TRANSCRIPT Ep. 309 | Podathon Day 4: Hellenistic Astrology, with Patrick Watson!

TRANSCRIPT Ep. 309 (9.4.25)
Episode 309 | Podathon Day 4: Hellenistic Astrology, with Patrick Watson!

Announcer: It’s Podathon Week on the Big Sky Astrology Podcast, and for five big days in a row, we are bringing you special episodes that put the fun in fundraising! Including the week’s planetary news, a closer look at the Moon and special Podathon surprises. Plus your chance to win prizes, people – so many prizes! And now here’s your host, astrologer, and author, April Elliott Kent.

April: Hello, Invisible Friend. April here and the date today is September 4th, 2025. Welcome to episode 309 of the Big Sky Astrology Podcast and welcome to Day Four of the Sixth Annual Big Sky Astrology Podathon!

This is the week each year when I bring you five daily episodes, complete with the big astrological news of the day. And for this week, interviews with five fantastic astrologers, each from a different astrological specialty.

And of course, this is also the week when I make my appeal for donations, which help me cover the cost of producing the podcast for the year ahead. I do my very best to run a tight podcast ship, but there are costs associated with producing this weekly show, and I would much rather turn to my listeners to help cover those costs than to take on advertising. And so, once a year during Labor Day Week, I bring you Podathon – and then the rest of the year, I don’t have to be going on and on about fundraising.

You can make a one-time donation in any amount or become a regular monthly contributor. Just go to BigSkyAstropod.com. And to encourage your contributions, here are this year’s giveaways.

First, everyone who donates $25 or more, as well as ongoing monthly podpal contributors, will be entered in a drawing to win one of these prizes:

One grand prize winner will win a 90-minute reading with me. That’s a $275 value. Two lucky donors will win a 60-minute personal astrology reading with me, a $215 value. Three lucky donors will win a copy of my Followed by a Moonshadow Eclipse Report, a $35 value, and that will help you get ready for this month’s eclipses.

To be entered in the drawing, you need to make your $25 donation at BigSkyAstropod.com no later than 11:59 PM Pacific Time on Monday, September 8th. The drawing will be held on September 9th, and winners will be notified by email.

But let’s say you can’t really donate that much. I’m also offering donors of only $10 or more a special bonus, a series of private YouTube videos for donors only. Over the past year, we’ve met virtually for most New Moons, going in depth on big planetary transits and the symbolism of the New Moon.

And if you really can’t contribute financially at all, I completely understand. Here are a few easy, free ways that you can show your love and support for the podcast.

Please subscribe or follow the show on your app of choice. This is one of the very best ways you can support the show and help it get noticed by other listeners. You could leave a five-star rating or a nice review either on Apple Podcasts or any of the other platforms that allow comments. These can inspire other people to sample the show. And finally, please recommend the show to an astrology-loving friend.

However you choose to show your appreciation, you have my deepest thanks and gratitude!

And now for today’s episode!

Astrology News

In this week’s special daily episodes, I am of course covering the week’s major astrological news, as well as an interview each day with a fellow astrologer, each of who is practicing in a particular astrological specialty -Psychological astrology, Vedic, Evolutionary, Astro*Carto*Graphy, and today I’m speaking with my colleague Patrick Watson about his astrological specialty, Hellenistic astrology. But first, let’s take a look at today’s planetary news.

Mars squares Jupiter (September 4, 7:58 pm PDT)

Mars in Libra squares Jupiter in Cancer this evening at 7:58 PM Pacific time. Leading up to that aspect, the Moon enters Aquarius early this morning at 3:31 AM, then makes a sextile to Neptune at 5:51 AM, a trine to Uranus at 6:12 AM, and a conjunction with Pluto at 6:40 AM. Now, most of this is happening in the wee hours here on the West Coast of the United States, but many of us here in the US will be starting our day on this Moon-Pluto conjunction aspect.

An aspect of the Moon is generally influential for a couple of hours, in this case between about 5:40 and 7:40 AM. You may have a hard time getting moving when you wake up, but especially with the Mars-Jupiter square already coloring the mood of the day, you could also feel a rush of excitement and enthusiasm for something that you want to get done today.

Mars applying to a square aspect to another planet is a very driven Mars. When that other planet is Jupiter, we can easily get a little carried away with something that we’re trying to get done. And with Mars in Libra and Jupiter in Cancer, relationships with those close to us are subject to our high tempers and impatience.

