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THE PRACTICE OF ASTROLOGY AT THE TRANSPERSONAL LEVEL
In order clearly to understand and practice what a few years ago I began to call "transpersonal astrology", an astrologer should fully realize what it is not. It is not classical European astrology, based on the approach formulated in Alexandria by Ptolemy and later by Roman and Medieval writers. It is not popular fortune-telling. It is not what is now known as esoteric astrology, and it does not deal with what is considered to be a "soul chart", nor is it Uranian astrology or cosmobiology. Though it is based on the holistic and psychological foundations characterizing the "humanistic" or "person-centered" type of astrology I first formulated in The Astrology of Personality, a strictly transpersonal approach to astrology has a different orientation and gives to the astrologer-client relationship a rather unprecedented character. It interprets astrological data in terms of a new set of values.
Transpersonal astrology addresses itself specifically to human beings whose problems and expectations derive from the fact that they are (or consider themselves to be) not only autonomous, self-motivated "individuals", but individuals who realize that mere satisfaction — the growth and fulfillment of their individuality at a strictly personal and social or cultural level — is not an end in itself. They see in such personal fulfillment and happiness, at best a phase, in a transformative process that should lead to a higher and more inclusive level of consciousness and activity, a "spiritual" state.
Such individuals constitute only a small minority in relation to the masses of mankind, but because our society is now passing through a state of crisis with a potential of either global disaster or radical transformation, the number of individuals who are aspiring to a really new and at least relatively transcendent state of being is steadily increasing. These individuals are experiencing a profound dissatisfaction with present-day conditions not only of living, but of thinking and feeling. They do not want merely to grow bigger and better as personalities, but to become transformed into a new type of human, or an even more-than-human being. They therefore do not find deeply satisfying or especially inspiring and transformative answers in either the now-popular forms of psychology and quasi-psychotherapy represented by humanistic psychologists and the various forms taken by the human potential movement, or in the broadly psychological type of astrology which merely describes their character and how they should handle their conflicts or opportunities for growth at a purely personal level — a kind of growth that would mainly make them feel happier, more confident, and better able to function at home and in various social situations.
As I have stated at the close of the last chapter, an individual today more than ever before may be faced by the need to choose between fulfillment as a social person within the collective framework of his or her culture and radical transformation. What is usually called "growth" leads only to a more or less individualized form of fulfillment that does not deeply challenge the collective assumptions of the culture and the way of life of society, or at least of one's peer-group or social class. This kind of growth may modify the character and personality of a human being; it may have extremely valuable results at the psychological level, or even extend the field of consciousness through the blending of several cultures and their approaches to self-development. But as long as the position of the "I-center" in the personality remains secure unchallenged, growth is personal not transpersonal.
An individual solely, or even primarily, intent upon a personal kind of happiness and fulfillment — what he or she may wish to call "the integration of personality" — should seek advice and guidance from a person-centered type of astrological interpretation. Such an interpretation is basic, and even an astrologer employing a definitely transpersonal approach has always to keep it in the background.
Both the process of personal growth and the process of transpersonal transformation start from the same place: where the client "is" (or stands). They both have to begin with what he or she congenitally, socially, and individually is, and especially from what his or her mind is able to understand. But from the transpersonal point of view, whatever state of life the individual has reached, and whatever he or she possesses (psychologically speaking), are there to be used in the best manner possible to fuel the fire of transformation. On the other hand, in a person-centered type of astrology, all this personal material is considered as a field of more or less undeveloped substance to be refined and interrelated, usually according to the prevailing sociocultural model or plan, in the building of a smoothly operating, loveable, and successful personality.
In both cases, the natal chart provides the fundamental data that have to be considered, but after these data are understood, the focus of attention of the two types of astrologers changes. The person-centered, humanistic astrologer thinks of how best to help the harmonious development of the birth-potential along sociocultural lines; the transpersonal astrologer, tries to evoke (for the individual eager for self-transcendence), the possibility of using every opportunity, every tension, every crisis as means to gradually overcome the inertia of his or her past, of social and mental habits and prejudices and, above all, the resistance of the "I" to changes that would undermine its centralizing and controlling authority.
