ISAR president and Mountain Astrologer horoscope writer Clarissa Dolphin joins the podcast to talk about the astrology books she loves (as well as the books she’d steer clear of as a beginner)! Host Jenn Zahrt and Clarissa also get deep into harmonic (vibrational) astrology, midpoints, and also offer up some Sun Sign realness. Plus: Nothing wrong with hybrid freak astrologers!; Can you have synastry with a lizard?; and careful what you lay around the coffee table!
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Song “Wake Up” used with permission by The E-Block Band.
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Episode timestamps (conversation recorded April 2023):
00:32 – Clarissa is bringing some big vibes to the show today! Let’s talk vibrational (harmonic) astrology.
04:30 – Clarissa’s first encounter with an astrology book? Linda Goodman’s Sun Signs for the win! (Some books mentioned are available on our bookshop.org page, so do check it out! And feel the warm fuzzies: By purchasing books through this site, you help support CAELi!)
08:42 – What 3 astrology books would Clarissa take to a desert island? First up: Reinhold Ebertin’s The Combination of Stellar Influences and Fixed Stars and Their Interpretation.
09:31 – Clarissa’s next pick: The giant tome The Secret Language of Relationships by Gary Goldschneider and Joost Elffers. It’s cool how this book breaks down the decans, and tackles synastry, too!
11:41 – Let’s talk about midpoints! (And Clarissa gets two extra points for bringing up the hilarious phrase “hybrid freak astrology” again!)
12:26 – Visit our sponsor, Rod Suskin School of Astrology!
21:40 – What books would Clarissa recommend folks start with related to vibrational astrology? Of course, any books related to what harmonics mean, as well as planetary pairs. But, well… then it gets complicated, LOL.
22:57 – And what astrology books for beginners are worth a mention? Anything by Robert Hand, like Planets in Transit. The Mountain Astrologer magazine! Linda Goodman, always. And Dane Rudhyar deserves a mention, too. Don’t start with Marc Edmund Jones, though! (But hey – phooey on where you begin. Just start where you start!)
25:41 – Any final books? Horary Astrology Re-Examined by Barbara Dunn. Any of the 5 million books by Demetra George! And Chris Brennan’s Hellenistic Astrology.
27:10 – Thanks for listening to Within Orb! If you love the show, please help support it at no cost to you: Follow or subscribe wherever you listen, rate it five stars, or write a kind review! And if you’d like to become a CAELi member or support our work with a contribution of any amount, we’d be delighted! Thanks!
Show notes by Jen Braun, JJ Boots Productions LLC.
Transcript, Episode 4: Within Orb
Jenn Zahrt 00:01
Welcome everyone. I am here today with Clarissa Dolphin, an amazing astrologer based out of LA. Clarissa, What do you want people to know about you and your work with astrology?
Clarissa Dolphin 00:12
That I’m a hybrid freak astrologer. [laughs]
Jenn Zahrt 00:15
what does that mean? Hybrid freak!
Clarissa Dolphin 00:19
No, that was actually like the worst joke ever. sorry to like open up our dialogue with that.
Jenn Zahrt 00:25
Well I know you work with vibes, so let’s start with the vibes, right? I wouldn’t say hybrid freak. I would be like “vibey freak.” Like, what is vibrational astrology? I know that our colleagues practice that, but you’re the first person to truly open my eyes to this branch of astrology. So what is vibrational astrology?
Clarissa Dolphin 00:43
Well, thank you for asking Jenn. It is synonymous with harmonic astrology, number one. It is also very, very modern types of relationship to what the actual natal chart is. So instead of it just being like a topographical map, connecting, you know, terrestrial beings – you and I – to space time, like that’s what a natal chart is. A harmonic chart, or a vibrational chart actually takes us into kind of quantum worlds like the infinite. And the way to kind of calibrate that and to calculate it interpret it, etc, is literally through the aspect. It’s aspect centric. It’s not literally like the sky doesn’t exist in harmonics. So like the Zodiac takes, like a total backseat. It’s probably like 1% of what we do.
