September 2010
And while I am talking about Ed and David Miliband, I want to add something that I am currently learning about. I just attended a great Visual Astrology Conference in Santa Fe, featuring the wonderful Bernadette Brady, whose mission it is to bring the stars back to astrology. She calls us planetologists as we only use planets. She was ably aided and abetted by Darrelyn Gunzberg and Darby Costello at this particular event.
I have always loved the stars as well as the planets, and one technique I want to add to my work is something called parans. In particular I am starting with parans to the Sun, which I think has a lot to do with the calling of a person (not to mention a company and a country).
Parans are a bit of a nightmare technically, but basically what we look for are stars and planets that ‘do things’ together at four places. Rising or setting – i.e. on the horizon, or directly above or below you (a bit simplified but you’ll get the idea.) Suffice it to say that stars, like planets, are all imbued with particular meanings.
So I will just mention one for Ed. When the Sun was setting on the day he was born, Arcturus was also setting. The short explanation of this given by Brady is “A pathfinder, to break new ground”. He will have to do this. I think a star tied to his Sun means his vocation and work will have to encompass Arcturus. The longer explanation of Arcturus from Brady I find very fitting and hopeful – a star of “guarding, learning, teaching and leading. Protecting people as they embrace a new lifestyle. One who has the vision or the spirit to take the first step.”
Even more interesting, is to look at the star that is combined with the Sun for David, and that is Procyon, a star in Canis Minor – the small dog! Procyon was directly under the Sun when the Sun was at its zenith.
The short explanation – “exceptionally talented but needing to diversify this talent” – is interesting but the longer one is even more fascinating: “A quick rise but with no real substance, like fireworks – wonderful to watch but quickly fades.”
I am definitely going to study these parans in more depth. They seem to offer deeper insight perhaps because they highlight the backdrop of the heavens that we are born into. Being fixed we are stuck with them, whereas we can negotiate a bit more with those wanderers – the planets.