There are many ways we can connect dreams to astrology, and many don't require that you know all about your Natal Chart. In this column we will be exploring the symbolic rather than predictive aspects of astrology. Symbolic astrology attempts to use the images of astrological to give meaning to one's life and empower choices rather than predict paths. We do this by imaginal overlay. In this process we impleach, (poetically interweave)dream, image, feeling, life and symbol in a way to evoke a felt sense of the dream's imagery and its position in our life.

This year we are focusing each month on a different House.
The inner circle of the Natal or Birth Chart is divided into 12 distinct regions know as Houses. They relate to everyday activates. One will be about physical appearances and temperament, while another relates to possessions, for example. Planets and signs fall within these Houses and influence the areas of focus. We will be watching for images of planets, signs and other celestial events and hopefully begin to see the emergence of an astrological chart that dips into birth charts, dreams, and our waking life.

Notes from the Net:
The 8th house is our desire nature which functions in the conscious mind area and the cause behind many of our daily actions. The 12th house of unconscious conditions is the filter of our dream states and the recording device of life experience. Our blood system is our memory system. Our dream state rallies around the ruler of the 12th and it's natal and transit place.

Blessings,Thomas Seers AMAFA
E-mail: tseers@voy.net

The Ninth House:
Sagittarius. Long distance & time communication and travel, the deeper mind, profound subjects, philosophy, religion, publishing, foreigners, language, dreams.

In the first six Houses, the 9th House corresponds to the 3rd House & Gemini. If you recall, that house is about communication and mind as well. In the Third house, it might be said, we collect and communicate, while in the Ninth House we discover the meaning of all this gathered informa tion. Often these two together make up the fuller term "Mind".

Dream: "We are on a train on a long journey. I'm thirsty and I go into a private compartment and a man there has the whole room filled. Its like Copernicus's room, with open books everywhere, globes, telescopes, maps and other instruments for navigation. I notice the man is very involved and he says he is tracing down the missing 8th harmonic of some Islamic scholar. I am amazed but haven't any idea how to relate to his project. I feel a great rush of love for the man."

How appropriate that it is often called the "House of Dreams."
Here the inner most workings are interpreted and revealed. The information gathered by that messenger and psychopomp Mercury in the Third House emerges as a new perspective in Jupiter and the Ninth House.

Dream: "I am with a business tycoon and he invites me into his office. It's full of things like model trains, compasses, books and other items. I want to talk business but he is interested in a larger project and offers me a chance to take my art to a new level by taking on this project. It's never quite clear what the project is, but I am very excited and feel it will be an amazing journey."

Jupiter is also associated with the Law, but the law has its spiritual as well as earthly order. Spiritual laws, more on the order of archetypes and religious dogma, are a grasping of the nature of the cosmos on a more intuitive level. The laws of living and being and consciousness belong to the subtle realm of the Ninth house. The close, in your face, surface truths recede in the Ninth house like the arrow of the Sagittarian archer, shooting through the surface to find its mark in a broader, more basic experience, awareness and approach. Thus the connection with philosophy and religion. Psychology and esotericism come together here in the binding search for meaning, or in Jungian terms, the path of Individuation.

For those that hide from the journey of the Self, the Ninth House can be like a Shadow and torment the person. Look for dreams of Lucifer, paths of constrictions, dream images where there is overcompensation, disillusionment, pain, endless searching, loss of faith and fears of torture.

Dream: "I see a mirror in my bedroom I've never noticed before. I put my hand through and then walk through the mirror. I enter a completely different kind of realm. Its a huge cavern filled with red lights. I see a passage way that continues out of sight. I become frightened that it might be Hell and try to get back to my room."

The Search for Meaning in the Ninth House may lead to peak experiences, a drive towards direct encounter with the larger than life, including not only traditional visions and gnostic experiences, but throwing oneself against fate, elements, problems and other more concrete adversaries. Watch for those parts of the self and dream characters that are very agnostic as well, especially if it is compulsive.

Dream: "There is an alarm that goes off on the floor where I'm working and we all have to abandon the building. We go down the elevator together but when we get to the first floor, everyone seems to be on their own. I notice on the floor several pieces of a puzzle, and feel that if can find the rest of the puzzle, we can return to the building. There is a great deal of pressure to hurry before the building collapses."