Jenn Zahrt 01:43
That’s amazing. Like, but even when you say the sky doesn’t exist, I’m thinking: you’re right. You know, in a way we are this speck of dust in the middle of this ahle, that’s a German word for the universe. We’re just dislike Cosmonautical, you know, marble hanging around. And what we see is the sky is a figment of our atmosphere. I mean, that’s what I heard you say, is like, the sky is made up.
Clarissa Dolphin 02:11
Okay, so now we’re entering like whole new territories of awesomeness, because in this context of “the sky is made up,” right. And this like, we’re like this quantum particle of the ahle, et cetera. This is why I love being a harmonic astrologer and on this cutting edge, because we need to start thinking about that as astrologers and humans as we enter like space travel, because we cannot bring our terrestrial Zodiac with us when humans are being born on Mars. when humans are being born in spacecrafts.
Jenn Zahrt 02:48
Have you ever come across a text that talks about what astrology would be like from the Moon? Or Mars?
Clarissa Dolphin 02:55
No, please tell me all about it.
Jenn Zahrt 02:58
No, I haven’t either. yet. I’m sure there’s something out there somewhere. You might have it here at the celestial arts education library buried in some of the books that we still have to go through. But I had a question just yesterday from a local Seattle palm reader named divine hand, Jim. He said, “Jenn, what’s the role of the earth in astrology?” Do you know what the role of Earth in the chart is from the harmonic perspective?
Clarissa Dolphin 03:20
No, that’s something that we still have to research. But what is that branch of astrology that actually does consider Earth as a planet? It was in a recent mountain astrologer magazine edition.
Jenn Zahrt 03:35
Yeah, Chrissy Blaze wrote about it. Basically like, you can always find the earth if it’s the exact opposite degree of your Sun. Because on Earth, we’re looking out into the zodiac. Right? that 1% that you consider. And so the position of the Sun is relative to Earth. So the Earth would be the opposite point from the Sun. Nevertheless, I want to go back to basics and ask you to tell me the story about your first encounter with astrology through books.
Clarissa Dolphin 04:07
Oh my gosh. Well, I mean, literally my first encounter with astrology through books, was very much kind of like coffee table format. Literally Linda Goodman’s books that my mom owned right? like so, I have actually a newer copy not the ragged copy with like the decaying skeleton spine.
Jenn Zahrt 04:33
Linda Goodman’s Sun Signs: How to really know your husband, wife, lover, child, boss, employee, yourself through astrology. That’s a lot of capitalism on that cover. husband, wife, lover employee boss, like whoa…
Clarissa Dolphin 04:49
that’s probably how they sold like a trillion books or however it’s over 2 million copies sold apparently.
Jenn Zahrt 04:56
So when you have these books sitting around as a younger person, what was it like? did you get into it? Did you feel resonance with what Linda was saying?
Clarissa Dolphin 05:04
Oh my god, I still get body chills as you asked that question. Absolutely. 5,000,000%. so I’m eight years old. I don’t know really the technical aspects of anything that I’m reading, right? I know that I’m a Sun Cancer don’t know my Moon sign. Don’t know, my, you know, ascendant or anything like that. But I really kind of was like reading and engaging for all the Sun signs that I actually knew. like myself as a Cancer. Did I resonate 1,000,000%. My mom, Leo? Yes. My Gemini grandmother, who’s also from Germany, which is interesting: Yes. Did I resonate? Absolutely. So it was kind of like this, like, interesting immersion into kind of the characters that I knew in my life as a time as a child. That’s kind of how it lived for me at the time.
Jenn Zahrt 06:04
You’re the horoscope writer for the mountain astrologer and Linda Goodman’s Sun Signs is ostensibly the most popular Sun sign book ever written. So has it persisted in your work today? I mean, is it still with you?
