I’m joining #dignitybabes astrologers on social media in exploring the collective myths (stories/theories) that support the traditional structure of astrology. note: the following is a life-time long personal storyline + complex concepts I am trying to summarize to contribute to a meta discourse so forgive any oversimplifications & feel free to ask questions. this is just the beginning of more I’ll be sharing on these topics this year.
for a long time I rejected hellenistic & traditional astrology because I didn’t really understand it but more-so, having to contend with the questions of fate & free-will scared me. coming from my context of abuse & lack of agency, I refuted anything that seemed to remind me of that powerlessness. I also was running away from how whiteness imposes structure & hyper-intellectualism even as I was running into how whiteness as hyper-individualism informed my spiritual & political praxis.
so I leaned deeply into prioritizing free-will & agency. I still center that in my practice, but I also recognize where my religious & patriarchal conditioning of false responsibility for other people & everything around me was prohibiting me from accepting that sometimes shit is just shitty. enter concept: it’s not my fault. this doesn’t mean it can’t be composted or transmuted but that possibility also doesn’t change that it just exists as is.
learning traditional astrology over the past few years & deciding to integrate it into my practice has helped me understand how structure is what supports freedom. it’s allowed me to engage with free-will more playfully & with fate more respectfully. the concept of essential dignities (what’s available to a planets needs based on the sign it is in) is a brilliant example of how accepting nuance & challenges can be generative rather than limiting.
it also presences the questions: how do we maintain our dignity while interacting with the ways oppressive constructs sneak into our practices (no matter the school of thought)? how do we integrate ancient wisdom while updating it with decolonial preferences? how do we maintain our dignity while interacting with the complexity of fate & free-will?
I think we maintain our dignity by accepting the response-ability to be aware & inquisitive about how we’ve internalized binaries, hierarchies, & supremacies. we maintain our dignity by understanding the origins of schools of thought & letting time talk to us through history. we maintain our dignity by questioning, discerning, & disseminating aged wisdoms. we maintain our dignity through an accountability of care that makes room for growth, truth, & the willingness to learn. we maintain our dignity by choosing to honor lineages & choosing curiosity over control. we maintain our dignity by reclaiming our power, sovereignty, & humility as cultivators and students.
I have learned & continue to learn so much about the false separation between the personal, political, & spiritual. my life is designed around intentionally reconciling those false separations aka healing. I am grateful for lineage like mine that supports these learnings. to name some: my Afro-Indigenous ancestors, Turtle Tank Freedom School, queer Black radicals, Grace Lee Boggs, adrienne maree brown, & the many known & unknown to me astrologers who have preserved this timeless tool.