Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter March 4, 2015

 Rob Brezsny's Astrology Newsletter
 March 4, 2015
 FreeWillAstrology.com

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My book PRONOIA IS THE ANTIDOTE FOR PARANOIA
is available at Amazon: bit.ly/Pronoia
or Powells: bit.ly/PronoiaPowells
Barnes & Noble: bit.ly/PronoiaBN

The e-book edition is available as an ePub directly from me at: bit.ly/eePronoia

Below are excerpts from the book.

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GRATITUDE FEST

Would you like to make yourself smarter and more beautiful? Are you interested in increasing your capacity for ecstasy and improving your health? Consider the possibility of celebrating regular Gratitude Fests.

During these orgies of appreciation, you could confer praise and respect on the creatures, both human and otherwise, that have played seminal roles in inspiring you to become yourself. You would devote yourself to invoking and expressing thanks.

Who teaches and helps you? Who sees you for who you really are? Who nudges you in the direction of your fuller destiny and awakens you to your signature truths? Who loves you brilliantly?

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EVIL IS BORING

Who are the perpetrators of the genocide of the imagination? I call them the entertainment criminals.

They're the nihilistic creators and dramatis personae who spread the propaganda that trouble and strife and disintegration are more worthy of our attention than integrity and splendor and quantum leaps.

The entertainment criminals are the decadent fools who preach the bizarre doctrine that witty gloom is the mark of a deep thinker. They are the educated idiots who try to trick us into believing that optimism is solely for naive fools with no aptitude for critical thinking.

The visionary philosopher Buckminster Fuller said, "When I am working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only of how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong."

To the entertainment criminals, Fuller's perspective is heretical. With the know-it-all certainty of religious fanatics, they imply with every word and image they produce that there is rarely such a thing as a beautiful solution.

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I heard an interview with the German film actor Udo Kier. He specializes in playing villains. "Evil has no limit," he sneered, blustering like a naughty genius. "Good has a limit. It is simply not as interesting."

How many times have I heard that idiotic cliché? Most everyone everywhere seems to agree with Udo Kier. And I'm in a tiny minority in my belief that evil is boring. There seem to be few thinkers, communicators, and creators who share my curiosity about exploring the frontiers of righteous pleasure and amusing truth and boisterous integrity.

Some pretenders do make counterfeit attempts: Hollywood producers who produce sentimental fantasies with artificially happy endings, advertising executives who sell the pseudo-positivity of narcissistic comfort, and New Age gurus who ignore the darkness with their one-dimensional appeals to sweetness and light.

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The word "imagination" gets little respect. For many people, it connotes "make-believe" and is primarily the domain of children and artists. But the truth is that your imagination is the engine of your destiny. It's the single most important tool you have in your daily campaign to be free. It's the source of every act of liberation you will ever need to pull off.

That's why it's so disturbing to know that all over the planet, the imagination is deeply wounded -- paralyzed by the media's nonstop onslaught of toxic psychic waste. How can you generate images that energize you to create your highest good if your mind's eye is swarming with dazzling yet vacuous and fear-inducing stories crafted by the most monumental brainwashing juggernaut in the history of the world?

To get a sense of the growing devastation, I suggest you wander around a grade school playground at recess. You'll hear kids' conversations overflowing with the degrading narratives they've absorbed from their favorite sources of information and stimulation.

I call this ongoing tragedy the genocide of the imagination. Because of it, many people cannot access their greatest magical power. They have forsaken the sanctity of their sacred temples, allowing them to be defiled with soulless images and stories that are at odds with their deepest desires. As a result they live incoherent lives corroded by chronic anxiety.

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If we hope to prevent the genocide of the imagination, we've got to perpetrate massive, mirthful attacks of pronoia. But we have to do it without acting like True Believers, because fanaticism is anathema to our cause. Our strategy is to be blithe and flexible as we learn not just to believe, but actually perceive the truth that life is a benevolent conspiracy designed to keep mutating our immortal souls until they're so far beyond perfection that perfection is irrelevant.

We will succeed. We will overthrow the doom and gloom fixation and make the cause of zoom and boom irresistible. Our parties will be better than theirs. Our jokes will be funnier, our jobs more enjoyable, our lovemaking more revelatory. We'll dream up tricks to create an environment in which it's more fun and interesting to talk about wise bliss than clever cynicism.

We will build shrines devoted to righteous pleasure and amusing truth and boisterous integrity in the ugliest places we know. We will unleash praise and gratitude without regard for the taboos we shatter thereby. And we will perform senseless acts of altruistic chutzpah everywhere we go.

