Astrologer meets client

[Guest guest]

Dear All, The following message is from:http://www.rudolfhsmit.nl/a-meet2.htm. Please not that this site is AGAINST astrology and considers them selves as siding psychology and erroneously and foolishly assumes that psychology is a science. =========================================

 

 

 

From www.astrology-and-science.com

Click

here to return to home page

Astrologer meets client

Tricks of the trade

Jacques Halbronn

An abridged translation of L'astrologue face a son client: les ficelles du metier

2nd edition, Editions de la Grande Conjunction, Paris 1995.

Abstract -- The present emphasis on tradition, techniques, and

speculation, should be reduced in favour of making astrologers more

aware of what happens during a chart reading. Astrologers should not be

deceived by the apparent success of their experiences. Such success is

due not to any inherent truth in astrology but to their strategies and

tricks of the trade, or what scientific researchers would call

artifacts. We should avoid training astrologers who become entrapped by

bad habits. Article is illustrated with ten cartoons.

Preface

This work is about astrological consultation and tricks of the trade.

For you, astrology may now lose its magic. But astrological consultation

is more a massage of the client's ego than a message from the stars.

Tricks of the trade are necessary to keep the client happy.

There are three parts -- the underlying astronomy, astrology as

knowledge, and the consultation itself -- with a postscript on teaching.

The text is addressed to astrologers and students of astrology. Ten

cartoons drawn by Larissa Halbronn to my captions illustrate the key

issues.

 

 

 

 

1

Client: I have a life without meaning.

I need a model I can identify with.

 

Astrologer: I have a model that does

not correspond to anything. I need the

experience of life to give it meaning.

 

1. The underlying astronomy

Astrology as divination could have developed without the stars. But as

an organised "speech encyclopedia" it had to have an organised structure

based on astronomy, which continues today. But what men say does not

have a source in the stars. Astrology merely imposes a cosmic dimension

on what is happening. An astrological speech introduces the stars via

the birth chart into an environment in which they are normally absent.

The birth chart is both your badge of authority and a necessary

component of astrological speech. Today this trick of the trade is

calculated by computer, which avoids your becoming too emotional about

it. It also makes you look erudite in a field that is not strictly

astrological. The jargon, the cabalistic signs on paper, its actual

validity, none of these matter provided the client is led to believe

that the service you provide depends on the care you have taken in

preparing his birth chart.

If necessary you must of course display your knowledge of astronomy,

even though this is mere rhetoric, for you are not concerned with

astronomy as a science, only with astronomy as something to distinguish

you from the fortune-teller. What matters is your public image, what the

client perceives. Without astronomy, the astrologer is naked. You are

purveying a reassuring well-regulated universe whose truth is good or

bad to hear, a parallel world that your client wants to be truer than

the real world.

An important part of the trick is your attitude to astrology. You must

understand that astrology is a means of communication, not a source of

knowledge. The chart tells you only that your client shows an interest

in astrology and is open to any speech that pretends to be based on

astrology. So the important thing is not your ability to read charts but

your ability to exploit this interest. You must understand why people

want to believe that such an irrational tool can allow a certain psychic

intimacy. Your aim is to be trusted by your client as an astrologer. As

we explain below, there are many more tricks for achieving this.

 

 

 

 

2

I have spent 3 hours on this chart. I know

this person as if I had known her forever.

 

Who cares if what he says is true or not

-- I just love the way he talks about me.

Such intimacy! I could almost believe it!

 

The need for precision

Nowadays the computer has made astrology calculations accessible even to

those unable to add up a grocery list. This precision is a valuable

trick. It provides a focus to distract the client from more serious

deficiencies. It is a little powder around the eyes necessary to

maintain credibility.

Another trick is to discuss the precision of time, the nature of time

zones, and so on, in front of your client so that he smells confidence

in your abilities. For example you need to point out that although

France for one century had only one time zone except during the

Occupation, the hour in Strasbourg in the east is not the same as the

hour in Brest in the west. The task of finding the "true" hour hidden

under time zones, daylight savings, and other compromises is highly

symbolic for the client, who sees this as further reinforcement of your

abilities. Of course the more books you can consult the better for your

image.

