33: Soledad Davies on Astrological Theories, Influences and Practices

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Astrology
Philosophy
Cultural Astronomy
Becoming Consciousness
Bipolar
Saturn Return
Stan Grof
Holotropic Breathwork
Ayahuasca
Dieta
Centro Transpersonal
Psychedelic Therapy
Cosmology
Natal Chart
Ontology
Marsilio Ficino
Electional Astrology
Anima Mundi
Ascendant Sign
The Moral Arc
Golden Ratio
Sacred Geometry
Pythagoras
Joseph Campbell
2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl
2012: Time for Change
Vedic Astrology
The Great Chain of Being
Biohacking

Giancarlo: [00:00:00] Hello, welcome to the Mango TV podcast. Today we have Soledad Davies. Soledad is a professional astrologer and researcher on the intersection of astrology, philosophy, and religion. She obtained an MA in cultural astronomy and astronomy at the University of Wales in the UK and founded Sakosimatika, an international online school for archetypal and transpersonal studies.

Sakosimatika. com Welcome. 

Soledad: Thank you Giancarlo. 

Giancarlo: So just to [00:01:00] put a little bit of this episode in the context of the general Mango TV line of inquiry. For those who read the, I wrote a blog, a blog called Becoming Consciousness, where we were explaining the difference of worldview. Around consciousness. So our scientific materialistic overview believe that the mind came from matter so that when the brain.

Reach a certain level of complexity, poof, magically consciousness appears. And then there is the other world view, which is more from the East which believes that matter came after consciousness. That the, the brain is just a, a mediator of consciousness, but not the creator of consciousness. That consciousness, you know, comes before.

Like the brain is like a radio who, who modulates the frequency. But the frequency comes from some sort of [00:02:00] divine, universal consciousness. So, if this is the case, and there are many, at the cutting edge of physics and mechanics now there’s lots of people looking at this new theory of consciousness. So if this is true and consciousness is primordial, then probably our universe is sentient or intelligent or, or you know, it, it might be that all these planets, they’re not just like a gigantic clock that move around without meaning and purpose.

If we believe that consciousness comes before the brain, then. It’s not just random and mechanic. So that’s why now we’re talking about Soledad. She spent a big chunk of her life studying the meaning of this planetary configuration. But let’s start from the beginning. So tell us a little bit about your personal story.

How did you get [00:03:00] exposed to that? 

Soledad: Hello, Giancarlo. Thank you for having me here. It’s a pleasure to talk about, to talk about with you and also about astrology. So my personal journey, how did I come across with astrology? Well first of all, from my 16 years old to my 27, 28, 20, yeah, 28 years old, I’ve been treated as a psychiatric patient.

I’ve been hospitalized several times. Because of psychotic, psychotic episode or brokes, as the doctor call, call them, like psychotic episodes. So after the psychotic episodes, I was in the clinic every time, so 

Giancarlo: How old were you when you were the first psychotic episode? 

Soledad: 19. 19. 

Giancarlo: And you were living where?

Soledad: In Buenos Aires. I am from Patagonia, Argentina, but I’ve been living in Buenos Aires for 10 years before moving to Europe, like seven years ago. So at the [00:04:00] time I, I, I was in, in Buenos Aires. I moved there to, for, for studying. So I had this first psychotic, I started with a depression at my 16 years old, around that age.

And around, yeah, 19 years old, I had my first episode that drove me to the hospital. And I’ve been hospitalized there for a while. And many times after suicide episodes also. 

Giancarlo: Do you mind me asking how did the the episode look like shaking or fear or inability to leave the bed? 

Soledad: It was it was yeah, a lot of fear because it was very confusing because I was Feeling, sensing, seeing, hearing things that I, I, I couldn’t explain.

So the explanation of the medical paradigm at that time was like, I was insane. So, and and also I was [00:05:00] insane for life. So I was treated with a for a illness that was for life. That’s the speech. 

Giancarlo: The diagnosis, yeah. The diagnosis 

Soledad: and also the speech that the doctor told me. That I have to take pills all my life.

That was my life at that time, you know. So, well, that was like kind of ten years. More or less so 10 years 

Giancarlo: of, of being in prescription medication? Yes. From 19 to 29. 

Soledad: Yeah. Yeah. No, no, no. Before from taking pills at 19 was my first 

Giancarlo: crisis. Yeah. 

Soledad: Hospitalization. 

Giancarlo: Hospitalization. 

Soledad: But I started with crisis and with depression and taking pills at 16 years old.

So yeah, I was chaotic and I, I was feeling so desperate. I was desperate. I said, I, I can. I cannot live anymore. I was tired already. I was 20 years old. I was [00:06:00] tired. I cannot, I cannot do anything with this. This life is not for me. I was like, I quit. I quit. This is not for me. Thank you very much. But your parents were supportive.

Yeah, but strange because this, this is a paradigm thing. This is not easy because my family was supporting me, but based on an old paradigm that it was not helping me even if I wanted and my family wanted that everybody wanted to help me, but it wasn’t helping me at the end because I was taking lithium every day and a lot of people actually, I was taking lots of people every day and I was.

Going down and up like always, but I did feel something that changed that I didn’t want to take my life anymore. [00:07:00] I didn’t want to suicide after I started to take lithium. So anyway, so I was. In this chaotic life with up and downs, going in and out from clinics, and going in from Patagonia in my parents house to Buenos Aires, and, and trying to, to, to be alive.

Right to keep me alive. So when I was reaching my 27, 28, that is something that in astrology we know as a Saturn return. And I invite you to, to your audience. Giancarlo, to think about what was happening at your 17, 17, no, 20, 26, 27, 28, more 28, 29 29, what was happening in your life? Maybe some turning points on this big decision, [00:08:00] something that will change the structure of your life for the The 20 years after that.

So it’s a big moment just 

Giancarlo: just to confirm your intuition that you are right. You know, I was 28 in In a year, I was born in 68. So around the 96, 97, that’s where I left London to start completely career in New York. 

Soledad: That’s it. That’s Saturn return. So it’s a turning point in, in, in, usually it’s a turning point.

