Encounters with Animals: Symbolic Process in the Astrological Consultation

This includes the astrological consultation itself: it’s always a crowded room when astrologer and client meet. Psychological discourse of the 20th .. Read more century and the psychological astrology that grew in dialogue with it often became caught up in a very Day-organized practitioner stance of objectivity, neutrality, and distance – yet these concepts actively reject the premise of astrological imagination: that we are saturated at all times, through and through, with creatures of psyche and cosmos – and there is no space where they are not at play, including the consciousness of the astrologer and the consultation space. In this webinar we will actively contemplate the space of the astrological consultation as a place for symbolic exploration. A place where the various creatures in both astrologer and client appear. And we will look at how to actively engage that field in readings which follow and engage that space rather than merely describe it or speak about it. We will also consider at length the relational configurations that activate between astrologer and client and how these reflect the voice, or call, or footprint of the many creatures within – and how we can welcome these creatures into the consultation. Drawing deeply from multiple client and chart encounters and from the well of Mesopotamian, Egyptian, and Greco-Roman myths; inspirations from the world of theatre; and from naturalists and others who work in the animal world, we will explore some frameworks, metaphors, and ways of creating safe and rich habitat in the consultation to engage the many creatures within us.