So, the challenge today is to reign in the negative side of this combination and of that Moon-Pluto conjunction, in the same way we might build a dam to channel water and to create energy.

Interview: Hellenistic Astrology, with Patrick Watson

During this Podathon week, I’m excited to bring you interviews with five astrologers, each of whom tells us about their particular astrological specialty. Today’s interview is with Hellenistic astrologer, Patrick Watson. Here is our conversation.

April: I am joined today by Patrick Watson, who is a certified professional astrologer with 20 years of experience. He has been featured on The Astrology Podcast, where I’m sure many of my listeners have seen and enjoyed him, on ABC, Fox, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post. His research covers Hellenistic Time Lords, synodic, election prediction, financial astrology, and astrological AI. He co-founded Thema Mundi Technologies… Who did you co-found that with? Who’s your co-founder?

Patrick: Nick Dagen Best.

April: Oh, wonderful. Brilliant guy. He is also an astrological software developer, got a big project in the works. He is an Astro Databank editor, member of AYA, NCGR, ISAR, and CAPISAR President. And the reason I asked him here is because I think that, besides being a very capable and knowledgeable astrological voice, I’ve always enjoyed his spirit and his sense of humor.

Patrick, welcome, and thank you so much for joining me on my Podathon week.

Patrick: Thank you so much for having me. This is very gracious.

April: We’re talking with you today about Hellenistic Astrology, and many of my listeners take a great interest in it. They are fans of The Astrology Podcast, so I know there’ll be a lot of interest in this particular episode.

For listeners who are a little more familiar with modern astrology, what would you say really distinguishes Hellenistic astrology and what makes it your astrology of choice?

Patrick: What distinguishes it from modern astrology is an interesting question, just because so many of the things that we take for granted in modern astrology – say, houses, aspects, many of the fundamental things we have in astrology – they come from, they originate in, Hellenistic astrology, this amalgamation of the Babylonian and Egyptian and Greek ideas about horoscopic astrology, that that sort of came together in the first and second century BCE.

This is kind of where this stuff comes from. If you want to go back to where the houses come from, well, from Hermes, you know, from this time period and from this tradition, and this covers several centuries afterward. So I think it’s first just important to note that Hellenistic astrology is sort of an origin point for a lot of the things that we take for granted in modern astrology, there’s really sort of fundamental basics.

What distinguishes it from modern astrology is somewhat of a perspective of you not necessarily being your birth chart. In modern astrology, that tends to be the perspective that you are your chart, that everything in your chart reflects some facet of your own psyche.

But in Hellenistic astrology, there is more of the point of view that, maybe one particular planet in your chart or house represents you, and that all the other planets sort of represent other figures or other sort of situations or other sort of potentialities and represent other things in the context of which you live.

So, the chart reflects more of your context in which you exist as opposed to just being you yourself. Which can be a little bit of an adjustment, but you know, to be fair, there are plenty of people who practice Hellenistic astrology today who may have some blend of both of those perspectives. They may see Mercury in their chart, for example, as representing something about their own kind of particular intelligence or particular sense of humor or something like that from the modern tradition, while also maybe recognizing Mercury’s natural significations and its status as a house ruler in the particular chart you’re looking at.

And then the other part of your question was, why is it my astrology of choice? Well, in a way it’s not, uh, just because, and this might seem kind of surprising – I’m here to talk about Hellenistic astrology, and here I am saying it’s not really my astrology of choice. Honestly, I don’t describe myself as a Hellenistic astrologer because I was born in 1987. I am very much a modern astrologer, just practicing, you know, Hellenistic techniques as we all are.

No one can be a Hellenistic astrologist because they all existed back then. You know, there’s no one around today who is, you know, solely of that tradition. And I, although I use a lot of Hellenistic techniques and find them very useful, I do use the outer planets. I do use other modern approaches to looking at charts, and so I really am more of a blend of a lot of different things.

And so, I do find Hellenistic astrology is great as a sort of basis. I think it’s helped me form a great foundation in my astrological understanding. And what’s cool about it is that you can use that basis and build upon it, you know, with whatever way you want to go. And I think that’s partly how we have modern astrology itself, is it comes from this long tradition that ultimately goes back to this sort of beginning.