Clarissa Dolphin 06:18
Yeah. And it’ll never die. And that’s such a trippy question. I love your questions, Jenn. Like all goosebumps. because like it this is so moving for me. So yes, I’m the horoscope writer for the mountain astrologer like the best astrology magazine in the world right now. It’s amazing.
And it’s a trip how like the universe kind of like converges to create the human that you are, because like at the time, did I think that I would be a horoscope writer when I was eight years old reading Linda Goodman Sun sign books? Absolutely not. like, but I am one. So it definitely like kind of like cultivated that. I also oddly one of my greatest astrology teachers Bob Glasscock, he was really good friends with Linda Goodman. In fact, she transferred all of her clients to him in the 60s and 70s. And he was my Horary teacher, and my solar arcs teacher. And it’s kind of like, even through from other dimensions different like timelines and scales, like Linda Goodman has totally shaped who I am.
One other thing that is interesting about this is like, even beyond books, like my grandmother was like a tabloid reader, right? So like, literally, also, you know, formative thing with astrology was reading horoscopes in magazines, like period every day, every week. So yeah, like it’s such a trip how like, directly formative all of this was in terms of my actual professional role right now.
Jenn Zahrt 08:00
That is amazing. So I guess another takeaway would be Be careful what you lay around your coffee table around the kiddos. [laughs]
Clarissa Dolphin 08:08
I would second that. Yeah. [laughs]
Jenn Zahrt 08:11
Yeah, for sure. Okay, so here’s the big question. If you were stranded on a desert island, maybe the island doesn’t need to be a desert if you were stranded somewhere and you could only take three astrology books with you, what would they be?
Clarissa Dolphin 08:23
Okay, that’s like literally the hardest question that can ever be posed to an astrologer.
Jenn Zahrt 08:28
I know. It’s hard. I know, how can you pick just three when there’s like, you know, 3000 that you’d want to have at your disposal, but really, like just the top three,
Clarissa Dolphin 08:36
I will probably take Reinhold Ebertin anything with me, the combination of stellar influences and also his fixed star book or tome, just because it’s so interesting. I like the Cosmo biological kind of, you know, reference point, I think it would just be like cool to know. And also, this classic book, The secret language of relationships by Gary Goldschneider and Joost Elffers. Because literally, there’s like, no kind of end to what you could possibly, like, look into while you’re trapped on a deserted island.
Jenn Zahrt 09:17
I’ve seen that secret book of relationships, but what is the structure of it that makes it endless when you open it up?
Clarissa Dolphin 09:24
Okay, well, first of all, there’s like literally 800 pages. Giant thing. So you have like, every single astrology sign is broken down in decnas, right? So we have like, a week. And this is your personality, if you’re born in this week, etc. And then we have like the synastry component, where it’s like, there’s hundreds of pages of like week on week, how you would relate to this person born into this week and then this book was just It’s so well done, right? Because they found like actual relationships for every single description that these people wrote. so I mean, that’s why you you’re really not gonna get bored. Like even if you meet a lizard, you know, and somehow you discover like its birthday. Like we can figure out how compatible you are as homies on your desert island.
Jenn Zahrt 10:26
I love that: lizard astrology. See, hybrid freak isn’t wrong, right? Another question that like coming to me is like, you have on the one hand the Cosmo biological harmonic slash vibrational school. And then on the other this expertise and Sun sign work, which to me seems like when you say on the like that at the beginning, the Zodiac is only 1%. But then when we look at the tropical zodiac and Sun sign culture, it’s everything. It’s like 99%. So that’s a really cool, like engagement that you have, because you’re covering all the bases, just not all at once. Anyway, just appreciating you. Okay, so that was the two books or I guess three, technically you have two Ebertins and one relationships.
So the other thing I think that’s neat about combination of seller influences is like, Okay, we’ve got Mercury, Venus midpoint, compared to all of these other factors and you know, other planets that might be the middle of that midpoint or whatever. So you kind of have this plug and play that would take a lifetime to truly ingest and have inside us like knowledge, right?
