natal chart navigation for cosmic jellyfish
wayfinding + astrology
an important note: sharing this piece just happens to be lining up with a fundraiser auction taking place this week to support the daily survival and eventual evacuation of the Abu Dayer family in Palestine. i’m auctioning off a 1-hr natal chart reading through Resonance Institute, and there are many more goods and services from all over the country and overseas. please see the end of this post for more information.
isn’t it incredible that we can stand upright, anchored to the earth by gravity, moving at 67,000 mph around the sun and we can’t feel it? that what the experts say anyway. but sometimes i wonder if we can feel it.
i’m no physicist, but what if our comparatively microscopic ant bodies do experience the impact of that profound amount of torque force? perhaps in the spine or the sacrum or at the base of the skull? and what if the spinning thoughts of the mind are the result of our overwhelmed psyches spiraling through outer space?
the deeper my relationship with spirals, the clearer it becomes to me how utterly difficult it can be for us to find our way. and that’s without considering the fact that everyone we encounter is struggling to do the same. if everything changes, and if we are in relationship with change, with the layers of poly-force spirals of the seasons and the moon and daytime/nighttime and our circadian rhythms and the planets, is there any place we can catch a damn break? although i’ve found that it balances out in the long game, change can be exhausting. and i sometimes long for something, anything, to stay still.
in the incomplete list of the constantly shifting spirals above, we can thank the birth chart — and dna! — spirals for being a static force. amidst all of the constant change in the poly-spiral multiverse, your birth chart doesn’t change. it interacts with the current sky, but it’s a static map, maybe a fingerprint even. and since it offers us information about our elemental natures and relationship to the cosmos, i like to think of it as a recipe of the energies simmering in the alchemical cauldron of our unique frequency. like if our personal resonance could be visually distilled in some way, the natal chart could be one way. and it’s an ancient way, with similar cross-cultural approaches around the globe.
valuing stillness is of course the primary reason i spend time in nature, on the floor, and in meditation. and as the dial on global polycrisis turns up, i’ve continued to seek out tools to navigate the constant stream of completing contradictions and polarizations of the mind. the most helpful path i’ve found for living in less crazy-making liminality is by moving in the direction of creative intelligence, towards resonance in my daily life.
that sounds simple. it is so not. it is so very not even when we’ve shaped helpful conditions for it. and before i had created more hospitable conditions for myself, i was living out of tune, so far away from my frequency. i needed help finding my way back. breath and mindfulness, internal family systems, developing Self leadership, and embodiment practices were paramount in helping me re-attune. another incredibly helpful guide was learning about my astrological natal chart.
the natal chart, also called a birth chart, is a snapshot of the sky, of the stars, of the planets and their placements at the time and place you were born. most people know their zodiac sun sign. this information comes from a birth chart. and awareness about rising and moon signs seem to be growing. but these relatively simple lenses of astrology flatten what is in fact a much more sophisticated and complex sky system of placements and relationships that can offer some helpful, gentle guidance for wayfinding. our charts can teach about the masks we wear, what we need to keep our light lit, what specific planets might influence us, what elements and alchemy can support elemental rebalancing, and may offer insights about what you’re transcending and moving towards in this lifetime. it can teach us about the depths to which we are different and unique and the depths to which others are different and unique from us.
even though it was not part of my family’s culture, many of my friends growing up had their birth charts read by astrologers at some point in their lives. in Eugene, OR the new age wave was strong and white and tended to exclude equitable perspectives of cultural and racial diversity, but astrology’s roots don’t begin there. and i’m continually inspired by the way members of the global majority are reclaiming an embodied indigeneity with a return to wayfinding like our ancestors did. old technologies have modern and futuristic implications.
personally, i’ve always been fascinated by astrology, and the it’s always made sense to me. energies affecting energies feels like a clear formula, and of course we are impacted by forces in the universe. in high school i used to debate with my parents about the existence of God based on quantum theories about energy and emerging research on the god particle. when i was a kid, i would wake up in the middle of the night with a strange embodied sensation of my body expanding and contracting simultaneously, something i understand now as a quantum body experience.
i’ve always understood our natal chart to be an energetic imprint from the moment we arrive in the world. in the womb we’re still in outer space ocean. we’re in limbo land. and when we’re born, we have our first energetic encounter with the world out here. every season, every day, every moment, every place has a different energetic quality to it. watching summer sunsets feels different than the feeling of trudging through a winter ice storm. a full moon puts my dogs on high alert. the morning is slow compared to the early afternoon bustle. — vibes. and those vibrations, those frequencies make something of an imprint on us when we’re born.
natal charts support a deeper, personal understanding of multiplicity. inside we are a system of parts, after all. and a natal chart can offer us insight into the way mars might be stoking a warrior fire in our psyches. or show you the way that a predominance of the air element in your chart brings a constellation of intellectual, knowledge seeking parts of you to the surface. parts work and astrology are an exciting dual-force for navigating the beautiful mess of being human.
it should be noted that to read a birth chart, astrologers need to know the exact time and place you were born. as a second gen adoptee, i’m sensitive to the reality that not everyone has access to this information. in a culture that seems more and more interested in astrology, i imagine this could be a tender spot of othering.
there are also different house systems that can change the way your placements appear in your chart. thinking about astrology as a perfect science or system to manage your life is not that helpful to begin with. but when i’ve encountered contractions in my chart through different house systems lenses, i ask myself what feels most resonant. that’s the whole point anyway — to be able to begin to feel and sense for yourself where and how you would like to orient to yourself and others through this one life. information in a natal chart can conjure various levels of resonance at different times of your life. it is not intended to be the wayfinder. that’s your job, my stardust friend.
astrology is not meant to be taken literally or become a single lens through which to view yourself or others or the collective. i’m sometimes troubled by what i notice as a hyper-fixation on astrology. i can sometimes be this way myself. but to be honest, the more i learn about astrology, the harder it is for me not to think in terms of planetary influence and energy. but it’s meant to be more like checking the weather. it’s good to know that there’s a heat wave coming, and you also have to release thinking you know anything for certain.
in my quantum world where i am a jellyfish floating through liminal outer-space ocean, i often imagine my birth chart as a compass guide for returning to our inner resonance. our frequency extends along our center, outwards around us like an expanding and contracting energetic donut. the alchemical vibration that each of each uniquely offer to the world is something we must actively attune to. that attunement can look an infinite number of specific ways, and we can develop personal practices to help us do that. some are simple like breath and embodied movement. but many are behind the veil of predatory and harmful systems that are threatened by our inner and collective resonance.
many don’t think about the practice of astrology as an act of resistance. but one of the most disruptive things we can be in a culture of consumption and exploitation is to be ourselves. it’s scary to be yourself, to break rules, to take risks, to not abandon yourself to conformity and the pressures of a culture that wants you to be faster, better, more productive, more beautiful by some arbitrary standard, more easily put in a box. we often need tools to help us return to ourselves, and learning about your natal chart may be one of those.
this week i am auctioning off a 1-hr natal chart reading in support of a fundraiser for the Abu Dayer family in Palestine. you can read more about their story below.
if you would like to support the auction, you can learn more at my friend Joon Ae HK’s Instagram here.
if you would like to bid on the natal chart reading, you can comment on the post here with your offer. bidding starts at $50 for a service valued at $150.
