Multiplicity in the Planets (Internal Family Systems work with Astrology)

I have been guiding clients since 1999 with an integration of Yoga, Āyurveda, and Vedic Astrology, and coaching as well. In all of the above situations, I use an astrological chart to see which areas of life there are issues, then we directly work on the subjectivities affecting those areas. Before my Master in Clinical Psychology, I talked about what would be personality issues in the person. Now, I frame these issues as subjectivities and talk about how those parts are affecting an individual’s life. Seeing the parts as separate aspects of the individual has created a more empowering place to take clients and more effective application of Vedic techniques.

Planetary combinations in astrology create certain ways of being. For example, Venus conjoined or in aspect from Saturn creates a subjectivity that doesn’t feel beauty, doesn’t feel worthy of love, thereby denying oneself situations/relationships that could be appreciative and caring. This energy becomes a subjectivity that lives in the individual. I used to say that a client with this combination was a “type of person who didn’t feel worthy of love,” but now I speak about it as a part that feels unworthy of love. If the Sun was conjoined or aspected by Saturn, the individual would have a part that felt unworthy of respect and being valued and this would show up as delays or lack of growth in work related situations. If Sun and Venus were conjoined and aspected by Saturn, then the two different types of unworthiness would be tied together in a more multilayer complex subjectivity.

Connecting these subjectivities to schemas and the cluster of affective response has been important in my work the last few years. I have been helping clients be aware of the thought processes and body languaging that these combinations create. Previously, I would just mention the thought processes the “type of person” would have and give them specific mental exercises, mantras and balancing postures to work with transmuting them. But now I often guide the individual to really get in touch with the subjectivity I am referring to and see how it shows up in a somatic posturing. I work to give the subjectivity more life of its own so. In Internal Family Systems (IFS), when we speak about the part, it becomes less enmeshed by being more clearly defined. The distancing created by working with the subjectivity (as opposed to oneself) helps to more easily personify the subjectivity, visualize it in an external form or relationship and care for it in the way needed.