Dr. Peter Niehenke:
Lecture: Become your real self
Psychotherapeutic aspects of astrological consultation
Astrologers and psychotherapists deal predominantly
with people who are in a state of distress. This distress
can be of different types: professional difficulties,
health-problems, financial worries, partner problems,
feelings of inferiority, various concrete and irrational
fears, depressions, learning hardships - the list could
be continued in many ways.
Now how do the astrologer and the psychotherapist, respectively,
deal with these difficulties? How does each of them
believe to be able to help the person in distress?
What, exactly, is to be achieved by his corresponding
aid? Are there problems for which the astrologer is
more competent and others for which the psychotherapist
is more competent?
Many people will surely feel the need to spontaneously
answer this last question: "Yes, naturally!".
They may argue that financial worries or certain types
of professional problems are more likely to belong
to the astrologer's sphere of competence, whereas the
treatment of feelings of inferiority or learning hardships
is more likely to belong to the psychotherapist's.
This delimitation of the spheres of competence does
seem plausible at first glance. But are psychological
sorrow and a difficult fate really that different from
each other? I am well aware that most people feel that
psychological sorrows, such as feelings of inferiority
or learning hardships, are something originating within
themselves, having to do with their personality-structure,
whereas financial "misfortunes", for instance,
or other strokes of fate, are felt as something determined
by exterior factors, something that they have, in a
sense, become the victim of. The terms "misfortune"
and "good fortune" specifically have the
undertone of being something coincidental. But that
which happens to me "coincidentally" is not
completely "coincidental" in today's understanding
of the word.
Perhaps I can best explain this - using a personal experience:
Some years ago, a close acquaintance of mine stole
my checks and check card in my apartment while I was
out for an hour. I only noticed the theft three weeks
later due to my bank's statement of account which suddenly
showed a negative balance of DM 3000,-. Understandably,
I was very outraged, and after I had thought over who
alone could be responsible for the theft, I reported
the man to the police immediately. After taking this
step essential to the reduction of my possible financial
damages, I settled down and asked myself: If this experience
was a dream, if you had not really experienced it but
had dreamed it, how would you interpret this dream?
One way of deducing the meaning of a dream is to personally
identify with each figure or even with each segment
of your dream: "How would I feel, if I was the
armchair in this dream? And how, if I was the flowing
water?", etc. You are always only dreaming of
yourself, of partial aspects of your own personality.
In my case: In what way am I similar to this thief?
Expressed abstractly: Which aspect of my own personality
should I deal with shall I be made attentive to by
this drastic experience? This is not the place to completely
present the results of my self-analysis to you. In
any case, this reflection brought me into contact with
characteristics of mine that I had thought to have
already overcome. The way in which this man had fraudulently
presented himself to me as being rich reminded me of
my own tendencies to behave in a fraudulent manner.
It became clear to me that I was not that different
from this man, and that the difference between us lies
in the fact that I am paid enough respect that my fraudulent
tendencies do not come into play.
Novalis, the poet, says: Fate and soul (better: psyche)
are two designations for the same principle. Many astrologers
would more likely, in some way, feel themselves competent
for the fateful experiences or incidents that we are
"befallen" by. Many psychotherapists would
more likely feel themselves competent for that which
Novalis designates as the soul.
To endorse Novalis' conception that both things are
the same in the end, and to make this conception the
basis of your own work, is a matter of decision - in
the end, a matter of belief. The validity of such conceptions
cannot be proven stringently, of course - and anyone
who thinks it could be done might better first think
over what exactly makes up a proof.
I have decided to work from this assumption and to use
it as the basis of my astrological and therapeutic
work. For me, everything a person experiences is a
direct expression of his character. I have found that
it is prolific to approach my own problems and those
of my clients with this assumption as a basis. The
therapist's conceptions are only one element in the
course of a consultation, however. What type of help
does the client expect when he consults a psychotherapist
or an astrologer, respectively? What conception does
he have concerning the deeper reasons for his difficulty,
his distress? Does he expect something else when he
consults a psychotherapist than when he consults an
astrologer?
