Jupiter in Gemini: All Change, Please.

Greetings, and welcome back to Journeys! With Jupiter entering Gemini in May for just over a year I thought this month would be a good time to examine it astrologically. So let’s dive deeper!

Modern astronomy states that Jupiter is physically composed of liquid molecular and metallic hydrogen and helium, like the Sun, and accreted most of the matter in the solar system which did not go into the formation of our star; indeed, it is theorised that it only just declined to ignite into a second Sun, which would have created a binary solar system, and it remains hovering on the edges of possible physical expansion – it seems as large as it can get. In other words, theoretically it cannot get much bigger than it is, without igniting into a second Sun.

Regardless of whether or not this is true, the point is that Jupiter is akin to the Sun and he is BIG… so imperial and so huge in fact that the rest of the planets in the solar system could fit inside. The fluids which compose Jupiter are highly conductive, so Jupiter has a very strong magnetic field, a complex system of radiation belts and transmits many radio waves. This body of radiation (planetary aura) is so vast and all encompassing that it is akin to the Suns, justifying Jupiter’s identification with the King of the Gods, known to the Greeks as Zeus, the ruler of the Immortals of Mount Olympus. Zeus was Fiery- Airy, a capricious, volatile being, as the gaseous state of Jupiter reflects. Everything about this planet is grand, majestic, staggering, and immense; it dwarfs relatively tiny human conceptions in every respect. It is god-like. A human being beholding Jupiter in person up close for the first time would be left breathless by its scale, as if struck by a bolt. Among the planets only Saturn is more visually impressive.

In natal astrology, Jupiter shows how we seek to become ‘bigger’, to grow and expand our experience and capacity to choose, our level of optimism and faith, our reliance on a greater plan and our openness to a state of grace and mercy. A feeble Jupiter believes only in itself, while a vibrant Jupiter connects to something bigger than you or I. As explained above he is the first of the planets which allow us to effectively bridge generational gaps, his reach being able to connect people who are born 12 years apart, and in expression his cycle brings about a growth spurt, first in terms of physical embodiment (puberty at age 11-12), then in terms of astral embodiment (coming into young adulthood at age 23-24), then in terms of mental embodiment (entry into true adulthood and the growth phase of the prime of life at age 35-36). It is the commonality of this experience that allows us to bridge the generations expressed through Jupiter. So there is a Gemini type of puberty and the common factors in this experience form the basis of the connection between Jupiter in Gemini people regardless of age.

In ancient times Jupiter was viewed as the planet of greatest fortune, of rewards and gifts, reputation, the place of the bestowal of wealth, property, community spirit, grace and the ever increasing blessing of Divine Providence. It was the planet of crown princes, regents, popes and pastors, of churches or figureheads who set themselves up as moral guardians and their coronations and ceremonies would often be timed to coincide with favourable Jupiter influences. However the figures represented by Jupiter are not Kings, Queens and the highest authorities, those positions have long been associated with Saturn, the ultimate authority and law giver. So their influence tends to be spiritual rather than temporal and it does not come loaded with weighty responsibilities or at least not as many and they tend to be more enjoyable ones. These figures are crown princes, heads of church and state, kingmakers and political heavyweights.

Jupiter is also associated with people and circumstances which (at least allegedly) benefit the individual, individuals who are optimistic and generous, but he often calls for responsibility, self restraint and a tempering of indulgences, naiveté, pomposity and hypocrisy. Early in life it refers chiefly to the influence of teachers, godparents, gurus, uncles and aunts, moral and spiritual guardians and all the expansive properties of the child. Later, Jupiter is linked more firmly with wider social contexts through religious teachers, royalty, churchmen, ascetics, globe-trotters, benefactors and indulger’s, the wealthy, philosophers, fortune hunting, judges, attorneys and notions of moral fibre and faith. In dreams, visions or spiritual seeking Jupiter is the good humoured teacher, the wise old mentor and benevolent guide of the psyche, the impetus towards our own better nature, the more merciful, kind and forgiving part. Jupiter forgives because we all make mistakes and a grudge held against another is a grudge held against everyone.

If Jupiter is the crown prince and the godparent in mundane terms then in human spiritual practices we can link Jupiter with two concepts – the guide and the guru. ‘Guide’ is a loose term I use to describe a broad category of forms. It is the incarnation of awareness of deity in a symbolic form changing through time, in ancient days the changing pantheon of gods that live in our mythologies. Hermes is a Guide, as are Aries, Persephone, Marduk, Chronos and every other deity from every culture in every time. Any figure which is essentially god-like to us can be an expression of Jupiter. In magical experience, the guide can appear in many guises, as in myth – the many mythological gods are aspects of the universal awareness, all of which the magician can invoke or evoke for themselves because they are also an expression of that same awareness. The animal and plant totems of shamanism are also guides.

I also use guide to refer to the hermetic Holy Guardian Angel, the Greater Self, Higher Self, conscience, etc – the eternal mental body, or eternal spirit of each individual thing. The other guides mentioned above are in fact often just guiding us to this being as they are simply expressions of the same intelligence on different planes of manifestation. Their common characteristic is that they are not incarnated as historical figures, even though they can be expressed by or through physical individuals, they are not in themselves typically experienced as physical beings. Our approach to and interaction with all of these manifestations are indicated in astrology primarily by Jupiter and secondly by the 9th temple.

The guru on the other hand is a physical teacher, an historical or present time enlightened mentor who plays a role ‘when the student is ready’, an incarnate personality figure who instructs the initiate in the next realm of the Mysteries, to pass on what needs to be passed on. The guru is an anchor for the physical transmission of enlightenment, the wise or more experienced figurehead, the one from whom an inner light radiates with greater understanding, expressed through individuals such as great philosophers or thinkers and any teacher who serves to hasten, expand and encourage our understanding. The guru leaves behind a body of knowledge or teaching which others can use. These individuals are also manifestations of Jupiter, or rather our relationship to these archetypes is. The guru can also be the guide, but not necessarily, meaning that some will lead us astray and some will not. The various Buddha’s are all gurus, as are Mohammed, Jesus and any historical figure that has left a teaching or a path for others to follow, whether that is in religion, science, art or anything else that humans do.

Its hermetic or magical dimensions are even more profound than the influence of these figureheads; the hermetic significance of Jupiter is that of the sheer jaw dropping majesty of the boundless, ever-changing infinite universe all about us, and its ever growing degree of similarity as each point sequentially expands into the awareness of Unity – as Jupiter smiles, a quadrillion flowers open on a distant world and each releases a quadrillion spores that float in every direction at once; elsewhere, onlookers in the gulf of space are awed as they watch two distant galaxies collide together, bringing an end to countless civilisations and worlds that have stood for billions of years. This is Jupiter, or rather, the universal principle which the planet Jupiter signifies for life on Earth. He connects things together on epic scales. It is grandeur, scope and the connectivity of life. It binds the multiverse together in infinite degrees and varieties of common perspective and experience.

All creation and destruction occurs by natural laws. Saturn is the ultimate arbiter or architect of those laws, but Jupiter symbolically formalises and enacts them. The Jupiter sphere receives the Saturn spheres supernal energy and arranges it into ever developing individualised sequences, distributing them lawfully (that is, according to a pattern) and so bringing order to the limitless but singular potentials, while ever expanding the infinite design of the Creation. It brings sequence, it increases, time passes, fortunes come and go, awareness expands and by such enlargement, by this progression, Jupiter’s sphere brings expansion of meaning through greater and greater context. It never ceases to pour out this unending fountain of abundance.

So Jupiter symbolises the fertility of an unstoppable, limitless abundance, a faith in and connection to the sign and temple it is in, a confidence and trust in its affairs which shows the way in which we develop through and expand our infinite horizons. It is connected with human belief but more than that, with the necessary ingredient for any belief to prosper – faith. Faith is not a devout worship of an unknowable God, it is any trusting belief in the greater forces of the universe, and this is a key to happiness in life, as those who have no faith in something greater than themselves live in places of shrinking uncertainty and can see little mercy in the universe. But faith can be expressed in many different ways; one does not have to be religious to have faith – faith can be placed in a marriage, work situations, political bodies, the evidence of the eyes, etc. It distinguishes from belief because it is not something that we claim, but rather trust in, even know. Jupiter’s growth transforms belief into faith and gnosis.

Jupiter, being warm and moist in nature, belongs to the diurnal sect and is stronger in the daytime, in a Fire or Air sign and above the horizon in daylight, but he is also strong in any Fire sign during the night because then he is also in his own Triplicity. He is especially strong in Sagittarius and also gains strength in Pisces, which are his two signs, and also in Cancer where he is exalted.

In Gemini, which is a sign opposite to one of his own signs, Sagittarius, Jupiter is far from home. This is called being in ‘detriment’ – the detrimental condition being referred to is ‘far away from a place of rulership’. A planet in detriment is in territory that is far from home, on unfamiliar ground. This is important to understand – while the Air of Gemini has given Jupiter support in the form of Electric Fluid, the sign itself (Reactive Air) is strange to Jupiter and this could deplete him if he suffers for it. Gemini is a scattered, unfocused, duplicitous sign and when Jupiter tries to inculcate it with richness and fecundity the seeds scatter on the wind aimlessly, depleting their potential by diluting them through too much analysis and too many viewpoints. Too many irons in the fire make the potential of this Jupiter barren because the development and growth invested in things is spread out and superficial. This is why he is in detriment here.

As a gas giant Jupiter is a mental plane principle and therefore less of a personal influence than the celestial bodies already covered – it is the first planet to shape the astrology of individuals who are born into the same sub-group, a part of the way group minds are incarnated and individualised. Essentially, patterns of commonality are incarnated in large groups of individuals, factors which connect everyone born in the same window of time, and these patterns are expressed individually by everyone born into that window. With Jupiter the window of time involved is about 1 year, since he takes roughly 12 years to move through all 12 signs. So, for example, everyone born between July 22nd 1988 and July 31st 1989 (with a period between December 1st 1988 and March 11th 1989 when Jupiter is in Taurus instead) has Jupiter in Gemini and is therefore connected by an astrological thread. Each person will then take this thread and individualise it through their more personal astrology – Sun, Moon, etc – and this creates an open system through which they will grow as individuals alongside one another. These threads of commonality will not only connect directly with those born in that period but also indirectly with everyone else with Jupiter in Gemini, regardless of age, thus to incremental generations spanning 12 years of time into the past and the future from the year of birth. This, there is an innate natural astral connection between you and everyone born about 12 years apart from you, and 24, and 36, and so on. The Jupiter key shows when this connectivity is being stimulated en-masse but the table below shows who these individuals are:

Jupiter in Gemini, 1900 – 2100

1) 21 Jul 1905 – 5 Dec 1905; 10 Mar 1906 – 31 Jul 1906
2) 30 Jun 1917 – 13 Jul 1918
3) 12 Jun 1929 – 27 Jun 1930
4) 26 May 1941 – 10 Jun 1942
5) 9 May 1953 – 24 May 1954
6) 22 Apr 1965 – 21 Sep 1965; 17 Nov 1965 – 5 May 1966
7) 23 Aug 1976 – 17 Oct 1976; 3 Apr 1977 – 20 Aug 1977; 31 Dec 1977 – 12 Apr 1978
8) 22 Jul 1988 – 1 Dec 1988; 11 Mar 1989 – 31 Jul 1989
9) 30 Jun 2000 – 13 Jul 2001
10) 11 Jun 2012 – 26 Jun 2013
11) 26 May 2024 – 10 Jun 2025 – NOW
12) 9 May 2036 – 24 May 2037
13) 23 Apr 2048 – 23 Sep 2048; 12 Nov 2048 – 5 May 2049
14) 28 Aug 2059 – 12 Dec 2059; 4 Apr 2060 – 20 Aug 2060; 28 Dec 2060 – 12 Apr 2061
15) 22 Jul 2071 – 30 Nov 2071; 10 Mar 2072 – 30 Jul 2072
16) 30 Jun 2083 – 12 Jun 2084
17) 12 Jun 2095 – 26 Jun 2096

When the period is broken up into two or three parts (see 1, 6, 7, 8, 13, 14, 15) it means that Jupiter has either retrograded back into the previous sign or forwards into the next before returning to Gemini. This results in 2 or 3 periods when Jupiter is in Gemini and some intervals in that time when he is not as can be seen above. So for example in the first line, Jupiter is not in Gemini between December 5th 1905 and March 10th 1906. Note that these retrogrades occur in clusters of 3 over the span of each approximate gap of 12 years. This is just the way the celestial mechanics work in this case. There are interesting patterns everywhere in astrology.

According to astrological lore Jupiter in Gemini coincides with many significant changes, an ‘all change’ atmosphere. It is linked to advancements and expansions in communication technology, such as breakthroughs in telecommunications, the internet, social media platforms, or innovations in information sharing and dissemination. It also corresponds with an emphasis on intellectual exchange, diplomacy, and international dialogue or diplomacy and global talking points. There may be increased efforts to foster understanding and cooperation between nations through communication, negotiation, and talks. It may stimulate global trade and commerce, as well as opportunities for cross-cultural exchange and economic growth through communication-based industries such as publishing, advertising, telecommunications, and digital media.

Another theme of Jupiter in Gemini is an emphasis on education and learning and the dissemination of knowledge. Governments or organizations may invest in educational initiatives, promote literacy programs, or encourage intellectual development through policies and initiatives. There could be information overload and a glut of poor data or deliberate misinformation and it could exacerbate issues related to the spread of rumors or gossip. There may be challenges in discerning truth from falsehood in the media landscape, leading to confusion or polarization. Divisions into opposite sides are more prevalent in society.

Gemini is associated with movement and transportation, so Jupiter in the sign may bring about growth and expansion in these areas. This could include advancements in transportation technology, changes in travel patterns or debates over issues such as transportation infrastructure or travel regulations. Similarly we may expect an expansion of networks and communities, with communication itself enlarging in scope. It may foster the rapid growth of social networks, online communities, and networks of like-minded individuals sharing common interests or goals. There may be an increase in networking events, online forums, or platforms for connecting people across geographical boundaries.

We can see some strong indicators of these themes in the historical periods identified above, some examples of which are:

1905-1906: This period saw the signing of the Treaty of Portsmouth in 1905, which ended the Russo-Japanese War. Diplomacy played a significant role in resolving the conflict.
1917-1918: World War I was ongoing during this period, and diplomatic efforts were crucial in shaping the outcome of the war and negotiating peace treaties.
1929-1930: The first public demonstration of color television took place in the United States in 1928, and by the late 1920s and early 1930s, television broadcasts were becoming more widespread.
1941-1942: World War II was ongoing during this period, and educational initiatives were important for training military personnel and supporting wartime industries.
1953-1954: The first successful color television broadcasts occurred during this period, marking a milestone in the evolution of television technology.
1965: This period coincided with the peak of the space race between the United States and the Soviet Union, with significant investments in science and education to support space exploration.
1976-1978: This period saw significant advancements in aviation technology, including the introduction of the Concorde supersonic passenger airliner and the expansion of international air travel routes.
1988-1989: The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the widespread adoption of personal computers and the internet, leading to fundamental changes in how people communicate and access information.
2000-2001: This period saw the dot-com bubble, characterized by rapid growth in internet-based companies and significant investment in technology stocks. The rise of the internet and social media platforms such as MySpace facilitated the creation of online communities and networks of like-minded individuals.
2012-2013: The global economy was recovering from the 2008 financial crisis during this period, with increased focus on international trade and economic development. Social media continued to expand with the increasing popularity of platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram contributing to the growth of online communities and digital networking.
2024 – 2025: Potential for commercial space travel, electric cars, other travel developments, major development of internet, misinformation and the growth of new communications technology.

Waking up to this shared level of your astrology is what gives Jupiter his greatest expansiveness and abundance because the commonality of experience shared between people and times leads us to understand the way we all grow together. So for example, the people born now, the people who are now about 22 or 23 (born in 2000/1), and the people who are now about 47 (born in 1977) all share this common thread, a Jupiter in Gemini thread that when they combine their efforts dramatically increases the influx of Jupiter in their lives.

Note that this cyclical pattern is attuned to an annual rhythm with Jupiter taking about a year to pass through 1 sign while the Sun goes through all 12 signs in that time so that in any given iteration of Jupiter through a particular sign there will be one ‘set’ from each Sun sign, giving an individual life to a broad pattern and creating 12 solar ‘tribes’ for each Jupiter in Aries, each Jupiter in Taurus, and so on.

When Jupiter is in the twin sign of Gemini people search for a constant exchange of information as a way to affirm their faith that life is worth living and as a way of building confidence. They seek knowledge, information and lore as a way of lifting the spirits and maintaining trust in life. They are versatile students and teachers and move through life with an ever growing curiosity. They will tend towards mental restlessness, which is reflected in much travelling and moving about, a love of dancing, teaching, reading and constant dabbling in areas of study or interest. Their broad base of intellectual knowledge and awareness of and interest in varied subjects puts them in a position where they can see the wider scope of and general outlines of historical, social and political trends, the patterns, giving them a superficial and limited but astute and knowledgeable insight into the future and destiny of those patterns and hence mankind and society. However, the fact that their knowledge may be broad but superficial or unsupported by practical experience will lead to a large part of their growth, as they relate expansive concepts to actualities. They need to remember that the most accurate, detailed knowledge comes from direct experience, and furthermore, that only experience offers the most superior form of knowledge, which I call the understanding of knowing, or wisdom.

They will attract many friends and passing acquaintances, particularly through opportunities provided by the temple placement of Jupiter. Certain faces in the crowd they find themselves in will look out for their interests. They will experience fortune in terms of benefits that arise from the people they know. These contacts will allow them to expand their intellectual understanding of human nature and the diversity of human knowledge and intellectual perspective. By comparing and exchanging ideas and opinions they expand upon them, and are able to grasp the generalities and beliefs behind them. It is the new, the curious, the youthful, the open minded and the informative that brings most benevolence into their life and activates the Jupiter principle. Additionally, all the more positive and benevolent qualities of Gemini are accentuated and made fortuitous by Jupiter here – being friendly and sociable to all, light hearted and playful, accommodating of different viewpoints, inquisitive, youthful, knowledgeable, open to new ideas and flexible to change.

Still, despite this, there is sometimes something of the split personality about this Jupiter, as it tends to believe one thing then another, flitting from one concept or idea to another like a dazed butterfly in the heat of summer or a moth at a candlelit altar. Ideas can be dazzling, magnificent, powerful things for Jupiter in Gemini: information is growth and prosperity. But too much information is still information glut. In this modern world, information glut is something of a global disease – there is now so much information, about everything, so widely available, that it becomes difficult for the common person to discern what is truly significant. Consequently all information becomes meaningless, as scientists say one week that certain chemical additives are sending us mad, and on another that they have discovered they boost resistance to cancer. New information rapidly replaces old and makes it all meaningless. This is the personal and individual problem we face with Jupiter in Gemini but displayed on a grand scale, so that we can see it more clearly. Jupiter requires us to look at the big picture in order to see the pros and cons because otherwise we are just inclined to see his benefits and indulge too much.

Therefore under Jupiter in Gemini we must gain an awareness of when we have become drunk on too much data and left ourself with mental congestion. We will recognise this because we will feel incapable of trusting any of the information we receive, and so we must learn to consume it with greater care and perception, carefully measuring our glass.

