Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter October 7, 2009

Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter
OCTOBER 7, 2009
FreeWillAstrology.com

+

"My own definition of Dada: an insane lyrical impulse to remain light and carefree, always looking for something to wonder or marvel at, or love, or laugh at, but always remaining illogical and joyous in a world gone mad with too much logic, seriousness, science, newspapers, war, and destruction."
- Irving Stettner

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The revised and expanded version of my book PRONOIA IS THE ANTIDOTE FOR PARANOIA is now available.

With 55% fresh material beyond the original edition (60,000 additional words and 75 new illustrations), it basically has a whole new extra book inside it.

Order it here:

Amazon: tinyurl.com/lxpnyt

Barnes and Noble: tinyurl.com/kkadtb

+

Here's a piece from the book.

A Global Array of Further Pronoiac Resources

In recent years, the doom and gloom prophets have become even more strident and brazen in blurting out their cacophony of curses.

Joining them in the mad rush to shower condemnation on the entire human enterprise have been millions of emboldened everyday complainers who've also become addicted to the sick thrill of chronic rage.

I'm sometimes tempted to view the growing hordes of fulminators as a black magic army flinging hexes and maledictions on everything they see.

But whenever I brush up against that fear, I stop my mind from its careening and refocus my inner eyes. Breathing out the jive and breathing in the love, I survey all the evidence I've been gathering of an antidotal force rising up.

When my book on pronoia first came out in 2005, I felt isolated in my seemingly eccentric invitation to celebrate the glory we're surrounded by, to name the thousands of ways that the universe proves its love for us, to notice all the miracles and help we receive.

But I soon realized that I was by no means a lone crank crying in the wilderness. I became aware of an ever-growing rebel crusade -- swarms of pilgrims and activists and artists and creative optimists who had signed on to the conspiracy to shower blessings, devoting themselves to the work of not just saving the world but making it more beautiful and mysterious and interesting.

I wasn't under any illusion that they were suddenly arising because of my influence. Rather, my sense was that my book was just one symptom of an energy that was awakening in the whole world. I was a current in the flood.

For years, I've been compiling data about other currents in the flood, making them known through this free weekly email newsletter. A Beauty and Truth Lab researcher named Darin Wilson has created a website that is archiving these pronoaic resources. The posts are categorized and tagged, and there's built-in search. You can find the site here: pronoiaresources.com.

Please note that when I praise all these purveyors of beauty and truth and love and justice, I do so simply because I like them. My endorsements are not advertisements, and I get no kickbacks.

Let me know about your own nominations for pronoiac resources. I'm at beautyandtruth@freewillastrology.com.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

MORE PRONOIA RESOURCES:

Sources of good news are proliferating. In fact, their increasing abundance is proof that there's no longer any excuse for steeping yourself in the perverse life-hating obsession that infects the mainstream media.

Here's my challenge to you: For the period of one week, I dare you to refrain from sucking in the nihilism that pours out of mainstream news sources. Instead, for those seven days, get all your news from the pronoiac websites below.

Good News Network
goodnewsnetwork.org

Change the World News
cthings.com

Great News Network
greatnewsnetwork.org

Positive News
positivenewsus.org

Ode magazine
odemagazine.com

Yes! magazine
yesmagazine.org

Gimundo
gimundo.com

Good News Daily
goodnewsdaily.com

Good News Blog
goodnewsblog.com

Happy News
happynews.com

Heroic Stories
heroicstories.com

Positive Economic News
positiveeconomicnews.com

Good News Economist
goodnewseconomist.com

NPR report on good news
tinyurl.com/d5mkuw

New "positive change" magazines thrive
tinyurl.com/y9hen3d

(Note: I endorse these because I like them. They are not advertisements, and I get no kickbacks.)

