MEDITATIONS ON THE HOUSES OF ASTROLOGY: A PERSONAL WALKTHROUGH THE CHART

The First House

“We consist of everything the world consists of, each of us, and just as our body contains the genealogical table of evolution as far back as the fish and even much further, so we bear everything in our soul that once was alive in the soul of men.”

HERMANN HESSE, DEMIAN

My first house upon reflection of my Saturn Return (being in the middle of my 30th year) is in Cancer, The water living crustacean that holds ancient history and connection points of community. This last transit has me so grateful for social supports that I have leaned into outside of family. It is also the year that I discovered the work of revolutionary anthropologist Maria Gimbutas. Cancer in the 1st house for me has demonstrated a need for ancient connection, a meandering into the lost mysticism of the Hierophant in the Tarot. Except this time the hierophant is the High Priestess of the Cucuteni-Trypillian Culture, the cyclical and vulvic art of the Neolithic Thracian societies. The ones that the Romans called Barbarians…  

The first house according to astrology, which again originates in the ancient culture of Mesopotamia, is the house of the self. It is where the sign that arose on the eastern horizon of your birth nests into this sense of self. It also, as the ascendant of your personal natal chart, leads with the potential of your self. 

The closest word that I have for the first house is your inherent comportment and approach to life. For me as a first house cancerian, it is very intuitive and emotionally led. It took years for me to allow this Sagittarius heavy intellectual, to come to a place of feeling-driven intuition. As you can see, this ancient crab is still the factual academic seeker.  I can say that I am someone who cares, deeply. 

Despite playing into the societal game of hustle culture to survive - give me the cozy life with nourishing food, planning trips, and making a cottage home that is self sufficient but with access  to the internet. I for the longest time, because of my caring ways did not develop boundaries. When I first implemented them I said I was in my “villain-era.” When it was just the basic idea of not saying yes to every cry for help, organization, or volunteering. I believe it was the preamble to my Saturn return that I was diagnosed with with first stage cervical cancer (hindsight funny enough Cancer strikes). And the first thing I did after my diagnosis was cry looking out the window of the L train in Chicago on my way home. 

It was this time that I hunkered down and leaned into my herbalist training, learned what rest really was, and befriended death. The curiosities that I intuitively was led to, that I judged as being impractical or veering off my focused path of being a travel writer and consultant, were the medicine that I desperately needed to survive and recover. I am happy to say that as of this writing, I am cancer free. Yet, it is an active practice to live to my potential as a Cancer Ascendant. Again, that idea of potential. The potential to be caring, nurturing, and let the water and emotions flow not just for others - but for myself too. 

My curiosity and my degree from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago led me to discover the initial ancient symbol that I had been searching for in the background of my art practice for years. From my paternal grandmother asking me as a pre-schooler if I wanted some authentic folk costumes, to a complete assimilation into Western American culture, to rediscovering the neolithic origins of the symbols on traditional Romanian folk costume as I began deconstructing my Christian religious upbringing. 

By reconnecting to these Goddess figures I feel that my first house ascendant has been rebuilding this matriarchal divine energy that I had so matter-of-factly held around God. Water signs - Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces - are the intuitive signs of the zodiac and for me, religion and spirituality lie in the intuitive realm of life. I feel that the ascendant is also the public-facing potential that you embody in the world. This rekindling of the spiritual feminine energy in a post-modern Western society I feel is a balm of wisdom and ancestral wisdom. I do not know this Goddess well, as most of my education has been the Hellenistic and Christian adaptations of religious theology. Am I attached to transforming God into Goddess? No. I am attached to the kaleidoscope of openings to God. Why feel attached to any public sentiment about God, when the current zeitgeist turns away from God and holds a polarizing vengeful God type figure in modern culture. Let’s also not forget the atheists, agnostics, and reactive pagans…

Within my first house also lives the planet Mars, the God of War, and the feared Dacian barbarians - as the propaganda of the Romans state. Mars, or Aries, was known as the God of war and agriculture. I feel this kinship with Aries as a protector of those Neo-cyclical agrarian societies that we still are unearthing and learning about. When it comes to Cancer the association is to the Goddess Artemis, who from the more modern Romania and Greek tradition is associated with wild animals, the hunt, vegetation, childbirth, and the moon. I think if I would have looked at these collective myths sooner I could have found my purpose and focus more. This was the research that I was always drawn to - the myths, the meaning, and the cycles of history. 

I feel that astrology today is having a revival due to the depth and access to history it has. The way that it is used to judge someone’s personality from their sun sign or to guess someone’s sign is not really plunging into the rich depths and resources for reflection that is possible within the framework of astrology. There is a fluidity to doing inner myth work and research that is comforting to me. One of the biggest elements that I miss even with all my current education is this lacking of the classics of literature, origins, and of myths. Yes we heard of Zeus and Hera and Hercules from Disney, and even that was inaccurate to make it family-friendly, but if we had access to these myths and stories what could that open up in self-reflection? In invention? In community care?

This lack of cyclical awareness of time led me, and so many others to illness. To constantly be pushing, making, and hustling. I am ruled by the moon and Mars - my actions always will be cyclical. My artistic practice and business always is cyclical. Since 2008 I have developed care communities and educational resources to support autodidactic learning, using public resources that are accessible to all, and to following your curiosity as a value within your own life and community. 

What is within your first chart? Explore the planets, the histories, and mysteries. The potential that you have as ancestral depths that are meant to be uncovered and to invoke a feeling of wholeness. I hope the excavation proves fruitful for you and if you need a fellow guide to explore together reach out.

Works Cited

The Living Goddess. Marija Gimbutas.

https://www.britannica.com/summary/astrology#:~:text=It%20originated%20in%20Mesopotamia%20(c,civilization%20during%20the%20Hellenistic%20period.

Horoscopes and Public Spheres: Essays on the History of Astrology by Günther Oestmann, H. Darrel Rutkin and Kocku von Stuckrad Review by: Sheila J. RabinSource: Isis , Vol. 98, No. 1 (March 2007), pp. 172-173 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science Society Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/519093

The Second House