After the beginning of the Chinese New Year many people wrote me asking for predictions based on their natal charts for this year, and well, the fact is that just with the date and time of birth is not possible to predict very specific things like if you will find a better job in the following months, some general trends can be seen, but there is much more to it than you would think at first.

The problem arises because the natal chart is always the same throughout the whole life of a person, it doesn't matter if you are 4 or 40 years old, or if you are living in California or Angola.

During a very long time Chinese Astrology has used this kind of gadget to glimpse a general view of the astrological trends affecting a person or situation, the circle is basically the sky which changes over time, and the square is our natal chart that never changes:

But is just subtle trends that it shows, after that information is gathered it comes the time to analyze the hard real facts, and most of the time is just in those hard facts where the root of the problems lies, not in the date and time you were born, even if these somewhat took you to those hard facts.

With a simple example: If you have a job in which you are unhappy and want to find a better one, by comparing the characteristics of your natal chart with the astronomical ephemerids for the coming months, we can identify trends all together, and even more or less favorable times to try to make positive things happen, that's what my programs of daily and monthly predictions are supposed to do.

But as I explain in the fine print, what these programs can offer is inevitably something general that leaves out important details, continuing with the new job example:

• If you are looking for the job in the proper way.
• If maybe you would do better looking in other activity sector.
• If your personal circumstances are favorable or not...

It's not the same to look for a particular job in Zimbabwe or in Zurich, and yet your natal chart does not change a bit because of being in one place or another, it just depends on your date and time of birth.

In fact Chinese Astrology has always postulated that the time of birth determines only a third part of our destiny, the other two thirds depending on the place you are and the choices you make along your whole life; in the above example this could be buying your home in Zimbabwe or Zurich, and looking for work using Internet or physically visiting the companies that interest you the most.

In other words, the study of the natal chart and astrological short-term trends is like forecasting where the wind is going to blow from and its force, so the whole point is not about knowing only the latter, but also where our boat is and where we want to go; this drawing can help to better understood:

If the wind is against us we are out of luck, of course we could try to advance to windward sailing alternatively at angles of 45 degrees, but in practice that is too exhausting and prone to cause problems; on the other hand if the wind comes from our stern that's good in theory, but in practice it is easy to lose control of the sails or find unexpected problems like too large waves that prevent sails form working properly... the best situation is when wind come more or less from one side ;-)

So our particular circumstances would be something similar to the place where our boat is, and our goal the place where we want to sail to, is not the same wanting to go to Cuba from Miami than from Sydney.

Astrology is good to understand ourselves and see if the Wind of Destiny is with us or not, but it is not sensible to try to read our life in it as if it was a movie, it is obvious that whatever happens in our future depends to a great degree on the decisions we make and the place we are, which to a greater or lesser extent may also be a decision.

So, to analyze specific problems that develop in a short time span, my experience is that it is more practical and efficient to look at them through a series of tarot readings, so to be able to make all the specific questions needed, and as a complement to that you can also look the astrological trends for the following weeks or months, but to pretend to see in astrology the short-term future as if it were a movie, in my opinion that's not possible at all.