The sexual houses. Chart by Eric and Sarah, in the Book of Blue studio.

The colored houses in the wheel are the ones that address sexuality directly. That would be about half the houses. For those new to the astrological system, a house is a basic division of the chart. The houses started with the signs, then became a wheel imposed on top of the signs; so that the two wheels make a unique pattern in each chart, and most houses comprise of part of at least two signs.

That aside, the houses have a certain philosophy that accompanies them; how do we divide up the subject matter of life? How do we think of the meaning of each house?

Part of the answer involves how far back the astrologer’s understanding of the houses goes. There are traditions involved in assigning subject matter to houses. In this article, I am assembling everything that I’ve learned both from reading and from working with many, many clients on actual questions. Here is a prior summary of the houses, not designed to answer the question of which houses address sexual subject matter. That page needs an update; the page you’re reading may be it.

It would be easy to find meaningful sexual themes in all the other houses, not colored in. Let’s start with them: the “non-sexual houses.”

I have left out the 1st house. The 1st is a crucial house of sexuality because it’s about identity — we all identify with our sex, our gender and our sexual identity group. Remember Hannah, the Book of Blue model who said, “It’s not about sex, it’s about self“? Wisdom from the mouth of a babe.

Sex and self are closely related. When you say, ‘I am a lesbian’ or ‘I am monogamous’, that is core 1st house material: how you experience yourself, describe yourself and the face you put on. One could write a whole book chapter called ‘Sexual Identity and the 1st House of Astrology’, and people would even read it. The 1st represents the self that does the sexing; the identity that is attractive to others or not; the presence in the world that exists and is noticed or alternately feels invisible and ignored.

We could include the 3rd house because so much of sex and relating involves language and ideas, from talking dirty to love notes to pillow books. Here in the BlackBerry Age, the 3rd is all those communication devices that have become sex toys, from video cameras to the digital keyboard we send those hot, pervy notes with. The 3rd is also the neighbors we flirt with; the roommate (or sibling) we play with. We could include the 4th house because one’s whole sexual reality is balanced on one’s level of security and grounding. So the business of the 4th house is strongly influential in one’s relational and sexual reality.

The 9th house isn’t about sex but it’s about either: religion, which impresses its sexual values onto people like nobody’s business (and for many, co-opts the whole issue); or spirituality/higher self, which is about sex because we have the theme of full integration of the psyche and the honoring of sexuality as a sacred ritual. In the Thema Mundi (the ancient chart of the world — a key teaching example from Hermetic astrology), Pisces is in the 9th house. Pisces is the cosmic source, the most watery water sign, the sign that embraces all, contains every trace element, swallows all differentiation, and provides a great deal in the way of direct knowledge and nourishment: and much that seems like mist and taken for granted rainwater. Pisces to human consciousness represents the headwaters of creation; the mouth of the river of creation; the River of Night and the ocean on which creation floats, and into which it will someday dissolve. That sounds like it could include sex.

The 10th house is the power house, and we all know that the more power and visibility you have, the more people are interested in you. So the 10th is full of sexual dynamics and if an astrologer is doing the chart of a successful or planning-to-be-successful person well, a check-over of those dynamics is vital.

The 11th house is about social groups: who we meet and where we meet them. The 11th would cover themes such as polyamory, because it’s a group activity in many different ways (poly people tend to create group environments in which to get together, their relationships are group environments, and they have different norms within their social groups — an 11th house theme).

But let’s skip that kind of house where a sexuality is implied or exists by extension, and initially cover the houses that specifically address material of a sexual or erotic nature, starting with the 2nd house and going in order.

Eric Francis is now offering online astrology readings as part of Cosmic Confidential, the 2010 annual edition of Planet Waves. Check this link for more information.

The 2nd house addresses masturbation, as the house of self-value and self-relating. It is the resources we have that come from ourselves. You might call it the sexual/erotic/amorous bank account. It is the house of “you can only love others as much as you love yourself” and by extension, “your sexual relationship to yourself is the basis of your sexual relationship to others.” Contrast this with the 8th house in a little while. When you apply the Thema Mundi (the ancient chart of the world) this house is associated with Leo and the Sun, which act like a giant battery of resources that we access if we know where to start.

The 5th house is the house of play, pleasure, child-like fun, curiosity and risks. The 5th includes art and artists, and we know that these are among the most sexually interested and interesting creatures; we know how much art involves sexual, erotic or relational themes. For many astrologers, this is THE house of sex; just consider the themes. The ‘child like fun’ also includes children and the activities which lead to their existence. If you apply the Thema Mundi, you find out that this is the house that has Scorpio involved, which is the sign of the genitals, of sexual bonding and of deep surrender. So the superficial appeal of the 5th — fun, risks and pleasure — lead deeper, into the more emotional, karmic region of Scorpio. Isabel Hickey called the 5th the house of esoteric karma. She does not say what she means (and it sounds like she got this from a writer named Alice Bailey, but I cannot find it), but if you study the 5th, that is, if you watch what happens with 5th house events, placements and transits, you figure it out. There is that “other layer” that became evident when Project Hindsight unearthed the Thema Mundi.

The 6th house is the house of healing, service and wellbeing: bienestar. Most astrologers would not say this is a house of sexual or relational themes, unless they have a holistic orientation. First, a healthy sexuality and sex life are key elements in whether one is mentally and physically healthy. Looked at another way, much of the world is walking around with unaddressed sexual injury. Consequently, all healers (6th house role) are working with their clients on those injuries whether they know it or not. All healers, be they massage therapists, astrologers, psychologists or doctors, have to work out a system of sexual boundaries with their clientele and the 6th is the environment in which this is done. Then there are those who work specifically as sexual healers; there are more than you think. Some are working ‘undercover’ as nurses who lock the door and help out someone laying in traction; others are working as erotic massage practitioners. These are people offering sex in service. Anyone who is a conscious lover offers sex in service, and as a gesture of healing and self-integration (again, whether ‘consciously’ or not). The 6th is also the house that covers one’s workplace, and we all know how much sexual energy flies around the office; how many affairs; how many relationships start in the office.

The 7th house is the one that covers lovers and open enemies (the ancients either had a sinister sense of humor or were highly perceptive, or both). The 7th is where we engage with The Other directly, be it lover, spouse, boyfriend, girlfriend or mistress. The 7th speaks of the inherently polarized nature of relationships, and of sexual relationships in particular. It’s interesting that the 7th covers open enemies: how many of those does sex make?

The 8th house in the words of my astrology mentor David Arner is the sex you want. It’s also the sex you want specifically from others, so carries themes such as jealousy and possessiveness. From the earliest English characterization, it’s the house of death, dowry and the substance of the bride. In more modern terms it’s the house of other people’s resources, which would count for their sex, sexual organs, reproductive capacity, genetic material, genetic lineage/heritage and all matters of legacy that connect with sex (such as your father in law). The sexual psychology of the 8th is the fascinating stuff we usually glaze over. The 8th contains our concept of surrender; what prompts, or induces, or leads, or pushes us into surrender. We tend to keep this secret. It would be interesting to peer into your mind in those last 10 seconds before orgasm and see what, ultimately, allows you to let go. I think that is the 8th house at its most beautiful psychic depth. In some respects the 8th is the power game we play with ourselves (by granting or denying that thing that helps us let go); and at other times it is the leverage we use against others to concentrate power, or try to; but of course there is that point of frustration — dualism. Nothing that we do to others, are we free from. The 8th is also the house that covers specifically where money is exchanged for sex, so all matters of prostitution would be covered by the 8th, even if they have other themes covered by other houses.

