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Astrology and the Symbolic Imagination

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On-line Course

Tutors: Brian Clark, Carole Taylor, Safron Rossi & Jason Holley

June 2 - 23, 2024

2025 DATES COMING SOON

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Astrology and the Symbolic Imagination is our signature course, enshrining our approach to astrology. It is taught by four of the core contributors to the CAMS project. Each of these tutors is an experienced individual voice in contemporary astrology and each offers their unique perspective – yet together we are united in the ground of our approach, placing central importance on the faculty of symbolic imagination and on the inspiration of the archetypes as a living presence. 

 

Together, these perspectives create a prism through which to understand the complex and often elusive and mysterious subject of astrology. The emphasis in this course is on astrology as an invitation into dialogue with the archetypal world, as participants in an ensouled cosmos.

 

All four tutors are practising astrologers and the course flows out of our many decades of client work and teaching. The aim is to provide you with ideas and tools to enrich your understanding and practice.

 

Astrology abounds with techniques, but these can sometimes serve to build technical knowledge at the expense of a deeper and more meaningful view. The work of CAMS is to invite astrologers into a participatory mode that acknowledges technique as being in service to the symbol, the symbol as a threshold into psyche, and the chart as sacred space.  

 

Why take this course?

 

  • To develop a deeper relationship to the symbols and patterns of the birth chart.

  • To enrich your understanding of your own chart and your work with clients, through developing a more symbolic and archetypal point of view.

  • To engage with the magical, mythical and divinatory dimensions of astrological work.

  • To use techniques with greater awareness and develop astrological wisdom.

 

​Anyone interested in the approach taken by the Centre, or thinking of following one of our other courses, is encouraged to take this signature course. 

 

Format

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The course is arranged in four sections, with two pre-recorded videos and one live Discussion & Reflection session in each section.

 

Each pre-recorded lecture is approximately 45 minutes in length. The two lectures in each section will be released one week in advance of that section’s Discussion & Reflection session. Along with these, you will be given suggestions for reading and further study.

 

The Discussion & Reflection sessions are held live on Zoom. Each is 90 minutes in length and will be recorded for anyone who cannot attend live. 

 

You will retain access to the video lectures and the Discussion & Reflection recordings for a period of 3 months from the end of the course.

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Course outline

 

1. Astrology, Symbol and Imagination

   Brian Clark

 

Recorded Lecture 1: Astrology and the Mythic Imagination 

In this class we will explore a return to mythic sensitivity, symbolic thinking and imagination in our astrological study and practice:

 

  • Astrology and Nature 

  • Astrology and the Sacred Stories of the Soul 

  • An Astrological Mythos

 

Recorded Lecture 2: Reading the Horoscope in a Sacred Context

This class explores ways to engage the client’s world with the symbols of the horoscope, as if the chart were a sacred text:

 

  • Listening, Witnessing, Questioning, Participating: creating the space.

  • From Type to Archetype

  • From Sign to Symbol

  • Astrology as Poetry

  • The Dream of One’s Life

 

Discussion & Reflection session with Brian: Sunday June 2, 2024 

  • 3pm PDT (Los Angeles)

  • 4pm MDT (Sante Fe)

  • 11pm BST (UK)

  • Monday June 3, 8am AEST (Sydney/Melbourne)

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2. The Living Symbol – Astrology, Dialogue and Divination

    Carole Taylor

 

Recorded Lecture 1: Symbol, Myth and Imagination

This lecture explores the symbolic mode in the hermetic tradition and symbols as our connection to the living archetypes:

 

  • Objective/scientific and subjective/imaginal modes in the history of astrology.

  • Astrology as imaginal cosmology: a ‘myth’ of a cosmos that invites our participation. 

  • Symbols as connection between revealed and concealed worlds.

  • Experiencing the symbol: the hermeneutic of the Four Senses.

 

Recorded Lecture 2: Participating with Symbols in Astrological Practice

Here we will look at symbols at work in the birth chart, as well as astrology as a divinatory art:

 

  • Symbol in action in chart work and consultancy. 

  • Speaking in the moment – the divinatory dimension in astrology. 

  • The role of the astrologer in the manifestation of the symbol. 

 

Discussion & Reflection session with Carole: Sunday June 9, 2024

  • 11am PDT (Los Angeles)

  • 12pm MDT (Sante Fe)

  • 7pm BST (UK)

  • Monday June 10, 4am AEST (Sydney/Melbourne)

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3. Astrology as Cosmology for Soul

    Safron Rossi

 

Recorded Lecture 1: Cosmologies in Myth

  • Joseph Campbell and the four functions of myth. The cosmological and the psychological. 

  • Cosmologies—what do they serve? What archetypal (universal) need have these stories fulfilled?

 

Recorded Lecture 2: Astrology as a Cosmology for Soul – Gafurius’ Music of the Spheres

  • Astrology as soul making — the restoration and cultivation of the imagination through myth and metaphor.

  • Gafurius – the Muses and the planets, the songs of the soul.

  • Conclusion — the fruits of an archetypal, mythic, psychological approach to astrology, what it offers to the time in which we live and our need for a new cosmology.

 

Discussion & Reflection session with Safron: Sunday, June 16, 2024

  • 3pm PDT (Los Angeles)

  • 4pm MDT (Sante Fe)

  • 11pm BST (UK)

  • Monday June 17, 8am AEST (Sydney/Melbourne)

 

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4. Engaging with Symbolism in Astrology

    Jason Holley

 

Recorded Lecture 1: The Symbol in the Sensuous: Reweaving Body and Soul, Instinct and Imagination

This class explores how we can re-embed our practice of astrology into the mythic and imaginal experience of living symbolism that gave birth to it.

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  • Dreaming Earth and Reflecting Sky

  • The Dismembering and Re-membering of Myth in Astrology

  • Astrology as Ritual and Sacred Play

  • Hermes/Hestia: Safe Encounters with the Gods

  • Astrologers as Custodians of Star and Story

 

Recorded Lecture 2: The Symbol in the Relationship: Meeting Mystery Together

This class explores how we can consciously and collaboratively engage with symbolism in astrological consultation.

 

  •  The Interpersonal Field in Astrological Terms: Day, Night, Twilight

  •  When the Symbol Slips In: Description, Enactment, Invocation

  •  The Astrologer’s Use of Self and Subjectivity

  •  Penelope/Odysseus: Methods of Symbolic Perception and Engagement

  •  The Oracle as Querent and the Querent as Oracle 

 

Discussion & Reflection session with Jason: Sunday June 23, 2024

  • 11am PDT (Los Angeles)

  • 12pm MDT (Sante Fe)

  • 7pm BST (UK)

  • Monday June 24, 4am AEST (Sydney/Melbourne)

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Video Presentation with Brian, Carole, Safron & Jason

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