So, you took up a bus up to Iowa to join a religious cult; work in the kitchen as a bus-boy for free; lived in a pod for two years; got down on your hands and knees twice a day to pray to the Hindu gods; and went inside a golden dome for hours to try and fly; but we are "a bunch of blind men commenting on an elephant." Go figure.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <mjackson74@...> wrote : The discussion here is hilarious as we have a bunch of blind men commenting on the elephant called astrology. :-D That's like saying we all have to get ebola to know its a bad thing. From: "Bhairitu noozguru@... [FairfieldLife]" <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Saturday, February 28, 2015 11:44 AM Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Maybe this is why things get so screwed up? Yes, there are many bad astrologers. I read an article a couple years about by an astrologer who asserted that many beginning astrologers are sometimes better at interpretations than experienced astrologers. Why? Because astrologer because tangled up in the "rules.". Beginners tend to use their intuition as they don't know the "rules" yet. But doing astrology mechanically by the "rules" would be as bad as writing a piece of music based entirely on the rules of music theory and composition. Those rules are "tools" and meant to help you out of a bind when writing a tune. Likewise astrology is a form of "divination" like palmistry. We don't know how it works but it does work in the hands of someone with intuition and the ability to "divine" meaning out of abstraction. In our computer age it is now possible to examine recurring patterns that took place over centuries. One recurring pattern that is being studied shows an 80 year recurring cycle that expresses itself through our global politics. Think what was taking place 80 years ago and compare it with now. This cycle has been shown to go back about 900 years. Predictive astrology is a primitive method of mapping these cycles. In general it is a "weather report" that provides the propensity for events happening. I know Chakrapani and he's also looked at my horoscope in one of his group sessions. Blurted out that I should have been a doctor because of the presence of Jupiter in my first house. Interesting because I have no problem understanding medical and biochemical principles but if I had chosen that field I would have gone the research rather than clinical route. But I have a strong third house ruled by Jupiter which drove me into the arts. I even regard computer programming as an artform and not a science. The discussion here is hilarious as we have a bunch of blind men commenting on the elephant called astrology. :-D On 02/28/2015 05:54 AM, feste37 wrote: That's interesting. I have never consulted one of the MMY-approved jyotishees, and from what I have heard they are not that great. I'm sorry that they didn't do a good job for you. I can assure you that the readings I am referring to did not fit your description of "feeble character analysis." They were detailed and accurate and very useful. I recommend Chakrapani in LA as one of them. At one point he said something to me that was dead-on accurate and I said "I didn't think anyone else knew that about me!" He just laughed. I wonder if the MMY jyotishees are kind of mass produced, so to speak, not people for whom the study of astrology is a lifetime's calling. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> mailto:no_re...@yahoogroups.com wrote : ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> mailto:no_re...@yahoogroups.com wrote : In my experience over the past 35 years, and I have said so on this board more than once, astrology is the best tool for self-understanding that there is—at least, the best I have found. I'm sorry for these scientific types whose minds are so closed. I wonder whether any of them have ever had their natal chart done by a competent astrologer. Well I have. From Marshy's favourite jyotishee apparently. It was rubbish. But then you might say he just wasn't a very competent astrologer. The funny thing was everyone on the course I was attending thought he was great until I started pointing out the obvious shortcomings in what he was telling people. Most of them were being told the same thing and it was all so India-centric, with advice to get jobs as ticket-wallas and such like, that it was embarrassing. But not to the devotees until I opened my mouth, they thought it was great. I wonder what you would have said about his skills? I only went along for the reading because my girlfriend wanted a compatibility chart done. He said we were perfect except for occasional disagreements (wow) and should take care communicating. He told her she would take a journey up a great river and write a book about science. She didn't on both counts. He told me I'd be very wealthy in middle age. Not so far but I don't give much of a toss anyway. I'll let you know if it comes to pass. The rest of it was feeble character analysis such as you would get in any 5 cent gipsy tent at the local fair "You are kind but like to say what you think" etc... See Rorshach for further details. The only time astrology interests me is