Pluto square Moon

RIP Kate Spade

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Designer Kate Spade, whose handbags can be seen everywhere, has died of an apparent suicide at the age of 55.  A fashion designer for many years,in 2006 she sold the successful company that she started with her husband in 1993.  Their more recent endeavors had not been as well received.

I recently did a session for a client who was very depressed and wanted to know if her chart showed a tendency towards suicide.  The fact is, while a chart can show whether an individual will suffer from depression and what form that is likely to take, how they manage their suffering is not something we can see in the chart.  We can see whether someone has the strength to actively fight for their health and turn their life around, but we can’t predict whether or not they will actually do it.

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Kate Spade’s chart (set for noon, no birth time available) does show the potential for psychological issues.  Emotional intensity (Pluto square the Moon) adds to a deep sense of abandonment as illustrated by stressful aspects from Chiron (soul wounding and healing) to both the Moon and Pluto. Uranus (radical behavior) is involved too in that system, which can sometimes suggest a tendency towards anxiety and a highly sensitized nervous system.  The fact that her Moon was in happy Sagittarius suggests that it would be difficult for her to delve into her unhappiness and would instead attempt to fly beyond her problems.

Ms. Spade’s chart was also weak in the fire element; her Sagittarius Moon provided motivation and drive […]

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By |2019-11-10T19:09:06-05:00June 6th, 2018|Death, People, Psychology|7 Comments

The astrology of Oscar Pistorius

Oscar Pistorius astrology The Bionic Man

Oscar Pistorius is in jail right now awaiting trial for the Valentine’s Day shooting of his girlfriend, Veena Steenkampf.  Previously he rose to fame as the first double amputee to win a medal in an able bodied world track event.

Pistorius is a Bionic Man as befits a transhuman athlete in the Aquarian Age – fitted with artificial limbs that some argue give him an unfair advantage over mere mortals.  (See my posts on Transhumanism here.)

Pistorius was profiled in the New York Times last year in a piece that described him as “more than a little crazy” – a risk taker who was fearful of intruders and an excellent shot at the firing range.  This fear is captured in a tweet from November: “Nothing like getting home to hear the washing machine on and think it’s an intruder.”

The astrological chart of Pistorius offers interesting clues into his character.  The French website Astrotheme offers a birthtime of 10:30 am on November 22, 1986 (source: email from family member) which indicates Aquarius rising.  Aquarius is the sign of detachment and reason, technology and innovation.  We can’t be 100% sure of this birthtime, of course, but an Aquarius ascendant is  the perfect mask for a Transhuman-type athlete; someone who seeks to shatter the paradigms of what is possible for human beings to accomplish.

His Sun is at the very last degree of Scorpio, often called the “critical” or “anaretic” degree.  In medieval astrology the “anareta” was a planet of destruction.  While modern astrology doesn’t take these significators literally, the 29th degree indicates a completion of some kind of karma and needs to be taken seriously.  The Sun is on the Scorpio/Sagittarius […]

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By |2013-02-21T08:38:59-05:00February 21st, 2013|Crime, People|5 Comments

The astrology of depression: Andrew Koenig

photo montage from CNN. Andrew Koenig, the son of Walter Koenig who played Pavel Chekov in the original Star Trek series, has been missing since February 14th.  He was last seen at a bakery in Vancouver.  Koenig is an actor who is best known as Kirk Cameron’s sidekick in the long-running television series “Growing Pains.”  Some of Koenig’s friends fear the worst, reporting that he had been depressed and fed up with his life in California. He sold all of his possessions and walked away from his home in Venice on February 4.

Koenig (8/17/1968, time unknown, LA CA)  is 41, the age at which transiting Uranus opposes Uranus in the birthchart, and because he is one of those “Uranus/Pluto” people who were born between 1962 and 1968, that Uranus opposition is particularly intense.  Briefly, Uranus is the planet of rebellion and revolutionary change, and Pluto, the planet of death and rebirth, presides over experiences that transform us from the ground up.  This cohort of people carry this archetype of revolutionary change within them.

The Uranus Opposition is a planetary cycle in which Uranus in the sky opposes Uranus in the birthchart.  It occurs at age 40-42, and is the most intense of the “midlife crisis” transits, generating an urge to break free of whatever is holding us back.  For this age group, because Uranus opposes not only natal Uranus but also natal Pluto, this time period is even more urgent and powerful and necessitates a letting go of the past in order to move forward into the future.

Pluto squares his Moon, or his emotions, and Andrew’s former landlord told TMZ that Andrew did not have a good relationship with his mother (the Moon often, but […]

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By |2018-06-11T12:26:12-04:00February 26th, 2010|Death, People, Psychology|Comments Off on The astrology of depression: Andrew Koenig

Happy Birthday, Jim Morrison!

The death of Jim Morrison was one of the first really sad events of my young life. As a young and lonely wPlut hippie, his music took me to places beyond my reality that really did open the doors of consciousness. I discovered Jim Morrison’s music at the same time I discovered Aldous Huxley and psychedelic pharmaceuticals, which began what was to become a lifelong exploration of the mystery of life. Huxley wrote, “When the doors of perception are cleansed /Things will appear as they are: Infinite.

Jim Morrison said, “There are things known and things unknown, and in between are the doors.”

Jim Morrison had Sun in Sagittarius, the sign of the seeker of truth. Sagittarians typically do not like to delve into the dark recesses of the human unconscious, but Jim’s chart was more complex. Pluto, the god of the underworld that fearlessly enters the jaws of death to uncover the mystery, was exactly square his Moon and opposite his ascendant (rising sign), showing us that the archetype of death and rebirth (Pluto) was integral to his life (ascendant) and expression of his deepest emotions (Moon).

Mars in his chart was in Gemini, which is a very expressive place for the sexual drives of Mars. Mars was conjunct Uranus, the planet of innovation and revolution – the perfect placement for a leader of a cultural revolution such as Jim Morrison was. Mars/Uranus combination also indicate someone whose sexual tastes can be eccentric or extreme, and who is never satisfied with the status quo.

His Venus was in Scorpio, showing that his relationships (Venus) were intense and rooted in issues of power and sexuality (Scorpio), and opposed his Moon in Taurus, expressing a need for physical pleasure […]

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By |2019-08-26T13:42:07-04:00December 8th, 2005|People|Comments Off on Happy Birthday, Jim Morrison!