Radical Reposts: The Planets – Chiron, Part 1

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 Centaurs bridge and palace in Pavlovsk Park
St. Petersburg, Russia

In this year of reposts by topic on The Radical Virgo, we have started with blog articles on the planets. In order of distance from the Sun, our next set of planetary reposts are on Chiron. Because Chiron is my astrological specialty, there is a large volume of material here on Chiron.

Healing, Chiron’s turf, can be a bit overwhelming as a topic in large doses. So, I’ve made the decision to split the Chiron posts into two segments—this starter set now with the rest to follow in May. Chiron himself was a dual, bifurcated being—half human and half horse. Splitting in two anything to do with Chiron seems par for the half-horse!

But what I’m splitting it with makes even more sense—Humor Month during April. Much of our humor derives from pain and putting our lives in a new perspective, a key Chironic concept.

Enjoy this Chiron opener, the humor in-between, with more Chiron to come in May.

Basics

Why Chiron? Gifts of the Wounded Healer (20-Jun-09)

Don’t let its small size and unusual nature as part-comet, part-planetoid or asteroid fool you. Chiron is the missing key to interpreting your astrology chart. It opens the door to personal and planetary evolution.

Planetary Fishing: Chiron (21-May-13)

Just joining our fishing expedition? See May Planetary Fishing Expedition for background. Like all planets, the centaur Chiron offers you a mixed bag of challenges and blessings. Your Chiron can point to where you have lingering pain, whether it’s physical, emotional or both. It can be your stumbling block or a hurdle you can’t get over for having denied or disowned certain parts of yourself. Chiron’s greatest gift lies within this discomfort or stuck state—and in your willingness to work through it. In that process, you’ll often discover the key to personal integration and wholeness.

For a fuller introduction, including Chiron in the signs and houses, Chiron and Wholeness: A Primer is available in PDF in the Radical Virgo Store and in Kindle and Nook versions. All are $7.95. Read more about its contents here.

Learn More from Chiron’s Keywords

Chiron's Keyword Corner: Ecology (04-May-09)

Chiron teaches us that nurturing is of the utmost importance, and that the forest is sacred.

Chiron's Keyword Corner: Puns (23-Aug-09)

Puns or plays on words: Some people consider them the lowest form of humor—others, the highest. The mere fact that people react to puns from one extreme to the other suggests they're Chironic ...

Chiron's Keyword Corner: Halves and Composites  (13-May-10)

Chiron of mythology was a half-breed—half-human, half-horse. His top half represents our divine nature in human form, his bottom half our baser instincts. Many scenes in Chiron's story contrast his gentle nature as a mentor of heroes to the wild centaurs that ran around raping and pillaging the Greek countryside. Those two types of centaurs represent the extremes of character in our human adventure.

Chiron's Keyword Corner: Horse (27-Sep-10)

Why was Chiron half horse rather than half goat, ram, llama or turtle? Here's one possible answer from a rich site on symbolism, The Horse Archetype in Poetry and Anthroposophy.

Like learning about Chiron through Keywords? The ultimate experience is Keywords to Unlock Chiron: 50 Passageways to Healing and Wholeness, available in the Radical Virgo Store in PDF format for $9.99. I consider it my consummate book on Chiron. More about what’s inside …

The Quizzes – How Chironic Are You?

The Chiron Quiz: How Strong is Your Chiron? (17-Aug-10)

How many indicators in your natal chart suggest that Chiron may be an important archetype to you? A planet to pay attention to? Don’t be dismayed if your score is low. Not every archetype is important for everyone, and what actually matters more is the next quiz—how much you resonate to Chiron. It’s similar to the rumor that we only use 10% of our brains. (I’ll bet that varies a lot.) Even if you only have a small “dose” of Chiron, if you are “seized by the archetype,” as Joseph Campbell says, you may make more out of it than a person with a high score who just can’t seem to get into it. After all, Chiron involves pain for gain, and many people would prefer to avoid it as long as possible. (Fair warning: Ignoring pain has consequences.)

The Chiron Resonance Quiz: What's Your Chi-Res Score? (17-Sep-10)

You’ll learn a lot about Chiron by taking this quiz, and quite possibly, how Chironic you are, often without realizing it. Learn whether or not you “get” Chiron and how many things about you may be woven together through knowing Chiron’s myth, astrological characteristics and how modern culture has changed since its discovery.

