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Organization of Professional Astrologers |
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OPA E-News |
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Volume 1 - No. 3 - April, 2001 (Part Two) |
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This month: We are now Accepting Conference Reservations. Plus More Exciting Conference Details, Results of Last Month's and previous Surveys, New Survey Question, Results of Last Month's Q & A, Previous Month's Q & A
Q & A
Last month
Ellen Zucker wrote:
Although I've been a student of Astrology since the late 70's, I'm only now going out and setting up a practice.
One of the biggest roadblocks for me has been dealing with other people's negative opinions about Astrology. It is necessary to let people know what I do if I want to attract clients. But I feel exposed, vulnerable, and frankly don't enjoy handling the reactions of those who disparage or disapprove of Astrology.
How do you insulate yourselves about the negative opinion in which Astrology is held by the mainstream?
Sandra Leigh Serio writes:
After a while you learn to respond effectively to the naysayers. I will always fall back on constitutional rights --- living in America and having first amendment rights --- freedom of speech. I have the right to practice or believe in anything I desire (religious and philospohical freedoms) and the right to make a living. Anyone who interferes with your efforts to make an honest, legal living can be prosecuted. Since I moved from Cleveland (conservative midwest city) to Boulder County, (very liberal), I rarely run into to the naysayers. So region has a lot to do with it. However, because Cleveland is such a large metropolitan area --- over two million with the suburbs and neighboring cities, I had a thriving practice. In Boulder County, there are many hobbyists who call themselves astrologers --- so building a practice has been more difficult. So the so called liberality can be a double-edged sword.
Georgia Stathis writes:
You don't. It is important to know that. Judgments from others are powerful things. They can make or break us. Who wants to be judged? I think it is important to carefully feel out those to whom you talk. When they ask you what you do, always answer I am a full-time (if you are) professional astrologer working with individuals on life path and direction. Then drop it. If they pursue the discussion, you can explain, if they don't, you move on. Not everyone likes astrology, trusts it, or respects it, but that is only at certain percentage of the population. You can't win them all.
Jeff Baugher writes:
I am circumspect about what I say in social settings. I will often make a judgment about the person or group I am with, and if I feel they really don't want to know they are talking with an astrologer, I give them more generic information. For example, with a group that tends to be rabidly anti-astrology (for example, fundamentalist Christians), then I say I am a "consultant" and leave it at that. If that same person then asks, "What type of consulting?", I do tell them I am an astrologer. If they get upset, I feel like it's their problem because they asked! If they try to verbally beat me into submission about the evils of astrology, I either move on (if not in the mood for a debate), or I whip the Bible on them ("Who were those three wise men, anyway?"). Of course it helps to be armed with some Biblical quotes.
It has surprised me, however, that some people who I thought would never be open to the subject are actually fascinated, and eventually become clients. Sometimes they will indicate a mild interest in astrology in a social or professional setting, and then really open up about it in private. I suspect that they are afraid to appear too interested in astrology because of repercussions from their peer group. And they may interpret my understated way of talking about astrology as a good indicator of someone who understands confidentiality, and the potential consequences of their interest in astrology being gossiped about.
If you are very sensitive to others' opinions, then you are also probably sensitive enough to intuit whether the person or group you are talking with deserves your "full" truth. Use that sensitivity as an ally.
Gail Fairfield writes:
I explain what I do - not what I don't do. I emphasize that what I do is a tool, not a religion (you don't have to "believe" in it)... Use it if it works. If someone persists... "A lot of people feel the way you do; fortunately my clients do not." Bottom line - Keep responses brief and break rapport. You don't "owe" them a conversation. Simply walk away or hang up.