Here, again, at first glance, "Yes!" seems
to be the right answer. I, myself, also made a corresponding
distinction when I opened my practice as a professional
astrologer 18 years ago. As an astrologer I considered
myself a "diagnostician". My endeavours
were to make fitting and differentiated diagn >oses.
For example, it filled me with pride when clients,
after a diagnosis, stated: "Yes, that describes
me precisely! Nobody has expressed it that well before.
I couldn't have said it that well myself." - Whether
it was in the characterology sector, for which I felt
myself competent, or in the prognosis sector, which
other astrologers consider more important: Both are
diagnosticians! The diagnostician determines the
tendency a character or a situation has, or will have.
The longer I worked in this way, the less satisfied
I was with this method of diagnosis. Once a client
wrote me a letter after receiving a written report:
"Many thanks for your report. It was a great surprise
to me. It almost seems like a wonder, how precisely
you have described me.....After you have analysed my
strengths and weaknesses so precisely, I would ask
you to be so kind as to tell me how to deal with the
problems you have shown me." This request finally
showed me that I could not separate astrological work
and therapeutic work. At first I felt the desire to
tell the client that he should consult a psychotherapist closer to
his home. I had made the diagnosis: What I did not
have was an astrologically founded "therapy."
And I was no longer "naive" enough to give
advice reverting to "healthy common sense"
based on "tested everyday techniques" regarding
psychological problems (as most astrologers do in such
a case) being too much of a psychologist already.
The situation described above occurs often. It begins
when a client consults me with what seems to be a simple
request for detailed information: For example, a middle-aged
woman, married for 20 years, who has been left by her
husband, consults me. She asks me: "Will my husband
come back to me?" Even if I could give her a definite
answer based on my experiences (which is not possible,
of course!): Did she only come to see me to find that
out, or was that the reason at all? Have I really helped
her?
The justifiability of my doubts becomes clear with many
clients who continue with further questions of their
own accord: "Have I done something wrong? How
will I cope with the new situation? What will happen
now? What should I do?"
The client is looking for advice, for orientation. He
is suffering and is looking for a way to deal with
this distress, to avoid new, additional distress. -
He would like to feel better again. - At this point,
the initial situation for therapists and astrologers
is identical: Both are faced with the question what
is to be done, and, in my view, also with the question
how to justify their own treatment or advice. If I
want to help, I must know my objective: What can my
help change? When can I consider my help to have been
successful?
For a person who thinks in a direct and straightforward
fashion, this question may seem pointless. He may think:
"If the client feels better afterwards, then the
help was all right:" Unfortunately, it's not quite
that simple! Picture a patient having trouble falling
asleep: He gets sleeping pills from the doctor and
he feels better. As time goes by, he gets used to the
pills and needs stronger doses all the time until he
ends up being addicted to the pills (a hypothetical,
extreme, but not entirely improbable case). Perhaps
financial worries were the cause of the sleeping problems
or there were problems with his marriage. Resolving
these problems would have provided a lasting solution
to his sleeping difficulties without any "side
effects".
It is a question of choosing the frame of reference:
In this case, the doctor, in my words, had a purely
physical, a physiological frame of reference. For him,
sleeping disturbances, to put it in simplified form,
are the result of an excessively active vegetative
nervous system, which he tries to correct with chemical
methods. Within his frame of reference, this is a consistent
and sensible decision - his help is effective, after
all. This frame of reference sees the body predominantly
as a functional sytem, and human suffering, be it physical
or psychological, is essentially the expression of
a disturbance of this very susceptible system. If psychological
suffering should be something different from a functional
disturbance in the chemical set-up of our body: What
is it, then?
The question regarding the nature and causes of human
sorrow has been answered in very different ways in
the different epochs of human history: revenge or even
capriciousness of gods, God's punishment for immoral
behaviour i.e. for violation of his commandments, in
eastern cultures: karma, in our times the aforementioned
conception of a functional disturbance which may have
to be seen in connection with the so-called heredity,
but also development disturbances during early childhood
or else "wrong learning" that was more or
less coincidentally carried out.