Clarissa Dolphin 11:31
Yeah, and you’re introducing the midpoint angle that I think is kind of like the lost angle of… when we’re talking about like hybrid freak astrology. One element of this is just kind of like really mastering specific esoteric techniques, like midpoint, like, you know, other stuff.
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Jenn Zahrt 11:54
So when you say the lost angle, can you explain more about what you mean by that?
Clarissa Dolphin 11:59
Yeah, so I feel like I’m actually getting to know myself in such a different way talking to you, Jenn, because like, I think I’m like this all like super esoteric astrologer, like on the cutting edge, with harmonics, but like, actually, like, I am a Sun sign astrologer as well. So like now, I don’t know who I am anymore. But like, so for example, I think that most astrologers, when we’re in a Sun sign analysis conversation, like we’re not thinking of direct midpoint structures, and how the angular distances between certain planets, how they cut each other up how they like slice each other down, and vice versa, actually changes the resonance, or the glow, or the impact of what we’re interpreting at any given point. And that’s what like midpoints do, period.
Jenn Zahrt 12:58
So going back to that very first statement around vibrational and getting into this quantum level, like, when you look at a chart, knowing midpoint structures as deeply as you do: Can you start to see them without calculating? Can you just look at the angles and start to see these hidden features?
Clarissa Dolphin 13:16
I wish I could. At times, I think I’m kind of gangster like that. But not every time No, like, I’m gonna have to look at the midpoint listing period.
Jenn Zahrt 13:28
Yeah, I think it’s really cool how that technique began or got, like, revived ish and improved upon. I love the way the Germans put it. It’s like sensitive. So we have the word vibration. We’ve got sensitive points, right? Like there’s this point in the Zodiac that would respond to all those things that you’re talking about these angles, cutting things up. And it’s like, in that midpoint picture, there’s going to be a place that isn’t occupied by something, right? And when something moves into that point, then suddenly a whole vibe gets unleashed. Like whoa.
Clarissa Dolphin 13:59
yeah, and you can feel it. Yeah, you can feel it just like you’re like, literally when you were when you said the word unleashed, like I feel it like in my actual body. I think that’s the interpretive qualitative difference as well. Especially with midpoints it’s just the energy of it, the sensation, you know,
Jenn Zahrt 14:23
yeah. And I also love how you’re able to have multiple styles of astrology in your fluency because I think that is the hallmark of, you know, being truly in this field and being able to say, like, Oh, I’m gonna go on to the vibrational level. Now, I’m going to be shuttling off to the Sun sign level. And now I’m at a conference, now I’m the president of ISAR.
Whoa, congratulations, by the way, you just got elected to be the president of ISAR!
Clarissa Dolphin 14:48
Thank you.
Jenn Zahrt 14:49
That is so cool.
Clarissa Dolphin 14:50
It’s an honor and it’s definitely an honor working with you too. Like you’re so super brilliant. Like we’re just fire, so..
Jenn Zahrt 14:58
Total fire. no Earth. I’ve been thinking a lot about Earth and like this idea of sensation and how, as astrological practitioners, these books like the structure of combination of stellar influences to stick with that title for a moment, whenever I see it laid out, and I’m reading in there, to me, it seems like the skeleton upon which we can hang a lot of interpretive power that isn’t articulated exactly there. But it allows us to, like fully unleash, like, say that that word comes up again, unleashed something, but how is it for you? Or do you sit and read this one? Or do you reference it? Like, what’s your relationship to it?
Clarissa Dolphin 15:38
It’s kind of more like reference, you know, and I wonder what your journey is to like as a professional astrologer as well with your books now. like at the beginning, they were like structural pillars to like form your own voice like to form your own analysis, like, absolutely critical, like total skeletal type of things. And now it’s just like, the ability after you know, 1000s of hours of obsessively practicing. Now, it’s like, these books, not like they’re relegated to you know, obsolescence, because they’ll never be, but now they’re just kind of like treasures on the bookcase that remind you of when you were starting, and now you can read the hell of out of a midpoint. You know?