Please tell me your own personal nominations for PRONOIA RESOURCES.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
Week beginning October 8

Copyright 2009 by Rob Brezsny
FreeWillAstrology.com

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):

The sun shines brighter on my new home. The old place had resemblances to a cave and was surrounded by tall trees. My new space has many broad windows and soaks up the solar radiance from dawn to dusk. As you might expect, my 15 plants need to drink a lot more than they used to. The watering ritual at the old house used to come once a week, but now it's every other day. According to my reading of the astrological omens, a comparable shift is occurring in your rhythm, Libra. Metaphorically speaking, more heat and light are coming your way.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):

Amazingly enough, the good deeds you do in the next 21 days could alone qualify you for a permanent exemption from hell. It seems God has cooked up some imminent tests that will give you a chance to garner some ridiculously sublime karma. What's that you say? You don't believe in either God or hell? Well then, interpret the opportunity this way: The good deeds you perform in the coming three weeks could practically ensure that the sins you've committed thus far in your life will not stain the world or be passed on as IOUs to the next generation.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):

In 1968, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn finished his book The Gulag Archipelago, a scorching indictment of the oppression that he and his countrymen suffered under the totalitarian regime of the Soviet Union. Banned for years, it was never formally published in his home country until 1989. Even after that, the new Russian government tried to control the teaching of history by suppressing texts like Solzhenitsyn's. This year, all that changed. The Gulag Archipelago became required reading in Russian high schools. At last, the truth is officially available. (Maybe one day the equivalent will happen in the U.S., with alternate histories by Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky finding their way into the curriculum.) I celebrate this breakthrough as a symbol of the events that are about to unfold in your personal life: the long-lost truth finally revealed.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):

John, a colleague of mine, is a skillful psychotherapist. His father is in a similar occupation, psychoanalysis. If you ask John whether his dad gave him a good understanding of the human psyche while he was growing up, John quotes the old maxim: "The shoemaker's son has no shoes." Is there any comparable theme in your own life, Capricorn? Some talent or knowledge or knack that should have been but was not a part of your inheritance; a natural gift you were somehow cheated out of in your early environment? If so, the coming weeks will be an excellent time to start recovering from your loss and getting the good stuff you have coming to you.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):

Let's imagine that an independent filmmaker has been following you around, gathering footage for a movie based on the story of your life. This week he or she would face a dilemma. That's because unexpected new sub-plots may arise, veering off in directions that seem to be far afield from the core themes. The acting of the central players won't be bad or unskillful, but it might be out of character with what they've done before. And there could be anomalous intrusions that impinge on the main scenes, like a bug landing on your nose during an intense conversation. Yet I can't help wondering if this chapter of the tale won't be intriguing for just these reasons.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):

"Tenderness and rot / share a border," writes the U.S. Poet Laureate Kay Ryan in one of her poems. "And rot is an / aggressive neighbor / whose iridescence / keeps creeping over." Your job in the coming week, Pisces, is to reinforce that border -- with a triple-thick wall, if necessary -- so that the rot cannot possibly ooze over and infect tenderness. It is especially important right now that the sweet, deep intimacy you dole out and stimulate will not get corrupted by falseness or sentimentality. I urge you to stir up the smartest affection you have ever created.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

LISTEN TO AN EXPANDED HOROSCOPE

Since I put all my heart and soul into the written horoscopes I send out in this newsletter, they're pretty nutritious. You may never need any of the other stuff I create.

But if you ever do crave an added boost, you may want to sample my Expanded Audio Horoscopes. They're different in tone and intent than the written scopes, imbued with a little more of the psychologist in me, and a little less of the poet.

Find out more at RealAstrology.com.

The audio horoscopes are also available by phone at 1-877-873-4888 or 1-900-950-7700.