It’s a wild kind of branch, or offshoot, along the way through this winding snake of, of transmission that kind of emerges from Mesopotamia and goes through Greece and into the Middle East and up through Europe and, and then everywhere. You know, that’s a terrible summary of the history.

But you know, why it’s my astrology of choice, I guess it’s a good place to start because it helps you formulate the fundamental ideas and astrology from their actual origin points, and from there, you can go anywhere you want. That’s why I’d recommend looking into it, even if you don’t think it’s necessarily your thing. It’ll help you get a deeper and better understanding of some of those fundamental things we take for granted in astrology.

April: Well, it’s well said, and it makes me think, we were talking before we began the interview and you were talking about learning languages, and you’ve learned a number of them, including Latin. I wonder if it’s helpful to think of Hellenistic as almost like that base Latin language for astrology.

Patrick: Yeah, that’s a really interesting analogy – because so many other languages come from Latin, is what you’re saying, and so you have these other kinds of offshoots of that.

I like it as well because the traditional signifier of astrology itself is Mercury, which, of course it’s also the planet of communication and languages. And of course, what are we all reading, if not the language of the sky?

April: It is how the sky speaks to us

Patrick: And how we interpret it.

April: Yes, and communicate to others and explain ourselves as well.

One of the first ideas that I think people tend to encounter about Hellenistic astrology, whether it’s true or not, is that it takes a more fated kind of perspective than modern astrology. Do you think that’s true? And if so, how do you work with the idea of fate when you’re counseling clients?

Patrick: Ooh, big question.

The truth is that in the Hellenistic era, astrologers had many different opinions on how fated things were. You have some astrologers, like Vettius Valens, who were more stoic and believed more in determinism. But then you also had others who seemed to believe in more of a partial determinism, like Ptolemy.

So they believed that it wasn’t necessarily the end-all, be-all, of all the effects in the world, that it wasn’t all reducible to astrology. And not to mention there’s also, and I think Chris has also talked about this on his podcast at some point, the difference between looking at astrology as signs versus astrology as causes.

So Ptolemy, for example, thought that the planets actually affect the earth in some, or affect people in a very sort of direct or literal way through some sort of mechanism. Whereas looking at astrology as signs is looking at the planets, not as causing things to happen, but sort of signifying, mirroring the importance of a given event on earth.

And so it’s important to recognize that there was a diversity of opinion on this issue within Hellenistic astrology. So I don’t think it’s a very accurate thing to say that Hellenistic astrology is inherently more fated than any other type of astrology.

I think that astrology itself is, at least in its premise, is somewhat more deterministic just because if the transit of the planets are fixed, if they’re fixed enough to the point where we can accurately calculate them ahead of time, and that can’t be changed, and as above, so below – then if the course of the planets can’t be changed, then it would suggest that there’s something about our experience or our destiny or charts, which are also fixed or unchanging. And the degree to which you lean into that or not is going to tell you, how much more of a determinist you are versus maybe how much more you believe in free will and agency. I think it’s important to make sure that we understand our own feelings about that question.

To be okay if you don’t have like an overall answer. It’s a question that can’t be answered. I mean, unless we had a, you know, control universe or something where you could see what changed or you had some way to go to a parallel reality, I mean, is there’s no way you didn’t necessarily know.

So I, for myself – and I’m not saying anyone has to believe this or accept what I’m saying here at all – I do tend to be a little more determinist. I think things are maybe a little more planned out, maybe than we would like. But what’s also immediately apparent is that no matter if it’s planned or not, it certainly feels like we have some agency. And certainly, when I come to certain situations, I want desperately to be able to have some agency. And I still think my approach to life is almost a little bit of a self-deception. You know, even though I might have a hunch in the back of my head that maybe things are all fated, potentially, I’m still encountering life moment to moment, trying to make the best decision that I possibly can.

And in the event that we do have some free will or agency, I’m optimistic. I’m optimistic. I’m still going to try. Believing in determinism doesn’t mean you sit on the couch forever and you don’t do anything with your life forever. Again, you’re fated to do something, and you’re gonna do it no matter what. So if it’s your fate to sit on the couch for the rest of your life, then I guess you will. But if you, you know, decide to do something else, do a painting, go for a walk, what have you, well, that’s part of your fate as well.

