Brainstorming on synastry reports
Posted: Sat Dec 18, 2021 1:22 pm
I know that synastry features of TMSA are several versions down the road, so this post isn't to rush anything. It's just that my own blind spots make it seem a gigantic and complicated question of: Exactly what kind of reports do we want for this feature? It seems complicated and uncertain to me.
I'm sure these questions in my mind come from the fact that I spent decades trying to get a handle on exactly how to approach synastry in a systematic, regular way. - Or (since that's a little misleading), I could do it myself but without a clear sense how to teach others to do it. I've finally figured out ways that can be passed along, that can replicate success, and it's still complicated. What I actually do is too complicated and customized to expect that a whole series of reports would be crafted to match it, and I'm still not sure that they would give people what they need or what they want.
So, I thought I'd start a conversation that, in addition to Mike jumping in with what he's planned, everybody else can jump in with input. As I type this, I don't know where my thoughts will take most things. (I have a few settled conclusions in mind, but many more questions past that.) If I type it all out, there will hopefully be some good ideas and surely should be some bad ideas... and people should feel free to praise or condemn them accordingly
When I wrote New Instant, really the best I knew was to take the conjunctions, oppositions, and squares between two charts and pull the interpretive paragraphs for each. Even though I had a good idea what each planet combination meant (much of which has been modified and hopefully improved over time), this "just read the interchanges" as at best crude and, at worst, totally disproportionate on how each thing fit into the picture. There was no prioritization, no overview, no clear access point. I knew the orbs needed to be pretty wide, which is another way of saying that I knew that, at least sometimes, really wide orbs were important. OTOH I'm sure I had the instinct that closer aspects are more important, though I think I didn't say that in New Instant. There was also the sense that the few most distinctive "relationship interchanges" needed the most attention, primarily those that Jung found most common which basically were some specific luminary aspects and a few others of Venus and Mars (the priority, of course, being on judge adult romantic-sexual relationships; almost no attention was paid to other kinds of relationship, which, of course, also need attention).
Within a few years after, I was at least systematic enough that my rule was "read all those interchanges from smallest orb to larger." This isn't bad, it at least gives some sense of priority on how "most important" tends to imprint our thinking first. Its weakness is that, in the definition of "most important," it doesn't also factor in "most relevant," since some aspects might be not quite as close as others that have less to do with the particular relationship. (It doesn't factor in a lot of important things.) In time, I figured out more complicated strategies. It's that "more complicated" that makes me anxious about what would translate into truly helpful reports.
I'm sure these questions in my mind come from the fact that I spent decades trying to get a handle on exactly how to approach synastry in a systematic, regular way. - Or (since that's a little misleading), I could do it myself but without a clear sense how to teach others to do it. I've finally figured out ways that can be passed along, that can replicate success, and it's still complicated. What I actually do is too complicated and customized to expect that a whole series of reports would be crafted to match it, and I'm still not sure that they would give people what they need or what they want.
So, I thought I'd start a conversation that, in addition to Mike jumping in with what he's planned, everybody else can jump in with input. As I type this, I don't know where my thoughts will take most things. (I have a few settled conclusions in mind, but many more questions past that.) If I type it all out, there will hopefully be some good ideas and surely should be some bad ideas... and people should feel free to praise or condemn them accordingly
When I wrote New Instant, really the best I knew was to take the conjunctions, oppositions, and squares between two charts and pull the interpretive paragraphs for each. Even though I had a good idea what each planet combination meant (much of which has been modified and hopefully improved over time), this "just read the interchanges" as at best crude and, at worst, totally disproportionate on how each thing fit into the picture. There was no prioritization, no overview, no clear access point. I knew the orbs needed to be pretty wide, which is another way of saying that I knew that, at least sometimes, really wide orbs were important. OTOH I'm sure I had the instinct that closer aspects are more important, though I think I didn't say that in New Instant. There was also the sense that the few most distinctive "relationship interchanges" needed the most attention, primarily those that Jung found most common which basically were some specific luminary aspects and a few others of Venus and Mars (the priority, of course, being on judge adult romantic-sexual relationships; almost no attention was paid to other kinds of relationship, which, of course, also need attention).
Within a few years after, I was at least systematic enough that my rule was "read all those interchanges from smallest orb to larger." This isn't bad, it at least gives some sense of priority on how "most important" tends to imprint our thinking first. Its weakness is that, in the definition of "most important," it doesn't also factor in "most relevant," since some aspects might be not quite as close as others that have less to do with the particular relationship. (It doesn't factor in a lot of important things.) In time, I figured out more complicated strategies. It's that "more complicated" that makes me anxious about what would translate into truly helpful reports.