While in a person-centered type of interpretation, the process of change is given the basic meaning of the actualization of the innate potentialities defined by the birth-chart, and every progression is seen as an opportunity for growth — easy or difficult as it may be — a transpersonal interpretation considers every step on the road as a particular way of preparing for a radically transformative change. At the individual level of consciousness and activity, self-actualization refers to the fulfillment of what a "seed" sown in the past contains in potentiality. But, from a transpersonal point of view, what takes place during the progress of growth of an infant into adult has in youth the purpose of allowing the past (karma, whether "good" or "bad") to exhaust its as yet unspent energy, so that after maturity and midlife, the individualized consciousness and will may freely and safely repolarize themselves and use every opportunity for self-transformation and a future seed-mutation.
The ordinary person thinks he or she looks to the future while striving to actualize and fulfill his or her personality in terms of the goals publicized by society and culture; but what is actualized is a prolongation, and in most instances only a superficially modified repetition, of the genetic and sociocultural past We have to choose between allegiance to a past we seek to fulfill in our own personal way, and consecration to what for us, as mature human beings, is a possible future state — the transindividual state. Once such a choice is made, every astrological aspect is interpreted as an opportunity for transformation on the way to the "star".
Such a transpersonal interpretation of astrological data is in most cases significant and called for only after an individual has reached at least relative maturity. Yet we are today increasingly confronted by children and teenagers (some quite rebellious) who are sensitive to the possibility of radical transformation — even if it is only a naively formulated dream. The old ancestral seed has lost much of its power; the old karma may soon exhaust itself, and this leads to a deep, poignant feeling of emptiness whose cause and meaning are not understood. Then a transpersonal approach can be of great value, if it is adequately and sensitively presented.
The momentum, memory, and attractive power of the ancestral past and the old karmic patterns usually linger on for a long, long time, even when the vision of future possibilities has startled the consciousness, only perhaps to be discounted or laughed at by the mind. Then too can a transpersonal astrological and psychological interpretation be an important factor, for it can help the client gradually to reinterpret all the events of his or her past. By giving a new and transformative meaning to past events — especially past traumas, frustrations, and psychic injuries — the past is actually changed. It is transpersonalized. Every tragic occurrence may be consciously understood as a necessary step in the process that may eventually lead to the transindividual state.
The astrologer has first to be able to use such a transpersonal approach, but it should evident that he or she has also to answer to his or her satisfaction a crucial and determining question: is the client ready — has he or she the will and, even more than merely the desire, indeed the ability to deal with his or her problems in a transpersonal manner?
The Clients Readiness and the Astrologer's Responsibility
An astrologer seeking to interpret a birth-chart as I symbol (or hieroglyph) of the possibility of an individual entering upon the path of radical transformation should evidently be thoroughly grounded in the language of astrology, whose words are planets, signs, and houses and whose syntax is provided by the interplanetary aspects — and (in a sense) whose punctuation is provided by the house cusps. The ordinary astrologer is like a prose writer giving more or less detailed information. The transpersonal astrologer is like a poet evoking the meaning of the whole chart as a symbol of the whole person and his or her potential of transformative unfoldment.
It is obvious that no one can really teach how to write poetry or define the qualifications for being a poet. All that can be taught in school are the rules used in poetry of a particular culture — rules that limit the field of expression but can also deepen this expression by condensing it (as in the Sonnet or the Haiku poetry of Japan).
Condensation implies the rejection of all non-essentials. Likewise, I tend to use only the simplest, most essential "words" in the language of astrology. I pay very little attention to "new discoveries" which do not fill an evident place in the basic structure of the solar system — for example, the few asteroids now often used simply because some astronomer took the trouble to calculate their orbits. Similarly, in the Occult astrology to which H. P. Blavatsky refers in The Secret Doctrine only "sacred planets" are said to be considered, though over a hundred other planets are in existence at one level of physicality or another.
