CIIS Public Programs Podcast

transcript

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This is the CIIS Public Programs Podcast, featuring talks and conversations recorded live by the Public Programs department of California Institute of Integral Studies, a non-profit university located in San Francisco on unceded Ramaytush Ohlone Land. Through our programming, we strive to amplify the voices of those who have historically been under-represented. To find out more about CIIS and public programs like this one, visit our website ciis.edu and connect with us on social media @ciispubprograms.  
 
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Rebekah: Hello Jen, may I call you Jen?  

Jennifer: Of course. [laughs] 

Rebekah: Oh, I'm so excited to talk to you tonight because well, you're a dear friend of mine in real life, but your brilliance, I'm always so just in awe of your brilliance and this book just adds to that awe because it is so beautiful. So, thank you for writing Cosmic Health, I have it here with tons of dog ears getting ready to talk about all of it tonight. Hopefully we can get in as much as we can.  

Jennifer: Well, thank you. I'm so stoked you're here with me. 

Rebekah: Stoked, alright, we're getting casual. This is fun. I'm going to take a sip and we're going to dig in. I got a paper straw, so it didn't clink. So, I met you eight years ago at a really pivotal part of my life, and I think because of everything that I was going through, I was going through some big loss, some big transition. I was really drawn to your work because I was looking for answers and you are an astrologer, but you came to it, you came to astrology because of a crisis in your own life and I would like to touch on that just so people know exactly who you are, where you come from, and why you chose to make this your life's work. 

Jennifer: Yeah, I don't think I chose to make this my life's work. I think that my life's work chose me because I really kind of fought it for a long time, but as you alluded to, I had a health crisis early on in my life when I was still a teenager. I was diagnosed with cancer, which was a gynecological cancer that led to a radical hysterectomy before I had turned 19 and landed me, face-planted me, in menopause without really a roadmap as to where I would go from there. I mean, I knew some basic things like things like I didn't have cancer anymore, I would never have children, I wasn't going to get any period, but I didn't know how to really survive, let alone thrive after I made it through my cancer journey and that sent to me on a long healing path actually to San Francisco.  

But along the way I met a woman who tipped me off that following the cycles of the moon could be this really powerful thing I could do to replace the cycle of my period, my menstrual cycle, that I had lost and opened me up to the whole wild world of following celestial cycles as a way of tracking and understanding my personal rhythms and the rhythms of the universe and timing things… I started and it really taught me how to live in sync with my desire at the end of the day.  

And many years later, I had done that for so long that I started paying attention to many cycles and it wasn't probably until 2007 that I started seriously studying astrology in a very real way, with like a mentor and learning it and practicing it. Even then I was super resistant to doing this as a living or doing this even like as a professional in any way shape or form, but it was just through my coaching work and through my relentless studies and my deep love of it that it just all kind of came together. Yeah, so I always say it chose me. 

Rebekah: So, what was the resistance, like who were you as a person and why I mean… would you see yourself, let's say growing up as someone that would be into astrology or was it just a real left turn for you?  

Jennifer: Yeah, no I mean it wasn't like a real left turn, you know, like it wasn't. How do I answer that question, growing up I mean I was fascinated with metaphysics for sure. You know, like I definitely was into weird. Whatever that meant, [Rebekah laughs] mostly through music, you know, like that was where I found myself mostly spending most of my time and money. Or you know time and art and literature and writing and that sort of thing, but you know I was always really curious and exploring, deeply connected to nature like wildly connected to nature. I was pursuing something along the lines like environmental law or I don't know I wanted to like do good in the world and this felt like really un-academic to me in a way that I was just trained to sort of go after.  

I mean now I know that's like such a fallacy in my own mind because astrology's wildly studious and deeply academic in many ways but at the time like there was a stigma around it in my own mind, right and I didn't really understand. I didn't really understand astrology. That's the thing and I think a lot of people don't understand astrology if they think it's horoscopes or like hey, what's your sun sign conversations or like Mercury's in retrograde oh my god, you know and that's not really what astrology is, like astrology is a very sophisticated very ancient deeply rich practice that blends like the science of earth cycles with psychology and archetypes and so many different sciences together. And of course, every astrologer has a focus unto itself, but astrology is just really deeply rich, incredibly ancient practice and I don't think I understood it well enough to really even make a decision about it. I was just like in my head over like who I thought I was and who I was actually becoming, and they were two different people. 

Rebekah: Yeah, I think you know for me as you know being a skeptic and its weird because I would say that I'm the most left brain creative because I love to create and I love art and I love, you know, just making things and having new ideas but, you know, I'm very methodical about everything, I'm very disciplined and when I opened your book, I was so excited because I love a method like I was like, oh, okay, there's like parts and it's in like parts and I'm understanding astrology to be more of that. You have, when you open it up the five principles of cosmic health. You have these five pillars of Cosmic Health, the name of the book. I love that especially now and I want to get into it. I really want to talk about the state of where we all are right now, but I love of that you are focusing on our health and self-care in this book, but can you go through the five principles and tell us more about that?  

Jennifer: Yeah, I mean principle number one is, it's really what I learned in the most succinct way through following lunar cycles and ultimately learning to live seasonally and rhythmically is to live cyclically and the most core sense like that's what we're meant to do as humans. You know, we have a circadian rhythm, we have a seasonal rhythm. I believe we have a really strong circle of lunar rhythm or a circle monthly rhythm, which is the lunar cycle rhythm, though that’s not as like proven through science in the here and the now, but I think we're going to see a lot more science coming out around that. I have a lot to say about why we haven't had a lot of science on that just yet.  