Another issue is that we may take the flow of information for granted. Immersing yourself in opinion, writings, papers and words we can end up having to punch our way out of these definitions but we can also end up expecting information to be supplied whenever we demand it and more commonly that we can become incapable of regarding information as untrustworthy. With Jupiter in Gemini it can all be seen as good information and so a loss of objectivity arises. A substantial amount of weeding has to be done with Jupiter in Gemini so that the quality information is not strangled by the tangle of suppositions based on woolly facts.

These people enjoy a greater degree of social popularity because they have a carefree attitude towards life, versatility in obliging others and natural good manners. There is great charm in Gemini and Jupiter can often magnify it, combining a persuasive debate with playful love of wisdom. An early need to experience trust in ourself and life leads us to learn and grow in knowledge from across a wide range of subjects, so that we could develop and expand our intelligence and reasoning power by comparing different intellectual perspectives. This then provides us with a wide base of sources of information to draw our beliefs and opinions from. Through making these connections and verbalising or otherwise communicating them, our pool of faith increases, we feel more buoyant and free, our wide ranging connections bringing a meaning to our life. We share and give information and knowledge to others, and that is something we will do very much of, for we innately understand that knowledge is increased in the sharing, as are ideas, and so we desire to benefit others by sharing what we have learned. This is why we can come to expect information to be given whenever we need it.

Very early on in my online journal, twenty years ago in the summer of in 2004, I wrote the following about Jupiter in Gemini:

“So after grand fertilisation and physical growth, the experience of belief and growth being satisfied through the corporeal senses, comes the variation and diversity that we see present in nature through the sheer variety of shape and colour of wild flowers and natural growth, a diversity of shape and colour we experience mentally in the different branches of knowledge on the Great Tree, branches which stem from the trunks of numerous belief systems. Now, having discovered that some things can be true even when we cannot tangibly perceive them, we inevitably ask, ‘what is true?’ and eventually we shall probably question enough and gather enough intellectual knowledge to conclude ‘anything is possible!’. This is the declaration of Jupiter in Gemini. It is the precious ability to see that both sides of a coin are the true coin, but only after having examined both sides carefully, and turned them about face a few times in a confused fashion. It is awareness of information as a grand pattern, a jigsaw in which everything known is a piece that must be placed. It correctly presumes that every flower directly perceived is attempting to communicate, without the awareness that will determine correctly what the essential meaning of that message is. Thus, Jupiter in Gemini is ever mentally curious to gather more knowledge and explore where the truth becomes lie and vice versa. It is aware, through its connection to Jupiter via the Air Element, that there is an element of truth in everything, but it is only a child beginning to string words together in this school and cannot perceive the natural laws at work that connect every idea together in an all inclusive loving awareness – it only grows through its continued questioning and through a study and exchange of information that is infinitely open ended. Faith and intellectual expansion is open minded in Gemini and this is its greatest strength and its greatest weakness, for it can thus be vacuous, vacillating, empty, easily caught or distracted by any fresh wind that blows from any direction, too light and curious to settle in place and delve into the deeper meaning of what it is to really believe in and connect with something – to suffer or die for it. That takes time, and a certain kind of feeling, a sense that emotion must play a role in sifting through all the multiple possibilities, for in the end if the big questions cannot be answered by the intellectual acquisition of lore, solutions must be sought within the magnetic and fluid domains of the soul.”

What we are looking at here is a path through life that is seeking the logical and illogical reasons for life to be the way it is, the answers to questions like ‘where do I fit in?’ and ‘why do people think that way?’, ‘what does that really mean?’ and ‘what do I need to know?’, but it can easily become trapped by being too easily content and satisfied with a superficial and general answer to such questions, or never be satisfied because it is always seeking out the easy and simply answers. It is the kind of Jupiter that thinks it can reach enlightenment and bliss simply by reading enough and asking questions of everything. This is not the way this Jupiter will be enlightened. Instead, the way is by ceasing to add more information to the pile and looking within you for the answers you seek using the best of the information you have gathered. The rest should simply be dropped and its essence generously given away to others.

In essence, this Jupiter is a wonderful expression of true friendship and the sharing of knowledge and information in all forms, as they lead to a broader and more inclusive awareness of many intellectual capabilities. To keep yourself from feeling dispirited and lacking in a sense that life is worth living you need only involve yourself in seeking to witness something new or information that will benefit the people around you. Boredom is a great bane of your existence and can lead to hopelessness. You need to recognise that the key here is to keep life interesting and fascinating for yourself by opening your mind to the limitless sky of thought while avoiding the trap that comes from things like the media, the internet and other modern streams of information. These things quickly become soporific and dull and actually drain you of needed Jupiter energy because what is really sought for is not new information but the stimulation of sharing it with others and seeing the benefits it brings.

Alexander Graham Bell, Jane Austen, Aretha Franklin, Barbra Streisand, Clint Eastwood, Grace Kelly, Greta Garbo, Oprah Winfrey, Spike Milligan, Jackie Kennedy, Puccini, Stravinsky and Charles Dickens were born when Jupiter was in Gemini.

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Are you a Jupiter in Gemini soul? What will you be making with this flush of information? What questions will you be seeking to be enlightened on? I wish you the very best of the best in finding your path!

Perseus Conversations Interview

Another interview for you all to enjoy, this time an audio experience with James Robinson of Perseus Academy. We talk about all manner of things related to both magic and astrology as well as how these things relate to other phenomena. Please leave comments and questions below!

David Coleman on Astrology, Magic and the Mysterious

Mystery College interview

Hi! Just a short update to point you at my most recent interview with Jake Senn of the Mystery College podcast. We talk about all kinds of fascinating things! Please like, comment and subscribe, you know why! Jake put a lot of work in, and does this for many others. Show him the Love!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkMy3W1grgA

Chiron in the 8th House

Greetings, and welcome back to Journeys! Recently I was unable to write due to a fever so this month I am sharing a piece on Chiron in the 8th temple written many years ago. I chose this piece because I recently read it to a friend. It provides insight into Chiron and the 8th as individual components as well as in combination. It discusses 6 examples – Charles Chaplin, Marie Stopes, Hugh Hefner, Henri Matisse, Peter Sellers, Martin Luther.

Astrology is changing, and not just as it always has in terms of systems and approaches, but at a fundamental level that has not occurred in its history until recent times, with the discoveries of new and significant objects in the solar system throwing today’s astrologers into a very deep end, the depths of which they have not yet truly fathomed. Chiron is the primary entity in the emergence of a new sub-class of celestial bodies that are coming to be generally known as ‘minor planets’ or ‘dwarf planets’ but which are less rudely referred to as ‘planetoids’ or ‘planetesimals’. Identified in 1977 and considered first a moon of Uranus, then a comet and then an asteroid, now Chiron has come to be called a centaur, a planetoid which displays some characteristics of both asteroids and comets. They are relatively small bodies – the largest, Chariklo, is about 260km in diameter – and they orbit through the far reaches of the solar system extending from Jupiter outwards, crossing the orbits of one or more of the gas giants. They are numerous – it is estimated that there are over 44,000 centaurs with diameters larger than 1km. Chiron is in orbit between Saturn and Uranus, forming a conceptual bridge between them. This is rightly the case because he is the link which permits us to transition between the rigid rules of Saturn and the liberating freedom of Uranus. It seems likely that many of the centaurs originate in the Kuiper Belt, in the depths of the solar system beyong Pluto, and were captured by the powerful grativational forces of the gas giants. Centaurs are not in stable orbits and will be moved by the gas giant planets over a period of millions of years, moving to different orbits or leaving the solar system altogether. This fits the nature of Chirons band of centaurs in mythology, who were a roving mob of uncontrollable wanderers.

Chiron plays an important role in the birth of a collective (and then holistic) awareness because he offers the potential for pain to transition itself into healing, the root of which is to make ‘holy’ or ‘whole’ that which needs reparation and remedy. Chiron is a pathfinder on the metaphorical journey that lies between Saturn and Uranus, he is the cosmic ‘ferryman’ or ‘bridge’ that leads across the gulf between the visible and invisible worlds, a ‘Blessing Way’ connecting the separate, limited individual (Saturn) with the collective mind (Uranus), making it whole, bridging the temporal with the non-temporal. Essentially he bridges the gap between our fears and other limiting behaviours and the natural way we should live in order to be free. He also signifies the split or gulf between the awareness we have in our childhood and our adult awareness. In many cases this is the easiest place for us to begin getting a handle on Chiron because we all recognise that something is lost when we leave childhood behind and that the loss is painful even when the childhood we have is dreadful. Identifying this loss and its essence can help us come into contact with the field of energy represented by Chiron.

Chiron, the Wounded Healer, thus represents our emotional and physical wounds, the process of healing that we must tread in order to make the crossing of these gulfs through bridges, both as individuals and a species. He reveals a part of us that is hurt, small and vulnerable and accelerates its emergence as a stimulus for healing – he counsels us in the experience of pain as a teaching on where we are broken. Chironic (sometimes called Chirotic) energy is applied in relatively slight but potent amounts, and it sutures, like congealed honey dripping through a crack in the hive, sealing the rupture, or blood seeping from a wound pressed together by fingers, or homeopathic or herbal remedies, and so he encourages us to heal our wounds by closing the gap and bringing things together, the urge towards wholeness, to look beyond personal pain and see the suffering of others and to become teachers and healers in response. He can incline us to stick our fingers into septic wounds and reopen them to release the poison when we are not relating to him on a healthy level. He is everything that heals and everything that hurts because he is the emissary of a new way of life for all of us but the path to it is choked with thorns. Chiron is therefore critical for healers and people who carry scars – and who does not? – since its activations of the 26 keys reveal when this healing-hurting effect focuses on specific aspects of being. This energy can be applied internally or externally, so it can be used to heal others, but the ability to heal others is dependent on us first being whole ourselves.

According to a rough current consensus, Chiron as an entity seems to have three essential qualities:

1) Healing (holistic integration)
2) Questing (heroic initiation)
3) ‘Being maverick’ (neither a law maker or a law breaker)

He applies these qualities at the collective and the individual level, like the outer planets, and it’s really only in understanding each of these and looking for the connection between them that the deeper and more hermetic meaning of Chiron begins to become clear.

As a healing force Chiron uses tiny doses of influence to restore balance so that the entity can restore itself to wholeness. This is not just a medical influence; it draws us to a deeper and more holistic awareness of what wholeness or ‘holiness’ actually is – the merging and making whole of the physical, emotional and mental awareness as an integrated unity that is present in the perception of every single moment. This healing or making more whole is a grafting together of two or more parts that have been sundered. Ultimately Chiron forms a bridge between the temporal and the non-temporal states of being, allowing this wholeness to heal. It takes the prism of different colours and blends them into a rainbow. However, the healing offered by Chiron does not always promise cure – sometimes, the healing is in accepting the affliction or pain and using the knowledge and experience acquired to heal others or teach them so that they can pass on the wisdom. In other words sometimes the pain has to be lived through, not cast away. So the initiate eventually discovers that there are some things that magic is not meant to ‘fix’, that in some respects the world needs to be broken so that it knows what healing means and that some diseases and forms of suffering are karmically necessary and provide a path of teaching that cannot be found elsewhere.

As an urge to quest he guides a seeking after new vistas of discovery, a transformational process that occurs in a seeker simply by virtue of their seeking. He is the initiator, the one who teaches heroes the nature of their magical quest. He taught Achilles, Peleus, Jason, Hercules and many other legendary questing heroes. As a teacher and instructor of this quest he provides very few answers but instead listens to and then guides the questions we ask, which in turn reveals the holes in our understanding, and thus to the answers that will liberate us from the need to ask them. There is no final answer, only deeper philosophical questioning. As we quest for certain visceral truths and probe into aching or pained areas of our lives, we also eventually yearn to act as a guide to others using what we have learned, because this gives it greater meaning. Thus it denotes teachers and guides as well, but those who have actually walked the path and can show you their blood on the tracks. At the collective level the current overall quest of Chironic-human interaction is the birth of a collective awareness of nature, the awareness that we are living in the infinite fractal of nature and are therefore inseparable from our planet and all its life. Seeing this will bring home the pain of what we have done to it and ourselves and challenge us to heal the damage.

Finally as a maverick Chiron is about being ‘one of a kind’ but is not truly a rebel or an outcast, these are more Uranian properties. The word maverick means someone who stands apart from the crowd and does not philosophically align themselves with any party, faction or opinion (it comes from Samuel Maverick, a rancher who refused to brand his cattle, but at the same time did not protest against the branding). So its actually a combination of neutrality and non-compliance. A maverick is someone who does not follow the herd and who resists the imposition of labels like ‘asteroid’ and ‘comet’. They are a ‘one of a kind’ and shun labels because they know they are truly unique and thus better off independent. Chiron, too, is like this, a creature of instinct that is not subject to any laws but those of survival and the dictates of nature. Yet he is also a clansman, a leader of a familial tribe, and thus a social creature, like us, not a wild beast. In other words, he straddles divides and bridges gulfs.

In all of this we can see Chiron as an influence of great importance in initiation – he describes the process of aligning the equilibrated personal and individual self with the Greater Self. This is our true whole being and the path of initiation – to be truly ourselves, not one of the crowd, to be a whole self, healed of the wounds inflicted by the way we live. Many people today live almost completely entangled in their personal pain, in their personal lives, never knowing the sense of themselves as unique beings but only as parts of a machine, biological machines faced with overwhelming pressures, cogs in a broken society that no-one seems able to fix. Chiron is a balancing of the aspects of self awareness, an astrological influence that basically creates adjustments that edge us towards the point where our personal and individual selves are aligned with our Greater Self awareness. This is the wholeness that Chiron refers to and it is the quest he trains us in and sends us on, each in our own way. He knows he cant be that for us but he knows the way, and he understands it is the quest itself that forges the hero and that death is not to be feared in the pursuit of that quest. He is therefore deeply concerned with the hermetic path and in particular the astral and mental equilibrium as he acts to bridge the perceived gap between all levels of awareness. His appearance before humanity sends us all off on a collective initiatory quest to restore something powerful to our world.

This makes more sense when we consider and meditate upon the significance of Chiron’s orbital position between Saturn and Uranus, which also suggests that Chiron has a connection to our perception of the passing of time. Awareness of linear time is a property of astrological Saturn and Uranus is the point at which this order of awareness is ‘shattered’ by the awareness of infinite time or eternity, so Chiron is the path between these two, or relative time. This is the varying experience and perception of time as it passes according to circumstances. As Einstein said:

“When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute. But let him sit on a hot stove for a minute and its longer than any hour. That’s relativity.”

And that’s Chiron. So we tend to experience Chiron in meditative or pained states as we move beyond the temporal into the infinite or have our awareness of the passage of time warped by sensory stimulus. It presents itself as relative time, an eternity passing in the blink of an eye, a connection with time as timelessness in altered states and a merging of those states, resulting in holistic healing as we integrate this epic quest.

Chiron in the temples is therefore significant of an area of life where we will seek to be healed, probably because we are carrying scars from another life. There will also be lore connected with this area of life (inner knowledge often drawn from painful experience) and a marked tendency to want to draw our own conclusions and forge our own path. Additionally it is an area of life in which we will seek something of spiritual import – some kind of initiation into the temple – and shows an avenue which may lead to enlightenment. We will also be maverick in some way. We will not seek a conventional healing for any wounds in this temple but will take a road less travelled and will also tend to cause ourselves pain to draw attention to the need for healing. This is also a temple in which we will try to repair damage done by us as well as to us. At a broader level we can get involved in the healing of society and our generation.

Chiron in the 8th can have many profound effects, not all of which can be even raised in this writing because they are visceral realities and occult instincts that defy wordy explanations. Additionally, planets in the 8th are in the most secretive closet of the sky, the place where we keep all the things that we know exist but do not want to admit to or probe (the 12th is the secrets kept hidden from ourselves that we are not even conscious of yet). This means that astrologers do not have as much data on the 8th temple because it is mostly shared in very private consultations with their clients and is usually not the kind of stuff bandied around in ‘polite society’. These issues are not just private they are also often traumatic, sacred or illegal, things we do not want others to know and so we often find ourselves in the dark with objects in the 8th, especially newly observed ones.

We do however at this point understand the basic physics of the 8th temple, so to speak, and those physics have to do with deep emotional realities which we can be consumed by, deny, repress or be mortally afraid of, and these realities resonate with loss and the process of decay and death that must occur before rebirth. Frequently these instinctual impulses boil down into three very hot and touchy areas of human experience – sex, death and power. In some way, then, the instinctive responses to these three undeniable forces are Chironic and lead you to a Chironic experience. Sex and death are perhaps surprisingly the easiest of these three matters to analyse from a Chironic perspective – it is the relationship with power that contains the metaphysics here.

The instinct for sexual contact is more than just a natural instinct to reproduce – it is the natural instinct to have sexual contact too. What Chiron in the 8th temple does with both of these things is transform them from painful experiences to healing ones. This is achieved through a process related to the sign Chiron is in and his aspects. So the first thing we can note about Chiron in the 8th is that sexual encounters and sexual experiences are sometimes made prominent features of the healing journey and contain lessons which involve suffering, loss and pain and how to remedy and live with them. Thus, this placement will often make for a natural sex therapist or counsellor.

Society generally forbids them any positive role, but I would also include all sex workers in this too. These people go on often painful journeys that reveal to them the underbelly and criminal in society from which they often emerge with rare insights into human nature and they can serve an important part in keeping the sexual energy of other people healthy. Note that this does not just mean potentially working in the sex industry but with it too, especially its victims.

The basic truth of Chiron in the 8th here is that sexual encounters are inimically loss-tinged pained experiences in some way – either they cause pain, involve pain or are perceived as its remedy – and also that there is a tendency for sexual peccadilloes to be present which are categorised as ‘maverick’ by society. There are a truly vast range of taboo possibilities in play here, from the victim to the perpetrators of sexual crimes, to the people who help treat them, the people with secret foot fetishes and addictions to masochism or sadism, closeted bondage fans, hosts of partner swapping parties, closeted homosexuals – basically everything that forces the individual with that instinctive desire to break away from the herd and make their way into the sexual jungle on their own.

These people often have every right to their privacy but society will often not supply it because of what it fears. It will press upon their desire nature until it hurts, and then it will hurt it some more. Their private sexual experience can become a thing of torment that drives them to secretive but injurious encounters that bring emotional turmoil and extreme loneliness. Sex addiction itself is a possibility and the addiction can have all kinds of sources from abuse or a sheer carnal craving, to being an expression of a spiritual practice, but whatever its origins they will be deeply rooted in the psyche, in the experience of the soul, and have access to a vast battery of compulsive power over which you have little control and which periodically erupts into your life. With Chiron in the 8th sex can become an alluring demon with barbed skin in some way, a succubus or incubus that we cannot resist but which only brings us further suffering of some kind. When present any such negative compulsions need to be faced and resisted as they happen and an ordeal undergone in order for you to be released from them.

The native may feel inadequate or broken sexually and may need to seek a real healing of the emotional self on the deepest levels, a depth of feeling which can only be found when the tumultuous waters of their deepest inner self are explored and sated or calmed. Sexuality may be healing to as an expression of the urge to be reborn through union with a greater power than self, in other words, as a healer of fear and particularly the fear of death. There is a need to be radically honest with self and partners about our sexual energy because a healthy expression of sexual urges is a significant key to part of their enlightenment.

