Client Case Study: Pauline

Pauline is a woman in her late fifties who came to see me for a karmic astrology reading to understand why certain unhealthy patterns kept repeating themselves in her life.

Over many past lives, people are shaped by environments from past lives affecting their current emotional state through unconscious memories. The circumstances that surrounded us in a past life is what we expect our world to reflect today, usually in terms of beliefs and limitations. These unconscious memories often cause difficulties in our current life. Therefore, it is very important to uncover what these unconscious memories and beliefs are, in order to deal with them in the present.

With the south node in Virgo in the 7^th house, Pauline knows a lot about being of service and dutiful in relationships, and learning about balance through these partnerships. Her memory of relationships was one of being dutiful to her mate, rather than being in love and compatible with her mate.

Aspects to the south node show up in our current life as friction from other people, and repetitive, unhealthy patterns. Pauline found much conflict and tension when she expressed her desire for recognition of her achievements. She was not able to assert her will or take action to achieve her goals. She was not allowed to follow her beliefs and dreams. She was not able to follow her heart in love and romance, and did not achieve a sense of fairness, harmony and balance in her past life. These patterns continue to show up in her life today when she asserts herself.

The ruler of the south node, Mercury, and its aspects are the roles she played in past lives. This is important because these are the roles that feel familiar to her in this life, and she will have expectations of herself to fulfill the same type of role, even if it’s not enjoyable or what she really wants to do. This familiar role is not always what the soul wants to experience this time around either.

Pauline's south node ruler, Mercury, is in Aquarius in the 12th house. She was a person connected to her community, learning and intellectualizing. She was also exploring creating freedom, breaking out of defined roles, being original. She explored mysticism, surrendering and altered states of consciousness. Looking at her south node, we can imagine that she was not able to explore her beliefs and live her life according to her own philosophy in a public way, as she received much friction from others when she did so.

Aspects to the south node ruler indicate that she was suppressed and controlled by people in power (Pluto) or from very powerful people. Her creativity and sexuality were repressed in her day to day life. She had a role as a messenger or communicator, but was unable to fulfill this role in her own way. Her message was controlled by other, more powerful people.

Pluto represents the soul's greatest desires and also the soul's greatest wounds that we have from a past life, with similar wounding also occurring early in this life. Most people create their current life unconsciously to avoid this deep wounding and pain. We become disempowered by doing this because our journey of empowerment begins with fulfilling our soul's mission. True empowerment has everything to do with our relationship to ourselves, not our relationship to others. Pauline's Pluto is in Leo in the 6^th house. Her soul's deepest desire is to be a mentor or of service to others in her own creative, unique, individual way. She must learn to integrate her ego and identity in a healthy way, and communicate to others what she has learned on her own journey. This could manifest in her writing or speaking.

From some of the above information regarding what is familiar to her from a past life, we see that her soul's deepest desire will not be easy for her to achieve.

Pauline's north node is in Pisces in the first house. The north node represents areas of life that the soul wants to learn about and grow and expand into. This is new territory for her, and there may be many fears surrounding this new way of being. Her soul wants to learn about asserting her will, being independent and in a leadership position. She should explore mysticism, surrendering control to a higher power and explore altered states of consciousness. Her north node is conjunct Venus, Mars and Jupiter, so she will also learn about how she relates to others, and her beliefs, faiths and philosophy of life.

After this reading, Pauline was able to see why some of the repeated patterns in her life left her feeling disempowered. With a clear picture of what unconscious memories she was carrying from past lives and what her soul wants to learn and explore in this life, she was able to make conscious choices about her relationships and career, and feel more confident in herself and what she needs to do to achieve her soul's purpose.