A question about the astrological chart and visualizing the chart's owner

I'm trying to get my arms around the entire concept of the astrological chart. Is it wrong to visualize the chart's owner in the middle of the chart with him/her facing the ascendant at the moment of birth with houses going parallel to the person over the person's head? Does this make sense, or am I totally confused? I've never heard it described this way, but this is what I'm getting as I'm reading about the chart. (At first I was thinking that the chart was like a hula hoop around the person, but this doesn't seem correct.)

Let me say it another way: when a person is born, if the person faces east, the ascendant would be at the horizon, the first house would be right below the horizon, the 12th house would be right above the horizon, the 11th house would be 30 degrees above the 12 house's 30 degrees, etc.

How confused am I? I know that I'm not saying what I mean totally correctly, but am I totally wrong in the way that I'm looking at it? For some reason, I feel the need to visualize the person in the chart. (In the little circle in the middle of the chart.)

Any insights offered would be extremely appreciated!

:hi:

Dream's arms are "so large and so-o-o vast. . .we all down here are really, really, really impressed." (sorry-that's a really silly Monty Python quotation from the "Meaning of Life" when Michael Palin as a Vicar is trying to brown nose and suck up to God regarding his divine largess.)

"God's got the whole world in his hands. . ." Dream's got the whole solar system within her arm's reach.

Sorry again but I just got a couple funny visuals on your more than astute query.

Yup the person is at the center of the chart. It's an overview of where everything is in relation to each other. Which way they are facing is sometimes another matter.

Looking to the ascendant is sort of a mixed bag as YES, it is the cusp of the house of the personality, ego wiring, and the mask through which we perceive the world in some sense.

That would also be predicated by to what degree a person's planets are clustered on the eastern or western hemispheres.

Please stop putting yourself down as, all kidding aside, these are important perceptions and really valid questions.

Happy New Moon very soon.

I remember, back when I was first reading astrology books (when I really didn't pay enough attention to how the solar system works, you know, to understand the parallels and all that stuff) that there's been this slippage in the zodiac over the last so many thousand years, and so that while we say the sun enters such and so sign at this time, it isn't actually so, because where the constellations actually appear in the sky has -- drifted somehow?

Do you know what I am talking about? Sorry it's so muddled.

ETM

You're citing the not so subtle distinction between sidereal and tropical zodiacal measurements.

Vedic (traditionally Eastern) astrologers are siderealists. Siderealists are astronomically totally accurate in that our solar system has indeed moved 23 degrees against the backdrop of the zodiac belt over a couple of millennia.

Tropical astrologers maintain that the signs of the zodiac are more aligned with the terrestrial seasons so they've not made the adjustment.

The question is sorta. . .are we looking up or are we looking around???

I've tremendous respect for the Vedics for sure, especially in the accuracy of their dasas and interpretations of the Lunar Nodes.

Alas, I'm a western astrologer living in a western culture and spend enough time dispelling bunk about my craft.
I'm not about to start to run around telling more than 2/3rds of my clients that they are something other than the archetypes that persist in being seasonally correct and geocentrically appropriate.

I've worked in tandem with Vedics and still with most planetary transits, progressions, and the timing of them we are not in conflict. We interpret modality differently though.

In essence both orientations have their merit and their pitfalls like a lot of things.

I's got me some big ol' metaphoric arms! :)

As always, thank you so much for your insight. I'm finding that things make more sense if I can see it all in 3D, so this is one important part of the process for me.

:)