The 12th house in Vedic astrology is the pleasures of the bed. In Western astrology it represents the fantasy life and has a close correspondence to both solo sex and partner sex, which can be equally driven by fantasy. It often represents the disowned material which we project onto others. See all those houses on the right side of the chart? They are called the zone of projection (a term that came to me through the Canadian astrologer Ani Black). Most of the houses of relationship and sexuality are covered in the zone of projection and the 12th is like this hidden projection booth from where the light shines. Once we call back the projection and enter the 12th consciously, all the rules change; indeed, they are all suspended, and we are free within the containment of our own minds. Yet if those minds reach out to one another, the 12th may be the most significant meeting place; call it the astral plane, call it the collective unconscious; call it what you will. It is the house where we are all equal before the power of creation.

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

Our two grandest social taboos, or perhaps the one — the taboo against having enough of what you need — hadn’t so much shattered, but rather had evaporated. Sure, life was dangerous, with an assortment of evil forces trying to get their hands on Smith, and with the public bubbling like a cauldron with the shock of extraterrestrial contact: but life was really exciting. There were more important things to do than worry.

In this moment, the idea of polyamory was born, or perhaps reincarnated, or perhaps imported from Mars. Smith’s circle of friends were beyond “in love” and beyond being comrades, bonded by something much deeper. Among them, erotic sharing was natural and easy. They were called water brothers. These brothers included several intelligent, beautiful women with highly-trained and very open minds. The main sacrament of the religion which spontaneously emerged around Smith was sharing water from the same glass.

In actual history, a worldwide polyamory movement has grown up largely inspired and informed by Stranger in a Strange Land. Polyamory (meaning many loves, or honest, responsible nonmonogamy) is something of an official social phenomenon these days, with the word destined for dictionaries before long. Polyamory as a way of life has gotten the blessing of Americana in Time, the Los Angeles Times and many other media, and it all comes back to a Martian who believed in sharing what he had.

As for the money part, since Valentine Michael Smith had unwittingly ended up a worldwide cult figure and (as the technical owner of Mars) the richest man on Earth, there was cash a-plenty, with big baskets of it at the doors to his temple in case you needed any on the way out. Of course, just because you have money doesn’t make you generous. Usually it has the opposite effect. We forget that the root of miserable is miser, which means a penny-pincher; such people, while having lots of cash somewhere, are not often content, or successful in love, because love is about sharing who you are and what you have. It’s clear enough that the man from Mars pretty much just wanted to be happy.

One last thing: Martian custom held that when your friend died, you didn’t grieve madly, but rather, you celebrated the person’s life, and made a big pot of soup of which they were the main ingredient. You would Grok them. They would become part of you.

When people speak in whispers, they are usually talking about sex, money or death. Sex and money always seem in greater demand than supply allows, and death seems to place a finite value on time. Needing cash, sex and time in order to live a little, we are under a lot of pressure, and it shows. We are, for the most part, extremely uptight about all of these “issues,” as we term them in current parlance. They are rarely discussed openly, or calmly, and are the subject of many lies and secrets.

And they are rarely seen as being connected. The easiest way to get sex is to pay cash or to lie. The easiest things to lie about are sex and money. Most of the world’s control dramas surround sex, money or death, including a variety of violent, jealous scenes that demonstrate, sadly, that we are far from the ideas of Martian culture.

Most love affairs go up in the flames of disputes about property, money or sex. Jealousy, secret love affairs that are exposed, and issues over values and shared property are tried in divorce courts every day of the year. “Trust,” a word with definitions that reach deeply into finances and relationships, is a very difficult thing for many people to get a grasp on. Death, rather than being understood as moving on to one’s next stage of growth, can be a Sword of Damocles hanging over love, threatening to end it at any moment.

Can we even imagine a world where sex is a natural part of friendship, where we have no need to keep secrets, and where we have enough of what we need, not just to survive, but to live fully? Can we imagine gaining without others losing in the deal? Can we imagine a world where we are not terrorized by the idea of death? Can we imagine a world where we can trust?

Most people feel trapped in an untrusting world where fear and particularly fear of scarcity and death dominate awareness, where resources are in fact scarce, and where it’s either sinful or a struggle to touch another person.

An Astrological Connection

Sex, money and death have a lot in common, but nowhere so much as in astrology. Astrology, as well as being a divination tool, is also an ancient philosophical system. It is a way of organizing reality.

In that organizational system, there are 12 categories, or houses. Every thing, subject, action or purpose fits into one of the 12 houses. An astrologer uses the houses and their contents (i.e., planets) to read the chart, and to figure out who is who and what is what, but we can use the houses to look at how a very old thought-system has documented the structure and nature of society. It turns out that we can really fit everything into one of the 12 houses, and that this system works rather well to help us get a grasp on who we are — though it leads to some interesting groupings of themes.

And few houses are so interesting as the 8th. The 8th house of a chart is where astrologers look if they want to find information about a) the nature and cause of death, b) sex and orgasm, and c) big money, investments, corporate finances, contracts, taxes, and inheritances. From this we get the meta-themes of power and surrender. Most astrologers, given the propensity for people and institutions to lie and keep secrets about all of this, also presume the 8th house is a high-security zone, a kind of dimension of the occult, so it includes conspiracies and cabals like corporations that lie to us and try to run our lives.

Sex, death, money, power, control, surrender… and jealousy… and secrecy. All of these issues live in the same place — a crowded house, in the words of my friend Maria — and they have a lot in common.

One amazing example of an 8th house institution is Monsanto. We may be familiar with Monsanto from its efforts to take over the world with genetic engineering, including the creation of BGH, or bovine growth hormone; other people are familiar with their Agent Orange defoliant, which poisoned millions during the Vietnam era. Monsanto is a corporation that uses the resources of investors to create chemicals which, acting as artificial hormones (including PCBs, dioxins, pesticides and many others, all of which are “xenoestrogens,” or synthetic, hormonally active chemicals that mimic estrogen in the body), do sexual damage and cause sexual cancers which kill many people, all to make vast sums of money for the shareholders, in the process of which they keep warehouses full of secrets, which they guard jealousy and use to control our lives. Monsanto is the living incarnation of the dark side of the 8th house. Sex, death, money, power, control, surrender… and jealousy… and secrecy. They got it all.

Is this grouping of themes in the 8th house a coincidence, or is it a glaringly accurate picture of our culture that predicted the possibility of something like Monsanto centuries ago?

Whenever we face an inevitability, it seems to be an 8th house theme — you know, “death and taxes.” It seems that everything in life pivots on issue or limitation that we find in the 8th house (“money makes the world go round, the world go round, the world go round…”) Perhaps if we understood why these themes ended up in one place, we could do something about how messed up we (as a culture, and often as individuals) are.

So, I went looking for the answer. Researching back to the earliest astrology textbook published in English, Christian Astrology by William Lilly, published in 1647, I found that the original questions belonging to the 8th house include “death, dowry and the substance of the bride.”