Even that which is actually to be seen as sorrow has,
in various periods of our history, and, in various
societies, even today, been assessed differently: Let
us consider the position of a woman in oriental countries.
Let us just consider the lack of love in a marriage,
the "side-by-side existence" (as they often
call it themselves); this lack of love was a self-evident
truth in the purely functional marriages of the middle
ages. There, it was still common for the parents to
choose the marriage partner for their children. The
"love marriage" is an invention or achievement
of the last 2 or 3 centuries. Today, however, this
in former times natural situation often leads one or
both partners to consultation with a psychotherapist
or an astrologer. But even within our present society,
yes, even among those people whose profession is the
cure or alleviation of human sorrow (e.g. doctors and
psychotherapists), there are, as indicated before,
no uniform ideas regarding the nature and causes of
human sorrow, the therapeutic methods and possibilities
or even the goals that are to be attained by such therapy.
When asked what the goal of analytic therapy was, Sigmund
Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, answered that
the patient would be able to "love and work"
again after a successfully completed therapy. To actually
achieve this goal means a lot in reality, more than
many might feel at first glance. To be able to enter
a meaningful and satisfying relationship based on partnership
and to allow this high degree of closeness to a person
to develop, requires inner stability. But, much of
that which is called love should better be called "reciprocal
satisfaction of one's needs", perhaps also "reciprocal
soothing of anxieties": anxieties regarding financial
distress, sexual frustration, etc. The fact that I
need another person is too often mistaken with the
fact that I love him. Being needed and being loved
are two different things, in my opinion, however.
Similarly, the capacity to work requires a high measure
of inner orderliness. At least in those cases in which
I don't mean the work which I am required to do, even
if I must force myself, but when work means the capacity
to "serve" a purpose. Only an inner orderliness
allows me to bring up enough energy for such "work",
energy which would otherwise be used up for the solution
or, in the more unpleasant case, for the suppression
of inner conflicts. The route that leads to the goal
of being able to "love and work" againis
the psychoanalytic technique for Freud. Essentially,
its aim is to make subconscious things conscious: The
patient learns to consciously deal with his subconscious
motivations (!) and anxieties, which otherwise were
withdrawn from control by his conscious self. He is
then no longer the one driven by inner powers or impulses
which he can't understand, no longer the victim, but
an active, and thereby mature, adult person.
To preclude this possible misunderstanding:the goal
of any therapy is NOT to make an unhappy person into
a happy one. Even a therapist cannot make the facts
that make me unhappy disappear. What he can do was
expressed by Sigmund Freund in approximately the following
way: Neurotic sorrow is to be changed into normal human
sadness.
To be able to deal with his subconscious motivations
consciously, the patient must, as a first step, be
able to admit and be aware of them. This perception
generally involves certain anxieties, e.g. of being
a "bad person" with inclinations and desires
of this kind. Due to these anxieties, perception is
suppressed and the subconscious impulses can only be
expressed in distorted or symbolic form (e.g. in dreams).
The therapist, who has experience in the mechanisms
of distortion and symbolic coding of subconscious subject
matter, helps the patient with the interpretation of
his subconscious utterings and thereby helps him to
understand himself.
In broad outlines, this is how Sigmund Freud sees the
causes of psychological sorrow and the method and goal
of a therapy for this sorrow. Completely different
are the conceptions concerning causes, methods and
goals of the so-called behaviour therapy (a term developed
by the psychologist H.-J. EYSENCK). For behaviour therapists,
psychological sorrow, in simplified terms, is the result
of wrong learning processes, among other things. These
wrong learning processes lead to "unsuitable"
behaviour that is inadequate for the existing conditions,
and that usually leads to negative, listless results.
Such behaviour can be corrected in the same way that
it was formed, by learning: Learning new behaviour
or re-training. Another reason for the development
of such behaviour can be the adherence to (in this
case) harmful behaviour since it leads to the desired
results in another case. The behaviour has the appearance
of being "disturbed" since the connection
can neither be comprehended by outsiders nor by the
person involved himself.
