Latest / Astrology Hub Podcast / Mark Borax Unveils the Meaning and Importance of the Human Soul

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Mark Borax Unveils the Meaning and Importance of the Human Soul · Astrology Hub Podcast

1:01
Welcome to the astrology hub podcast.
1:04
I'm Amanda Poole Walsh, founder of astrology hub and your host for our flagship show.
1:09
We explore the many ways astrology can support you and your relationships, career, health, and personal growth.
1:16
Thanks for tuning in.
1:20
This podcast episode is sponsored by Astrology Hubs Academy.
1:24
Wherever you are on your astrology journey, we have a class that will help you get to the next level.
1:31
Amanda: Well, hello everybody and welcome to the Astrology Hub Podcast.
1:34
Amanda: I'm so excited and happy and honored that you've decided to join us here today to listen to a very interesting conversation that we're gonna have with astrologer teacher, author Mark Borax, and he uses astrology to explore the soul.
1:55
Amanda: So we're gonna have a very interesting conversation around soul and astrology, and I was recommended.
2:01
Amanda: I have, there's people in my life that when they reach out to me and they say, you need to talk to this person, I really pay attention because I, I, I know them, I know that they are aligned with what we're doing.
2:14
Amanda: And so I have a friend that I've known for a very long time.
2:18
Amanda: Her name is Sue.
2:19
Amanda: And she said, Amanda, you've gotta talk to Mark.
2:22
Amanda: You, you have to talk to Mark.
2:23
Amanda: She was so, insistent upon this that I then went and looked up Mark's work and it was really resonating on so many levels.
2:30
Amanda: I was like, okay, let's do this.
2:32
Amanda: So I'm really very excited to introduce you to Mark and Mark.
2:37
Amanda: Welcome to the Astrology Hub Podcast for your Astrology Hub debut.
2:42
Mark: Thank you, Amanda.
2:43
Mark: It's great to be here.
2:44
Amanda: All right, so a little bit about Mark.
2:46
Amanda: He has been a nomadic poet his whole life.
2:50
Amanda: In the late seventies, he traveled the United States and Canada performing and selling his poetry.
2:55
Amanda: In the mid eighties, mark was befriended by his adolescent idol, Ray Bradbury, who became his literary godfather.
3:03
Amanda: I love that.
3:04
Amanda: He's the author of the book 2012 Crossing the Bridge to the Future.
3:08
Amanda: And this is a story about his first.
3:11
Amanda: Astrology mentor as I believe it.
3:13
Amanda: And then also a book called The Cosmic Weather Report that explores how to turn the strange changes of our times, how to navigate them.
3:23
Amanda: And then now he has just released another book called The Ruby Heart of the Dragon.
3:28
Amanda: He created soul level astrology in 1987 as a way to identify the core nature of human beings.
3:35
Amanda: I mean, amazing work mark, and really like what more could we be doing here besides trying to figure out who we are and what we're here to do, and to contribute in all those good things.
3:46
Amanda: So thank you for dedicating your life to that exploration.
3:49
Mark: You're so welcome, Amanda.
3:51
Amanda: All right, so let's start with this question that I love to ask new guests on our platform, which is, how did you get into astrology?
3:59
Amanda: What, what's the story behind your path to what you're doing here today?
4:04
Mark: Well, I always knew the signs of all my family and friends growing up, and I, I didn't realize this till hindsight, till looking back, but I, didn't really.
4:14
Mark: Either believe in astrology or disbelieve it until I was on my 25th birthday.
4:20
Mark: In Ashland, Oregon, my girlfriend at the time said, I wanna give you a birth surprise birthday present.
4:26
Mark: Come with me.
4:27
Mark: And she drove me to this house and she rang the doorbell and a woman answered.
4:32
Mark: And, and my friend said, here, congratulations.
4:35
Mark: Here's your first as astrology reading for your 25th birthday.
4:39
Mark: Go to it.
4:39
Mark: And then she got in the car and drove away and left me with this woman, who spoke for two hours.
4:45
Mark: And the first thing she said, looking at my chart was, I could sum you up in two words.
4:51
Mark: And I said, okay, okay.
4:53
Mark: What?
4:53
Mark: And she said, communication and relationships.
4:57
Mark: And she, I was hooked because that was my whole life.