But I think our bodies are just geared to be cyclical and rhythmic and we’ve been disconnected from it because we live in a very linear world that's about productivity and you know, a lot of it has to do with like just heteronormative patriarchy and you know white supremacy patriarchy and I think that we've just been conditioned out of our natural states in terms of like our modus operandi, but our health actually works best when we are living in sync with seasons and cycles, so that's principle number two. I mean principle number one, and then I go into resilience and like why resilience is key to health and clearly, we'll talk about it.  

But you know when I was writing this book, I started writing this book in 2017, I think seriously and I knew it would come out around this time and I was just really clear like by the time we get there like the only thing that's going to matter is resilience and besides that my work is all about resilience anyway because life you know, I think we went through a good long decade in the spiritual wellness world where we thought we could like avoid problems or you know what I mean? Like… 

Rebekah: A lot of people did, a lot of people thought that yeah.  

Jennifer: But like that was like the goal to be like exceptional enough that you were, that that was the problem for people who didn't like think the right thoughts or something. I don't know… and like having had cancer at such a young age and like so many, I mean honestly like I studied astrology because I was like what the hell's going on with my life like why like, you know just trying to figure out all the nuances of the many challenges I had faced and it wasn't until then that I seriously started studying positive psychology that I understood resilience as an attribute we need to develop, because eventually everything we're all going to die and everything is going to go away.  

So, we need to know how to be in the pits of hell and become better because of it. Thrive more because of what we learned and or just sustain when we're in it. So, resilience for me is like a really, really, really, really, really big piece. Did you have something you want to say on that?  

Rebekah: I have so many things that I want to say. I want to stop you on every single one. But I'm gonna let you go through them and then we'll circle back because all of these are extremely difficult. [laughs] All of these like, I have so many questions that I wanted to dive into especially with living cyclically because I think right there that is something that so many of us, it takes a lot of discipline and it's too… kind of unplug yourself from the rhythms that have been created for you in this world. Like when we're living in, especially in America, we're in this very driven, we don't take breaks, capitalists, you know, be better, compete with each other, dog-eat-dog situation. It's like, okay. So how am I supposed to unplug from that and not die like, how am I supposed to surrender to you know, the cycles of the moon and the Zodiac and all of that and just not just fall off the face of the Earth, but I'm gonna let you move on. [laughs] 

Jennifer: But there's actually, and this is so, you know, I have two things to say about that but just to answer it real quick is like one be congruent when you’re incongruent right? Like when I wrote my book, I pulled a few all-nighters and like that was like the biggest thing that I did while writing this book that wasn't in integrity with the book, but I didn't have a choice, you know it’s like on deadlines and I was like all right, this is happening. This just happened. How do I, and I screwed up my circadian rhythm because of it, that and stress. But I do think like we can be congruent when we're incongruent. Right? Like we're going to go through periods of our lives where we're not totally congruent and there's a way to be congruent in those incongruencies, right? That's the exception to the norm not the norm, but the norm when we when settle into the norm becomes the norm and it's actually more advantageous for us.  

Like we will… and this is what I love about the science of positive psychology is that there's just so much research out there around like what actually creates success like what actually gives us a creative edge and it's not burnout. I promise you that, it's not dog-eat-dog competition. No, it's like doing things that resource us in a way so we feel happier? You know, like so we feel like more alive, more awake, more in touch with our strengths, you know, like we're in a more intuitive creative whatever you want to call it flow state… and when I say flow state I'm talking about like the Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi definition of flow state, which is like that timelessness where we're at a peak creativity as opposed to a you know, everything's going to come up roses situation. But yeah, so cyclically's actually there's advantages to it, right? But I hear the push back on it and it just becomes something you entrain yourself to. 

Rebekah: Yeah, no, I'm there now and then, you know, we have conversations privately and I consider myself to be a very, I consider myself to be a happy person. Like I can use that word and not even cringe a little bit because I have surrendered to that but that was probably… I would say of all the self-work that I've done, really acknowledging how much I was killing myself with the way that I was working, and the way that I was pushing myself and trying to play this, play in this game that was not created for me. Like I thought I had to do that. I thought I had to do that, or I would just become completely irrelevant and unplugging from that, I had to do it like cold turkey and really just in shock and most because my body made me it wasn't, it wasn't a choice. That was, that was really scary. That was really, really scary. But on the other side of it I was like, oh wait a minute, I feel good, I sleep at night, I you know, I'm happy. I'm not screaming at my kids like it's just, it was miraculous when I surrendered to actually listening to nature and being in my environment and not pushing against it all the time now. 

Jennifer: Right. But it's an act of descent right? But it's like the most natural thing you'll ever do. 

Rebekah: Yeah, I mean after that feels natural. It felt like, it did not feel natural when I was going through it but yeah. 

Jennifer: Yeah, so back to the principles… [Rebekah: Yeah – number three!] which is know thyself. It's a never-ending journey, and you know, I just think like hey if we're embracing the path of becoming our most actualized self, we're constantly changing and so who we think we are isn't you know, who we are today isn't necessarily who we are going to be tomorrow. I mean astrology is one of those practices that gives us a roadmap to who we are right? Like we can understand who we are natally or the cycles and seasons that we're in from an astrological perspective. We can make sense, bring coherence, to what we're going through and yeah, I just find that incredibly valuable.  

Principle number four is embrace the paradox of the both/and, which you know even going back to my original story about like how I resisted getting into astrology was like I was an either/or, like I was going to do serious work or… you know and astrology wasn't in that category. I just, my understanding of astrology was too nascent to understand it, but I was wasn't even mature enough to understand like it's everything's an and it's not an either/or and we can be, in incredibly desperate times like we are right now societally and collectively and still have joy in our lives and cultivate solutions without needing to like resist the reality that we're in like we don't need to spiritually bypass. We can be really honest about how awful things are and be really resourceful. We can, you know, treat our bodies with the best western medicine and still pursue alternative healing however, we'd like, I mean, there's just so many ands. And I think for so long we have lived in an either/or like either I'm totally sugar-free and like, you know on the diet or I’m not, right? and I just don't think that that works for health. 