The bride’s “substance” is not about the size of her breasts, but rather how much money she has in her chest, which is conveyed from her father to her new husband to help ensure her care. The death connection to the 8th house is closely associated with the conveyance of an estate (very similar to a dowry), featuring issues like whether a son will inherit a father’s wealth. The sex aspect comes directly from the matter of dowry, which is money paid as part of a contract when a woman changes hands, from father to husband, in marriage, not till death do they part. This involves control. In such a process, the most coveted sexual aspect of a woman, her womb, her reproductive abilities, are conveyed in a contractual deal. (The 8th house is also where we look for information about contracts.)

So by looking at the 8th house, we get a CAT-scan of society; we can see inside a bunch of connections that everyone would prefer not to talk about. [NOTE: If you want some background on the 8th house here are two of my articles on the subject: Connubial Contemplation and Beyond Death and Dowry.]

There is an interesting marriage-death connection in the history of law. Note that marriage, before women kept their names, property and some of their rights (as some do today), is a form of civil death; that is, upon being wed, Miss Lucy McGillicuddy, for example, becomes Mrs. Ricky Riccardo. Her original identity ceases to exist as she appeared in her high school yearbook, and she can be subsumed by a man. Until recently, a wife was as dead-and-gone as her husband wanted to make her, and in some states and many nations, she was or still is his ward, charge and chattel property. Even today, divorce can be an extremely tricky procedure when a woman wants to extract herself from a man’s life and reclaim her identity, and many women remain in miserable marriages just to keep the roof over their head or because it’s too hard to get out.

A Biological Connection

We might think that these subjects fall together as a result of social science or philosophy, but there is a sex-death connection in biology as well. According to UCLA immunologist William R. Clark, in his 1996 book Sex and the Origins of Death, in order to have the many benefits of sexual reproduction (such as reproductive diversity), animals that reproduce sexually must eventually die. Each cell — with the exception of sperm and egg cells — is genetically programmed to end its life; in this way, the whole organism eventually dies. So in sexually-reproducing animals, death is a necessity — but it’s also the form that immortality takes in this world, as we pass our genetic code down the generations.

It was, says Clark, at the time sexual reproduction entered the genetic coding that this programmed cell death emerged as well. So if we seek mysticism or immortality in sex, this makes it fairly clear why.

Perhaps most interesting, Clark writes that it’s when humans become sexually mature in their early teens that the process of programmed cell death begins on an individual level. So, in our genetic legacy, we carry a deep memory that sex and death have one cause and one effect. In our individual memory, we have the experience of programmed death beginning just as we are reaching sexual maturity.

I offer you this summary of all the sexual, financial, morbid and cabalistic overtones of this dimension. The 8th house is essentially the house of the secrets of birth, life and death. It is the house of the secrets of existence. It is the place where humanity is God/Goddess, and in so being, creates and extends humanity in His or Her image, and where we give up our individual being and identity and return to the source. Out of fear, or perhaps just because we could, we have put a commodity value on the process; we have put a price on life and death. We buy and sell life and death, manipulate them, and in the process, make the most numinous, mysterious gifts we have into something with (often a merely) cash value over which wars can be fought.

And wars are indeed fought, over Kuwaiti oil and over electric bills in house-shares. There are impeachments about secret blow jobs and lives are bought and sold in corporate takeovers by companies in the business of death. All of us, to some extent, fight to find our true identity as we work for The Man, struggling to extract ourselves from having been subsumed by corporate culture and insane values that are absolutely not our own. This is a struggle for life. We struggle to be our own property in relationships, to have our own opinions, to exist as who we really are.

It would appear that the 8th house, a term with which very few people are familiar, is where we are lost when we are struggling with jealousy and financial issues. And perhaps, if we follow the map of astrology, we will see that these crises are a masquerade for the fear of death, which we view as the ultimate scarcity or limitation. You could say that all our efforts to have spiritual consciousness are efforts to be free from death and free to love. We seek to free ourselves from the limitations of the 8th house, and do something that is very much in the theme of this region: to transform ourselves.

The birth-death-rebirth pattern works psychologically here, and it is by going headling into 8th house issues that we transform ourselves (as the big beach ball in the Wet Spot says, Sex Changes Everything).

We want to be free to create our own lives, love whom we choose, have possession of our own talents and be free from the bondage of others. Yet so often we feel trapped. Often we are trapped in our luxury prisons, wearing golden handcuffs.

The Key

There is a way out, or at least the map points to one. Astrology organizes reality in a system of opposites, or polarities. There is a house opposite the 8th, which is the 2nd. In Lilly’s term, this is the house of riches: of one’s own possessions. Its questions surround whether one will attain wealth and keep it, whether a person will acquire the wages that are due to her, and what might get in the way of doing so.

In modern terms, this is the house of self-value and the awareness, and conscious possession of, one’s own values. This is a mysterious concept for many people. We are so encumbered in the values of other people (an 8th house effect) that we rarely feel or state our own values. Worse, we confuse our values with those of other people. We don’t know when we’re not really espousing this incredible desire for a Big Mac but rather had it planted in our head 4,543 times till we submitted and handed over our cash.

In food terms, conversely, the 2nd house is nurturing yourself with the food you like.

In sexual terms, it is the house of sex with oneself, selflove and masturbation. (The 8th is about sex with othes.) Betty Dodson, the mother of masturbation, has pointed out, and many of her readers have confirmed, that there is a direct connection between the depth and intimacy of one’s masturbation and the overall freedom and quality of life that we feel and have. Often, learning selflove and selfpleasure in the midst of an oppressive relationship is the key that turns the lock on being oneself. If we can live and be ourselves shamelessly, this has a way of protecting us from power struggles with others, and from getting lost in their values.

We would quickly notice whether we are involved in some kind of sex-for-money or sex-for-security trade-off if we became able to meet our own sexual needs a little better. Just like having sex with others involves us in their values, having sex with ourselves involves us in our own. We can notice that we have needs, and start doing things about them. In meeting one’s own needs, we both take a step out of the control games, and find that we have a lot more to share with truly receptive people.

And we may become very interested in finding a way out of the games. Power struggles, it turns out, become very unappealing when we’re actually in our power; they are a sign of weakness, and they are boring. If we are battling or fearful about money, it’s clear that we are not in touch with the more creative dimensions of ourselves, even though it’s that very creative power that would help us create the money we need to live.

When we are strong in our own values, then we have options, we see those options, and we’re not afraid to explore them.

But in the end, as I see it, every meaningful question comes down to one core value, which you could state several different ways: What do we love more, people or money? In what do we invest more faith, life or death? In whom do we believe more strongly, ourselves, or others?

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

John Cleese Natal Chart

But he also has Uranus in the aspect structure, giving a think-on-your-feet quality of inventiveness; which in this case combines with the assertive, competitive vibe: the mishap. Adding Uranus gives you the archetype of the trickster and the Prankster. Steve Martin, Woody Allen, Peter Sellers all have a Mars-Uranus aspect in the mix.

Cleese also has Sun-Saturn in opposition — the ability to never break irony; the ultimate straight-man. Sun-Saturn is pretty much the opposite of the Mercury-Mars-Uranus setup: deadpan, negative, constrained, contained.