Maybe if, whether if we can realize or not, it’s happening. Astrology is happening all the time. Even if you realize it or not. So at that moment I started to question the quantity of pills I was taking every day. So I don’t want to take All this amount of pills, all my life. So I [00:09:00] started to to look for alternative therapies to treat my illness more organically, you know, something.

I didn’t want to take so many pills, that’s the thing. But I was considered at, with, with a diagnosis, you know, I, I was not. So that’s when I started to look for others therapies and I encounter in Buenos Aires a transpersonal center. 

Giancarlo: Sorry to interrupt you, but just to clarify. So the diagnosis were for bipolar, schizophrenic.

Soledad: Bipolar. Bipolar. Bipolar. Mostly. 

Giancarlo: Mostly. 

Soledad: There were several about bipolar and maniac depression, 

Giancarlo: and the symptom were that, you know, you felt depressed and you, you were like, you know, panic attack. You were hearing things, seeing things also. 

Soledad: Yeah. But I, I, I had like crisis, like very emotional breaks that was break down.

Yeah. Breakdown. Totally. Like, it was desperate because I didn’t know what was happening to me at the 

Giancarlo: feeling was a feeling of [00:10:00] 

Soledad: desperation, desperation, yeah, desperation. At the base of the experience was inspiration, this connection 

Giancarlo: from this reality. But so 

Soledad: because you 

Giancarlo: said something very interesting, you said, you know, my parents did their best, but you know, the current paradigm tells you that, you know, if you feel that this reality is not enough for you and maybe you’re looking something deeper because you think that there might be different reality with meaning and purpose, our current paradigm tells you that you’re crazy.

And so this is like. You know, it’s a very important point. You know, we have won a movie in our documentary section called crazy wisdom where same thing, you know, in, in indigenous society, when people will have this strong emotion or vision, they will consider them enlightened. They will consider them.

They were like a bridge with another dimension. They would not consider them crazy. Okay. So thank you very much for sharing this. 

Soledad: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. [00:11:00] I was feeling that I was like split inside me between a visible world and an invisible world. I was feeling that invisible world. I felt, I still feeling that that other dimension.

But as you said, the current paradigm say that it doesn’t exist. So I was divided between worlds. So that’s schizophrenic. This is, so the, the, the, the current paradigm, what say, that try to put like I don’t know how you say, like, patches of things to, to put down, and it’s like a Frankenstein thing, you know, to try to be like a productive person in this world.

This is the, the, the, the aim of the treatment, 

Giancarlo: the aim, the aim of the treatment was to integrate you more in this paradigm 

Soledad: in this paradigm to in this productive paradigm that this materialistic paradigm [00:12:00] because I was trying to not not to feel so much trying to not be myself so much because if not, I can live in this world.

What do you do? What can I do? So I surrender to what? These people that’s supposed to be experts this there is a very interesting episode because the first time that as I got after being in a clinic already and but my first diagnosis from a psychiatric shrink, I remember that when she told me, Okay, you are a bipolar, I said, I remember like, like, if it’s happening right now.

I told her, No, I’m not bipolar. I have spiritual problems. I was around 20, 22 years old. And the shrink told me, Ah, yes. Okay. What [00:13:00] spiritual problem do you have? Tell me. No, I don’t know. I told her, I don’t know what, but I feel that it’s a spiritual problem. Okay. Because I said, I don’t know. I can I don’t know what to tell you about my spiritual problem.

She, she told me, okay, I, I can’t do, I, I, I can’t say to you why you are bipolar. You cannot say why, why is your personal spiritual problems? But I can say why. Why you are a bipolar person. So she started to read my symptom and it was right. Yeah, that’s happened to me. So at that moment I started to be like but I have the intuition.

Some part of me, even if it was, it was desperate and very confused I knew. 

Giancarlo: So you were saying then you had your first transpersonal session, you were saying. 

Soledad: No, yeah, yeah, yeah, but it wasn’t that one. 

Giancarlo: No, that was, that was 22 years old. You [00:14:00] had an intuition that there was something related to spirit and different dimension.

Yeah, yeah, 

Soledad: but then I, I, I continue with the old paradigm. So when I started to question the amount of field I was taking at that time, when I was 27, 28, I started to look for others, alternative perspective, and I started different kind of alternative therapies, and I found this transpersonal center in Buenos Aires with psychologists and therapists that were Grof, actually.

And they were pioneers, actually, in Buenos Aires doing what we call now, like psychedelic therapy. But at that time, we didn’t know that kind of therapy with that name, you know? But so they study with Stengrove, and they were doing allotropic breathwork and also working with ayahuasca. So, I started to treat myself there, [00:15:00] and that’s when I came across Stan Grof’s Spiritual Emergencies Notion video.

And that’s when I changed my mind. Because at that time, I was looking for other ways to take my illness more healthy, not to take that amount of pills. But I was ill. That’s my sense of me. But at that time, when I came across with St. Grace Spiritual Emergencies, I changed my mind. I was not Anymore.

So I started to think about my crisis, about myself and all, all what was happening during all these 10 years or 12 years with other eyes, like an spiritual thing. And it started to make me more sense. And so I started to quit the, my medication at that time I changed my, I started to change my mind about [00:16:00] what was happening to me, and that’s when ayahuasca.

Enter my life because I did one ceremony with them, not in a in a way that most many people now were with psychedelic with, with the mask and in a very like clinic, clinic environment, this was more like a Peruvian ceremony. So I did my first ayahuasca after I quit the medication. 

Giancarlo: But sorry, Soledad, what was the what make you quit the medication?

Soledad: What? 

Giancarlo: Yes, because you, you entered, you, you, you met this center in Buenos Aires. That was using the Stan Grof methodology and then that make you Discovering what transpersonal psychology is and then you decided to stop the medication. 

Soledad: No, I decided to stop the medication earlier 

Giancarlo: earlier 

Soledad: I start to think about I don’t want to [00:17:00] take more pills Yeah, but I continue with the illness somehow, but the first thing was medication.

