Jung, Free and Loving Astrology

As a people observer, I’ve always had a keen interest in astrology and psychology - and suffered for my love of it!
By suffer I mean, I’ve been called many names by miscreantes who have never been open minded enough to look into it properly. I’ve often been called stupid and regularly given that sympathetic withering look by ‘scientifically minded’ people, almost as though I’d just informed them that I still believed in Santa Claus. (He’s not real? What the F&*%?!!)

Thankfully, I was never one to be bothered about what people think of my intelligence. (Its enough for me to know that I’m smart, I don’t have to prove it to the world!) But it was a great relief when I went to study psycholgy and creative writing in the UK at the age of 18 and I finally found someone who agreed with me.
I won’t put his name in here, as I haven’t asked his permission to name him, but it was one of the Doctors of Psychology, a professor and a lecturer of mine for cognitive psychology.
After class one day I shyly approached him. The entire lecture theatre had emptied. My heart was racing beyond belief. He was shuffling through some papers. He was a tall man, African, very dark skinned – with an outgoing demenour.
“Can I help you?” I cannot remember what I said to him. I told him I wanted to know more about astrology and the links to psychology. Intead of laughing in my face and telling me I might be better off leaving the course, he took it very seriously! He told me he believed in it too – and that many psychologists, including Jung, did.
We went onto have a lengthy discussion about it.
As I was leaving he looked at me and he said, “Leo?”
I laughed.  “Taurus…”
“It was your bright clothing and the fact that you had the courage to approach me!” he said.
(I was wearing ridiculous attire.)
“Oh…” I replied. “Must be my Sagittarius moon!” He got it.
I felt suddenly, alot less stupid then I had in years about my interest in astrology and its affects on people. 

It all started for me about the age of 15, it sounds obvious, but that was when I started to notice how people really
related to their star sign. A friends mother had a keen interest and we used to discuss it too. After a while I as I got deeper into it and discovered more aspects to it in the other planets. There was not one case I couldn’t discover a very real insight into a persons character through the use of birth charts. I spent my pocket money and first wages on books about it. And every essential astrologers bible – an ephemerides, which is basically a big fat book of numbers and degrees. This one cost me the grand some of 27 euro (alot when you’re 17 years old!) and gave me every planets placement from 1900 to 2050!

I felt it gave me the edge, secretly. I could have someone figured out before they even knew anything about me.
My favourite part was seeing the similarities between people with similar star signs, moon signs and venus signs. It was uncanny. I loved watching how people related to one another. How perfect compatible matches worked together and filled in one anothers blanks, and how horribly wrong it could all go. To this day I could not imagine a world without astrology. It makes every day more interesting for me. I learn more every single day, week and year about it.

It is encouraging when I get moments of others being surprised at my insights into their own personality and relationships that I could have known little or nothing about, apart from knowing their birth date. At the same time, I keep it to myself most of the time. I accept its difficult for many people to believe or take seriously without solid proof. I accept that alot of it can be intuitive and down to perception, projection and its by no means foolproof. No one is denying the fact that people have unique genes and a unique personality. But astrology is alot more subtle then that. Its knowing what aspects and combinations of personality traits will be sure to point out one star sign for another.
Using broad personality trait words such as ‘brave’ and ‘adventurous’ can actually cause confusion. The most common question I always get asked is “Yeah but can’t you apply those words to anyone?” Of course you can – they’re broad words! But you asked me to describe Capricorn and then wanted me to do it in 30 seconds so what the hell do you expect? I could describe Angelina Jolie in 30 seconds without mentioning her huge lips and the fact that she’s married to Brad Pitt, and you could think she’s any Hollywood actress! But if you got to know Angelina Jolie, properly, and then spent a good amount of time explaining her to someone else who knew her, then you’d be more accurate. I could write pages about someones star sign – I could explain why they’re different to someone else they know with that star sign (because their moon is completely different) and why they get on with one Gemini and not another. In short, its a heavily complex subject. Nowadays people are so accustomed to getting ‘concrete answers’ done in a ‘concrete study’ by ‘concrete scientists’. They’re also used to getting it piped into their brains very quickly. Once something anomalous like astrology comes along, it can be much easier to brush it aside without really giving it any time, thought or research. The ability to really see people is important too. To see whats going on for them on many levels. Remember, you are your version of your birth chart – someone else on the other side of the world might have a very similar birth chart to you. After he or she is raised they might seem completely different to you in many ways on the surface. But I bet if you got to know them you would see how many things in common you ended up having!
I would love if some studies were done on astrology to prove what I am absolutely certain to be real. It makes me laugh when on a night out I can talk to a guy for a minute and then tell them their star sign. Recently I guessed right three times in a row and got called a witch! (One of the drawbacks… good reason never to tell people or indeed boys about this!!) But I do enjoy sometimes when I’m out for dinner and one person hears about it – once I’ve got one person down to a T, the rest of the drunken party starts shouting “do me, do me!!” I remember one time, I spent the whole dinner telling people about themselves and not much of it eating!

