When your Horoscope Contradicts Itself

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Oftentimes a single horoscope will have some placements that indicate one outcome, and some placements that indicate an opposite outcome. For example, a single horoscope may have several factors in it indicating poverty, while several other factors indicate wealth. How do you read this?

Some think that opposites “cancel each other out.” So that if you have 4 indications of wealth and 3 of poverty, well… the 3 poverty indications cancel out the 3 wealth indications, so the 1 remaining wealth indication wins. Congratulations, you will be wealthy. This is a completely bogus idea of how to read astrological charts.

Although it is a bogus method, it does have some merit. The merit is the idea that the stronger and more predominant indications in a horoscope will win out over the weaker ones. So for example if you have very strong indications of wealth and very weak indications of poverty, your experience of wealth will be much more prominent than you experience of poverty. How do you assess “strength”? Well, you need to learn astrology, but I can summarize that you defer to the shadbala of the planets involved, the confluence in theme between the involved houses, planets, and signs, and the quantity of other placements in the horoscope indicating similar outcomes.

This is a reasonably good approach to reading charts, but it remains ignorant to a very important fundamental point. The point is that people live for a long time. We don’t live our whole life in one moment. We may be wealthy, for example, at some stage of our lives and poor at other stages. This is why one horoscope almost always shows contradictory conditions. During the cycles and transits of the planets involved in the indications of poverty, for example, one experiences poverty – but during the cycles and transits of the planets involved in the indications of wealth, the same person experiences a change of fortune and enjoys wealth.

Vic DiCara

www.vicdicara.com

Thoughts About the Earthquake Disaster in Japan

I would like to open this discussion to other astrologers, so I will enable comments and welcome input.

I am looking at a chart of Miyagi, Japan on March 11, 2011 at 14:41. I am not really looking much at houses, so if there is a better time it wont make much difference to the initial observations I have to make.

I notice an ominous formation here:

(A) All the planets are hemmed between the lunar nodes, Rahu and Ketu.

(B) Saturn is the only planet outside the hem, and is therefore the focus of all the energy of most of these planets aspects. (near perfect aspects from Mars, Mercury and Jupiter and a somewhat significant aspect from the Sun)

(C) Saturn disperses the brunt of its own aspect upon the two nodes and Jupiter (54/60 to Rahu, 43/60 to Ketu, 49/60 to Jupiter)

(D) Saturn was with phenomenal shad-bala strength (196%) and low vimshopaka dignity (9/20)

(E) An undignified Mars (9/20) puts a nearly full aspect (57/60) to Saturn.

(F) Rahu in Moola (Ketu’s nakshatra). Mars in Satabhishaka (Rahu’s Nakshatra).

The Navamsha of this event is also asking to be observed. In that Chart the axis of the lunar nodes lines up with the Sun and Jupiter. Saturn perfectly aspects Mercury, and Saturn and the Moon exchange houses.

I would appreciate your comments and additional observations.

- Vic DiCara

www.vicdicara.com

I have _ in the _ house – but I am NOT _!

Smoking causes cancer. People used to laugh, “Joe has been smoking for 53 years and he is healthy. And Sally’s Mom died of lung cancer at the age of 42 and she never smoke or drank!” Well that’s lovely and sad, but smoking causes lung cancer. That everyone who smokes does not get lung cancer does not change this fact, nor does the fact that not everyone who has lung cancer gets it from smoking.

Similarly when a planet is in a sign, or house, or whatever – there are certain outcomes. For example, I have seen that Mars in the first house of a female horoscope contributes to the outcome of lesbianism. This does not mean that every woman with Mars in the first house is a lesbian, nor does it mean that every lesbian has Mars in the first house.

- Vic DiCara

www.vicdicara.com

ABCs of Medical Astrology

Ayurvedic Pharmacy

The medicinal science of Sanskrit culture (ayur-veda) primarily approaches health as a balance between three primary factors (doshas) in the body:

• Tissue (kapha)
• Metabolism (pitta)
• Circulation (vata)

A unique ratio of these three blends to constitute each individual’s health (prakriti). The more unbalanced the ratio, the more there is illness (vikriti). Various types of imbalances create specific varieties of ill health. For example, excess Tissue leads to weight retention and trouble riding the body of toxicity. Excess Metabolism leads to stress and the concomitant maladies. Excess circulation causes systemic frailty.

In this system of medicine, diagnosis is most often done by physical proximity. The most thorough and utilized diagnostic tool is an extremely sensitive and sophisticated method of reading the patient’s pulse. Other diagnostic tools exist as well, which observe various focal points in the patients physical and mental being. A substantial number of doctors in this discipline also avail themselves of Astrology as a diagnostic tool; the birth charts are a sort of “DNA” which these doctors (or their astrologers) can read to foretell the nature, depth and duration of a patient’s illness.

Since I am an astrologer, not a doctor, let me outline some of the basic astrological principles pertaining to the three primary health factors of Ayurvedic medicine. The key to deciphering which astrological factors pertain to which medicinal principle is to use the four primordial elements as a link between the two.

Factors Indicating Tissue (Kapha)
Tissue forms as a result of the primordial element “Earth” holding within it the primordial element “Water.” These elements, particularly Earth, therefore indicate the nature of an individual’s Tissue.

• Strongest of all, the planet Mercury promotes the Earth element. Jupiter, though not technically an Earth-element planet, also supports the Tissue principle.
• Earth exists strongly in three zodiac signs: Taurus, Virgo, and Capricorn.

Factors Indicating Metabolism (Pitta)
Metabolism is a result of the primordial element “Fire” being held is liquid substances, the primordial element “Water.” In astrology:

• Foremost agents of Metabolism (in order) are the Fire planets: Mars, Ketu, and Sun.
• The fire signs are also significant: Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius

Circulation results from the primordial element “Air.” Air represents itself astrologically like this:

• Foremost agents of Circulation are (in order): Saturn and Rahu.
• The air signs are significant: Gemini, Libra, and Aquarius

Basics of Reading
You, of course, cannot hope to successfully diagnose a medical condition after merely reading an introductory article – but this article can start you on your way to proficiency. One thing to do is to examine the planets of a particular medical constituent. Let’s say you want to know if a person has a healthy Tissue principle. You could begin by looking at Mercury. Is Mercury in a sidereal (of course) Earth or Water sign with Earth or Water planets (Venus and Moon)? If so, it is one factor indicating that the Tissue principle is strong. But if Mercury is in a Fire or Air sign with Fire or Air planets, it is a factor suggesting that the Tissue principle is thwarted by the other principles. Repeat the observation for the other planet concerned with Tissue, Jupiter.

In this way you can build up a list of positive and negative points for and against the health of a patient’s Tissue principle. Repeat that process for the other two health principles, Metabolism and Circulation, and you will have a valid basis for making a diagnosis about the nature of the person’s health constitution.

- Vic DiCara

www.vicdicara.com

Dhanvantari - the God of Medicine