Although initially sexuality or sexual encounters may bring a pained, broken part of self to light any suffering endured for it can ultimately become a magical force in life that deepens and heals feelings and the ability to express sexual desires. The key is to commit to any healing process, being prepared to go it alone if necessary and to work with Chiron to remedy the source of the pain directly, not avoiding it but working to integrate it with the rest of life. Once this begins it gets easier, as more and more pieces fall into place and the experience becomes more holistic. Like learning to walk again after a fracture, the pain gone through gradually returns strength and potency as the emotional turmoil clears as well. Sexual healing becomes more than just a healing of sexual expression, it goes far deeper and becomes a healing of the soul and its sorrows and demons, but there will be a fine line between bringing sexual healing and sexual damage.

A case in point: Hugh Hefner (Chiron in Aries in the 8th) was the creator and owner of the ‘Playboy’ enterprise, and a well known playboy himself. His promotion of pornography in the 50s and 60s drew heat and an eventual arrest for obscenity in 1963. The jury could not reach a verdict, but the pressure would never fully let up. In 1975 he accused federal officers and narcotic agents of causing the death of his secretary by an overdose because of his magazines liberal stance on drugs. He says that most of what he has done in life is related to his puritanical childhood – he grew up in a Methodist family where even though he felt loved there was absolutely no outward show of affection, not even so much as a kiss on a cheek. He started ‘Playboy’ in 1953 after being refused a $5 raise. He mortgaged his furniture to generate a bank loan of $600 and raised a further $8,000 from 45 other investors, including $1000 from his mother “not because she believed in the venture but because she believed in her son” and sold over 50,000 copies of the first issue. He died in 2017, his wealth estimated to be $50,000,000.

The connection between sexual urges and our fear of our own mortality is well understood by psychology today, but it has always been there for astrologers. The French encode the resonance in their language – ‘La petit morte’ is a phrase for orgasm that literally means ‘the little death’. This is a reference not only to the state of deep rest and often sleep that follows orgasmic release but also to the out of body condition and the obliteration of our awareness of the personality at the moment of orgasm, a point of explosive release in which we experience the nakedness of the soul. This is the crux of an 8th temple experience – this momentary but explosive release through coming into contact with emotive realities which overpower us and cannot be controlled (which is a big reason why we tend to deny and repress them). The loss of physical consciousness following death is similar, but even more profound.

The 8th temple is the place where we experience life as a place where death – the ultimate orgasm – can happen at any moment, and this unfailing awareness gives rise to a deep, instinctive response which we know is there but strongly tend to refuse to look at until we are confronted by its reality in the deaths of people, animals, places and concepts we are devoted to. With a strong emphasis on the 8th temple we will feel compelled to probe all kinds of taboo areas, a compulsion that will scare the more timid and perhaps give us a reputation for being sinister or predatory. Experience with death will be even more transformative than it usually is and we will perhaps inherit things through it that come to signify this transformative power, but our own death will ultimately win out over these lesser transformations and often in some way prove to be a critical part of our life story in ways that again surpass the norm.

So with Chiron in the 8th we can be not only a sexual healer but also a healer of grief and deep loss, but it will be a healing we are able to offer only because we have been through a similar tragedy or loss. We may have our own maverick ideas about the rituals of death or leave instructions that our body should be disposed of using sparse, ecological or natural methods, or in life be involved in healing or cosmetic activities related to death. There can be a sometimes unhealthy interest in death or a healing journey (or both, one leading to another), a need to repair the damage left by someone passing, near death experiences that utterly change the way we look at life, interests which relate to controlling life and death such as the right to abortion and assisted dying – issues which are blistering societal taboos and evoke potent emotional responses. Marie Stopes (Chiron in Taurus in the 8th) was a pioneer in the field of birth control. She was a well educated scientist who founded the first birth control clinic in Britain and championed contraception – in 1921. She famously sued a doctor who cast aspersions on her professional qualifications and initially won a moral victory in an acrimonious court case against him in which the jury found in her favour, but appealed (at the urging of the press) because the judge found in favour of the doctor instead. This appeal was won, and the decision was reversed in her favour again, but the Catholic community mobilised behind its doctor and forced a final reversal of the decision to be made at the House of Lords. The cost to Stopes was immense but in turn she had won public attention and turned birth control into a subject of public debate – book sales increased and the numbers of clients visiting her clinic doubled. Stopes is likely not a good example of Chiron in the 8th, however – not only is her Chiron on the cusp of the 9th, giving it strong focus there instead (I think it influenced her sense or morality and her attitude to religions), but it is not alone in her 8th. Instead it is Saturn and maybe even Neptune that delineate her 8th house experience and account for these factors. The other charts in this article are much better examples because Chiron is clearly in the 8th, alone, allowing for no conflation of influences.

The sign in the backdrop of Chiron in the 8th (also the 8th ruler and other 8th place objects) will show the way we process grief and mourning and fear of death into healing, closure and the potential for new beginnings. It can also show some of the qualities of the deaths and losses we encounter, for example, Water signs can show there are drownings in our story, or Leo that we most deeply mourn for our cats.

It may be that blockages were formed in a previous life, during death or as part of a close encounter with death, and that there has been a wounding of the ability to heal from the deaths of people we love which needs to be healed. If we naturally flinch from the subject of death or consistently use tactics not to think about it in a way which makes us feel edgy and nervy more than seems to be the norm it when forced to it is possible that this is the case and the native may need help and guidance in diving into buried emotions. If there are many overpowering dreams or imaginings connected with death and grieving you may need to find a creative outlet that allows you to energetically but safely express your emotions. Emotion can be felt at one time but be squished before it could be expressed or truly felt, and then it needs to rise up again and be reborn in the emotional body so that people can move on.

Some astrologers would interpret Chiron in the 8th too literally – they would say that it symbolises a painful or lingering death for the person involved, a death from violent injury or sickness, or a death that brings pain to others, even death from STDs. These are too negative and morbid They are also too fatalistic for modern astrology and serve as an example of the way astrological interpretation of Chiron has tended toward the negative, like Mars and Saturn.. Part of the reason for this is that Chiron is healing and we have an unhealthy attitude to healing itself, another part of it is that Chiron represents wisdom through ordeal and difficult undertaking, which is generally perceived as being less desirable and fortuitous than wisdom that lands in your lap. Not so, says Chiron, for that kind of wisdom is never properly understood – it is only borrowed and does not belong to us until it is actually used to fix something, something that really matters. Hence, to Chiron true wisdom can only be won through ordeal, never by instruction or transmission, it requires loss, and this is why he will bring some of these people very close to death in life, sometimes more than once, so that they bring some true wisdom back from their recovery. He does not destine a death involving pain or suffering when placed in the 8th; instead he portends a quest to bring greater healing to those who are touched by death. Often, however, this need is buried so deeply and beneath our own grief that we do not recognise it, and this is what makes our experience of death more tormented – we know deep down that we have skills to help remedy its pain and we do not use them. What can be said with more certainty then is that Chiron in the 8th can indeed bring about a very painful death experience if we have not made efforts to heal our fear of mortality beforehand.

The issues of power stemming from Chiron in the 8th are connected with the mundane necessities of giving money away or sharing it – financial loss – and more spiritual areas connected with the use of our power. The mundane form of Chiron in the 8th can bring painful experiences connected with debt, legacies and wills, legal manipulation, criminal prosecution and the money we share with other people (remember Stopes and Hefner?). There can be fragile and broken aspects to these experiences that do not work out as planned. For this reason it is not advisable to be involved in or associated with criminal behaviour, to contest the legalities of a death, to be too reliant on a shared income or bonds or to sink into significant debt, borrowed or owed, unless you are prepared to be dealing with a lot of pain. It is also advisable to create a legal and unambiguous will should there be resources these people wish to hand down to specific people or things. The issues of debt and forgiveness can become intertwined in our life story. Martin Luther (Chiron in Pisces in the 8th) was a prominent figure in the Protestant Reformation. He objected strongly to the use of indulgences, the notion that sins could be forgiven by giving the Church money. He translated the bible from Latin into colloquial speech and questioned the authority of the Pope by preaching that the Bible was the only divine authority. This was extraordinarily taboo and incendiary for the times. The Church excommunicated him and the Emperor named him an outlaw, which remained so until his death after many long struggles.

It is also possible that these people will draw dark suspicions from overarching powers for any maverick behaviour and that the consequences of this will lead to legal proceedings or major losses of income or liberty. This is often just the price of refusing to align with political blocs when those blocs have an axe to grind. London born Charles Chaplin (Chiron in Cancer in the 8th) is cinemas and the world’s most famous down and out tramp, as well as its most famous clown, but the image he is known for is not all fantasy. In real life his childhood mother was in and out of institutions and his father was a chronic alcoholic, so he took to entertaining to fend for himself at the age of 10, later moving to the U.S. to make some of the most iconic movies of the early 20th century. He married four times – the first marriage bore a deformed child who died three days later, and he was embroiled in years of painful legal battles over accusations that he was the father of an illegitimate child. Blood tests proved that he was not but were inadmissible in court, and the FBI started a smear campaign and used the scandal to pin criminal charges and Communist allegations against him. He was eventually denied re-entry to the U.S. “until he could prove his political views and moral behaviour” and chose to remain in exile in Switzerland until his death.

In general these people should develop an awareness of sharing and its healing potential as they may tend to grow sick with worries otherwise. They may not be open enough to sharing, one way or another, and may need to mend a broken sense of trust before they can safely enter into any joint financial arrangements. If or when they do share a joint account with someone else (or are given control of money that does not fully belong to them, such as a trust fund) then they must be prepared for this to bring up painful issues that need to be dealt with before it will work.

Money is simply a measure of power, an artificial one that we have created to open an account for power in the physical world. Poverty is certainly a major disempowerment in this setup and wealth an obvious advantage, but there are other forms of power in the 8th beyond this artificial one, powers that transcend it and can potentially transform it. Sex, for example, is also a currency of power, an arc of experience through which raw and undeniable power is transmitted, and a power that people would be willing to give up money for under the right circumstances. Sex, then, can transform money by overpowering the need for it or by changing it from a material resource into an emotional one or vice versa.

Other more occult instincts connected with the 8th can perform a similar function in transforming the significance of money and its power. One of these is the sense of powerlessness that arises from our instinctive, fear filled awareness of the inevitability of our own death. This kind of impotence can make us either more or less concerned with money as a unit of power depending on how we react to the sensitivity we will have to the powerlessness, which can be acute and sharp, like a needle.

Another possibility is that we will have an ability to pierce through the veil between the realm of the living and that of the dead. We may not necessarily see them or be able to communicate with them, but we will certainly have a sharper awareness of the astral presence of the recently departed and feel something of their pain and loss, but also perhaps of their relief and healing. If these gifts are naturally present at birth or arise at a certain time of life they have been developed by the soul in a previous incarnation but the training was very often incomplete and so vital pieces are missing. This means the native need to proceed with an open mind and not blinker their mind with a piecemeal and fragmentary picture of what they are doing. Further teaching and training will be required not just to catch up with their current faculties but to fill in the parts that were not given to them, and this can be a painful process of letting go of deep attachment to the previous sense of things. The same can be true of any spiritual path, including magical initiation, and not just with the spirits and souls of the deceased. There are powers in the universe far greater than we know, and Chiron in the 8th, being an explorer of the dark places, can certainly lead us to them.

One thing they must avoid and may have a tendency to do is giving their power away to others. This is bad for anyone but for Chiron in the 8th it is especially toxic because they have to reclaim any power they have too readily given away. There seems to be a leaning for people with Chiron in the 8th to develop power complexes related to the experience of being robbed of power or through a habitual throwing of it away, perhaps out of fears of what they will do with it or what it will do to them. In some way they are here to develop mastery of the deeper content of their soul and this means diving into its power source to claim it wholly and retrieve something that was lost, so it is counter-productive to surrender their power and control to others until they have done this. This may entail therapy to get to the source of what ails them but not necessarily, any spiritual or occult path can also work here. Yet in following such a path they must guard against giving the power over to a counsellor, guru or mentor; any genuine healer or guru will recognise that they have this deeper need and will refrain from fulfilling any such role. This is another way they may have to ‘go it alone’ with Chiron in the 8th temple – it is actually a deep blessing and not a curse.

Some may take this to other extremes, unfortunately – instead of unhealthily giving power away they may attempt to fill a vacuum or heal a wound by sucking it all up from everywhere they can, resulting in controlling and manipulative secretive behaviour that inflicts pain and suffering on those closest to them. Pain can be so all consuming, especially when locked in a closet, that it causes warps and twists in our soul that are eventually reflected in our behaviour. The horror that is bottled up inside grows even more grotesque as it inevitably morphs and plagues the external reality of our lives. Instead of facing the darkness we can be slowly consumed by it, and the wounds that were once fresh can grow enflamed and septic. These are all definite dangers with Chiron in the 8th if the issues we have surrounding the use of power are not healed. Peter Sellers (Chiron in Aries in the 8th) had an out of body experience during his first massive heart attack in 1964 – in fact he had a series of 13 of them over a period of a few days and at one point was pronounced dead for a minute and a half. His biographer Alexander Walker says that “The repeated act of ‘dying’ became for Peter Sellers the most important experience of his life.” Sellers himself said of death: “I’ll never fear it again.” He suffered many financial woes and bouts of suicidal depression. Upon his own death he cut his own children out of his huge inheritance and legally left it all to a wife whom he was in process of divorcing. He saw many mediums in a quest to communicate with his dead mother. He was also described as a monster by many people; Spike Milligan said of him “He causes pain to everyone who gets close to him … Even when you’re the victim of his outrageous behaviour, his selfishness, or one of his tantrums, you always found yourself smiling about it afterwards, even if you had to do it through gritted tears”. Like Stopes, Sellers has Chiron very close to the 9th house and may not be a good example for a case study but his birth time is suspiciously rounded off and he may have been born later which would push Chiron deeper into the 8th.

It’s interesting to note that like Chaplin, Hefner, Stopes and possibly also Martin Luther, Sellers tried to do something with and about the emotional torment he was in. Chaplin and Sellers made people laugh and made powerful statements through their movie characters, Hefner got laid with thousands of women (and probably a few hundred guys too, but he wouldn’t want to boast about that), Stopes and Luther kicked against the system they saw as corrupted and rotten, but they all pay a heavy price for taking this path. This confrontational reaction to emotional torment and inner demons or sin – to seek to vanquish them in revelry – seems to be a feature of Chiron in the 8th. Confronted with emotional pain it will dive into a remedy for the pain that can itself inflict greater pain. Thus, these people can end up feeling trapped by an emotional pain that only keeps fracturing into more and more pieces. My sense is that this is sometimes a karmic necessity and sometimes the result of failing to heal the deeper realities involved in the 8th temple.

Ultimately the placement of Chiron in the 8th shows that we are positioned to transform the deepest pain into the most magical kind of power through holistic healing and the sharing of the lore that we acquire on the thorny path. We can learn how to transform pain into other things (usually things connected with the sign of Chiron and by a process connected to that sign) and we can also have experiences where suffering or closeness to death bring total transformation and further empowerment. Pain and losses can be the door that unlocks to reveal a deeper realm of life. Henri Matisse (Chiron in Pisces in the 8th) discovered art at the age of 20 when his mother bought him a paint set during convalescence after a bout of appendicitis, and he spent the last 13 years of his life in a wheelchair or a bed needing assistance. When he discovered painting he described it as “a kind of paradise” and later in life when he was physically confined he changed the medium as a solution to no longer being able to paint or sculpt – he took up decoupage and championed it as an art form. This neatly stitched together painting and sculpture without the physical exertion required by both.

These people may be sensitive to hidden pain and use this knowledge later to become an intuitive healer, or they may use it to manipulate power struggles. Occult studies may provide a healing bridge as a means of attaining inner peace, the inner peace gained through an understanding of the deepest laws of life. Addictions to substances or sex may need to be overcome as part of the healing journey. They may pick at scabs and at their instinctive emotions and pain far too much and thereby cause more grief, never letting themselves heal or truly show themselves. The initiatory path to greater healing and wholeness is made by crossing a bridge from some kind of deep injury connected to loss to a state of emotional peace which involves growing free from toxic desires or addictions, compulsive willfulness, buried anger, a futile sense that life has no positive meaning and a fear of the need for survival and of our own fragile mortality that can be crippling. Once they are beyond such challenges they will unlock a buried treasure within their own soul that is able to guide them unerringly in the maze of life and bring healing and wisdom to those who are experiencing the deepest kind of sorrows.

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Thank you for coming with me on this Journey, I hope you found it useful and helpful, if you would like to know more about Chiron, the 8th or other matters in your own birth chart I will be happy to meet you through astralvisions.org. Thank you to all the Patrons who support this monthly work through patreon and therefore make this work a free online archive for everybody. You are all wonderful!

Secrets of the Quincunx

Greetings, and welcome back to Journeys! This month we explore the meaning of a little used aspect, the inconjunct or quincunx.

This is part of my series on interpreting aspects, the main body of which you can find in several places:

On Sextiles

On Trines

On Squares

Occult Aspects I

Occult Aspects II

Occult Aspects III

Interpreting Aspects

There are also many journeys in the archive exploring conjunctions but these are best found by searching for ‘conjunction’ in the search field or by asking me to point you in the right direction for a specific topic.

In astrology, the inconjunct aspect, also known as the quincunx is considered to be an aspect of tension or difficulty between two planets or points in a birth chart. The inconjunct occurs when two planets are approximately 150 degrees apart from each other, with an orb of about 1 to 3 degrees (I use 2°). Unlike aspects such as the conjunction, sextile, square, or trine, which are often seen as more harmonious or more dynamic, the inconjunct tends to bring a sense of unease or awkwardness and is more like a softer square or opposition. It suggests that the energies of the planets involved do not easily blend together because they are in signs that have no common ground or Element. As a result, individuals with an inconjunct aspect in their charts may feel a sense of disconnect or imbalance between the areas of life represented by the planets, signs and temples involved. However, the inconjunct can also serve as a source of growth and development, as it challenges individuals to find creative solutions to reconcile the conflicting energies represented by the planets. It often requires conscious effort and adjustment to integrate these energies constructively and this leads to transformation.

The inconjunct has been recognized and utilized in astrology for centuries, although it hasn’t always been as prominent as some other aspects. While ancient astrologers like Ptolemy primarily focused on the major aspects such as the conjunction, sextile, square, trine, and opposition, the quincunx aspect was also acknowledged to some extent. However, its interpretation and significance varied among different astrological traditions. In more modern astrology, particularly in the 20th and 21st centuries, there has been a greater emphasis on exploring and understanding the subtler aspects, including the inconjunct. Astrologers have developed more nuanced interpretations of this aspect and its impact on individual charts. So, while the inconjunct aspect may not have been as extensively discussed in ancient astrology as some other aspects, it has nonetheless been recognized and utilized in astrological practice for centuries, with its significance evolving over time.

The square, opposition, and inconjunct are all considered challenging aspects in astrology, but they operate differently in interpretation due to the nature of the angular relationships they form between planets. Here is a breakdown of the key differences:

Square (90 degrees): occurs when planets are approximately 90 degrees apart from each other, with an orb of at least 5°. This aspect creates a dynamic tension and friction between the energies of the planets involved but if the energies find a way to focus together there is great potential for productivity. Squares often signify obvious internal conflicts, obstacles, and challenges that need to be addressed and rather than blockages they create the release of energy in troubles and fires that need putting out. They indicate areas of life where there is a continuous need for growth, development, and forward momentum, a need to express pressurized energies. In terms of tension, it is like two boxers in a ring or a hydroelectric dam.