You know, I still elect charts. I still try, if it is at all possible to nudge things along a certain way, you know, I’m gonna try because that’s what human beings do. But I admit that, you know, when you see enough charts and you see enough ways that it sort of turns out, it’s hard for me to avoid the conclusion there’s maybe a bit more planned out than we would maybe even like or be comfortable with. And then we have to ask an even more profound question, which is, what kind of universe or reality do we live in where this is true? And I’m still figuring out the answer to that question for myself as well.

April: So, when you’re working with clients…?

Patrick: That was the other part of your question was the clients. Yeah.

April: And you have a sense that things were a little more determined. How do you frame that? How do you talk with people about that?

Patrick: That’s a really good question. So, I think what is important to an important asterisk to all of this is just because I think things are determined, A, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they are, and B, it doesn’t mean that I necessarily can perfectly predict this.

So when I see, for example, a challenging activation of a malefic in someone’s chart paired with some malefic transits, I will caution that even if I can’t tell exactly what way it will occur, whatever the situation is, it will be something that requires some of the virtues relating to those malefics.

So if it’s Mars, then maybe courage. If it’s Saturn, maybe patience and endurance. Whether it’s something that happens to you or whether it’s something that happens to someone else that you have to assist with, and you have to engage with this archetypal combination, or you have to engage with this sort of complex, that’s what I try to do with a client is I try to make them aware of the potential in timing, potential of the quality of the type of event. I will give some scenarios that could potentially match, while prefacing that I’m not suggesting those may actually happen. Try to give them the lesson or the tip as much as I can give it.

I’m no guru. I’m just a fellow human being here, you know, but assuming astrology is valid, and that these things actually do mean something, I do try to give a person a tip that I think will help them, regardless with whatever the situation is. That is about the best that I can do to help.

I can’t adjust people’s fates. And I know some people believe in, you know, remediation, and I don’t want to discount that. I don’t really have a particular opinion on it. I just know that I don’t particularly offer that myself. The only real remediation I can offer, sort of, honestly, is just advice about how to potentially deal with the transit, as well as helping the person look back at previous examples of that type of thing in their life. And to use what they’ve already done in their lives as a way to give them advice about how they might approach the situation. Because these things are usually, in some ways, cyclical. They may have had previous encounters with the type of transit we’re looking at.

April: I’m really asking for myself personally, but do you think there’s something dishonest about seeing a transit, for example, that looks really difficult and trying to give a little more of a positive spin to it and not to completely discount the meaning of it and the seriousness of it and the importance of it, but in some way trying to give a little bit of a sense of hope, because people do take these things really seriously.

Patrick: Well, I think you have to read the room a little bit, too, and an astrologer has to walk the line, has to walk that balancing act between being honest and accurate while also being compassionate. You know, if you can tell, for example, the person you’re working with is visibly shaken by things you’re telling them, you know, you’re going to have to soften that blow a little bit. Because you’re probably not going to be able to be very helpful in that moment if you just pile on, you know, inflaming their anxieties. And so I think that, in those cases, I think it can help to at least as a guard against our own tendency to maybe over-catastrophize if we see something that looks negative, to list those positive possibilities just to be thorough and also as a way to take a little bit of the edge off.

And I think it’s, it doesn’t necessarily have to be dishonest. You know, I think there are still positive things regarding, say, really malefic transits, that can still be useful and aren’t so terrifying.

For example, one of the things I’ve noticed with really big Mars transits is it may be a time when I won’t even be looking at the transits and I’ll just think, gosh, there’s this really big project that I’ve been putting off for ages and it’s never gonna get done, and like, it just has to get done. I have to do the difficult thing. I have to face this task head-on and just do it. Just put in the work that’s required to get this done, because I have to work up against a deadline. There have been so many Mars-Saturn things where I’ve been going through a terrible deadline, and I just have to keep going at doing the thing I have to get completed, and it’s not fun. It’s not pleasant. But it’s also part of life, you know?

So Mars and Saturn are not just out to get you, you know, sometimes it’s requiring you to step up and do the hard thing. And that doesn’t have to be scary. And again, this is why it helps to be able to look back and say, like, “Well, what do you know… What about this time? What about this time? Remember, like, you know, you’ve seen this kind of thing before and you kind of know what’s required.” And that’s not necessarily a positive reframing as much as just providing some real-life context to what these things can be like and they, they don’t have to be very pleasant, but it can still be honest and accurate and not anxiety-inducing, I would hope.

