"What hogwash!" he said, only he used a different word. "When you screw up your life, you blame astrology, like you had no choice because you were born at a certain time." Now he was smiling. "The reason I do drugs and can't keep my fly zipped isn't because of any stars! Like my old man knocked up my mother when Scorpio was Rising and because of that I'm going to jail? I don't think so! I'm going to jail because Im bad to the bone!"

This is a speech made by Edmund the Bastard in Act I, Scene ii of Shakespeares King Lear. I brought it up to date.

Edmund plots to turn his father against his half brother, Edward, but the boys father wont go for it. He excuses Edwards recent strange behavior by "these late eclipses in the sun and moon ."

Edmund says he was born under the Dragon's tail, the South Node of the Moon. That could be in any sign. Hes making a play on words. To be born under any animals tale is probably a slur on Edmund's mother who was not married at the time of his conception.

Edmunds "nativity" or horoscope is under Ursa Major, the constellation where the Big Dipper resides. At the time of this play, most of the stars in Ursa Major were in late degrees of Leo and the first half of Virgo.

It's a funny coincidence (no such thing?) when Edmund speculates, what if he were born under "the maidliest star" -- because that's exactly when he was born. If under Ursa Major, then the influence of Virgo, the Maiden.

Edmund shows a mistake people sometimes make about astrology. You can't be born "under something", you have to be born when the Sun is "in something".

Edmund's character is used as a contrast to King Lear's very evil daughters, Goneril and Regan. King Lear is destroyed by their cruelty. While these girls are dark to the core, Edmund is openly, carelessly and light-heartedly villainous. Back then as now, some people are bad but some people are really evil. M. Scott Peck wrote a good book to help with this distinction, The Road Less Traveled.

Edmund actually has a pretty good handle on an important concept in humanistic astrology -- way before Dane Rudhyar (1895-1985) wrote his books. It is our character that determines our fate, not our horoscope.

Thousands of people are born the same hour, day, year and even minute all over the world; yet no two are alike. The energy of the stars is neutral like electricity but there is a Soul lying beneath the horoscope which uses the energy for good or ill.

Charles Darwin was born on February 12, 1809 in Shrewsbury, England. Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809 in Larue County, Kentucky. It was a good day for men!

There's nothing evil about being born in Virgo. In fact many Virgos are among the most gentle people. But 9 degrees of Virgo is a degree of homicide. Alioth of Ursa Major in Shakespeares time was at about 7 degrees Virgo while Mizar and Alcor were at 12 degrees Virgo.

I think, too, that Shakespeare refers to the importance Ursa Major has always had in the northern hemisphere. It is one of the first things children learn to pick out in the starry night sky.

Ursa Major isn't part of the zodiac but its stars can be seen vividly at night. There are seven main stars, Alkaid, Mizar, Alioth, Megrez, Phecda, Merak and Dubhe.

The last two are special stars people use to site the North Star (Polaris). Mizar has a fainter companion, Alcor. As everyone knows, if you can see these two stars with your own two eyes, you have good eyesight!

Beginning astronomy students are taught to start from Ursa Major and "follow the arc to Arcturus"; then "spin on to Spica". Arcturus is the second brightest star in the spring sky, a fortunate star of the zodiac, while Spica is considered the luckiest star of all. Are you lucky enough to have a planet at 23 Libra? Email me at parklanenancy@hotmail.com and Ill let you know.

Mizar and Alcor have a love story in American Indian mythology. Not everyone can see Alcor, but she is the 7th sister of the Pleiades, the youngest sister, who fell in love with a mortal man. One night the Windsong lifted him up into the stars for her His name is Mizar and they have been together ever since. All cultures speak of the Seven Pleiades, but that is why you can only see six of them.

Astrologically, the constellation Ursa Major is said to give a "quiet, prudent, suspicious, mistrustful, self-controlled patient nature, but an uneasy spirit and great anger when roused". Much like a bear, I suppose. The name Ursa Major (the Big Bear) comes from a myth about Zeus, the king of gods. Zeus raped a young nymph named Callisto. Callisto gave birth to a son named Arcas. Zeus wife was so angry she turned Callisto into a bear. Callisto roamed the woods for 15 years. One day she ran into her son, who had become a hunter. As he drew his bow to shoot her, of course not recognizing that she was his mother, Zeus took pity on Callisto and turned her son into a bear as well. Then he took them both by the tail and swung them up into the heavens which is why their tails are so long. Zeus wife became furious again and drug a promise out of the ancient ruler of the sea that these two constellations would never get their paws wet. To this day they do not set below the horizon of the sea as other constellations do.

The constellation has had other meanings. In Arabic, Mizak and Alcor are called the horse and rider. The rest of the constellation is seen as a funeral procession ... perhaps because of the slow and solemn motion of the figure around the pole.

The Babylonians saw a chariot in these stars and the Romans, seven oxen. In Ireland the constellation is called King David's Chariot; in Denmark and Sweden the Stori Vagn or Chariot of Thor. Similarly the Vikings, Poles, Germans and Medieval Christians saw it as a chariot for their gods.