Rebekah: Yeah, no, absolutely not.  

Jennifer: My health is somewhere in the middle. And then the last one is, unlock your healing magic, which is work I've spent so much time in my own life practicing which is just the sacred art of ritual and really connecting to so many sacred practices around alchemy and making our reality what it is we most feel called to make of it through our own force of love working with forces inside of ourselves and externally to you know… I don't know, there's really no definition for magic is there? I mean there is, it's like it's like well, yeah, I mean I offer some in the book as well. But since we don't really know how it works, so it's kind of hard to define but living in that way and living in sync with seasons and cycles in a way, and nature where we can conjure and create. 

Rebekah: I think if you would have told me, that like brought up any of these points, I mean build resilience I'm good with. I think that I'm a resilient person. I've been through, I've dealt through a lot and I feel good about the way I can handle it and gotten to this point. But the other ones if you would hold me like three years ago, right? These are the steps. I would have been like, okay. That sounds good. Maybe go back a little bit more, maybe go back five years. It's been collectively that we have been in crisis, of course, you know, we have the both ends and we're experiencing joy and birthdays and birth and you know, all the other celebrations that we have. But that's what I think that's where I'm having the resistance, you know still in myself a little bit even though I know this to be true, but I'm thinking of people watching whatever and it's like, okay so we're in a time of crisis where we are desperately trying to just survive every day physically, financially, emotionally. I think we're all there, we're all on the emotional crisis point. How do how do we use these? How do we take care of ourselves during these times when it feels like we aren't able to really control much, when everything is like very much out of control and we are you know, kind of like a victim to what's happening? 

Jennifer: Yeah. I mean, I feel like first of all there's like a lot in there right, that we've got a global crisis, we've got perhaps our own economic crisis, we've got our own mental health crisis, we have our own isolation. We have our own just like fear of like is this ever going to end will we ever know normal again? Like for some people it's like I really wanted to date and like make a family or like, you know, like even like the book thing I'm doing now, I really just imagined this going different like maybe some in-person events, you know that sort of thing.  

So, it's hard to, it can get very overwhelming very fast. So, you know, I think that we need to be really specific with the problem we want to solve and we're not going to solve all the problems all at once. You know from an emotional standpoint we have to feel our emotions, right like we have to be with our emotions, and we have to do things to generate positive affect in our life. No matter what like, you know, like it's okay to not right? Like I’ve certainly, you know just lost someone in my life to COVID and I'm deep in grief around it and I went through a few weeks where I was like, you know, I could just see my mental health sliding and I'm like, well this isn't really going to turn out well, unless like I start to actively participate in my well-being. So, what does that mean? It means like doing what I can right? So, like so I'm like, oh I can I know to eat a little bit differently to pull myself out of a funk. I know to exercise a little differently to pull myself out of a funk and I think that when we know ourselves and we know ourselves well, we also know where we contribute to downward spirals, where we're not intervening when and how we can to pull ourselves out and up and through and you know, I mean for most of us tuning in I'm assuming you're in winter with us because we are here in the Northern Hemisphere, and so even coming back to that living cyclically is you know understanding we are wintering. We're in the dead of winter and we are in need of a certain kind of care right now. [Rebekah: Right] So even just looking at it from that seasonal perspective, what we're going to say? 

Rebekah: Yeah, I mean, that's what I wanted to talk about because it's like the combination of the isolation and you know, the emotional strain that we're all feeling and we're also in winter in the Northern Hemisphere. I see most of us are you know in that together and you know, is there a specific way to take care of ourselves now, like in this season, that you can offer?  

Jennifer: Yeah, well we are in Pisces season right now. So, Pisces is the last sign of the Zodiac and it's really amazing how the Zodiac works because there's so much wisdom in it, but Pisces is mutable water. It's the last sign in the Zodiac. It's really emotional. And I think we're in a season right now where there are some really strong emotions around grief, loss, hopelessness, fear, anger, and also spring is coming right? Like we know that, like the next Zodiac sign is Aries, and it's the astrological New Year. It kicks off the new year, and I think Pisces season is always a bit of a mixed bag because Pisces is a sign that loves art and poetry and it's like oneness and community, but it's also deep emotions and some escapism and right now we can't escape.  

So, we can't, I mean we can escape in some ways, but we really aren't, our normal escape routes are kind of all barricaded. So, we can escape to a certain extent and so that's very counterintuitive for Pisces mechanism, but I think just knowing that pretty soon we're going to have longer days and shorter nights, pretty soon the weather is going to be warmer and we're going to be able to get outside. Pretty soon, you know, we're going to have the burst that comes with Aries season. So, knowing that this too shall pass even if we don't know when the pandemic is going to end and/or what's on the other side of the pandemic and even though we're grieving such an immense amount of human loss in this country in this, at this time period, um… cycles and seasons are such that, when there's a down there's an up right? Like we are going to have a waxing period soon upon us and I think just getting ready for that is one thing also like just feeling your emotions, you know, understanding like is your grief, is your sadness, like are you slipping into depression? Like is there something you need to do to scaffold in your life so that you're not slipping just into the abyss of depression. Is what’s underneath your grief, anger? You haven't given yourself permission to feel and so you're starting to really go within, into depths of sadness in a way whereas if you got angry and a little bit real about what’s really upsetting you, it would feel catalytic? Is your anger really sadness that you're not feeling like are you overly angry because you don't know how to be sad, or no one modeled sadness to you? So, I think that there's a lot of emotional intelligence that needs to be developed right now and that is hard because it takes a trust and understanding that this too shall pass. It is impermanent. And then what and who we are and what we need. 