Yeah, that was the first point I don’t want to take this amount of pill all my life because 

Giancarlo: you were felt there was some side effects Yeah, a lot, 

Soledad: a lot 

Giancarlo: Okay. 

Soledad: And also, no, didn’t feel right. 

Giancarlo: Yes. So you met the center, you start working with them, but before ayahuasca, what kind of work were you doing? This was verbal therapy?

Yeah, 

Soledad: more verbal therapy. Yeah. Because I, I couldn’t do allotropic breath work. I went for the first time, I went to the center for an allotropic breath, breath work, but I couldn’t do it because I was taking pills. 

Giancarlo: Yeah. Okay. 

Soledad: So that’s when I decide, okay, this is. This is a pivotal moment. Okay, this is, this way, without pills, and, and trying to figure it out, what can I do with these people, with allotropic breathwork, and see, and if it doesn’t work, I [00:18:00] can, I can back and take lithium again.

I wanted to feel good. That’s my, what I wanted. I was trying to figure it out, how to do it. So I decided to, to try with the medication and see what happened. And I didn’t take any pill anymore from that moment. So first of all was verbal. And after a few months, I did my first ayahuasca session ceremony.

I was beautiful and amazing. I, I was saying to you minutes ago, this feeling about feeling like this, yeah, the feeling of, Division that I felt like a decision is myself separation, a separation and split between wars. And in that first session [00:19:00] was like. Both exist. You cannot deny no, the visible material world, no, the other one.

Both exist at the same time. 

Giancarlo: Yeah, you transcend the separation. 

Soledad: Yeah, I transcend the separation. Thank you. Thank you. What a 

Giancarlo: liberation. Yeah, 

Soledad: what a liberation. I feel relieved. I’m not crazy. I’m not crazy. I’m not crazy. And the week after that I flew to Peru and I did my first ayahuasca dieta. Which 

Giancarlo: tradition?

Peruvian? Yeah, Peruvian. Which tribes? Do you remember? 

Soledad: No, no, no, no. They, they they weren’t shipibos because the first one was around Tarapoto and the other one around Iquitos. But it was they were native, but not shipibos. So that’s changed my mind. And in that ayahuasca dieta in Peru, the first one, that’s when I have had the intuition of study astrology [00:20:00] because when I started to well during the, the, the ayahuasca journey, astrology was around me.

I, I at that time I had my reading, my first reading chart reading already and it was very It was an impact for me to have that reading because when, especially, especially when you have your first approach to astrology, this is a very common experience. You cannot believe it. How, how, how can you read that in the natal chart?

How, how can you say that, no? So it has, it has a need, an impact. But when I was in, in Peru, during the ayahuasca session, I had this astrological input during the journey. So I decided that when I came back to, to Buenos Aires, I wanted to enroll the a very important astro school of astrology that is in Buenos [00:21:00] Aires.

So when I came back, I enrolled to the school and the next year I started to study astrology for four years in this school and I really, it, it, it, it changed my mind. Because what gave me astrology in that situation was like a rewiring of my brain because it’s, it’s an impact for the cosmology, for the worldview, because how can it be that the movement of the star is related with my very, very private, intimate psychological process, or even the, my very daily things.

How can it be? So it is a really impact for, for the cosmology when you start to, to, to study astrology. But because, as you said, [00:22:00] this idea that maybe we, we can see in Eastern philosophy, we can find it also in the West tradition. We find that kind of cosmology very idealistic or with consciousness primary also in in, in West tradition, in the Western esoteric tradition.

And when we find astrology, Western astrology, because there is also a Vedic astrology that is the Indian one, but our Western astrology has its roots. In Mesopotamia, Hellenistic, the systematization of the practice of astrology that we believe. We use today came from the elistic barrier. So be, it’s a merch between philosophies like Plato, Aristotle the stoics.

So it’s a mix of this. this kind of philosophy. So it is a [00:23:00] platonic tradition that the worldview at that moment was a very holistic because this idea of fractal like a planetary feels like an onion in which we are inside this structure, inside this order, inside the sky. this idea that we are inside the sky and not under the sky.

So it’s, it’s a, also a turning point for, turning point for how do you live your life? Because you start to feel more connected with nature because you start to trying to put in tune or synchronize your personal complexes, your personal daily life. with a bigger order. So that’s when this rewiring of my brain that I was saying started to put in action and changed my mind also to, because the symbolic language [00:24:00] It’s a doorway to, to interpret to see and to understand that other invisible dimension.

Because in the origin, origins of, of astrology, the cosmology at that time for them, there was an invisible world as real as the visible one. So there, there was a, there wasn’t a problem with that. We have that problem in modernity. with this paradigm. So in that sense, astrology has a lot to offer because, because of the philosophical and cosmological implications of astrology, not only to know Saturn and Mars and what is happening to me and how can I be better every time and I feel my potentials, I express my potentials to astrology, but in a philosophical way, right?

How it’s a [00:25:00] daily practice that we can put into action to synthesize and put in tune our individual life. With nature, with cyclic movement of nature and see our life within a bigger order. So that’s gave me a bigger sense, this symbolic language that is astrology is another kind of mode of knowledge.

Symbolic our normal language. Works very different. They, they have different, they, they, they are connected with different ontologies also, these kind of languages. So it helped me to and try to understand what in a past moment, I feel desperate because I couldn’t understand what was happening.

And maybe now, maybe I, I don’t understand it. Neither, but I feel or have the sense [00:26:00] that there is an order. So it’s, it’s very different. 

Giancarlo: So with the knowledge you have now, those panic attack you had in childhood, would you think that they were maybe connected to some sort of astrological transit? 

Soledad: Yeah, totally.

When I when I saw my transits in the past at that time it was a Spanish the, the, the transits I was having, undergoing at that time. Well, I have to, to introduce, introduce symbolic astrological symbolism to talk about this transit, but yeah, it’s, it’s totally connected. And actually also, if I, if I think about the content.

The images that appears during these episodes psychotic episodes, psychotic, the content and the imaginary the images of that [00:27:00] moment, I get connected, I get connected with the astrological, not only with the astrological transit, but also with my natal chart and the themes that I can see in my natal chart.