Customer satisfaction is further improved by your finally managing to

complete his cosmic portrait. Even though it is not yet interpreted, the

fact that it is now known is already a moment of philosophical

significance and a great psychic relief. It prompts the client to see

you as an all-knowing astrologer even if you have no skills.

The freedom to manoeuvre

Until now, the trick has been to emphasise precision. You now tackle the

question of combining the various factors. You stress that there are

many factors to choose from and many ways they can be combined, so the

reading of a topic can vary from one astrologer to another, and also,

for the same topic, from one client to another. The tricks here are

numerous.

For example you can make it known that house position is not as simple

as sign position. Not only are there differences between house systems,

it is generally allowed that a house influence can extend beyond its

cusp. Against this sudden imprecision you can mention that aspects are

not a concept invented by astrologers. They can be found during

centuries in the treatises of astronomy, where they make it possible to

locate one star compared to another. And so on.

Your freedom to manoeuvre allows you to configure the topic to your

advantage without letting the client know, because you have the

privilege of "forgetting" to interpret any particular factor. This trick

is especially valuable. It is normal to use it constantly.

 

 

 

 

3

Please sir, just tell me, which

astrologer is suitable for me?

 

Her question is OK. But which

method should I use to answer it?

(He can use stars, clairvoyance,

tarot, I Ching, dice, hands...)

 

2. Astrology as knowledge

Here we enter the scientific field where our message is addressed to

astrologers who wish to avoid mystical interpretations.

Clients want to know what parts of astrology are reliable. Some

astrologers believe this cannot be known because astrology cannot pass

systematic examination. Some even think it necessary to inform their

clients of this. We disagree. We think you should behave as if you had

extraordinary knowledge along with your astronomical and mathematical

luggage.

The trick here is to use whatever reliable knowledge you have,

supplanted by the panoply of astrology. Here a planetary typology is

useful because it looks rigorous and scientific, and need not be based

on the birth chart. You merely identify the planet that best matches the

client.

For example, if you reformulate the findings of Michel Gauquelin, you

can allocate Saturn to the organiser, Moon to the artist, Jupiter to the

leader, and Mars to the controller. Or you can simply rely on current

language, where Mars people are martial, Jupiter people are jovial, and

so on. Or you can match planets to age, where faster planets are the

first part of life, and slower planets the second..

This matching of planets to what is already known is an infinitely

better trick than using signs, which have the defect of not satisfying

tests of validity. Better to use something that cannot fail than use

something devoid of any utility except that your client knows about it.

It is also better to present as specific for your client that which

applies to everybody, since this will spare his ego.

 

 

 

 

4

With your Mars retrograde in Gemini

it is normal for you to have problems

in communication.

 

I don't understand a word but it seems

very exact.

 

Signs and houses

Signs and planets are well known to the cultivated layman, but houses

make sense only to the initiate. For example why should the 8th house of

death be above the horizon? Nevertheless houses are an indispensable

trick because they allow a whole range of activities to be mentioned

when no particular question is asked, thus reinforcing your claim to

extraordinary knowledge.

Despite what we said above, the client often requires you to say more

about signs. But once again this can be done without approaching the

birth chart. Thus the sign can be seen as the need for membership, not

for individuality, which is the birth chart itself. That is to say, as a

model to be followed rather than a reality to be explored. In astrology

you have to be pragmatic.

The act to expect

Astrology as we conceive it must evacuate a great part of its

traditional postulates. This means that you should not explain your

working methods because your model may then seem too general and too

simple. Your claim to extraordinary knowledge will be eroded.

We must always distinguish between nature and nurture. To us the birth

chart cannot be a viable scientific reference even if it remains an

excellent focus for conversation. Nevertheless you will locate your

client within the cosmic framework, which will require the various

indications to be combined so that individually they disappear, leading

to a Harlequin suit, a costume made up of all the individual colours.

But here we leave the scientist for the artist, for you have an

embarrassment of tricks for mixing the colours and making them gleam in

front of your client. It is a question of alluring the client with a

drop of Bull, a slice of Lion, a pinch of Capricorn. The cocktail is

made ready to drink.