Rebekah: Well, you know going back to know thyself, you know, when I was in the book and you know, I'm looking at my moon sign and my sun sign and my rising and just reading, you know, like my traits and what that meant for me was really affirming and there's freedom in that and understanding that the way that I'm reacting if it's not exactly how someone else is reacting. It's like if I was oh, okay, so I get myself a little bit more and it allowed me to just you know feel into that and be more accepting. And you know be more resilient because I know that it's totally normal. But let's, before we get into the Zodiac, that's like the juicy part for me [laughs] because I want to, I'm going to selfishly probably like ask you something about myself, but the three primary rhythms… can we discuss?  

Jennifer: Yeah, I think I already kind of did. So, we have the circadian, which is our daily rhythm. Right? And that is, that works best when it's synchronized with cycles of light and dark, which is, happens because why the Earth is rotating on its axis as it does every single day and that's one of the key functions of how we operate even creating like astrological charts is by understanding the Earth's rotation and that is our circadian rhythm, which is just we know so much science about it. Our circa annual rhythm is our seasonal rhythm which we were just talking about with Pisces. Living rhythmically and seasonally and that's because the Earth as its rotating on its axis is also going around the Sun. And then our third rhythm is our circa lunar rhythm our circa monthly rhythm which is not as proven in the human body as it is in plants and animals. Certainly fish, marine biology, it’s been deeply scientifically proven that fish and so many plants and animals have endogenous clocks that sync with the moon cycles.  

I will say before we move on that what I find really fascinating about the science is that it's emerging, that humans have a deep connection to a monthly cycle and sync with the moon's rhythms. But we also have a lack of really good science around this and I thought about that a lot when I was writing the book because I was like, why don't we have better research on this and I really think it's because the moon has been deemed like witchcraft folkloric and like biology has so been so predominantly male for so long that they just sort of brushed it off as this thing that didn't really matter but I think as I was finding a lot of research for my book, there's a lot of women biologists now, particularly even in Europe, who are very interested in looking at the impact or I shouldn't say the impact. It's the mirroring of our own rhythms and sync with lunar rhythms. And I think we’re going to see a lot of new science on that in the future next few years, for sure. 

Rebekah: I mean, yeah, you said the circadian rhythm and I think that's so important. I think that's what a lot of people are super bad at. Like I'm bad at it. I'm you know on Freeblade at night. I'm sitting in front of a spotlight when its dark outside and that's you know, really messing with me and it happens in winter, you know, more and I'm trying to get more in sync with that but I did have a question about the lunar rhythm and moon cycle because you know you mentioned at the top of this that you had a hysterectomy and you went into early menopause and how to reconnect with your health and yourself is to follow the cycle of the moon so that you can kind of have a rhythm outside of you. Do you think from your understanding in your practice, do you think that anatomy makes a big difference in how we relate to the moon?  

Jennifer: You mean is it like a biologically male, assigned male at birth versus assigned female at birth thing no, I actually don't, I think that those who menstruate right whether they identify as women or not are on a menstrual rhythm and a menstrual rhythm is a circa lunar rhythm whether we call it that or not, but certainly those who don't menstruate also have a circa lunar rhythm, you know like the latest science that's come out that I hadn't even thought about it until I read the article and at first I brushed it off as like this is common sense, we already know this and then I had to really think about it and what they're finding, but actually this is cutting edge. This is cutting edge! [laughs] 

Rebekah: None of this is common sense! [Both laugh] 

Jennifer: But the latest research that I read on this is that they're saying now that, you know, the comment was like do you feel the full moon or like what's the full moon doing? And so many people for so long have been like with the theory around it as it's like well, we're primarily water, and the moon rules the oceans’ tide, so why wouldn’t it impact us? Which you know, if you really dig into the science, there's not a lot of science that suggests that we're being waxed and waned by the moon. We're just not you know, and maybe we are I don't know but like… but where there's more convincing science is around the fact that we're light respondent, right like our whole endocrine system responds to light. And during, so when there's a new moon when the sun and when there's no moon up in the sky the sun and the moon, the moon rises with the sun in the morning, right because they're aligned at the same zodiacal degree and then on average every day the moon rises about 15 minutes after the sun so between the new moon and the full moon, the moon is rising later and later in the day, and so we're seeing it in the daytime energy. By the time it's the full moon, the moon is rising while the sun is setting so we're getting this opposition between the lights. So, we're actually in this time where it's like the sun's going down but we get this bright reflection of the moon up, so we're not getting a dark sky and so what's fascinating about this research is that if we're really talking about like the waxing gibbous phase for even like the waxing quarter to the wax to the full moon phase, we're talking about a big portion of the moon rising in the afternoon. That's very stimulating and it doesn't matter your gender or how you identify or if you were born as a menstruater or non-menstruater. It's like you're still getting stimulated by these extra luminary of light midday into the early evening and then after its full moon the next day the moon rises on average or whatever it is 15 minutes later. So, you get this break between the sun and the moon immediately after the full moon and then again later and later and later, and while the moon's like losing light and the moon's rising later and later and later. So it's not as impactful as it is during the waxing phase particularly waxing quarter to waxing gibbous through full and I think that that's fascinating. I don't think it matters what your gender identification is. I think that’s going to impact you. 

Rebekah: Yeah, I like that. I think we're just yeah, we’re just getting high because we're in the light 24 hours a day for that period and yeah, that's pretty cool I like that. Can we talk about the Zodiac? 

Jennifer: Yes. 