5:00
Mark: I was writing my whole life and I was always chasing the goddess, always trying to make love work using all my poetry and cosmic desire.
5:09
Mark: And then this woman spoke for two hours about parts of me that no one else even knew about.
5:15
Mark: And from that moment on, I said, There's got to be something to this and then another birthday.
5:22
Mark: It must have been my 29th birthday.
5:24
Mark: Another girlfriend.
5:25
Mark: Gave me my first astrology book.
5:28
Mark: She said, I think you're gonna like this book.
5:30
Mark: And it was Alan Kins as Above So Below, Alan Kins, complete Astrology.
5:35
Mark: I spent four years studying that book, before I ever took an astrology class or a lecture.
5:41
Mark: There wasn't any, internet so to speak of at that time.
5:44
Mark: But I just studied my own chart, for four years and I read that book and at the end of those four years I thought, I might be able to do this for a living.
5:55
Mark: So all, all those years, it was just a passion.
5:58
Mark: And just when I was finishing it, the book, I said, yeah, I was working in comic books, but I, my writing wasn't making it through so much.
6:07
Mark: I was kind of sidetracked into editorial work.
6:10
Mark: And I was craving something, something that had meaning.
6:15
Mark: And right at that point I got another reading.
6:18
Mark: By, uh, master Astrologer Elias Lonsdale and, blew me outta the water and he ended up being my teacher.
6:25
Mark: He started a mystery school.
6:27
Mark: I apprenticed with him for seven years, and he taught a whole other astrology that led me to discover my own take on astrology, which I just poured into the current book.
6:39
Mark: Mm.
6:39
Amanda: Okay.
6:40
Amanda: I would love to hear, first of all, I need to do a little reflection.
6:44
Amanda: Number one, I have heard from so many men.
6:47
Amanda: That a woman is either the reason why they started getting into astrology because they wanted to figure out how to connect with her or a a, a woman nudged them.
6:59
Amanda: So you got a little bit more than a nudge, but, I, I just want to say that because all of you women out there, You are like in a position to really open up a world a lot of times, and I'm, I hear this story a lot, uh, and sometimes I think we don't realize how influential we can be, so I just wanted to just mention that.
7:19
Amanda: And then number two.
7:20
Amanda: The power of that reading, the power of that reading to completely shift your perspective on astrology, but probably also on yourself.
7:29
Amanda: Is that true?
7:29
Amanda: Like did you, did you have insights about yourself that changed everything?
7:33
Mark: This was more like an ayahuasca journey than a reading.
7:37
Mark: I mean, at the end of those, 90 minutes.
7:40
Mark: I, I went outside and found out that my body was soaking wet cuz I'd been crying and I didn't even know it.
7:46
Mark: Th this, this was, this was not just an information exchange, this was a life-changing experience.
7:54
Mark: And as it wore off outdoors, I said, I need to learn to do for other people what this guy just did for me.
8:02
Amanda: Like, full body chills.
8:04
Amanda: That's amazing.
8:05
Amanda: The, the, the power of a.
8:08
Amanda: Incredibly facilitated reading to literally change a trajectory of life.
8:14
Amanda: And I'm saying this from personal experience cuz I have the same, the same experience.
8:17
Amanda: I mean, we're, we're here because of my first experience with astrology reading and I know a lot of people in the community feel the same way.
8:25
Amanda: I know that soul is a big piece of your work.
8:29
Amanda: Can you tell us a little bit more about what you would consider your unique approach to astrology?
8:35
Mark: Yeah.
8:36
Mark: Unlike some other kinds of astrology and counseling, I don't feel like I'm the one who knows who you are, who you should be and what you should do.
8:46
Mark: But I do feel.
8:47
Mark: That there's a part of you that knows that, which I call the soul or the core nature it, it really doesn't even matter to me what you call it, but it's that part of you.
8:57
Mark: That knows exactly why you were born, why your soul came back from past lives, what you're doing, why you're here, and how to get there.
9:07
Mark: But like most human beings, few of us are always in constant contact with that deeper part.
9:14
Mark: Usually we're intermittently at best in contact with that part because we have a lot of conditioned layers of how we were taught to believe and behave.
9:24
Mark: So I feel my job is to paint in words a a verbal portrait of how I see your inner nature.
9:31
Mark: And if that resonates with you, then your inner nature is gonna say the same thing.