Overall, its near impossible to explain how much I can see astrology working in people, even though I come across so many examples every single day. For me, I feel its almost too much evidence! I feel overwhelmed by the evidence, and hence I never seem to find the right way to explain to disbelievers!

None the less, tonight I found some intesting quotes from Jung on Astrology… it feels comforting to know in all the times I’ve been misunderstood on this topic, that good old Jung was misunderstood too!

• While studying astrology I have applied it to concrete cases many times. … The experiment is most suggestive to a versatile mind, unreliable in the hands of the unimaginative, and dangerous in the hands of a fool, as those intuitive methods always are. If intelligently used the experiment is useful in cases where it is a matter of an opaque structure. It often provides surprising insights. The most definite limit of the experiment is lack of intelligence and literal-mindedness of the observer. … Undoubtedly astrology today is flourishing as never before in the past, but it is still most unsatisfactorily explored despite very frequent use. It is an apt tool only when used intelligently. It is not at all foolproof and when used by a rationalistic and narrow mind it is a definite nuisance. – C. G. Jung: Letters, volume 2, 1951-1961, pages 463-464, letter to Robert L. Kroon, 15 November 1958
• Astrology is knocking at the gates of our universities: A Tübingen professor has switched over to astrology and a course on astrology was given at Cardiff University last year. Astrology is not mere superstition but contains some psychological facts (like theosophy) which are of considerable importance. Astrology has actually nothing to do with the stars but is the 5000-year-old psychology of antiquity and the Middle Ages. – C.G. Jung in a letter to L. Oswald on December 8, 1928, in Carl G. Jung, Letters, vol. 1, 1973
• It is indeed very difficult to explain the astrological phenomenon. I am not in the least disposed to an either-or explanation. I always say that with a psychological explanation there is only the alternative: either and or! This seems to me to be the case with astrology too. – Carl G. Jung in a letter to Hans Bender, April 10, 1958, Carl G. Jung Letters, Volume 2, 1951-1961, p. 428.
• So far as the personality is still potential, it can be called transcendent, and so far as it is unconscious, it is indistinguishable from all those things that carry its projections…[that is,] symbols of the outside world and the cosmic symbols. These form the psychological basis for the conception of man as a macrocosm through the astrological components of his character. – Carl G. Jung
• Astrology is one of the intuitive methods like the I Ching, geomantics, and other divinatory procedures. It is based upon the synchronicity principle, i.e. meaningful coincidence. … Astrology is a naively projected psychology in which the different attitudes and temperaments of man are represented as gods and identified with planets and zodiacal constellations. – Carl Gustav Jung
• We are born at a given moment in a given place and like vintage years of wine we have the qualities of the year and of the season in which we are born. Astrology does not lay claim to anything else. – C.G.Jung

So I was having a Ross O.C.K moment…

“Why is there no ‘Exclude Tallaght’ button on Daft.ie?” That’s me, asking God why he can’t make house hunting easier for me.
“I mean if jobs.ie can have an ‘Exclude Agencies’ button, why not an ‘Exclude Tallaght’ button? And while they’re at it, they can also add an ‘Exclude Crumlin’, ‘Exclude Inchicore’ and and an ‘Exclude Kimmage’ button.
And where the hell is “Ballycullen” when its up and dressed?
These are places that daft.ie have all included in the their South City or South County Dublin category.

Oh. Come. ON.

Those places are WEST. South WEST. There is a massive diference between South West and South East.
I mean everyone knows KISS means Keep it South Side. But they should rename it “KISS… EW!” (“Keep it South Side… Except West!” ) to make it clearer, what with all the riff raff sneaking in.

The scariest port, is that I was nearly raised in Tallaght. The only thing that saved me was because my dad had an argument with the builder over a tiny piece of land in the garden (we’re talking feet… but my dad is Irish, we’re sensitive about people taking our land, however small the amount…) I mean Shankill was hardly a barrell of laughs to grow up in either. I couldn’t count the amount of times I’ve had rocks chucked at me, been chased home and set upon by a mob of angry girls trying to wrench a pack of John Player blue from my hands (no she didn’t get them, and yes I did kick her in the stomach and run off)… but at least we’re walking distance from Killiney. And the beach. The worst of the agro buzz people have grown up and its become an alroysh area over the years to be fair…

On another note, what the fock is up with estate agents turning their phone off at weekends?!
How dare they have a life when I’m looking for somewhere to live.
This country is such a pile of weird-balls… total mare, in fact.

Even Naked Gym Guy…

Even naked gym guy gets free minutes.

