Tracy Marks - Planetary Aspects: An Astrological Guide to Managing Your T-Square

OTHER BOOKS BY TRACY MARKS PUBLISHED BY IBIS PRESS

The Art of Chart Interpretation:

A Step-by-Step Method for Analyzing, Synthesizing, and Understanding the Birth Chart

Your Secret Self:

Illuminating the Mysteries of the Twelfth House

The Astrology of Self-Discovery:

An In-Depth Exploration of the Potentials Revealed in Your Birth Chart

Published in 2014 by Ibis Press

and imprint of Nicolas-Hays, Inc.

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Distributed to the trade by Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC

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Copyright 2013 Tracy Marks

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from Nicolas-Hays, Inc. Reviewers may quote brief passages.

ISBN: 978-0-89254-204-8 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-0-89254-595-7 (ebook)

Cover and text design by Kathryn Sky-Peck

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PART ONE:
UNDERSTANDING YOUR T-SQUARE

PART TWO:
HOW TO HANDLE YOUR T-SQUARE

I am a poet, a seeker and a confessor, obligated to truth and sincerity. I have a mission, albeit small and confined; to help other seekers understand and cope with the world, if only by assuring them that they are not alone.

HERMAN HESSE

B ecause I firmly believe that squares and oppositions are indicators of motivation, potential achievement, and consciousness development, I have written this book for people who struggle with contradictory and seemingly mutually exclusive tendencies within themselves, as indicated by the squares and oppositions of their natal astrology charts. Throughout the chapters of this book, I am specifically addressing the reader whose chart possesses a t-square configuration, a combination of planets, signs, and houses suggesting a pronounced strength or overemphasis, as well as imbalance and deficiency. Since everyone experiences the t-square configuration upon numerous occasions, because of the continually mobile influences of progressions and transits, the information on the t-square presented here can be applied to any person, whether or not he/she possesses a natal t-square; it is also of particular relevance to any person whose chart includes at least one square or opposition.

This discussion of the t-square configuration is basically a discussion of the conflicts and harmonies suggested by the astrology chart, and the process of constructively utilizing squares, oppositions, sextiles, trines and conjunctions, as well as developing the qualities of the planets, signs, houses and aspects which may be weak or lacking.

Any planet or sign can be expressed constructively by including within its expression an awareness of opposite or conflicting planets and signs. Oppositions can be synthesized and techniques for resolving oppositions can be applied to squares and other aspects or planetary combinations. A stellium, a house or sign emphasis, or an emphasized element or mode may operate like a focal planet; a house or sign opposing a stellium, as well as a deficient element or mode may present problems similar to the problems of the empty space of the t-square. Techniques presented here for use with the t-square can therefore be applied to other variables in the chart.

In the last chapter of this book, Becoming Whole, I demonstrate some of the techniques of integration presented earlierspecifically, the technique of giving voice to one's planets as if they are personalities, and allowing them to dialogue with each otherthis includes name calling, arguing, cajolinguntil some degree of cooperation is reached between at least a few planetary selves. The reader who wishes to experience the astrology map as a live map of psychological energies before more abstractly attempting to understand its dynamics and potential, may wish to read Becoming Whole first.

Becoming Whole is a somewhat autobiographical chapter. It was not originally written for this book, but was written spontaneously during the month of my Saturn return in 1979 when I experienced the power of my planets as live entities within myself. The process of giving life to them, and of allowing them to speak and dialogue, led to an internal transformation of energies that clearly altered the dynamics of my own t-square configuration, and precipitated a lengthy time period of substantial growth. Because of this, Becoming Whole, although written several years ago, still stands as an important illumination and insight into the conflictsand cooperationinherent in the t-square.

This work is a revised and expanded edition of Plantary Aspects: From Conflict to Cooperation, originally published in 1986. In the years since its publication, my understanding of the human psyche and the process of psychological change has continued to grow and evolve. In this new edition, I present my current thinking in regard to the dilemmas posed by the t-square configuration. In particular, I have added in-depth material on the t-square as it relates to the four elements. I have found, in contrast to Jung's theories, that oppositions in astrology do not pertain to superior and inferior elements (fire vs. earth or air vs. water). Oppositions suggest imbalances within the masculine (fire/air) or feminine (earth/water) sphere. The elemental energy that we most often express in a pronounced and conflicting way is the element represented by the sign of our focal planet. The chapter Your T-Square and the Four Elements addresses the complexities posed by the four elements as both constructive and conflicting expressions, and suggests several ways to balance and harmonize these elements.

In The Symposium, Plato describes how the gods originally created a perfectly whole, androgynous human being, one who was so self-complete that he/she lacked motivation, and defied the gods' orders to perform human tasks. As a result, the gods split this being into two selvesmale and femaleeach one now motivated to find the missing half in order to experience completion.

This myth clearly explains the cause of the attraction between the sexes; it is also a fitting metaphor for the incompleteness known to the t-square person, who is forever driven to find the missing piece. Incomplete gestalts act like magnets; the incomplete person draws to herself, as well as attempts to create within herself, the missing part which will help to alleviate the agonizing sense of emptiness, of hanging open, of feeling exposed, or raw and amputated. A person with a t-square may also feel fragmented, as if she has been torn into many parts by forces beyond her control, as a result of some deep-seated deficiency.

Squares and oppositions indicate splits within the personality that occur early in life. Failure to receive the right amount, kind and proportion of love/empathy and frustration (which, in appropriate doses, catalyzes growth), the evolving self is unable to retain its sense of unity, and to develop its capacity to integrate conflicting and often powerful drives. As a result, it splits into dissociated pieces. The t-square, in particular, suggests three splits, as well as a terrifying void. This void or empty space is usually related to some early trauma, which occurs at the time of the splitting, and which then leads to subsequent difficulties and deficiencies in this particular realm of life. Meanwhile, dissociated from each other, the three part-selves all develop their own specific behaviors and aims, without regard for each other, so that by adulthood the person experiences his t-square as pulling in three different directions, which seem incapable of coexisting. This pattern is often reinforced by the internalization of different and often clashing attitudes and actions from the parents and environment. Similarly, a person with a grand cross configuration experiences internal splitting, but instead of struggling with a three-way split, compulsive drive and a void, he/she is pulled apart by four planetary selves, and often feels paralyzed.