benebell wen METAPHYSICAL PRACTITIONER; AUTHOR OF HOLISTIC TAROT AND THE TAO OF CRAFT STATEMENT OF ASTROLOGICAL APPROACH This appears in the introductory pages of your birth chart monograph. It is my pleasure to connect with you and write about my analysis of your natal chart. I ll begin with a statement of my astrological approach. There are different approaches to astrology, Eastern vs. Western traditions, and within the Western tradition, Whole Signs vs. Placidus, among many other differing systems of astrological practice. Thus, it is important for an astrologer to explain upfront what her approach is. I work with Hellenistic astrology using the Whole Signs method, which is said to have been devised by the Babylonians. Whole Signs is considered the oldest of the Western astrological house systems, a tradition of interpretation that dates back to 200 to 100 B.C. The Placidus system, by far the most popular Western astrological system, came around the 1600s. Another popular system, Koch, came about in the 1800s. There are also Eastern traditions that have become popular in the West, such as Vedic astrology or Chinese Ba Zi, Four Pillars Analysis, which isn t really astrology per se, but now we re just splitting hairs. Under the Whole Signs approach that I ve adopted, when reading your ascendant sign, sun sign, and moon sign, I apply a traditional day-night rulership for examining the influence of planets on these signs in your chart. Yet I integrate many techniques from modern interpretation to my reading, so in all other areas of chart consideration, I apply a single rulership approach, and will often examine both traditional and modern single rulerships. In other words, for Scorpio, Aquarius, and Pisces, I ll look at both traditional/modern planetary attributions (whereas for the other signs, traditional and modern rulerships align). If at any time you are confused by my terminology, please check the Glossary of Astrological Terms at the back of this natal chart reading for reference. So if you encounter a term you re not familiar with, such as opposition with Mars and you re not entirely clear what an opposition is, you can refer to the back of this book and find its definition in the Glossary. If I start talking about decans and you want to learn a bit more about decans, take a pause and check out its entry in the Glossary. I m hoping the approach I ve elected here, where we organize your astrology reading by areas of life rather than one by one consecutive house and sign analysis, will be more of a bespoke or customtailored chart interpretation keyed specifically to the patterns and formations found only in your chart. We begin with your sun, moon, and rising, like any basic chart reading. Then we get into other personal sensitive points and your lunar nodes. We then zoom out for some general information, like your dominant element and dominant modality. There are specific chart phenomena that may be unique to your chart that are not found in other charts, and we will address those phenomena. We then cover a diverse range of topics, from the mundane like work and love to your higher purpose, the Divine Plan set for you, and your spirit guardians accompanying you along your life path. We also talk about spiritual practices keyed to
2 your birth chart that are most optimal for ascension and just feeling more at peace with yourself, and sufficiently balanced so that you can robustly pursue your aspirations. For better or worse, this monograph is keyed to my personal gnosis, such as inclusion of religious language and the concept of reincarnation. Thus, your monograph will touch upon past life astrology. While I believe we have many past lives, this past life astrology analysis is based on your present life natal chart. The way I read the chart, it yields the one past life that is most influential on your present life karma. What is in your subconscious now, your inclinations, and innate abilities are based on the experiences of this particular past life and it is only through the balancing and reconciliation of the karma from this past life incarnation that you will be able to move on completely from the tethers of your past life karma. I will also touch upon concepts considered paranormal, of spirit entities and religious expressions of a Divine Spirit that fall outside the realms of science. If you do not share my beliefs, then there are two ways to approach these references in your monograph. Dismiss them altogether, and you can still reap great psychoanalytical-esque benefits from your book to gain a better insight into your personality profile. Or you can translate the language I have opted for into more palatable terms, relating more to human psychology. Often when we talk about past life memory or ancestral inheritances, we could be talking about cellular and genetic memory. Throughout human history, God, gods, and spirits have been attributed to natural phenomena we don t quite understand. The perception of ghosts can be and has been attributed simply to concentrated pockets of electromagnetic frequencies and geopathic stresses. So my religious or paranormal references represent the vocabulary I have personally opted to use to describe science or psychology that we do not yet understand. As you read through your monograph, I recommend having a hard copy of your birth chart on hand. I have provided a separate file of your birth chart along with a summary of angular aspects, elements, and modalities. The chart reference prints on standard size paper and contains legends for following along the astrological symbolism. While you read your monograph, follow along with the birth chart on hand so you can pinpoint exactly where in your chart I am addressing. Now let s talk a bit about the underlying structure of your natal chart monograph. As I said, I begin with the trinity of natal astrology the sun sign, moon sign, and ascendant (or rising) sign. The trinity of natal astrology is like summarizing the who, what, where, when, and why. The synthesis of these three natal signs is most telling of who you are and your fundamental nature. Next we examine the how. The subsequent square diagram labeled Traditional Natal Chart at its center depicts the common chart used in medieval astrology. Note, however, that for your reading I use the horoscopic wheel. Nonetheless, your natal chart in the traditional square form is provided in the end pages of this monograph. The way the twelve houses are sectioned off in the diagram reveals a power cross formed by Houses 1, 4, 7, and 10. These four houses in particular reveal the four layers that make up how you operate, given your fundamental nature: Who You Are, Where You Come From, Who You Love, and Who You Become.