If, for instance, a female client consults a behaviour
therapist and complains about difficulties making acquaintances
or about loneliness, then the behaviour therapist may
first analyse the form of making contact and may then
possibly practise other, more efficient forms of making
contact. On the other hand, he may discover during
the analysis that the client receives deep pity and
consolation from her mother regarding her loneliness,
which may be of great importance to her if, for example,
she does not otherwise receive much affection from
her mother. For the psychotherapist, the mother's affection
is a form of reward for the loneliness, a pleasant
result from a harmful situation which, on the other
hand, encourages the upholding of the situation. Depending
on the case, the therapist may speak to the mother
and ask her to react to all her daughter's future attempts
to make contacts with the same affection, but to treat
her daughter's feelings of loneliness more neutrally.
So far, we have got to know three ways to understand
human distress: The doctor might have given the client
referred to an antidepressive medium if she had consulted
him; an analyst might assume that the daughter subconsciously
feels her mother's real or imaginary (in technical
terms: projected) jealousy when she makes contact with
other people and that her difficulties in making contact
are rooted in the quite childlike fear of losing her
mother; the behaviour therapist sees it simply as a
matter of practising more efficient forms of making
contact.
How would we see it as astrologers? How do we see psychological
distress? In what way can we alleviate this distress
in an astrologically founded fashion? Are there any
such methods?
I believe that there is no uniform conception about
the nature of human distress among astrologers either;
there is definitely no uniform astrologically derived
conception of how to help people in distress. There
is not even agreement on what the horoscope "actually"
means, what type of message one can derive from this
graphically depicted configuration of the planets that
was in existence at the moment of birth.
There are, for example, the "total fatalists",
who go so far as to claim that a person's every step
can be derived from the horoscope, if only one knows
the correct method and calculates precisely enough.
Apart from the fact that these astrologers, in my opinion,
do not take the difference between the symbolic meaning
and their corresponding concrete equivalences into
account (each astrological symbol is ambiguous in respect
to the concrete real-life situation that it relates
to), the question always remains unanswered, how such
"schedules of fate" are to help those seeking
advice. Must they not feel powerlessly passive, at
the mercy of a train whose destination only the astrologer,
at best, can tell them (as he believes)? To the question:
"What sould I do?", such an astrologer can
only give one logically consistent answer: In any case,
only those things will happen that are destined to
happen.
Since nobody has been able to make this assumption convincingly
plausible to me, I have in any case decided to reject
it, since it is so fruitless, among other reasons.
It takes the responsibility for my own fate completely
out of my hands. Due to this, though, it also takes
away my motivation to do anything but to let myself
drift.
By far the greatest number of today's practising astrologers
actually does not see the horoscope as a "schedule
of fate", but as a structure diagram that reflects
the construction of my "basic character",
coded in symbolic form. Looking at it this way, the
horoscope is a simile, and there is an infinite
number of concrete realities in life, concrete experiences,
concrete facts that can "comply with" this
simile. But, even though there is an infinite number
of concrete realities in life that correspond to this
simile, they are nevertheless not "arbitrary"
- to immediately counter any possible objection against
astrology. We can also sketch a triangle in an infinite
number of ways, what we sketch still does not become
arbitrary: A triangle is still something different
than a rectangle! I like expressing this circumstance
in the following way: The symbols of astrology refer
to a "meaning" that certain facts have for
the life of a person, not to the facts themselves:
As an example, the symbols do not directly refer to
the money itself, but to that, which the money "means"
to the corresponding person; for instance they can
refer to his relationship to financial security or
to the role that material or also intellectual property
plays in his life. Similarly, applied to a different
field of interpretation, not to the "professional
change" itself, but perhaps to the search for
a new leading motive, the desire for a different social
position, the desire for an increased scope of vision
or whatever meaning a change of profession as a fact
can have for the client in a concrete case.
I believe that most seriously practising astrologers
will agree with this conception of the nature of the
horoscope. And I also believe that something can be
derived from this conception concerning the nature
and the deeper causes of human distress. As I described
above, Sigmund Freud distinguishes between two types
of pain or distress. He says that psychotherapy's goal
is not to make an unhappy person into a happy one,
but to change neurotic distress into normal human sadness.