You must explain to your interlocutor that it is never a case of Lion or

Scorpion with clean characteristics. You must scramble the tracks, note

the contradictions, play the subtle planetary mixtures, and choose

whatever best fits the client. In this way a discreet mixing will enable

you to avoid the reproach of uniformity and generality.

 

 

 

 

5

Please drink this little cocktail of planets

and zodiac made specially for you, which

nobody has tasted before.

 

This is a nice change from tested mass

production. It is good to absorb something

special once a year. But if it has not been

tested how can it be trusted?

 

3. The astrological consultation

Here we arrive at the final stage, the intelligent management of

astrology. Our first two parts are frankly not useful enough to provide

the consultation your client awaits, even though they contain the tricks

needed to confer a certain legitimacy on your actions. What matters now

is your ability to engage personally with your client while preserving

your horoscopic frontage. You have to avoid appearing too general and

not specific enough, yet you want to focus on overall truth rather than

individual truth since it is much easier and safer.

The astrologer is not a soothsayer even if perceived to be one by the

client, regardless of what you say. So it is at the same time necessary

to be and not to be. You need to be an actor who acts in accordance with

the popular image of the astrological profession, one that promotes

divination, while strenuously avoiding it. A true dilemma!

 

 

 

 

6

I am using this lady to test my

new theory of Jupiter transits.

 

What I like about astrology is that

it never changes over the centuries.

 

Astrology as language

Of course you have to learn a certain astrological language, but only as

a foreign language is learned. It is not itself truth, only a means to

be better heard by your client, a means of saying the same things

differently for better or worse. To release yourself from a certain

intellectual terrorism, you have to speak astrology but not think

astrology.

You have to say more than can be seen in the birth chart, but in such a

way that the customer has the feeling of being in good hands, as when

calling a client martial or jovial, even when this does not correspond

to anything in the birth chart. You must deform the astrological

language and make it serve his impressions, so it is merely a way of

saying things and ceases to be an access to a transcendental knowledge.

Do not forget that your client will read into whatever you say as if it

applied only to him. So do not search for specifics but instead try

general philosophies that he can build on. In this way he will know of

what you speak! Do not send your client on a "great adventure"!

 

 

 

 

7

Madam, everything I tell you is

in your chart. I invent nothing.

 

I love people who do not blurt out

whatever is on their mind. (She does not

realise she is now a prisoner of her chart.)

 

Profile of the client

You should learn as much as possible about your client so you need not

rely on astrology to give answers. On one side of the table is the

astrologer who speaks astrology, on the other side is the client who

speaks his problems. What the client wants is not astrology but relief

from his problems. It is an antiseptic, if not dehumanised, situation.

In short, the client needs protection against astrology. He needs to

explain his request for astrology so that you can deal with it in terms

of psychology. For example some event may have happened to explain his

attraction for astrology, and knowledge of the event may be more helpful

than knowledge of astrology.

Profile of the astrologer

You are not there to project on to astrology your own problems or to use

it as a means of personal expression. You are the priest of a religion

in need of close supervision. And you need to be credible. Here certain

tricks are at your disposal. First, you must admit to using certain

basic methods, shared with others, before claiming any originality.

Next, you should not crush your client under a flood of words. Just

because he came to you with a certain aim does not authorise you to go

beyond what was wished or what was imagined, wrongly or rightly. The

only thing that matters is client satisfaction. You are seen as someone

with particular assets that could possibly justify confidence. You are

the interlocutor of the last chance before despairing of living in the

world.

 

 

 

 

8

So madam, this is your portrait when

you were born, your life story, before

society puts its imprint on you.

 

Alas, I have changed a lot. I'm not

Dorian Gray.

 

Profile of a consultation

First, make sure you can be seen to deliver what the client wants. A

certain minimum behaviour is needed to persuade your client that they

are dealing with traditional astrology. So receive your client

surrounded by astrological symbols and complicated documents. Be warm,

be smiling, and do not hurry the preliminaries. If they are well carried

out, the remainder will follow easily.