Rebekah: [laughing] I'm gonna get real corny now. I love this because you know as much as I, like I said, I’m like a left-brain person and I seek feeling grounded. I seek safety and consistency and predictability, but for some reason, and I guess it's because it is very academic and ancient and all of that. I am just very, very drawn to the Zodiac and not in the horoscope way. Like I didn't, I was never into that, but I just love this idea of and plus I've been on this constant journey and you know because I have, I don't have a relationship with my biological father, and I really had this journey of identity that astrology has given me some of that… like this is who you are. Okay. So, I want to talk about Zodiac, I want to talk about birth chart. We got a note. I want to make sure we have enough time to talk about this because I'm alright, there we go. 

Jennifer: So, what's the question? 

Rebekah: So, tell me what is Zodiac if it's not just horoscopes and you know, predictions? 

Jennifer: Yeah, yeah so what is the Zodiac? Well, actually I think that question is really what is astrology right? Like what is astrology and like what's a birth chart. The Zodiac is a… different. Yeah. I'm going to answer that in a moment. [both laugh] So, astrology is really this understanding, it's a study of corollaries right with what's happening here on Earth and what's happening in the sky and understanding the correlative relationship at any given moment and we can do astrology charts for this event has an astrology chart when started. We could do it for businesses, babies, animals, all of it, none of it.  

And so, your natal chart is a snapshot of the sky the moment you take your first breath and it's basically a roadmap to who you are and/or the potentials that live within you whether they come to fruition fully and or/not. We'll see things like timing we will understand proclivities, strengths, weaknesses, and I've just come as a skeptic to astrology myself, I mean deeply wildly interested in it, resistant to doing it professionally. Now obviously fully, fully, fully committed to it in more ways than I understand and I, it's wildly accurate. That's all I can say. So, we'll talk more about the natal chart, but what's the Zodiac?  

So, I work with Western astrology and I work with the tropical Zodiac and so you know, going back to that circa annual rhythm, which is formed by seasons. The Zodiac is really this understanding that as the Earth goes around the Sun, or I should say the tropical Zodiac, because there's three really, multiple different versions of the zodiac but it's just understanding that as the earth goes around the sun the ecliptic, which is the path that the Earth takes around the Sun is divided into 12 equal parts.  

Each of those 12 equal parts is one of the Zodiacal signs. So, we start with Aries, Aries initiates, is the beginning of the tropical Zodiac, Taurus stabilizes, Gemini cross-pollinates. And if you even notice in those three, right like we have initiate, stabilized, cross-pollinate so each Zodiac sign builds off of the previous one. Cancer like so after we cross pollinate, Cancer calls us home back to family back to roots, Leo asks us to like express and if you feel more creative and more outward. Virgos, like organized, systematized, straighten up, Libras like balance harmony, justice, beauty. Scorpios, like enough with the beauty. Let's go to the depth. Let's like really get underneath the surface. What's the truth? But what do we really need to see here and then Sagittarius is like enough of that truth, let's just like be big picture and broad and inspirational and optimistic. Capricorn's all like okay enough with that broad optimism and like let's get back to work. Let’s you know, like apply ourselves, Aquarius is like well, we've applied ourselves, but are we really solving the problem? Couldn't we do this better? What's another alternative way of seeing this? And then Pisces is like I'm everything that's ever come plus more and like we're going to feel right? And like that's a very basic interpretation of the 12 signs, but really what we're looking at is the journey of the Earth around the Sun and so, you know, the sidereal Zodiac which is the Zodiac of Vedic astrology is more aligned to constellations. And then the constellational Zodiac is actually working with the constellations. The tropical Zodiac is the signs and constellations are two different things in the tropical Zodiac and that's a very rich and deep conversation, but it's really a rabbit hole, so… [laughs] 

Rebekah: It's all a rabbit hole. I'm like I can't I mean it's all around the hole we could spend you know the entire hour on one of these points, but go ahead. Proceed.  

Jennifer: No, no, I think we should move on to the next question because we can come back to it should you know, we want to go deeper on that. But what else would... 

Rebekah: I do want to talk about birth charts though. I do want to talk about this. I think it's really fun and interesting and yeah wildly accurate which is just yeah. 

Jennifer: So, is there a question? Or just talk?  

Rebekah: The question is…  

Jennifer: I can just talk. [both laugh] 

Rebekah: I would love for you to just talk about birth charts. Yeah, and why I mean really what do they tell us? Like what? Okay. So, if I if I'm going to get my, what am I allowed to ask of my birth chart? Like what am I allowed to expect of my birth chart?  

Jennifer: Yeah, so… your birth chart is the most like sacred, beautiful, ridiculously potent… I don't even know what to say like it blows my mind, it literally blows my mind. So, you know, I mean we have in the most basic sense our sun. Our sun signs are for lack of a better phrase like our core our core. It's like our daytime energy. It's who we natally are but it's based on the season we were born into so we can get a hell of a lot more specific than just like, hey, I was born in this season right? Our moon sign is our deeper emotional need it’s what we need to feel nourished or how we were nourished or nurtured or not nurtured as in our in our childhood and what we need to feel sated what we need to feel safe. It's our nighttime energy. And then our rising sign is the sign that was on the Eastern horizon where we were born, and I really think of the rising sign as what are we rising to? Who are we becoming? And it's also you know how we present ourselves to the world and it's how we individuate from others.  

So those are the three like that's the those are the three main components but of course we look at Mercury. We look at Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn straight on through the outer planets, which aren't so much impacting us individually as much as they are collectively, but they're in certain places in our charts that are really important and they're often communicating with other planets in a way that makes them really dynamic.  