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I've gathered all of the big-picture horoscopes I wrote for you, and bundled them in one place. Go here to read a compendium of your long-range, big-picture forecasts for 2015: bit.ly/BigView2015

If you like, you can also review the long-range, big-picture horoscopes I wrote for you in January 2014. You can see whether my forecasts back then turned out to be accurate and helpful during the course of 2014. They're here: bit.ly/BigLife2014

More? If you'd like to go even further back to see how my oracles jibed with your actual destiny, here's a compendium of your forecasts for 2013: bit.ly/BigLife2013

One more blast from the past: the long-range horoscopes I offered at the beginning of 2012. They're here: bit.ly/BigPic2012

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Are you in quest of an Intimate Ally? A Soul Friend? A Wild Confidante?

Check out Matchmaker.com via Free Will Astrology's link: bit.ly/SoulMatch

Look for a Co-Pilot, Co-Conspirator, or Collaborator . . . an Agent to represent you or a Disciple to worship you . . . a Secret Sharer who'll listen better than anyone or an Amazing Accomplice with whom you can practice the Art of Liberation.

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MORE PRONOIA RESOURCES:

Bigger Than Science, Bigger Than Religion
We're closer to environmental disaster than ever before. We need a new story for our relationship with the Earth, one that goes beyond science and religion. Here's a start: The universe is not a random assemblage of dead matter and empty space, but is alive, intelligent, and continually evolving.

Not only is the world alive, it is alive in us. "We bear the universe in our beings," said Thomas Berry, "as the universe bears us in its being." In Berry's view, we are the eyes, the minds, and the hearts that the cosmos is evolving so that it can come to know itself ever more perfectly through us.
tinyurl.com/knqyqd9

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In praise of the brave people who do good acts that they risk being demonized for. "Contemptible heroes" often suffer terrible isolation for standing up for what's right.
tinyurl.com/mlr6l2j

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What Does It Take to Start a Worker Co-Op? A Practical Video Guide to Democratizing Our Economy. A new film asks whether practicing workplace democracy would be easier if our media gave us as many visions of collaboration as they do of competition?
tinyurl.com/mcdmqda

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(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.

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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
 Week beginning March 5

Copyright 2015 by Rob Brezsny
FreeWillAstrology.com

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):

When Arnold Schwarzenegger became Governor of California in 2003, the state had the eighth largest economy in the world, right behind Italy and just ahead of Brazil. Schwarzenegger had never before held political office. When Cambodian doctor Haing Nor performed in the film The Killing Fields, for which he ultimately won an Oscar, he had no training as an actor. He was a novice. Will you try to follow in their footsteps, Pisces? Is it possible you could take on a role for which you have no preparation or seasoning? According to my divinations, the answer is yes. But is it a good idea? That's a more complex issue. Trust your gut.

ARIES (March 21-April 19):

To depict what lay beyond the limits of the known world, medieval mapmakers sometimes drew pictures of dragons and sea serpents. Their images conveyed the sense that these territories were uncharted and perhaps risky to explore. There were no actual beasties out there, of course. I think it's possible you're facing a comparable situation. The frontier realm you are wandering through may seem to harbor real dragons, but I'm guessing they are all of the imaginary variety. That's not to say you should entirely let down your guard. Mix some craftiness in with your courage. Beware of your mind playing tricks.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20):

Whenever I close my eyes and seek psychic visions of your near future, I see heroic Biblical scenes. Moses is parting the Red Sea. Joseph is interpreting Pharaoh's dream. Jesus is feeding 5,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish. What's the meaning of my reveries? Well, this psychic stuff is tricky, and I hesitate to draw definitive conclusions. But if I had to guess, I'd speculate that you are ripe to provide a major blessing or perform an unprecedented service for people you care about.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20):

In a New Yorker cartoon, Tom Gauld outlines "The Four Undramatic Plot Structures": 1. "The hero is confronted by an antagonistic force and ignores it until it goes away." 2. "The protagonist is accused of wrongdoing, but it's not a big thing and soon gets sorted out." 3. "The heroine is faced with a problem but it's really difficult so she gives up." 4. "A man wants something. Later, he's not so sure. By suppertime he's forgotten all about it." In my astrological opinion, Gemini, you should dynamically avoid all four of those fates. Now is a time for you to take brave, forceful action as you create dramatic plot twists that serve your big dreams.