Opposition (180 degrees): occurs when planets are directly opposite each other in the chart, approximately 180 degrees apart, with an orb of at least 5°. This aspect represents a polarity or duality between the energies of the planets involved, a need to bring them into balance. Unlike the square, the opposition is often involved in projection, with one side of the opposition having more power within us than the other, leading to a split feeling and the projection of the ‘disowned’ part of the opposition onto the world and relations with other people. Oppositions therefore often symbolize external conflicts, oppositions, or polarities in life. They highlight areas where there is a need for balance, negotiation, and integration of the opposing forces, otherwise they tend to straight-jacket one another and create blockages. Once this tug of war is resolved by allotting equal time, energy and value to both sides of the opposition the potential of it to bring greater stability is unlocked, with the opposition acting as a kind of spine or axis around which the chart stabilizes. In terms of tension, it is like a see-saw, or a tug of war.

Inconjunct (150 degrees): also known as the quincunx, this occurs when planets are approximately 150 degrees apart from each other, but only within a short orb of about 2°. It creates a sense of awkwardness or discomfort between the energies of the planets involved. Inconjuncts signify areas of life where there is a need for adjustment, adaptation, and flexibility. They represent subtle or hidden tensions that may manifest as challenges in integrating the energies of the planets involved. Individuals with inconjunct aspects may experience a sense of unease, awkwardness or clumsiness in the areas of life represented by the planets, signs and temples involved. However, they also have the opportunity to develop creative solutions and find harmony by making adjustments and fine tuning the planets involved. The potential of the quincunx then is the transformation that can occur when these adjustments are made, the fine tuning of the two planets leading to their synchronization. In terms of tension, it is like trying to run while your shoe-laces are tied together, or two bits of sandpaper scraping up against one another. It’s a trouble that does not arise as often and has more specific forms than a square or opposition, which have more general umbrelly like manifestations.

It is worth noting here that squares, oppositions and inconjuncts all involve two different Elements – the source of their tensions – but squares and oppositions find some common ground in their sign Modality since they involve two signs that are both Cardinal, Fixed or Mutable in nature. Yet the quincunx has no such common ground between its two signs. This is where it gets its awkward and clumsy nature from, the two signs basically having nothing in common. The conflicts and tensions of squares and oppositions can use their Modality as the basis of agreement and cooperation, which is how they reach their potential for productivity and balance respectively, but the quincunx has some analysis and tuning to do before it can resolve its tensions. Usually, this involves actually identifying that we have a certain personality trait that trips us up – we have to look down and see that our shoe-laces have been tied all along. Once we realise the inconjunct within ourselves, the next step is untying the laces – basically, you have to find a way to first disentangle the two parts of the inconjunct and then look for a way to synthesize them smoothly. With squares and oppositions experience makes it blatantly clear that we have certain issues, but with the inconjunct we may never even realise it is there. Hence it is described as a ‘minor’ aspect. However, having your shoe-laces tied, not knowing it and trying to run (or just walk) is by no means a minor challenge. It is also frustrating because you don’t know why you keep falling flat on your face – at least with the squares and oppositions you can see the blows coming and react. So the inconjunct requires you to get your detective cap and magnifying glass out for some analysis before you even know its a problem.

However it is quite interesting to note that there are two inconjuncts which have more common ground to start with than the others, the inconjunct between Aries and Scorpio and the inconjunct between Taurus and Libra, since these are signs ruled by the same planets, respectively Mars and Venus. This means that inconjuncts in these signs tend to be not so awkward since they have something they share. There is actually a pattern here that is worth contemplating:

The two signs ruled by the Lights are inconjunct one sign ruled by Jupiter and one sign ruled by Saturn, each.
The two signs ruled by Mercury are both inconjunct signs ruled by Mars, and either Jupiter or Saturn (one each).
The two signs ruled by Venus are both inconjunct signs ruled by Venus and Jupiter.
The two signs ruled by Mars are both inconjunct signs ruled by Mercury and Mars.
The two signs ruled by Jupiter are both inconjunct signs ruled by a Light (the Sun or Moon, one each) and Venus.
The two signs ruled by Saturn are both inconjunct signs ruled by a Light (the Sun or Moon, one each) and Mercury.

Here we can perceive the basic misalignments involved, for example the signs of Saturn do not mix well with the luminous and bright qualities of the Lights (Saturn is dark and dim) nor with the constant flexibility and mobility of Mercury (Saturn is stasis). The problems of an inconjunct involving Capricorn and Gemini are therefore about this issue of stasis vs. flexibility and motion, while those between Capricorn and Leo are more to do with our charisma and how we radiate ourselves. Similarly, the other combinations also reveal their basic awkwardness after some reflection.

This innate awkwardness or misalignment will then be tempered by the nature of the two planets involved in the quincunx, and if they are in rulership (either or both) then these innate themes will be more prominent, but if not then the theme will apply itself to the interaction between the two principles and they will strongly shape its meaning, for example in the Capricorn/Gemini quincunx, if the planets involved are Saturn and Mercury then the theme of stasis vs. motion will be pronounced and easier to identify, but if instead the planets are Jupiter and the Moon then it is not so apparent and the qualities of the Moon and Jupiter take the tension in a different direction, perhaps towards the way we form personal beliefs about ourselves or others. As always, the temples and planets shape the way aspects manifest.

With all this explained, lets look at some of the key words and phrases that I feel are connected to this aspect, first looking at all 12 sign combinations and then all of the planet based combinations. For each of the pairings I have suggested a type of struggle, a type of tension and a type of adjustment that can ease these things. Use these suggestions as guidelines but remember that not only is every aspect unique and part of a whole chart but also that inconjuncts require some detective work.

THE QUINCUNX BY SIGNS

Aries/Virgo: Struggle between impulse and practicality. Tension between spontaneity and detail-oriented approach. Synthesizing assertiveness with attention to practical details. Adjustment – balancing spontaneity with careful planning, incorporating strategic action into daily routines.
Aries/Scorpio: Struggle to reconcile assertiveness with depth. Tension between directness and hidden motives. Synthesizing courage with emotional depth and intensity. Adjustment – integrating passion with perseverance, harnessing inner strength for long-term goals.
Taurus/Libra: Struggle to balance stability with co-operation. Tension between material security and relational harmony. Synthesizing security with desire for fairness and balance. Adjustment – creating balance between material security and social connections, cultivating beauty in practical endeavors.
Taurus/Sagittarius: Struggle between stability and spontaneity. Tension between practicality and idealism. Synthesizing material comfort with the desire for exploration and expansion. Adjustment – combining adventure with stability, seeking growth through practical experiences.
Gemini/Scorpio: Struggle to balance communication with depth. Tension between intellect and emotional intensity. Synthesizing curiosity with the need for privacy and depth. Adjustment – honoring both superficial and profound connections, diving into intellectual pursuits with emotional depth.
Gemini/Capricorn: Struggle between adaptability and rigidity. Tension between intellectual pursuits and practical goals. Synthesizing curiosity with the need for structure and long-term planning. Adjustment – balancing flexibility with structure, applying strategic thinking to achieve long-term goals.
Cancer/Sagittarius: Struggle to reconcile emotional security with the desire for freedom. Tension between nurturing instincts and independence. Synthesizing sensitivity with the need for exploration and expansion. Adjustment – embracing emotional growth through adventures, finding comfort in expanding horizons.
Cancer/Aquarius: Struggle between emotional depth and detachment. Tension between nurturing instincts and intellectual independence. Synthesizing sensitivity with the need for individuality and innovation. Adjustment – integrating personal and collective needs, fostering emotional connections within communities.
Leo/Capricorn: Struggle to balance self-expression with responsibility. Tension between creativity and practicality. Synthesizing pride with the need for long-term achievement. Adjustment – balancing self-expression with responsibility, leading with integrity and perseverance.
Leo/Pisces: Struggle between self-centeredness and empathy. Tension between ego expression and spiritual connection. Synthesizing personal desires with compassion and intuition. Adjustment – incorporating creativity into acts of kindness, expressing spirituality through artistic endeavors.
Virgo/Aquarius: Struggle to reconcile practicality with eccentricity. Tension between attention to detail and detachment. Synthesizing critical analysis with the need for innovation and individuality. Adjustment – applying practicality to forward-thinking ideas, serving humanity through systematic approaches.
Libra/Pisces: Struggle between harmony and idealism. Tension between diplomacy and emotional sensitivity. Synthesizing the need for balance with the desire for transcendence and escapism. Adjustment – creating beauty in acts of compassion, fostering harmony through spiritual connections.

THE QUINCUNX BY CHART POINTS

The Sun inconjunct
Ascendant: Difficulty in expressing authentic self to the world. Inner conflict between consciousness and outward presentation. Tension between personal identity and social image. Adjusting self awareness and self image.
Midheaven: Struggle to align consciousness with career goals and aspirations. Inner conflict between self-expression and public image. Tension between personal identity and professional expectations. Adjusting how we shine in public life.
Moon: Inner conflict between conscious identity and emotional needs. Tension between ego expression and instinctual reactions, difficulty integrating personal desires with subconscious patterns. Adjusting our inner being, becoming more comfortable with who we are.
Mercury: Impossible.
Venus: Impossible.
Mars: Struggle between assertion and identity. Inner conflict between commanding expression and assertiveness. Tension between personal drive and external actions. Adjusting the expression of wants and desires, learning to be less dominating.
Jupiter: Inner conflict between consciousness and expansion. Tension between individual identity and philosophical beliefs. Difficulty reconciling personal goals with broader perspectives. Adjusting our beliefs about ourselves and life in general.
Saturn: Struggle between self-expression and responsibility. Inner conflict between ego and limitations. Tension between personal ambitions and societal expectations. Adjusting our attude to setbacks and learning to be less rigid with rule sets.
Chiron: Wounds to consciousness expression and identity. Inner conflict between self-confidence and insecurities. Tension between individual authenticity and woundedness. Adjusting our attitude to healing and/or teaching.
Uranus: Struggle between consciousness and liberation. Inner conflict between personal expression and rebellion. Tension between self-assurance and unpredictability. Adjustment to our need for freedom.
Neptune: Confusion between individual being and spiritual awareness. Inner conflict between identity and illusion. Tension between personal clarity and nebulousness. Adjustments in how we imagine ourselves to be and how we imagine things.
Pluto: Struggle between ego and transformation. Inner conflict between personal power and control. Tension between identity and unconscious forces. Adjustments in how powerful we feel ourselves to be.
Dragon’s Head (North Node): Challenges in aligning consciousness with life purpose. Inner conflict between personal desires and karmic growth. Tension between individual identity and collective destiny. Adjustments in what we are seeking to become.
Dragons Tail (South Node): Struggle to integrate past patterns with present identity. Inner conflict between consciousness and karmic necessities. Tension between personal ambitions and past influences. Adjustment in who we think we have been and what we have been through.
Eris: Struggle to integrate chaos or disruption with conscious identity. Tension between discord and self-expression. Adjusting goals and ambitions to navigate disruptive energies.

Inconjuncts of the Moon
Ascendant: Difficulty in expressing soul needs to the world. Inner conflict between nurturing instincts and outward presentation. Tension between emotional security and social image. Adjusting the way we see and project ourselves personally.
Midheaven: Struggle to align soul needs with career goals and aspirations. Inner conflict between nurturing instincts and professional image. Tension between emotional security and public expectations. Adjusting the way we feel about our role in public life.
Mercury: Struggle to balance the souls instincts with rational thought processes. Tension between feelings and communication style. Adjusting verbal or written expression to reflect inner landscape.
Venus: Striving to harmonize soul needs with relationship dynamics. Tension between nurturing instincts and social harmony. Adjusting habitual responses to foster healthier relationships.
Mars: Struggle between inner reactions and assertiveness. Internal conflict between nurturing instincts and aggression. Tension between emotional needs and external actions. Adjustment to our personal desires and how we seek their satisfaction.
Jupiter: Conflict between soul needs and expansion. Inner tension between nurturing instincts and philosophical beliefs. Difficulty reconciling emotional needs with broader perspectives. Adjustments to the level of faith we have in ourselves personally.
Saturn: Struggle between soul needs and responsibility or authorities. Inner conflict between nurturing instincts and limitations. Tension between emotional security and societal expectations. Adjusting personal boundaries and rules.
Chiron: Wounds to emotional security and nurturing instincts. Inner conflict between emotional vulnerability and healing. Tension between emotional needs and inner wounds. Adjustment to what we perceive as needing healing in our personal experience.
Uranus: Struggle between emotional stability and individuality. Inner conflict between nurturing instincts and rebellion. Tension between emotional security and unpredictability. Adjusting the need for personal freedoms.
Neptune: Confusion between instinctive needs and spiritual awareness. Inner conflict between nurturing instincts and illusions. Tension between emotional security and nebulousness. Adjusting personal idealism and the tendency to dream or fantasize.
Pluto: Struggle between soul needs and transformation. Inner conflict between nurturing instincts and power dynamics. Tension between emotional security and unconscious forces. Adjustments to the way we fixate or obsess on things.
Dragons Head: Challenges in aligning internal needs with life purpose. Inner conflict between nurturing instincts and karmic growth. Tension between emotional security and collective destiny. Adjusting the attitude we have to personal development or the way we give meaning to things.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to integrate past emotional patterns with present needs. Inner conflict between nurturing instincts and karmic obligation. Tension between emotional security and past influences. Adjusting the way we give significance to the past.
Eris: Difficulty reconciling emotional upheaval or chaos with nurturing instincts. Tension between discord and emotional security. Adjusting emotional responses to navigate disruptive energies.

Inconjuncts of Mercury
Ascendant: Difficulty in expressing thoughts or ideas to others. Tension between personal communication style and social presentation. Adjusting communication to align with self-image or public perception.
Midheaven: Struggle to integrate career goals with communication style. Tension between professional aspirations and mental processes. Adjusting communication to achieve success in public or professional life.
Venus: Impossible.
Mars: Conflict between intellect and action. Tension between thought processes and assertiveness. Adjusting communication to avoid aggression or impulsivity.
Jupiter: Struggle between detail-oriented thinking and expansive ideas. Tension between facts and beliefs. Adjusting communication to balance skepticism with optimism.
Saturn: Difficulty in expressing ideas due to self-doubt or criticism. Tension between mental flexibility and structured thinking. Adjusting communication to navigate authority or limitations.
Chiron: Wounds to communication or learning abilities. Tension between logical thinking and inner wounds. Adjusting communication to address vulnerabilities or insecurities
Uranus: Struggle to integrate routine with spontaneity in thinking. Tension between logical processes and unconventional ideas. Adjusting communication to accommodate sudden changes or disruptions.
Neptune: Confusion or misunderstandings in communication. Tension between logical thinking and intuition. Adjusting communication to discern reality from illusion.
Pluto: Struggle to express thoughts due to power dynamics or intensity. Tension between superficial understanding and deeper insights. Adjusting communication to navigate psychological complexities or hidden agendas.
Dragons Head: Challenges in aligning thoughts with karmic growth. Tension between logical processes and destiny. Adjusting communication to pursue life purpose or evolutionary path.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to integrate past patterns with current thinking. Tension between intellectual pursuits and past influences. Adjusting communication to release outdated beliefs or mental habits.
Eris: Conflict between disruptive thoughts or communication style. Tension between chaos and analytical thinking. Adjusting communication to navigate disruptive energies.

Inconjuncts of Venus
Ascendant: Difficulty in expressing affection or charm to others. Tension between personal values and social presentation. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to align with public image.
Midheaven: Struggle to balance career aspirations with relationship needs. Tension between personal desires and professional obligations. Adjusting priorities to accommodate both personal and public life.
Mars: Conflict between desires for harmony and assertiveness. Tension between love and passion. Adjusting romantic expression to balance sensitivity with intensity.
Jupiter: Struggle to reconcile idealism with practicality in relationships. Tension between romantic expectations and reality. Adjusting values and beliefs to align with relationship dynamics.
Saturn: Difficulty in expressing affection or receiving love due to barriers. Tension between desires for stability and fears of rejection. Adjusting relationship expectations to accommodate responsibilities
Chiron: Wounds to self-esteem or worthiness in relationships. Tension between desires for love and fears of vulnerability. Adjusting relationship dynamics to address insecurities or past hurts.
Uranus: Struggle to balance freedom and commitment in relationships. Tension between desires for independence and intimacy. Adjusting values and expectations to accommodate sudden changes.
Neptune: Confusion or disillusionment in romantic relationships. Tension between fantasy and reality in matters of love. Adjusting perceptions and boundaries to discern genuine connections.
Pluto: Struggle to navigate power dynamics or control issues in relationships. Tension between desires for intimacy and fears of manipulation. Adjusting boundaries and trust levels to promote healthy connections.
Dragons Head: Challenges in aligning relationship dynamics with karmic growth. Tension between desires for harmony and evolutionary needs. Adjusting values and behaviors to support soul growth.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release past relationship patterns that hinder growth. Tension between comfort and progress in matters of love. Adjusting relationship dynamics to overcome old habits.
Eris: Struggle to reconcile chaos or disruption with relationship dynamics. Tension between discord and harmony. Adjusting values and boundaries to navigate disruptive energies in partnerships.

Inconjuncts of Mars
Ascendant: Difficulty in asserting oneself or taking initiative. Tension between personal desires and social presentation. Adjusting actions and behaviors to align with self-image.
Midheaven: Struggle to balance career aspirations with assertive actions. Tension between personal goals and professional obligations. Adjusting actions and strategies to achieve success in public life.
Jupiter: Struggle to reconcile assertiveness with philosophical beliefs. Tension between personal desires and ethical considerations. Adjusting actions and goals to align with broader perspectives.
Saturn: Difficulty in expressing assertiveness due to self-doubt or criticism. Tension between ambition and limitations. Adjusting actions and strategies to navigate obstacles.
Chiron: Wounds to assertiveness or independence. Tension between personal desires and insecurities. Adjusting actions and behaviors to address vulnerabilities.
Uranus: Struggle to balance impulsivity with unpredictability. Tension between assertiveness and rebellion. Adjusting actions and energy to accommodate sudden changes.
Neptune: Confusion or disillusionment in assertive pursuits. Tension between aggression and intuition. Adjusting actions and goals to discern reality from illusion.
Pluto: Struggle to navigate power dynamics or control issues. Tension between assertiveness and manipulation. Adjusting actions and behaviors to promote empowerment.
Dragons Head: Challenges in aligning assertiveness with karmic growth. Tension between personal desires and evolutionary needs. Adjusting actions and goals to support soul growth.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release past patterns of aggression or conflict. Tension between assertiveness and comfort zones. Adjusting actions and behaviors to overcome old habits.
Eris: Difficulty asserting oneself amidst chaos or conflict. Tension between discord and assertiveness. Adjusting actions and strategies to navigate disruptive energies.