The Plough, as it is called in the UK, is the bucket shaped figure on the back of the Bear, outlined by the stars Merak, Dubhe, Phecda and Megrez. The Three Horses pulling the plough are located in the tail.

Ursa Major has also been called the Wain by the Welsh, short for Charlie Wain or Charlemagne, while Arcturus refers to King Arthur.

The stars do not compel any more than there are chariots, bears and funeral processions in the skies. Most individual stars have Arabic names while the constellations in our northern hemisphere have names derived from Greek and Roman mythology. There was a time 2000 years ago when these worlds were all one -- when shepherds sat alone on hilltops at night and stared into the sky. There was a time when desert caravans followed star maps reliably across the sands and sailors cried By Jiminy! to the constellation of the twins to keep them safe at sea. There was a time when astrology and astronomy were twins as well and Im one astrologer who likes to return to those times every now and then.

Nancy R. Fenn has been a professional astrologer in the San Diego area for over 25 years. She's the astrologer who wasn't born yesterday.

Over the years I have learned a great many things since entering the holistic field. The biggest discovery was that the more I learned, the more questions I had. This is true for any field, but even more so in metaphysics.
I have found that there is a great deal of confusion both in and out of the metaphysical world about auras, energy and intuition.
The first concept to understand is that quantum physics teaches that EVERYTHING is energy. Physicists postulate that only five to ten percent of the entire universe is actually physical matter. The rest is all energy vibrating at differing frequencies, which cause the different densities from the thickest steel to the air we breathe. Anything from your car, to the tree out front, to you yourself are all made of energy.
Now you must be thinking, wow ok Im energy, but you are only taking into account your physical body. Yes your physical body is energy but there is more to it than that. Your energetic body extends beyond the physical body. This, in a nut shell, is your aura.
Many people have been taught to extend or fluff out their auras as far as possible. This is the opposite of what should be done. Many people believe that their intuition is somehow connected to their aura. They believe they will be more intuitive if their aura is extended. Intuition and your aura are two different things.
The aura is an energetically and magnetically based field that is an extension of our chakras. It can indicate our physical, mental and spiritual states. Looking at an aura can be similar to a medical doctor checking our ears, nose and throat for symptoms of infection.
Intuition, however, comes from the secretions of the pineal gland located in the center of the brain, between the eyebrows.
Your aura should be kept as close to your skin as possible. Here is an example of why: A friend of mine used to live and work in Manhattan and he learned really quickly to keep his aura close to his skin. It took him awhile to realize what was happening, with his aura so fluffed out he was going through hundreds if not thousands of other peoples aura fields through out his day, in doing so he was picking up other peoples emotional, mental and spiritual stuff. He was getting halfway through his day and he felt like he had been running all day. Once he started pulling his aura close to his skin everyday he felt much better and had energy at the end of the day. You see, not only will other peoples stuff stick to your aura there are some people who will drain your energy because they have so depleted their energy they have to get it from others to replenish themselves.
That is why we teach our clients to connect to their version of divinity to replenish their energies. Whether that be, Gia, Universal Spirit, the earth, God, Buddha, Et Al.
If youre sensitive to your aura or your overall energy, the next time youre going to be in a crowded situation pull your aura close to your skin and see how you feel at the end of the evening. And then think back to how you feel now verses how you felt the last time you were in a crowded social situation. I am willing to bet you will feel worlds better then you did last time.
It does take practice to keep your aura close to your skin. You will want to check it periodically though out the gathering. At this point youre probably thinking, ok this all makes sense I'll try to pull my aura in. As Yoda says there is no try, only do or do not". What you want to do is find the edge of your energy field of your lower arm, mine is about an inch from my body which is ok since I am alone at the moment, once you have found the edge of your field that can be your reference point. Now imagine your energy field is the air around you and just breath it in, so you have the same amount of energy it's just in a smaller area, closer to your skin now.
When you first start trying this technique it may seem like your having to struggle. If youre struggling then your trying to hard, just relax, breath and if your intention is for your aura to come down to your skin it will.
Once you realize that your aura and your intuition are not related you can begin to work on building your intuition.
I spoke a little bit about intuition at the beginning of this article. The best way I can describe intuition is it's that little voice that tells go the other way to work, then you find out later there was a major crash on your normal route that would have made you late for work. Or that feeling you have that something is wrong with someone you pass in the street. All of those things and lots more are examples of your intuition trying to give you additional information about the world around you. Some people call it the sixth sense and I suppose you could call it that but I prefer intuition, it has a less new age ring to it.
Most people, myself included start off noticing their intuition after something has happened. Once you realize its happening and will take note of it you can begin to use your intuition more productively. The biggest problem I have found with using my intuition is getting out of my own way to allow my intuition to guide me not only during healing sessions but in my everyday life.

Ken Myrback along with his wife Maria our Certified Hypnotherapist and energy healers they can be reached at Holistic South, Inc.
770-713-2804 www.holisticsouth.com

Ken is a Certified Hypnotherapist and Energy Healer living and working in Metro Atlanta.

