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Welcome to Dr Z's Crash Course!

"An astrological chart describes inner substance. It's the stuff you're made of, the basic matter that forms the psyche. It is certainly what has been written, but it's unformed when you are born. It exists in potential. It hasn't been lived yet. And sooner or later it will seek to actualize itself."
        Dr. Liz Greene Ph.D., Astrologer and Jungian Analyst

"We are born at a given moment in a given place and like vintage years of wine we have the qualities of the year and of the season in which we are born. Astrology does not lay claim to anything else."
        Dr. C. G. Jung M.D., the original Jungian Analyst

Just The Basics

Welcome! This is a cut corners, crash crash in astrology. Before we're finished, Mac the faithful guide dog and I want you to understand more about astrology than 90% of the rest of the population does. (Although, you'll probably learn just enough to make you dangerous.)

Highly Recommended: You might want to bookmark this page, since there's likely more here than you can comfortably digest at a single sitting.

Sun Sign Astrology?

Yep! Almost everyone knows what their astrological "Sun Sign" is from reading the daily horoscopes in the newspaper.

Yet Sun Sign Astrology is just the tip of a massive (and complex) iceberg. What most folks don't know is that at the moment of a person's birth - in "real astrology" each of the planets in our solar system has a correlation with regard to the human personality depending on:

  • What Zodiac Sign the planet is in
  • How the different planets "aspect" or "connect" with each other
  • And what house the planet is in.

Geez! We've barely just gotten started - and we've already got four major concepts going here:

I - Planets - the raw energy (the Verbs of Astrology)

II - Signs - the patterns of energy (the Adverbs of Astrology) you know - the twelve signs, Aries - Pisces

III - Aspects - the different connections between the planets

IV - Houses - where the energy/patterns (planets/signs) take place

So in birth chart interpretation, astrologers are attempting the difficult task of cohesively pulling together all of the various ways that the planets, signs, aspects, and houses in a person's birth chart might work together in order to form a whole.

We look for major repeated themes in the birth chart. And we look for a thousand other "things" that aren't part of a cut corners, crash course in astrology.

 
I- Planets II - Signs III - Aspects IV - Houses
Grand Finale - The Castle

Okay... by now, if you've already checked out and read about the Planets, Signs, Aspects, and Houses - then you're probably already experiencing a serious brain strain overload and meltdown.

Hang in there with me... cuz we're almost to end...

If you're in a state of total confusion - then I've found telling stories to be an effective right brained method of communicating.

So here's a story that may help "unconfuse" you about some of the stuff I've been talking about (especially in regard to the Ascendant and the Midheaven).

So it's time for a story called The Castle.
( If you previously took the Crash Course for Lazy Folks, then this is simply a repeat of that.)

Whew! We're Done...

Well, that's as much as you'll get from me about the basics. If you REALLY want to understand this stuff - then go out to a bookstore and buy a book. That's right, web surfer! Get out into the real world every once in a while! Get out from behind that computer!

By Popular Request - Recommended Reading for beginners wanting to learn more about the Basics of Astrology (provided with Amazon.com links for those folks too lazy to make a trip to a local bricks and mortar bookstore):

Stephen Arroyo
Chart Interpretation Handbook - excellent beginner's cookbook for learning some of the basics of how to interpret your own birth chart. Buy it at Amazon.com

Kim Rogers-Gallagher
Astrology for the Light Side of the Brain - Great (with good humor) for getting down some of the Basics! Buy it at Amazon.com

Julia and Derek Parker
Parkers' Astrology : The Essential Guide to Using Astrology in Your Daily Life - Excellent beginner's book for learning how to interpret your own chart. May be overwhelming if you're totally brand new to all this stuff.  Buy it at Amazon.com

Alice O. Howell
The Heavens Declare, Revised Edition: Astrological Ages and the Evolution of Consciousness (This is primarily a revised edition Jungian Synchronicity in the Astrological Signs and Ages.) This imaginative book is written only for those right brained, non-linear folks that don't necessarily need and/or want organized, boring lists designed for learning astrology by rote memorization. It's guaranteed to pretty much stretch your brain. It's one of my favorite books, but probably not for everyone. Buy It At Amazon.com

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