Recently, a client  has suggested that certain behavior patterns she recognizes in herself, somehow feel ‘fated’. This prompted me to dust off some work that I’d done on karmic ‘stuff’ a while ago.

Points for initial consideration:

• General shape of the natal chart – looking for empty spaces (i.e. quadrants or hemispheres rather than single houses). We need to understand the energy ‘flow’ in the chart in order to pinpoint blockages as well as overcompensations. I have absolutely nothing in the 3^rd quadrant-  which governs my personal development through relationships, socialization and intellect. I’ve been married twice and have far too many university degrees. Overcompensation? You can bet on it. Chiron is a big karmic factor and guess what – he’s conjunct my 7^th house cusp! He’s telling me that I’ve suffered prior ‘wounds’ in relationship that had to do with balancing my own needs and that of the ‘other’. Not surprisingly, this often manifests as ‘I’ll do anything for you to stay in the relationship’ – oops – this sounds exactly like what I’ve been discussing with the marriage counselor. The karmic lesson involved here involves learning to love myself so that I’m not so dependent on the love from my ‘significant other’ (my poor husband). I’ll take that on board and discuss it in my next meeting with that marriage counsellor.
• Element balance and imbalance – no planets and/or four or more planets. Again, we’re looking for overcompensation and fixations. I have no water in my chart and I often dream of water – not of drowning but instead, of being constantly flooded.
•  Moon and the South node –  representative of deeply instinctual patterns – something that I’ve done over and over before – and so keep doing it. My Moon is in the 12^th house – the most karmic of the houses. This definitely has to do with ‘mother-stuff’ (I spent years on ‘mother’ in my therapy – and I do mean years) – and of course emotions – or rather being ‘detached’ from my emotions because otherwise it causes too much personal pain with which I cannot deal. Don’t be surprised to learn that my South Node is in Cancer. Doesn’t this tie in (too) nicely with my lack of ‘water’ and recurrent ‘mother issues’?
• Certain aspect patterns – with this, we’re looking to spot ‘karmic dilemmas’:
  • Oppositions – tendency to farm out one side of the dilemma on to someone else.
  • Squares – tendency to ignore everything until it blows up in your face.
  • Trines – represents difficulties from the past that you’ve tentatively sorted – so the test is now – did you really learn your lesson?
  • Conjunctions – suggest that you’ve learned your lesson well enough but now really need to put it into practice. With Saturn conjunct Neptune, I’m personally dealing with the mystical pragmatists dilemma and I may be on my way to solving it now that I’ve retired from practicing international tax law and instead, am practicing astrology.