 

I’m quite surprised I’ve managed to write as many posts as I have and never touch on this subject before.
I choose to write about this now because its been highlighted a few times recently to me. You might say it has been ‘stripped’ down to its core, ‘exposed’ to the masses and that this will be the first time I will ‘bare all’ on the subject.
What to I mean? Erm, nakedness – to put it bluntly.
In the recent Channel Four documentary – “My Daughter the Teenage Nudist” they follow a load of teenagers planning to become nudists, or at least exploring the idea. It makes for occasionally uncomfortable viewing (when they go to the nudist garden full of old wrinklies and join in the naked party – ”darling you’ll love it!’ as though being naked together in a free love frenzy is just like trying the new orange flavoured kitkat) but overall, it opens your mind to that fact that nakedness doesn’t always have to be something to be ashamed of, or indeed a sexual thing at all – it can just be another  tool for ‘baring’ your soul and participating in freedom of expression.
For whatever reason people choose to do it (I won’t pretend to understand exactly why, I’m sure everyone has different reasons) having watched the documentary, it seems there is absolutely nothing seedy about the nudist scene.  
The nudist scene aside, as this can be rather extreme for the majority of us, most of us only enounter the naked issue in pools, gyms and at the beach.
Most Sex in the City fans will remember the episode where Charlotte won’t go in the sauna naked because she is self concious of her body. At one point she is talking to the girls and she says defensively, “I just didn’t grow up in a naked house!!”  
Everyone knows what Charlotte means!
Even if you did grow up in a semi-naked/naked house – you will always have a friend who comes from a more naked house then you do. And if it happens, that your family are in fact all nudists – or hippies who brought you up with the idea that clothes are only there to stifle you and pin you under the thumb of the capitalist regime, even then, you’ll know someone or have met someone LESS naked then your family and so this will be highlighted for you in the opposite way. Lets face it, we all know a prude, and we all know a naked nelly.
I mean for some its okay to walk around the gym naked. For others, its fine to take a naked bike ride. There are people who would  bare all in Tenerife for their weeks holiday every July.
Personally, I like many Irish people have grown up in a very ‘non naked’ house, where it was just the done thing to be covered up all of the time. In fact, I think the Meteor advert above, perfectly epitomises the general Irish view towards nakedness as a whole – not the guy with the towel but the fellas with the grimaces.

When I go topless on holiers, its on the sand dunes, like 3 miles from any living human eye.
As a result, I’m am the girl at the busy Irish beach doing the shimmy inside the towel (occasionally toppling over as I struggle on one leg trying to hide from the passing train) and in the gym the  person who takes her clothes into the cubicle for some privacy. I don’t think this is weird. What I think is weird are those people who strut around naked for like 45 minutes, just casually drying every part of their body and having long conversations with friends as they do… and as a friend of mine once highlighted a few years ago – putting body lotion all over themselves too? For me, not that I ever, ever, go to the gym or even swimming for that matter ( ha! its been over a year anyway…) but I just don’t get it!!When I went to university in the UK I encountered the naked behaviour even more. Sharing houses and flats alot with a whole host of new people all the time was novel. That said, although I did see a few strange things over the years, I actually found the British to be very similar to the Irish in their prudish habits. Its when you get into Europe mainland that it begins to change for the ever more naked.  
France and Germany are definitely more ‘open’ (translation: open = naked). My German friend might kill me for using her again for an article, but she’s just so perfect for this example. During my final year in university over in the UK I ended up living with her.  
She as a German, and me being Irish, we had such different attitudes to nakedness. While I was never prudish in the slightest about most things, such as conversations about sex for example, when it comes to simple things like changing clothes I usually was.
I had a walk in closet in my room (sounds cool, and in fact it was but I had the smallest room in the 9 bedroom house so that was like my consolation prize) and I would always go in there to change when I had friends in my room.
I was also the type of person to do the David Beckham dive and roll into my bed/to the nearest towel, should anyone inadvertedly come in to my room. My German friend had such a completely different attitude. I’ll never forget the first day it happened.
Her room was next to mine. “Knock knock knock” (Thats me knocking on her door)
“Can I come in?”
Loud, relaxed reply: “Yeah sure!”
I open door. Friend is standing there in nothing but a thong, tidying up around the place or doing something or other, I don’t remember what, I wasn’t really noticing what she was doing anymore.
“Hey honey, whats up?”
“Um….”
Avert eyes.
“Um….”
Fifteen seconds might have passed.
“I forget now….”
“Does my nakeness bother you?”
“No…. is just something I need to get used to I think….”
Suddenly remember what I came in for.
“Can I borrow your hair curlers?”
This routine continued for a while. Eventually, I literally didn’t notice. Just to emphasise: friend is NOT a pervert. She is just confortable with her body and being exposed. Is European. Its very, very normal for them to be naked and not bat an eyelid. Im surprised most of Paris and Berlin don’t just gadd around naked come summertime.

So anyway to sum up. I think its great if the whole world wants to go around naked. Just don’t expect me to join you.
Besides, its far too cold in Dublin for naked tea and biscuits by the fire, never mind a naked bike ride…