3 House 1, relating to Fire in the eastern horizon, our ascendant sign, is the gateway to understanding your individual identity. Pay attention to mentions of your ascendant sign throughout this reading. House 1 and your ascendant is what form the nature of your spirit. I will use ascendant and rising interchangeably throughout the book. House 4, in the north and relating to Water, is where we come from, our birthright, the family and home environment we were born into, our subconscious, and in the way I read the signs, the gateway into revealing your past lives. Pay attention to the Past Life Astrology section herein. Despite the section title, there will be a lot of cross-over into your present life birthright. I believe that past life astrology, even if you read it figuratively as a metaphor, is quite telling of where you come from and where you have been. House 7, in the west and relating to Air, reveals the significant interpersonal relationships in our lives. While the most important is who we love (so pay attention to the Love and Romance section of this monograph), House 7 also relates to who we are most compatible with for socialization. As we all might acknowledge, who we love is very much an integral part of our identities. House 7 is your descendant, and so I cover interpretation of your descendant sign by way of House 7 analysis. Your descendant sign is your psyche projected onto your partners. The final spoke of the cross is House 10. House 10, southbound and relating to Earth, is the gateway to what we do, who we become, and our highest aspirations for this life. In society today, when we introduce ourselves, one of the first topics raised in the conversation is to talk about what we do for a living. Our work is a major component to how we identify. House 10 is an amplified, glorified version of that. House 10 points the way to our highest professional and personal aspirations, our
4 social status, and so it denotes who we become on this life path. Pay attention to the Professional Potential section of this monograph. Yet in the traditional Whole Signs astrological approach, House 10 is a distinct point of analysis from your midheaven sign. We will talk about the distinctions and how that matters to you as we progress along your natal chart monograph. Here, actually, is one of the reasons I prefer Whole Signs. To me, the treatment of the midheaven analysis and the tenth house as distinct brings in so much more nuanced information about our higher purpose. Speaking of higher purpose, if you are seeking insight into your higher purpose, or God s plan for your life here on earth, look to the midheaven sign and the Arabic Parts (or Hermetic Lots) analysis, where we will cover your Lot of Fortune and your Lot of Spirit. I believe the Lot of Spirit reveals insights into spirit guides or guardian spirits that accompany you on your life path. If that is of interest to you, then pay attention to the section on your Lot of Spirit. The lunar nodes are essential in Chinese and Eastern astrology for examining one s karma and thus karmic path, past, present, and future, which reveals our life purpose, what will most fulfill us, the shadow of our inner selves, and possible soul fragmentation, noting their root causes. I may get a little dark and intense when we talk about your lunar nodes, so be prepared for that. There will also be some cross-over between nodal analysis and past life astrology. To construct your chart and for some of the tables provided herein, I use a professional astrologer s computer software program called Solar Fire Gold. All the astrological charts and tables of data based on your birth details are created by Solar Fire Gold. My job through this monograph is to then translate all of that data into plain English for you. To put together this written reading, I use paragraphs of content corresponding with specific astrological phenomena, such as content I ve drafted myself over the many years I ve practiced astrology for Sun in Libra, Ascendant Sign Aquarius, Air-Dominant Personality, the Fixed Modality, Life Path 7, Saturn in Sagittarius, Mercury in Virgo, or Moon conjunct Neptune, etc. These were done in advance of this reading and compiled based on what applies to your natal chart. However, the process is heavily personalized and I always study the collective series of phenomena in your chart to reach conclusions that can only apply to your chart. Based on my knowledge, experience, and intuition, I reach certain deductions about your life path pursuant to the patterns that are wholly unique to your natal chart, such as the specific degree that your Ascendant Sign is in Aquarius, for example, and its Term Ruler and Decan, or the unique set of trines and oppositions to your Saturn in Sagittarius or Mercury in Virgo and the astrologer s conclusion that can be reached based on that unique set of angles. These points of analysis cannot possibly be done through use of pre-written content. A natal chart is a pictorial representation of the heavens at the exact date and time of your birth, in consideration of your location of birth. It is geocentric, assuming you to be at the center. I read with a Tropical zodiac (as opposed to a Sidereal), which means in your natal chart, the position of the