9:37
Mark: And I'm on the outside of you, so your ego is really sandwiched.
9:41
Mark: It doesn't really have a chance if I, if I'm really getting to the core part of you.
9:46
Mark: I love
9:47
Amanda: that.
9:47
Amanda: Your ego and you are sandwiching the soul basically saying, this is the truth, this is your truth.
9:54
Amanda: What do you say to people who feel nervous when they come to you i, I've noticed that there's a lot of like, oh no, are you gonna tell me something bad or, oh no.
10:03
Amanda: Are you gonna tell me something that, that I don't wanna know?
10:07
Mark: I think that it's kind of a good nervousness because they sense, especially if they've been following my work, which the majority of my clients at this point have either read my books or they get my monthly newsletter, or they've taken classes or seen podcasts, so they kinda have a feel for me on where I'm coming from.
10:26
Mark: And I think they also feel that in order to read somebody, I can't do it like a professor sitting back from them.
10:35
Mark: I have to fall in love with them.
10:36
Mark: Mm-hmm.
10:37
Mark: I have to fall in love with something in their chart, in their soul.
10:42
Mark: And when people get nervous coming to see me, I kinda look at it as it's really meaningful to them.
10:48
Mark: They're sensing that this might change their life and yeah, it's going to reveal parts of their shadow.
10:55
Mark: Even when I'm going deep into their most darkest places, I'm holding the light of an unconditional acceptance.
11:03
Mark: That's
11:03
Amanda: huge, and people can feel that.
11:05
Amanda: Okay.
11:06
Amanda: So I, I'd love to ask you a question about soul, because I recently, it was recently brought to my attention.
11:13
Amanda: That maybe humans don't have a soul, and that that concept is, is not true or, or accurate.
11:22
Amanda: So how do, first of all, what do you think about that?
11:26
Amanda: And second of all, how do you see, how does astrology shape your perspective of the
11:31
Mark: human soul?
11:33
Mark: Well, talking about the human soul often leads me to talk about synchronicities.
11:38
Mark: Like if, if there was no higher force, if there was no deeper force, if there was no grand design, my life could have never made it to the point that it's made it at.
11:50
Mark: And so, I mean, for one example, my teacher, Elias Londale, who I ended up apprenticing with, I found out shortly after meeting him that we both began life in Queens, New York.
12:02
Mark: And then we moved to Northern Vermont.
12:05
Mark: And then we moved to Willamette Valley, Oregon, and then we moved to Bay Area, California, and then we moved to Santa Cruz where we met.
12:14
Mark: Whoa.
12:15
Mark: And so, yeah, so that's one of many, some of which I go into in the book, especially the Sagittarius chapter.
12:22
Mark: That's one of many synchronicities that even if I didn't feel there was a soul or a greater power, it'd be hard to feel that way after those kinds of things keep happening.
12:35
Mark: Secondly, I understand somebody like that person you were talking about, because it's hard to look at the world out there today and look really deeply into it and feel there is a God there.
12:47
Mark: There are angels there are higher powers.
12:49
Mark: There is a grand design.
12:51
Mark: I can understand somebody kind of collapsing into nihilism.
12:55
Mark: I have a lot of compassion for people who feel that way, but I think it's also sad because for me, the soul, is that part of you?
13:05
Mark: That's been here before in other lives, and this is a new life, so it has to find out all over again what everything is.
13:13
Mark: Your body's never been here before, but even if a deep part of you has been coming back in life after life, it's on an arc.
13:23
Mark: It's on a creative trajectory of how to bring your creativity and your love out through the vessel of your personhood into this world.
13:34
Mark: And that's how I see the soul.
13:37
Amanda: beautiful.
13:38
Amanda: And and where do you see astrology playing in with this?
13:40
Amanda: Like when you look at someone's chart and, and when you're looking at people's lives and stories, how does, how does that confirm or, or not this concept of soul for
13:51
Mark: you?
13:52
Mark: I think I'm probably less infatuated with the chart itself than most astrologers because for me, the chart is only as relevant as it gets me to your soul.
14:03
Mark: It's like a scope.
14:04
Mark: If I can get to your soul, I don't care that much about the the chart.
14:08
Mark: This is why in my course of my life, I've delivered.
14:13
Mark: Hundreds, maybe even thousands of readings without mentioning a sign or a planet, or a house.