Inconjuncts of Jupiter
Ascendant: Difficulty in expressing optimism or faith to others. Tension between personal beliefs and social presentation. Adjusting beliefs and attitudes to align with self-image.
Midheaven: Struggle to balance career aspirations with philosophical beliefs. Tension between personal goals and professional obligations. Adjusting beliefs and perspectives to achieve success in public life.
Saturn: Difficulty in integrating optimism with responsibilities. Tension between expansion and limitations. Adjusting beliefs and goals to navigate obstacles.
Chiron: Wounds to faith or beliefs in personal growth. Tension between optimism and insecurities. Adjusting beliefs and perspectives to address vulnerabilities.
Uranus: Struggle to balance optimism with unpredictability. Tension between expansion and rebellion. Adjusting beliefs and goals to accommodate sudden changes.
Neptune: Confusion or disillusionment in belief systems. Tension between faith and skepticism. Adjusting beliefs and perspectives to discern reality from illusion.
Pluto: Struggle to navigate power dynamics or control issues. Tension between expansion and manipulation. Adjusting beliefs and goals to promote empowerment
Dragons Head: Challenges in aligning optimism with karmic growth. Tension between expansion and evolutionary needs. Adjusting beliefs and perspectives to support soul growth.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release past patterns of optimism or overindulgence. Tension between expansion and comfort zones. Adjusting beliefs and goals to overcome old habits.
Eris: Struggle to integrate chaos or disruption with beliefs. Tension between discord and expansion. Adjusting beliefs and goals to navigate disruptive energies.

Inconjuncts of Saturn
Ascendant: Difficulty in expressing authority or discipline to others. Tension between personal responsibilities and social presentation. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to align with self-image.
Midheaven: Struggle to balance career aspirations with practical considerations. Tension between personal goals and professional obligations. Adjusting ambitions and strategies to achieve success in public life.
Chiron: Wounds to self-discipline or self-worth. Tension between responsibilities and insecurities. Adjusting goals and boundaries to address vulnerabilities.
Uranus: Struggle to balance stability with unpredictability. Tension between tradition and rebellion. Adjusting routines and structures to accommodate sudden changes.
Neptune: Confusion or disillusionment in long-term goals or ambitions. Tension between practicality and idealism. Adjusting aspirations and boundaries to discern reality from illusion.
Pluto: Struggle to navigate power dynamics or control issues. Tension between responsibilities and intensity. Adjusting goals and strategies to promote empowerment.
Dragons Head: Challenges in aligning responsibilities with karmic growth. Tension between structure and evolutionary needs. Adjusting goals and boundaries to support soul growth.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release past patterns of control or restriction. Tension between stability and comfort zones. Adjusting goals and boundaries to overcome old habits.
Eris: Confusion or power struggles in integrating chaos with responsibilities. Tension between discord and practicality. Adjusting routines and structures to navigate disruptive energies.

Inconjuncts of Chiron
Ascendant: Difficulty expressing woundedness or healing journey to others. Tension between healing and social presentation. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to align with inner healing.
Midheaven: Struggle to integrate woundedness with career aspirations. Tension between healing and public image. Adjusting ambitions and strategies to achieve healing in public life.
Uranus: Difficulty reconciling woundedness with individuality or rebellion. Tension between healing and freedom. Adjusting routines and structures to accommodate inner wounds.
Neptune: Confusion or disillusionment in healing or spiritual journey. Tension between healing and idealism. Adjusting aspirations and boundaries to address inner wounds.
Pluto: Struggle to navigate deep psychological wounds or power dynamics. Tension between healing and intensity. Adjusting goals and strategies to promote empowerment.
Dragons Head: Difficulty aligning woundedness with karmic growth. Tension between healing and evolutionary needs. Adjusting goals and strategies to support healing and soul growth.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release old wounds or patterns. Tension between healing and past obligations. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to overcome old wounds and habits.
Eris: Struggle to address discord or chaos within the healing journey. Tension between healing and disruption. Adjusting structures and boundaries to manage discordant energies within healing processes.

Inconjuncts of Uranus
Ascendant: Difficulty expressing individuality or sudden changes to others. Tension between independence and social presentation. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to align with personal freedom.
Midheaven: Struggle to integrate individuality with career aspirations. Tension between rebellion and public image. Adjusting ambitions and strategies to achieve personal freedom in public life.
Neptune: Confusion or disillusionment in integrating individuality with spirituality. Tension between independence and idealism. Adjusting aspirations and boundaries to accommodate personal freedom.
Pluto: Struggle to navigate power dynamics or intense changes. Tension between independence and intensity. Adjusting goals and strategies to promote personal freedom.
Dragons Head: Difficulty aligning personal freedom with karmic growth. Tension between rebellion and evolutionary needs. Adjusting goals and strategies to support personal freedom and soul growth.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release old patterns or obligations. Tension between independence and past influences. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to overcome old habits and restrictions.
Eris: Struggle to address discord or chaos within personal freedom. Tension between independence and disruption. Adjusting structures and boundaries to manage discordant energies within personal freedom.

Inconjuncts of Neptune
Ascendant: Difficulty expressing spiritual or idealized aspects to others. Tension between inspiration and social presentation. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to align with spiritual beliefs.
Midheaven: Struggle to integrate spiritual aspirations with career aspirations. Tension between transcendence and public image. Adjusting ambitions and strategies to achieve spiritual fulfillment in public life.
Pluto: Confusion or disillusionment in navigating deep psychological processes or power dynamics. Tension between transcendence and intensity. Adjusting goals and strategies to discern truth from deception.
Dragons Head: Difficulty aligning spiritual aspirations with karmic growth. Tension between transcendence and evolutionary needs. Adjusting goals and strategies to support spiritual growth and soul evolution.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release old patterns or delusions. Tension between transcendence and past influences. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to overcome illusions and embrace spiritual growth.
Eris: Struggle to address discord or chaos within spirituality or illusions. Tension between transcendence and disruption. Adjusting structures and boundaries to manage discordant energies within spiritual pursuits.

Inconjuncts of Pluto
Ascendant: Difficulty expressing intensity or deep transformation to others. Tension between control and social presentation. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to align with transformative experiences.
Midheaven: Struggle to integrate intense transformation with career aspirations. Tension between control and public image. Adjusting ambitions and strategies to achieve success in public life amidst intense transformation.
Dragons Head: Difficulty aligning intense transformation with karmic growth. Tension between control and evolutionary needs. Adjusting goals and strategies to support deep psychological processes and soul evolution.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release old patterns or power struggles. Tension between control and past influences. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to overcome old habits and embrace intense transformation.
Eris: Struggle to address discord or chaos within power dynamics or intense transformation. Tension between control and disruption. Adjusting structures and boundaries to manage discordant energies within deep psychological processes.

Inconjuncts of Eris
Ascendant: Difficulty expressing chaotic energies or disruption to others. Tension between discord and social presentation. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to align with disruptive experiences.
Midheaven: Struggle to integrate chaos or disruption with career aspirations. Tension between discord and public image. Adjusting ambitions and strategies to achieve success in public life amidst disruptive energies.
Dragons Head: Difficulty aligning chaotic energies with karmic growth. Tension between discord and evolutionary needs. Adjusting goals and strategies to support growth amidst disruptive energies.
Dragons Tail: Struggle to release old patterns amidst chaos or disruption. Tension between discord and past influences. Adjusting behaviors and attitudes to overcome old habits amidst disruptive energies.

Inconjuncts of the Dragons Head
Ascendant: Striving to integrate future-oriented growth with personal identity. Tension between evolving life path and self-image. Adjusting personal goals to align with soul’s evolution.
Midheaven: Struggle to harmonize career ambitions with spiritual growth. Tension between public image and soul’s purpose. Adjusting career path to align with destiny.

Inconjuncts of the Dragons Tail
Ascendant: Striving to release past patterns while maintaining self-identity. Tension between ingrained habits and evolving self-image. Adjusting self-perception to break free from past influences.
Midheaven: Struggle to let go of past achievements for spiritual growth. Tension between legacy and karmic evolution. Adjusting ambitions to release attachments to past accomplishments.

Inconjuncts of the Chart Angles
Ascendant inconjunct Midheaven: Striving to integrate personal identity with professional aspirations. Tension between self-expression and career goals. Adjusting life path to harmonize with self-image and career aspirations.

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Using these guidelines you should be able to get going on interpreting the inconjuncts in your own chart and then in other charts. I hope you will discover many fascinating things on your journeys! Thank you for reading and if you would like to support this journal and receive a monthly forecast from me, come join all the Patrons at the 5 dollar or more per month tier on Patreon.

On Solar Arc Directions

Greetings, and welcome back to Journeys and 2024!

This month I’m going to talk about a technique I do not use very much but have always found to be accurate when I do. Solar arc directions are a simpler alternative to secondary progressions, which I have described in my book “The 26 Keys” and in this journal. They offer some additional ways to work with the slower moving planets from Jupiter out as well as the ascendant and midheaven (which are quite difficult to progress by comparison) and from an interpretive standpoint they may be useful for those astrologers who are interested in being able to forecast external events or chapters which are literally plotted to occur in the course of a life in a certain sequence. In this journey I will introduce you to the technique and focus on what I think are the key elements of the method.

Development of Solar Arc Directions

Solar arc directions are a more recent development in astrology but the techniques from which they derive – progressions and directions – have been part of astrological techniques for a long time. One of the prominent figures associated with these concepts is Claudius Ptolemy, who lived in the 2nd century AD, but he is drawing from far earlier sources which we have partly lost. Ptolemy’s work, particularly his book “Tetrabiblos,” laid the foundation for many astrological concepts, and in it he discussed the idea of a day-for-a-year symbolic movement of celestial bodies. The development and usage of solar arc directions as a modern method derived from these ancient techniques. Alfred Witte, the founder of the Uranian astrology system, began developing his astrological theories in the early 20th century. Witte’s work on Uranian astrology, which included the concept of solar arcs, gained prominence in the 1920s and 1930s. Witte and his collaborator Friedrich Sieggrün played pivotal roles in formulating and promoting the technique. The first edition of Witte’s book “Regelwerk für Planetenbilder” (“Rulebook for Planetary Pictures”) was published in 1928. This work laid out the foundation of the Uranian system which included concepts like midpoints and solar arc directions.

Witte continued to refine and expand his system until his death in 1943. After his passing, astrologers like Reinhold Ebertin – a German astrologer and student of Alfred Witte – further developed and popularized Uranian astrology, incorporating solar arc directions into the broader context of astrological practice. While Witte introduced the concept of solar arc directions within Uranian astrology, Ebertin made additional contributions to the technique. He worked on refining and expanding the system, offering practitioners more insights into the use of solar arcs in predictive astrology. Ebertin’s work helped bridge the gap between Witte’s original ideas and the broader astrological community, making Uranian astrology, along with techniques like solar arc directions, more accessible and integrated into astrological practice. Astrologers such as Alan Leo, Charles Carter and Noel Tyl (among many others) made further contributions to the development and popularization of solar arc directions during the later parts of the 20th century, making it a truly collaborative (Uranian) effort among modern astrologers.

What are Solar Arc Directions?

The first thing to address here is the difference between solar arc directions and progressions. These terminologies are sometimes used interchangeably which results in no little confusion among astrologers, especially those beginning to learn the craft. A secondary progression moves the planets in your natal chart according to their positions in an ephemeris on the days following your birth, following the idea that each day is representative of one year. For example, a progression of your natal Moon for the 5th year of your life is calculated from the position of the Moon on the 5th day after your birth. The planets effectively progress themselves into new signs or houses as time goes by, altering their natal expression for a temporal period. There are other methods of progression (as the term secondary would imply) which use a different rate for progression – primary directions are based not on the one day equals one year formula but on a four minutes equals one year formula. Roughly every 4 minute period after birth – which is the time needed for the ascendant and midheaven to progress by 1 degree – is equivalent to one year in a person’s life. This method is used to progress the midheaven and ascendant and when they conjunct or otherwise aspect natal chart placements or move into new signs or houses/temples, they symbolize events related to those natal placements, signs and temples. Tertiary progressions work on the principle that one day after birth equals one lunar month of life. Other systems of progression exist. Most astrologers use secondary progressions in the modern era. This might be because it is more effective but it is more likely that it is just the one taught more frequently.

By contrast, a direction moves a planet a set number of degrees, an arc, this arc being determined from the progression of another object. For example, the most common form of direction, solar arc direction (sometimes called solar arc progression as per the confusion mentioned above), moves every object in the chart the same distance as the progressed Sun moves. If your Sun has moved 5° on by secondary progression then by solar arc direction every single object, including the angles, are moved on exactly 5°. Since the secondary progressed motion of the Sun is more or less approximately fixed at 1° of movement through the zodiac per day (it is actually slightly more) it’s a simple matter to make a rough calculation by just converting the age of the person concerned, or the age that you are forecasting for, into zodiac degrees and then adding that number of degrees to everything in the chart:

First year of life (0 to 1 years of age): move everything on 1°
Second year of life (1 to 2 years of age): move everything on 2°

Etc.

Note that the first year of life is from 0 to 1. This means if you are currently 36 years old you want to move everything on about 37° because this is your 37th year, or if you want to see the directions for when you were 16 years old you need to direct everything by 17°. This is about the only kink in the system that you need to remember. If you can add up and know how to work with the way that signs of the zodiac are divided (into 12 signs of 30° each in a specific order) then you can actually work solar arc directions out in your head while looking at a chart, something you can’t do with secondary progressions (or any kind of progression) with the same ease. This makes solar arc directions a more attractive system for teaching to newer students of astrology since secondary progressions can be very off-putting in their abstractions. However, the 1° measurement is an approximation which means there will be some variance and the years you arrive at may be off by one or two years.

Differences between Progressions and Solar Arc Directions

One of the major differences between these two methods is that solar arc direction allows us to work with the slower moving planets from Jupiter out as if they were progressing. These planets do not move very far via secondary progression – even 90 days after you are born, which is symbolic of your 91st year of life, Neptune will hardly have moved at all from its natal position. There is no scope for it to undergo any major progression in life. By contrast, solar arc directions will move that natal Neptune three entire signs forward in the zodiac, meaning it will have a scope that encompasses a quarter of the chart. This will not only give it access to other signs and temples by direction but also to a larger number of aspects since it will oppose everything and square everything as well as conjoin everything, trine everything and sextile everything that it can within that scope.

Secondly, it is easier to figure out the directions for the ascendant and the midheaven compared to figuring out the progressions for these angles. The method is exactly the same, just add the relevant arc, the number of degrees the progressed Sun has moved since birth, to the natal ascendant and midheaven. By contrast to figure out the secondary progressed ascendant and midheaven you have to proceed according to more complex calculations and there are multiple ways to do this with no accepted standard method.

Thirdly, using secondary progressions planets obey their own rules of motion but under solar arc directions they are literally under the direction of the solar principle and must behave accordingly. In practice one of the things that this means is that because solar arc directions are all based on the arc of the secondary progressed Sun being added to all other points in the chart there is no difference between the solar arc Sun and the secondary progressed Sun. They are the same thing. This is actually a telling and intriguing detail which helps with interpretation, see below – the implication is that the Sun is a creative manifestor, that the universal power of creation flows through it since the psychic, interior consciousness (secondary progressed Sun, our inner being) is the same thing as what is manifesting in our outer life experience (solar arc directed Sun, our outer being). Another practical effect of this tethering to the solar principle is that the planets lose their ability to go retrograde, something they retain under the system with secondary progression. For example, you might have a natal Mercury that is retrograde in the early degrees of Libra and a week after you are born it has retrograded back into the sign of Virgo. This means that by secondary progression it has managed to find itself in Virgo for your 8th year, but this is something that could never happen under solar arc directions. The Sun is never retrograde and only goes forwards and every object in the chart is moved forward similarly, even if it is natally in retrograde. So a week after you are born (seven days) Mercury by solar arc is 7° forward of where it is placed in your natal chart, deeper into Libra. We disregard the behavioral movement of Mercury entirely and just move it the same steady rate as the Sun. This also neutralizes its capacity to be either slow or fast in speed, much like Neptune’s capacity to be slow was neutralized through direction in the example above.

Like progressions it is best to use very tight, small orbs of influence for directions – 1° is best. This will not only give you more focused results, sieving each year of your life down to the most essential ingredients, it also resonates with the daily motion of the Sun which is directing things. It makes directions and progressions easier to work with than transits which can have quite varying orbs depending upon the aspect involved (sextiles tend to have smaller orbs than trines, for example) and the nature of the planets which are in aspect (the Sun and Moon tend to have the largest orbs, being luminaries whose light extends radiantly in a glow) but it also makes timing directions and progressions less precise because usually the closest you can get to timing a prediction is to say “it happens in this year or the year either side of this year”. In transits you can often be more precise in timing things but there is more work to do with the orbs of influence.

Guidelines for Initial Interpretation

The consensus in astrology for interpreting transits as opposed to progressions is that transits generally signify outer events that we must respond to while progressions signify psychological changes, but there is almost nothing said about the distinctions between transits and directions or progressions and solar arc directions as far as interpretation. I think the clue we have is that these are solar arc directions, meaning they are related to the solar principle, which is to say the development of conscious awareness. This makes directions strongly biographical, part of the life story. Metaphorically if you are a tree then transits are the weather and changing environment, progressions are the psychic growth or development of your interior landscape and directions are the events that happen to you, the birds that come to nest in your branches for a while. There is of course some overlap between these distinctions as we all know how the weather can impact our mood and psychological state and some of us also understand that psychological states and inner conditions, the interior landscape, causes a matching manifestation in the exterior world. It is not helpful to be too rigid with these distinctions but they do help students to comprehend the differences between the three techniques and to integrate them together if they wish. There is a lot of work to be done in this integrative astrology, a lot of territory for researchers to make their own.

The planet that is being directed (which we can call the promissor) has more power in the interpretation than the planet it is being directed to (called the significator). So, if your natal Sun is at 10° of Taurus and your natal Moon is at 20° Taurus, sometime around the age of 10 you will experience the solar arc direction of the Sun to the Moon, and the Sun will have some kind of power to affect your natal Moon through some kind of life event that you experience connected to Taurus (and whatever house is involved).

Moving everything on a large number of degrees as will happen in most cases and including all major aspects means that directions can generate a lot of data (which is why you need to vigorously sieve data with that 1° orb) so in the beginning I recommend that you restrict yourself to the following:

1) Direction of the Lights looking for conjunctions only.
2) Directions of the ascendant and midheaven looking for conjunctions only.
3) Directions of the chart ruler looking for conjunctions only.

In particular, note when these objects are directed to each other, i.e.

1) Look for when your Sun directs to your natal Moon, ascendant, midheaven or chart ruler.
2) Then when your Moon directs to the Sun, ascendant, midheaven or chart ruler
3) For when your ascendant is directed to the natal position of your Sun, Moon, midheaven or chart ruler
4) For when your midheaven is directed to the natal position of your ascendant, the Sun, Moon or chart ruler.
5) And finally, if your chart ruler is neither the Sun or the Moon (i.e. you are neither Leo or Cancer rising) then look for when the ruler of your chart (the ruler of the ascendant) is directed to the Sun, Moon, ascendant, or midheaven.

Again, only look for the conjunctions to begin with. This means it may not be possible for some of these conjunctions to happen in the course of your life. It all depends on the exact placement of the objects in your birth chart. Take note of the conjunctions that do occur for this reason because they are important ones. Look at the directions you have already experienced and begin your interpretations based on those, using the past events you know about to calibrate your interpretation.

After this, consider the movement of these directions through the 12 temples of your chart, paying particular attention to the 4th and 7th houses (the other angles), as the power of angular houses of the chart always produce stronger effects. When either of the Lights or the chart ruler directs into a new house there is an effect that causes us to focus on that house because things are going down in that part of our life and this will be ongoing for some years. For example if your Sun directs into the 2nd temple then money and resources and your income power become part of the themes of life events for that year, but those themes while being strong in that particular year or two will continue to develop while the Sun directs through your 2nd temple and the focus created will only shift once it is directed to about 1° away from your 3rd temple. So this delineates a longer phase of many years with an overall 2nd house theme highlighted by the Sun. If you have natal planets in your 2nd temple then the eventual direction of the Sun to those natal planets will cause major events related to those planets and the Sun as well as the 2nd house and the sign involved. Overall there will be a 2nd house ‘phase’, a chapter in your life that is ongoing for many years but which has important events, ‘happenings’ of 1-3 years, seeded into it for specific periods. For example, if you have Venus in Libra in that 2nd house you might enter into a new relationship that improves your finances when the Sun is directed to it.