Although you know, it’s one thing to hear about it, a very different thing to live through.

April: It really is. So I know in Hellenistic astrology there are a few really important techniques that I hear about a lot that aren’t used in modern astrology, such as profections, zodiacal releasing, and even the idea of sect, whether somebody is born during the day or at night. Are these all things that you use, and are there any other techniques in Hellenistic astrology that you think give insights that a modern technique might not?

Patrick: Sure. I do use these techniques and obviously, I think they can be very useful. I think the one that would probably be the most useful and immediately applicable to a modern astrologer would just be the concept of sect.

Because all it is saying is that there are qualitative differences between day and night charts, which makes perfect sense. If we think about astrology as the, you know… If it’s looking at the sky, then obviously taking into account the fact that someone was born deep in the middle of the night or right at sunrise, there’s going to be some qualitative differences between those times.

It would make some amount of sense, for example, if someone was born at night and the Moon was bright in the sky, that, well, you might wanna pay a little more attention to that Moon, you know? In modern astrology, we have this idea of like, uh, the Sun sign obviously, or the big three, you know, the Ascendant, the Sun and the Moon.

I think looking at something like sect is just a simple way of being able to almost categorize which one might be the most dominant. And so that’s where that kind of analysis could be helpful. If the Sun was rising at the same time with the Moon above the horizon, well then maybe we’d still think that, that the Sun may still be the most important.

And if both of the lights fall in places that are cadent, if they’re in cadent houses relative to the Ascendant, then maybe the Ascendant might actually be kind of more important. This is what I’m referring to, is determining the pre-dominator, which is basically seeing whether the Sun, the Moon, or the Ascendant is the most dominant, and I think that that would work pretty easily in in a modern astrological consultation just because it would let you know whether or not to focus on the Sun as kind of describing a person’s sort of quality of soul or whether they might embody more of that, those Moon qualities.

And this comes up from time to time, where maybe you might come across someone who is like maybe a Cancer Sun and they don’t really seem to match Cancer Sun, but oh man, do they match their Moon in Aries, you know?

And that may be a reason for that. There may be a nocturnal birth. And so that Moon in Aries is taking on maybe more of a leading role in kind of describing basic qualities.

The other techniques you mentioned, things like annual profections and zodiacal releasing. These are somewhat similar to what we have in Indian astrology, the Mahadasha system, and this is, uh, essentially it’s a fixed sequence of signs. In the case of zodiacal releasing, it’s a fixed sequence of signs that unfolds according to the planetary periods associated with each planet. And it’s used as a way of timing the peaks and valleys, twisting turnarounds of your life, uh, for whatever topic you’re releasing from.

So if you were to release from the Lot of Spirit, then it’s gonna show you things relating to your own actions and maybe your professional activities. If you’re releasing from a Lot of Fortune, then it might show you events relating to the body and things that happen instead of more circumstantially. If you are releasing from the Lot of Eros, for example, as many people do, then that’s supposed to show something about the ups and downs of your romantic life, which may be of interest to people.

So it has a fascinating and curious power to be able to time these kinds of turning points and peak periods of our lives with respect to these topics.

And so, zodiacal releasing is a very complicated technique, but if you have a foundation in Hellenistic astrology and you understand the attending concepts, then you can attack something like zodiacal releasing and potentially get quite a lot out of it. It’s another one of those things that kind of makes you feel a little like maybe we don’t have as much free will. Because these are fixed events, these are fixed periods, so when they line up so perfectly with things that happen in your life, it’s a little unnerving ’cause you’re like, “Did I ever have any choice or am I just a bag of molecules following the script?” It’s eerie enough that it can produce that kind of almost like crisis of, sort of existential crisis, like of, how much agency do I really have?

But our experience, though, our day-to-day experience is so overwhelmingly… it feels like we have free will that, you know, we just have to kind of deal with that, for whatever reason. Even if there’s a script, you still have to act, and you know, maybe there’s an improv moment. Maybe there’s an unexpected cameo. You know, you never know what happens in live theater. Uh, but ultimately, it has a trajectory, it has a way that it goes and, um, we just have to, you know, play the part as best as we can. And the part is ourselves, so….

April: Well, because look at how differently different actors will play the same role.

Patrick: Right. That’s true.

April: There is a lot that can be… says the Leo, of course, I’ve got to defend the, you know, the main character of the story, right?