So, what can we see in our natal chart? We can see our strengths, our needs for health, or wellness the timing we're on in our life. So, for example, you know starting a book in 2017 and knowing that by the time it was done and come out it would be in 2020, 2021, you know, it was like very obvious to me that we'd be in a time of challenge, right? Like I won't say crisis. I don't know. But yeah, I mean it's very obvious to me because those sorts of things are in… you can they’re cycles right, there are patterns that can reduce patterns, but we can also see those cycles and patterns in our own chart. We can see the cycles and patterns we were born into we could see the potential within that chart for ourselves and we can also see the timing of our lives and we're like, oh we're going to be going through something that's expansive then or like that's actually gonna be a fairly challenging time, we're going to be tested and people get really scared about that sort of stuff. Those are like I want to know anything bad, but it's also like I don't know. I've been going through a Pluto transit which when you read the book if anyone hasn't read the book yet like, you know Pluto has an archetypical force that's not yeah, I mean it just doesn't mess around and so like I've been going through this Pluto faze since 2016 and I really won't be out of it until 2023. You know, like that's a long time to be going through a Pluto cycle by the way. Yeah but, but I have to say like thank God like I knew you know what I mean? Like thank God I could like actually make sense of this and you don't really ever know what's going to happen in these cycles, but at least you know, like oh, this is I'm going to be developing in this sort of way. 

Rebekah: That was really my next question though because like, you know, when we talk in terms of astrology and peoples’ like prediction and it's you know, what? What can I expect from this week? Like I'm going to read my you know my horoscope for this week or like what can I expect in this month? But I like the, I like knowing what the what I can, how I can expect to change if I'm going to be meeting lots of challenges, I was reading about Uranus is that how is that how we're saying it now? 

Jennifer: Well you could say Uranus. You could say Uranus. 

Rebekah: Uranus I'm gonna say Uranus. 

Jennifer: I said Uranus around too many teenage boys, and I need to stop saying that. 

Rebekah: I love that kind of humor. I teenagers. You know, I have three almost adult children now and I think they're so much fun. I'm 42. So, I love this. Are you 42? 

Jennifer: No, I'm 41 but keep going. You're in Uranus opposite Uranus 

 
Rebekah: Yeah, it's a very exciting time for me because I have yeah, I'm going through a very liberatory time and I'm breaking the bonds of my... I read this and I was like, yes, I think I'm really feeling it in my life, and I think it's really exciting from, you know, talking in terms of that of like what to expect in life and it allows me too, to be affirmed in what I'm doing and in knowing that I'm supposed to be doing this and I can lean into it more and it's completely natural that it's like it breaks down the resistance of it. So, I love that. I'm so sorry. I'm still like kind of reeling over your Pluto situation, but. 

Jennifer: You can let go of my Pluto situation because it's going to be going on for a long time. 

Rebekah: Okay well, I'm probably you know, I have anxiety so I'm probably going to be thinking about it, but I have a lot of questions, but I do want to satiate my curiosity about what, because I'm a serious person by nature, what can we expect for this year? We're still very much in the beginning of this year, you know feels like it's been 10 years already. What can we expect going forward the kind of collective transitions that we might be experiencing or collective, whatever.  

Jennifer: Yeah, opportunity, you know I keep saying 2021 is the epic battle between no longer and not yet. Like it's this year where we are like, we're done with where we were really, but we are nowhere near where we're going yet and we're in liminality. Right? I mean, it's why the opening story of this book is chaos and why I talk about chaos so much through the book is because we're in a period where it's rather chaotic, but I think we need to look at like what chaos means and chaos is the void. It's the void of pure potentiality.  

So, 2021 it is like that, that's what she is mythologically, that's what chaos is. And so we're in this time where it's like our creativity is our future and all of us have our backs against the wall in some way shape or form. The question is what are we going to do with our backs against the wall and old systems are crumbling, right, you know, so 2020 ended with the Saturn/Jupiter conjunction with just like signified this massive transition from earth to air which is this huge multi-generational shift. I mean hundreds of years in the making and we are nascent, we are so in the beginning of this new cycle and that the habituated ways of being are not going anywhere overnight. Right? Like she's like you don't just walk up to things and knock them down. They look like kind of rock and rock and rock and rock and rock until they fall on their face. That's it somewhat quoted from Jerry Seinfeld in a different context, but we're in that rock we’re in that rocking and rocking and rocking until like things just… and it's going to you know, we're going to experience it in our own life.  

Like last week. We had the first Saturn, Uranus square on February 17th, and like whatever happened last week is really so, our massive curriculum for the year ahead. It's like what did we see? What are we experiencing now that is letting go of the old or like what are we restructuring? So, Saturn and Uranus will Square three times this year they did last, last week again in June, and then again in December and Saturn's the structure it’s the foundation and in Cosmic Health, I correlated with our purpose but he's more broad than that as well. And then Uranus is disruption and liberation and or as Richard Tarnas says promethean, he's the force of how we steal the fire back from the gods to liberate humanity.  

So, we have this like promethean sort of energy clashing with foundations and structures of the past and that is so much of what the year ahead still holds. We also have some really, really, really awesome things happening this year. Like I mean, I personally think March is one of the easier months we've seen. I mean astrologically speaking, who knows what will happen in real life but like the cosmos are, the cosmic curriculum, on paper is easier than anything I've seen since 2019. Jupiter, the planet of expansion and growth dips into Pisces from I believe it's mid-May through sometime in July and then he retrogrades back to Aquarius. And I think that that's a real solid dose of like expansion around healing coming in, you know, like compassion, empathy, connectivity, love, art, and music. And I think that the year ends with some tricky energy with the final Saturn/Uranus square, Venus stations retrograde at the very end of the year. We have our last set of eclipses right before the year ends, and then certainly we'll feel the reverberation of the center on Uranus square in 2022, but personally like I'm really hopeful, like I think we're you know, we have huge problems, they're not getting solved any time quickly like, you know, we can't solve the global crisis in one fell swoop. I mean the climate crisis, it's going to take you know, a lot of deconstructing and reconstructing for long periods of time. Obviously, the pandemic is here to stay in some iteration and/or form, but I do think we'll become more mobile within it and reduce the amount of death. And you know, I have hope around it becoming more, an easier ride. Yeah, I mean there's so much we could say about the state of the world. But I do think that personally we're on the cusp of energy that's very renaissance in nature. [Rebekah: Okay] You know where, yeah. 

