Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter
December 25, 2019
FreeWillAstrology.com
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SURROUND YOURSELF
Surround yourself with people whose eyes light up when they see you and who have no agenda for your reform.
—Jess Lair and Kirsten Lauzon
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A PREVIEW OF YOUR DESTINY IN 2020
Want to get a head start on your future? This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a sneak-peek at some major themes you'll be working and playing with in 2020.
Start dreaming and scheming about who you're going to be in the new year. Enlist my help as you energize your quest to become your best self.
To access the Expanded Audio Horoscopes, go to RealAstrology.com
Register and/or log in through the main page, and then click on the link "This week (Dec. 24, 2019)."
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The cost for the Expanded Audio Horoscopes is $6 per sign. (You can get discounts for multiple purchases.)
You can also listen over the phone by calling 1-877-873-4888. The cost is $1.99 per minute.
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Beginning with next week's EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES, I will devote three consecutive weeks to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming year.
Part One of my BIG-PICTURE FORECASTS FOR 2020 will be available beginning Tuesday, December 31.
Part Two will be available on Tuesday, January 7
Part Three will be available on Tuesday, January 14.
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INVITATIONS
Change yourself in the way you want everyone else to change
Love your enemies in case your friends turn out to be jerks
Brainwash yourself before someone nasty beats you to it
Write a love letter to your evil twin during a lunar eclipse
Fool the tricky red beasts guarding the Wheels of Time
Locate the master codex and add erudite graffiti to it
Dream up wilder, wetter, more interesting problems
Change your name every day for a thousand days
Exaggerate your flaws till they turn into virtues
Kill the apocalypse and annihilate Armageddon
Brag about what you can't do and don't have
Get a vanity license plate that reads KZMYAZ
Bow down to the greatest mystery you know
Make fun of people who make fun of people
See how far you can spit a mouthful of beer
Scare yourself with how beautiful you are
Stage a slow-motion water balloon fight
Pretend your wounds are exotic tattoos
Sing anarchist lullabies to lesbian trees
Commit a crime that breaks no laws
Sip the tears of someone you love
Build a plush orphanage in Minsk
Feel sorry for a devious lawyer
Rebel against your horoscope
Give yourself another chance
Write your autohagiography
Play games with no rules
Relax and go deeper
Dream like stones
Mock your fears
Drink the sun
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In 2020, I wish you captivating adventures that help weave together diverse threads of your experience, inspiring you to feel at home in the world and fall in love with life again and again.
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OPTIMISM FOSTERS PROGRESS
Every optimist moves along with progress and hastens it, while every pessimist would keep the worlds at a standstill. The consequence of pessimism in the life of a nation is the same as in the life of the individual.
Pessimism kills the instinct that urges men to struggle against poverty, ignorance and crime, and dries up all the fountains of joy in the world.
—Helen Keller
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HISTORY IS WILDER THAN OUR IMAGINATIONS
The grounds of my hope have always been that history is wilder than our imagination of it and that the unexpected shows up far more regularly than we ever dream.
—Rebecca Solnit
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OUR GREAT RESPONSIBILITIES
Our greatest responsibility is to be good ancestors.
—Jonas Salk
Another one of our great responsibilities is to be ancestors who experimented with the compassionate truth our entire lives.
—me
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CONSULTING OUR ANCESTORS
At a family planning conference in Beijing, a researcher from Ghana presented testimony about tribal issues that he had in part gleaned through interviews with dead ancestors. He said that spirit mediums had acted as his "translators."
When he was met with skepticism from colleagues, he was defensive. "If I only heard from the living," he explained, "I wouldn't get a very good balance."
His perspective would be smart for all of us to consider as we contemplate how we can prevent the ongoing ecocide that's ravaging our planet.
It's crucial to work hard on practical and political shifts that will alleviate the stress we're putting on our shared environment. But it's also important to be in intimate touch with the influences of past humans who cared for the earth better than we are doing—and who might motivate us to be more tender and thoughtful as we contemplate the legacies we will leave for our descendants.
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OPTIMISM IS A SOUND STRATEGY
"Optimism is a strategy for making a better future. Because unless you believe that the future can be better, you are unlikely to step up and take responsibility for making it so. If you assume there is no hope, you guarantee there will be no hope."
—Noam Chomsky
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CRAFTY OPTIMISM
Howard Zinn wrote: An optimist isn’t necessarily a blithe, slightly sappy whistler in the dark of our time.
To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.
What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something.
If we remember those times and places–and there are so many–where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.
And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.
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RE-DREAMING CHRIST
Some Christians might be shocked to learn that Jesus Christ is one of the Main High Magicians in the Beauty and Truth Lab's pantheon of deities and avatars.
