The Soul Speaks: The Therapeutic Potential of Astrology

by Mark Jones

Raven Dreams Press, www.ravendreamspdx.com, 2015.

Paper: 239 pp.

Price: $24.95

The author is a licensed psychosynthesis therapist as well as an astrologer who is not only a certified evolutionary astrologer but also a graduate of Noel Tyl's Masters astrology program. His book is based on over 10,000 hour of client work in the field of astrology. So, if you're looking for insights into counseling on pretty much any level from the esoteric to the psychological, you've come to the right place.

Jones begins with an introduction in which he credits astrologer Christina Rose for stressing the need to move away from the cookbooks and taking in the client's point of view and then moves on to a thorough definition and discussion of therapeutic astrology. This leads into a chapter on counseling skills, which is geared to astrologers specifically and again with an eye to taking the client's point of view. Importance psychological concepts such as projection, transference in its many forms, congruence, and more are discussed clearly and without a lot of psycho-babble.

Now so far, there has been next to no astrology. That changes, with a chapter on the signs as steps to healing, a chapter on Saturn as the guardian of our true potential, and an excellent chapter on the outer planets. Here, Jones discusses something I haven't seen covered in years — the outer planets as higher octaves of inner planets.  And for once, it is a discussion that makes some sense. This is one of those old concepts I threw away years ago because I never really saw any use in it. It was just waffley astro-babble. Well, Jones has changed that and caused me to revisit this concept — and the planets — in a new way. I appreciate that.

There's also a decent chapter on the Saturn and Uranus cycles and another one on soul psychology. This last one is redolent of Assagioli, who was the founder of psychosynthesis. In my opinion, this is wonderful, because psychosynthesis largely vanished from the astrological scene with the death of Alex Ruperti.          

There are good endnotes. There is also a decent bibliography, which is geared to counseling rather than astrology. There is no index. There are a few charts — house system not noted, and not all of which are timed.           

All in all, this is a valuable addition to the literature on counseling and very definitely a good investment that will serve most consulting astrologers well.