In an analogy to this wording, I would distinguish
two types of human distress in reference to the horoscope
also: I will call one the "healthy", and
the other the "unhealthy" type of distress.
In my opinion, the type of distress that we feel in
the form of an illness, as a "disturbance",
the unhealthy type of distress, results from the fact
that I deviate from the basic character expressed by
my horoscope, that I deny it, suppress it or simply
reject it!
There are very many reasons for such a suppression or
rejection of a person's basic character. A clearly
plausible example is the situation of a woman whose
horoscope shows a strong Mars component, or the situation
of a man whose horoscope contains a strong Venus or
Moon component. In a society in which a strong separation
of the sexual roles is carried out, as was the case
in our society until recently, an overly sensitive
man with an emphasis on feminine characteristics or
an overly robust woman with an emphasis on masculine
characteristics must feel inferior, since neither of
them can fulfil the prescribed sexual roles projected
onto them, unless it is done through self-denial. Mind
you, this price is generally paid.
So the situation can lead to myself personally rejecting
my most inherent character. In my opinion, it is immediately
plausible that such a rejection must have painful consequences
for the corresponding individual.
There is, however, to get to the so-called "healthy"
distress, a certain measure of pain in every life that
lies in the necessity to cope with the unavoidable
limits to the satisfaction of my desires that exist
- with the so-called frustrations, in other words.
Coping with such challenges of fate is a healthy pain,
since it promotes growth and maturity. The greater
part of these limits is likely to result specifically
from my basic character, as it is represented by the
structure of the horoscope. I refer back to Novalis:
Fate and soul are two designations for the same principle.
The actual unhealthy pain often results from this distress
specifically due to my attempt to avoid this pain,
which would mean for me to deviate from my basic character.
In this correlation, let us not forget that it is not
the fact as such that counts, but the meaning that
it has for me. Not the incident itself hurts, but my
pain relates to something that is triggered in me by
the incident.
Even the death of a close person triggers different
types of pain in different people since the death of
a close person can have different meanings: It can
be the goodbye, the final goodbye that I must say to
him - it can be a type of compassion that he must depart
this life now - it can be an expression of my fear,
since I am reminded of my own death by this experience
- it can show me the transitoriness of all that I cling
to, and, in this way, lead to a complete new orientation
regarding my values - and, finally ... it may even
be that we are happy to see the person dead - we all
know that! But the pain can also be coupled with my
inheriting and becoming rich. The death of a close
person can mean all this to me, and the pain, or the
feeling that I experience, receives its tone from this
meaning.
What can I derive from this characterization of human
distress that allows me to help people that are in
need?
If the horoscope reflects my basic character, and if
the assumption is correct, that a disowning, suppression
or rejection of my basic character represents a source
of distress, then the maxim of astrologically founded
therapeutic work is that which I would like to call
"reconciliation with my own basic character"!
One can express this circumstance in various ways.
In the known American astrologer DANE RUDHYAR's (1)
words, the horoscope, for him, represents an "instruction":
It does not say what someone is like but what they
should be like! One could add: Should be like to be
or live in harmony with his basic nature. In other
words, this means: Be who you really are!
It makes a big difference whether I see a horoscope
as a character depiction that shows me the actual state,
that helps me analyse my strengths and weaknesses,
as the client mentioned above said it in his letter
to me, or whether I see it as the outline for something
towards which I should develop, as something that I
should strive towards.
The difference is obvious: In this case, there is nothing
in the horoscope that I would have to avoid, weaken,
or even keep a particularly watchful eye on. On the
contrary: Every aspect of the horoscope designates
a part of my self-development that has a right to be
carried out, that must be carried out, so that I am
"intact", i.e. complete and living in harmony
with myself! In this way, the horoscope is not a "schedule
for my fate", but a guide-line for my self-realization.
This first determination of my astro-therapeutic maxim
is a little general, I must admit. The astrologer who
is experienced in interpretation will have a number
of serious reservations at this point. After all, there
are configurations in the horoscope whose voluntary
realization seems to border on masochism. At the end
of my lecture, I would like to attempt to distinguish
clearly what the transposition of my maxim means in
practice with regard to configurations traditionally
considered "critical".