Like the archer, the person in the Ninth House needs a goal or mark to shoot for. Without this direction, we are just pissing in the wind. The wise man and fool may find this a fine activity, but the Ninth House seems to require a one-pointedness to avoid downward spirals. At least at first. The problem seems to be that this goal must be one's own. Taking on someone else's goal will not work for long as the Ninth House is not fulfilled by the individual taking on any authority but his or her own. Like Saturn, the law must emanate from within. As straight as I am characterizing this goal, the truth seems to be a more circuitous path, a wandering from one thing to another, following long paths, extended journeys, broad mental training and deep readings. All of this activity bubbles up from an underlying Jovian joy, a fountain that was not made, by the hands of man.

M. Aionia

Next month: 10th House -Aspirations, ambitions, public standings and honor. Send in your dreams to M. Aionia at aionia@dreamgate.com

Island (1997 September). Reflections on the Ninth House. Electric Dreams 4(9). Retrieved July 26, 2000 from Electric Dreams on the World Wide Web: http://www.deramgate.com/electric-dreams

To my understanding there is no house larger than the ninth, for it is boundless, stretching farther than the naked eye can see, one reason why "vision," "prognostication," are considered ninth house activities, X-rays and telescopes ninth house objects, where mythology and story abound. Imagine a house where activities take place in realms rather than rooms. When I find myself at once transported without accompanying feelings, I dare say I've not quite made the trip. It appears to me that the ninth house is so large and complex that us mere mortals struggle through it. People with ninth house consciousness have more to say than we sometimes can or should afford to hear, sometimes a double-edged sword. It is the house of the dreaming mind and of dreams, the expanding consciousness, the prophet and philosopher, the visionary.

Remember, also, Cassandra's fate and that of John the Baptist or the prejudices felt against the still much maligned "gypsies." On this darker note, it is a house where justice, or judgment, is passed in a court of law; a foreign land or culture where we are beset with difficulties and feel estranged; where we may experience the constraints of law, dogma and orthodoxy espoused by fanatics; where our debaucheries and other excesses may result in karmic consequences; where what we publish, broadcast, advertise or propogandize boomerangs on either the bombast or the individual or society swept away; our counsel and advice to others falling short of intent or drastically overreaching its mark.

Yet here more than anywhere else, I feel shaped by raw feeling, for who cannot weep unabashedly at the feet of an awesome God(dess) of My or Your Understanding, to find oneself, filled with awe, reborn. It is where I go to touch my soul, and I can walk through the hallways of orthodox religion, ritual, profound study, meditation, formal learning, or dreams, and many others besides, to do so. I can fly or sail to foreign realms, immerse myself in diverse cultures. When I allow myself to experience the room or realm, I find my day-to-day reality upturned, my consciousness expanded, as I reclaim or own the inheritance already mine.

I am surprised when I recall some of the very special feelings the ninth house inspires: adoration, a spirit of adventure, reverence, wanderlust, wonder, awe, an exhilarating rush, liberality, love of truth and freedom, prayerful feelings, magnanimity, inspiration, desire to philosophize, confidence and faith, enthusiasm, zeal, buoyancy, authenticity, mystery, rapture, righteousness, a sense of destiny. When I experience those feelings, especially consistently over time, I cannot help but be transformed/reborn anew.

Now it is very curious to me when I stumble across a person with a ninth house developing or developed consciousness because I really want to read or listen intently to what they have to say, while exercising my developing powers of discernment, also ninth house. Fortunately we have to look no further than the commentary provided by a dreamer in this issue whose allusions to dreams seem to suggest a seamless interweaving between dream and day-to-day reality. His commentary, entitled The Immortal, The Living and the Dead, made mention of God 23 times; Muslim, 5; Jesus or Christ, 10; spirit, 5; religious or religion, 6; prophet, 3; Mohamed, 2; Buddha, 2; hexagram, 3; foreign, 3; Tibetan Yogi, 1; Catholic, 1 as some examples. Once immersed in his commentary, I felt a bit of the void filled through my lack of either ninth house dreams or feelings in recent times.

Following are some quotes obtained online which, I hope, may help to clarify ninth house themes and dreams.

Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for? Robert Browning

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed.
Albert Einstein

We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects. Herman Melville

The people I'm furious with are the women's liberationists. They keep getting up on soap boxes and proclaiming that women are brighter than men. It's true, but it should be kept quiet or it ruins the whole racket. Anita Loos

When we walk to the edge of all the light we have and take the step into the darkness of the unknown, we must believe that one of two things will happen. There will be something solid for us to stand on or we will be taught to fly.
Patrick Overton

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to he man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows the triumph of high achievement; and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.
Theodore Roosevelt

Our faith in the present dies out long before our faith in the future. Ruth Benedict

By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest. Confucius

The stories of childhood leave an indelible impression, and their author always has a niche in the temple of memory from which the image is never cast out to be thrown on the rubbish heap of things that are outgrown and outlived.
Howard Pyle

Fanatacism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim.
George Santayana

Everyone takes the limits of his own vision for the limits of the world. Arthur Schopenhauer

FAIRY TALE, n: a horror story to prepare children for the newspapers. ZEAL, n: A certain nervous disorder afflicting the young and inexperienced. Ambrose Bierce

The universe is made of stories, not of atoms. Muriel Rukeyser

"And don't tell me God works in mysterious ways", Yossarian continued "There's nothing mysterious about it, He's not working at all. He's playing. Or else He's forgotten all about us. That's the kind of God you people talk about, a country bumpkin, a clumsy, bungling, brainless, conceited, uncouth hayseed. Good God, how much reverence can you have for a Supreme Being who finds it necessary to include such phenomena as phlegm and tooth decay in His divine system of Creation? What in the world was running through that warped, evil, scatalogical mind of His when He robbed old people of the power to control their bowel movements? Why in the world did He ever create pain?"
Joseph Heller, Catch22

Years ago fairy tales all began with "Once upon a time...", now we know they all begin with, "If I am elected..."
Carolyn Warner

What you've done becomes the judge of what you're going to do especially in other people's minds. When you're traveling, you are what you are right there and then. People don't have your past to hold against you. No yesterdays on the road.
William Least in Heat Moon, Blue Highways

Nigel gave the lamp a cautious buff and small smoking red letters appeared in the air. "Hi," Nigel read aloud, "Do not put down the lamp because your custom is important to us. Please leave a wish after the tone and, very shortly, it will be our command. In the meantime, have a nice eternity."
Terry Pratchett, Sorcery

Astronomy compels the soul to look upwards and leads us from this world to another.
Plato, The Republic. Book VII. 529

Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth, more than ruin, more even than death ....Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit. Thought looks into the pit of hell and is not afraid. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the world, and the chief glory of man.
Bertrand Russell

Scriptures, n. The sacred books of our holy religion, as distinguished from the false and profane writings on which all other faiths are based.
Ambrose Bierce

Life is the only real counselor; wisdom unfiltered through personal experience does not become a part of the moral tissue.
Edith Wharton

Laws are only words words written on paper, words that change on society's whim and are interpreted differently daily by politicians, lawyers, judges, and policemen. Anyone who believes that all laws should always be obeyed would have made a fine slave catcher. Anyone who believes that all laws are applied equally, despite race, religion, or economic status, is a fool. John J. Miller, And Hope to Die (in Jokertown Shuffle Wild Cards IX)

All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.
Thomas Paine

Why is it when we talk to God we're said to be praying, but when God talks to us we're schizo phrenic?
Lily Tomlin

Man has always sacrificed truth to his vanity, comfort and advantage. He lives by make believe. W. Somerset Maugham, The Summing Up, 1938

The books that the world calls immoral are the books that show the world its own shame.
Oscar Wilde

Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is condu cive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.
Buddha

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all. Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature.
Helen Keller

Suppose that we are wise enough to learn and know and yet not wise enough to control our learning and knowledge, so that we use it to destroy ourselves?...Even if that is so, knowledge remains better than ignorance. It is better to know even if the knowledge endures only for the moment that comes before destruction than to gain eternal life at the price of a dull and swinish lack of comprehension of a universe that swirls unseen before us in all its wonder. That was the choice of Achilles, and it is mine, too.
Isaac Asimov, The New Hugo Winners

There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle. Albert Einstein

If the quotes above confuse and muddle sensing/apprehending ninth house dreams, then read anything by Walt Whitman...or dream archetypal? grandiose? lofty? dreams...

Island