Need some help learning/mastering midpoints

Not a waste of time . . .

Nothing about the learning process is a waste of time. We all ask questions before we take the time to find answers, it is part of the excitement we find in astrology. And, you will find that you will ask the same or similar questions over and over again as you become more proficient and explore other areas and levels of astrology.

Ebertin's descriptions of midpoint combinations are strongly "event oriented." I don't use midpoints as a primary astrological approach to charting. I do use them within other systems of charting such as various types of return charts. As with any interpretive effort, you have to work within the CONTEXT of the subject's life at that point in time.

As an example:
** Moon-Saturn combinations for a young person need to be nuanced to reflect family environment and structure, the condition of the parents relative to providing a home and security and guidance.
** Moon-Saturn combinations for a teen-ager or young adult might relate to rebelling against learned family values and reflect a more assertive and immature approach to the challenges of establishing one's own identity.
** Moon-Saturn combinations for an adult can cover a broad range of issues. Again, the context of the person's life will help you apply a better interpretation. ** Dealing with an aging parent might be one situation. Bridging the gap between yourself and a grand-daughter might be another area of concern. The expectations of a spouse who is older or younger than you, and who has a different set of social expectations would be a severe contrast to deal with. Having a partner who was suddenly going through intimacy issues due to an illness, trauma or family influence might arise. All of these could change the way an astrologer assesses a situation.

Relative to Ebertin's use of HARD ASPECTS.
His studies, and the affirmation of the many thousands who use midpoints, demonstrate that the hard aspects represent challenges and crises, excitement and action, situations that "come to a head." In the midpoint system, there is little difference between an actual conjunction, opposition or 135 degree angle in terms of their interpretation.

However, when working with conventional chart wheels, I always look for direct midpoints, patterns that visually depict one planet in the midst of two others. The eye becomes adept at "seeing" these after awhile.

Now, your last comment was.
"my comment: aha, so this is way of doing fine analysis of a chart. First one looks at individual planets and their role (traditionally this would be done by analysis of sign, house, dignities etc), then combinations of planets (formed by aspects) and once that is complete, then midpoints to evaluate 3 planets at a time. The assumption of this theory is that a midpoint of two planets is a sensitive area - I haven't seen any justification of why this should be true, but if you treat it as an assumption, then the rest of the theory makes sense."

This is correct, but it may be overly complicated. Although the learning process is helped by spending an hour or two examining a chart, one finds that the sooner you are able to move away from such a deep and comprehensive approach to working with a chart (or several, many charts) the better off you are. Simplicity comes with experience. Keep that in mind as a goal !!!

When I do a chart for someone I glance at the chart to see its overall shape, if there are any unusual aspect combinations or placements that stand out. I make a mental note of them but do not immediately assess them. Using phase relationships such as those promoted by Rudhyar in his 'Lunation Cycle" or Marc Robertson's "Engine of Destiny", i look at the Sun-Moon for character and personality, Moon-Saturn for family structure, Mars-Venus for poise and self-expression, Jupiter-Mercury for awareness and intellect, Jupiter-Saturn for social contact and managing one's life, and Saturn-Uranus for the development of individuality. It only takes a minute or two to grasp the essence of these patterns. Then, I look for the strong aspect patterns in the chart -- BOTH those that reinforce each other AND those that contradict each other. Contradictions point to stress points that shape character. All in all, I only spend five or ten minutes looking at a natal chart.

My next approach, and this reflects the way I work and not the way you should work, is to look at Return charts that cover the subject's current life. I'm always interested in what is happening and why. This is where Ebertin's midpoints come into play. His planetary meanings are especially appropriate (often right out of the book) to events, situations, actions and attitudes. Forget about the measurement of placement and the 90 degree wheel. Just use the interpretations to fit the chart's two combination and three combination patterns.

