By Daniel Eddy, August 2008

Once we get past the ubiquitous answers of “No Parking” or “Do Not Enter,” we get back to the most popular pick-up line of the 1970s: “What’s your sign?” With a serious response of “I’m a Leo!” or “I’m a Capricorn. What are you?” If the person responds with three signs, such as “Pisces, Scorpio, Gemini,” then you know you have someone with real astrological background. If they respond in Sanskrit, like “Vishakka,” then you’ve got a Vedic astrologer.

All clichés aside, as a practicing astrologer for over 20 years (Yes, practicing. Always practicing. Can’t get it quite right, hence this article.) I’ve found that astrology is a great conversation starter. I just finished a two-week intensive course at one of our unknown Gainesville gems, Avalon School of Astrology.

Nestled in an office park in northwest Gainesville, Avalon is perhaps the only standing school solely for astrology in the U.S.  Founders David and Fei Cochrane teach and administrate the school while running their adjunct software business - Cosmic Patterns Software - which designs cutting edge astrology programs such as Kepler and Sirius for professional astrologers.

“Astrology is important because it has a huge impact on our society,” said Mr. Cochrane. “Professor Rory Coker at the University of Texas states that in the United States there are more astrologers than astronomers, and $200 million is spent annually on astrological readings.”

But, why Gainesville?

“Because I have lived here since 1972. This is my home. I love Gainesville,” he said, “and I think the community respects and appreciates diversity, especially when that diversity includes, as Avalon does, the following: a very high level of professionalism, high ethical standards and [the] ability to produce practical benefits for our community.”

Allowing the school to function as a focus for astrological study in this area, Mr. Cochrane said he and his wife developed Avalon because they began providing classes to educate users of their astrological software in the advanced techniques of the software.

Eventually, he said, Avalon became a nonprofit educational institution that is licensed by the State of Florida Department of Education. Avalon is unique because it provides a comprehensive curriculum that is rigorously academic and designed to enable graduates of the program to excel in the field professionally.

My two weeks included Vedic scholar and Ph.D. psychoanalyst Dennis Harness and visiting specialist in Hellenistic Astrology and asteroid readings Demetra George. They partnered up in an archetypal comparison between East and West, with a little Jung thrown in for good measure.

My friend, Michelle Gould, now a teacher at Avalon, introduced me to the school. After a few years and a job firing (that pesky Pluto - Mars opposition in January 2008), I found the time and have now enrolled.

In my discussions with friends who are practicing astronomers, they ask how this pseudoscience of astrology can have any merit when astrologers can’t even look at the night sky and see how off we are (about 23 degrees). Now, I tell them to go Hindu, since they use the constellation-based sidereal system, while most Western astrologers use the solar-based tropical system. Their other major criticism is the fact that most of these celestial bodies are so far away that the gravity and other cosmic forces from these bodies really don’t physically affect us. Ay, there is the rub! Physics.

“Astrology is the study of a relationship with celestial behavior with terrestrial behavior, particularly those relationships which cannot be explained by simple scientific principles such as gravity. According to this definition changing ocean tides from the effect of the gravitational pull of the moon is not astrology,” said Mr. Cochrane.

The “real” relationship to the stars is not a physical one but a psychic/archetypal one. And Mr. Cochrane said that astrologers do not even agree about how astrology works.

“I think that astrology works via an information system similar to the form-building iterative processes described by physicist Stephen Wolfran in his book, A New Kind of Science, and in patterns and systems discussed by physicist and inventor Ray Kurzweil,” Mr. Cochrane said. “However, at this point there is no direct validation of this belief, but I believe there is a growing congruity developing. I also believe that some ideas in astrology are valid and many others will eventually be shown to be clever concepts that are not in fact actually true.”

Since I am a skeptic and he has a very scientific approach, I asked Mr. Cochrane how he responds to skeptics.

“Being skeptical is good,” he said. “The premises of astrology seem absurd and there is no scientific proof of astrology. However, some of the implications of modern theories in physics are also absurd.”

The crazy synchronicity of my own asteroid chart and 25 years of noting the timing of planetary transits or progressions have made me less doubtful, though not what I would call a “fundamentalist believer in astrology.”

 “Both skeptics and believers must work together to control the worst abuses of astrology and to have an honest and sincere dialog,” Mr. Cochrane said. “Our attitude toward astrology seems to be similar to a prudish, Victorian attitude towards sex; not talking seriously about it will somehow be better.”

Avalon School is an amazing local resource that remains unknown. The Cochranes are so busy teaching classes and improving their software that they hardly have time for community outreach, and how many more “psychic fairs” can one attend? Though if you need to find a rare book on astrology they probably have it for sale in their bookstore or at least available to read in their extensive astrological library, open by appointment. Full enrollment is not a requirement to take the quarterly intensive seminars with visiting academics, but once you’ve taken one class, you’ll want to take more.

As with most alternative viewpoints, astrologers are pretty open minded and welcoming, even if you disagree. Plus, there are lots of astrological systems and perspectives, and none can be completely “right.” It’s the conversations we have about our unfolding experience of the universe that bring us closer to the creative forces of the universe. This journey of self-discovery resonates with many religions or philosophies and as our world gets bigger and bigger while getting smaller and smaller, being open to different viewpoints will be a key to our survival.

If you are interested in becoming a student or auditing some of their special seminars you can reach them at the Avalon Web site at www.AvalonAstrology.com or call them at (325)375-1250 to obtain more information.

In the end, everyone wants to hear more about themselves, even if dubious of the stellar impact.

“Please, tell me more about me,” Gould said. “I think people find it fun and healing to spend a few hours where the focus is solely on them and their lives.”

When I asked my classmates what their future held, most said they planned to counsel once they had graduated the program. When I posed the “Why study astrology in this day and age?” question to the class, Robert Phillip’s answer was an unequivocal: “Because, it works!