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Photo Credit: © Kokhanchikov - Fotolia.com

See you in May for more reposts on Chiron—then onto the rest of the PUNCs, what I call the outer planets and people who have them prominent: Plutonian, Uranian, Neptunian Chironics. Meanwhile--laughter.

"Keywords to Unlock Chiron" - New Book Now Available in PDF!

Dear Radical Readers,

I’m thrilled to announce the release of my new, full-length book in PDF format, Keywords to Unlock Chiron: 50 Passageways to Healing and Wholeness. In my previous post, Chiron: Wounded Healer, Wholeness Weaver, you got a preview--a collage of the 50 most important words or phrases that, together, weave the tapestry of Chiron’s meaning. 

I cover each one in depth in this new book. Not only is there a standalone chapter on each of the keywords or phrases; how they interrelate becomes obvious by the device of bolding the keywords as they are mentioned in other chapters. The same ones repeat throughout the “conversation.” You soon will see not just the big picture but the stitches of reiterating words that hold together the substance of Chiron’s interpretation. I cite the “discovery source” of each word or phrase—whether it comes from the myth of Chiron, the astronomy of the centaur planet Chiron or the cultural changes around the time Chiron was discovered. Folklore even finds its way into the mix as we learn both superstitions and some of the more frequent "omenclature" of comets, half of Chiron's astronomical identity.

Astrological interpretation is built on metaphors. Keywords reveals how the underlying concepts behind these words help us grow toward wholeness—words such as hero, mentor, healer, weaver, catalyst and stuck. As I mention in the post cited above, a good starting phrase for Chiron is Wounded Healer, Wholeness Weaver.  The book begins with Weaver and ends with Wholeness. You’ll have a sense of the process and healing curve Chiron brings into our lives. When pain or disowned parts of ourselves finally hurt enough, we are pushed by discomfort or misery to break the logjam and dare to become more of ourselves.

Chiron is both personal and outerplanetary. It is the archetype for the Third Millennium. The tight conjunction of Chiron and Pluto at the Big Turn on January 1, 2000 foretold the cosmic importance of our current global issues with the healing of power and the power of healing.

Your personal message from Chiron lies in which keywords “hit home” for you. There’s a handy reference tool at the back of the book that suggests which keywords are the likeliest home runs for you based on your Chiron sign and aspects to Chiron in your chart. Two chapters match your Chiron configuration with specific healing modalities.

The PDF version of Keywords is now available at $9.99. This is a bargain, considering it’s the download of my 25 years of research and focus on Chiron. You can purchase the PDF e-book on the sidebar of this blog or directly at The Radical Virgo Store. Other versions will become available over the months to come—e-reader and paperback with other possibilities to be determined.

Why Choose PDF?

One of Chiron’s key words is Ecology. Besides saving trees, there are many advantages to buying the book in PDF:

1. It’s the first available and the most unabridged version. You’ll have the information at your fingertips early-on. (This perk is especially for the Aries and Mars-prominent folks.)
   
   
2. You don’t need an e-reader like Kindle or Nook to access a PDF file, though most devices can read this format. You can read Keywords on your computer—and more! See below.
   
   
3.  PDF is the least expensive version, although the e-reader versions will be similarly priced. Paper costs more to produce and requires higher pricing.
   
   
4.  The PDF version is full of rich, color images just like my blogs. That makes for a more comfortable read. It’s in 12-point type, easy on the eyes. Color printing is costly. It remains to be seen how “graphic” the paperback version will be based on quality  black-and-white conversions of the images I'm sure you'll agree help "make" the book.
   
   
5. You can print out as much or as little of the book as you choose, including your favorite passages.
   
   
6. You can keep a copy on your computer and have a searchable document any time you want to look up something you want to remember or re-explore.
   
   
7. Adobe has a free application to download PDFs onto your iPad, iPhone or Android phone. You can buy this book once and enjoy it on your computer, phone or pad. You can read it on the go. My preview readers say it's an easy read on an iPad.
   
   
8.    PDFs can also be read on most devices with two simple steps:
   
   a.   From your search engine, enter how to read PDF on (name of device).
   
   b.   Follow the instructions of whichever article looks the easiest.