A poet, however, does not usually feel responsible for the feelings his or her poetry may evoke in readers. Yet an author's responsibility can be great. We know historically that the publication of Goethe's Werther led to a number of suicides. The astrologer using a transpersonal approach (and no one has any right to call himself or herself "a transpersonal astrologer") thus incurs a twofold responsibility. On the one hand, he or she deals directly, face-to-face, with a client. Thus there is a person-to-person relationship and responsibility, as in the case of a consultation with a trained psychologist. Therefore, much depends upon what the person of the astrologer emanates to the client. There are a few "born astrologers," but this does not mean being "psychic". It means instead facility in translating the abstract words' of the astrological language into inspiring, evocative, and cohesive meaning, also interpersonal sensitivity or empathy — and openness to "inner guidance."
This last-mentioned quality exemplifies the second aspect of responsibility assumed by the astrologer adopting a transpersonal approach, for as one who advocates treading the path of radical transformation he or she speaks for or represents to the client the promptings of the client's higher being and potentialities for transformation. This responsibility is not merely a "horizontal" one confined to the person-to-person astrologer-client relationship. It is also a "vertical" or transpersonal one in which the astrologer accepts being the "agent" or "mouthpiece" of higher powers urging the client to transform himself or herself, to open the closed center of the mandala of his or her personality to an influx of transcendent power and light. In this sense, the astrologer endeavoring to show the way along the path of radical transformation is indeed a poet, in the broadest sense of the original Greek term: one who acts as a "mover and shaker" of souls.
Let me repeat what I have often stated. Astrology is not a science. Transpersonal astrology is not even actually an "art." It is a means of communication. The good astrologer is able to communicate meanings. These are grounded in what the astrologer sees in a chart and its progressions and transits with his or her analytical mind (his or her knowledge of the language of communication). Such grounding never should take less than a few years of concentrated study not only of the elements of the language of astrology per se, but even more, of well-known people's birth-charts, progressions, and transits in connection with their detailed year-by-year biographies — the only way of intelligently studying the intricacies of actually applying and using astrology.
Assuming that the astrologer has understood, assented to and prepared himself or herself to assume the responsibility of all that is implied in the practice of a transpersonal approach, the actual use of such an approach for a particular client can prove valid, significant, and above all, safe and constructive only if the client already understands to some extent what a basic process of transformation implies, and more or less clearly feels, in the depth of his or her consciousness, the need to deal with long insoluble problems in a new and radical manner. Most of the time, such a feeling comes only after a person has experienced difficult crises and has perhaps been shocked into the realization that a basic change at any cost is imperative — and indeed the only alternative to complete breakdown. Various palliatives or partial solutions have probably been unsuccessfully tried along traditional lines — religious, moral, or psychological. But in our present society, which has lost most of its reliance upon ancient principles of interpersonal relationship and any sense of the "sacred", traditional solutions are often no longer convincing and therefore no longer valid or effective. The individual is then left to his or her own devices, and often seeks help along unconventional lines — perhaps rushing from one weekend seminar to another or from one ashram to the next. These excursions may sooner or later lead to an astrologer. But what does or should the client expect of an astrological "reading"?
If a person comes to an astrologer solely out of intellectual curiosity and simply to find out how much the astrologer will be able to tell concerning past or future events and character-traits, he or she should certainly not come to an astrologer using a transpersonal approach, and the astrologer he or she sees should riot try to use one. It would also be far better if the client did not expect the astrologer to be a substitute father- or mother-figure on whom the whole responsibility for making decisions would be placed in a spirit of psychological dependence — a situation occurring frequently today.
