Christopher Renstrom - Using Astrology to Get in Sync with Your Best Life

In 46 BC Julius Caesar changed the world. He had been invited to a dinner party on Queen Cleopatras barge and found himself seated next to one of her court astronomers, Sosigenes. The two men became absorbed in conversation and were inseparable all night. The discussion was about calendars. The Roman calendar had been a mess for decades. It was based on the Moon, so intercalary months needed to be added every eight years in order to align it with the seasons. Although lunar calendars were commonplace throughout the Mediterranean, Roman priests had been adding and subtracting months willy-nilly to extend the terms of politicians in office they favored and shorten the terms of those they disliked. Indeed, their manipulation of time was wreaking havoc on shipping, commerce, and tax collecting.

Sosigenes suggested switching over to the Egyptian calendar, which was based on the Sun. Centuries earlier the Egyptians had calculated that it took the Sun 365 days to return to the place in the sky where it was at the spring equinox. He demonstrated to Caesar that by dividing the year into twelve monthsone month of 30 days alternating with another of 31he could create a consistent year of 366 days and then reduce February by one more day in order to sync the calendar to the Sun. That way, instead of having to add or subtract an entire month every eight years, all Caesar had to do was add one day to February once every four years. This was the origin of the Julian calendarnamed after Julius Caesar, of courseand it standardized timekeeping throughout the republic. Sundials and obelisks (both Egyptian inventions) soon became all the rage as Roman citizens were able to clock for themselves the time of day, month, and year. Moreover, this change of calendars gave birth to Western astrologywhich had been based on the Moon since the twilight days of Babylon and would, from Julius Caesar on, be based on the blazing Sun.

Your birth chart is a calendar. One thats unique to you because its a picture of the heavens at the moment of your birth. You can think of it as a screenshot of the skyyour skyand this individualized star map will guide you throughout your entire life. It tells you when you are in season or out, and whens a good time to start a venture or think better of it; it shows you grace periods where you can breeze right past obstacles and it gives you a heads-up on future rough patches where you can expect resistance. And like the calendar, this can all be done according to the Sunwhich is why its so important to know where the Sun is in your birth chart. Not everyone was born with the Sun shining overhead. Many of us were born when the Sun had already set. People born in the early-morning hours arent going to be like people born in the late afternoon any more than people born in the middle of autumn are going to have the same outlook on life as those born in the spring. This book will also describe your individual elemental temperament as depicted by the planets in your birth chart. This will be easy for you to understand because everything relates back to the Sun. The Sun represents you in your birth chart, and we will be using it as the You Are Here planet throughout this book.

You will need a copy of your birth chart and for that you will need to know your birthday and year, birth time, and birthplace. You can download a copy of your birth chart from my website: RulingPlanets.com.

If you dont know your birth time, then use 12 PM. Astrologers often use noon as a default time because it still gives a general idea of where the Moon is. You may not be able to distinguish if youre a day or night birth, but at least youll get a list of the planets for your birthday and that will still allow you to use this book.

Identify your Sun sign (you can do this by looking up your birthday on ).

Find your season: Are you spring, summer, autumn, or winter?

Whats your mode: Are you an unstoppable force? An immovable object? Or are you the one trying to make an impossible situation work?

Are you a day or night birth? This is significant because if youre a nighttime birth, then the Moon is going to be just as important as the Sun in your chartmaybe even more so.

Whats your elemental makeup? This is what really unpacks the birth chart. The four elementswater, earth, air, and firedescribe the cornerstones of your personality: your emotional life, material welfare, social skills, and spiritual beliefs. Based on the seasons, the four elements are rarely evenly distributed in a birth chart, and how they work with (and sometimes against) the Sun speaks to your temperament.