I have received numerous emails about the recent U.S. Presidential election. Several astrologers predicted that Clinton would win the election and as a result many people are now questioning the validity of Astrology.

One prominent example occurred at the ISAR (International Society for Astrological Research) 2016 Symposium in October this year. The symposium was synchronistically titled, “The Power of Forecasting Meets the Consequence of Choice!” Of six international astrologers and six USA astrologers, all twelve picked Hillary Clinton to win the U.S. Presidential election. 

As you can imagine, these kinds of predictions shake any belief in astrology that the general public might have had, and even worse, contribute to astrology being so misunderstood in today's world. I think this kind of prediction is the result of a huge misunderstanding with what we are actually able to see in an astrological chart.                                       

In the astrology courses that I teach, I have often used the analogy that looking at a horoscope is like viewing the wiring diagram of a house. You can see the wires running in the walls and the outlets in each room, but you have no idea what the person is going to be plugging into those outlets. You can make an educated guess that, for example, there will be a stove in the kitchen outlet, a hair dryer in the bathroom, and so forth, but these are only educated guesses. A person might have a hot plate in the bedroom, a radio in the bathroom, and so on. 

For me, a horoscope shows the inner wiring of a person in symbolic language. I do not see how the person will be using this energy that is available through this wiring. When a prediction isn’t accurate, it is the result of trying to predict outer events from an inner symbolic situation.

Unfortunately, even some of the most "renowned" astrologers in the world failed to present astrological aspects as symbolic and descriptive of the inner situation rather than being predictive of the outer results that may come from them. Predicting “outer” events ignores the fact that we all have free will, as the Edgar Cayce readings continually emphasized. 

Below is what I wrote in my June 2016, newsletter to clients about the election and this, in my opinion, is the most that could have been said about this election:

The Presidential Election

Everyone is wondering what astrology has to say about the upcoming presidential election. We do not have a birth time for Clinton, but at first glance, assuming she will be the Democratic nominee, her horoscope looks much better on election day than does Trump's...but this does not say that Clinton will win the election. Remember that an individual's horoscope tells us what is going on internally within the person - not what is going on in their outer life. 

The charts could be interpreted to say that Clinton will win the election...but... they could also indicate that she might lose and would feel extremely relieved that it was over and she did not have to proceed with the great responsibilities of a President. 

Likewise, although Trump's chart looks like he could be feeling depressed on Election Day, depression could also be the result of his winning and realizing what a tremendous burden he had taken upon himself for the next four years. 

We have free will in choosing how to express the energies in our horoscopes and the candidates will be making many decisions over the next few months that will define the path as to how these aspects will actually manifest on Election Day. This is why it is so difficult to predict outer events in a person's life with astrology...because (1) astrology describes the inner situation, not the outer one and (2) we have free will to change our behavior and in so doing we change the way future aspects manifest.