Jenn Zahrt 16:31
yeah, I think change comes when you start to disagree with them. You know what I mean? Like, there’s a worship phase of like, Wow, I love this book. And then you go to a conference and you talk to somebody who practices something different, or they teach you something, and it’s that human to human transmission, assuming we’re all human. Not sure about some of us might be meteorites, you know… And then you get a download of a different way. And then you go back to that book, and you’re like, No, you know, and then that begins this whole, then it starts falling apart, and you’re like, I don’t need these books. I know what I’m doing.
Clarissa Dolphin 17:11
I completely commiserate. What a beautiful way to put it, Jenn. Yeah.
Jenn Zahrt 17:15
this library is filled with books that are all arguing with each other, just like we do at conferences like No, no, no, you have to calculate it with the naibod arc distance angle, like whatever that is, you know, it’s like, that’s, you precess your progressions, you know.
So I recently learned that Converse by reading a book, it was Martin Cranston’s primary directions, that Converse wasn’t always what we think of when we say the word Converse. Instead of thinking about it as backwards, like Converse progression, meaning backwards in time is same as forwards in time. It just means in the context of primary directions, taking a significator to a promisor versus a promisor to a significator. but they never imagined the times moving in reverse.
Clarissa Dolphin 18:00
Wow. That is a trip.
Jenn Zahrt 18:05
I know. So that’s why I love the books. Now. That’s what I would say, that’s my relationship with it is, like you were saying with these more esoteric techniques, like, I want to go to those conversations where people are like, thinking about things like, is time moving backwards? Can we say something meaningful about numbers progression? Of course you can, if you look, and you have a human brain, you can create meaning out of anything, right? I mean, that’s why we have so many beautiful kinds of astrology. 15 different sets of degree symbols, right?
Clarissa Dolphin 18:32
Yeah. And I love that, like, I love that we have the capacity as like masterful professional astrologers to have debate to have, you know, like critical analysis, that’s the only way that we’re going to grow, you know, as like a community. It’s so fun and exciting to actually kind of like sink teeth into why somebody employs a technique or define something like, the way that they define it and et cetera. So I’m all for it. I would be so bored without this kind of like: what is… I’m pulling on your knowledge Now Jenn… like what I’m thinking of pandemonium, but it’s like, totally not not the right word. Like when back in ancient society when people just came together and just had dialogue, like scholars, what’s the name of that?
Jenn Zahrt
A symposium.
Clarissa Dolphin
symposium!
Jenn Zahrt 19:32
Yeah, I mean, our conferences are kind of like that. But I go back to Demetrius Bagley always asking this was about 10 years ago, he was saying, is there a way we can gather differently? Yeah, and I don’t think we’ve sufficiently answered that question yet.
Clarissa Dolphin 19:45
Well, I think we’re probably gonna like really kind of make waves on that in Pluto in Aquarius as astrologers, because we are going to be gathering super, super weirdly outside of the conference model, I believe.
Jenn Zahrt 19:59
Yeah. I hope so I hope so. And having symposia where, you know, our colleague Kent Bye with his engagement with virtual reality, having an endless conference in the virtual sphere where you can just tune in and be in this virtual space of like, well, what about that? You know, arc distance calculation dah-di-dah.
Cool. Okay, so if you were to… I got two versions of this question because I want to know if I was going to begin with vibrational astrology, where would you send me first? Is there a book that I should start with to learn vibrational astrology?
Clarissa Dolphin 20:33
Well, to learn vibrational astrology, I think that there are some reference books that kind of break down, you know what harmonics mean. And kind of planetary pairs. But if I’m honest with you, they’re not my favorite books. Just like when we were talking about earlier like, now I just don’t agree.