So, for me, simplicity means a quick look at the natal chart to grasp the general expression of the subject, gaining a sense of context for the subject's life via discussion or news reports, etc., and then using a Return chart and derived daily charts to assess the current life. The type of Return chart has to fit the nature of what you are looking for. This is true of any form of astrology. The right chart for the work at hand. Dave

good advice, dadsnook

and greatly appreciated.
Though I am young in astrology study, I am old in years, and so any advice that saves time (of which I don't have much left lol) is greatly appreciated!

dadsnook2000 said:

When I do a chart for someone I glance at the chart to see its overall shape, if there are any unusual aspect combinations or placements that stand out. I make a mental note of them but do not immediately assess them. It only takes a minute or two to grasp the essence of these patterns. Then, I look for the strong aspect patterns in the chart -- BOTH those that reinforce each other AND those that contradict each other. Contradictions point to stress points that shape character. All in all, I only spend five or ten minutes looking at a natal chart.

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This is pretty much the same place I came to after many years of working with natal charts. I think of it as a gestalt approach, trying to see the "big picture" pattern in the chart before getting down to specifics; you can tell a great deal about its main themes in a very short time. I suppose Marc Edmund Jones and Dane Rudhyar had more to do with that than anybody. I consider every natal chart to be an individualized matrix or personal mandala containing the promise of that particular life, and all the different ways of progressing it show the manner and timing of its realization. A Zen corollary might be to "Admire the shape of the fruit before you start peeling it."

As Dave says, no learning exercise is a complete waste of time. Even if you learn that what you tried to do doesn't work, you have learned something and will modify your approach for the next time.

I tried to learn Astrology on three separate occasions, one in my late teens, once when my daughter was born, around ten years later, and once when I was made redundant in my early fifties. On the first two occasions I tried the planet keywords, the planets in signs from a cookbook and the planets in houses from a cook book. I even tried aspects but ended up with reams of paper and very little understanding. What is more, my reams of paper were covered with psychobabble and that was the complete opposite of what I was hoping for.

My third attempt produced much the same outcomes and would have led to the same conclusion but for a more determined standpoint, a willingness to invest in books and, most importantly, a willingness to take on a distance learning course. The benefit of that, in hindsight was that it introduced me to Astrology as it was practiced before the psychologists got to it, and therefore outcomes, which if still producing too much paper, were at least free of psychobabble.

As Dave says, eventually, experience teaches you to recognise important patterns (not necessarily aspect patterns) and to recognise these largely by simply inspecting the chart.

I no longer destroy rain forests on my way to identifying salient features and indeed may not even make any notes at all, holding those salient features in my mind. The notes relate to what I'm trying to predict.

That isn't to say that houses and signs are unimportant and what matters is aspects. Signs modify planets but it's quite easy to learn whether this enhances, restricts or does nothing to the nature of the planet. Houses give not only a way to identify whether planet are 'busy' or 'largely inactive' and where, in terms of a person's life they are likely to manifest.

Aspects give an indication of whether a planet's role in a chart is influenced by one or more other planets. What you are looking for is whether that influence is 'good' or 'bad' in terms of the person's life experience. Clearly 'good' and 'bad' are value judgements, that is they are subjective or opinion; nevertheless people have a strong predilection for seeing life in terms of 'good' and 'bad' events both at the time they happen and in retrospect, when their view may have changed. So a Venus/Mars event might be seen at the time as being 'good' because we met a person we fancy both have too much to drink and have amazing sex. However this might in the long term prove to be 'bad' because our spouse finds out, we end up with an acrimonious divorce, large alimony payments and possibly lose our job because we struggle to deal with the to pressures of the divorce and start to hit the bottle. If Mars is in a dominating square to Venus in the twelfth and it's a day chart, as an Astrologer, we might already have concluded that this aspect isn't going to produce a good effect in the long term. all other things being equal.

