother Principle, sees all of creation, earthy or cosmic, as female. The man at the desk in this symbol thus strikes me as the animus of all feminine being, the masculine purpose-driven dot of yang within this yin universe, the mind of the Mother. That big daddy at his desk isn’t out for domination in this model; rather he is seeking to use the power of the collective in a way that is harmonious to the welfare of the whole of which we are parts. Considering this has never been achieved, as Rudhyar points out, and rarely attempted, this mode of operation still mainly resides in our future visions of a world that has evolved out of human ego and greed and all that goes with it. Aquarius is all about evolution and here we see the specific development of the understanding that the only true beneficial moves to be made are those which positively impact everybody and everything. The old model of the man at his desk calling the shots and making personal gain to the detriment and dearth of others will have shown that, in the end, he doesn’t benefit either. Such systems based on greed will be dismantled or overthrown. It is only a matter of Time.

We might have to nearly destroy ourselves via revolution to get down to the level of the few “seed-people” who will be part of a new order, doing things in this wholistic manner. Still we shall draw on existing models of management and systems analysis even as we move forward in our evolution. In simple terms, the greedy maneuvers and mercenary moves of the past can still be mined for their strengths in our future endeavors of full-humanity benefit. The lovebirds of the previous image signaled that we could come to a place where our lower-case and upper-case Selves could work in concert, not conflict—once we get to that place we must no longer go back into division. One would think that those who act from ego-selfishness would indeed feel divided or torn; words that describe being other ripped back in two. Sadly, some people don’t seem to own a conscience that could be in conflict. (Like so many Republicans.) There are few things scarier to me than that thought.

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Two Lovebirds Sitting On A Fence And Singing Happily couldn’t fall more aptly under any sign other than that of Gemini which rules this Aquarius 15° symbol in a twelve-fold sequence. Gemini is steeped in bird and flight imagery, ruled by Mercury named for the winged god, and the sign governs courtship, rituals of which are a particularly birdy biz. The duality of Gemini is not only expressed in the pair of birds but also in the fence which is separating one field (of experience) from another. The birds might very well signify the mortal and divine, just as the twins of the Gemini, Castor and Pollux were immortal and divine, respectively.

Indeed what could be more fulfilling than to have our terrestrial actions marry perfectly with our spiritual aims or, moreover, spiritual blessing—for our earthly conduct to be in accord with divine mind or soul. And it works the other way as well, perhaps: The spiritually fulfilled soul mightn’t be able to take anything but right action in this world. The point being that we are living in harmony (singing) with ourselves, whatever dualities and dichotomies working in accord, the opposite of inner conflict being inner concert, pun so very much intended. This, my friends, is bliss. In the previous oracle we followed it through a tunnel that speeded us through a mountain of obstacles, now we have achieved a sense of it. The proverbial we is sitting on a fence, poised between two gardens of our own being, perched on the happy middle way.

Following that bliss, we get to blessed These are love birds. And the love is of a higher (winged) spiritual kind. What we have here is supreme blessing or beatitude. Inner happiness is the reward for having made a valuable contribution to the world and mankind.

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