5 sun is in reference to the earth s horizon at the specific geographical location of your birth. Thus, the framework is constructed on two solstices and two equinoxes. Also, as an astrologer I observe mean lunar nodes rather than true nodes. If that means nothing to you, then forget I mentioned it. If you study astrology yourself, then you ll nod and smile at why I d mention it. Some astrology purists will assert that you must look at true nodes, not mean nodes. I ve thought about that. I ve studied the astronomy and scientific rationales for how both are calculated. At the end of my own studies, I ve concluded for myself that mean nodes work just fine for me and the use of true nodes is astrologically insignificant. Overall, a natal chart will reveal your predisposition and the innate strengths and weaknesses you possess. It is a spiritual narrative of who you are. In my own view, the natal chart is God s plan for you, expressed in the most divine way by the whole pattern of celestial alignments in Heaven at the precise moment of your birth from the precise location of your birth. By the way, when I say God here, I mean Spirit, the Divine, the collective unconscious, the anima mundi, Akashic Records, or any other term in lieu of God that expresses your personal gnosis. For convenience, I m simply using God to denote all or any of those concepts. Yet when I say a divine plan, this monograph as written is not that divine plan, but only one interpretation of the language that the Divine has used to reveal your plan to you. It is the chart itself, the alignment of the celestial bodies at the precise moment of your birth that is the divine plan for you. I strongly encourage you to seek out your own personal and direct connection to the Divine for further and more accurate revelations of that plan. That is why your monograph is structured the way it is, with detailed introductory text in each chapter and section, along with the glossary. The intent here is that you will not only learn about yourself, but also learn a great deal about astrology just from reading your birth chart monograph. I read a natal chart as karma-based determinations of a life path, plus a personality profile, plus most probable social and environmental circumstances that altogether tell a story about a person, but leaving out one key component free will. Given your karma-based determinations of a life path, your personality and innate character traits, and social and environmental circumstances you re dealt, what will you do with it all? That is the only question the natal chart does not answer. I think of it like this when I was conceived, my parents had big plans for the newborn they just created. They could envision the specifics about the future they idealized for me. The reality is I and every child become an independent entity with agency and free will. What I do with what I am given is up to me, and not up to those who created me. On a much more all-encompassing, grander, and more cosmically powerful scale, that s how I see the Divine Plan. You are born the way you are accompanied by an idealized vision for your future and what you can become, what purpose you serve. I believe that is what natal astrology can reveal (along with revealing pre-set conditions based on karma carried over from previous lifetimes, which can show up in a chart). However, what you do with what you are given is up to you entirely, and not up to that which Created you. My approach to astrology does not predict your future because free will overrides predisposition. A natal chart does not tell you who you will marry, how many children you can have, what occupation
6 you will choose, or when you will die. From reading your chart, I can tell you what your higher purpose is, but that is not to say that you will make all the choices, by your will, toward fulfilling that higher purpose. These outcomes are based on the choices you make, though of course, your predisposition will certainly play a role. Your monograph is intended to be a manuscript, a book about you that accompanies you throughout the course of your life. Consult Your Life Chronology by Quadrant Analysis from decade to decade to track your progress and see how you have aligned with or diverged from the divine plan. Be attentive to the zodiac sign that Mars is in right now, in the present moment, and locate the house in your birth chart that same sign rules over. That can reveal to you Mars influences in the area of life that corresponds with that house in your chart for about a 3-month period, which is how long Mars is typically stationed within a sign. Check for transiting Jupiter, as it can bring blessings and opportunities in that given area of life for that year. Uranus brings shifts, upheavals, and changes up the dynamics of the status quo every 7 years and you can see how exactly the current positioning of Uranus (i.e., transiting Uranus) will affect you by checking the sign the transiting Uranus is in and cross-referencing it with the natal house that sign occupies in your chart. When a transiting planet enters a house that is populated with planets in your chart, things may get stressful yet bountiful. When a major planet enters a house that is empty in your chart, suddenly you may find yourself having to pay attention to issues that normally cause you no trouble. Understanding Your Twelve Houses covers the fundamentals of house analysis while Understanding Your Twelve Signs will address the zodiac signs. These two sections of your monograph will help you through a basic understanding of house and sign analysis for your future astrological considerations. The point of a natal chart reading is spiritual, to reveal and confirm to you the presence of a Divine; it is to help you better examine the reflection of your soul and the relation between your soul and that Divine. For me, the study of astrology has been my proof of God s existence and a validation that there really is a Divine Plan for each one of us. I hope you will revisit this book many times over through the many different stages of your life and each time, find something meaningful, something divinatory that will help you with the present situation you re facing. It is with that purpose that I write these natal chart monographs. For every monograph I write, I invoke the Divine and ask that the entire exercise be done under that watchful, guiding Light, and may that Divine breathe into your monograph the precise words and insight that you need to guide you in your spiritual journeys. With that in mind, let s get started. Toward a greater collective, Benebell Wen Last Updated June 13, 2016