With the ascendant and midheaven moving into different signs there is also the technique of including the house that is traditionally ruled by that sign in the interpretation, for example if your ascendant directs itself into Capricorn then you would consider the meanings of the 10th house in your interpretation because Capricorn is the traditional and natural sign of the 10th house (because it is the 10th sign of the zodiac). Some astrologers may also take into account the natal house placement, for example that your ascendant has directed itself into the 3rd house of your natal chart as well as Capricorn, and they would include the themes of both the 10th house and the 3rd house. However, the traditional approach, associating the directed angle with the house naturally ruled by its corresponding zodiac sign, is widely used in astrological practice (for reasons that will become clear later).

Generally we use the same rules here as we do when interpreting a natal chart (Mercury is the mind, etc.) but we must always remember that the natal position of a planet and the natal matrix is always dominant. It doesn’t go away because of directions, progressions or transits, it is only modified by them and importantly different individuals have a different capacity with different influences (if the person is very sober and Saturnine by nature then a big influence involving Jupiter will not affect them so strongly). Always use the birth chart or natal chart as the context around which you interpret these events. Do not expect strong effects from an object that is not strongly placed in the natal chart. If your midheaven directs itself to conjunct Jupiter it behaves very differently if your natal midheaven is conjunct Venus than if your natal midheaven is square Saturn.

Adding Other Planets

Next I would recommend that you add all of the other planets including the nodes, but still limiting your studies to conjunctions by these directions and in particular conjunctions to the objects you worked with above, the Lights, ascendant, midheaven and chart ruler. After that, look up the directions of these planets to the houses as described previously, for example note which houses Mercury directs through, when it enters and leaves them, and when it conjuncts any natal planets there by 1°. Unless you are only looking at a single year of your life and not trying to map out the entire thing at this point you may feel that you are really wading into the bushes as even only considering conjunctions you will have a massive amount of information to interpret. For this reason I recommend you use these basic interpretive guidelines for solar arc planets as activators of your natal objects, which will help you focus and narrow down your interpretation of what kinds of happening and events each brings:

Solar Arc Ascendant
These are often major influences but the birth time must be highly accurate as an error of just a minute or two can shift solar arcs of the ascendant off by an equivalent number of years. This makes the solar arc ascendant useful in rectifying birth times (if the majority of events you experience that match the solar arc ascendant are earlier or later then it means that your birth time is also earlier or later and if the discrepancy is consistent – for example the dates are always about 4 years too late – it means the ascendant is about 4° off from the one being used). Obviously the ascendant will direct through the temples in order, and after 90 days it will only have made it so far – depending on house systems and cusps it may reach into the 4th or 5th temples by solar arc by the time we are 90 years old. This is interesting because it means that we all experience the same order of solar arc directions of our ascendant through the temples – it moves through the 1st, then the 2nd, and so on, and that it only reaches so far (it never makes it to the 9th temple, for example).

The solar arc ascendant dodges this restriction and individualizes itself in two major ways – first by using the method described above where the sign that the ascendant is in is related to the house that sign naturally rules in the zodiac (the 11th for Aquarius, etc.). Second, by making aspects (especially conjunctions) with natal planets that have house rulerships assigned to them through the natal chart itself (for example if the Sun rules your 9th house because you have Leo on the 9th house and the solar arc ascendant aspects the natal Sun, it is then able to manifest 9th house themes as happenings regardless of where the directed ascendant itself is).

As it directs through the chart we can expect events and happenings that cause us to change the way we present ourselves to the world, encounters which impact our personal identity and self-image, new beginnings and self-presentation related to the new sign, changes in our bodily appearance or how others energetically perceive you and the initiating of new projects or relationships. As it reaches natal chart objects we will see events which cause us to incorporate that natal planets or signs meaning into our self projection and self-awareness more completely and directly.

Solar Arc Midheaven (MC)
Again these are major influences but the birth time must be highly accurate for timing to be precise. The midheaven has the same restrictions as far as the temples are concerned except that it begins from (usually) the cusp of the 10th house and moves to the 11th, 12th, and then the 1st and maybe the 2nd in a lifetime. It dodges this restriction in the same way as the solar arc ascendant does. It’s worth noting here as well that since the angles are an interconnected quartet it’s always possible for directions of the ascendant and midheaven to manifest 7th house and 4th house themes as well.

As the MC is solar arc directed through the chart we can expect events and happenings that cause us to change our career trajectory and public image, what we hold up as important and worth striving towards, in our public status (achievements and recognition) and overall shifts in life direction or purpose. As it reaches natal chart objects we will incorporate the meaning and significance of that natal chart object into our goals, we will encounter something from its themes that calls us to pursue it as an ambition of some kind.

Solar Arc Sun
As noted above there is no difference between the solar arc Sun and the secondary progressed Sun. This implies that the Sun is the conduit that manifests consciousness as external experience. It turns the light of consciousness into material manifestations. Here we are in the workshop of some of the core mechanisms of fate and character and we see how they are intertwined together.

Solar arc directions of the Sun through temples which are different to its natal temple signify a broadening of our awareness of life into the themes of the new temple. This can be quite a dramatic and colourful event, especially if it coincides with the solar arc Sun making some kind of aspect to the natal chart. For example, if your natal Sun moves by solar arc direction into the 9th temple and you have Jupiter conjunct the 9th temple cusp you may find a guru who teaches you something enlightening and brightly illuminating that completely changes your life for the better. Basically, when the Sun connects with the natal chart it has a powerful enlivening effect that can produce very commanding results. This isn’t always a pleasant experience – squares and oppositions from the solar arc directed Sun can for example be scorching and burning, figuratively and sometimes even literally. We have to remember that the Sun is a giant, blinding thermo-nuclear inferno. It also tends to dry things up, leading to experiences where emotions are less of a factor. In general, expect to see events that affect or involve your vitality and energy, life direction and purpose, leadership and recognition – things that put a huge and obvious glowing spotlight on or vividly animate whatever the Sun is directed to.

Solar Arc Moon
Solar arc directions of the Moon are related to experiences which help us find a way to more radiantly and brilliantly express our natal Moon qualities. They can be mysterious because they relate to our instincts of the invisible worlds (thus can also be very important for mystical and magical paths) and in early years can be related to happenings involving our home, mother or female guardian (the solar arc Sun can also signify this for our father figures). As it moves through the temples we start to look for sources of comfort in different areas of life and as it moves through signs we look for different kinds of comfort and experience different forms of nurturing. When it reaches a natal planet our instinct for that planets energy leads us to sense its presence in everyday life. Primarily though we expect events which bring about emotional development and changes, happenings in family and home life, the development of inner feelings and instincts and our nurturing and protective qualities.

Solar Arc Mercury
Solar arc directions of Mercury are learning experiences, significant books or messages, powerful experiences involving communication, important tests and paperwork, events which provide us with knowledge and information as well as instruction and training. They can also manifest as changes in the spaces and places we move through as well as journeys we make. Our first car, a major exam or application for a job, for example, can be connected to the solar arc direction of Mercury. As it moves through the temples we awaken a hunger to study or train new things, as it moves through signs we take different approaches to learning and communicating and as it reaches natal objects by aspect it brings about situations which cause us to think about the meaning of those planets more often and deeply. In general the solar arc directions of Mercury bring happenings involving more mental activity and communication, learning and education, information processing and decision-making, travel, business, contracts and networking.

Solar Arc Venus
These solar arc directions bring about emotive events that shift our own capacity to feel. They are new relationships, new things that we fall in love with, happenings that have strong emotional dimensions, sexual encounters and shifts in sexuality, important interactions with feminine energy and with muses, significant parties and social gatherings. As she moves through the temples the solar arc Venus arouses interest and brings pleasure from different areas of life, as she moves through the signs she finds new kinds of emotions to feel and as she makes contact with natal objects by aspect she activates and manifests as experience in the material world how we feel about those natal planets. In general look for events and life experiences which involve relationships and social interactions, love, romance, and aesthetics, personal contentment and satisfaction or creativity and artistic pursuits.

Solar Arc Mars
Solar arc Mars is about where we find challenge and something to prove ourselves over as well as experiences which awaken our need to follow our own desires and our own wishes. There is thrust, motivation and momentum to these influences which can feel encouraging or irritating depending upon how we handle it. Sometimes we will cross paths with a rival while in others we will be given a weapon or an empowerment with which to defend ourselves or to strike. As it moves through the temples the solar arc Mars produces something to fight for or against connected to the themes of the temple, new overarching desires to pursue, as it moves through signs it takes on different tactics and adds new tools to its arsenal and finds new ways to achieve its desires and as it aspects natal planets it lights fires which force them into action as events manifest around us which ignite their potential. It brings encounters which involve high energy, competition, struggle, assertiveness, drive, trials, action and initiative, conflict resolution or increased conflicts, physical activity and fitness/health.

Solar Arc Jupiter
Since we don’t see much movement from Jupiter by secondary progression this is how we can understand the more psychological and interior development of Jupiter as a principal. We can do this with transits or progressions of other planets to our natal Jupiter since these will always change our relationship to that natal Jupiter but with the solar arc direction of Jupiter itself we have more information to work with. The same is true of all the other objects considered below.

As Jupiter moves through the temples by solar arc direction it leads to experiences which lead to the formulation of belief systems about that area of experience and encounters with individuals who expand our awareness of that field of life. As it moves through the signs we encounter new ways to grow or more of those signs qualities show themselves to us in our experience. As it reaches or aspects a natal chart object it brings about happenings which make us more optimistic about that object or which lead us to be more wasteful of its potential. In general however we see expansion of opportunities, spiritual illumination, growth and abundance, higher learning and philosophical pursuits, luck and optimism as major themes in these events.

Solar Arc Saturn
The solar arc directions of Saturn are frequently hard going events but ultimately they are about experiences which help us to create healthy structures and boundaries in our life as well as an awareness of how things get done. This is somewhat different to the transits of Saturn – in my analogy earlier, transits of Saturn are the weather of Saturn (over which we have some control because we can alter our experience of it according to how well prepared we are for that weather) while the solar arc directed Saturn is more what we are fated to encounter at a locked in time as a mechanism which matures our relationship to Saturn. As it moves through the temples we find more effort is needed in certain areas of life, as it moves through the signs we experience different kinds of resistance or a lack of certain qualities around us and as it aspects natal objects it turns off the tap in that area for a temporary period – we experience a certain kind of necessity – so that we see how important it is to the structure of our lives and redesign it. In general Saturn by solar arc brings events which involve responsibilities and challenges, karmic events, extreme slowness, gradual improvement, boundary changes, structure and discipline, achievement and mastery, authority figures, career developments, sometimes illness or aging.

Solar Arc Chiron
These are healing experiences and sometimes result in events related to sickness and injury, either that of ourselves or other people. Sometimes they are also teaching experiences. As it moves through the temples we can experience the need to integrate that area of life more fully into our world, we see where our perception of life in that house is wounded and we start to look for ways to include it more, or we see ways to fix whatever we perceive to be broken there. Through the signs we find encounters with the healing potential of different zodiac signs and as it aspects natal objects we have experiences which enable us to integrate and heal those principles. The general themes in the happenings of these solar arc directions are healing and integration of past wounds, awareness of vulnerabilities and sensitivities, mentorship and guidance, transformation through acknowledging and addressing pain.

Solar Arc Uranus
The solar arc directions of Uranus are often exciting but chaotic happenings which involve surprises and unexpected events which cause us to become more spontaneous in response. They allow us to connect with networks and groups of people, to find connection in the wider society, involve new technologies shaping our experience and sudden shifts which change everything. As it moves through the houses it awakens the significations of a new area of life, as if we suddenly realise how fascinating and complex it is. As it moves through the signs we encounter events which reflect that sign in new ways and in forms that cause us to open our minds. As it makes aspects to natal objects it shakes them vigorously until their foundations collapse leading to events and happenings which manifest that object in completely new ways. Its overall themes are individuality and uniqueness, sudden changes or breakthroughs, innovation and unconventional experiences, independence and group activity.

Solar Arc Neptune
These directions are about spiritual and psychic development, expansion of consciousness, seeing through illusions and contact with the transcendent. They bring about mysteries and visions, struggles with addiction and immersion, compassion, sacrifice and dissolution. As it passes through the temples this Neptune brings about the events which cause us to lose our grip somewhat on that area of life as we must move beyond concrete form into pure essence in some way. It slowly refines and sifts through our experience of that field of life, dissolving many parts and leaving only what is pure, and we encounter many veils of reality as we gradually lift them from the house. As it moves through the signs it does a similar thing, bringing about experiences which cause us to encounter more transcendent dimensions of the sign, it’s more spiritual aspects, we have experience which makes us more sensitive to the sign in general. Making aspects to natal objects this Neptune makes it harder for us to be concrete in that area but at the same time infuses the object with some kind of vision, imaginative direction or calling. In general these directions bring happenings related to our imagination and creativity, spiritual insights and experiences, confusion or idealization, intuition and sensitivity.

Solar Arc Pluto
Solar arc Pluto is regenerative and revelatory as well as subterranean, it pulls things up from the underworld in order to purge them. It can involve experiences which reveal hidden wells of power within the soul of every human being, life or death struggles, mortality, extreme survival, resurrection, obsessions and infatuations, power and control. As it moves through the houses we encounter experiences which ramp up the intensity and profundity that the corresponding area of life provides. As it moves through the signs our transformative experience shifts, we start to draw different things up from the deep well in terms of what we see as the meaning of our experience. As it makes contact with natal planets or objects this Pluto unearths whatever is buried deeply within them and manifests them as an external experience for us to deal with. Its general themes are transformation and rebirth, power dynamics and control issues, deep psychological changes, intense and transformative experiences.

Solar Arc Eris
Eris is in Aries in the natal chart for practically everyone alive today so it’s solar arc direction into a new sign is somewhat universal – we all have her going into Taurus, then Gemini, then Cancer, etc. It’s just the timing of when this occurs according to where Eris is placed in Aries that matters, as well of course as our age (if you are 10 years old she is only 10° or so on from where she is natally, but if you are 60 she has moved two whole signs on). It’s therefore her movement through the temples that has more significance and personal relevance. Her movement through temples is probably connected to finding ways to stand on our own two feet in that area of life while her movement through signs is likely more connected with how we as a people are dealing with the need to dismantle our current way of being as a collective society. Her aspects to natal objects act to shake up that object in a way that is similar to Uranus but probably more extreme and with far less emphasis on the resulting freedom from bondage – Eris just wants to see things demolished for the joy of seeing vain egoic structures undermined. Similarly her effect is like that of Pluto but without the regenerative, purging and transformative qualities – Eris is instead about things needing to stay destroyed because she represents the balance that pure destruction plays in bringing low things that need removing. Her solar arc probably relates to this. General themes to expect here are disruption and chaos, awakening to inner discord or conflict, asserting individuality and standing up for oneself, agitations, stirring necessary change or controversy.

Solar Arc Dragons Head
These are important karmic events, like those of solar arc Saturn. These events are about experiences we need to have in order to move on in our spiritual evolution. They are important in the development of our soul and relate to the intentions we had before incarnation in the physical. The Dragon by solar arc through the houses furnishes us with experiences in the form of events that map out an evolutionary pathway of development for our soul. Through the signs it triggers different impulses within the soul via encounters with different spiritual callings. As it makes aspects to natal objects it brings that object into alignment with our spiritual intentions for this life and incarnation. Its general themes are happenings related to our life path and purpose, opportunities for growth and development, meeting significant people or engaging in transformative experiences, moving toward fulfilling one’s potential.

Solar Arc Dragons Tail
Also important karmic events, the solar arc directions of the Dragons Tail are more similar to the solar arc Saturn than the Dragons Head is (which is actually a bit more like Jupiter by solar arc). These happenings are manifestations of past lives and express any patterns that we need to let go of from those times and experiences. They can be haunting for this reason, as if we have been there before countless times. As it moves through the temples the solar arc Tail presents us with happenings that reflect or reproduce in some way our past life experience with that house and as it moves through signs we can have experiences that are re-enactments of memories connected to past lives lived as that sign or in connection with it. In aspects to natal objects the karma and past life content of that natal object comes into play and shows itself in some kind of event. The general themes are past influences and habits, lessons from past experiences, releasing or moving away from certain patterns, navigating challenges related to past behaviors.

Adding the other aspects

Finally, adding the square, opposition, trine and sextile is the next step, but you might want to do this only for specific years or events that you want to research. In general you just use the same principles for interpreting these as you do in natal astrology, considering the square and opposition as more tense and challenging or difficult life events and the sextile and trine as happenings presenting with opportunity and an ease of acceptance.

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Thats all for this month, what do you find in your own solar arc directions and those of the people and places you know? Have fun finding out and let me know in the comments below if you have any questions or would like to share anything! If you would like to see the continuation of Journeys in the future please consider joining the private members club on Patreon at the 5 dollar or more tier, where you will also receive a monthly astrological forecast and newsletter. And if you would like to discuss any of the topics in this journal with me personally head over to astralvisions.org and request a meeting in one of the slots open in my calendar there.

The Astrology of 2024: II

Greetings, and welcome back to Journeys! This month I present the second part of my look at the astrology of 2024 covering the transits of Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Eris. Along the way we will meet the modern re-invention of the ghost and learn about the mostly unknown astrology of the womens movement.

These slowest moving planets are always the major players in a yearly global forecast. This is because the slowest moving planets in the solar system describe the longest living influences, the ones we recognise as the shapers of history. If I had to choose single words to describe each of these four planets including the new one, they would probably be “revolutionary” for Uranus, “transcendent” for Neptune, “transformative” for Pluto and “discordant” for Eris. In my view they also have a connection or resonance with the invisible planes, with Uranus resonating more as a mental and social influence that inspires new technologies and paradigms of thinking, Neptune with the astral realm of psychic and spiritual awareness and Pluto and Eris representing aspects of both the underworld (the realms inhabited after death), the collective unconscious and the Akasha.

When any one of these planets changes signs it indicates that we are moving into a new zeitgeist, a new era of some kind. With Pluto and Eris this happens very infrequently, as each take over a decade or more to travel through signs but with Uranus and Neptune it only takes 7 and 14 years respectively. Therefore we measure longer term, more generational influences from Pluto and Eris and shorter more fad like bursts in fashion and memes or cultural weaves from the other two. To understand the astrology of 2024 we need to understand it in the context of what comes in 2025 as well, as these two years see Uranus, Neptune and Pluto all change signs (Pluto changes this year and Neptune almost makes it out of Pisces too). The full transition window spills over into 2026 as well since Uranus and Neptune retrograde back into their previous signs for periods in 2025 and 2026, and in 2026 we also see the end of Chiron in Aries and the start of Chiron in Taurus. This alone would be enough to write the theme of change loudly and clearly into the skies for the middle of this decade, but when we see the signs these planets are going into – Uranus into Gemini, Neptune into Aries and Pluto into Aquarius – the theme of change and new beginnings is doubled down upon. Gemini is well known for its two mindedness and capacity to be in a state of endless change, Aries is a sign of new beginnings and Aquarius is a sign of radical and irreversible revolution or reset with widespread upheaval.