Transpersonal astrology should not be approached with the expectation that it may solve any or all personal problems. It can only help an individual, confused by a situation filled with unknown and knowable factors, transcend these problems by clearly, objectively, and unemotionally understanding where they fit into the larger, transformative pattern of a step-by-step unfoldment of innate, but mostly latent potentiality. A psychologist of the human potential movement might arouse in a long-restrained and static personality the impulse to develop unused capacities and what is so often mistakenly called "creativity" or "spontaneity." But this arousal would, in most instances, have only an emotional or personal foundation. It would usually operate, at best, only at the individual level of consciousness and activity. Nevertheless, this is obviously the highest level at which the immense majority of human beings today can operate. The individual who in his or her distress has tried some of these now-popularized methods may eventually reach an astrologer known to use a transpersonal approach.
A transpersonal interpretation of astrological data is not meant to provide the client with set and precise solutions or recipes for "spiritual living." Its basic function is to evoke possibilities emerging out of a new and more inclusive way of understanding not merely a particular situation or conflict, but the need or opportunity for transformation the situation suggests or underscores. For such an understanding to be effective, the client's present situation or conflict has to be shown to him or her as a particular phase of a process of transformation whose entire span must also be abstractly surveyed, understood, and subjectively assented to by the I-center of the client's personality.
This may mean that as a preliminary step to a transpersonal interpretation, or to the astrologer's assessing its appropriateness, the astrologer and client together might review the major events, circumstances, and inner turning points in the client's life thus far. This can be significantly enlightening for both the client and the astrologer, especially if such a review takes place against the background of the astrological progressions and major transits of the client's life — for as I have said at the close of the last chapter, transpersonal astrology tends to give a greater importance to the process of change and unfoldment of latent potentialities itself, i.e., to what is represented by astrological progressions and transits, than to what may be symbolized in the birth-chart alone.
For the client, such a review may help to reveal the unquestionable inevitability of entering upon the path of radical transformation, for he or she may come to see how the whole of his or her life has been leading to such a decision. For the astrologer, such a review may enable him or her to at least tentatively answer a crucial question: is the individual whose chart is being studied ready, sufficiently eager, and at least moderately able to safely begin or to pursue farther the process of transformation? Asking and at least tentatively answering this question is indeed crucial, for both the client and the astrologer, for the path of radical transformation, once entered upon, cannot be safely trodden backward, unless it be for the temporary purpose of a "strategic retreat" or for testing to learn if one has missed the right turn in a deeply confusing situation.
From such a review the astrologer may indeed be able to determine that the client understands, accepts, and is ready to pursue an interpretation of his or her chart giving a transformative meaning to all the elements of the personality and life-pattern. On the other hand, what may be revealed is an individual still uncertain and confused, one who still needs to pursue goals of social or personal fulfillment. Nevertheless, underlying the client's confusion, apathy, or self-centeredness, the astrologer may perceive an inner strength and soul-directed intuition, which the astrologer can hope to arouse in the client by presenting him or her with a new possibility of existence, a new vision.
Nevertheless, in attempting to assess the client's readiness for a transpersonal interpretation of his or her birth-chart and other astrological data, the astrologer finds himself or herself in a similar position to the one of trying to assess the level at which the client is already operating. He or she must therefore take into consideration all I have said and pointed toward when discussing that problem in Chapter 3, and as well all of the issues I have raised since the opening pages of this chapter.
The fact is that it is extremely difficult for an astrologer to "know" how his or her client will actually react to any kind of interpretation of the astrological factors involved in any situation being discussed. No one can even be absolutely certain at the level of the mind what his or her own responses will be when being made aware of what at first may seem to be an unfamiliar or, astrologically speaking, a dire prospect just ahead, or the need for a crucial decision requiring severance from some familiar situation. A higher-than- mental kind of "knowing" should operate in the astrologer; a sense of inevitability should be experienced by the client, making what we love to call "free choice" actually irrelevant. But such a feeling-experience of inevitability or "no choice" may not come easily to most people relying strongly upon mental processes in which pro-and-con argumentation predominates; or, if such a feeling arises in the consciousness, it may result from the mind having been so thoroughly indoctrinated in a particular approach to life and problem-solving that there can be no doubt about what is the "right" judgment or course of action one may take.
