Life’s Skills, Tasks & Paths

A couple of months ago, I saw the following question on an astrological Q & A board, and it stayed with me. I have edited & rewritten it for space:

“Someone is born at a particular day & time & place, and he/she will therefore have certain talents/gifts/characteristics, and even challenges. This person will use the characteristics/gifts/talents he/she was born with and honed through life, believing these attributes were all tools meant for the application and preparation of a single task. How can we prove astrology is helpful during one’s journey, but not prove what the journey IS? Could this be a possibility? Please explain why we cannot find the “task” in the chart, but we can find everything else?”

Would that be wonderful? Would getting a precise set of instructions make life better or easier? Sometimes when I am at a loss and unsure of my direction, my “task,” if I could just get a specific set of instructions it could remove so much of the worry & discomfort I feel choosing how to proceed when facing the future. And yes, even with all my skills, experience and abilities as an astrologer, I can still look at my own chart and say “Now what?”

I know there are some astrologers who profess to have figured out precise techniques to pinpoint exact timing for specific events, and sometimes the research is pretty impressive, but this is always done after the fact. They will show you, say, 15 weddings and 15 precise matching planetary positions, but this is simply poor research. I would rather see 15 precise matching planetary positions set up before anything happens, and then let us watch 15 weddings take place exactly as predicted.

I do not believe in exact, to-the-letter predictions, because I do not believe in “fate.” I am on the side of free will. I think astrology can give you general directions unique to you, and then you choose what to do with them. I can give 15 people with strong artistic abilities a sheet of paper and one pencil, and I can predict we will get 15 pictures, but they will all be different, even if I told all of them to draw the same thing. They all have “artistic abilities” but they are not going to produce the same picture. They will make choices.

The person who asked the question above used the term “task,” but I see the word as a little limiting. There is no singular “task.” Let’s use “path” for now. Picture it as a wide path with many other paths branching off from it. In my own chart, I see my North Node in Capricorn in the 10th house indicating a need to work in the direction of my career in a public and responsible way, in some capacity as a teacher or authority figure. Other things in my chart indicate an offbeat spiritual & creative direction. I have chosen to become both a professional astrologer and a commercial artist. Both of those things satisfy my path’s basic requirements, but either one alone could have. And writing this blog is another facet of satisfying that path. Or I could have become a person who taught painting as a spiritual path, or perhaps a psychotherapist who specialized in counseling people in the creative arts, or…or… or…

Yes, the “path” is important, but what is also important for one’s personal evolution and growth is HOW you choose to go down that path. The creative use of free will is very important… otherwise we would just be robots following programming, wouldn’t we?