2024 then is the last year before these great changes begin to emerge in our world in unstoppable ways. We can only shape them, not hold them off or cancel them. This can be both terrifying and exciting, often at the same time. What is helpful to remember amidst the probable panic in society everywhere is that we are all truly blessed to be alive in this time witnessing these moments in history. What is happening in the world today may be the most profound and powerful time in human existence on this world. We all get to witness this first hand. It’s quite possible that the diaries and blogs people are making today and will continue to throughout events that are to come just around the corner are of great historical importance. They may be the final records of the time before this Great Change arrived.

As I have done in previous years I will work from the graphic ephemeris showing the major transits of the year in motion:

Uranus is the magenta or pink line, Neptune is the lilac (mostly at the bottom) and Pluto the grey (mostly at the top of the graph). Eris is the almost straight black line between Uranus and Neptune. The red lines show Mars, a powerful activator of these slower moving planets. When the red lines cross any of the other lines on this graph there is the potential for an activation of that slower planets power. At other times the power of these influences tends to be just coasting along as a background form, a meme or an ongoing situation. What Mars does is put things into action. The faster moving planets of Sun, Mercury and Venus also perform these functions but the difference is they do so with less force, less potential time to trigger things (they usually expire after a week or two) and additionally they are seasonal, occurring on an annual basis, while Mars has a slower cycle of around 2.5 years, which means he does not have an annual rhythm. Annual rhythms are important seasonal activations but because there is nothing particularly special about them from the point of view of a single year they take second place to activations by Mars.

After the Sun, Mercury and Venus the next level of activation around these slow-moving planets is made by the Moon as it cycles around the Earth every month – this focuses and transmits the slow-moving planets influence over the course of a couple of days for each influence every month, and the Moon collects every possible influence from every planet in the solar system every month – meaning it is like a prism that reflects every facet that every planet is transmitting but on a monthly basis for short periods. When any two slower moving objects, for example Jupiter and Uranus, form an influence together by being in aspect then the days and hours when the Moon matches that pattern and expresses it will be powerfully charged with the slower moving planets influence, but often the Moon transmits influences that are not backed up by anything with any inherent sticking power (its just the Moon and Sun or Mercury or Venus/Mars), and those influences are more transient experiences and moods that we mostly forget after a week or two, maybe just a few hours.

This year we will see the Moon kind of doing this with Saturn and Neptune whenever it is in Pisces as it will be forming a bridge between them that is drawing them closer together as time passes, but it’s not until 2025/6 that that bridge will be crossed by the joining of the two in conjunction. However the conjunction between Saturn and Neptune in 2025/6 will happen in Aries not in Pisces. Moon in Pisces is going to be quite interesting this year as a result. It will show us what Saturn conjunct Neptune in Pisces would look like if it was going to perfect in 2025/6, but it’s not going to perfect that way. Something new is going to arise that changes the vision. If you’re interested in learning more about how the Moon transmits influences I recommend you read my article on Moon Maps and follow my monthly musings which are available to subscribers in Patreon at the 5 dollar or more a month tier.

So, all that said, let’s scout the wild paths ahead together!

URANUS in TAURUS

Uranus begins 2024 at 19° of Taurus and advances to 27° of Taurus before retrograding back to 23° Taurus at the end of the year. This places greatest emphasis on Taurus 19° to 23° where it will spend the most time. It begins the year in retrograde motion but turns direct on January 27th, stationing and reversing once more on September 1st. It’s only major interaction is a big one, the April 21st conjunction with Jupiter just as the Sun also enters Taurus (note how both the arrival of the Sun in Taurus – with Jupiter conjunct Uranus in Taurus – and Aquarius – with Sun conjunct Pluto as it enters Aquarius – has some big conjunction energy this year). There is a suggestion here of major financial change (Disney looks like it is in trouble right now, for example, having had a disastrous year and with nothing major lined up for 2024 as a result of the entertainment industry strikes). Uranus meets with Mars twice in the first quarter and once in the each of the others, with the biggest alignment between them happening on July 15th with the conjunction at Taurus 26°.

Major periods: So far the major effect of Uranus in Taurus that we have all been touched by was the disruption in trade and everyday household goods caused by the coronavirus. There was a while not so long ago when toilet roll was like gold and the everyday normality of life was just gone. While I do not foresee a return of the coronavirus any time soon, I do think that the conjunction of Jupiter will lead to some kind of massive global financial disruption or change, and this conjunction shows that we are definitely not done with Uranus in Taurus yet. This conjunction begins to build around the end of March, heightens to a peak as the Sun enters Taurus around April 21st and stays in effect until May 26th when Jupiter enters Gemini (which heralds even more omens of coming change, described last month). It’s going to be very difficult in this period to say that anything is normal and it’s going to be quite difficult to pinpoint what you can rely on or depend on for sure, at least in the physical, material world. Uranus is well known for reversals and it’s conjunction with Jupiter in Taurus suggests redistribution of wealth or resources, with big-money potentially losing a great deal and the poorest or most needy finding more opportunity for positive reversal. However, we could also see the very rich getting even more rich and vice versa. There is really no normality here, things are in flux and there is very little sure footing but what we can depend upon is that faith in ourselves, our belief in what we are doing for the greater good, and our ability to make any needed change, no matter how things have been before, no matter how grand, can reach much greater heights. The Taurus people among us, those born with the Sun or major chart factors in Taurus, and also the other Fixed signs (Leo, Scorpio and Aquarius) are at the epicenter of many of these changes. If you are born in any year a week either side of May 20th or 21st your Sun in Taurus is being strongly targeted by this conjunction. You must be ready for major changes in your life and who you perceive yourself to be. You have to expand beyond your current limitations. You have to embrace more freedom or independence. If you resist change you will struggle and likely suffer considerably as change happens anyway. If you cannot see it yet, trust that the change is good and that this will become clearer in the future.

Those of us who have been working to positively transform our financial situations can look forward to this period as one of great reward and opportunity, similarly collectives or groups who want to get really busy making things happen and actually getting things done will find this period an almost magical one in which the various elements fall into place in synchronous forms. It’s a profoundly good time for forming physical collectives of any kind, for gaining resources and making them work together towards some common goal, for blessing the Earth and the land, for feeling the soil between the toes and fingers and smelling the blooms that float forward to meet you. Being in nature, connecting with trees and plants especially, can open up portals to spiritual awakening and a broader awareness of the spiritual truths abundant in nature in a myriad of forms. We are ALL wealthy beyond imagining is the message here, but you have to look beyond paper toward the trees they come from. Nature itself is the abundant supplier. Aesop’s fable of the goose that laid the golden egg comes to mind.

Minor periods: The path of Mars clashes against Uranus in Taurus only once, in March when he is in Aquarius and creates major shockwaves and disruption to normal routines, but there is a great deal of volatility and shock value to the conjunction that happens in July. This is really the main spotlight of the year for Uranus in Taurus aside from the Jupiter conjunction. The other times Mars interacts with Uranus are easier to handle – an Earthy trine from Capricorn in late January and early February that is productive and dynamic on multiple fronts, a sextile from Mars in Pisces in April that oils and lubricates things so that they run more smoothly and another from Mars in Cancer in the second half of October that is less potent (since Mars is in its Fall) but still has the power to make things happen, especially in domestic and family matters.

The path of the Sun over the course of the year interacts with Uranus in Taurus whenever it is in a Fixed sign, an Earth sign, or the Water signs Pisces or Cancer. The Sun in Earth (Jan. 10th, May 13th, Sep. 19th) and two of the Water signs (Mar. 10th, July 18th) is supportive (except the 13th is still disruptive as mentioned shortly) and this makes it much easier for us to embrace life changes, we are thirsty for change and look forward to the newness of the future. The Sun in Scorpio or another Fixed/Stable sign is likely disruptive and chaotic because it squares, opposes or conjuncts Uranus in Taurus (Feb. 8th, May 13th, Aug. 19th Nov. 17th). Don’t expect things to go as planned around these days or in the week either side of them. Changes come which we are forced to adapt to. These are good weeks if you want to shake up your life .

NEPTUNE in PISCES

During the course of 2024 Neptune in Pisces moves from 25° to 29° before retrograding back to 27° at the end of the year. It therefore spends the most time between 27° and 29°. It stations on July 2nd and retrograde until stationing direct on December 8th. It has one major interaction with Jupiter in Taurus in May as Jupiter is leaving for Gemini. Flowing and easy interactions with Mars in February, July and October with more difficult encounters occurring at the end of April/start of May and the end of August/start of September.

Neptune is almost done sailing through Pisces and will come within a hair of entering Aries this year before the wind blows it back for a while. This means the themes and patterns of Neptune since 2012 are reaching conclusions in 2024 and 2025. Neptune does not bring sudden conclusions but gradual ones – like a tide retreating or advancing, the changes are too subtle to notice until they are upon you. One of the major happenings connected to Neptune in Pisces in this period was the global pandemic but others have included the rise of augmented reality and innovations in visual technology introduced by AI generated art, the major theme of escapism and fantasy in film and entertainment (people wanting stories and myths about high fantasy superheros for example), an emphasis on memory and nostalgia in general, dissolution (Brexit, the EU unraveling, US isolationist policies threatening NATO), paranoia or suspicion concerning the pharmaceutical industry, increasingly rising sea levels, deception and cover-up in the Catholic and Christian churches and an overall atmosphere of surrealism or madness. Some all of these themes and others are likely to be in redux, settling into the bottom of the glass or undergoing a revival or revisiting. On the positive side Neptune in Pisces has seen a lot of people turning onto the benefits of meditation and clarity, tranquility and peace. Sometimes this was imposed forcibly (during the lockdowns) but in the majority of cases people just felt called to it. There have also been some quite incredible developments in the visual arts with aged and even dead performers being returned to youth on the screen in what is a reinvention of the ghost archetype.

Major periods: The major interaction with Jupiter is the sextile which takes place on May 23rd but which basically covers the period from late April up to May 25th when Jupiter enters Gemini and the sextile diminishes suddenly, while at the height of its power. As I said last month under Jupiter “in May try to expand your spiritual horizons, open your consciousness to more abundance, put more into meditation, seek inspiration for greatness, let go of outgrown beliefs and be open to dreaming and daydreaming”. Sextiles between Jupiter and Neptune bring a major activation of spiritual growth and expansion, an opening of spiritual opportunities and the possibility of growing through faith in the goodness of life. They can bring visions and prophecies, signs and portals. If you are looking for a guru or a teacher you may find them now. This is a beautiful aspect for Jupiter in Taurus to finish with before it goes into Gemini, potentially bringing about the physical manifestation of a long cherished and yearned for dream.

Minor periods: Trouble with Mars in late April and early May and then again in late August/early September indicate that these times have some very slippery slopes and deceptive snares in them. A conjunction with Neptune in Pisces on April 29th could be put to good use if we are crusading forward on a spiritual pathway provided that pathway does not involve attacking the beliefs of others. Rushing or panicking around this time is especially problematic and could result in major accidents or spills. The urge to push forwards with a particular vision could make us both dogmatic and/or zealous. Strong or forceful feelings of empathy may be expressed at this time, either towards us or from us. The square from Mars in Gemini on September 3rd is likely to be even more risky and slippery with caustic words escaping the lips or fingers easily and traps laying in wait for any who rush ahead. The wisest course here is not to react impulsively to anything but to listen carefully for the inner voice and its guidance. Better conditions are provided by Mars on February 8th, July 20th and October 28th. The first two dates are sextiles, one from Mars in Capricorn and the other Mars in Taurus, so they both provide some substance and reality, some Earth to the bobbing fluidity of Neptune in Pisces. This helps us to activate its potential and put it into motion and form. We can see the pathway we need to take to reach the oasis, the vision or mirage on the horizon. We know what action we need to take and how to take it. Mars in Capricorn is exalted and so the February sextile is stronger overall. The activation in October close to Halloween is from Mars in Cancer, a trine that is stronger than the sextile but Mars is in an overall weaker position, being in its Fall. Nevertheless, a Mars/Neptune trine is still very good for making progress towards spiritual goals and developing the imagination and empathy within us. Most Mars activations extend for about two weeks either side of the core day (around a month total), sometimes much longer if he retrogrades.

The annual path of the Sun through the zodiac activates Neptune in Pisces in challenging ways when it is in a Mutable or Reactive sign (excepting perhaps Pisces itself) and in a harmonious way when it is in a Water sign or either Capricorn or Taurus. This means that the main challenges are the weeks either side of June 20th, Sep. 21st and Dec. 18th, with the additional possibility that the weeks either side of Mar. 17th, during the Suns conjunction with Neptune, could similarly unhinge us from being in touch with reality. Sun/Neptune challenges often involve us having to discern who we really are with greater clarity. On the other hand, harmonious interaction between the Sun and Neptune brings about visions and enlightenment, something we can look forward to around Jan. 16th, May 20th, July 22nd and Nov. 19th. For many of us the conjunction on Mar. 17th will also be good, uplifting our spirits and bringing highs in meditation or just a restful, energizing sleep. Some people might find the opposite though – trouble getting to sleep because of too wakeful an awareness. The seasonal activations by the Sun in January and May are sextiles from Earth signs, stabilising and materializing the intangible and invisible energy of Neptune while the July and November activations are trines from the Sun in a Water sign, meaning they activate the emotional and empathic power of this Neptune as well as its imaginative transcendence, they let love flow and allow devotion and inspiration to be felt. Allow about a week either side of the core day for the full lifespan of the Suns influences (totalling about 2 weeks from introduction to conclusion).

PLUTO in CAPRICORN/AQUARIUS

Pluto’s path begins at 29° of Capricorn, advances as far as 2° of Aquarius, then retreats back into Capricorn 29° before returning and finishing the year at 1° of Aquarius. It therefore places most emphasis on 0° to 1° of Aquarius. It first enters Aquarius on January 21st, then turns retrograde on May 2nd, re-enters Capricorn on Sep. 2nd, turns direct on Oct 12th, and then enters Aquarius again on Nov. 19th, at which point it has fully transitioned into Aquarius. It receives one major activation from Jupiter in Gemini in early June. Along the way it has troubling interactions with Mars in February, June and twice in November, with more easy to handle interactions emerging in May and July.

The broken path of Pluto throughout the year, with part of it in Capricorn and part of it in Aquarius, creates several ruptures or complications in the astrological weather. When we are in-between major periods, in other words when we are in transitional stages like we are now and for the next year or two, old patterns still exist in potential alongside all the new ones that are to come to replace them and so there is a general uneasiness or lack of stability to things in general. This year, from late January to early September and then from late November to the end of the year, Pluto in Aquarius is setting up the future while at all other times he is resolving the past. This means we get this reaching back to the past from September to late November, a kind of clinging on as if we can avoid or stall the future that has already been set in motion and will eventually sweep aside resistance. It also means that all the Cardinal sign people are not entirely off the hook with Pluto until later in the year, although they may feel that they are up until September. Another point to note is that all of the Sun sign people born at the beginning of Aquarius, around January 20 of any year, are now getting to experience major transformations in their lives. There is a rebirth occurring, but this may by necessity involve some death or letting go. Every other Aquarius entity will be given advance warning of Plutos arrival, a kind of shift in the vibe towards heavy intensity.

Pluto in Capricorn has had a lot to do with major disruptions and threats to the global financial system and the rise of powerful corporate monopolies and their influence on global policies and the environment. Globalization, corporations and even our own governments have been threats that people have obsessed about. So far we have dodged a lot of these bullets, or at least their most catastrophic potential, as we still have an intact economic system. However, that game is not concluded yet. This is the final year of Pluto in Capricorn and we still also have some Uranus in Taurus to deal with which has a very similar resonance. However, we are now definitely in the endgame stages of these themes and it seems likely we will see some conclusive summary of those events that could potentially be the granddaddy of them all, as Capricorn likes to wait and wait. However, the likelihood of this happening is not too high since the only aspect from a slow-moving planet that Pluto makes this year is a trine with Jupiter in Gemini while he is himself in Aquarius, a trine which has more to do with setting up the future as I’ve already explained. If such a thing is to occur it is most likely going to happen around the time Mars is in Cancer, so in September, October or early November, most likely towards the end of October.

Major periods: As noted above, Jupiter in Gemini will make a trine with Pluto in Aquarius that extends over roughly May 25th until the end of June, with its core being on June 3rd. This Air trine is an omen of an expanding or growing paradigm being embraced, a path of growth multiplying, a critical mass cascade, an opening up of possibilities and the genesis of new questions. It is overall an aspect that reveals the truth and brings it to a collective awareness, communicating things that have been hidden from view and opening up vaults and scientific or technological progress. For individuals who embrace change it has a magical transformational power that can sweep them away in ways that are easy and pleasing for them, leading to more abundance in their lives than ever before, but for those who seek to control or manipulate change it is somewhat of a curse because the scale of things is too vast to reliably influence. Mass communication probably plays a major role in this.

Minor periods: November is truly explosive with a double opposition from Mars in Cancer to Pluto in Capricorn as both change signs early in the month, setting us up for a second Mars/Pluto opposition later in the same month, this time across Leo and Aquarius. Mars then goes retrograde in Leo, coming back for two more oppositions with Pluto in Aquarius, one in early January 2025 and then in late April of the same year. Mark these dates well – a sequence of four oppositions between Mars and Pluto, the first of which (this years) has Pluto in Capricorn and is therefore a major summation of Plutos influence over the last 14 years, the others (next years) with Pluto in Aquarius which explosively and powerfully trigger the events of the next 14. They are likely to be difficult or just dynamic times for all Fixed sign people but especially the Leo/Aquarius crowd, and particularly those born in the early days of these four signs or with sensitive chart points in those degrees. The retrograde of Mars in Leo in December puts everyone but especially these people on course for a series of trials as change happens forcefully. The middle of June (Mars in Taurus) is also a forceful trigger for Pluto in Aquarius, one that pits an armed establishment against a zealous revolutionary force or a workforce against a radical transformation. We also have to acknowledge that the conjunction of Mars with Pluto in Aquarius is also very potent and potentially dangerous as far as out-of-control consequences and shocking or unexpected actions is concerned. All of these challenges involving Mars will all be especially dangerous times for the world to be at war, anywhere. There is increased danger of repercussions getting out of control.

On the other hand the path of Mars helps the emergence of Pluto in Aquarius to happen more easily and comfortably in early May (when Mars is in Aries and very strong) and in late July (Mars in Gemini). Both of these aspects encourage openness and communication and an amnesty when it comes to telling the truth but they are also very determined and pushy, probing into things that are new or revolutionary and finding new connections between concepts that can lead o advances in collective knowledge. The changes that come in these times are easier or more welcome and can be invigorating and refreshing instead of rude splashes of cold water into a sleepy face.

The seasonal path of the Sun interacts with Pluto in Capricorn on January 20th when it provides a conjunction just before both of them go into Aquarius together, on Sep. 22nd (when it is in Virgo and so in a supportive trine that allows order and precise focus), and on Oct. 22nd (when the Sun in Libra makes a square to Pluto in Capricorn and causes us to need to re-evaluate our relationships and responsibilities). With Pluto in Aquarius the Sun is in a conjunction with Pluto when it enters Aquarius on Jan. 21st (radical change, embracing freedom and the future), in a sextile with it when it is in Aries on Mar. 21st (ignition, launches, big collective events, excitement), a square while it is in Taurus on Apr. 21st (damage control, rupture, loss of containment, disruption to trade), a trine while it is in Gemini on May 22nd (inspiration, deep insight, profound learning experiences), an opposition while it is in Leo around July 23rd (power struggle, domination, tyranny, rebellion) and another sextile while it is in Sagittarius around Nov. 21st (adventure, new horizons opening, freedom, the joy of moving on swiftly). All of these activations by the Sun last about a week each on either side of the dates I have given.