He tends to begin his routines with a negative: “No it’s not,” “Your time is up,” and so on: a limit of some kind. He’s just shown us the Argument Clinic sketch from Monty Python.

Skipping ahead a few years, we got to see the Sex Education sketch from The Meaning of Life, the last Monty Python film. Note the incredible sexual tension of the Venus-Mars square, from Scorpio to Aquarius. In so many ways this chart is bursting with sexual energy — look at that 8th house! Imagine that much Aries in the 8th, with its feeling of being driven to find one’s identity in the midst of merging with others and uncompromising libidinal energy: SELF.

Check these clips out — and I’ll be back in a moment with a comment about Cleese’s minor planets, which touch on this point several ways.

Eric Francis is now offering online astrology readings as part of Cosmic Confidential, the 2010 annual edition of Planet Waves. Check this link for more information.

Okay. Rick does not use the minor planets. He’s not against them — if they’re “burnished in your soul,” as he puts it; but they’re not part of his work. He also avoids use of the signs and sticks to the planets. It’s an interesting method (avoiding the signs) but you get used to it. Now — there are two minor planets that blaze out of this chart. One is the Moon square Chiron, from Aries to Cancer. There is a sense of a hurt child underneath this aspect, and that looks to me like the emotional engine driving his intensity. He is able to focus his sense of alienation into something that others can relate to and laugh at. I would say if you like the “wounded healer” concept of Chiron, this is a good example.

Yet the healer part is not a given; the emotional quality will work as a healing energy only if the person who has the aspect is aware of the energy and takes responsibility for it; which in this case would mean putting it to use. (This aspect is echoed in a nearly exact Sun-Nessus opposition, and for Vesta fans, notice Vesta-Nessus conjunct.)

One of the ways he covers the hurt kid is by putting the parent archetype — Sun-Saturn — out there first; and then you get the rebellion of the Mercury-Mars-Uranus. Underneath it all, the troubled soul piece of the equation is Sun-Nessus. The expression aspect of this comes from the Sun; Nessus is what is being expressed from deep underneath. We will tend to express the most boldly that which is aspecting our Sun.

Second minor planet aspect is Jupiter-Eris in Aries, on the Aries Point. I don’t know what to make of this (I have a feeling Len will crack this riddle) but it has some involvement with how famous he is, because the Aries Point is all about fame. Eris describes a chaos factor in the psyche; the sense of not knowing who you are, and the sometimes mad attempt to find out. There is a bit of Everyman in the Aries Point connection.

We have the wisdom attribute of Jupiter; and the chaos of Eris. There is power in that eternal search for “wisdom” which is really the search for self.

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

Eric Francis is now offering online astrology readings as part of Cosmic Confidential, the 2010 annual edition of Planet Waves. Check this link for more information.

Note to Readers: This article doesn’t mention astrology, but it’s really about Mars retrograde in Leo, opposite lots going on in Aquarius.

The other day, an email came floating into my inbox from a website called Care2, a green-styled corporate site purportedly dedicated to saving the world, claiming 12.5 million subscribers. The subject header of the email read, “Monogamy vs. Polyamory: Do Open Relationships Work?”

Naturally, I thought: this ought to be interesting.

The writer gave her analysis a title like a boxing match or a legal case. Mono versus Poly is now in session! All Rise! The article commenced as such (literally, its first words): “Non-monogamy is about one thing — sex. And sex is good.”

(You can tell she learned her writing style from The Bible.)

It went downhill from there, fast. Faster than I thought possible without jet propulsion and a lot of lube. “And sex with different people — either concurrently or over the course of a lifetime — is good too. Sex is so good that some people are addicted to it. Sex makes people do crazy things and it makes people feel amazing things. I love it just as much as anyone else, but there is more to life than sex.”

When you see the word ‘but’ you can usually tell how things are going to go. Her premise is that since polyamory is about sex, and since sex isn’t everything, polyamory is nothing special to concern oneself with. The author, whose name is Polly, continues: “I am pretty sure that the words on your deathbed won’t be, ‘I wish I had had more sex with more people’. Maybe if you’re a pervert, or if you didn’t get much action in your life, you would say that, but most people wouldn’t.”

I will spare you any more. This article, while one of the less eloquent and less favorable recent mainstream reviews of polyamory, shares one thing in common with every other article on the topic that I’ve ever seen in the mainstream media: it sets polyamory and monogamy against one another as irreconcilable opposites.

While the author is less tactful about her prejudices, she does us the favor of expressing them overtly: for example, there is in many discussions the lurking suspicion that people who don’t claim orthodox monogamy are perverts, but the word is rarely used. Or they don’t really like relationships, and can’t handle intimacy; they just want to get laid. Facing these prejudices repeatedly is enough to push nearly anyone who tries to be openly polyamorous back into the closet.

Yet I wonder what the real issue is. Studies done over the years on the incidence of cheating reveal that 45% to 65% of women and 55% to 80% of men stray outside monogamous commitments. The variance is because some studies ask whether people have ever cheated while in a monogamous agreement; some ask whether they have cheated in their current relationship. Other studies show that women tend to understate their sexual conquests, and men tend to exaggerate.

In any event, we’re talking about a large portion of the population whose definition of monogamy has at one time included, and possibly includes today, sex with more than one person. For a fast check, ask yourself: do you know anyone who hasn’t been through this at least once? How about three times? How about five?

Notably, the accepted definition of monogamy has changed in recent decades from one partner for life (now considered archaic), to one partner at a time, as often as you feel like moving on. That’s a big difference. The revised term is ’serial monogamy’, but I prefer to think of it as serial polyamory: we tend to have multiple partners, one at a time (that is, while we’re not having multiple partners, several at a time).

By any realistic description, monogamy is sounding a lot like polyamory. Those who are proponents of monogamy at all costs, who advance the cause of abstinence only until heterosexual marriage for life, sound like they are in reaction to the observable data, which basically proves that most people are simply not that way; that, and in reaction to their own feelings. True, there are some who choose a mate for life. For some this actually works and for some it creates misery. In any event, we only know their story up until today. We don’t know about tomorrow.

No matter how we experience relationships, I would propose that there are more similarities between what we call monogamy and what we call polyamory. For one thing, they both involve modes of relationship. No matter what the outward style, relationships boil down to a one-to-one meeting between two individuals. Those meetings are set within a larger community context with many complex interrelations: a community. That community either supports the relationship or it weakens the relationship. The relationship either offers something back to society, or it does not. Who has sex with whom seems to be incidental — except for one thing, jealousy. I won’t say much about jealousy in this article, except I would state up front that if one issue is choking off the potential of the human race, that’s the one.

From Self to Self: The Inner Origin of Relationships

But let’s go back to the back to the egg. One must be a self to have a relationship with someone else. Being a self implies an inner awareness of existence, which is a relationship to existence that is in truth a relationship to self. The quality of this core relationship determines nearly everything that follows. No matter what kind of external relationships you engage in, your primary relationship is to you.

How do you feel about your existence? Do you love yourself, judge yourself, hate yourself, struggle to ‘be yourself’? What threatens you and what makes you happy? To what extent to you take ownership of your life? What threatens or enhances your sense of existence? How do you relate to death?