Bob Mulligan writes:
Early on in my practice of astrology I learned that I had to be proud of being an astrologer and to say so regardless of the circumstances when asked by people. At the same time, I also realized that it was a complete waste of time talking to someone about astrology who had a negative opinion about it. Astrology is a useful tool for living. If people are willing to look into it they see that it is quite a helpful tool for planning. People who don't use astrology, think of it as superstition or just mistaken, live in a different reality. I accept this and waste no time with them in discussion of the subject. I don't "insulate" myself at all from the "mainstream." I don't have to do this and shouldn't. I feel sorry for anyone living in a non-astrological universe. Its as if they were confined to a wheel chair. My emotions for them are about the same. I don't get angry or try to convince them of something else. I busy enough with people who want what I have to offer.
Tim Rubald writes:
> Ellen Zucker writes:
> Although I've been a student of Astrology since the late 70's, I'm only now going out and setting up a practice.
>
Congratulations! Take pride in yourself and in your decision.
> One of the biggest roadblocks for me has been dealing with other people's negative opinions about Astrology. It is necessary to let people know what I do if I want to attract clients. But I feel exposed, vulnerable, and frankly don't enjoy handling the reactions of those who disparage or disapprove of Astrology.
You will have to work on that. You do well to realize your roadblock. Look to the history of astrology and to the important contributions of astrologers. I apologize that my list includes mostly men. There have been, and of course there are, great women in the field. Here are just of few for your consideration: Evangeline Adams, from an American "first family," was an advisor to many wealthy, important and powerful people. Don't forget the major contributions to the success of the Reagan presidency by the contemporary astrologer, Joan Quigley, an honors graduate of Vassar College. Nicolaus Copernicus, proponent of the heliocentric view of the universe, while more the astronomer than astrologer is known to have erected birth charts and he entrusted his masterwork, De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium, to his friend, astrologer Joachim Rheticus, in order that Rheticus would see it through publication. [LEA]
I am flipping through my alphabetically ordered notebook of astrologer and astronomer charts, so this is in that order. The herbalist, and apothecary, Nicholas Culpepper was an astrologer. His translation of the Pharmacopea into the common language, English, exploded the "professional secrets" of the physicians of his day and still is regarded as a standard reference for herbalists and healers (Culpepper's Herbal) [TEA]. Galileo Galilei was a practicing astrologer (no bones about it), astronomer and physicist. He finally got public acceptance of Copernicus' heliocentric view and was brought before the Inquisition by a paranoid Church that only recently exonerated him. (And you think you have a hard time.) [LEA]
Johannes Kepler, (Kepler's Laws -- of planetary motion), astronomer, mathematician and astrologer, said early in his career that astrology was "the foolish and disreputable daughter of astronomy." [He had it backwards.] LATER in his career he wrote that, "A most unfailing experience (as far as can be expected in nature) of the excitement of sublunary natures [we on earth] by the conjunctions and aspects of the planets has instructed and compelled my unwilling belief." He also said that his belief "derives in the first place from experience, which is so convincing that it can be denied only by those who have not examined it." [LEA]
The astrologer William Lilly predicted the plague and the Great Fire (both for London) quite publicly and also became a physician. Speaking of physicians, I'm sorry that I can't cite a reference for you now, but Hippocrates, the supposed "Father of Modern Medicine" was an astrologer. He said that a physician not conversant in astrology should not be called a physician.
Those are a few. There are plenty of astrologers that are not known outside the community of astrologers who you can also investigate and which investigation may help you learn to take pride in your chosen occupation.
LEA = Larousse Encyclopedia
TEA = The Astrology Encyclopedia (Lewis)
> How do you insulate yourselves about the negative opinion in which Astrology is held by the mainstream?
Lesser minds have always attacked great thinkers. It goes with the territory. Pray for them.
Ellen Zucker writes:
I want to thank all of you for taking the time and energy to write. I really do appreciate your
words of encouragement. I now realize that part of my problem was as much in my head as the actual reality. I've started (by necessity) coming out of the closet, so to speak, and have found more acceptance than I anticipated, especially among women. But acceptance is hardly universal. My perception is that Astrology is more accepted now than it was when I began studying, although it still has a way to go.
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Dear Members,
If you have additional comments on this or any other topic, we will continue to publish them.