In an earlier article I spoke about energy. In this article I will go more in depth about energy and how it relates to reincarnation. First you have to understand that it is the nature of energy that it can be neither create nor destroyed. So, if we start with the assumption that the soul is energy, which is not such a big leap, then it stands to reason that it can neither be created nor destroyed. There are some people that say, Wait there are more people living now then have lived in all of history. Yes thats true, so they say if thats true where did all the extra souls come from? There are several theories about this, but my personal belief is that they are souls from lower life forms and from other parts of the universe. I know this is a difficult concept to wrap your brain around but bear with me. If you believe that the universe is infinite and time and distance are illusions, which I spoke about in my Auras, Energy and Intuition article which if you have not read it yet it is available on our website, then its not much of a leap to understand how souls can move about in the universe as they go from lifetime to lifetime. You see our ultimate job as a soul is to learn and grow from our experiences. This particular planet is a fast track for soul development.
For a lot of you this will click as it did for me. Your thinking ok, so why would any soul want to come here if its so hard here? Let me answer that question with this question? Why do people climb mountains or kayak down class five rapids? The easy answer is what a lot of people say because its there or maybe, its something I havent done yet!
The more true answer I believe is because we are driving ourselves to work through our issues so we can grow. A lot of people now a days seem to have forgotten this though, they are so busy just trying to get by that they have forgotten what they are on this planet to do. I was confused with this concept at first when I thought about all the depressed, confused and generally messed up people in the world. Well, for some of those people the lesson they are working on is related to their situation or the situation they are working through is part of their path. So they are exactly where they are supposed to be on their path of development. Others however have strayed from their path. But with guidance, both energetically and otherwise along with a willingness to change anyone can find their true selves again and get back on their true path.

Ken is a Certified Hypnotherapist and Energy Healer living and working in Metro Atlanta.

Everyone has heard the phrase, my how time flies when your having fun. Well, I am here to tell you its true. Because time as most people perceive it is an illusion. Youre probably wondering what I'm talking about, of course that's why youre reading this article.
Before I started writing this article I repeated to my self several times that " one minute is as five " meaning that for every minute that passed it would be as if I had done five minutes of work. Most everyone has experienced this time distortion. Say for example your in a very long boring meeting or a lecture or any mind numbing activity. Now you will swear the person has been speaking for at least an hour. But when you look at your watch you realize with some shock and horror that only ten minutes has passed. This is time slowing down. The opposite is true as well, when your having fun doing something you really enjoy you figure an hour has gone by and you look at your watch and you have been doing that activity not for an hour but for three hours.
The reason this occurs is because time is fluid but its not the same for everyone. Lets take the lecture as an example. To you the boring lecture felt like an hour, to the lecturer who is nervous it may have seemed like two hours. But, to the fellow three rows up who is very interested in the subject of the lecture it seemed like only a few minutes. Now, who is correct? Well in fact all of you are correct, in your perception of time. You see thats how it works; its your perception of time that is fluid. Once you understand that you can change how you perceive time then you can control time in your life.
Unfortunately that does not mean that you can get home in rush hour traffic in ten minutes when it normally takes you an hour. But you can control how you perceive that hour.
You see man created the concept of time help him control and categorize his world. This was done by dividing up the things he saw in nature IE the seasons and the smaller time bits like the phases of the moon and the still smaller bits of the rising and setting of the sun into smaller and smaller chunks so that he could better arrange his life. Though what has been mostly forgotten is time is an illusion.
If your still with me and like this whole fluid time idea. Try this: the next time youre in a boring situation, like say stuck in traffic,
Relax take a few deep breaths and tell yourself that five minutes are as one" and repeat that several times. This will change your perception of time so though you will still have to drive those five minutes they will seem like only one minute. And I am willing to bet that the commute won't "seem" nearly as long as usual. There are so many application of this concept the only real limit is your imagination.
Allot of people are fascinated by the concept of time travel. There is a lot of controversy both in the scientific community and the hypnosis community. From everything I have read I believe that using current life regression and past life regression as well as other modalities it is possible though not physically possible to go back in time it is possible to alter past personal events to effect your present and your future. The reason I believe this is possible is that not only is time flexible but so is our perception of our reality. For example, let's say there is someone who is deathly afraid of heights because of a trauma as a child. But using any of several techniques we remove the trauma from that memory so that all subsequent height memories no longer have that trauma and fear connected with them. That person would no longer have a fear of heights. So, have we traveled back in time? I will leave that for you to decide. But the same concepts can be used to visit past lives as well for either therapy or discovery.
It felt as though I have been writing for well over an hour but in fact by my watch it has been about 40 minutes. Not the five to one ratio I was hoping for but that will come with practice.
Go have some fun, go change your perspective today.

Ken Myrback along with his wife Maria are Certified Hypnotherapist and Energy Healers.
They can be reached in their office: Holistic South, Inc. 770-713-2804
Or on the web at: www.holisticsouth.com

Ken is a Certified Hypnotherapist and Energy Healer living and working in Metro Altanta.