Most of the time, a client (or friend or family member) isn't interested in their psychology. They already know that, or at least enough to satisfy them. What they are interested in is some facet of their life. So there's little reason to go into detail about their life as a whole in order to answer their query on their employment prospects in the next six months. Those other areas can be ignored, unless there's clear evidence that their significators are involved in employment or income issues. For example, if the ruler of the seventh house is in the tenth, then relationships will be in someway linked to career. If that initial link also involves an aspect then we may have some idea whether that link is likely to be beneficial or not. That is the reason why we need the chart as a whole and need to have done our initial quick examination. It is of course also a reason why we should never make a judgement on partial evidence.

So to come back to the main point. I will only now do a detailed examination of an area of life if I'm asked for information about that area. Some areas tend to be asked about only rarely, others more frequently. I'm sure you can guess what they are, simply by looking at a chart wheel. But when that rare area does come up you should have the techniques to analyse it and those will involve secondary charts or tables. Those enable you to go beyond, say 'siblings' as a general area to what a person's sibling is doing now and how their actions may impinge on your client's current situation.

So don't try to analyse the lot at the outset. Familiarise yourself with the key features and then only explore areas in detail if you need to.

A question for Minderwiz

Minderwiz said:

The benefit of that, in hindsight was that it introduced me to Astrology as it was practiced before the psychologists got to it, and therefore outcomes, which if still producing too much paper, were at least free of psychobabble.

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This is my goal now (astrology without the psychobabble and focused on concrete events and outcomes). Any books (or better, book sequences) you'd recommend? (courses are not practical for me)

Thanks in advance,

RohanMenon said:

This is my goal now (astrology without the psychobabble and focused on concrete events and outcomes). Any books (or better, book sequences) you'd recommend? (courses are not practical for me)

Thanks in advance,

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Read as widely as you can. In your Harmonics thread I've mentioned two UK sources of books; the Wessex Astrologer and the Midheaven Bookshop. Both are excellent in that they cover virtually all approaches.

In your Harmonics thread you mentioned the ninth harmonic in Jyotish, whilst I assume that you want to explore Western Astrology, don't forget the Indian version; especially as there's a strong argument that it was influenced by the very earliest form of Western Astrology; Hellenistic Astrology (which is also event oriented but has a psychological component - obviously pre-Jung)

Virtually all of Western Astrology up to the end of the nineteenth Century was event oriented but was forced into a more character based approach by the laws on fortune telling.

A slim volume that you could try is Ben Dyke's Traditional Astrology for Today: An Introduction.

I'm not suggesting that you take up the Tradition but this book gives a good contrast between the ways Astrology used to be practised and how it's practised today (by the psychologists).

Look for hints and tips in Dave's approach. It's very different from mine but that's what you need at the moment - a diversity of views sharing the same idea - Astrology's purpose is to predict real events, be they for a person, for a nation or for natural or man made entities. I've done a thread somewhere on the sinking of the Titanic and Dave's done threads or posts on companies and other institutions.

You might also try books that look at the history of Astrology. Holden's A History of Horoscopic Astrology is an excellent account of 2000 years of ideas. Nick Campion has an equally excellent but much more expensive two volume set. These will tell you about how ideas and practice changed and why; enabling you to put the modern in the context of the past. You can get Holden from both of the online bookshops I mentioned but it's cheaper at the Midheaven Bookshop (check international shipping costs in both cases)

Exactly what I wanted Minderwiz,

Minderwiz said:

A slim volume that you could try is Ben Dyke's Traditional Astrology for Today: An Introduction.
...

Look for hints and tips in Dave's approach. It's very different from mine but that's what you need at the moment - a diversity of views sharing the same idea - Astrology's purpose is to predict real events, be they for a person, for a nation or for natural or man made entities. I've done a thread somewhere on the sinking of the Titanic and Dave's done threads or posts on companies and other institutions.

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I already have one of Dave's books, and the second is on its way. I'm ordering Dyke's book right away.

"Astrology's purpose is to predict real events" - I can't agree with this enough.

Much appreciated! Thank You.