Cancer

It is impossible to predict, from the birth chart, exactly how planets, points, and houses in Cancer will turn out. This is the energy of beginnings, the place and/or signature of birth and infancy. Anything in Cancer will grow, rapidly and a lot--provided you give it a reasonable amount of attention and care. Examine every chart to see where self-nurture needs to be applied. Sometimes our greatest potentials are neglected.

EXAMPLE: We have been taught that anything in the seventh house is not-me. In the twelfth it may be forgotten, etc. Cancer on those houses shows something that needs attention, needs to be noticed and nurtured.

Cancer is also the sign of emergence, from the womb or from the soil, into the light. It is where Spirit and Soul unite to become a living, growing, needing, feeling, human being. It is where the incarnational journey emerges from the invisible to visible, from dark into light, from the unknown to the known. Like a newborn infant, it may cry for the loss of security represented by the womb. It must adapt to a new environment and begin the process of physical growth.

It has long been a custom to regard ourselves as a spirit, living in a body, as though spirit got itself trapped in something unlike itself. We can now understand that energy-containing particles cluster into formal structures. These structures remain in motion but that motion is not apparent to other structures with a matching rate of motion.

Cancer is like a baby. It needs attention. When it does not get it, it will hurt, and probably "cry." Crying is particularly associated with Cancer, but only as a means of getting needs met before the coming of language. Pain is a result of (perceived) need. Even as adults, if the pain is too great (particularly emotional pain), we often cry. Too much pain overwhelms the ability to think and throws us into a pre-verbal state where the natural response is to cry. Times of great stress may throw us into a state where tears are close to the surface. We feel that we are being punished or subjected to something uncomfortable that we do not understand . . . the same way that we felt as children with no control over our own lives.

If Cancer planets are hurting or crying, it will always be from lack of attention or care. If properly nurtured, they will be the happiest points in the chart, cooing and smiling as easily as a happy, content, infant. Cancer must not be ignored because it is primal and primary to our survival as what we are. We may survive without paying heed to it, but we will not truly LIVE.

Whatever is seeded in Aries, will be born in Cancer. It will reach visibility or be made manifest, WHEN it outgrows its womb, cradle or playpen. Cancer also refers to the family or nest, as it continues to surround, nurture, and support the growth of the child. At first the child is not conscious of separation from the mother. It will be much longer before it fully separates from the birth family.

Cancer may be considered close in space and feelings. Any point in Cancer is so close as to be not entirely separate from the sense of self.

Cancer and the Moon are most commonly used to refer to basic feelings: hunger, thirst, satisfaction, comfort, discomfort, pleasure, pain, etc. This area may also include the "muscular responses" to these feelings--or e-motions.

Above all else, Cancer refers to bonding and its effects. Too weak a bond gives poor feeling responses and injures your survival skills. Too strong a bond will make it difficult to separate from mother and/or family enough to mature. This is true whether her feelings are positive or negative. Either can affect how safe we feel and what makes us feel safe, at home, and comfortable. The quality of bonding will affect our ability to go out into the world of work and career and our adult relationships--especially in a home and family situation. If we learned that home or the world was not a safe place to be, it will color almost every aspect of our lives. Childhood is the foundation of adulthood and if the foundation is weak, what is built upon it will use a lot of energy just trying to stand.

The Cancer area of your chart is a place where you will always grow. It also says something about your need for security/safety. The house placement may show where you most seek security–as money in the second house or marriage in the seventh. It may define what you think that you need, as friends in the eleventh or control in the eighth. It may also be where you most obviously channel energy.

Above all, it is the most fluid area of the chart, where energy takes on the shape of the container and finds its own level of expression, according to your incarnational needs.