when they make claims about these periods in life that we supposedly go through. Things people in the TMO say like "I'm in gurmuntha and so can't be expected to be successful just now" this is all checkable and I was disappointed that it didn't match up. It seems more likely that we just cherry pick things from life to say that we agree with the planetary diagnosis and if it doesn't work we can blame our karma. I've heard it all. I would doubt it. Astrology does not get such high marks from me for predicting the future, but that's not what I have used it for. Astrology can tell you a huge amount about who you are. The first reading I ever had was from an American astrologer named Howard Sasportas. He also happened to be a TM teacher. He was absolutely brilliant. I will always be grateful to him for the way he gave me an understanding of myself through astrology. (And as it happens, his predictions for the future were pretty spot on too.) So his predictions of the future were good but you don't think it gets high marks generally? I don't get it, it either is or it isn't good at something. How can it be good for you but not me? I'll tell you, I think it depends rather more on the intuition of the astrologer than it does on any planetary influence - not that there is any - It's just pot luck if something ties up. And it depends what it is, something that's quite likely to happen like getting a new job if you've been looking for one. Out of the blue stuff is impossible to predict but it doesn't stop the TMO claiming that it can. I remember they used to publish a list of predictions for the year but abandoned it after 9/11. I used to keep them and check them at the end of the year, I once asked a "higher-up" how come none of it ever came true and he claimed that our meditation affected world events through the unified field so it was bound to be inaccurate. I further pondered why they didn't just include the revised events as part of the original prediction but that met with a stony look. This is my point, if you accept it you tend not to ask too much of it - certainly not how it might work. If you want to get to the bottom of it you find it all unravels pretty quickly under scrutiny and that's before we get to the actual behaviour of bodies in the solar system and how our knowledge of what they are has changed over the years. I also remember the TMO changed the birthchart requirements for a while so you had to include both your parents and grandparents birth details before they'd attempt a reading because it was too inaccurate otherwise. What sort of sussed, time-tested science has to do things like this? Why are there so many different types that each get a poo-pooing from each other? It was sstill inaccurate BTW and they went back to the old method because there's more money in it. Far from being closed minded I know how to draw up birthcharts - or I used to anyway, probably still got the book somewhere - but I dismissed it almost immediately as it's much more about the intuition of the person reading the chart than it is about planets and stuff. Marshy always said that a computer would make the best astrologer as there would be no misinterpretation of physical principles. But he came out with more crap per day than most of us manage in a lifetime, but it was cool sounding crap so he got away with it because no one ever asked difficult questions. The guy you saw was probably sincere, the guy on the TMO course was too but he was crap and didn't know enough about western lifestyles to be able to give us enough soft soap to make us think he was getting some profound insight via existential means. But that doesn't mean astrology doesn't tell us something about ourselves at all, I think it's fascinating that the positions of planets - the word means "little wanderer" - could ever have been a contributing factor in human life. I find it even more fascinating that people still believe it considering what we know about what they really are and where we really are. To hold onto that ancient belief of connection between lights in the sky that move in a different way to the other lights in the sky is actually kinda sweet. I think we are pattern making creatures that look out for connections between unrelated events - star movements, sheep entrails, where the cow decides to sleep - and assume a link that doesn't exist so that next time one event happens we assume the other will too. Astrology is as human as it comes really but, like all attempts at soothsaying, it's a thought error due to some superstitious and insecure need for certainty or to know that what happens in life isn't our fault but part of some great cosmic dance of the planets. Or even that we can change it with a prayer or some good deeds if we know it's coming. I suspect that the overriding principle of the universe is really a process called "Shit Happens" but I convert for evidence. As for the sceptics, I am reminded of the remark attributed to Isaac Newton when the astronomer Halley tweaked him about his belief in astrology. "Sir, I have studied it; you have not." Make of it what you will: Isaac Newton and Astrology Isaac Newton and Astrology View on www.staff.science.uu.nl Preview by Yahoo