So it’s very impressive. How can I see the journeys? This this psychotic episodes at the content is very similar with the content that we can compare. with a psychedelic journey as well. There is a connection. 

Giancarlo: But so if imagine we were living in a paradigm that has integrated this knowledge of this you know, we’re going to have time to talk more about this term of participatory epistemology.

So. You know, I just want to clarify for me and for others to what extent some, you know, [00:28:00] cyclical emotions or intense emotion might just be associated to the natural cyclicality of the universe. The fact that there is the cycle, there is the woman have their moon, there is. You know, they, some ladies feel a little bit crazy just before the moon and maybe some men are also, also the men of the, you know, the, the mood of the humans is definitely connected with the cycle of the moon and the ties.

And so, you know, when you were like 20, 22, you had your first psychotic breakdown. Imagine we were living in a society that has integrated this, this cosmology, this worldview, this ontological way to interpret reality. Then the psychiatric will not have read you. your symptoms and then label you with bipolar and give you all the pills.

It would have been a different sort of, of, of expert therapist that would have maybe looked at your [00:29:00] natal chart. Or how, how do you think a psychiatric or a doctor could have interpreted your considered bipolar behavior with the knowledge of the astrolog with the astrological knowledge you now have now?

You know, can you put yourself into the skin of that psychiatry that diagnosed you back then. Knowing what you know now, what would you have told you? 

Soledad: Yeah. It’s a tricky one. Yeah, interesting, interesting. I think that the knowledge that can bring the natal chart But of course, we are talking about a different paradigm, so it’s not just a knowledge that I can took and put it here or there and whatever, no, it’s not.

Astrology is not a tool. We cannot [00:30:00] produce astrology as a tool to just a tool to put it here and out, but a cosmology. So is the shrink is working with astrology. So we Just suppose that he also believe. That there is invisible dimension that there is people that is sensitive to this dimension. I give me tools to manage that because it’s not something that finished to happen to me.

I feel that things today, but I have the tools to, to manage them. 

Giancarlo: Can you talk a little bit about the tools? 

Soledad: Well, in that sense, the, the tool for me was. Body embodiment and breathing. 

Giancarlo: And always go back to practice of embodiment and breathing and getting out of your head. 

Soledad: Yeah. Because in that sense, I think that [00:31:00] astrology, especially right now in modernity, can nourish our neurotic things because I was trying to explain all the time because this planet is this and this that’s why I’m feeling this that’s why I try to explain all the time everything with astrology and this that’s neurotic and it’s not I’m embodying the deep treasure of astrology in that neurotic explanation.

Giancarlo: Okay, so let’s go back a little bit to you know, I would like you to put a little bit your didactic hat now. Okay. at the teacher of astrology. So you sign up to the school of astrology in Buenos Aires, which was teaching what kind of astrology, like Western or Latin American or Vedic or Egyptian.

There’s so many different type of astrology, right? Yeah. 

Soledad: Yeah. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Well, every culture has. Their astrology, we can see it in different culture, but we learn yeah, [00:32:00] Western astrology. That is the astrology that we we used to know that when we read posts and everything. 

Giancarlo: So who invented that astrology?

Soledad: Who invented ? Who, who created, that’s the question. The, the ancient Greeks. Well the, the scholars say that the origins are in Mesopotamia, but it was systematized in, yeah, in, in the ancient Greece. So, the techniques and the basic element that we use today in astrology came from there. 

Giancarlo: But you don’t study them in school.

They teach you about Plato and Aristotle, but they don’t tell you about the astrology. 

Soledad: Yeah, no. No, that’s, well, that’s the esoteric current that study this.

So already back 

Giancarlo: then they were like underground already back then they were like, 

Soledad: no, no, not that much. Not that [00:33:00] much. Because at that time you have to think that from that time till 17th century, the cosmology was current with the vision of the world of astrology. So astrology all the was Was teaching at was taught at the university in the medical studies every, 

Giancarlo: when, where?

Soledad: Well, in the 16th century. 15th, 16th century in Bologna actually, and also in France was was part of the medical studies because of this gano philosophy that the balance of the elements. And the temperaments, the humors, you can balance it. Astrologers were also doctors, were shamans. were priests, and they used natal chart for medical treatment.

How how to balance the four elements [00:34:00] for them was a sign of health. And also, for example, for Marsilio Ficino, one of a big Renaissance astrologer, had this, well, this healing vision of of astrology because For many, but also for him, the therapeutical thing about astrology was to tune yourself, synchronize your individual life to nature, to to the cosmos.

So when your life and a bigger order are going together, moving together, synchronized, that’s a sign of of healing and health. So they were looking for that to synchronize that the particular and the universal. So astrology was very important. 

Giancarlo: Just repeat the Italian astrologers. We’re going to put in the footnotes.

Soledad: Marsilio Ficino. Marsilio Ficino. Yeah. He was very important because he [00:35:00] translated all the platonic. Well, no, no, not all, but many of the platonic, the Corpus Hermeticum. So the, Platonic Renaissance and the total renaissance in the renaissance. He has a big important role with Chino. 

Giancarlo: Okay, great. So let’s go back to your course at Buenos Aires.

Soledad: One thing. So we, we have lots of years of astrology. So we have there are different currents and also we have natal astrology, but there is. Other branches very important of astrology, like orrery astrology, that is the most oracular astrology, is the astrology of the question, okay, I will move, for example, I will move next month, it’s not the netter chart, we calculate a chart for that question.

And also we have the elective astrology that is the election of a good moment to start everything because startings are very important in, in astrology. So [00:36:00] in my school, we, we teach like an, an integration between techniques, ancient techniques and techniques, and also modern techniques. But we also study the philosophy and the history of astrology.

Giancarlo: Beautiful. Let’s go back to just, who, who curated the curriculum of your Buenos Aires course? It was an astrologer from the West? 

Soledad: Yes, yes. All, all the astrology that I study is, is Western astrology. 

Giancarlo: Okay. That was a what? A four, four years course? 