And, a kind of operative question that results from all of these: why do you want to be in relationship to other people? What is your motive? Is it to share pleasure, learning, and food? Is it to share work and a mission? Is it to share misery? Is the purpose to seek completion in another, or to explore your wholeness with another? Is the purpose to protect you from something or to celebrate and explore a sense of safety? Do you seek love or attachment?

These themes appear to be mediated by one’s relationship to oneself. Each individual brings an agenda into the pairing, and that agenda is internally mediated. In other words, you decide and express your agenda based on your relationship to yourself. Notably, this is the relationship that we seem to lose sight of when we’re “in a relationship,” which might feel like losing one’s independence or sense of identity.

And I would add, this inner relationship is the real thing that most of us struggle with. Even if we think we’re struggling in a relationship, what we’re actually struggling with is a relationship with ourselves. If we could figure that out, we would have fewer problems and more solutions. We would know where to look for those solutions.

From One Self to Another Self: Dyad as the Basic Bond

One subject that rarely arises at polyamory conferences (the places polyamorous people come to talk about relationships) is monogamy. I mean, it’s mentioned, but the topic of the depth of one-on-one bonds is secondary to the issue of how things are doing with the other partners; the rules of engagement with other partners; and so on. Rare is it to hear open conversation about the need to relate one-on-one or the need to be in an exclusive relationship for a while.

I think that most people who identify as polyamorous know this and honor this, but individual relationships seems to play second fiddle in poly culture when in fact, so far as I can tell, it’s the second most basic foundation of poly culture. The very most basic is where one stands with oneself.

Now ‘monogamy’ and ‘polyamory’ have a second key element in common: they both use dyadic (that is, pair) bonding as a structural basis. Strong dyads share the same basic properties: they are based on agreements; they are based on honesty; they are based on a desire to share; hopefully they are based on love.

Relationships have a purpose, and they express that purpose within a tribe or community. Remember that marriage, our society’s most basic and seemingly most coveted bond, is often performed in a pubic ceremony, officiated by a public official (traditionally by a minister, a judge, the mayor or a sea captain).

The relationship is presumed to have public implications and the marriage license is a public document, filed with the city clerk. This suggests that the pair bond is part of something larger: society or a community and often, a family.

Relationships involve a contract or agreement of some kind, even if that is just to be together. Whether they are happy affairs or not usually involves whether the individuals involved feel that the agreement is honored; whether the individuals get their needs met; and whether the arrangement works for both people. These facts apply whether the relationship is heterosexual or homosexual, whether the individuals are members of the same race or economic class, or whether they are of the similar or very different ages. Most of us would agree to that: “whatever makes them happy.” Whatever makes us happy, if we can arrange it. Whether the individuals involved choose to have sex with other people would be covered by all of these concepts.

The Many: We All Have Multiple Relationships

One thing does not change, whatever kind of relationship is involved: those individuals relate to other people. Unless they are really, really lonely, they love other people and other people love them.

Referring back to the beginning of Polly’s article (polyamory is all about sex), the truth is our relationships are always about so much more. It verges on hilarious that someone would accuse polyamorous people in particular of focusing on sex; poly folk spend so much of their time obsessively involved with the details of their relationships, it’s amazing they have time for sex. But even the ‘let’s meet at the motel for a quickie’ kind of affairs have a way of becoming more than just sex.

Yet even if we presume sexual monogamy — someone who only has physical sex with one other person, for a long time — we all have bonds and commitments with others. Some of those, while nonsexual, can be profound, intimate and long-lasting connections. Imagine a man is married, in a healthy relationship with his wife. He also has a secretary who has worked for him for 20 years, and they love and trust one another deeply. They haven’t shared sex, but their bond of love is as powerful as that of any marriage. Most people would not call that polyamory; I would.

One thing I’ve always found interesting is that monogamy has many rules that don’t involve sex. Some monogamous couples do not ‘allow’ one another to have close friends of the opposite sex. Some monogamous people feel threatened when their partner has any friends at all. Some don’t ‘allow’ their partner to go to community college. Some feel threatened when their partner checks out a cute guy or girl, and some encourage one another to be open about their attractions and even their erotic fantasies, unfettered. Others would be profoundly threatened by this. Still others invite their friends to have sex with them.

Since nearly everyone has sexual desires and fantasies about others, the core issue running the show would seem to be jealousy. Jealous people are going to relate to others with a different set of presumptions and expectations than those who either don’t experience jealousy, or who process it in a healthy way. As it turns out, in an attempt to avoid the jealousy issue, a great many have sex with others without telling their partner about it.

When we talk about polyamory, what we’re really describing is an agreement to take up all the boundaries of a relationship consciously, rather than applying a term that seems to presume the nature of those boundaries, but more often denies their existence. Why ever would we do that? Well, since your first relationship is to yourself: ask yourself.

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

Eric Francis is now offering online astrology readings as part of Cosmic Confidential, the 2010 annual edition of Planet Waves. Check this link for more information.

Here is my summary of the Aquarius New Moon chart: you may need to take an odd path to figuring out what you want. You may need to ‘back into your desire’, or find it by making what you perceive as a mistake; you may discover what you want by an experience of conflict that resolves itself quickly and then leaves you with real information. Therefore you need to be mindful of experiences that teach you what you don’t want, and therefore provide information about what you do want.

One other point. What you want and how you feel about that influences your environment — particularly your mental environment but also your direct ‘physical’ environment. Your conscious desire changes the world around you, and has an influence on elements of life that you thought were ‘too powerful’ to respond to you. Therefore, focus on what you want and observe how the local cosmos responds. Observe how you respond.

One last point. This is a good time to observe your conditioning patterns and see the ways in which you are influenced by groups and by the media. Until we do something about it, we are all brainwashed by the influences of others who are trying to tell us what is supposed to be good for us (a luxury car, an awesome new deodorant, chewing gum that makes you hallucinate). To move out of that level of consciousness primarily takes awareness.

Now, how did I get there? Are these kinds of declarative statements really possible? (Note to English majors: astrology writing is a literary format, in which I am expected to give you useful material that you can actually apply to your life. But this is a kind of mental trick; it’s useful because I interpret it in a way that slants it in that direction.

Let’s look at the chart for Saturday’s New Moon. This chart is a simplified version, with most of the planets and points removed. If you want to see this contrasted with a more complex version, tap this link. I’ve left the ones that are directly in the current game. I will name them in order, from the top, anticlockwise: Mars retrograde, Saturn retrograde, Pluto, Mercury, Sun, Moon, Chiron, Neptune, Venus and Jupiter. The glyphs are all intuitive and you already recognize some of them.

Notice that there are planets with lower numbers next to them (from 3 to 6). They are talking to one another, and working as a set. Then there are planets with higher numbers next to them and they are talking to one another and working as a set (those in the 25 to 26 range). The sky is a little like a radio. Planets tune into frequencies based on their degree position, and relate to other planets in that range. Easy.

The planets in the 3 to 6 range are in aspect to Mars retrograde (the purple guy at the top). The ones in the 25 to 26 range are the Aquarius New Moon, conjunct Chiron and Neptune.

Reading astrology, the thing that is odd or unique can call the tune. Mars retrograde stands out in this regard. Mars has retrograded far enough back in Leo to be mixed up in the Saturn-Pluto square. You can see that because Saturn (green thing on the left) and Pluto (purple thing on the bottom) are within one degree apart, in a square aspect (see the line that connects them? It’s not necessary, you can see the aspect without it because planets in the same degree range are in aspect to one another.)

