Being Ourselves

My copy of R.H. Naylor's Home Astrology, (1933) around 80 years old, pages yellowing and brittle, can still prove to be a source of interest, as part and parcel of the history of popular astrology.
R.H. Naylor (1889-1952) was the first Sun sign astrologer with forecasts appearing in British newspapers - that was in 1930.

In Home Astrology, a book written for readers with no knowledge of the subject at all, Mr Naylor at one point talked about personal magnetism.

"Some people are naturally magnetic, i.e. others are blindly attracted to them. This power of attraction often appears to be entirely independent of physical appeal or character".

He goes on later to warn that,

" There is no greater enemy of personal magnetism than the modern passion for imitation. The young people of today are so busy trying to model themselves upon their favourite film star, theatrical celebrity or public figure, that they forget to be themselves."

Oh Mr. Naylor ! Nothing changes! It was ever thus, and thus it will will be for ever more, I suspect!

"BE YOURSELF" he says "The real you is quite unlike anybody else, and for just that reason, it is naturally attractive."

Digging deeper into astrology than the Sun Sign, much deeper, using the many and varied tools and methods available to astrologers, it becomes blindingly obvious how unique - and I do mean unique in its literal sense - each one of us is. Nobody else is born in exactly the same place at exactly the second you took your first breath. Not even your twin, if you have one. Siblings have similar background and similar inherited genes, but astrology and experiences will differ. This is why astrology can never be capable of all-round proof of its validity - too many variables and imponderables.

So, you'd think it'd be easy to "be yourself". Nothing to it. Just....be! Human nature, though has this wee quirk: attraction to shiny objects and to other, shiny, personalities. I think R.H. Naylor was advising readers not to try to become carbon copies, "clones" of someone they admired.

It's not easy advice to follow though, for a young person: not to imitate others. Imitation is part of how we humans learn. We watch our parents and siblings, and imitate. Later we read and watch, and imitate when we write our first letter, or draw our first scrawly piece of artwork. Almost every great writer or artist has been inspired by someone else before them. It's the way life is. And, we never really finish "becoming ourselves", development slows but never stops, until our life stops.

I clearly recall, in my schooldays, trying to copy somebody else's style of handwriting, because my natural style didn't please me. School mistress fairly quickly recognised what I was up to, and gave me a lecture along the lines of Mr. Naylor's advice. I felt squashed and embarrassed for a while. Little by little I adjusted my handwriting until, though it did retain whispers of the style I'd so admired, it was different, and solely my own. This is what happens, I think. We take bits and pieces from all life's experiences and encounters with others, and use them in the development and blossoming of our original innate and unique characteristics.

Obliquely related to all of the above is the experience of finding oneself admiring, maybe even wishing to emulate, a certain style, or a certain smile, of someone whose planetary blueprint matches, complements our own. What I find absolutely fascinating is how this can happen without knowing anything at all about the other person, at the time of initial "attraction". I suspect that this phenomenon is related to the kind of "magnetism" Mr. Naylor mentioned in his book. "Like attracts like", or even "like attracts its opposite" has been attributed to several different sources, depending on a favourite theory of the person writing or speaking. I've noticed it being related to, for example, twin souls/old souls, psychic vibrations, body/sexual chemistry. I like to think, rather than, or maybe in tandem with, one or more of those factors, like attracts like/opposite springs from an astrological sensitivity imprinted in our DNA.

Magnetism & Imitation

My old copy of R.H. Naylor's "Home Astrology", around 70 years old, pages yellowing and brittle, is still a source of interest, as part and parcel of the history of popular astrology. I've mentioned the book previously, here. Picking it up last evening, opening it at random seeking inspiration for today's post, I read these words:

"Some people are naturally magnetic, i.e. others are blindly attracted to them. This power of attraction often appears to be entirely independent of physical appeal or character".

Mr. Naylor goes on later to warn that,

" There is no greater enemy of personal magnetism than the modern passion for imitation. The young people of today are so busy trying to model themselves upon their favourite film star, theatrical celebrity or public figure, that they forget to be themselves."

Ah! Mr. Naylor (wherever you are - probably in that great astrology conference in the sky), it was ever thus, and will be for ever more, I suspect!

"BE YOURSELF" he says "The real you is quite unlike anybody else, and for just that reason, it is naturally attractive."

Digging deeper into astrology than the Sun Sign, it becomes blindingly obvious how unique - and I do mean unique in its literal sense - each of us is. Nobody else is born in exactly the same place at exactly the second you took your first breath. Not even your twin, if you have one. Every living thing on this Earth is unique. Every dead thing, too, come to think of it.

It's hard advice to take, for a young person though - not to imitate others. Imitation is part of how we, as humans, and creatures of the Earth learn. We watch our parents and siblings, and imitate them. Later we read and watch, and imitate when we write our first letter, or draw our first scrawly piece of artwork. Almost every great writer or artist has been inspired by someone else before them. That's just the way life is.

