Welcome to Gaia! ::

Motivation
Most people know what is commonly known as their astrological sign. Grossly stated, this is basically the month in which you were born, so that makes it really easy to pick out. You don't need complex calculations, or an astrology program or even to visit an astrologer. This sign, is what astrologers call your Sun sign.

Okay, that's easy, so why bother with an astrology course?

Astrology involves a heck of a lot more than the Sun sign. It's also more than in which sign the planets are at your birth time.

There are also the houses, numbered 1 to 12, starting from your ascendant, and this adds a whole new dimension to where the planets are. This is where the outer planets (Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto) have more personal effects. When you only look at the zodiac, these planets talk about the generations, but when you look at the houses, they talk about where their planetary energies are distributed.

Astrologers also look at the shape of the chart, the elements of the zodiac signs in which the planets fall, the angles the planets form with one another. All this and more, just talking about the Birth Chart.

Then you can make what is called a Progressed Chart, where you do all this analysis comparing the current state of the sky (or that of some other time of your choice, e.g. your upcoming birthday perhaps) with that at your birthtime. Then you can compare where the planets are with where they were, not only each planet to itself, but also to every other planet on the chart.

Astrology is way more complex than most people imagine. It's no wonder that people say that they don't really fit the description of their sun sign; it's just a fraction of what the stars have to say about them.

Resources and Tools

Websites
http://www.alabe.com/freechart/
This website will generate a free astrology chart and an interpretation for each planet's zodiac placement. If you haven't had your birth chart made before, this is a good one to use as you go through the lessons.

http://www.tarot.com/astrology/
I love tarot.com!! In addition to Tarot readings (Duh!), they also have a wide variety of astrology reports, numerology reports, i-ching readings, some feng shui stuff, and more! Their astrology reports are pretty good, and most of them come with a birth chart. The various reports focus on different facets of your birth chart. They are cheap, but not free.

http://www.astro.com/
This site has a lot of interesting articles about astrology. But to be honest, the main reason I visit this site is because I'm using their software library to build my own astrological chart making program.

http://www.astrologynotes.com/
This is a wiki for astrology. Anyone may sign up and contribute.

Books
Parkers' Astrology by Julia and Derek Parker (amazon)
This is my main reference for the material I teach in this course. The book goes into a lot of detail. It goes into how to build a birthchart using all sorts of calculations and data tables, how to interpret a chart, going through all the planets in each sign, each house and aspected with every other planet. I picked up the 1991 edition in a used book store for 15$CAN; it was definitely a great find!

Darkside Zodiac by Stella Hyde (amazon)
A tongue-in-cheek look at the Sun signs' less desirable qualities. It's a fun look at our darker selves.

The Little Giant Encyclopedia of the Zodiac by The Diagram Group (amazon)
This little book packs a punch when describing the Sun Signs. The amount of information it contains is surprisingly large for such a small book. All the fat is trimmed off. Half of this book is devoted to Western Astrology, the other half to Chinese Astrology.

A to Z Horoscope Maker and Delineator by Llewellyn George (amazon)
I've barely peeked at this book, but I'll probably be using it a lot to prepare my lessons. It's chock full of information. This is another little gem I found at a used book store (10$CAN). It was first published in 1910; the edition I have was printed in 1976.

Software
WinStart Plus by Matrix Software (http://www.astrologysoftware.com/)
This is the program my astrologer friend uses to create charts. There are so many different options is gets confusing at times. From the little exposure I've had to it, it seems pretty powerful.

If anyone has any other tools or resources they'd like to see here, please let me know either in this thread, or by PMing me.

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This is cool! I love astrology. I think this will definately be helpful biggrin

I have been so confused by astrology for the longest time. It just goes in one ear and out the other. I wish you would finish this, I think it would be helpful.

I would love to see this finished! biggrin I love my western astrology