Rebekah: Okay, that's what I wanted to talk about because I'm thinking okay, so I mean, you know me personally, I know you, and we're both very focused on social justice issues and wellness as a social justice issue. So, you know talking about Cosmic Health, I, you know when I hear health I think about the collective. And we've just experienced this surge in social justice activism. I think it's really exciting. I think every generation has their time of conflict and then coming to awareness and you know activism, but how, my question is are we experiencing long-term? I'm talking about generational or even beyond that. Is this a unique time for that or are we experiencing a different kind of transition because you know, I've only been here for 40 years. I only know this as being like this big, exciting time where you know, a lot of people are becoming aware, but are we making a difference or is this a big time for us collectively? 

Jennifer: I mean, certainly we've had the 60s that had a cosmic imprint unto itself. You know, like there are all sorts of cosmic imprints. What makes this time different, and it is different, is that the transition from earth to air so that Saturn/Jupiter conjunction that we had that was so visible in December and it was like all over everything and if you're even remotely into astrology, you know that that happened. You know that, that's a very big turning point for us. I mean, it's a really huge turning point and I personally don't believe that we're in the age of Aquarius. I don't think that that comes for you know, well beyond our lifetime, but I do think that that transition from Earth to air is a huge signifying change where we're moving away from a time that's been predominantly dominated by status, money, power, you know, the person who dies with the most toys wins sort of mentality into something that's much more collaborative much more solutions oriented. And also, there's a downside to that too like, intellectually over, you know, overly intellectual maybe disembodied from our... from being embodied maybe a little too heady. Maybe like too much technology. Like there's a shadow side there too, but I think like we are on the cusp of some really big changes potentially, around our willingness to share resources in different ways, so we can survive, right? Because survival is not half of us survived and half of us die like, survival is we all, as much as we can, survive right, as a team as a unit, and that's very utopian. I understand that but I also think that yeah, I just think that there's a chance for all that. 

Rebekah: It's funny to use the word utopian that feels so natural for me like, you know? I mean, especially like with the filter, the micro cultures, you know, which I grew up was this tiny village, you know this, I grew up in row homes, where everybody's doors were open, and we just walked into each other's homes. And everybody just took care of, I had a place to eat dinner every single night like it was just, just as that feels very natural and I've been feeling very hopeful and you know, I've been on the internet for a really long time. I've had my platform for 12 years and as you know, as a business and I do see a very significant shift in the way people are communicating and showing up for each other in a way that feels like a return to that for me and it feels very safe and exciting. So, I'm incredibly hopeful and, but again the to be affirmed in saying, okay. Yes. This is a special time, and this is something that’s not written in the stars so much as… 

Jennifer: Oh no, it's written in the stars. 

Rebekah: Alright, well then, thank you! [laughs] 

Jennifer: Yeah no, it's written in the stars. It's written in the stars. I mean Uranus first entered Taurus in like May of 2018, and Uranus is like the planet of disruption in the sign that's Venus- ruled…earth, and it's not just like how we’re relating to one another, it’s how were relating… and coming back to Cosmic Health… our food system, how we're treating the planet. Is it sustainable the way we've been farming and feeding ourselves, and feeding each other. I mean we're so divorced from practical wisdom in how we've been living and then we add to that the… so many other transits that are going on. I can go on forever about it.  

But yeah, no I think we are in a very special time that is written in the stars. And I think that we're going to have to be resilient as hell to make it through it and we're gonna have to be collaborative as hell to get through it, but I do think that it's really you know, I mean it's embracing the paradox of the both/and, it's wildly sad and totally awful and there's a lot of room for creativity, which is why I like I think it is important that we come back to who we are natally, how we resource ourselves, what we're here to do, what our unique contribution is. How do we take care of our bodies and our minds and our spirits? How do we see health beyond like diet and exercise into like how am I being the most integrated version of myself so I can actualize my purpose and contribute in a way that's meaningful. And in this, in the here and the now break ourselves out, I keep saying, break the gloomies like we're in such a gloomy time. You know? Like break the gloomies, which is like for me, it's like being really mindful about how I'm caring for myself what I'm taking in, you know, how to live, walking, my talk so to speak so that we don't go down with the ship. We're not supposed to. 

Rebekah: I feel really good, I feel really good, and I feel sometimes I feel like I am living on another planet because I am so hopeful and I feel very integrated within myself, but even more so integrated within the community and you know, like I feel very much in alignment with why I'm here and all of that. So, it's you know, I love all this. I love, like even when I read this before we came on, I read like my sun, my moon, and my rising and I was like, okay. Yeah. It makes sense that I'm so hopeful. It makes sense that I'm so creative right now and I'm looking for solutions and I feel good about them. But alright. I just want to reiterate how much I love this book and how happy I am for you. This is like such an achievement it is so incredible and beautiful, and it feels really, really good to hold. I'm a book coach and before I you know, I work with my clients, I always pose four questions to them. The last two questions are what do you want, or how do you want the reader to feel when they're reading the book? And the last one is what do you want them to know for sure? I'd love to know that from you, and it really reveals like why you love the book and the impact that you want to make with it.  