They may believe that people like us -- Goddess-worshiping tantric Sufi Qabalist pagans who hang around with Zen trickster witches and espouse a socialist libertarian political philosophy -- couldn't possibly have an intimate and vivid relationship with the cosmic hero they claim to own. They act as if they have commandeered the trademark of one of the smartest wild men in history.
Christ was a champion of women's rights, an antidote to the established and corrupt political order, and a radical spiritual activist who worked outside religious institutions.
He was a passionate advocate for the poor and underprivileged. He owned nothing and had no use for the idea of "private property." He was uncompromisingly opposed to violence and war. Besides that, he was a master of love and he devoted his life to serving the Divine Intelligence. He even went so far as to say, "Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you, and give away all your possessions."
I want to be like Jesus Christ when I grow up!
(But it's quite OK with us if you don't want to be like him. The good thing about adoring Christ's pronoiac glory but not being a Christian is that we don't have any investment in wanting you to do as we do. We want you to do as you do!)
Is there any hijacked hero you'd like to liberate? Any spoiled treasure you hope to redeem? Any detoured savior you want to get back on track?
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BECOMING OURSELVES
The whole point of Jesus's life was not that we should become exactly like him, but that we should become ourselves in the same way he became himself. Jesus was not the great exception but the great example.
—psychologist Carl Jung
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MORE PRONOIA RESOURCES:
What would happen if our first step towards solving homelessness was to actually give people someplace to live?
tinyurl.com/yx5q62jr
By decriminalizing even “hard” drugs like heroin and cocaine, Portugal drove down HIV rates and overdose deaths—and proved beyond a doubt that harm reduction works.
tinyurl.com/yy3xp2br
The bustling Nigerian city of Lagos is bursting at the seams with art fairs, biennials and galleries. Now, some of the artists who left to find work elsewhere are returning home.
tinyurl.com/quxfhff
(Note: I endorse these because I like them. They aren’t advertisements, and I get no kickbacks.)
Please tell me your own nominations for PRONOIA RESOURCES: Truthrooster@gmail.com.
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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
Week beginning December 26
Copyright 2019 by Rob Brezsny
FreeWillAstrology.com
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):
Fifteenth-century Italian metalworker Lorenzo Ghiberti worked for 28 years to turn the Doors of the Florence Baptistry into a massive work of art. He used bronze to create numerous scenes from the Bible. His fellow artist Michelangelo was so impressed that he said Ghiberti's doors could have served as "The Gates of Paradise." I offer Ghiberti as inspiration for your life in 2020, Capricorn. I think you'll be capable of beginning a masterwork that could take quite some time to complete and serve as your very own "gate to paradise": in other words, an engaging project and delightful accomplishment that will make you feel your life is eminently meaningful and worthwhile.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):
You're wise to cultivate a degree of skepticism and even contrariness. Like all of us, your abilities to say NO to detrimental influences and to criticize bad things are key to your mental health. On the other hand, it's a smart idea to keep checking yourself for irrelevant, gratuitous skepticism and contrariness. You have a sacred duty to maintain just the amount you need, but no more—even as you foster a vigorous reservoir of receptivity, optimism, and generosity. And guess what? 2020 will be an excellent time to make this one of your cornerstone habits.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):
Dante Alighieri (1265–1321) finished writing The Divine Comedy in 1320. Today it's considered one of the supreme literary accomplishments in the Italian language and a classic of world literature. But no one ever read the entire work in the English language until 1802, when it was translated for the first time. Let's invoke this as a metaphor for your life in the coming months, Pisces. According to my visions, a resource or influence that has previously been inaccessible to you will finally arrive in a form you can understand and use. Some wisdom that has been untranslatable or unreadable will at last be available.
ARIES (March 21-April 19):
Nazi Germany invaded and occupied Denmark during World War II. In 1943, Hitler ordered all Danish Jews to be arrested—a first step in his plan to send them to concentration camps. But the Danish resistance movement leapt into action and smuggled virtually all of them to safety via fishing boats bound for Sweden. As a result, 8,000+ Danish Jews survived the Holocaust. You may not have the opportunity to do anything quite as heroic in 2020, Aries. But I expect you will have chances to express a high order of practical idealism that could be among your noblest and most valiant efforts ever. Draw inspiration from the Danish resistance.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20):
When she was 31, Taurus writer Charlotte Brontë finished writing her novel Jane Eyre. She guessed it would have a better chance of getting published if its author was thought to be a man. So she adopted the masculine pen name of Currer Bell and sent the manuscript unsolicited to a London publisher. Less than eight weeks later, her new book was in print. It quickly became a commercial success. I propose that we make Brontë one of your role models for 2020, Taurus. May she inspire you to be audacious in expressing yourself and confident in seeking the help you need to reach your goals. May she embolden you, too, to use ingenious stratagems to support your righteous cause.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20):
2020 can and should be a lyrically healing year for you. Here's what I mean: Beauty and grace will be curative. The "medicine" you need will come to you via poetic and mellifluous experiences. With this in mind, I encourage you to seek out encounters with the following remedies. 1. Truth Whimsies 2. Curiosity Breakthroughs 3. Delight Gambles 4. Sacred Amusements 4. Redemptive Synchronicities 5. Surprise Ripenings 6. Gleeful Discoveries 7. Epiphany Adventures 8. Enchantment Games 9. Elegance Eruptions 10. Intimacy Angels 11. Playful Salvation 12. Luminosity Spells
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START EXPLORING YOUR LONG-RANGE FUTURE
This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser, sneak-peek look of some major themes you'll be working and playing with in 2020.