The example refers to the topic of the 12th house or
field. Let us use the description of the 12th house
by the doctor and astrologer H. Freiherr von Kloeckler
(2) as a starting point: "In this house, tendencies
are expressed that easily lead to outer inhibitions
and isolation. If the house is strongly emphasized,
the outer effects are accompanied by psychological
restraint, aversion and, in some cases, antisocial
or criminal tendencies and inclinations. Distress and
the sensitivity for the "theme" distress
are mostly very pronounced, physical and psychological
illnesses are expressed by the planet positions of
the 12th house. In the overcompensation of these restraints,
social inclinations and tendencies are developed that
result in removal of distress for me in general. The
12th house is, for example, usually a significant structural
element in the chart of a doctor, a welfare worker,
etc. Strong disharmonic configurations in the 12th
house indicate a considerable burden of fate and almost
always lead to a certain isolation, to illnesses but
occasionally to disastrous compulsive deeds and to
moral dangers that are mostly difficult to overcome,
since the self-insight into these areas of nature seems
to have to fight against the greatest difficulties."
That is the end of Herr von Kloeckler's quotation.
As can be seen in a number of phrasings in this description
of the 12th house, it results from descriptions of
typical, concrete equivalents for the astrological
symbol: 12th house, based on experience. The description
has a diagnostic approach, and, for it to be useful
therapeutically according to our maxim, one must convert
it into an "instruction".
It is clear that this instruction cannot possibly contain
a regulation concerning concrete behaviour, since that
would not do justice to the symbolic basis of the "instruction",
would be one variant of fatalistic conceptions. The
instruction can, of course, only refer to "basics";
in the end, it refers to that which the configuration
"actually" means.
Here, we are in a dilemma: How are we to determine what
a configuration "actually" means, when we
always only see concrete realizations of this configuration
in certain specific people?
I see 3 ways, in which we can come closer to the "actual"
meaning of a configuration bit by bit: To start with,
we can carefully examine the diverse concrete realizations
for a certain principle. This has always been done
in astrology, and the well-known key words have developed
that, for the 12th field. for example, are enemy, opponent,
sorrow, prison, tribulation. We can now continue to
try to examine the more detailed circumstances that
have led to the determinations such as enemy or prison,
in the hope of finding a common principle, possibly
the common denominator of all these different equivalents.
Trying this the 2nd possibility that I see helps us:
The structure, the build-up of the astrological system
itself shows us one specific method: The 12th house,
for instance, is at the end of the house cycle, it
belongs to the 4th quadrant, which is close to the
collective, it is related to the pisces sign of the
zodiac. We must attempt to let the "pictures"
speak through which astrology has been handed down
to us and to let ourselves be "moved" by
these pictures, to "attune" ourselves to
the language of these pictures. Some can do that better
than others can, that is true in all areas of life.
In this way, we may be able to suspect or feel what,
for example, the 12th house means and be able to relate
it to our observations.
In the end, we still have the client himself, if we
let ourselves be led by him, encourage him to admit
the things that he feels, even if they may frighten
him. In this way, we can gather experiences on how
a configuration manifests itself in an individual that
considers himself stable and has the feeling of being
in harmony with himself and how differently the same
configuration manifests itself if we are dealing with
an unhappy, distressed individual. We could even use
ourselves as a test case in this situation.
In my opinion, the 12th house symbolizes needs and impulses
of a person that are related to the collective of all
people, probably, in the end, to the genus of the human
being. Somehow this house has a proximity to the victim:
The giving up of self-centered needs for the benefit
of collective needs or requirements.
What the 12th house could mean became clear to me abruptly
thanks to an animal film I saw on TV some years ago:
This film dealt with a mysterious march that crayfish
undertake every year on the seabed. A group of divers
tried to accompany the crayfish on their march to study
their behaviour.
The crayfish were marching in queues of approximately
20 individuals each, in single file. If a diver approached
the group from the rear, the last animal stayed behind
to oppose the supposed attacker. The group marched
on. Only if the danger became larger, the whole group
would form a circle and hold their claws outwards for
their protection. The commentator explained that this
animal in the final position protects the group at
the risk of its own life and often loses its life thereby.