In terms of the everyday practice of astrology, all this may simply mean that the transpersonal astrologer — more than the ordinary astrologer who merely describes a client's character and apparent opportunities, strengths and weaknesses — has to rely upon his or her deepest intuition of what seems possible for the client. Two or more ways of interpreting past experiences in the client's life, or several alternative courses of action and their expectable consequences in relation to present situations may have to be presented by the astrologer as a way of testing from the immediate reaction or facial expression of the client the character or range of what is possible for him or her.
However, when an astrologer (or psychologist) has taken a definite public stand on the most basic questions involved in the function and practice of astrology (or psychology), it is quite likely that mainly persons who, consciously or unconsciously, need what that practitioner has to offer will be attracted to him or her to ask for a consultation. In any case, the astrologer should make his or her position clear at the start, stating to prospective clients what his or her basic approach to astrology and life in general is. Some written statement by the astrologer, which the client is asked to accept, may prove very useful, especially if the legal status of astrology in the place where the consultation is held is doubtful, which is the usual case.
Nevertheless, such a written statement or even a tacit or explicit agreement between the astrologer and the client should not be taken by either party to it as an absolution of responsibility. Anytime a counselor attempts to guide a client — even if he or she simply tries to present the client's problem or situation in a clearer light or from a broader perspective — he or she assumes responsibility. This is a fact which I have consistently stressed during the last forty years, particularly at the beginning of my book, The Practice of Astrology (1) Anyone who reveals to another person a truth, a law, or any kind of knowledge, especially when that person will most likely be unable or unwilling to apply the knowledge in a constructive way or will use it destructively, incurs a perhaps grave responsibility. It may be that in the long run the person may nevertheless benefit from the knowledge or guidance, and that the first adverse reaction was unavoidable and made valuable by the ultimate results; but this does not lessen the responsibility of the teacher or guide.
1) Now free online at the Rudhyar Archival Project.
Accepting responsibility for whatever one says or does in any form of interpersonal relationship is one of the basic prerogatives of being human. Man's destiny — and his burden — is to deliberately induce change in the processes of life and spiritual unfoldment, and he must accept responsibility for the changes. Refusing to change or to help make changes does not excuse one from taking responsibility either, for if an astrologer understands what the transpersonal process implies but refuses to assume that responsibility toward a client in need of transpersonal guidance, the astrologer may still be accountable for his or her "non-action" — perhaps for the loss of the only chance the client had at that time to relate to a higher level of existence.
The only way an individual can in a sense transcend this responsibility is by having truly become an "agent" for a transpersonal purpose and operation. But one can easily make oneself believe that one has actually become such an agent, while in reality what one says or does is entirely or mainly the product of one's personal self — a self which can wear many subtle disguises and whose mind can perform wonders of rationalization!
The Birth-Chart as a Symbol of Individual Karma
A birth-chart calculated for the precise time and place of the first breath of a human organism is the foundation of a transpersonal as well as a person-centered interpretation. It represents what a human organism — which has the possibilities of becoming first a "person", part of an organized community (sociocultural level), then an "individual" emerging as a self-actualizing, autonomous "I", and last, of growing beyond this state of strictly individual selfhood — starts from.
The birth-chart refers to all that conditions the possibility of a human being's growth. But by saying "conditions," I do not mean "determines." Conditioning refers to a base from which one can operate in any direction; the character of this base conditions what one is as one proceeds, but it does not determine what one will do and, still less, think. For instance, the fact of being born as a member of a minority group in a city tenement indicates in social terms what the person starts from, and this "conditions" the nature of the person's experiences in childhood and youth; yet it does not "determine" whether he or she will become a heroin addict or the executive of some important business firm — both possibilities are there. The birth-chart of many an artistic or literary genius is often very similar to that of a psychotic in a mental institution.