Who do you want to be in the coming year? What do you want to do? Where do you want to go? Your destiny is more wide-open than you might imagine. You have a lot of power to shape the flow of events.
I hope to inspire you to take advantage of the possibilities!
The cost is $6, with a discount for multiple purchases.
To get your sneak peek of some of 2020's major themes:
1. Go to RealAstrology.com
2. Register and/or log in
3. Then click on the link "This week (Dec. 24, 2019)."
They are also available by phone at 1-877-873-4888.
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CANCER (June 21-July 22):
“There are years that ask questions and years that answer," wrote author Zora Neale Hurston. According to my astrological analysis, Cancerian, 2020 is likely to be one of those years that asks questions, while 2021 will be a time when you'll get rich and meaningful answers to the queries you'll pose in 2020. To ensure that this plan works out for your maximum benefit, it's essential that you formulate provocative questions in the coming months. At first, it's fine if you generate too many. As the year progresses, you can whittle them down to the most ultimate and important questions. Get started!
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):
The Roman Emperor Vespasian (9–79 AD) supervised the restoration of the Temple of Peace, the Temple of Claudius, and the Theater of Marcellus. He also built a huge statue of Apollo and the amphitheater now known as the Colosseum, whose magnificent ruins are still a major tourist attraction. Vespasian also created a less majestic but quite practical wonder: Rome's first public urinals. In accordance with astrological omens, I invite you Leos to be stimulated by his example in 2020. Be your usual magnificent self as you generate both inspiring beauty and earthy, pragmatic improvements.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):
When Virgo author Mary Shelley was 18 years old, she had a disconcerting dream-like vision about a mad chemist who created a weird human-like creature out of non-living matter. She set about to write a book based on her mirage. At age 20, she published Frankenstein, a novel that would ultimately wield a huge cultural influence and become a seminal work in the "science fiction" genre. I propose we make Shelley one of your role models for 2020. Why? Because I suspect that you, too, will have the power to transform a challenging event or influence into an important asset. You'll be able to generate or attract a new source of energy by responding creatively to experiences that initially provoke anxiety.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):
Libra-born mystic poet Rumi (1207–1273) wrote that he searched for holy sustenance and divine inspiration in temples, churches, and mosques—but couldn't find them there. The good news? Because of his disappointment, he was motivated to go on an inner quest—and ultimately found holy sustenance and divine inspiration in his own heart. I've got a strong feeling that you'll have similar experiences in 2020, Libra. Not on every occasion, but much of the time, you will discover the treasure you need and long for not in the outside world but rather in your own depths.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):
Among his many accomplishments, Scorpio rapper Drake is an inventive rhymer. In his song "Diplomatic Immunity," he rhymes "sacred temple" with "stencil." Brilliant! Other rhymes: "statistics" with "ballistics"; "Treaty of Versailles" with "no cease and desist in I"; and—my favorite—"Al Jazeera" (the Qatar-based news source) with "Shakira" (the Colombian singer). According to my analysis of the astrological omens in 2020, many of you Scorpios will have Drake-style skill at mixing and blending seemingly disparate elements. I bet you'll also be good at connecting influences that belong together but have never been able to combine before.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):
Sagittarian poet Rainer Maria Rilke (1875–1926) embodied a trait that many astrology textbooks suggest is common to the Sagittarian tribe: wanderlust. He was born in Prague but traveled widely throughout Europe and Russia. If there were a Guinness World Records' category for "Time Spent as a Houseguest," Rilke might hold it. There was a four-year period when he lived at fifty different addresses. I'm going to be bold here and hypothesize that 2020 will NOT be one of those years when you would benefit from being like Rilke. In fact, I hope you'll seek out more stability and security than usual.
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HOMEWORK:
Your imagination is the single most important asset you possess. Listen: bit.ly/YourProphecy
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Submissions sent to Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter or in response to "homework assignments" may be published in a variety of formats at Rob Brezsny's discretion, including but not limited to newsletters, books, the Free Will Astrology column, and Free Will Astrology website. We reserve the right to edit submissions for length, style, and content. Requests for anonymity will be honored. We are not responsible for unsolicited submission of any creative material.
Contents of the Free Will Astrology Newsletter are Copyright 2019 Rob Brezsny
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