Here are directions for Kindle, as an example. I tested these on my B&W Kindle. There are, of course, limits, since the PDF is not designed specifically for the Kindle format. Suggestions: Using your Aa button, increase the contrast to darker or darkest.  Increasing type size really doesn't work well as the formatting goes pretty wonky. The best read is on Fit to Screen. Though the print is small, it's surprising how legible bold, small type is with increased contrast. You can also move to landscape view which gives you bigger type without funky formatting. It allows you the experience of one of the key phrases, A Different Perspective. That worked best for me, as I have one of the smaller screens without color capability. Limits: A few photos are too dark and difficult to discern and footnotes do not link. Same on footnotes reported for iPad.

If you're an avid Note reader, wait till the Kindle or other e-reader versions are available--or purchase the  PDF and read whatever Notes you want to explore on your computer. The printed version, of course, has no linkability. Are we spoiled or what?  If you've got a Kindle Fire or another color reader, some of these PDF limitations will go away with the higher technology, larger screens and the ability to reproduce the color photos as-is.

What’s Inside?

Two preview posts give abbreviated examples of the kinds of essays this book contains on each keyword: Maverick and Spirit in Matter. There’s one key word or phrase per chapter. Keywords to Unlock Chiron expands on something I’ve been doing since the early days of Chironicles newsletter in the 1990s and on this blog, the Chiron’s Keyword Corner feature. Existing Keyword Corner features have been updated and expanded, plus many more were written  exclusively for this book. The handful of Keyword Corners already posted on The Radical Virgo has grown to 50 in this new book format.

It Doesn’t Look Like Other Astrology Books

Just as Chiron the mythical centaur had very unique looks indeed, Keywords doesn’t look like your typical astrology book. It’s light on astrological technicalities. People who aren’t even into astrology will get a lot out of it. Who doesn’t need healing and wholeness? Keywords to Unlock Chiron is all about interpretation of Chiron’s archetypal meaning.

By taking the journey into the background of each keyword, you’ll have a mental and emotional storehouse of Chiron’s message for personal evolution. This will allow you to tune into the most intuitive yet accurate interpretations involving Chiron in astrology charts, including your own.

Truth in Advertising

You probably don’t want to print out the entire book unless you’re willing to sacrifice two-thirds of a ream of paper and can talk yourself out of any resulting eco-guilt. I debated whether do a PDF version of a book this length, but Keywords has been long awaited and postponed due to some of my own Chironic healing challenges—and my husband’s. (Note the adjective form of Chiron has “ironic” in it.) This format allows me to bring it to you as soon as possible. If you still can’t live without a printout, plan on getting the fattest binder you can find and making enough confetti with the paper punchings to celebrate the New Year. (Please recycle.)

You can also consider doing what I do for my favorite Astro-references. Buy the book in electronic format now and paperback later. The PDF will be searchable and readable on your computer and other devices. The paperback will be good on your reference shelf for those who like the low-tech perks and the feel of paper, as well as the sound and smell of a squeaky yellow highlighter. After all, one of Chiron’s key phrases is Not Either/Or but Both/And.

You can always purchase it later when the paperback or e-reader versions come out … but, of course, I hope you can’t wait!

What Preview Readers Are Saying

“Your writing is like getting a letter from a friend containing golden advice.” ~ JT, United Kingdom

“A delightful blend of astrology, humor and valuable insights into our own human nature, Keywords brings the magic of Chiron alive and teaches us how to apply its multidimensional wisdom to our everyday lives. It is a fabulous fun-filled guide for anyone seeking greater self-awareness or simply wanting to 'amp up' their authentic self-expression.” ~ DS, California

Your feedback is welcome! Please sent your comments on the new book to me: joyce [at] joycemason.com or feel free to Comment on this blog post.

Publication Summary

Length:  301 pages (8.5 x 11)

Format: PDF

Publisher: New Inkarnation Media

Publication Date: June 18, 2013

Price: $9.99 US

Thanks for being part of my odyssey of learning and sharing about Chiron. I’m still as excited about this archetype today as I was on Day 1.

Healing and Wholeness,
Joyce

PS - Please click on by and Like the new Keywords Facebook Page.