Objectively understood, what we see in a birth-chart is the state which the solar system, viewed from the Earth, has reached at a particular moment. This state is a composite of the cyclic motions of all the planets, including the rotating motion of our globe around its axis. This birth-chart is a "snapshot" of an immense continuum of activity in which all the planets, the Sun, Moon, and stars participate. We seem to have arrested that complex motion when we take a picture of it with our "astrological camera", the birth-chart; but, in fact, the cyclic movements keep on going, each according to its own rhythms. The patterns produced by the relationship between any two or three of the moving celestial bodies will keep repeating themselves, as they have in the past. But they interact with other patterns in always new ways, unless we postulate a definitely limited universe.
The birth-chart is thus not a static picture drawn by a cosmic architect imagining fanciful buildings. This is why to speak of a birth-chart as the "blueprint" of personality, while it is a convenient and at a certain level valuable simile (I have used it extensively myself), it is nevertheless not really an accurate statement of fact.
If we focus our attention on the personality of an individual and try to discover what we can expect of it as a whole at a particular time and in order to satisfy a particular interest or purpose, we can assume that it has a somewhat monolithic "character". But in fact a person is not a static entity that can be isolated from the forever moving universe — as for instance a statue. A human being is a small area of space in the midst of the immense wave which is the evolution of mankind. It is an area into which a vast number of ancestral currents of — we may want to assume psychic, mental, and spiritual forces that, when seen in their interrelated state, we call "past incarnations" — converge.
Every human being is the convergence of a multitude of dynamic currents of energy and memories unrecognized, yet latent, and susceptible of being revived. The past of a countless number of atoms, of genetic patterns always seeking to repeat themselves, so great is their inertia, of cultural endeavors, and discoveries that have generated currents of energy as yet unexpanded — and, if one believes in individual reincarnation, of spiritual decisions which created either fulfillment in success or failure: all of this past acts in a new combination at the moment of birth. Every human life is, I repeat, but a brief moment in the total evolution of mankind — a drop of water within an immense wave, rising or breaking. When a baby is born, this evolution does not stop; the planets do not cease revolving around the Sun, nor does the Earth stop rotating around its polar axis. Because all these motions have inertia, every present moment in a dynamic process is founded upon a never-entirely-ended past. But every present moment, because of the same inertia, also contains a future in potentiality.
The realization of this fact has given rise to the concept of causality: every event has causes and will be the cause of future effects. This is also the basis of the Hindu concept of karma, which has become greatly materialized and emotionalized in India as well as in America. As the birth-chart symbolizes what the past of a particular evolutionary strand in the total evolution of mankind has led to, the birth-chart can therefore be considered to represent the karma of the newborn. This newborn is the result of millions of causes which, when considered together constitute his or her karma; and, being dynamic currents of energy, these causes will produce effects. What so many people fail to realize is that we can give different interpretations to the fact that all these currents have converged to form a particular human being.
When interpreted in a materialistic sense, the principle of causality leads to determinism. It has thus been said that if all the causes operating in the past were known, their effects, and even the future effects of these effects acting as causes, could also be totally known. Causality leads to the concept of predetermination. The fallacy of such an idea is that it considers the operation of forces only at one level - the physical level. It is fashionable today to speak of this type of thinking as "linear" thinking. From my point of view, which I expressed in my book, The Planetarization of Consciousness, (2) it concerns itself with only what are called "horizontal" relationships — the relationship between entities operating at the same level of activity and consciousness.
2) Aurora Press; Santa Fe, 1977.
The relationship of a newborn to his ancestors is a horizontal relationship, because it links in a linear sequence entities operating at the same biological level. Similarly, if by reincarnation one means the successive reappearances of the same entity, and one does not take into consideration any other factors except this entity periodically passing from the state of consciousness in a physical body to that of consciousness in a "body" made of non-physical substance, this too refers to the "horizontal" type of relationships between a series of incarnations, each one being the effect of previous causes (karma), and becoming the cause of future lives — i.e., generating new karma.