Soledad: Well, that school was four years, but I studied in many school after that.

And I studied with, with Richard Tarnas also in California. I did some courses at the CIIS. And then I started a Master of Cultural Astronomy and Astrology in UK for three, four years more. And I finished it. 

Giancarlo: So you study like a decade. 

Soledad: Yeah. And I continue to, I love astrology and it’s infinite. So I [00:37:00] continue studying all the time and also teaching.

Giancarlo: Amazing. Okay. So out of this 10 years body of work, is there one aspect that really turns you on? 

Soledad: About 

Giancarlo: astrology 

Soledad: yes, yes. The philosophical implications. 

Giancarlo: Exactly. Okay. So let’s talk. Let’s talk. I just want. I just want to say, because sometimes I feel that I feel the need. To bring our listener back to what is, you know, the DNA off of Mango TV with the documentary and the blog and and the podcast.

Forgive me for this quick discretion, but ultimately what we are interested to explore here. is, you know, is the new generation of the human potential, which is, you know, how do we achieve body and mental wellness? How do we ultimately feel better in this life? And, you know, [00:38:00] how can we find our gift? How can we give it away and how can we help others?

How can we thrive in this planet? You know, ultimately I’m trying to explore the formula for you know, for, for living connected and happy and fulfilled. So, ultimately, we are about personal development. So that’s why when you start talking, okay, philosophically, how do we, how can we, how this new paradigm affect a new type of philosophy that then will impact a new way of living, which then will make us happier?

Soledad: Hmm. Yeah, I think that astrology has a lot to offer. In that sense, because how can it be that, as I say, the movement of the star are connected with our very intimate and private events and processes? [00:39:00] How can? I think that that’s the question. The answer of the question is a mystery, but the a symbolic language, actually the role of symbol is to relegate.

To unify, that’s actually the the etymology of symbol have to do with that, with unify. So when we put in practice the philosophical view of astrology, we enter to a vision of the world where everything is connected to everything. It’s not only that the stars cause our events here in Earth, but that thing that [00:40:00] moves the stars also moves our life our inner life.

So in that sense, astrology is an invitation to connect. Our very isolated mother in a life that as a something that is happening inside my skin. No, the idea, the modern idea is me, myself, my psyche. Psyche is understood as a mix of complexes and tendencies, personal tendencies. But for astrology, Psyche is this idea of anima mundi, is the inner aspect of life, not only the human life.

So, astrology is an invitation to this subject subject relationship with, also with nature. Because these active forces that we call the planets, for example, are [00:41:00] moving everything. They move the planets. There is a really nice vision that the planets are the visible faces of divinity. So, if we think about that Di Divinity, for example, is expressing through the planets and through us.

That thing that is moving the planets is also moving our life in not just cause and effects. So this is a very important thing, how it start to connect our isolated life, modern life to a bigger order, that there is an order and we, we can start to participate in that order when, when we realize. I start to work to cooperate with them.

That’s one of the implication. And also it has a very ecological aspect [00:42:00] because it connects our personal life. to the rhythm of nature. We tends to live in a modern society in a productive kind of life and also our idea of time used to be linear. So, past, present, future, so our, and the experience of time in astrology is cyclical.

So that means that our identities, our experiences, our projects, our everything is also cyclical. We are, we don’t have fixed identities, but cyclical. So our idea of time, that is not only a matter of quantity, but also of quantity, that time has Quantity and also an order well, [00:43:00] I think that it’s, it’s, it’s something there is a lot to, to think about that, you know, how it, it, it has an impact in our normal way of living as a progress, as an evolution.

The cyclical theory means increasing and decreasing, not just increasing, increasing, increasing and progress and progress and progress. So it, it is, it is the polarity base of, of, of life We have, they, we have night. So it’s based of nature and nature has also inner life. So in this sense, the ecological aspect of astrology that can brings our internal life connected with nature, not only in terms of.

What quantity, but also of quantity and the rhythms. So a lot of things. No, that’s super 

Giancarlo: interesting. So let’s maybe talk a little bit more about these two concepts just to try [00:44:00] to crystallize a couple of notion because it’s a lot for people like me. Who’s not familiar with astrology. So this idea of anima mundi, can you explain what it means?

Soledad: Si, el alma del mundo in Spanish, the soul of the world. And there are different approaches to that, of course. But there are some myths in this origins of astrology. And the idea that the soul came from the stars, that the soul was going down through the structures of the skies, and that’s when the soul is imprinted with the planetary qualities.

And then he, right, the soul arrives to earth, and then we have the ascendant. Journey [00:45:00] through the planetary spheres. 

Giancarlo: So the soul was coming down from where? That was 

Soledad: the platonic idea. From, yeah, from, from the stars. From 

Giancarlo: the heavens. 

Soledad: Yes. Yeah, the heaven was, that’s why tend to, to think astrology and the sky, you know, like something that is, 

Giancarlo: Above.

Soledad: Above. That we are under the sky. No? That is affecting this idea of cause and effect. But if we think that we’re inside the sky, more a circular, more more like a context. 

Giancarlo: Inclusive. 

Soledad: More inclusive. Yeah. That we are embraced by the planet, by the solar system, by the cosmos, that we are part of that. So what was the question?

I was Anima Mundi. The Anima Mundi. So this idea that the soul was the mediating the planets are the intermediate dimension between the agency of the earth and the movement of the sky. So it [00:46:00] is a, as a, it’s a doorway. The planets and the anima. Mui is all, all this active, it’s like a it’s like the the collective unconsciousness that y brought this, one of the ization of the anima Mui in the 20th century was this collective unconscious notion of, of Carl Young.

But the difference is in, one of the difference is that for modernity. This idea that the collective unconscious is something human that we project to the world. But the idea of Anima Mundi is the psyche is something that pertains to all the living beings of planets, not only human, that our individual souls are part of this Anima Mundi, this world.

So that is the world of the images. So 

Giancarlo: it’s the inner, inner 

Soledad: aspect of the planets. Not only humans, [00:47:00] 

Giancarlo: this, this idea that there is an intelligence in the Cosmo because the word intelligence, you can use also the word moral, you know, like I think Dr. King used this line, but he bought it for someone else.

