Emotional Vibes

 

August 11, 2006 (with chart)

 

http://cainer.com/ericfrancis/aug11.html

 

Dear Eric,

 

First I would like to thank your for your website; for taking the time and energy to connect on the level you do with the world around. You have inspired me many times to cultivate emotional and social courage.

 

My question for you is: Why do I still have emotional barriers with myself, my world and my intimate relationship? I have been in therapy on and off for years, and have always seen myself as a work in progress. I try to cultivate patience and acceptance in myself but somehow I am still unable to receive the peace and love I feel is available to me and that I want. I have many times seen how wonderfully my life blooms when my heart is open but this is, sadly and often frustratingly, not often the case. What gives? I know there are a few funky relationships with my Moon and outer planets that make me a bit screwier but, aren't we all somehow? Or am I about to break into a new plane of consciousness? I feel this is holding me back from great love in my intimate relationship, great progress in my philanthropic work and peace and healing in my heart.

 

Amy

 

 

Dear Amy:

 

I've gone over your chart carefully for a couple of weeks. We've corresponded a bit. I'm going to take a layered approach to this question, and use today's response to open the discussion.

 

It's worth noting that you are asking me a question that essentially relates to your own personal introspection. I can see things in the chart, but the question 'why' something exists within your deepest emotional reality, and what to do about it, are personal matters that only you can work out. Others can give feedback and propose ideas, but the answer comes from you.

 

I want to point out a couple of things about your question itself. One is that you tend to speak in generalities rather than specifics -- in other words, "emotional barriers" rather than the emotions involved. That's different than saying "I can't say what I feel to my loved ones," or "I don't know what I feel," for example. It would help if we had some tangible examples of what you feel you're up against; it's always easier to work out something if we know what it is -- rather than what it's not.

 

You write: "I have been in therapy on and off for years, and have always seen myself as a work in progress. I try to cultivate patience and acceptance in myself but somehow I am still unable to receive the peace and love I feel is available to me and that I want."

 

It would be helpful to have a description of this. You speak in positive terms, but you seem to be describing something painful or negative.

 

One of the things I can see in your chart is that doing just this kind of thing -- being specific about what you feel going on inside yourself -- would be very helpful to you. That is me interpreting your chart.

 

You have two rather remarkable aspects. One is an exact square from the Moon to a conjunction of Neptune and Jupiter. Can everyone see that? The Moon is the gray crescent on the left side; it has two zeros next to it. Neptune and Jupiter are at the bottom of the chart, and they each have two zeros next to them. Because the Moon moves so fast, it's remarkable to have this aspect so precise.

 

Squares are generally experienced as internal dynamics. Generally we go from one side to the other till we do what is called integrate the square. So if I may, let me use your chart to be introspective for you, in cartoon version.

 

That Virgo Moon wants to do things right, and in the first house, there is an image of a 'perfect self'. It wants things to be accounted for. Along the lines of perfection, it's perfectly square Jupiter and Neptune, in your 4th house of what you feel. Looking at your chart, I'm asking myself: how would I feel if I had Jupiter and Neptune in the 4th house? In Sagittarius?

 

My answer: I would feel a lot... of something... but I might not know what it is. And it might not match my idea of perfection. But I would want it to. And it would be a very high standard, as there is something Perfectly Spiritual about Jupiter conjunct Neptune in the very first degree of Sagittarius. And there is something Perfectly Spiritual about that perfect square, from the 1st to 4th houses.

 

I am not suggesting you lower your standards. I am suggesting that you know exactly what you mean when you say something. Mercury is also there in Virgo, close to the Moon. This will tend to co-mingle your ideas and your needs, which would be great to keep sorted out. Ideas, one thing. Needs, another thing.

 

Mercury is square Neptune and Jupiter. Again, the need for not only precision in what you wish to say to yourself, but also honesty with yourself. The block represented by these squares from Moon to Jupiter/Neptune are basically invisible; they represent a kind of internal blind spot.

 

Now let's add one last factor: Saturn in Gemini opposite Neptune and Jupiter in Sagittarius, square the Moon. That is likely to feel like a block, from many directions. In essence, it's the opposite of that light, extremely idealistic feeling of Jupiter/Neptune.

 

Now let's add one last factor. Saturn opposing Jupiter can crate a sense of 'living two lives'. I would say the same holds true for Saturn opposing Neptune. Saturn in Gemini itself has a 'two lives' feeling (Gemini as twins) and so one message I get from your chart is that you are very often of two minds on many things -- and the way you avoid the conflict is to not enumerate exactly that which is contrary within you.

 

Please do respond with feedback if any of these comments inspire a response. Thanks for writing!

 

ERIC FRANCIS