Toward the right, Venus and Jupiter in Pisces have moved into the aspect structure. When I am describing all the planets in the 3 to 5 range, that is called an aspect structure: the one that involves Mars retrograde and the Saturn-Pluto square. This is quite a mix of tension and gratification. Notice how Mercury is opposite Mars: that’s the conflict (Mercury opposite Mars can have the flavor of a blow-up or of psychic tension), which is largely mental in nature. It’s about an idea, and that could well be within you, trying to work itself out.

When I say, “you may need to take an odd path to figuring out what you want. You may need to ‘back into your desire’, or find it by making what you perceive as a mistake,” that is the influence of Mars retrograde talking to, and influencing, and being influenced by, Saturn and Pluto: an aspect that is changing civilization as we speak. Where Mars encounters that is where the individual will meets the big forces that shape the world. Example: if you lose your job (presumably as a result of Saturn-Pluto restructuring), you then get to figure out what you want to do next (Mars involvement: desire, but it’s retrograde, it’s an ‘odd’ way to figure something out, but it works).

Then there is the New Moon group, at 25-26 Aquarius. (By the way, they are really at 26-27 because once you go over 25 even you are into 26th degree; but I’m stating it this way to match the chart illustration.) As I explained in a recent edition, when a slow moving setup such as the Chiron-Neptune conjunction is met by a close event from the Sun and the Moon, it brings out the nature of the slow moving setup.

And what would that be?

Chiron conjunct Neptune is about seeing our environment for what it is: the psychic environment, the digital environment, and any environment involving exclusive groups of any kind. By exclusive I mean anything for which you need membership, a password, a device, or to believe in an idea. The Neptune fog is being clarified and focused by the high-precision energy of Chiron. We are getting to see through the fog, which includes seeing the potential for creative movement and the toxic potential of the environment that is around us. If we get good information, it will give us some ideas for how to respond — not merely present a hopeless situation.

I have been learning a lot from the Abraham-Hicks material under this Mars retrograde in Leo, and today’s daily quote sums up this point nicely.

“Anytime you feel negative emotion, stop and say: Something is important here; otherwise, I would not be feeling this negative emotion. What is it that I want? And then simply turn your attention to what you do want…. In the moment you turn your attention to what you want, the negative attraction will stop; and in the moment the negative attraction stops, the positive attraction will begin. And — in that moment — your feeling will change from not feeling good to feeling good. That is the Process of Pivoting.”

Yours & truly,

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

Eric Francis is now offering online astrology readings as part of Cosmic Confidential, the 2010 annual edition of Planet Waves. Check this link for more information.

Dear Friend and Reader:

Three of the most potent aspects now in effect involve what are called Centaur planets — a class of small, icy or rocky planets orbiting our Sun. The first one discovered was Chiron, in 1977. These kids don’t behave like asteroids, which mostly add detail and literary richness to a reading. They don’t behave like traditional planets, which establish the main lines of energy and dominant, obvious personality traits.

Centaurs talk about where we are doing the deep work, or where we need to be doing it. They suggest where we’ve been hurt and are therefore concentrating either power, or pain; they describe the shadowy parts of our psyche, places of doubt, fear and denial; and they can represent extraordinary gifts that we must learn how to handle.

The aspects begin with Sun conjunct Nessus. This is a fast-moving aspect exact on Friday, at 17+ Aquarius. Nessus is a planet that talks about the karmic implications of our actions. Its action is cyclical, that is, the story goes in an ellipse and comes back to remind us what happened. Therefore it also has historical implications, and is frequently used to decode any history of abuse or potential abuse that we may have experienced.

Aquarius takes this to the level of the collective: much of the abuse that we experience is at the hands of groups and elite institutions that tell us who we’re supposed to be, not be, hate being, envy, or whatever. Sun-Nessus in Aquarius is about seeing these rules for what they are. In general, they are brutal, contradictory, unspoken and designed to protect the egos of the insecure; and most of all they are the toxic byproducts of advertising; which is generally designed to make everyone else feel insecure or inadequate.

Next is Chiron conjunct Neptune. This event is fairly rare, lasting for about one year every 60 years or so; that year is about to end, with the mid-February exact conjunction (though it’s well within one degree of exactitude now). This has a focusing effect: clearing the fog from our long, woozy dream of Neptune in Aquarius. There is a reason the criminals in Washington and Wall Street could get away with conning so many people on Maple Street — we were willing to be lied to, and living our own version of the EuroDream or the American Dream or the Asian Prosperity Dream or whatever dream it was. Chiron is the alarm clock going off, and it’s also about focusing your eyes and taking that first drink of water in the morning to get your blood cells hydrated.

Last of the three: Venus is moving into a conjunction with Chiron and Neptune. This is a fun one, potentially: sexy, orgasmic, and the manifestation of fantasy. Luscious, in that respect: especially if you like women or are into being a woman.

This is, however, a complex aspect. There are struggles indicated, like: what if I don’t live up to my fantasy of who I’m supposed to be? What if I feel hurt or incomplete, and I’ve tried to make up with it by glamor or fantasy? What if I keep attracting men who don’t like women, and I compensate with my imagination?

Then one day the bubble bursts…‘reality’ sets in. I think that among other things, this aspect is about balancing the benefits and risks of one’s sexual imagination, of one’s sense of existence as an attractive force. Yet there is often a disconnect: how much time do you spend waiting for what you want to come to you? How much time do you spend denying what you want? Maybe you need to spend less time go-getting certain things, and more time go-getting the ones you really want.

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

Eric Francis is now offering online astrology readings as part of Cosmic Confidential, the 2010 annual edition of Planet Waves. Check this link for more information.

Dear Reader:

There is a whopper of a Full Moon on the horizon: the Leo Full Moon, conjunct Mars retrograde. One of the ways astrology works is that events involving the Sun and the Moon precipitate or bring out the influences of aspects or placements that are already standing. This is a good example — Mars is doing a long, slow (and rare) retrograde, and the Sun and Moon are about to show up and oppose and conjoin Mars, respectively.

So this is going to bring out the nature of that Mars retrograde. There are a few ways to take this aspect: for one thing, it’s going to take everyone for a ride. It’s the chart of a news event, before the event. Part of that news event is on the human level: the Moon and Leo are about human feelings; human emotions. The Moon is amplifying the rather mixed, inwardly searching emotions of Mars retrograde. And on whatever scale, those feelings are poised to come out. The extreme polarization of the Full Moon nearly guarantees that emergence. It’s a question of how whatever comes out, comes out.

The problem with this Full Moon is that personally, we have the potential to over-react, and have suppressed feelings burst out. I suggest that it would be efficient to ask yourself what you want, and then state what you want. They are two separate processes. My take on Mars retrograde is about figuring out what we want.

Yet the Moon applies an emotional overlay to what we want: it’s like a veil of denial, that we’re trying to remove and get to the heart of the matter. Leo represents the heart. Mars represents desire. The retrograde represents conflicted desire, or the search for what we want. This is deeply personal stuff; sometimes seeming too personal for personal acknowledgment (that is never really true), but certainly too personal for admission in a relationship.