It sacrifices itself!
I deliberated how the animal might overcome its survival
instinct. Since it surely doesn't do this due to moral
considerations, but instinctively, this "sacrificial"
urge in the animal must be stronger at that moment.
Instinctive actions are something automatic, but this
automatism is usually satisfying, eases tension and
is pleasure-orientated, as a rule. The animal behaves
in a simple fashion: It fulfils itself, to use a term
related to humans. It fulfils itself by sacrificing
itself for the group! Self-realization and destruction
of the individual are identical to each other here.
The same applies to the basic character of a person,
that its realization, its fulfilment is "pleasure-orientated",
that it is connected with the feeling: That's the right
way! A strong emphasis on the 12th house presumably
means a strong impulse in the direction of "sacrifice
for the requirements of the group" for the individual.
That is the reason why so many people with jobs in
the welfare area are found there.
In our society, the term "victim" has an unpleasant
connotation, though. The spirit of our times is related
to individuals, and such needs seem incomprehensible,
if not unhealthy. But not only for others, even for
the individual himself, his needs are incomprehensible,
possibly even frightening, and he may defend himself
against them. This defense can go so far as to convert
the impulse, to give himself up for others, into its
exact opposite, then we have the criminal quoted by
Freiherr von Kloeckler, who takes more than he is entitled
to.
But the strange thing about the basic character is that
it has a strong yearning for realization, and that
pure suppression or denial does not take away its power,
the power is only "stored". Prison or violent
self-destruction can perhaps be understood as distorted
forms of realization of the original impulses just
described.
From case to case, the conveyance of such thoughts to
the client requires a high degree of empathy, since
the attempt to explain to a non-receptive person that
his problems would disappear if he could give in to
his need to sacrifice himself for others can only meet
with a lack of understanding or aggressive refusal.
For this reason, I often word certain impressions from
the horoscope as a question during the consultation:
"What is your impression of people who sacrifice
themselves for others?"
"What do you mean by that: sacrifice? Do you mean
martyrs?"
"Yes, we can call them martyrs, for example, in
this case."
"I find them dreadful! No fighting spirit! Somehow
something like that makes me feel sick."
Someone who has the sun in Aries in the 12th house might
answer like that. I might continue by asking what is
so sickening about these people, and would, in this
way, attempt to let him discover this part of his character
himself.
Psychologically speaking, the process I am describing
is the discovery and assimilation of that which C.
G. JUNG calls the "shadow". The "shadow"
encompasses all the parts of my person that I cannot
stand, to put it simply. Least problematic are those
parts of my person that I am aware of and nonetheless
reject. More difficult are those parts of my person
that I reject so strongly that I am afraid to admit
to them belonging to my person.
C. G. JUNG showed that it has been expressed in various
ways in mythology and in fairy tales already that we
can only become healed if we can integrate our shadow,
if we can identify with it, if we can accept it, yes,
if we can love it. One example for the pictorial expression
of this knowledge is the fairy tale about the Frog
Prince: The princess must not only let the ugly frog
into her bed, she must even kiss it. But if she does
so, the fairy tale teaches us, then the ugly frog turns
into a good-looking prince.
We must learn to love the dark side in us, only then
can it show us what enormous potential there is in
this part of our person also, and how important this
part is, so that I can live in harmony with myself.
For me, as a therapist, the great difficulty lies in
the fact that I, also, am involved in a process, and
that many of my clients' shadow figures also instil
me with a sense of fright, that I cannot accept many
impulses myself and then cannot accept them in my clients
either. How should he learn to love his shadow with
my help if I reject this shadow for the same reasons
he does?
Here it shows that both as an astrologer and a therapist,
I only can accompany a client to the point which I
can reach free of fears myself. With my help, a client
always only reaches the point to which I have developed
myself. This knowledge commits both the astrologers
and the psychotherapists to work on themselves constantly.
A psychotherapist's training includes the personal completion
of a psychotherapy. There are good reasons to demand
this for astrologers, too.
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