Jennifer: Yeah, how do I want the reader to feel is like I kept saying like I wanted them to feel like it was a hug, right? Which is like why I structured the book the way I did which is like science, story, details about your chart, you know, like myth, because I wanted it to be enough for them to know that they can't show up wrong to their life. Like you can be angry, you could be pissed off you could have eaten like the worst meals for years, right or like whatever it is, and you could still be spiritual and healthy on the path of becoming your better self. You don't to be your best self. You had to be your better self. You don't have to be your happiest self; you just have to be moving in the direction of conceptualizing yourself as a happier person. Right? Like we'll have our highs and our lows our goods and our bad days. So, I want them to feel hugged, right? Like it's okay to be exactly where you are right now and if we dug into your chart, we could probably figure out why and understand that this too shall pass or these are the things you can do right now to really take care of yourself in a unique and specific way. What was the last question? What do I want them to know? 

Rebekah: What do you want them to know for sure once they've finished? 

Jennifer: So, we're stardust, you know? Like that we are like literally burnt-out stars and we're just like we are tethered to a planet. This is what I want them to know. I don't know if I did a good enough job of getting in the book, but I just land it here… that we are tethered to a planet that's constantly spinning in two directions spinning on its axis and spinning around the Sun. Sorry, I hit the mic and that's a lot of spinning right but it's those two planes of motion that is the foundation of astrology. And then we've got a Moon that's circling around us and then we've got all these other planets circling around the Sun. So, if we look at astrology, it’s most basic sense, it's that the Earth's planes of rotation. It's you know, it's daily rotations, yearly orbits around the Sun and then the Moon's orbital path around the Earth, like that's what it's primarily studying and our bodies are interwoven into those cycles through our natural rhythms our circadian, or circa annual, our circa lunar rhythms, and then we layer all these other planets right and see them through an archetypal lens and suddenly it's like whoa, it's like the full spectrum of humanity, but it's all in space and it's all inside of us.  

So essentially… we’re kind of like human embodied space/Earth beings? I don't know what we are but it's trippy to think about and it's more than what we'll find in like, you know a diet book and I think that if we can conceptually see ourselves as tethered to a planet that's constantly in flux amid a solar system that's constantly in flux and it all has meaning, it feels a hell of a lot less lonely. And the other thing I will say is that none of us are cosmically forgotten. None of us are cosmically forgotten,, we may feel cosmically forgotten but we're not and we have an inner cosmos and we have an outer cosmos and it's kind of a yeah. I mean it's a fun way of being. 

Rebekah: My face hurts from smiling because when you said you wanted the book to feel like a hug, that's exactly what it does feel like. I wanted to say, I don't know if I said it out loud, but I felt very held by it and it feels… there's a lot of grace in it. There's a lot of grace in it, and that's been a practice of mine, to extend grace outward but also inward, grace for transformation and grace for, like as you say to just be better and be better not in the way of like performance or status but be better in that I feel you know, more integrated and more at peace with myself and it does it feels like a hug and you're just like, you're one of the most bright and energetic people I know but also the most passionate and warmest and generous and I just feel so privileged to call you a friend, but also just to be here in conversation with you.  

Okay so I mean, I don't really know how we're supposed to end this, but I want to plug the book and I was saying to you before the show, it's Cosmic Health, it really is a gorgeous book. Were you so happy when you got this cover? I know as an author the cover it's like it's scary. Was it nerve wracking? Did you love it right away? 

Jennifer: So, we did a redo on it, the first one they sent me I was like I… don’t know, and then I sent them my brand guidelines from Soul Camp Creative and then they came back and they gave me two covers, this was one of them and I loved them both, I actually love the other one more and then I did like a taste test with like people… I'm like which one, which one, which one and this one got more positive responses. So, we went with it. And yeah, the design of the book is beautiful, I put my like literally years of my life into this book and I hope it serves people. 

Rebekah: I was with you through that process. All you know this year's and so much that it shows, it's so beautiful and you know I was saying before we went live how I wasn't reading the book straight through I've been jumping around, and I really love it for that. It feels like this really cool manual but also this really beautiful story and it's so rich and it's so, it's again, it is like a warm hug and I would say that it like, it's given me a lot of grace. I just I love it so much, I love you so much. Any last words from you for the audience. 

Jennifer: No, thank you guys for being here. Thank you so much for having me California Institute of Integral Studies. You guys are such an awesome, awesome, awesome community and institution and you make astrology, you've given astrology a home in a way that I really appreciate. So, it's an honor to be here and thank you so much for interviewing me, Bex. I love you and I'm super grateful.  

Rebekah: I love you. 

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Thank you for listening to the CIIS Public Programs Podcast. Our talks and conversations are presented live in San Francisco, California. We recognize that our university’s building in San Francisco occupies traditional, unceded Ramaytush Ohlone lands. If you are interested in learning more about native lands, languages, and territories, the website native-land.ca is a helpful resource for you to learn about and acknowledge the Indigenous land where you live. 
 
Podcast production is supervised by Kirstin Van Cleef at CIIS Public Programs. Audio production is supervised by Lyle Barrere at Desired Effect. The CIIS Public Programs team includes Kyle DeMedio, Alex Elliott, Emlyn Guiney, Jason McArthur, and Patty Pforte. If you liked what you heard, please subscribe wherever you find podcasts, visit our website ciis.edu, and connect with us on social media @ciispubprograms. 
 
CIIS Public Programs commits to use our in-person and online platforms to uplift the stories and teachings of Black, Indigenous, and other people of color; those in the LGBTQIA+ community; and all those whose lives emerge from the intersections of multiple identities.  
 
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