Remember that the client needs the strangeness of your astronomy and

mathematics and extraterrestrial links, to agree to listen to you. Just

receiving the birth chart can be more decisive than its interpretation,

see Part 1. But the birth chart cannot tell you about a client. At best,

it merely provides a focus that allows therapy by conversation to

proceed, in the same way as the idea of previous lives might do.

Another trick. The astrologer should not be as negative as his client.

It is vital for you to have a positive philosophy that will cope with

the client instead of leaving it to astrology. Without imposing morals

on your client, you are there to reconcile him with the world of men,

not to reconcile him with the stars. In fact you should here ignore

astrology altogether.

So start by talking about the problems of living, its loneliness, its

uncertainty, and anything else that you have found to apply generally to

clients. Stress that, thanks to astrology, such problems are well

encircled and solvable. Start a conversation and keep it going until

feedback is occurring. That way you will know in advance what the client

wants to know and what the answer should be. You do not want to be

dependant on astrology..

Of course, you avoid giving this impression, and you avoid giving the

impression that you have done it all before with other clients. Your

client needs to feel special. Once his confidence has been obtained by

your general attitude, astrology can gradually grow blurred, leaving you

to focus on the feedback. Soon you and your client will be closely

joined in a dialogue, and astrology can mostly be ignored except as a

convenient means of changing the subject.

In this way, by excavating the past, your goal is not to prove the

validity of astrology but to locate the traumas that will reinforce his

interest in astrology. The unknowing client will see this as exorcising

his past, leaving him free at last and very satisfied with the

consultation.

 

 

 

 

9

My astrologer is going to tell me who

I am and what is going to happen, which

are things I have no idea about.

 

I hope she understands what I am saying

because I certainly don't.

 

Postscript: Teaching astrology

What of those who wish to teach? The difference between consulting and

teaching is quite distinct. In consulting, the client receives

information in a more or less passive way, and there is generally only

one meeting. In teaching, the pupil actively wants to learn and ask

questions, and there are generally many meetings. In the former the

relation is with an astrologer, in the latter with astrology. In both

cases it is advisable to respect a certain appearance. The teacher must

thus have the same luggage as described in Part 1.

Just as the client wants the astrologer to have extraordinary knowledge,

so the pupil expects astrology to solve the mysteries of Man and Life.

But because astrology cannot do this, it is important to resort to

pretence. You pretend that the fit between chart and person (which can

always be found even if they are unrelated) is remarkable and striking.

You pretend that any interpretative failure is the fault not of the

stars but of the astrologer. Such pretences prove exceedingly positive

for the dynamics of the course.

Astrology is mainly an imaginary science. It is a pseudo-competence

resting on tricks of the trade. To us, many teachers seem dangerous,

irresponsible, and unconscious of what they convey, because their

personal relation with astrology is too strong. They are a fanatic of

astrology. They see reality where there should be pretence, so they lack

antidotes. They should revise their values and give up their naivety.

The problem is that the majority of astrologers are unable to hold such

views. For twenty years we have organised conferences devoted to

rebalancing their views, but with little effect. The paradox is that

such rebalancing would establish their detachment and credibility. Had

they been trained properly in the first place they would not have

developed such bad habits.

We plead for a homeopathic low-dose astrology, whereas most astrologers

give their clients and even more their pupils an extreme high dose. We

should avoid training astrologers with bad habits who become trapped by

situations for which they are not prepared. Astrological consultation is

more a massage of the client's ego by an involved caring astrologer than

an all-knowing message from the stars. What matters is the astrologer

not the astrology.

 

 

 

 

10

Strikes, paralysis!

No mail, no public transport!

 

It's all due to Saturn!

 

Further reading

Alexander C. Rae. Bluff Your Way in Astrology & Fortune Telling. Revised

edition, Ravette Books, West Sussex 1992. The way to instant erudition

without having to know anything. Has "enough details to pass yourself

off as an expert and to allow you to charge extortionate fees for your

readings."

From www.astrology-and-science.com

Click

here to return to home page

=========================================Love and regards,Sreenadhai