Humanistic, or person-centered astrology, developed by Dane Rudhyar over the past forty years, stands in contrast to event-oriented astrology, focusing not so much on specific external events, but primarily on the meaning of what is taking place. Astrology, conceived as a system, uses the cyclical movements of celestial bodies as symbols that convey to individuals immediate and practically applicable insights into the fundamental patterns structuring individual and collective existence.
As Rudhyar writes: “The essence is being able to see how everything that happens at any given moment fits into the overall pattern or structure of your existence.”
Those who perceive all of life as chaos and absurdity undermine human health and viability (as demonstrated by Viktor Frankl’s experiments). What a person needs most to be healthy is a sense of meaning. Consciousness is defined as a progression through a series of phases which, when interconnected, become a frame of reference for everything occurring in your life. To show a person the consciousness of their life—this is the most important thing astrology can do.
Astrology is significant because it can demonstrate that life itself lends itself to meaningful interpretation.
The reason for astrology’s poor reputation in scientific and academic circles over recent decades lies in the fact that most astrology (and nearly all popular astrology) continues to focus on predicting specific events rather than on the inner life of the individual.
A crucial step taken by Rudhyar’s humanistic astrology is the shift of emphasis from the external world of events to the internal world of personal experience and growth. Various “predictive” techniques, such as progressions or transits, still have their place in humanistically oriented astrology, but the significance of what these technical methods indicate shifts from deterministic and meaningless fate to a meaningful opportunity to experience and integrate new aspects of being. In other words, periods identified as critical (through analysis of cycles most significant for the individual growth pattern) are viewed as part of a larger pattern of growth and self-actualization. Thus, even difficult experiences acquire a positive, growth-enhancing personal significance.
Rudhyar explains this new emphasis in astrology as follows: “If you want astrology to demonstrate its genius, you must focus on what is unique in astrology, where it can provide the fullest meaning—this is the individual situation.”
What you are trying to understand is the meaning of the situation as a whole. The reason planetary positions are important is this: if you recognize that the universe is an organism in the broadest sense of the term, then everything occurring within a system of integrated activity has its place and function within that system. If you wish to understand a particular point in space-time within this system, you must consider it in relation to the entire system.
The integrity of the system is always in polyphonic harmony with the life of the individual who has emerged from the whole, becoming himself—a small whole, a small organism. Whenever something individualizes and separates from the whole, it remains part of the whole… The idea of astrology is to connect all functional activity of a person with ten primary symbols, or planets, each planet representing a certain quality of activity. Taken together, they form a picture of the person as a whole.
In his pamphlet “Astrology for the New Mind,” Rudhyar explains this point:
Each individual personality is a relatively independent organic whole, in which numerous forces dynamically interact with one another according to an originating and formative pattern that establishes its life purpose and its fundamental relationship to all other wholes in the universe. This organic whole—the individual personality—does not essentially differ from it. Indeed, the individual personality is one distinct aspect of the universal Whole, focused at a specific point in space and, from the standpoint of a specific need within it, at the precise moment of transition into autonomous existence.
Since, as Rudhyar writes, “the essential elements or primary impulses in every organized system are the same,” and since Earth’s people are part of the same whole as the planets in our solar system, we have a basis for creating a cosmic language suitable for a true mode of existence and functional pattern. In a lecture delivered at the American Federation of Astrologers’ congress, Rudhyar summarized what he considers the most important application of astrology:
“…to live a more conscious and more understanding life from the standpoint of a more objective awareness of the nature and relative significance of the basic factors structuring your life and the lives of those around you… this is the way of wisdom.”
Stephen Arroyo. “Astrology, Psychology & the Four Elements: An Energy Approach to Astrology and Its Use in Counseling.”