The situation takes on a different aspect if we use the principle of holarchy as a basis for our interpretation of causality and karma. We then have to consider not only the relationships between entities operating at the same level, but the interaction between greater Whole and lesser wholes-that is, between entities operating at different levels. One can call the latter type of relationship "vertical", though it is actually quite an unfortunate, even if convenient term. This so-called vertical type of relationship is rather one of encompassment: the greater Whole encompasses all the lesser wholes participating in it.
If one understands the implications of this concept, the whole picture of the world-process and of the possibilities inherent in the state of individual existence radically changes. The cause-and-effect principle working in "horizontal" sequences and karmic relationships is not in any way negated, but it is seen to refer to only one type of relationships. The "vertical" type introduces into human existence — and into the operations of all that exists in the universe — a new factor in the light of which many things that have so long appeared mysterious and miraculous can be interpreted in a simple and at least potentially understandable manner. For vertical relationships refer to the direct influence or impact (perhaps the "blessing" or healing power), of a greater Whole upon the lesser whole — thus of Humanity (as the planetary Being), or of some "divine Hierarchy" upon men and women in need of help or inspiration.
This directly applies to the transpersonal interpretation of an astrological birth-chart, because in light of it what is seen in the chart can be given a new meaning. The picture presented by the chart is still understood to represent the starting point of the individual. It depicts the convergence (and indeed focusing) of past cycles of activity into a new human being, thus his or her karma. But it can also have another meaning. It can be seen to represent the meaning and purpose with which the greater Whole, Humanity, has invested this birth — thus the dharma of the new human being.
The Transmutation of Karma into Dharma
The term dharma simply defines what this new human being could do for Humanity of which he or she is a part, what Humanity expects of this individual, and what it will help him or her to do, if help is possible. Considered from the point of view of karma, the new birth is the result of a multitude of past causes and of the inertial power of the energy these causes generated; but from the point of view of dharma, the new birth constitutes a potential answer to a need of he greater Whole, Humanity. It is only, however, a potential answer, for the inertial power of karma may force merely a repetition of old patterns. Such a repetition would be almost inevitable if there were no possibility of the greater Whole deliberately interacting with the lesser whole, the human being. But such an interaction is possible in a focalized and individualized sense only if the human being first opens his or her consciousness to that possibility — which means to the belief in the real "presence" of this encompassing greater Whole, or of what the Christian religion interprets as the presence of God (thus the title of a well-known Medieval manual of devotion, The Practice of the Presence of God. (3)
In other words, a human being can transform karma into dharma if he or she is able to fulfill the purpose with which Humanity invested him or her at birth. The transmutation of karma into dharma is the transpersonal way. Along that way, the inertia of the individual's past is being used to fulfill a need of humanity. As he or she struggles along the transpersonal way, the individual has to repolarize the energies and faculties from his or her past. The individual was born as the convergence of these energies and faculties, but it is possible for him or her to cease acting and thinking as a creature of the past and to become the creator of a future — or rather to become a focusing agent through whom Humanity (or the planetary Being, or God), is able to fulfill a particular and limited purpose. Such a repolarization is truly the essence of the transpersonal process.
The fallacy inherent in the ideal of personality fulfillment is the notion that what is fulfilled is something of the individual himself or herself. What is fulfilled is in fact the flowering of the past. In this sense, many great poets, artists, or thinkers can be considered the flowering of their cultures; and this is truly the ideal one works for at the sociocultural level of consciousness and activity. But the real "genius", while in a sense the product of his or her culture, is nevertheless a flower that contains a mutating seed, a transformative agent. Most often, however, the "genius" is not clearly conscious of being such an agent, because the I-center is still involved in the karmic patterns of the past. Even if there is a conscious realization of being a channel for some superior Power, the interpretation given to this fact may be as confusing as helpful.