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Cathy Coleman writes:
I charge $125 for a 90-minute reading (I know of other astrologers who charge less and some who charge a little more; I don't know of anyone in the Bay area who charges as much as Bob does).
I think Bob's rates are very high. They're very high for San Francisco--the most expensive city in the country. I am not surprised that he is having difficulty attracting clients at those rates.
Bob Mulligan replies:
I've had sessions with many astrologers through the years. Some astrologers with little experience (and should I say) lacking seasoned insight, charge more than I do. A couple of very famous and extremely competent astrologers have charged much less than I do.
I have not noticed a direct correlation between price and value in chart work.
In my job with OPA I have through the years interviewed many astrologers and had readings with many. Although it cost more to live in NYC than it does in Omaha, I haven't noticed that the cost of living was a significant factor in astrologers rates. It seems that our personal rate depends more on life style, expectations, general milieu, and some less tangible subjective factors. It could be that as we become more standardized as a profession, our rate structure will become somewhat more standardized. Perhaps like other professions we will always have a certain financial hierarchy. In law you have everything from public defenders to $600 an hour counsel. I know of astrologers one who charges $3000 and one that charges $15,000 a session (No, I didn't have a reading with either but both are quite busy). In my own situation, I do wish that the general public valued astrologer more. I wish that people would see it as essential as having a yearly doctors appointment, then the fact that we charge closer to what our work is actually worth wouldn't be such a stigma. If this were the case then astrologer charging what I charge would probably see clients from every socioeconomic level at least once a year.
Ellen Zucker writes:
I'd like to offer another perspective.
In addition to my fledgling Astrology practice, I've been self employed as an artist for the past six years.
Like those of you who derive all or a substantial part of your income from Astrology, I've faced a number of issues common to the self employed.
It seems that in the minds of many, there is confusion over the concept of hourly RATE versus an hourly WAGE. A RATE of $100 an hour is a way different animal than an hourly WAGE of $100 an hour.
That is because an hourly rate seriously OVERSTATES what we actually receive as hourly income and an hourly wage UNDERSTATES it.
A self employed person can only bill for a portion of the actual hours he or she works. Time spent marketing, doing administrative tasks, ie, bookkeeping, taxes, for starters, aren't billable. (And only Georgia Stathis mentioned billing for prep time).
Also the self employed have expenses that the employed do not. Telephone, computer and office supplies, rent (if you have an office), marketing/advertising, self
employment tax to suggest a few. If we want fringe benefits, we have to buy them-often at high rates because we don't have the clout of a large organization to get a better deal.Sometimes, we end up buying expensive individual policies because that's the best we can do.
People who are employed, on the other hand, generally receive a benefits package paid for at least in large part by their employer. And there's some kind of vacation and sick leave. When the cost of these benefits is factored in, the hourly income of an employed person is substantially greater than his or her hourly stated wage.
Try this experiment. Take your gross revenue earned from Astrology, deduct ALL expenses connected with running your practice. Then divide the remainder by the actual hours WORKED (as opposed to billed). The result is your "hourly wage." My guess is that you'll be humbled.
My point is that if you're self employed, you need a rate sufficient to generate the income you need to run your business (And if you are self employed, you ARE in business whether you like it or not).
What that rate should be is a very individual decision. But I believe that a clear analysis of your costs is a first step in making that decision.
It's also my opinion, if you ARE a decent Astrologer, you're not ripping off your clients by charging an adequate rate.
Dear Members,
If you have additional comments on this topic, we will continue to publish them.
New Q & A
Ellen Zucker writes:
I attended a meeting at a local Astrology organization when the speaker made an offhand comment to a long-time Astrologer in the audience. He said that the two of them were probably the only Astrologers left that knew how to calculate charts by hand.
Do you think it is necessary for an Astrologer to be able to calculate charts by hand in this age of computers? Why or why not?
Dear Members,
Send your comments to Ellen Zucker at emzucker@netreach.net. Comments will be published next month.