14:19
Mark: I just wanna talk about you.
14:21
Mark: Some people wanna hear me teach them astrology, and I'm happy to talk about Quinn Ks and Mars and the eighth house.
14:28
Mark: But other people, they, they just want a soul boost.
14:31
Mark: They want me to paint a picture of their optimal destiny.
14:35
Mark: And for me, the chart is the, is the scope.
14:38
Mark: It's, it's not the be all and end all.
14:41
Amanda: I love that.
14:42
Amanda: Why do you think that we come here and forget?
14:47
Amanda: Like why is that the
14:48
Mark: design?
14:49
Mark: Because unless we gave ourselves a certain amount of amnesia, it would be like we were always.
15:00
Mark: Speaking on Ayahuasca or l s d, the, if, if you take the highest moment where you're, you're expanding into the glory, into the interconnected glory of all things like mass humanity did in the 1960s.
15:14
Mark: I, I, I was very much a part of that movement.
15:17
Mark: I was just old enough in the 1960, and, and the beauty of that is staggering, but you'd never be able to contact.
15:28
Mark: All the other people in the world who need your, your love, your awareness, your enlightenment.
15:36
Mark: If all you did was remain in that state of full awareness and not have any amnesia, you'd be, you'd be soaring with the angels, but you wouldn't have a lot of contact with all the people who need you.
15:51
Mark: I think we need a sufficient amount of amnesia, but we carry it way too far.
15:57
Mark: Mm-hmm.
15:57
Mark: We don't have to forget.
15:59
Mark: To the extent that we do.
16:01
Mark: And that extent gets reinforced with, mainstream media and public education and false diet and, and ego and and the craziness of our time.
16:12
Mark: So there's a lot of support for forgetting and there's, there's not as much support for remembering, and that's what I help people do.
16:20
Mark: Mm,
16:21
Amanda: yes.
16:22
Amanda: I love that.
16:22
Amanda: That's great.
16:23
Amanda: That's what we help people do too, so all right.
16:26
Amanda: You recently wrote a book called The Ruby Heart of the Dragon.
16:30
Amanda: This is an awesome title, what does that mean?
16:33
Mark: Well, it has to do with the north and south nodes of the moon, the, uh, karmic points, of your origin and your destiny.
16:42
Mark: Arabian astrologers came up with colorful names.
16:45
Mark: They called the south node of the moon, the dragon's tale.
16:49
Mark: And they called the north note of the moon, the dragon's head.
16:53
Mark: And so the dragon's tail indicates where you've been in past and past lives, the dragon's head indicates your optimal destiny in this life.
17:03
Mark: So I was thinking of redoing the sun signs, and I realized that.
17:08
Mark: Between the dragon's tail and the dragon's head, I can envision your son.
17:14
Mark: That would be the heart of the dragon.
17:16
Mark: And then it got to a ruby heart.
17:19
Mark: Because the book is designed to ignite your inner knowing, like a ruby ignites a laser beam.
17:25
Mark: Lasers come from rubies.
17:27
Mark: And so when I ignite the core part of your love and creativity and your higher knowing, it shines that beam out from the dragon's heart and enables you to deal with the leftover issues of the past in your shadow in order to be able to clear the way ahead for the future.
17:48
Amanda: Okay.
17:48
Amanda: And what's the focus of the book?
17:50
Mark: I completely redo the 12 sun signs.
17:53
Mark: I introduced the reader into each sign as if it was this fascinating country.
17:59
Mark: I describe.
18:00
Mark: Its its dangers and its blessings and its perils and I, I, I write in a, in a very, Easy to read, but multi-leveled, multi textured way, cuz those are the kind of books that I love.
18:14
Mark: I'm also a songwriter and a poet, and then at the end of each chapter I have, two pages on what it would mean to have that sign as your dragon's tail or your dragon's head.
18:27
Mark: So that's
18:27
Amanda: exploring the, the nodal axis.
18:29
Amanda: Yeah, that's right.
18:30
Amanda: So, mark, what inspired you to write this?
18:33
Amanda: I mean, there's, there's books that talk about Zodiac signs already.
18:37
Amanda: Like, I, I know your unique take on the Zodiac was there like a guiding thought or a guiding, person you were speaking to as you were going through the zodiac signs?
18:46
Mark: That's also a really good question.