Jenn Zahrt 21:02
okay, I have to stop you right there because that’s the book you have to write. I’m just gonna call it I’m calling it in public. That’s the book that needs to be written is the Clarissa Dolphin version of getting into vibrational astrology from jump. no pressure!
Clarissa Dolphin 21:22
I totally feel like the cosmological pressure of the universe of that declaration and statement Jenn in the best way thank you very much. I’m totally taking it on. Give me two years it’s coming out.
Jenn Zahrt 21:35
Cool. So and then for anyone getting into things from no base of knowledge whatsoever if there was somebody where you… so they come to you and they say I really want to get into astrology What do you tell them? Which books do you point them to?
Clarissa Dolphin 21:49
Definitely anything Robert Hand. so like planets in transit period. This is your starter book. If you’re just trying to get into astrology and figure out I think the mountain astrologer magazine is also an excellent reference point just to like, what other books are really good. For starters, I would not recommend anything by Marc Edmund Jones for starters.
Jenn Zahrt 22:20
I love that you said what you wouldn’t recommend that is so cool. Do not read Mark Edmund Jones if you’re beginning! You know what’ crazy? I did, though. Dane Rudhyar has an astrological mandala which is based upon the Sabian symbols that Mark Edmund Jones came up with. so I did cut my teeth on that a little bit but it was through the frame of Dane Rudhyar though so.
why do you think someone needs to stay away from Mark Edmund Jones?
Clarissa Dolphin 22:45
Because I think Mark Edmund Jones is not palatable in the way that perhaps you know later astrologers like Dane Rudhyar are to kind of like the modern mind. Like for example, Marc Edmund Jones horary astrology books are basically like LSD. Like they’re straight up like acid astrology or something if you don’t know about, like, he introduces triads he totally you know, demolishes kind of classical ideas of how to apply it to horary astrology etc. Even now, I don’t know what he’s talking about. So that’s probably why you don’t want to kind of start there. Start with Linda Goodman. Start with Dan Rudhyar start with you know, Robert Hand. like keep it simple.
Jenn Zahrt 23:40
Be careful where you begin is what I’m hearing.
Clarissa Dolphin 23:45
Yes, and no, I say Sure, we own that and just start where you start right? like coffee table formative situation. You know, my mom had Linda Goodman probably your kid probably has like every single cool title project time so…
Jenn Zahrt
Project hindsight! [laughs]
Clarissa Dolphin
Yeah! [laughs]
Jenn Zahrt 24:04
you know, but then they rebel, right? So like, you know, it’s like, oh, you’re sitting around an entire out of print copy of project hindsight, what does she want to do? She’s gonna go off and do karmic astrology. Not saying they’re bad. I’m saying they’re not in the same area of the field.
So very cool. And is there any book that you have a feeling about that you want to share with people? Or have we pretty much covered the terrain so far? Like, is there just one last title that you just want to shout out and let people know about because maybe not enough people know about it?
Clarissa Dolphin 24:36
Well, yeah, like actually, so this is so I’m outing myself as a horary astrologer now to this book, horary astrology reexamined by Barbara Dunn. This is a good title. If you want to actually like practice horary and apply it this is going to really help you out. But there’s so many books there’s Demetra George has 5 million books that are awesome. Chris Brennan, you know how many other authors like we can just be talking about this for like 7000 hours, listing title after title after title. You know, I feel like this one discussion could never do justice to how many good astrology books there are out there, period.
Jenn Zahrt 25:22
It’s very true. Okay. Well thank you for taking time today to share with me some of the Top of the Pops for you. And congratulations on all the amazing things that you’re doing in the world of astrology. You’re super critical to all of the cool things that are coming up as well. And thank you, Clarissa!
Clarissa Dolphin 25:37
Thank you, Jenn and ditto, you’re the most awesome person and astrologer period. So I’m very grateful to be here.
Jenn Zahrt 25:45
Thank you. Talk soon.
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