I clearly recall, in my schooldays, trying to copy somebody else's style of handwriting, because my natural style didn't please me. The school mistress fairly quickly recognised what I was up to, and gave me a lecture along the lines of Mr. Naylor's advice. I felt squashed and embarrassed for a while, but little by little I adjusted my handwriting, until, though it did retain whispers of the style I'd so admired, it was different, and solely my own.

What I think Mr. Naylor was really saying is that, however much we admire and wish to emulate another person, we should aim not to be a carbon copy. I guess nowadays that would be better expressed as "photocopy" - carbon paper having long since been re-categorised as "antique".


Although each of us is unique, we do have close relationships, astrologically, with many around us. It's not at all surprising that we latch on to a certain style - or a certain smile - attached to someone whose planetary blueprint complements our own. What I find absolutely fascinating is how this can happen without knowing anything about the other person. That's the "magnetism" which Mr. Naylor mentions so often in his book.

Astrology Without Frightening the Horses

In a seventy year old astrology book I found in a used book store recently: "Home Astrology" written by the father of British newspaper astrology columns, R.H. Naylor, I notice that the author studiously avoided using any astrological terms or jargon. His book was intended for a readership with no former exposure to the subject, so he had obviously decided to tread very delicately.

In the author's preface he writes that he is afraid

"that much that is set down herein will arouse the criticism of astrological purists and pundits. Such a symptom surely shows that all is well with the world, for when astrological experts agree, human nature will have changed, and astrology will have become orthodox! For myself, I find the "general reader", who comes within the first class (with little or no knowledge of astrology) a peculiarly kindly and interested soul. He is extraordinarily generous in his appreciation of one's small efforts and does not hesitate to write giving an amiable exchange of opinions and suggestions....I have written this book for them."

Sweet! But that was before "the astro-skeptic in the street" grew sharp claws.

In this extract, scanned directly from the book, he describes what he terms the "magnetism" of people born during each astrological month (from 21st to 21st). He doesn't mention zodiac signs, probably hoping for the tolerance of readers who might otherwise have fought shy of "all that mumbo-jumbo"!

THE EXTRACT:

R.H. Naylor - A lucky find!

My latest acquisition: "Home Astrology", by British astrologer R.H. Naylor (1889 - 1952), who was, in 1930, the first astrologer to produce a regular astrology column in a UK national newspaper.



The book (damaged jacket shown above) was published, I guess, sometime in the 1930s or 40s (I can find no date in it, so it might be a first, and only, edition). It was published by Lippincotts of Philadelphia, printed in Britain. There's a pencil note inside, "Lippincott's File copy", and a rubber stamped warning: "File copy, not to be removed from office".

I bought the book in Archer City, County seat of Archer County, North Texas, from the used book store of famous author Larry McMurtry (Lonesome Dove, Terms of Endearment, The Last Picture Show etc.) Archer City is home to some 1,800 souls. Larry McMurtry's bookstore "Booked Up", spreads through four very large stores and houses around 400,000 books ranging from paperbacks to valuable antiques and first editions worth thousands of dollars. The four stores are not fully staffed so a notice is posted in stores # 2 to 4, to the effect that one must wander across to store #1, book(s) in hand, to pay for any purchases. How very trusting! It's said that these book stores are the life-blood of Archer City, an otherwise sleepy little Texas town.

The book I've bought is a treasure indeed, well worth the $10 it cost me. It contains a very basic explanation of natal astrology in layman's language. The book is peppered with other odds and ends of information about omens, superstitions and suchlike, material which has gone right out of fashion nowadays - it's all the more fascinating for that. I noticed, among the yards and yards of ceiling-high shelves crammed with 400,000 used books, there were only 3 volumes on the subject of astrology, from a scant few shelves of books dealing with "New Age" subjects. Perhaps Mr. McMurtry, who buys from estate sales and bulk stock from other stores, has a blindspot when it comes to astrology.

I'll return to a few tidbits from "Home Astrology" in future posts, but to be going on with, a couple of paragraphs which immediately caught my eye when opening the book at random pages:

"The cases in our museums reveal the amazing growth of what we must call Natal Astrology. Even prejudiced observers admit that the astrology of the ancients, and in later times, of the Moors, was one of the most complex things the human mind has ever evolved. To pass over such relics of complex thinking with a light sneer is merely a confession of ignorance. Einsteins's theory of relativity is a comparatively simple thing by the side of ancient theories of astrological determination."

"You and I have in our bodies an infinitely complicated electrical machine. Our brain is the battery, our nerves the wires. This machinery works what people call "the sixth sense" and is behind all so-called omens, "psychic feelings" and so forth."