Maybe, you know, he said that the moral arc of the universe It’s very large, but it exists, meaning that our history tends toward justice and morality. So by him saying that, it implies that there is a design, there is a consciousness in the universe. Another. Another metaphor or actually another mathematician who developed this idea of the the Fibonacci numbers, this mathematician from the 14th century, and, and he, you know, he created this golden [00:48:00] ratio, which is basically those numbers that he created this line of number where every number is the sum of the two previous number.

And so it came out with this, with this ratio and incredibly, those ratios are present everywhere in nature, in the spiral of the shell and the reproductive cycle of the rabbit and in the moon and in the architecture, ancient architecture, and also you can use them to predict the financial market and, and, and you would think, how is that possible?

And so, so That’s another example, you know, the moral arc that Dr. King was talking about, the Fibonacci number that many people are familiar with. 

Soledad: Yeah, it’s the same principle of astrology, it’s sacred geometry and the Pythagorean tradition and the idea of number as a quality, as a spiritual entity is very old.

So if you look at astrology, it’s all about geometry and second geometry. Yes. So [00:49:00] that’s the, the logos part of the, the question. No, we, we have this anima mundi, this chaotic war of images and qualities and forces, and we have the, the the intellect, no, this part of the, the, this, the, the, the, the There is ratio, there is an order.

So as I was saying at the very beginning about the Saturn return, that’s math. Because we knew as an astrologer from the moment you, you born that at that time you will have the Saturn return. That’s an order. So, it’s not something that you can do or everything is possible at every moment. From the point of view of astrology, well, there is a lot to talk about determinism and free will in that sense, no?

Really philosophical implication in that sense as well. But if [00:50:00] you believe that there is an order, there is a ratio, and we are talking about this kind of determinism, and that our individual life. is expressing that order. We are not disconnected from that, from the bigger order. So if we can connect the part, the particular and the individual, because what you are saying is that the structure of the cosmos and the structure of our inner life and our psychology is the same.

It’s not just something is first or What comes first, consciousness, but together. 

Giancarlo: Okay, so let’s maybe try to bring all this wisdom and knowledge a little bit down to, you know, daily human affairs. So. If there is an order, if there, [00:51:00] if the sent, if the universe is sentient, if there is, if there’s an intelligence, we are in the center.

We’re part of an intelligent big, you know, it’s like a multicellular organism, you know, we’re all one . And so how this new paradigm. Could affect our, our human daily behavior, how, how this knowledge is awareness that, you know, we’re not crazy if we feel sometimes disconnected from this reality, how all this can help us.

Soledad: Yeah. I think that astrology has a lot of aspects that can, that can offer. I said about the ecological aspect because it can connect our inner life. In a natural rhythm connected with nature. So it can bring a lot of ecological consciousness because also there is the, [00:52:00] the, the fundamental insight that everything is connected.

So if I start to realize that this moment, this interview is. implicated in both in the nature of both of us. Well, since it’s mind blowing, astrology for me is mind blowing all the time. And not because sometimes I cannot understand it, but I can feel the meaning, you know so to connect us with, with the world.

And also, for example, to understand other another difference. disciplines, for example, politics or economics, there is the munen world war astrology. That is the astrology of the world that reads the social movements, economical movements all the interpretations around COVID or that kind of things, for example.

So astrology has a lot of to offer in that sense, how we can connect [00:53:00] politics and economics in, in, in order with the stars also. So this is what you’re mentioning, you know, Richard Tarnas wrote a book, Cosmo and Psyche, yes, and basically. One of his argument was that when two planets are utterly aligned on the other side of Earth or on the same side or in a, in a, in a perpendicular, that’s associated with time of transformation and revolution.

Yeah, every planet has its quality, of course. So it’s So, when this planet starts to relate to different qualities with different effects that has, and what you were talking also is about aspects. Aspects are kind of dialogues. If we are in a difficult aspect, we are having like a difficult dialogue. If we are trying or succeed that are more soft aspects, well, it’s another kind of dialogue.

So we can start to compare [00:54:00] also because we are talking about cyclical time. It’s not evolution. It’s not linear. So it’s cyclical. So that means that there are cyclical experiences, or cyclical processes. So we can compare somehow different moments in our story to see what was happening one when this planet enters that or that sign, for example, what was happening.

So what information can that bring for the present? Because astrology is not just to, to manage the future or to control the future, but to manage the present. What do we do with the present? So, for example, next year, Pluto will enter the sign of Aquarius and we’ll do it in the 25 as well. The last moment that Pluto was in Aquarius, in the sign of [00:55:00] Aquarius, was in the context of French Revolution and Industrial Revolution.

Okay. And maybe I can smell something about that right now. 

Giancarlo: The technological revolution. 

Soledad: The technological revolution. With artificial 

Giancarlo: intelligence. For 

Soledad: example, Aquarium has a lot to do with technological breakthroughs. And so, and revolutions and technology. So, yeah, with robotics and artificial intelligence, there is, there will be like a very intense.

Crisis in work, and just as they say, a lot of people is migrating to, to the countryside instead of going to the city. It’s already happening. Yes. Yeah, it’s starting. Now, this is just the beginning. So we can understand that kind of things. But [00:56:00] so, you know, we, I produced a documentary on a book by Daniel Pinchper called 2012, the return of Squesco at all.

Giancarlo: And we would produce a documentary called 2012 time for change. And the starting point was that the, the end of the Mayan calendar and this idea that the end of the Mayan calendar was associated with the moment of transformation. And, and rebirth and crisis and, and the body, nobody really, no, none of the Mayans scholar we interviewed specifically said 21st December, 2012 on the dot, it was an IRA, right?

So now you look around the world, you’re like, Oh, maybe there was something to it. And then I remember back then they were also talking about the Vedic astrology and the Yugas. And then how the Kala Yoga and the different yogas also work. You know, come, you know, also we’re coinciding with the Mayan calendar into a new era.

