Note: If you prefer audio, there is an audio version of the video in the next section. And below that there is an edited transcription that you can read. In the Intro to the Intro section that comes next, I share some additional thoughts.
Intro to the Intro :)
At the start of the month, I spontaneously began creating an astrology chart calculation course as part of my process of learning how to do it for myself. The concept has evolved and I am now seeing this course as part of a more comprehensive astrology course. I am starting here, with chart calculation, because that’s where I’m starting but also because chart calculation is the foundation of practical astrology. In other words, if the charts aren’t calculated, we can’t look at them.
Right now, we rely on computers. It is not that I don’t value computers and the astrology programs that are now possible because of them. I do. And I hope to create my own program one day so that I and anyone else who’d like to can generate phase wheel charts. And even while I am learning to calculate charts by hand, I am, at the same time, creating a way to calculate chart data automatically using non-astrology software. (I will be sharing that in module 2, which will be a course on creating our own calendars. And, if I work it right, it will also serve as a course for learning the basics of astrology, though it might not quite work that way.)
Regarding chart calculation, after a quarter century on and off the astrology path, I have come to believe that we are better off when we know how to calculate charts for ourselves, when we make that knowledge part of our foundation.
I can’t remember where I heard or read it, but, somewhere in the last few months, I came across something that said that back in the day - ancient Greek days - the first requirement for being accepted into the ranks of aspiring astrologers was to be able to accurately calculate an astrology chart. Since they didn’t have computers back then, they had to do that by hand. Calculating charts by hand is our foundation.
Consider that it has only been in the last 30 years that astrologers began moving away from the necessity of calculating charts by hand as people knowledgeable in both astrology and technology began creating software programs. While I agree that software programs are a great benefit, I think we are better astrologers if we learn how to calculate charts by hand and have that knowledge and experience as a solid base of understanding. I give more of my reasons in the video / audio.
One final thing. I’ve never created a course and I’m doing this on the fly as I learn. I don’t know everything. In fact, there’s a ton I don’t know. But I do expect you to come away from this course feeling and being confidently able to calculate an astrology chart by hand. Along the way, I’ll share my best understanding of why we need to do what we do and also some insights I gain as I go through the process. Beyond that, I hope that what I contribute offers some inspiration for the journey. And, as with everything I post here, I ask that you take what I share as a starting point for your own learning.
And please ask questions. I’ll do my best to answer them or suggest resources if I don’t know the answer. For the audio and transcription, please scroll down further.
Pricing
I am offering this chart calculation course free here on Substack. I’m not sure if it will remain free forever, but it will be free while I am posting it and I imagine beyond that for at least some amount of time and possibly forever. As for the other course modules I have in mind, I’m not sure if those will be free or available for a price. I’m still learning how all this works. Ideally, I would like everything I offer to be accessible to everyone, while also being able to support myself. So that’s what I’m walking with. It remains to be seen what will be possible. Thank you for your understanding and support.
Next Up
Next up is part 2 of the introduction. In that part, I will share why we have to calculate charts in the first place, whether by hand or computer. After that, it’s on to the actual work of learning how to calculate charts!
Part 1: Why Bother Calculating Astrology Charts by Hand?
Audio Version
Edited Transcription
So why bother learning to calculate charts by hand? We have astrology programs. They do it a lot faster and probably a lot more accurately than we can do it by hand. So why go to the trouble of learning to calculate charts….
I can speak from my experience…, my personal reasons… why bother doing that. And the main one for me is to address a kind of a, almost like a background noise insecurity that I've had in my relationship with astrology. And it's not just because of not knowing how to calculate charts by hand. There have been a number of holes in my astrology knowledge because I just picked it up along the way. I didn’t have formal training in it - for the most part I didn’t have formal training in it.
So… for me, that not knowing how to do it has kind of acted like a background level of insecurity. You don't really know it's there. It doesn't seem like a big deal. Sure you can look at a chart. But without understanding how it's all constructed and without really understanding, you know, why, I don't know, how what we're looking at was created, to me that… leaves me with a level of security even if I don't notice it.
It’s sort of like when you…have a very subtle injury in your body and it’s so subtle you don't even know it's there. But your body knows it's there and it affects your gait and it affects your body. It affects how you move. It affects you even though you don't realize it, even though you don’t know it. And so that's kind of how I’m thinking about it. So for me, it's been important to learn how to do it, to fill that hole, and to sort of alleviate a certain level of insecurity.
We also happen to live in a time where astrology’s still…, you know, pretty disparaged. I mean, it's made some good progress in terms of people accepting it in the world but there’s still kind of a baseline disparagement that's there. And so I feel like by really understanding the nuts and bolts of the craft, that sets us up to be able to weather that disparagement a lot better. You know, because… a lot of that disparagement is coming from, I would say, mis-characterizations or perhaps misunderstandings about what astrology is or understanding what astrology is and putting a particular slant on it.
And so if we understand the nuts and bolts and we come to our own understanding of it and our own relationship with it, then that sets us up for a kind of a better sense of strength and confidence and security in the face of ridicule or disparagement or whatever may be coming at us around astrology. So those are a couple of my whys.
And then the third why is [that] astrology is about time. That’s what we’re looking at. When we're looking at a chart, we're looking at time. That's really what it's about. And so when we learn to calculate charts by hand, we are looking, we are learning about time in a different way. We think about - in astrology we especially think about time in terms of cycles. That's really the main thing we're looking at. But when we're learning to draw up charts, we’re kind of looking at… the different kinds of time and we're starting to learn that there are different kinds of time and that we need to figure out how they relate to each other.
So those are my whys. And so I share those with you.
Update (7/11/2023): Just after I hit the send button, I realized I forgot to include the attribution for the cover image. I found it on Wikimedia. It is by James O'Donoghue, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=132008436
Update 2 (7/11/2023): I guess I was a little over-excited to post this? I corrected a few more mistakes. There is no footnote 1 because I included a Pricing section at the end which covered it. I moved the Next Up section to where it belongs - at the end of the post. And I corrected a couple of minor grammar errors.
Update 3 (7/12/2023): I made one final edit. I moved the Pricing and Next Up sections to the end of the first section and added a note so that people would know the audio and transcription were further down in the post. I think that’s the best way to handle the flow of information.