The transpersonal way does not particularly deal with individuals belonging to the special category of "genius". It is open to all individuals who, because they inwardly feel, realize, or experience their relationship with a greater Whole (whether they interpret this relationship in religious, metaphysical or occult terms), are able to give a larger frame of reference to the conscious or half-conscious process of repolarizing what in them represents the past into a future that includes far more than their personality. In fact, the past of an individual is not merely the legacy of his or her biological ancestors and the mental-emotional accumulation of all that his or her culture has impressed upon him or her; it is also the unfinished business and failures of past personalities with whom the individual is psychically related and of the societies in which these personalities lived. The popular concept of reincarnation refers at best to only one kind of psychic relationship with personalities of the past, and it does not take into consideration group or national karma.
Astrologically speaking, all this past, however it is interpreted in a psychic or spiritual sense, is seen to be condensed in the birth-chart. More accurately, the birth-chart as a whole symbolizes what part of this immense past is condensed as the karma of the newborn human being — thus what has conditioned the new birth. No particular factor — planet, node, or house — can be especially related to the karma of the person. The entire chart — and in concrete terms, the family and environment (physical, mental, and social) of the newborn — represents his or her karma. This karma can be repolarized and transmuted into dharma, and the function of transpersonal astrology is to help individuals who not only consider such a repolarization possible, but are sincerely willing and seemingly ready (or at least very eager) to take some definite steps along this path of radical transformation.
A transpersonal interpretation of astrological data should first of all assist the individual in realizing how the energies of his or her whole person, the circumstances and major events of his or her life, can be given a new and transformative meaning. The purpose of the transpersonal interpretation is not to describe what the birth-chart may be said to indicate. It is to evoke the possibility of repolarizing what the past had produced into the means required for the performance of the future-oriented dharma, and to evoke this possibility in such a convincing manner that the individual will be stirred into taking active steps toward such a performance.
In order to accomplish this purpose, two procedures have to be used. First, every factor in the birth-chart must be interpreted in the light of the process of transformation, thus of what each can contribute to it. In order to do this so that the client will be able to understand and especially to assimilate and constructively respond to the interpretation (as I have already stated and cannot stress enough), the astrologer has to discover where the client stands in his or her evolution. This can be done to a large extent intuitively as well as by closely observing the behavior, mannerisms, and vocal inflexions of the client, especially when two alternative courses of action or interpretations are presented to him or her. At a strictly astrological level, the other procedure which is required is a careful and complete study of planetary progressions and transits.
These two factors represent the dynamic aspect of astrology, and for this reason they acquire a paramount value in transpersonal astrology; for transpersonal astrology essentially deals with a process, and not merely with a supposedly static entity whose identity is set at birth and outlined by an unchanging birth-chart. While a person-centered type of astrology seeks to discover the character of this identity and to help the fulfillment of the potentialities it reveals, transpersonal astrology deals mainly with the possibility of using whatever the birth-chart indicates to transform the very concept of individual identity by raising the level at which it operates — eventually raising it from the "I" level to that of a transindividual "We". This is the level of conscious and responsible participation in the greater Whole, Humanity, considered as a planetary Being.
Transpersonal astrology deals with a dynamic process. The birth-chart reveals its starting point. The process can be followed by the astrologer as it unfolds day by day, year by year. It can be "tracked" in two ways because it has a twofold character. On one hand, it refers to a particular individual, but on the other, this person does not grow in a vacuum. The process of individual transformation occurs in a universe also in transformation and, more particularly, in a society and community undergoing constant changes. In our century these changes are so rapid, so violent, and so extensive that virtually no one's life can escape their direct or indirect impact.
As a result, astrology in its dynamic aspect uses two different techniques. The technique of progressions (secondary or "solar") refers to the individual aspect of the process of transformation, while the study of transits (particularly those of the planets from Jupiter outwards) deals more specifically with the collective aspect of the change. The qualificative collective, however, should be applied to both the "lower" collectivity constituted by a particular sociocultural environment, and to the "higher" collectivity represented by the greater whole, Humanity, seeking to induce a conscious and open response in the individuals who participate in its planetary existence.
Before proceeding to study these dynamic aspects of astrology, we should first focus on the birth-chart at the transpersonal level.
The Astrology of Transformation