18:48
Mark: I kept, little sticky notes on my computer where I came up with the names of all the people that I knew best in each sign and I was psychically.
19:01
Mark: Tuning my words through all those years.
19:03
Mark: I'm a crazy perfectionist when it comes to writing.
19:06
Mark: I think few writers go through as many drafts as I do.
19:10
Mark: And so as I was going through that, I would try it on and say, well, well, that thing, that thing that I just wrote seems to really fit my Capricorn.
19:21
Mark: Friend Stephan, but it doesn't seem to fit Alison.
19:25
Mark: Let me see if I can tune it.
19:27
Mark: So I kind of psychically tuned in to the people I knew.
19:31
Mark: And I tried to.
19:34
Mark: Get through every cliche, whether it was an astrological cliche or one of my own.
19:41
Mark: In my first draft, I said, I have to start out saying something about each of the 12 signs that I've never said before, and that itself took a long time but I, I, that got something really fresh and from then on I just had to use both my writing art and my astrology art to the max, like far beyond where I'd ever taken it before.
20:05
Mark: And it was like a shamanic journey cuz the signs kept morphing and I was like having to catch up with them.
20:11
Mark: Wow.
20:12
Amanda: Interesting.
20:13
Amanda: one of the things you said before we went on live you asked me what my sun sign was and I said, Capricorn.
20:18
Amanda: And he said, oh, you're, you're gonna love what I have to say about Capricorn.
20:22
Amanda: And I went, wow.
20:23
Amanda: I mean, that's a first.
20:24
Amanda: Because normally when I read about Capricorn, and I think this is one of the reasons why I was never really interested in astrology is cuz I would read these things that were like, Ugh, God, is, is that really me?
20:36
Amanda: Like that's kind of that the.
20:39
Amanda: I don't wanna identify with that version of what they're saying.
20:43
Amanda: I am.
20:44
Amanda: So tell us a little bit about how you're reframing some of the, what you think as, as misconceptions or, ideal ideas that might not, may or may not be true about the signs.
20:55
Mark: Well, it's understandable that you would feel that way, especially being a Capricorn, cuz many years ago I noted.
21:01
Mark: There were two sun signs who whenever they came to me for readings is tiptoed in the room and like skirted the walls like a cat as far away from me as they could go before they sat down and it was Capricorn and Scorpio.
21:15
Mark: And I think when most astrologers are delivering readings, to Capricorn, Or Scorpio, they're really projecting their disowned shadow on you.
21:27
Mark: They're not talking about you with Capricorn.
21:30
Mark: They're talking about power, the part of power that they've never owned.
21:35
Mark: And with Scorpio, they're talking about sex, the part of sexuality they've never owned.
21:40
Mark: And because most people haven't dealt with those things, I think they're seeing.
21:45
Mark: A false shadow of their, their own disowned projections.
21:49
Mark: And I blew those cliches apart with both Scorpio and Capricorn.
21:56
Mark: Plus, I delivered a, a version of Virgo that no one, no one in the world has ever even thought of before.
22:01
Mark: Cuz I thought that was the most mis misplaced sign in terms of most astrologers.
22:06
Mark: I
22:06
Amanda: was gonna say Virgo too.
22:08
Amanda: I feel like Virgo gets, gets a pretty bad rap.
22:10
Amanda: And we definitely don't need more proliferation of things that make people feel bad about themselves or like, you know, put them in a box that feels constrained and.
22:19
Amanda: Brings out the, the things about them that they may not really like, doubles down on that, you know, so thank you for, for taking on that work.
22:29
Mark: I feel.
22:32
Mark: That we need to give people something to live for now, especially the younger generations.
22:39
Mark: Because there's a bleak landscape out there in the world today, which threatens the, the bright future that we started to create in the 1960s with All you need is love.
22:51
Mark: To look into another human being and find what wants to blossom, what wants to grow, what, what version of you is yearning to break out of the disguise, to break out of the conditioned layers all my work is, is predicated upon that I help people find something.
23:14
Mark: Good to live for.
23:16
Mark: And when I, wrote this book, one of the tasks that I gave myself was to write in such a way that if any one of the 12 signs was contemplating suicide, that after they read their chapter, they they wouldn't be.
23:33
Mark: Wow.
23:35
Amanda: That is so beautiful.
23:36
Amanda: And you know, I know that both of us have teenagers.