And then also the Western astrology with the age of [00:57:00] Aquarius. And so sometimes I think, of course, it’s not a coincidence that all this map, if we believe that they are true, like I think Rick Thomas was saying that, Oh, Joseph Campbell was saying that. The map of truth will converge because if they are true and the planet are the same, then, then, then maybe there is, there is something to it.

Soledad: Yeah, I think that this, those culture had had a kind of internet without internet, you know, that they, they were connect connected with the same thing and trying to interpret that. Mystery in their way and measuring that. So, yeah, it has a lot of religion implication, I think, in that sense, because if we are talking about planetary beings and planets, they were connected with [00:58:00] gods and goddesses.

So in that sense, we are talking about So in that sense, that’s another aspect that astrology, I think that can offer for our change today, because through the invitation of connecting us to the world and to the order of cosmos, I think that astrology could be understood, can be understood as a spiritual practice.

Because Again, it connects our particular, the details of our life to a bigger order to the planetary God and goddesses. So in that sense, it’s ecological, it’s spiritual, it also has a very practical and pragmatic aspect that is. How to manage the present because we are trying to tune to the quality of the moment.

But what is the quality of the moment? We are talking [00:59:00] about fields theory. We are talking about that. We are that psych that we are inside the psyche psyche is not inside us, but we are inside the psyche like a fish. in water. So if we start to, to be more sensitive to this field, we can bring our potentials to the world in a better sense, in more, more authentic, more.

I think that astrology It’s a guide to discover our very authentic and true self, that true self is a very, is nature expressing through us and trying to give the context for this planetary spiritual beings express us. Through our life and express their potential, not [01:00:00] our potential, the potential of life, not soledad potentials.

Yes, of course, too, but it’s in service to something else. 

Giancarlo: Beautiful. Beautiful. But so now I start to see what you meant by the ecological awareness. So this idea of. You know, being aware of trying to lead your life, you know, using nature operating principles 

Soledad: because we are talking about nature, planets, we go, we can go every night and see the planet.

So we connect our life to nature because we are not talking about some abstract notions like planets, they are actually there. So how can it be that that thing that is So, far away from us is also inside us. How can it be? That’s why I want, want to say this one more time, that it’s not that the planet as a [01:01:00] objective thing is affecting us, but the thing that is moving the planet, that mystery thing that is moving the planet, is moving everything.

And also our psychology processes is the same thing. So, our life and the planet move together. Everything breathed together, say, the Asian people. So if we start to live our life, that our inner complexes and drama actually is also connected to that, and it’s part of that, that this interview is part of that, I think that that changed the, the, the the fundamental base of our life, how we live our life.

Giancarlo: Beautiful, beautiful. Let’s, let’s talk another few minutes about this concept of a cyclical identity. 

Soledad: Yes. 

Giancarlo: So, what do you mean by that? [01:02:00] 

Soledad: We tend to have a sense of identity as a fixed identity, no? I’m Soledad, this is me, I can do like a description of me, for example, and how I project myself. in the future and trying to continue with that image, self image, because that image, that sense of me, bring, give me a sense of identity.

But if we look at astrology and the transits, if Transits, for example, what we are talking about Saturn return, that means that the quality of our life, if we think of planet of the seven trends of our personality, like this, like the structure of our personality. We have this difference quality that are more strong or less strong in different [01:03:00] moments of our life.

So it’s a continuum movement. So if time has quality, and this quality is informing our thoughts, our actions, our behaviors, because we are inside that, We are moving with, with this cycle. So pay attention to, to your life. How not only our identity, but our experiences are cyclical. They increase and they decay.

And nature is like that. We have seasons, we are, yeah, actually the Western astrology is based on the seasons. So if we think about our identity as seasonal. It makes sense also that we, we change 

Giancarlo: beautiful. So so basically to apply this [01:04:00] intelligence to our life, you would recommend to, you know, be connected to nature in the sense of, you know, eat seasonal fruit and vegetable, be connected with the season, live.

Sustainably in the sense of you know, try to be in sync with the cycle as much as possible. And also the neuroscientist now says that, you know, you need to look at the sun 15 minutes the first three hours you wake up to start your cascade of hormones. I feel how this new practice of bio hacking, this seems all related about integration with nature.

Yeah. They say go in the cold water go bare feet in the forest, look at the sun. You know, it seems to be, look at the moon. It seems that, yeah. 

Soledad: And you can look at your natal chart for a treatment, depends of your, for example, the balance of your elements. Is good for [01:05:00] you a nice bath or the sun or is, is not good.

It depends of your balance. Maybe you need more, something more hot or more dry, you know, to balance your particular temperament. That’s one thing. But there is a very important notion in, in astrology, astrology that is the, the great chain of being. That is the idea. Very fractal idea that everything is connected in, in different scales.

So in a symbolic language, the like astrology, for example, the sun. It’s also connected with gold or the sunflower or the kings and queens, not where the kings actually on the lion. So it means that there is a quality that express indifference, scales and elements, but respond to the [01:06:00] same quality. So there are plans, herbs, stones.

Connected with a metal connected with a particular planet so you can work medically in that sense, not to connect with venues. You can work with Cooper Cooper or with gold or silver to connect with the the, the moon. No, the Italian manic magic perspective work a lot of this because is working with the quality of the moment.

So if you want to do a Cooper talisman, talisman for Venus, you do it in venues day in the venues hour when venues in the sky is with good aspects, not Any moment is a particular moment because the idea off astrology that the time has quality. So if we sense that quality, we are tuned with that. If [01:07:00] we want to start something.

We don’t do it when the moon is, is dying because the quality of that moment is, is, is, it’s a dying moment, it’s a finished moment, it’s the end of something. To put a very simple example, no, in that sense with every planet. So this idea that everything is connected with everything else it means that Metals, plants, herbs are connected with the planet and in reading a natal chart, we can use that natal chart for a diagnosis.

To use this kind of thing for a treatment and see if cold is good for you or hot is good for you and dry or whatever. 

Giancarlo: A little bit like the Ayurveda system. 

