What's Up with astrobaz?

9.2.12


I presume your 2012 has been as far from dull as mine has. It's hard to get too cozy or stagnant when constantly poked and prodded by a world in dynamic Uranus-square-Pluto transition.

I still feel like I'm playing frenzied catch-up, trying to attend to everything I thought I'd have handled during the first half of the year. As I've shared here before, the personally stultifying Mars-retrograde effectively delayed much progress I'd been counting on making… and only since July and August have I actually begun to move forward in earnest.

Much of what I am working on is to provide more for you, my loyal readers. I have just recently reinitiated the process of redesigning this website, after a prior interrupted attempt a couple years back. The current format dates back to 2005… which, in tech years, essentially means I designed it using a manual typewriter and carbon paper. My goal is to provide you a smoother, visually updated experience when enjoying my horoscopes and writings, with full social-media integration so you can keep sharing me with all your friends more easily. I can already tell you this redesign will take longer than many might expect, mainly because (shock of all shocks) I'm a fussy hands-on client who'd rather explore the many different possibilities upfront, since I don't want to have to do the whole thing again a year from now. (It did take me more than seven years this time around.) Please stay tuned.

Another feature I'm working on with the new website is an improved delivery system for downloading my e-books… including my next e-book release, ASTROBARRY's 2013, which I expect to be ready for purchasing and perusing by the beginning of December. For those of you who bought my 2012 book, I understand the purchase-and-download method was not as simple or straightforward as it could've been for some of you. I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, and I hope to alleviate such hassles in the future. I am now actively working on a bigger-and-better year-ahead forecast for ASTROBARRY's 2013, including longer yearly horoscopes for all twelve signs. Can't wait to get this juicy writing to you, my astro-aficionados.

The other exciting news is that I've been making travel arrangements so I can come visit with some of you in person very soon. For all my East Coast peeps, I will be hosting face-to-face consults in New York City (Oct 16-17). I'm also headed back to Australia, my home-away-from-home, and I'll be hosting face-to-face consults in Canberra (Nov 6), Melbourne (Nov 8-10), and Sydney (Nov 14-16). I will be starting the actual scheduling in the next few weeks, with more details to come… but for now, if you are interested in booking one of my limited number of appointments, please email me at barry@astrobarry.com (include your desired city), and I'll put you on the first-notification list.

On the Sacred Well (the metaphysical shop I own) front, I'm also neck-deep in a major overhaul, as we are moving from a quaint handwritten-receipt checkout to an ultra-modern iPad-based point-of-sale system, which has us all super-psyched. On the plus side, this switchover will save me hours of data-entry a month, as well as providing our business gobs more sales data and much-improved inventory tracking. Of course, in the short term, it involves a very steep learning-curve, for myself and my co-workers, and truckloads of inventory item entry. But it's one of those paradigm-shifting metamorphoses that simply cannot be avoided any longer, despite the inevitable chaos and discomfort that accompany transformation. We cannot move forward without bravely confronting whatever's holding back our growth… and more often than not, there's something.

This last sentence really sums up my experience of 2012, insofar as the work projects I've mentioned—as well as the psychological issues related to my longstanding doubts, reluctances, and hesitations—are all symbolic of the sharpened pressures many of us are feeling to evolve, or suffer. I cannot further promote astrobarry to my liking without a new-and-improved website, though the rollout brings necessary disruptions to my routines. I cannot continue to grow The Sacred Well without freeing myself up of administrative tasks and gaining access to better information for better decision-making. I am somebody who can thrive with consistent repetitive work (in case you couldn't tell by the fact I've written horoscopes every week for a decade), but I get easily thrown when the habits must be broken and the processes reconceived to meet changing circumstances. I'd probably prefer to keep everything just as it is, though I must welcome change because it is both necessary and the natural state of affairs, despite how deeply disconcerting it can be during its heights.

On good days, I am inspired by my inching ever closer toward realizing the visions I hold for what's possible, even when they seem to perpetually remain several steps ahead from here. At each small milestone, I excitedly claim the awareness of having broken patterns that were no longer serving me… and of leaving certain bits of 'the old me' decidedly in the past, never to be lived out again. On difficult days, I awake in panic, skeptical I'll ever make it beyond the next threshold because I don't know what the hell I'm doing and probably already made too many irreparable mistakes and that's why my life is such a fucking mess, while simultaneously acutely conscious that nor can I stay where I've already been because this status-quo is unsustainable and the cracks are getting bigger. It's a lot to handle all at once. That's when I start feeling like the Star Wars protagonists trapped inside the Death Star's garbage compactor, enveloped by stellar flotsam, the walls closing in from every side. (This is the scene I'm referencing, for your viewing pleasure.) Han Solo and company got out of it okay; I guess I will too.

I like to keep you periodically updated on what's going on in my life, both to further our relationship and in case you might be going through something similar and could take a smidge of solace in knowing you're not alone. Even those of us with astrological knowledge to anticipate those evolutionary challenges we'll be dealing with still must actually deal with our shit, too… and, with honest effort, will ultimately thrive for having faced it head-on.