23:42
Amanda: And when I hear about young people taking their lives, I often have the thought, God, if they only knew that their life matters, that there is something so unique and wonderful about them, and we need, we need what they're here to contribute.
23:58
Amanda: If they only knew these things, and there's this, the kinds of things that Astrology has helped to reveal and, and really solidify within me.
24:05
Amanda: I have a question.
24:07
Amanda: I recently watched the movie Woodstock, it was awesome and it just, It was like so nostalgic.
24:13
Amanda: It like elicited so much in me of like, wow, the, those kids had such a beautiful vision.
24:18
Amanda: They were really there, like in their hearts.
24:20
Amanda: They were there with like these lofty ideals and, and they, they did it like for a weekend.
24:24
Amanda: How amazing is that?
24:25
Amanda: And the whole community rallied around them.
24:27
Amanda: And it was like, wow, that's, that's really inspiring.
24:31
Amanda: And then I was sad because it was like all these bright eyed kids that you would see in this documentary.
24:39
Amanda: It's like, How come, how come that didn't last?
24:41
Amanda: Like why, why couldn't we uphold that vision of what's possible?
24:48
Amanda: I'd love to hear your perspective cuz you were in there, you were like, you were, you were doing it.
24:53
Amanda: And why do you think that that ideal from the sixties was unsustainable, at least between then and now?
25:02
Amanda: And do you think it is actually possible in this realm, in this third dimensional
25:06
Mark: reality?
25:07
Mark: Yes, I do think it's possible and I delve into that in the aquarium chapter.
25:12
Mark: there are a few reasons why I think it didn't last, and one of them was that there was a, a secret government, operation to be sure that it didn't last.
25:23
Mark: It's called Operation Mockingbird.
25:25
Mark: You can look it up, the cia.
25:28
Mark: Decided that the idea of people getting together was dangerous to them, especially blacks and whites.
25:37
Mark: So they set an operation, a program where they, they replaced, media people with c i A agents.
25:45
Mark: They, they put in hundreds of agents in the New York Times on, B C C B S network.
25:52
Mark: In the news and their instructions were to make people think that the, the, the powerful changes of the 1960s were just simply caused by too many drug hallucinations that, that they weren't real.
26:06
Mark: And, and it worked because if you talk to a lot of people today about what happened, then you'll often get that kind of take on it rather than this powerful thing that could change everything.
26:20
Mark: Whoa.
26:21
Amanda: Yeah, like I am being blown.
26:22
Amanda: I mean, I would definitely hoodwinked by the messaging.
26:25
Amanda: I will definitely admit that, that, you know, when I think of it, it's like, it is sort of that feeling of, well, yeah, it's easy to be all love and light when you're like, Drugged out and, and not on the earth.
26:40
Amanda: I feel like the sixties would've worked better if the drugs weren't such a focal point.
26:46
Amanda: But my other, my other philosophy is that, It, it, it was the light of what's possible with, with humanity without acknowledging the shadow.
26:56
Mark: And I think in the, in the sixties, another reason why it didn't last.
27:01
Mark: Was because it was a very adolescent movement.
27:04
Mark: We knew what we were getting rid of, but we only had vague ideas of what we would replace it with.
27:11
Mark: Mm-hmm.
27:11
Mark: We, we hadn't grown up, we hadn't matured, so we were really good at pushing away.
27:16
Mark: And that's how we've matured since then.
27:19
Mark: A lot of us and, and learned how to face shadows.
27:23
Mark: Unfortunately, many of my peers, the, the baby boomers have sold out.
27:29
Mark: And they, they're not still living the dream.
27:33
Mark: I, I never sold out.
27:34
Mark: I, I, I've, I've always been living that dream.
27:37
Mark: Just the dream that we are all in this together and we need.
27:43
Mark: Love to be the glue that unites us no matter what the picture looks like, and we cannot settle for less.
27:50
Mark: That's what was busting out all over in the sixties.
27:53
Mark: But it, it does raise a lot of shadow because the more you gain enlightenment.
27:58
Mark: The more you become aware of how much darkness there is.
28:02
Mark: And you know, one of the first things that happens when you awaken is realize how unawake you are.
28:08
Mark: You didn't know that before you awakened.
28:10
Mark: And if you deal with the shadow, then you can still follow the vision and bring it all the way down to earth, you know, bring the stars down to earth,
28:21
Amanda: resonating deeply with everything that you're saying.