This Moon makes things more complex because while the relationship could be seen as personal (Sun/Moon, Venus/Mars involved), Aquarius is a collective entity of some kind. It’s not just one relationship partner who may have an interest in knowing how you feel; it may be a group of people who have this interest. I know this may be difficult, but I suggest checking in with how much you may have to say, and rather than letting that feeling well up, you know, the one that helps you empathize with throwing something through a window, or worse … make some decisions.

Get real with your feelings: first with you, then, calmly and directly, with those who matter.

Yours & truly,

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

Concession call from Coakley to Brown last night.

But first, psychology class.

Dr. Wilhelm Reich, renowned as Freud’s brightest student, and notably the one who rebelled against him with the most precision, said that politics was the very pinnacle of neurosis.

We have options for understanding the current state of politics, other than psychoanalytic. We can look at the election of Scott Brown to the U.S. Senate as a backlash against the failings of the Democrats, and Obama’s seeming failure to live up to his campaign promises. Then again, Brown campaigned with a promise to be the 41st vote against health care reform in the minority rules Senate (where you need 60 votes to get anything done). So the public is pissed off that Obama and the Dems aren’t doing enough; and the answer is to scramble the little that they have got done; which sounds more terrible twos than adolescent. The only reason I buy that analysis is the chart — which I’ll come to in a moment.

Let’s get used to the fact that the Cornballs have stolen the concept of progressivism from the Democrats and the Independents and for that matter from Abbey Hoffman and Noam Chomsky. That’s the way things go. Hippie, punk, nerd, goth, heroin addict and the American flag all find their way to the same Madison Ave.

But to find out who Mr. Handsome really is, all you had to do was listen to his victory speech. In particular, the part when he declares both of his daughters available. In the greatest moment of his life, as the man of the hour, on international television, he offers his daughters to…whomever.

With them, and their mother, standing right there.

Haha, just kidding and by the way one has a boyfriend. But for anyone who doubts that the Republicans are the official party of barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, you now have some compelling evidence of your own.

It is amazing how the guy whose qualifications for Senate include having a truck and posing nude in Cosmo can get elected by a landslide in a state where there are more universities than farms. You would think that in a moment when so many are so cynical about politics, the person who isn’t really a politician — Martha Coakley qualifies brilliantly — might be the choice of those paying attention. She knows less about the Boston Red Socks than I do, which I thought was impossible — especially if you live in Boston. You might think that because it was Ted Kennedy who worked for so many decades for health care reform, the voters of his state might want to honor that legacy and not guarantee his dream will be DOA the moment the Senate resumes session…fractured as that dream is, after last autumn’s psychotic, manipulated session of Congress.

So how exactly did Mr. Handsome get elected? Well of course: he answered the mystical longing of the people. Very, very repressed people, whose sexual pain is so intense that it turns into what Dr. Reich called a mystical longing, which is then answered by a ‘leader’ offering nothing more than charisma (and a hidden agenda). The same way that Sarah Palin gets any attention at all. To say they are both porn stars would be partly accurate, but in general porn stars are harmless working folk who actually make a difference in people’s lives. What we are looking at uses sex appeal as bait for another purpose.

Let’s look at the chart, which is dripping with mystery, sex and confusion. Uranus on the 7th house cusp, particularly in Pisces, looks like a populist revolt. Uranus is the planet of revolt and Pisces is the sign of populism. Look at how precisely it aspects the 7th house cusp — to the very degree, as if Coakley called her astrologer and asked her when to make the call, down to the minute. This placement suggests the USA pol scene is about to get turned upside down with the elegance of a shark scare on a hot day at the beach. Yet this is the revenge of the clueless; Tea Baggers Quantum Edition. Then the Moon — the public — is also in Pisces and is about to make a conjunction to Uranus. This would be a sweet chart if you’re starting a movie; which may be what just we just started.

The fun has just begun (and in two months from today it will be throbbing). However, the Fishy Moon-Uranus conjunction is charming compared to other aspects of this chart, of which I will describe two.

For an image of the unbridled nihilistic narcissism inherent in this election and so much of American politics, culture and media, we can look right to Eris in the 8th house: the house not just of sex, but of the sex/death/money/power/secrets confluence. That special kind of sex; ‘the sex you want’, according to one of my mentors; in other words, despite all the potential madness and pitfall, we actually do seek our deepest erotic releases in the 8th. In other words, when you wonder why people tap their foot in a men’s room, or, you know, risk it all for sex, they are generally driven by the compulsion of the 8th. I am not generally in the role of outing people, but I do read charts. Would the secret young hunk please come forward?

Aries is on the cusp of that house and Eris, right there, points to Mars retrograde in Leo. Who would that be?

Aries there also represents the special kind of self-obsessed mental chaos of our era, where the streets are wandered by those lacking any concept who they are; or was it always this way; or is this part of our cultural myth: that we are the land of the lost, which is our excuse for letting everything slide. Whether or not you take Eris to be a vindictive, castaway outsider looking for revenge (apropos enough, in this case), Eris in Aries illustrates our massive collective identity crisis; the concept of identity flaking apart even as it updates its Facebook page.

Last, we have the Sun in Capricorn in the 5th house: the house of taking risks; of compulsive gambling; of more sex we think people just cannot help. The Capricorn involvement, however, looks like gambling with power. Not just anywhere in Capricorn, but in the last degree of Capricorn: void of course, or anaretic, depending on your lingo: a big lesson of some kind. This is the edgy part; this is the part about something ‘about to come out’. (Feb. 2 we learn something about this guy, or this election — mark your calendar.)

An hour later, and the Sun would be in Aquarius, which is a very different story. I don’t have my Sabian symbols book handy, but that last degree of Cap is the one about the secret cabal of leaders who rule the world. And in Capricorn style, this looks kind of like ancient Rome.

Oh, that’s where I recognize Mr. Handsome from.

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

I have noticed the squeeze of Friday’s approaching simultaneous Mercury stationing direct and annular (not annual, rather annular) solar eclipse. I bet you have, too. Using a fairly basic set of planets, there are 11 of them concentrated in Capricorn and Aquarius, including Mercury and the eclipse; plus Jupiter, Chiron, Neptune and Pluto. This whole setup is stretched across the two Saturn-ruled signs, Capricorn and Aquarius. One addresses psychical structures and the other, psychic structures. To illustrate the point of how this feels, in case we need to look at a chart for information, Saturn is square Pluto, which feels a little like a train making a 90-degree turn.

The Thema Mundi, or chart of the world. This is probably a fictional horoscope, used as a teaching tool and reference, handed down to us from the classical era of Greece. Unlike the current chart, it's light and airy and all the planets are exactly in their proper places: that is, each planet is in the sign of its rulership. Notice that the chart has Cancer (ruled by the Moon) rising, whereas we usually associate Aries with the 1st house.

In case that’s all not enough for you, there’s also a “near Earth asteroid” called 2010 AL30 going by, which the space-type blogs are saying might be a piece of debris. This morning one of the world’s leading astrophysicists said in an email that his best guess (the word ‘guess’ was written in all caps, which I will spare you, because we’re all feeling a little jumpy) is that AL30 is a hunk of spacecraft debris, of which there are many orbiting the Earth, and in near-Earth orbits around the Sun. “Give it a few days and I bet it’ll be pretty clear,” he said.