CANCER (June 21-July 22):

"To be happy is to be able to become aware of oneself without fright," said heavyweight German philosopher Walter Benjamin, a fellow Cancerian. I am happy to report that there's a good chance you will soon be blessed with an extraordinary measure of this worry-free self-awareness. And when you do -- when you are basking in an expanded self-knowledge infused with self-love and self-appreciation -- some of your chronic fear will drop away, and you will have at your disposal a very useful variety of happiness.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):

"As you get older, the heart sheds its leaves like a tree," said French novelist Gustave Flaubert. "You cannot hold out against certain winds. Each day tears away a few more leaves; and then there are the storms that break off several branches at one go. And while nature's greenery grows back again in the spring, that of the heart never grows back." Do you agree with Flaubert, Leo? I don't. I say that you can live with such resilient innocence that your heart's leaves grow back after a big wind, and become ever-more lush and hardy as you age. You can send down such deep, strong roots and stretch your branches toward the sun with such vigor that your heart always has access to the replenishment it needs to flourish. The coming weeks will provide evidence that what I say is true.

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MY OTHER HOROSCOPES

Factual information and reasonable thinking alone are not sufficient to guide you through life's labyrinthine tests. You need and deserve regular deliveries of uncanny revelation.

One of your inalienable rights as a human being should therefore be to receive mysteriously useful omens on a regular basis. In this spirit, I offer you the free weekly horoscopes you read here.

If you ever want more, and think it's worth paying for, try my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES. They're four-to-five-minute meditations on the current state of your destiny and where you're headed.

They're available here:
RealAstrology.com

You can also access them by phone:
1-877-873-4888

"I always feel like I know myself better after listening to your audio 'scopes."
-June R., Austin, TX

"Your audio horoscopes calm me down when I'm too manic and pep me up when I'm down."
-Arthur T., Cleveland, OH

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VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):

"I will not wait to love as best as I can," says writer Dave Eggers. "We thought we were young and that there would be time to love well sometime in the future. This is a terrible way to think. It is no way to live, to wait to love." That's your keynote for the coming weeks, Virgo. That's your wake-up call and the rose-scented note under your pillow and the message scrawled in lipstick on your bathroom mirror. If there is any part of you that believes love will be better or fuller or more perfect in the future, tell that part of you to shut up and embrace this tender command: Now is the time to love with all of your heart and all of your soul and all of your mind.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):

I love the song "Shine On You Crazy Diamond," by Pink Floyd. Other favorites are Tool's "Third Eye" and Yo La Tengo's "Pass the Hatchet, I Think I'm Goodkind." But all of these tunes have a similar problem. They're more than ten minutes long. Even before my attention span got shrunk by the Internet, listening to them tested my patience. Now I have to forcefully induce a state of preternatural relaxation if I want to hear them all the way through. In the coming days, Libra, don't be like a too-much-of-a-good-thing song. Be willing to edit yourself. Observe concise boundaries. Get to the point quickly. (You'll be rewarded for it.)

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):

Sneaking around isn't necessary, Scorpio. There's no useful power to be gained by hiding information or pursuing secret agendas. This is not a time when it's essential for you to be a master of manipulation who's ten steps ahead of everyone else. For now, you are likely to achieve maximum success and enjoy your life the most if you are curious, excitable, and transparent. I invite you to embody the mindset of a creative, precocious child who has a loving mommy and daddy.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):

In 1953, Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first humans to reach the summit of Mount Everest. It took them seven weeks to climb the 29,029-foot peak. In 1960, Jacques Piccard and Don Walsh got into a bathyscaphe and sailed to the lowest point on the planet, the Mariana Trench at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. It took them four hours and 47 minutes to go down 36,070 feet. Based on my analysis of your astrological omens, I think the operative metaphor for you in the coming weeks should be the deep descent, not the steep ascent. It's time to explore and hang out in the depths rather than the heights.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):

The African country of Ivory Coast has two different capital cities. Yamoussoukro is the official capital, while Abidjan is the actual capital, where the main governmental action takes place. I suspect there's a comparable split in your personal realm, Capricorn: a case of mixed dominance. Maybe that's a good thing; maybe it allows for a balance of power between competing interests. Or perhaps it's a bit confusing, causing a split in your attention that hampers you from expressing a unified purpose. Now would be a favorable time to think about how well the division is working for you, and to tinker with it if necessary.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):

I've gone on three book tours and done my spoken-word show in scores of bookstores. But one of my favorite author events took place at the Avenue C Laundromat in New York City's East Village. There I performed with two other writers as part of the "Dirty Laundry: Loads of Prose" reading series. It was a boisterous event. All of us authors were extra loose and goofy, and the audience offered a lot of funny, good-nature heckling. The unusual location freed everyone up to have maximum amusement. I see the coming weeks as a time when you, too, might thrive by doing what you do best in seemingly out-of-context situations. If you're not outright invited to do so, I suggest you invite yourself.

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HOMEWORK:

Devise a plan not to get back to where you once belonged, but rather to where you must some day belong.
Testify at FreeWillAstrology.com.

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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 2015 Rob Brezsny

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