Patrick: Yeah. Annual profection is a bit simpler. That’s simply where each house represents a year of life. The first year of life, when you are age zero, you are in a first house profection, which highlights the planet that rules that place, as well as any planets that transit through that place at the time of the solar return, especially.

So, what’s cool about annual imperfections is, it actually points you to particular years where maybe your most fortunate planets are activated for that particular year or where your most destructive planets are highlighted for that particular year. You can use this in conjunction with solar return charts as well, which is quite interesting.

There are a lot of other Time Lord systems as well, and that’s what they, that’s what these techniques are usually grouped under, is that they’re Time Lord systems. Because they’re divisions of time that a planet controls the whole duration of. You know, some people will do the zodiacal releasing and go like, “Oh, you know, my zodiacal releasing came out to this date and nothing happened on that date,” not realizing that it’s maybe a period of time as opposed to hits.

It’s governing these, these chapters in time that often match the way that biographers might approach a life. You know, say I’ve seen some cases where the duration of a zodiacal releasing period, it will kind of capture the timeframe in which someone lived in a particular place. So it’s like, you know, “These were my Denver years,” “Well, these were my Paris years.” If you think about the different eras that artists go through in their careers, that’s almost what zodiacal releasing kind of captures, from zodiacal releasing from Spirit. It’s kind of telling you those different. versions of yourself that you see and it’s sort of operating in a different way than we may understand from, like, transits.

But the other kind of crazy thing about them is that you can use it to sort of give a forecast for a person’s entire life. In fact, you could do it without knowing anything about the person. You would be able to sort of lay these Time Lord sequences out and be able to kind of pinpoint ahead of time which years look particularly advantageous or disadvantageous. And then if you cross-reference that with major returns and transits of things that are happening in the chart, then that’s another frame of reference that can help point you to know that a particular time is really significant.

You know, for example, if you’re age 32, and you have Mars in the ninth house with Venus, well, you know, 32 is gonna be a huge year because Venus and Mars come back to the same positions when you turn age 32, and 32 just happens to be a ninth house year by annual profection. So you would be contacting the position of Venus and Mars in your profections at the same time that that return period is happening in your chart. Therefore, you know, oh, okay, Venus-Mars is gonna be a huge theme for this year, and this may have to do with say, you know, social transgressions or artistic breakthroughs or, uh, social breakthroughs or…

April: … getting married. I got married at 32, and I’ve got everything in the ninth house!

Patrick: How funny. Oh, very interesting. I didn’t even know that!

April: The whole matter of sect was so interesting to me. I had heard a little bit about it over the years. It really didn’t make an impact on me, but when I started reading up about it and learning just a little bit about it, it really made me understand my chart in a different way. I had always thought Saturn was the planet that tormented me when it was Mars all along, for example.

Patrick: Right. I didn’t even get into that part of sect. I was just focusing on the luminaries. But you’re absolutely right. If you’re a day chart, Mars is supposed to be the more destructive malefic, while Saturn is actually supposed to be more constructive. Saturn is actually sort of better in a day chart. Which is interesting, because you may have noticed that not all Saturn transits are so bad for some people. Like some people seem to really do very well for themselves with Saturn transits, and I think sect is a big way of sort of understanding why.

Now, in your case, April, you also have Saturn in Cap, so you’ve got that dignity as well. That kind of additional factor that…

April: It’s pretty helpful. Yeah.

Patrick: And then, Venus is sort of slightly less positive while Jupiter is more positive in the day chart. So if you’re a night chart, then Venus is your most positive planet. Jupiter is more moderately positive, and then Mars actually is more positive, and then Saturn is gonna be a little more cruel, let’s say.

But even then, you know, there can be, there’s a lot of mitigating conditions. You know, I’d say sect is like the first line of analysis. And then beyond that, you’re gonna want to consider the, the house position, the sign position, the aspects to that planet that’s going to give you that sort of more nuanced picture of how helpful that planet is to you or how unhelpful.

And then of course, you know, regardless of what the theory of astrology says or what, you know, these theories from Hellenistic astrology say, ultimately it’s gonna be, you know, the facts of your own life that kind of tell you, you know, really how bad or how good a given transit is going to be.