Soledad: Yeah, I don’t know much about Vedic astrology, just the basic differences with Western, but I think that all these [01:08:00] systems like Ayurveda that use also astrology.

have very fundamental principles in common. 

Giancarlo: Amazing. Amazing. I don’t want to keep you for too long. I think we should do, we should do another episode after I digested all this information. Just in terms of your, you know, career now. So how did you, how did you apply all this knowledge you have acquired?

You, you do reading, you do, how do you, 

Soledad: yes. I do readings with a psycho spiritual orientation. And also I founded this school where I also teach. I really love teaching astrology. And I teach there, but there are many, many other experts teaching not only astrology, but also transpersonal psychology, symbolism, a lot.

It’s all around symbols. Mode of knowledge of life. And for me, what is super interesting is everything in [01:09:00] Spanish. Sorry the school. But for me, what is very interesting is to study the symbols and archetypes with people from different countries and culture because it’s everything in line. So for me, it nourished a lot with me.

When people from different cultures can, can talk about the same kind of archetype, you know, because they have different experience about that image, maybe, you know. So, we do trainings on astrology, trainings on symbolism, and we did also, also Western esoterism religion, psychology. Mythology well, all that archetype, and also my, I am a researcher, academic researcher, so my interest is in mystical experiences and astrology [01:10:00] because for me, I argue that the symbol has the potential to expand our consciousness in the same way that psychedelic has.

But you can put it any in practice in your daily life. That’s why I really love teaching astrology, because for me, it’s to bring the tool and the language and the paradigm to the other person, not only to read the natal chart in a context of a session and that cannot Change the cosmology of the person.

But yeah, this is my work life. Beautiful. And so your classes are online. Everything is online. What’s the website? The name is psychosimatica and actually simatica, cymatics in English. It’s the study of the, I don’t know if if you saw these experiments with sand or water that the geometry that [01:11:00] makes the sound, that’s cymatics.

So there are the vibration 

Giancarlo: create this beautiful geometry pattern. 

Soledad: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And we, we tend to think that the sound creates. The geometry, the mandala because we, we think about time in a linear way, but it’s happening at the same time. So that’s semantics and the idea of the fundamental structure of astrology, this idea of psychic geometry.

So psychosomatica is the mix of psyche and matics. So that’s mean that our psyche is all it. It also has an order as we can see with sematic in nature. As you said, there are geometries, like FCI ratio that we can see in nature. The repetition in different scale of nature. So if we [01:12:00] translate that notion to psychology, well, it’s the same.

And we can see it very clearly with with astrology, this idea of psychosomatic, that we, that our life respond to the same order of the cosmos. So that’s the idea of psychosomatica. 

Giancarlo: Beautiful. And the website is psychosomatica. com. 

Soledad: Dot com. Yes. 

Giancarlo: But so now with recent tool. You can transcribe and translate for people that don’t speak Spanish.

Soledad: Yes, yes, yes, yes. We are on that. The idea of the school is to be bilingual, because we have also an English speaking teacher. That are translated to, to Spanish, mostly Spanish speaking teachers, but we have other languages too. So in the vision Psychosemática will be bilingual, both Spanish and English everything.[01:13:00] 

Giancarlo: Beautiful. Saccosimatica. com. We’re going to put it on the show note. Okay. For people that I’ve listened to us and are now curious to go a little bit deeper, what book, movie, article would you recommend? 

Soledad: I recommend child reading more than, than a book or Many, many books, but if you want to go deeper with astrology, I want to grasp the gift of astrology, do a reading.

Giancarlo: But what about people that are in Los Angeles? They, how do they find the right reader? 

Soledad: Well, there are really good. Astrologers in the U. S. Can they contact 

Giancarlo: you? Is your email on the website? 

Soledad: Yeah, it’s my email. They can contact me, but astrologers are everywhere. And yeah, it’s how do you find the best for you?

Yeah, you can write me and I can do it or I can recommend another one. [01:14:00] Depends on your city. 

Giancarlo: Because I feel, you know, the, this reading, it’s so open to interpretation, right? This, this, this reading, I feel that it’s very easy to attract little charlatans. 

Soledad: Yes. Yeah. Well, that’s one of the problem of astrology in every, every area.

Like, like shamans 

Giancarlo: a little bit. You need to get a good referral. 

Soledad: Yeah. Especially now because astrology is. It’s quite popular in, in social media, but it’s very reductionist and very simplistic, that kind of astrology. Astrology has very complex techniques. So in that sense, the techniques help you to synchronize what is happening at that moment in this chart and not to blah, blah, blah.

Giancarlo: But Soledad, correct me if I’m wrong. If someone give his date of birth, time of birth, and [01:15:00] place of birth, then you can have, you can do a Zoom call. You can share your screen. 

Soledad: Exactly. That’s what I do. So when I work online, my online session, I. Share the little chat and we are, we talk about what I see from that and what this, the question of the person, what is the, 

Giancarlo: yeah, so let’s, if anybody’s interested to have a reading, just call you.

Soledad: Yeah, call me, call me and then let’s see. 

Giancarlo: Okay, perfecto. 

Soledad: The first session at least is around one hour and a half. Because we are talking about astrology, and in another chart there is a lot of information in the already in the fixed chart, but when we start to see the transit, the cycles, in the past, in the future, it’s a lot.

And also, there is another technique that is the synastry. That is the relationship between natal charts. So we are related here. Your natal chart, Giancarlo and [01:16:00] mine are related. If not, if they are not related, we cannot connect from the perspective of astrology. So that’s another technique to, for example, to use between, for, for couples or for partners or for the coach and the client, for example any kind of relationship one on one.

And also you can use it for families and start to to relate difference natal charts. So there are difference. techniques. 

Giancarlo: Beautiful. I think we’re going to stop here. I don’t want to you know, inundate people with too much information in one go, but 20, 

Soledad: 20 centuries of astrology is another one. Now we’re trying to see centuries of astrology.

Giancarlo: So we’re going to do, we’re going to do an episode, episode two very soon. Thank you very much for your time. So 

Soledad: thank you. [01:17:00] Giancarlo.