28:23
Amanda: I've experienced that too.
28:24
Amanda: A lot of people who had those lofty ideals, it, it's like they became cynical.
28:28
Amanda: It's almost like they, they believed that propaganda that was being spread.
28:34
Amanda: It's was they probably internalized that.
28:36
Amanda: It's like, oh yeah, maybe it was just cuz we were high.
28:38
Amanda: Or maybe it was just, just, you know, a, a a, a childlike innocent ideal that just isn't, isn't reality.
28:47
Amanda: You know?
28:47
Amanda: Yeah.
28:48
Mark: Yeah.
28:48
Mark: And that's part of it.
28:49
Mark: It's true.
28:50
Mark: It was a, a childlike, it was an adolescent movement, but it had some beautiful open energy.
28:58
Mark: People were so open to finding new ways, and we need that again because, we've become jaded.
29:06
Mark: As a culture and, and the, the younger generation, unlike we were back then, doesn't have a lot to live for.
29:13
Mark: They have a very uncertain future and we need to believe, again, we don't need all the excesses of the drugs.
29:21
Mark: But we do need its willingness to believe that something beautiful might happen.
29:27
Mark: Hmm.
29:28
Mark: me cry.
29:29
Mark: Wow.
29:30
Amanda: Yes, yes, yes.
29:32
Amanda: It starts with each and every one of us.
29:33
Amanda: It's almost like you have to have the courage to believe that that's possible.
29:38
Amanda: And getting rid of the naysayer voices that are within us.
29:43
Amanda: In order to really live that way, you know, not just believe it and think it and hope it and wish it, but live
29:50
Mark: that way.
29:51
Mark: Absolutely.
29:52
Mark: Which is why I say that, sometimes music is the only thing that keeps me sane because I ha I go through talking with people all over the world trying to drum up their faith and their belief, and then I get whacked with.
30:06
Mark: All the stuff that seems in the way of it, but I then I pick up my guitar and start playing, especially some of the songs from back then, Kat Stevens songs, you know, Beatles songs, and, and just the, all of a sudden the energy comes back into me again because the music at least carried the message and the open vibe.
30:25
Mark: And the music inspired, you know, the Grateful Dead who've inspired younger jam bands who still, still go off right into that vision.
30:34
Mark: And, um, so it's, it didn't totally die from the world, it just went underground.
30:38
Amanda: Does astrology inspire your music
30:40
Mark: at all?
30:41
Mark: No, absolutely.
30:42
Mark: In fact, for me, astrology is like music.
30:45
Mark: I call it star jazz because I'm the kind of person.
30:49
Mark: The day that I met my teacher, he said, If you're gonna be an astrology, you need to know there's a lot of bullshit in the field of astrology.
30:55
Mark: But if you wanna do it the real way, never think, you know what Capricorn is.
31:01
Mark: Always be willing to find out what it is all over again with each new Capricorn and all the other signs, and that became my mantra.
31:10
Mark: And that's like jazz because unlike classical music or rock music with jazz, even if you've played the score of a song, uh, hundreds of times, you have to play it the next time as if it was brand new almost.
31:23
Mark: That's how I look at the birth chart, which is some people have gotten 20 or 30 readings from me over the years, even if I've looked at that chart before.
31:32
Mark: In order to be jazzed in that living moment, I have to see it all over again.
31:38
Mark: Well, what is this version of Capricorn?
31:41
Mark: Who is this being right there in front of me?
31:44
Mark: What's going on in them?
31:45
Mark: What are they all about?
31:46
Mark: So for me, there's very little difference between songwriting and music playing and chart reading.
31:53
Amanda: Star jazz.
31:54
Amanda: I love that.
31:56
Amanda: Mark, for people that are learning, I.
31:59
Amanda: Like what you just said sounds very true, but it also could seem maybe a little frustrating cause it's like how do you actually learn astrology if it's always changing and never the same and you can't really like take what you learn and apply it to people?
32:15
Amanda: What is that?
32:16
Amanda: How, how do you rectify that, those two?
32:19
Amanda: Paradoxes.
32:20
Mark: Yeah.
32:20
Mark: You, you got to the trickiness of the art.
32:23
Mark: The Ruby Heart of the Dragon Sun Signs For Our Times.