If there’s anything I can tell your listeners, and the one thing I wish I had done better too, growing up, is take some notes, keep a diary, keep track of, like, when important things happen. Because that is such an invaluable resource too, as an astrologer, really, nothing could be more helpful than having the records.

April: Boy, I agree with you completely.

Patrick: Yeah. And you know, to some degree, you can help jog their memory just by describing what the last one would’ve been like. Sometimes, if it’s happened in a year where you can remember an important event happened at that time, then maybe you can go like, “Oh, this happened in the same year of, you know, the 2008 crash, for example. So, what was happening then?” Sometimes those sort of historical references actually can trigger out, oh yeah, this.

And I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a client who maybe couldn’t remember something that I’d been asking about, and I’m like, I’m positive, you know, something that was important, something important about this particular period. And then later they’ll contact me and go like, “Oh my God, I can’t believe I totally forgot about this extremely important thing!” We tend to be pretty poor historians of our own lives and you know, that is very common for sure.

April: Well, if people are curious to delve a little more into Hellenistic astrology, other than The Great Astrology Podcast, you know, with Chris Brennan and yourself as a guest, very often, other great guests. What are some good first steps for people? What sort of resources might people turn to in terms of websites, other podcasts, books? What would you suggest?

Patrick: Well, honestly, I think Adam Elenbaas of Nightlight Astrology is also a great teacher and a great place for people to learn more about these concepts. In addition to Chris Brennan’s The Astrology Podcast, I can also recommend very highly Demetra George’s volumes on astrology, they are called… Ancient Astrology, volume one and two. Uh, I just have them right there. So those are kind of thick, intimidating books, but Demetra George does a great job kind of breaking it down. Demetra George also has a book she wrote a while ago, which actually is designed more for modern astrologers encountering Hellenistic astrology. If the ancient astrology volumes are kind of overwhelming, then I think that’s called something like “Astrology and the Authentic Self,” I think is what it’s called. I can’t remember the exact name of it. All I can remember is that I, I loaned my copy of it to my mom, ’cause my mom is more of a modern astrologer and I’ve kind of confused her when I’ve tried to explain it myself. So I gave her the book and she never gave back.

April: Oh, Mom, how dare she? That sounds like a good bridge for people who are more versed in modern astrology. Demetra’s wonderful.

Well, where can listeners find you and what do you have coming up that you’re excited about?

Patrick: Sure, you can find me at my website, PatrickWatsonAstrology.com. On my site, you’ll find a lot of my silly articles and you can find all the sort of tools and stuff I’ve been working on and you can find my services.

I do general consultations where I help people understand more about their own charts and make projections about things that will happen. And I also help people find out what their birth times are if they don’t know them, uh, rectifications.

April: Oh, it’s great to know you do that. I get a lot of requests about that.

Patrick: I help people answer sort of short, little questions, which I can do through my horary service.

I also help people pick auspicious times to do things with electional astrology. I also offer tutoring for many students of these traditional techniques. I’ve, uh, assisted many through that service, so, uh, yeah, you can check all that stuff out. I am working on a new astrology software called Nechepso, and I am also, as you mentioned, the president of CAPISAR and we also have certification exams, uh, in September.

So I think you’ll probably be watching this in September if you, if you see this, go and check out the website CAPISAR.org to see those. So all of things to provide that I… I’m doing quite a bit.

April: Sounds like you’re really busy. And you’re speaking at UAC next year.

Patrick: Yeah I, I’ll be speaking at Norwac in 2026 and at UAC in 2026.

April: Wonderful. Well, I’ll get to meet up with you there. And a lot of listeners, too!

Patrick: Okay, excellent. That will be great as well. Great. Wonderful.

April: Patrick, I can’t thank you enough. This has been fascinating, and I’m so glad you were able to spend some time with me today. Thank you.

Patrick: Oh yeah, it was a pleasure.

Suzanne, Cyprus, and Carrie, thank you so much for listening and for supporting the show with your donations each and every month!

Thanks so much to all of you for stopping in during the Sixth Annual Podathon. Join me again, bright and early tomorrow morning, for our final Podathon episode, including my interview with astrologer Ronnie Gale Dryer, who will talk to us about her work with Astrocartography.

And until then, keep your feet on the ground and your eyes on the stars.

Announcer: That’s it for today. Don’t forget to make your donation at BigSkyAstropod.com and join us each Labor Day weekday for another very special episode of the Big Sky Astrology Podcast.

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