"Your Expanded Audio Horoscopes provide me with the Rest of the Story. I'm not necessarily a believer in the scientific accuracy of astrology, but I do think you've got a lot of practical wisdom to impart."
- M. Tennenbaum, New York

"No one knows more about me than me. But you're right up there near the top of the list of people who do understand something about how I tick. How is that possible?"
- R. Goren, Albuquerque

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

ARIES (March 21-April 19):

The poet Stephen Mallarmé wrote the following in a letter to a friend: "I don't know which of my internal climates I should explore in order to find you and meet you." I love that passage. It alludes to one of the central facts about the nature of reality: The quality of your consciousness is crucial in determining whether you'll be able to attract the resources that are essential to your dreams coming true. In order to get what you want, you have to work on yourself at least as hard as you work on the world around you. This is always true, of course, but it's especially true for you now, Aries.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20):

Is there anything in your life that you don't really want but nevertheless find it hard to part with? A situation or experience that gives you a perverse sense of comfort because of its familiarity, even though it has a steep emotional cost and doesn't serve your higher dreams? If so, the coming week will be an excellent time to change your relationship with it. You will make dramatic progress if you brainstorm about how you could break up the stagnant energy that keeps you entranced and entrapped.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20):

One of my New Age friends says she has it on good authority that the Seven Lords of Time will reconvene in their Himalayan sanctuary on December 21, 2012 and reinvent the nature of time, as they last did back in 3114 BC. I have no idea if that's true or not, but if it is, I say "hallelujah!" We would all benefit from some big-time reinvention of time. But that happy event, even if it actually does come to pass, is still more than three years away. What to do in the meantime? Luckily, you Geminis now have major personal power to do some time reinvention of your own. To get the meditations rolling, ask yourself what three things you could do to stop fighting time and start loving it better.

CANCER (June 21-July 22):

Soup is your metaphor for the week, Cancerian. Symbolically speaking, it's the key to your personal power and a model for the approach you should take in everything you do. On the most basic level, you might want to eat some soup every day. That will make potent suggestions to your subconscious mind about how to mix lots of ingredients together so that their value and beauty as a totality are more than the sum of their parts. Not just in the kitchen, but in every area of your life, blend many little miscellaneous things into one big interesting thing.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):

Change your password. Take a different way home. Ask a question you've never asked. Dream up a new nickname for yourself. Choose a new lucky number. Change the way you tell the story about an important event in your past. Make it a little more difficult for people to have you pegged. Eat a type of food you've never tried. Do the research necessary to discover why one of your opinions may be wrong. Add a new step to your grooming ritual. Feel appreciation for a person whose charms you've become numb to. Surprise yourself at least once a day.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):

One of the best modern Turkish poets was Seyfettin Bascillar, who worked as a meat inspector in New Jersey for many years before his death in 2002. Nobel Prize-winning poet Czeslaw Milosz lived in Berkeley, California for over four decades while writing his books in Polish, his native tongue. Iceland's great poet of the 20th century, Stephan G. Stephansson, lived in Canada most of his life but always wrote in Icelandic. These people remind me of what you're going through: striving to do what comes natural and authentic in a situation very different from the place where you first learned to be natural and authentic. The interesting fact of the matter is that this feeling of displacement could very well be key to your success.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

HOMEWORK:

To try the exercises and experiments in "Pronoia Therapy," an excerpt from my new book, go here: tinyurl.com/95ykn

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

WANT TO GET YOUR CHART DONE?

I'm not doing personal charts, but I highly recommend my astrological colleague, RO LOUGHRAN. Her approach closely matches my own. In our many discussions about astrology over the years, we've had a major influence on each other's work.

Ro utilizes a blend of well-trained intuition, emotional warmth, and a high degree of technical proficiency in horoscope interpretation; she is skilled at exploring the mysteries of your life's purpose and nurturing your connection with your own inner wisdom.

Ro is based in California, but can do phone consultations and otherwise work with you regardless of geographic boundaries.

Ro's website is at YourSoulJourney.com

She can also be reached at roloughran@comcast.net

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Submissions sent to the Free Will Astrology Weekly 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 such submissions for length, style, and content. Requests for anonymity will be honored with submissions; otherwise, reader names, screen names, or initials will be used. Please be sure to note your preference when sending to us. We are not responsible for unsolicited submission of any creative material.

Contents of the Free Will Astrology Newsletter are Copyright 2009 Rob Brezsny

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++