32:26
Mark: It's written both for someone who has no experience at all with astrology, maybe never even was interested in astrology.
32:35
Mark: It's gonna work for them as well as professional astrologers.
32:39
Mark: Stephanie Azar wrote a beautiful.
32:42
Mark: Endorsement.
32:43
Mark: She said, I've been a professional astrologer for 50 years.
32:46
Mark: I thought I knew just about all there was to know about the Zodiac, but the Ruby Hard offers an entirely new perspective.
32:54
Mark: Mm-hmm.
32:54
Mark: And so it, it works for both because that's the way to do it.
32:58
Mark: It, it took me many years to design my course in the College of Visionaries and wizards because it is tricky to teach jazz.
33:08
Mark: It's like teaching Zen.
33:09
Mark: It's much easier to teach academics and math and history than to teach something that has magic in it and to do justice to the earthy sides of astrology, as well as the magic.
33:23
Mark: I poured all my artistry into this book.
33:26
Mark: So this is the book for those people that you're talking about.
33:30
Amanda: I cannot wait to order this book.
33:31
Amanda: I, I can't imagine that anyone out there isn't like, okay, tell me where to go.
33:35
Amanda: How do I get this?
33:37
Amanda: Is it Amazon?
33:38
Amanda: Like how do we, how do we get your book?
33:40
Mark: Yeah, you, Amazon is the best place to get it right now cuz it'll boost all my ratings.
33:45
Mark: The Ruby Heart of the Dragon Sun Signs for our times if they go to the Ruby Heart of the dragon.com, they can also take advantage of some special free offers, with getting the book.
33:56
Mark: But you can get it right now in print form, audiobook and in ebook form.
34:02
Mark: And if you read it and write reviews, I will love it cuz we only have one or two readers reviews, even though we have some professional reviews.
34:10
Mark: So the book was just released and it's all starting and the word is spreading.
34:13
Mark: And I'm so thankful to you for having me on your show to where I can let people know about it.
34:18
Mark: Oh,
34:19
Amanda: I'm so honored to be able to, to share your work with everybody.
34:23
Amanda: It sounds like incredible work.
34:24
Amanda: I can't wait to read it.
34:27
Amanda: And, uh, And yeah, everyone write your reviews.
34:30
Amanda: If, if you enjoy it, just write it in Amazon so that mark that more people can, can get access to it.
34:38
Amanda: So the more, the more reviews he gets, the more that we order through that platform, then they will recommend it to other people to, to read as well.
34:46
Amanda: And astrology hub gets nothing for this, by the way.
34:49
Amanda: So this is just a pure.
34:50
Amanda: We're just grateful for you.
34:52
Amanda: Mark.
34:53
Amanda: Thank you for, I mean, like I said in the beginning, thank you for dedicating your life to this work.
34:58
Amanda: To me, the world would be, Such an incredible place with am amazing astrologers, like you just canvassing the lands, helping people remember who they are.
35:08
Amanda: Helping people remember their brilliance and their beauty, and so thank you for doing that.
35:12
Amanda: And thank you for, for holding the vision for what's possible for humanity.
35:16
Amanda: I mean, we need people holding that line so that we can just continue to, to grow up into it.
35:23
Amanda: And it always inspires me to meet people like you.
35:26
Amanda: So thank you for, for doing your work and for helping so many people.
35:30
Amanda: It's, it's
35:30
Mark: awesome.
35:31
Mark: You're so welcome, Amanda.
35:33
Mark: Thank, thank you for the acknowledgement, helping people remember who they are.
35:37
Mark: You got it.
35:38
Mark: Yeah, that,
35:39
Amanda: that's, that's the jam right there.
35:41
Amanda: There's the star jazz.
35:43
Amanda: I love that word.
35:44
Amanda: I'm gonna find a lot of different ways to use it and I'm gonna, give you credit for it everywhere that I do.
35:50
Amanda: Okay everybody, so go check out the Ruby, heart of the Dragon on Amazon and, let us know if you like this episode and would love to hear more from Mark.
35:59
Amanda: I would love to invite him back so, Let us know your thoughts in the comments, and just thank you everybody for being here.
36:05
Amanda: Thank you so much for being a part of our community, and thank you for making astrology a part of your life.
36:11
Amanda: We will catch you on the next episode.
36:13
Amanda: Take care everyone.