I would agree. Assuming the world doesn’t crack open on Friday (I read a report recently that earthquakes are indeed associated with planetary alignments, and the alignment we now have is the perfect specimen) we will all feel better Saturday. Mercury stationing direct at the time of an eclipse has the feeling of significant, specific information coming out: it could be personal, and this week is one of those distinct personal watersheds where it’s possible to make some actual, deep decisions about ourselves and our lives that stick.

In Capricorn with stuff dancing around the Aries Point, it could be another one of those huge revelations about what is happening in the banking world that nobody seems to notice because the information gets snowed under by the kid with the underpants bomb. Or, you could turn on your TV and be treated to a debate about whether Buddhism or Christianity is the better path to redemption for Tiger Woods. (Note that the notion of redeeming one’s soul does not exist in Buddhism, to my knowledge. For that, you definitely have to go straight to the Christians.) With the eclipse conjunct Venus in Capricorn, we learn something about values and what we hold dear; we learn something about how deeply our values are ‘informed’ (putting it politely) by corporate culture. Learning is, of course, subject to one’s interest level; but other factors suggest that there will be reason to pay attention.

Closeup of Friday's eclipse of the Sun, which takes place at 2:11 am EST. Nearly a dozen points and planets are in Capricorn and Aquarius, including Pluto, the Sun, Moon, North Node, Jupiter, Neptune and Chiron -- and Mercury about to station direct. Jupiter is in the last degree of Aquarius, about to ingress Pisces on Sunday.

Now for a little analysis. As you can see from the diagram to the left, there are lot of planets concentrated in one part of the sky. Notably, the Earth is opposite all those planets; they are in Cap and Aquarius and the Earth is in Cancer. So all that energy — big planets a thousand times the size of the Earth, and small potent ones — are pulling on us; pulling us in one direction. What direction would that be?

From time to time, there has been discussion or speculation about a chart for the world. It turns out that such a thing exists; from the Hellenistic (classical Greek) era of astrology. The chart is called the Thema Mundi, and I’m a big fan. Since discovering this chart a few years ago, it’s informed my study of the houses in particular, which are the basis of astrological interpretation. This chart has Cancer rising; 15 degrees, to be exact. Yes, the chart of the world has the maternal, feminine sign Cancer on the ascendant, rather than aggressive, headstrong Aries.

This is interesting because it puts all those planets that are going by into the two relationship-oriented houses of the Thema Mundi — the 7th (Capricorn) and the 8th (Aquarius). By relationship I mean partnership, conjugal, marriage, contractual type of relationship: direct and straight on. Note, in the chart of the world, the two houses associated with relationship are both ruled by Saturn. This confirms the joke about lesbians bringing a moving truck to the second date. We already know about everyone who gets married by Elvis in Las Vegas and the only ads I see on TV these days are for dating websites and Girls Gone Wild; I always want to marry those girls, straight away.

That joke is on me. The 8th house (marital contracts) of the Thema Mundi is Aquarius — the sign of groups.

Note that in a high federal court in San Francisco right now, a trial is underway (as of yesterday) that will in part determine the constitutionality of banning same-sex people from marriage. We will know these laws are really fair when a bisexual person can marry a man and a woman; or when five people can get married.

So this whole traveling space revival is shaking up the marriage and relationship angle of the world horoscope. Isn’t that funny? Well, I guess not if you had to call the cops on your boyfriend last night, but the rest of us can afford to have a sense of humor about it. There is a lot, and I do mean quite a lot, of stress on our concepts of relationship, and on our actual relationships, to get in step with the post-postmodern world of constant change.

Full chart of Friday's eclipse of the Sun in Capricorn, conjunct Venus. This is a few hours before Mercury stations direct on Friday.

The Chiron-Neptune conjunction, approaching full focus, is suggesting that we clear the fog and look at the world through some lens besides the ideals that have proven themselves to be untrue. Mars retrograde in Leo (opposite all that Aquarius) is saying we need to do the one really, truly brave thing that we are here to do in the world, which is to be an individual. When you do all the relationship calculus, no matter what one is or thinks they are in terms of lovestyle or lifestyle or preference or sexual orientation, there remains the first and final project of being a self-aware individual no matter how zonked out anyone else is on trying to make their lives as perfect as an advertisement.

And there remains the fact that the antiquated expectations that we were given by our grandparents and our parents need to be carefully assessed. We need to question every single one of the assumptions that were handed to us from the past. The group pressures coming from the direction of Aquarius, which is the sign of conformity, among other things, need to be seen for what they are — and I trust that Chiron-Neptune will offer anyone who wants to break free the clarity and resolve to do so.

Mars retrograde in Leo has been reminding me of the Abraham-Hicks material, which tells us to focus on what we want, because that is usually what we get: the key being to apply that powerful manifesting force called desire on that which is actually in our own best interest.

Yours & truly,

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.

Weeks ago I described our current phase of astrology as the winter whirl. Two inner planets are retrograde (Mercury and Mars) and we’re building toward a solar eclipse — the perfect recipe for confusion and originality. Dare I say paranoia, but do we really believe it? Is it really credible? Why do we take fear so much more seriously than, say, creativity? Eclipses apply mental pressure, which can spill over to other levels. If you’re feeling good, that will spill over and if you’re in conflict that can magnify or get hooked — let it go if you can.

Eclipses combined with retrograde planets, especially Mercury, the result can be the feeling of ever-deepening chaos. Yet deep in there is a LOT of creative mojo.

If you’re experiencing frustration, the best plan of action is to set clear goals and return to your tasks day after day grateful that you’ve made at least a little progress. There are bound to be setbacks and these, too, need to be handled gently, but any setback can contain the gift of an invention. Think that way and it’s more likely to be true.

Mercury retrograde takes us out of automatic mode. Humans tend to think like old-fashioned robots: in rote habits, which is another way of saying many people don’t think at all. Mercury stopping and backing up three times a year scrambles those patterns. There’s the added benefit of a built-in pause, and with a necessity to take care of old business.

Notice how much emphasis has been placed on corporations and government since Pluto entered Capricorn. That alone is a source of change and confusion, as is the ongoing opposition between Saturn and Uranus. Mercury retrograde in Capricorn is like looking down and pausing to pick up the pieces of what has been scattered as a result of these potentially disruptive events. Mercury is calling for an alert, even creative, approach that acknowledges the past without getting caught there.

Mars retrograde has a different flavor. We live in an aggressive culture. We wage war, we love competitive sports and we are trained to experience our creative journey as a rat race called a career. Mars retrograde is saying: slow down. Consider the factors that you normally might miss, like whether something is really worth doing; like whether you really want what you think you want.

Mars in Leo is famous for its ego-trip quality. It’s a lot of fire in one place, and when you turn that fire retrograde, the message is tune in and go on. Question your motives. Take off some of the pressure and listen to yourself.

About the Author

Eric Francis is the creator of Planet Waves and author of Book of Blue. He has worked as a professional astrologer and internationally published horoscope columnist since the mid-1990s, specializing in minor planets. He has presented sexuality workshops and written for such publications as the Journal of Bisexuality, Sexuality.org and Loving More magazine. He writes his astrology columns in his fine art photography studio in Kingston, New York.