Help & Advice on EA Study

HI Lou,

I hope that others will respond to your post. One thing I would suggest given you have Mercury retrograde in Pisces in the 12th is to focus on the roots of EA itself which start with an understanding of the archetypes of the signs themselves. To understand Pisces for example is to simultaneously the 12th House, and Neptune. So too with all the signs, and their natural planetary rulers.

From this basic structure you can then practice putting the signs of different house cusps, i.e Scorpio on the 3rd House cusp. At that point you then combine the archetypes remembering the houses, the natural zodiac, is the foundation of the whole system So the foundation of the 3rd house archetype would now be 'conditioned' by the archetypes of Scorpio. The more you practice this simple thing the more you will progressively internalize/understand the foundation of EA itself.

From there a natural next step is to understand the natural structure of the zodiac, 1st house through the 12dth, in which natural aspects occur. For example the 3rd House is naturally square the 12th, and the 6th. The question them becomes what is the archetypal intent for these squares ?

The more you do this sorta thing you will, again, understand the core structure of EA itself, to internalize it is such a way that you will not be dependent of memorizing anything but applying on your own that which you have internalized/ understood is this simple thing to do.

From there you can then expand into all the various archetypes / dynamics of what EA is.

God Bless, Rad

Hi Lou, reading your words reminds me of my experiences at times too. I'll be delighted to connect and hear about your experiences and share mine, if you would like. And anyone else feeling the same too. As we all know, and feel, this work is just beautiful and transforming. But there can be challenges. I've had some help in my journey, and it has made all the difference. So, in any ways that I can I'd like to offer my help and support too. Blessings and much love Joe

Hi Lou,

First of all please do not get disheartened with your studies. There is a reason you have been drawn to this material and trust the process you are moving through.

My personal EA journey towards certification included reading a lot of books, watching the YouTube videos and also reading through the original message board on The School Of EA. What really helped me also was through working on practice charts with friends and family. By doing this I could then observe and correlate life events with their charts and start to see how the energies depicted in the birth chart played out for them. Even doing this through using celebrity charts was useful.

I don't think you are alone in feeling like you may never get this material. I had never studied astrology before and yes I also had moments of thinking I would never be able to synthesise the charts the way I had seen other EA Astrologers do. But there did come a point, when it all started to fall into place. The desire and passion for this work I feel was key.

This material is VERY deep that you need have faith and trust that you will become a professional Evolutionary Astrologer. Also, try not to look at how many 'years' you've been studying the material. Everyone learns at a different pace and I feel you maybe putting unnecessarily pressure on yourself.

If you would like to have a chat over Zoom, I would be happy to, so please do reach out.

All the best,

Rav

Hi Lou,

I agree with what everyone has said. I will say, Rad made an excellent point. For me, personally, understanding the archetypes of each sign were paramount. Once there is a foundation for understanding the sign's archetypes it just continues to expand from there.

What really helped me besides the old message board and the Pluto books, was the correspondence DVD's. I immersed myself in them and took notes and then correlated to charts of others. In the correspondence DVD's JWG goes over the archetypes.

I also want to say that in my experience the first thing I started seeing in charts was repeating themes. Once I started to understand the archetypes the repeating themes started to tell a story of that person's chart. The "story" would then be validated through that person talking about something or me asking them questions. That gave me the direct experience of observing the archetypes.

I don't think any one of us is going to ever know everything about astrology, that's kind of the beauty of it. It keeps us always striving to learn and understand more deeply. One of my favorite things to do is to go back and re-read the Pluto books and old message boards. To also go back and rewatch different sections of the correspondence DVD's. I learn something new each time!

That and just talking to other astrologers and what I call "nerding out" on charts. That way you hear other's perspectives about the archetypes and it broadens your own understanding of them.

Lastly, just doing charts is helpful. It creates action and from that you get feedback. That feedback deepens your understanding of the archetypes. At some point knowledge whether its reading or watching needs to be put in action in order to have the direct experience of it.

Let us know if there is anything we can help you with.

Much Love and Blessings,

Jordyn

Hi Lou,

I truly resonate with your feelings and i hope all contributions here truly help you as you desire. From my part all i can say is this... i have mercury in pisces, and reading your post was truly incredible, because a few months ago i had this urge to write a post (ended up not writing it...) about exactly this, on how it is so important for anyone who has this mercury in pisces placement, or a strong influence of neptune to mercury, mercury in the 12th, etc., to fully accept themselves and their own capacities and their own talent, even if that is totally different from how most people understand and communicate EA. I feel it is such an important step to come to that realisation so we don't feel what you are feeling right now, and i think it is important for people who have this placement to exteriorize speacially among others who share it too. It is not wrong or anything to fix. It's just different your understanding of EA than how EA is communicated for most of who are studying or practicing astrology. JWG has saif that the method for EA chart analysis was that in this virgo way because it is easier for most people to learn in this step by step way (but with a moon in pisces i wonder if he too had his own difficulties conveing it that way, it's a questioni have indeed).

