This past
Monday I made my first post on the Astrodienst forum, a place where people can
post questions or ask for help understanding their charts. I actually made 3 posts. One of the members that I responded to
followed up with further questions and lots of thanks. I am in astrology heaven.
Yesterday,
after answering the second response from my new astrology buddy, I kept
thinking how silly it was that I had waited so many years to ‘enter’ the
forum. I’ve been feeling for some time
that the Our Sky group is not getting the kind of participation I had hoped
for, and wishing I could just give up and spare my friends the badgering about
real time. Every time I am disappointed
at the lack of interest I think of all the interests my friends have that are
low on my list of things to pursue. But
the messenger in Aries will be heard whether the message is welcome or not. (Mercury was in Aries when I was born, just
beginning to set. The position right
before disappearing under the horizon is called the house of partnership, and
is associated with friends, marriages and contracts.)
So I just
floated on long delayed satisfaction all evening and worked on ways to help my forum partner
with the language. Later, after I had
finished my response, and checked to make sure there were no errors, I went
back to see if my two other posts had responses. And one of them did. The response was a criticism. The other forum member actually said such and
such (that I had written) is not your greatest asset, your greatest asset is
this…
So I had my
answer of why I had waited so long to enter the forum. I wasn’t ready to be shot down, contradicted,
or criticized. It has bothered me for
years that I rejected the astrology community and learned the language in
almost complete isolation. Though it is
a language for meditation, it is not objective if it can’t be communicated with
others. I knew restricting my efforts to
communicate with friends, as opposed to the wider community, was an insular
approach.
Now, I am
relieved that that period of protecting myself as an astrologer is over. Thank you to all my friends who have been so
patient with me and resisted the urge to shout, “Shut up Mary Pat you are
boring as can be. We are so tired of
hearing about your pet project!”
The forum member’s
remark did not bother me a bit. I can
furnish objective reasoning for the statement I made based on the grammar of
the language. I have developed a lot of
skills writing the Our Sky blog and built up a lot of confidence thanks to the
kindness and enthusiasm of my friends. Thanks
Y’all!
One last
thing while I am on the subject of gratitude for wonderful friends. (Venus is in Taurus right now and I am really
digging it.) I can tell at least two
stories off the top of my head of incorrect statements I have made in the process
of explaining charts to friends. Both
times I was showing a level of ignorance that really needed to be
remedied. This would be embarrassing if
it happened to anyone else, but it is really hard to embarrass someone with
Mercury in Aries, so here goes.
In one of
the first charts I ever did I said Mercury, Venus and Mars were inside the
orbit of Earth. My friend caught the
error immediately and gently questioned the statement. I really thought I had the order of orbits correct! One of these days I will mention the other
piece of bad information that I would be trying to spread around if an informed
friend had not set me back on track. So,
thanks not just for being patient but also for showing me when I’m crossing the
lane and headed for a collision.
See you all later, I'm off to the forum!