Those of us with this placements tend not to have a linear way of thinking, we don't think this plus this equal that most of times. We start from the whole and let the parts fall in place, but they never appear separate to us, that's why it is difficult either to communicate how we are seeing things or understand something that is communicated to us in much of a linear way. For us language is very limiting relative to the totally of the understanding of things (pisces) or fall incredibly short to how we perceive it (piscean ideal). that why we must see so many poets having mercury and neptune combined ;-)

JWG has said of mercury in pisces or the 12th that we need to communicate through metaphor or story in order to convey a message and he was absolutely right. The way thinking is structured and organized is in a way where, for me for example makes me much more at home when i can communicate trough myth or i can see the teachings or particualr aspect or placemtn in direct human life and drama than to simply look at a chart. You too, if i remember correctly (my apologies if this is mistaken as i am taking from memory) , have communicated that here with beautifull story of how you where contemplating placements and then remembered a birth mark that completely made everything fall in place. I can assure you i have a very lousy memory but when things are conveyed like this i don't forget it, because it makes more much sense than just words.

So my advice if i can give any to you or any0ne with this placement, is don't doubt yourself too much (even if life is full of uncertainty when things are not too linear, that is a beauty sometimes), life can look magical for this placement sometimes and i'm sure you have an antenna exaclty for the information you need or need to give others. In EA there is a place for the counceling that we can do. Each person will have its own message, some people, speacially those who look at life in subtle ways, will need to meet another who can also undersant them exactly as you do.

Hope this helped Lou and you can reach out to me if you see you need to just speak to someone who's brain can function a bit like yours :-)

P.S. One other important thing i remembered is that, with this placements, we might need our own time to let things unfold in way that a connection is made to a broader whole, as it always does. remember, the south node of neptune is in aquarius, which makes communication have a background uranian component for those with mercury in pisces - meaning things will at time feel disjointed before they are fully grasped. This could also have a very peculiar sense of time, sometimes hapening fast like graspint it all in a snapshot moment, other times much more time needs to unfold. But there is beauty in this process too.

Hey Lou, I agree with everyone’s brilliant advice and support here in helping you in your EA learning journey and as Rav said, please try not to feel discouraged or lose hope in your process. This is really deep stuff, quite rich to absorb and takes time. As Jordyn said, the archetypes are significant. Patricia Walsh wrote an amazing book “Understanding Karmic Complexes: Evolutionary Astrology and Regression Therapy” that has all the archetypes in a well-organized format. Highly recommend her book. Also, as Rad said, learning the basics of astrology as in the natural chart from Aries to Pisces is also significant and think Jeffrey once said once you know the signs of the Zodiac, you pretty much know all their planets and houses too in that a lot of a sign’s planetary and house energies do overlap. So I found my learning process to be in layers. It did not all come together in one piece, nor in a linear fashion and took time. I struggled too and know others who have as well who achieved their EA certificates. It’s totally normal. But I kept at it and didn’t give up and that’s huge in the process. I’m also always being educated in it and consider myself a lifetime student of EA and astrology in general. I actually feel like I still don’t know enough and am always reading books on EA and astrology in general and watch EA Zoom Meeting YouTube vids. I also went to Soul Wise School of Evolutionary Astrology which helped, and already had a foundation in basic astrology too (ie. signs, planets, houses,etc. as Rad mentioned) before learning EA. When I began my EA studies, when looking at charts, I just focused on the karmic stuff first. So Pluto in its house and sign only for a bit practicing the archetypes there. After that, I looked at SN in its sign then its house, and again the archetypes there, and then after that, tried synthesizing both the Pluto stuff with the SN stuff together. I was able to get a strong baseline story of the past with just that alone. Once I got those initial basics down, then tried integrating their ruling planets in house and sign too. If you want to try a practice chart with me, let me know. I can always use extra practice too 😊

And one last note, although don’t know your chart, hope it’s ok to say, that if you have Mercury Rx Pisces 12th in your natal chart, my understanding of any Rx planet is that the antidote is to move towards its polarity in house and sign. So in your case, take on Virgo 6th H energies in your process of understanding and learning EA. So to try to focus on one thing at a time ie. just Pluto and SN. Spend time analyzing those details of each, and then start to gel or hypothesize a story around those details and organizing that info rather than trying to absorb the entire paradigm and its rules all at once. And it may feel like you’re not absorbing this stuff but you are, in particular on a subconscious level. Don’t give up! Practice, practice, practice I was constantly told by my teachers. Hope this helps. Peace and Love to you.