ERIS in ARIES

Eris moves between 24° and 25° of Aries. It begins the year in retrograde but quickly slows to a station on January 11th and is then in direct motion until stationing again and turning retrograde on July 21st. There are no major activations but from April onward Chiron in Aries is within range of a conjunction (which it will perfect in May and November of 2025 and again in 2026, years in which it is basically active all of the time) and between the start of September and the end of December 2024 Jupiter in Gemini comes within range of a sextile to Eris before retrograding and turning back, again saving it for 2025. The strongest trigger or activation from Mars is when he is in Aries in early June and makes a conjunction in the period when Chiron is also in orb of conjunction. Trouble arises in February and October with Mars squaring Eris from Cancer and Capricorn while more easy to handle interactions in March and late August with Mars in Aquarius and Gemini respectively.

Eris has been in Aries since the early 1920s and even though it still has only 5° left of the sign to move through it is still going to remain there until 2044. This means that everyone alive, more or less, has Eris in Aries and that the entire modern era has been under its influence. The previous era of Eris in Aries was from 1393 to 1522, an equally long period of history that basically covers the 15th century. This period brings about the Renaissance, the Gutenberg printing press, the Fall of Constantinople and the Byzantine Empire, the Spanish Inquisition, the voyage of Columbus and the life of Joan of Arc. This last example is especially interesting given that Eris is a feminine archetype and seems very strongly connected with female empowerment. The others show that these are periods of major change and new beginnings, but those could be connected to Aries rather than Eris.

Major periods: Since Eris is so slow at moving through signs we have to use major aspects to identify her key traits, aspects like conjunctions with Pluto or Uranus, for example, as these are shorter lived and allow us to pinpoint her energy more precisely. Although we do not have any major aspects with her perfecting in 2024 the close sextile from Jupiter (September, October and November) and the conjunction from Chiron (from March onward) are probably influential regardless. Looking back at the records we have, When Jupiter in Libra was in opposition to Eris in Aries (2017) the #MeToo Movement saw massive marches of millions of people calling for women’s rights, social justice, and equality and during 2020 when Jupiter in Capricorn was square Eris, the pandemic highlighted and exacerbated existing gender disparities. Issues such as increased domestic violence, economic challenges for women, and the unequal burden of care-giving became prominent. This is very strong evidence for the agenda of Eris in Aries when you also consider that its beginning in the 1920s also dovetails with the Suffragette movement and the rise of the popular vote for women. The planet was first named Xena, after the television warrior princess, before being given its official name as the goddess of discord. So, the incoming near sextile between Jupiter and Eris probably helps the womens empowerment agenda and enlivens it. The previous sextile, with Jupiter in Gemini rather than Aquarius, took place in March 2013. This period saw the launch of the “Lean In” movement by Sheryl Sandberg, the Chief Operating Officer of Facebook. Sheryl released her book (Gemini) titled ‘Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead’ in March 2013, and the movement gained momentum in subsequent months. The book and the associated movement aimed to encourage women to pursue their ambitions and overcome gender-related challenges in the workplace. Perhaps now with Jupiter in Aquarius it will not be a book but some kind of Internet phenomenon.

The near conjunction with Chiron in Aries is strongly enforced by the passage of Mars through Aries during the period in which it is active, especially in late May and early June. This conjunction will perfect two times next year and once more in 2025, so it is an ongoing influence starting this year but it gathers up elements or themes that have already been in play for quite some time. It’s just bringing into manifestation all of the potential of having both Chiron and Eris in Aries, crystallizing things that have been floating around and waiting for ignition since 2018. This year isn’t that year but it is the year in which the trail of gunpowder is being laid down. The last conjunction between these two in Aries was over the course of 1971 and 1972. These were pivotal times for the women’s movement with the Equal Rights Amendment that prohibited sex-based discrimination, the First National Women’s Conference, the rise of International Women’s Day and the arrival of the Women’s Liberation Movement globally. So it seems likely to me that some kind of global assessment of how far women have come since the early 1970s (and the 1920s) will take place and will be a major theme of the next 2 to 3 years, with some especially powerful expressions, potentially including rage and anger, manifesting during the middle of this year (when a super masculine Mars in Aries really stirs the situation up and may be provoking a strong reaction). There’s also been some Eris like discord amongst the community of women on gender issues (look at the saga surrounding J.K. Rowling, for example), so the issues may widen to involve trans-gender discrimination and gender fluid equality.

Minor periods: The conjunction of Mars in Aries on June 2nd is the major trigger of the year for Eris. It begins building in the latter part of May and terminates when Mars enters Taurus on June 9th. This can be a dangerous time for any kind of conflict. Tempers are likely frayed and running high, patience thin and cool heads evaporated. Every influence has positive applications of course and this one can be used to push through things that are painful or difficult, to summon forth inner strength in the face of adversity, to overcome cowardice and meekness. Mars is causing a more pure form of trouble with Eris around February 5th and October 22nd with squares from Cancer and Capricorn. The first of these squares arises in late January and persists until Mars enters Aquarius on February 13. It is unsettling, uncomfortable, like a crab living in a cracked shell, it disrupts domestic and family life and makes it difficult to feel nurtured or to express one’s devotion. It tests our patience with worrying situations. The second square begins to take shape around October 10th and persists until Mars enters Leo on November 4. It is more destabilising for authorities, leaders, big businesses, global financial stability and for attaining ambitions in general. Mars is more supportive around March 16th (a sextile from Mars in Aquarius) and August 28th (a sextile from Mars in Gemini). These two sextiles help to cool things down surrounding Eris in Aries and can create dialog and more open forms of communication around her issues but there can also be some positive activism involved too.

The seasonal path of the Sun interacts with Eris in Aries on January 14th (a square from Capricorn which disrupts normal routines and systems and leads to trouble at the top), February 13th (a sextile from Aquarius which opens up surprising new options or outlooks on life), by conjunction on April 14th (a powerful illumination of the themes of Eris in Aries, but one which only lasts a week or two at most), a sextile on June 16th (from Gemini, which generally brings change, movement, news and discussion related to Eris in Aries), a second square on June 17th (this time from Cancer, bringing a less material and more emotional form of upset, disturbance and challenge, often surrounding family or domestic issues), a trine on August 17th (from Leo, encouraging and creatively enlivening the themes and possibly adding some celebrity or glamour to them), an opposition on October 17th (from Libra, a divisive and confrontational energy for all relationships) and finally a second trine on December 15th (from Sagittarius, which is less glamorous and warming than the first trine but has a more optimistic and less egotistical bent).

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This concludes the report for 2024, thank you all for your time and attention this year, I hope the journeys we have taken together have inspired you and assisted you and I look forward to 12 more journeys together with all of you. You are valued, you are loved and you are beautiful!

The Astrology of 2024: I

Greetings, and welcome back to Journeys! This month I present the first part of my look at the astrology of 2024 covering the transits of Jupiter, Saturn and Chiron.

As I have done in previous years I will work from the graphic ephemeris showing the major transits of the year in motion:

This graph shows the positions of the slow moving planets (Jupiter is blue, Saturn is black, Chiron is brown, Uranus is pink, Neptune is lilac and Pluto is grey) and Mars (the red lines) throughout the course of the year as curved or straight lines. Mars is included because it acts as a trigger mechanism and also because (excepting the Moon) its movements are less predictable than the other inner planets because Mars is not as bound to the Sun. Along the left-hand side of the graph you can see the glyphs for each planetary line with the sign it is in at the start of the year and the degrees that the planets are in from 0° at the top to 30° at the bottom. This means that when a line reaches the bottom of the graph at 30°, it then changes signs and goes to 0° of the next sign, reappearing at the top of the graph (you can see Pluto, the grey line, doing this as he moves between Capricorn and Aquarius in January – and Jupiter, the blue line, does it in May as he moves from Taurus to Gemini). When a line does this the glyph for its new sign appears with its line at the top of the graph.

When the coloured lines curl back and start moving towards the top of the graph the planet is retrograde, and when they curve towards the bottom again the planet is going direct. You can see that most clearly in the black line which represents Saturn – it starts to curve back at the end of June/start of July, moving towards the top of the graph, meaning that Saturn has turned retrograde. You can also see it quite clearly in October following the blue line representing Jupiter. When one or more lines cross one another there is the potential for a major interaction between the two planets, it will depend upon which of the signs those planets are in since some signs do not form major aspects with other signs. Most of the time, however, there is some kind of result. For example, the blue line from Jupiter crosses the black line for Saturn in August. Jupiter is in Gemini and Saturn is in Pisces, and these two signs form a major aspect with one another, a square. Therefore, this is a major interaction between Jupiter and Saturn. On the other hand if we look at the black line representing Saturn we see that it also crosses the red line for Mars in February, but Saturn is in Pisces and Mars is in Aquarius, signs which do not form a major aspect and so there is no major interaction between Saturn and Mars in that time.

Don’t worry about understanding all of this as I am going to explain it all piece by piece over the course of this journey and the next. The format that follows first describes the overall path of the planet along with any keys it may be activating, including birthdays that are strongly emphasised as being affected, regardless of what year you are born into. Then I discuss the general meaning of the planet according to that sign position and finally present a series of major and minor periods in which that meaning is being amplified by faster moving objects. Major periods are longer and more ongoing while minor periods are shorter and occur as part of the seasonal cycling of fast moving planets. I offer some suggestions for how each of these periods could be used but a more detailed explanation of them will be provided in the reports I send out to my Patreon supporters at the 5 dollar a month or more tiers, a forecast which comes out once a month. So let’s look at Jupiter, Saturn and Chiron for this Journey, in the course of which we will touch upon the positions of the other planets which I will examine more completely next month.

JUPITER in TAURUS and GEMINI

Jupiter begins 2024 at Taurus 05° in direct motion, enters Gemini on May 26th, turns retrograde in Gemini at 22° on October 9th and ends the year at Gemini 13°. This means it will activate any key between Taurus 5° and Gemini 22° over the course of the year. This includes the Sun signs (and Sun key) of everyone born between April 25 and June 14 of any year. Special emphasis is placed on Gemini 13°-22°, the territory Jupiter stays longest in.

During this year Jupiter makes major aspects with Uranus (conjunction in April), Neptune (sextile in May), Pluto (trine in June), Saturn (squares in August and December) and Chiron (a sextile in October as Jupiter retrogrades). His strongest interactions with Mars are in January, April and August and are non-confrontational. This is an active Jupiter but not a rough riding one, only the square with Saturn and perhaps the Uranus conjunction are an omen of obvious challenges.

The positive potential of Jupiter in Taurus is economic and financial prosperity, fruitful gardening and agriculture, cultivating patience, simplifying things (un-complicating them), building something, material growth and expansion, receiving spiritual inspiration from nature, grounding the spiritual laws in work, putting in a massive effort through persistent labour, saving and conserving, sharing of the riches of the Earth, embodiment of compassion, people working together and the growth of support structures and stability. The negative potential is great stubbornness, greed, avarice and envy, land grabs, excessive materialism, possessiveness, mudslides, sinkholes, super high inflation, excessive cost of living and huge prices.

The positive potential of Jupiter in Gemini is freedom of movement and thought, mind expansion, learning and acquiring knowledge, travel that truly broadens the mind, open discussion and debate of big topics, major talking points and energised social activity, lightening up, diversifying interests, widening the scope of belief, getting things unjammed, breaths of fresh air and big ideas. It’s negative potential is instability and chaos, lack of predictability, rampant change, gossip and bilious innuendo, mad dashes, stampedes and destructive winds.

Growth and expansion in general will be more obvious while Jupiter is direct and then faster still, more fruitful and diverse, once he is in Gemini. Seeds planted late in 2023 will sprout more vigorously this May and June and spores will be released into the wind (projects, news and ideas will find it easy to spread). This will help free up a lot of things that have felt stuck in mud for some time. Traditionally Jupiter in Taurus is said to be good for money matters, but history shows it can also lead to inflated prices and just big trouble, big events. These events are more likely in the times Jupiter tangles with Uranus (April) and Saturn (from August, pretty much all the way through to the end of December). Major financial institutions may be struggling in these times.

Major periods: April, May, June, August, October, December. In April, use the conjunction with Uranus in Taurus to generate income, make a fresh start, renew a garden or outdoor space, build something quickly or connect more with the Earth Element. Just be careful of situations getting out of hand, of wild changes from out of the blue disrupting plans – be ready to be spontaneous. In May try to expand your spiritual horizons, open your consciousness to more abundance, put more into meditation, seek inspiration for greatness, let go of outgrown beliefs and be open to dreaming and daydreaming. In June, the Air trine with Pluto will really help you transform anything that needs regenerating, to open your mind to deep mysteries and questions of existence, to discovery and exploration and the possibility of collective rebirth. In October go for healing, seek teachings from wise mentors, find a way to say sorry or to show someone you care, diversify your goals, look for other paths and short cuts, possibly by backtracking slightly. The square with Saturn that occurs most strongly in August and December but which is active for the latter half of the year is the main stumbling block, a time when growth meets blockades, barriers and bumps in the road, a turning point in which we need to assess the current state of reality and readjust our beliefs and overall objectives. We become aware that either the rules have changed, or we need to change them.

Minor periods: January brings the chance to move forwards swiftly but surely as a trine from Mars in Capricorn brings a highly productive and lucrative thrust. Use this month to earn money, work successfully with nature around you, advance uphill to a summit or develop your physical body. April sees Mars in Pisces make another productive period with Mars in Pisces. Use this period to ground your spiritual progress, enjoy a moment of peaceful satisfaction, soften your harder edges or give yourself over to a new motivational or inspirational belief. The big conjunction of Mars and Jupiter in Gemini in August may have some sparks, some fireworks, some hot headed words, but most of the time this aspect just gives enormous boost and thrust to things, it is a propellant, a fuel being ignited, and a blessing for getting from a to b. We might see major launches occurring and can use this time to get something off the ground.

The seasonal path of the Sun brings days in which we can easily tap into the flow of Jupiter in Taurus – March 1st (Sun in Pisces, sextile Jupiter) and May 18th (Sun in Cancer, sextile Jupiter). These are both Water sextiles that will help us to grow and mature emotionally or through the emotions, they bring a feel good vibe, a buzz to being alive and the temptation to spend large amounts out of love and devotion. For Jupiter in Gemini there is one date, October 14th. This sees a trine from the Sun in Libra, an Air connection which smooths away disagreements in relationships, makes for memorable dates or parties, it finds the write words to say or write, brings people together and lifts spirits. As with all Sun influences described in this journey you can allow a few days on either side of these dates too, providing about a week for each instance. The Sun is of course not alone, it has the family kids of Mercury and Venus tied to it, and those will also trigger Jupiter sometime before, after or at the same time as the Sun, providing both mental (Mercury) and emotional (Venus) support for what Jupiter represents, but since these would bog this Journey down in too many details I will only mention them here and cover them in my monthly forecasts at the appropriate time.

More difficult days in which the Sun interferes with an easy expression of Jupiter occur around January 27th (Sun in Aquarius squares Jupiter in Taurus), September 12th (Sun in Virgo squares Jupiter in Gemini) and December 7th (Sun in Sagittarius opposes Jupiter in Gemini). The January date is different because it involves Jupiter in Taurus and this square is about the conflict between the avant-garde and tradition, between the way things have always worked and how they should work in the future. Adjustments have to be made according to your needs. The other two periods involve Jupiter in Gemini and are more about how too much fluidity and adaptability lead to a shapeless blob, a lack of definition and clarity, and so a need to focus and concentrate diverse streams into a single or more unified flow. They can therefore be about tying things together or seeking new directions to grow towards.

SATURN in PISCES

Saturn begins the year at 3° Pisces, retrogrades in June at 19° Pisces, turns direct again in November at 12° Pisces and finishes the year at 14° Pisces. This means it will activate any key between 3° Pisces and 19° Pisces, placing special emphasis on those between 12° and 19°. This path means that Saturn will be working very directly with people born on or between February 22 and March 10 of any year. During its journey through the sky it only meets with Mars and Jupiter, with the squares with Jupiter in August and December already described above being its major encounter. It’s major interaction with Mars occur in January, April, July, August and September and are non-confrontational with the exception of August, although April could be tough going.

Saturn in Pisces brings a need for persistent and dedicated spiritual progression and work. We have to grapple with a thicker, denser atmosphere of gloom and depressive news cycles that seem to go on wearing us down (see the wars in the Ukraine and Israel/Gaza, the reemergence of the Cold War environment) but which are also training grounds for the development of deeper empathy. Weariness sets in and people experience more depression as the heaviness of what we feel becomes more tangible. As a result, we learn how to temper our sympathies and set emotional boundaries that protect us from being so vulnerable. The things that make us feel miserable become generally unbearable and so we are more likely to make sacrifices, establish limits and learn lessons which bring those things to an end.

With Saturn in Pisces we have a collective tendency to become trapped in escapism, whimsical fantasy, evasiveness, nostalgic memories and an overactive imagination which may cause fears where there is little or no justification for them (paranoia). On the positive side it fosters a high degree of emotional understanding and compassion and the willingness to work hard on behalf of the less fortunate. Deep meditation and reflection on the feelings will make possible profound spiritual insights into the nature of reality and helps to dissolve the potential for limiting confusion and illusion. We need more peace and quiet, time in tranquil solitude and must make a strong effort to avoid self pity. We must learn to take responsibility for what we feel now and have felt in the past and progress in understanding the ways we block our own emotional and psychic expression. The karma of the way we have treated others is a major issue that we need to face. We may need to let go of something, as Pisces often involves sacrifices and Saturn brings things to their appointed ends in time, but that letting go need not be a sadness it can instead be an unburdening, or both at once. Pisces is a dual sign capable of crying with joyous laughter and heartbreak at the same time – it is emotionally transcendent in this way and the exact definition of what it feels is often elusive because of this, a nebulous conglomeration of different states, and Saturn can actually help sort this out. Key to Saturn in Pisces is learning how to create and maintain healthy emotional and psychic boundaries, between us and the external world and within our own interior. Pisces also emphasises everything connected to the ocean.

Major periods in which Saturn in Pisces is powerfully active this year are located in August and December through the two squares he makes with Jupiter as it retrogrades. These are times in which things which are being gradually built up go through turning points and challenges as they seek to assert themselves. We have to push harder in order to achieve a lesser result and be satisfied with that, manage our resources more wisely, be patient, be willing to re-institute or redesign our big plans and be wary of overextension, overdraft or hyperbole. The Mutable nature of the square in Gemini and Pisces also heralds a degree of chaos and slipperiness as things get out of control and spiral due to the effect of multiple data points. Jupiter and Saturn only get to around 7-8° apart from this square beginning in August and so it sets this weather system over the latter half of the year.

Minor periods: In January Mars in Capricorn is sextile Saturn in Pisces and this is generally a sign of progress and hard work producing dividends and meeting goals. We can strategise and push ahead with long-term objectives and plans, find more moments to recoup and recover, push ahead with surprising amounts of force and energy, endure more and generally get more done. Mars finally catches up with Pisces and Saturn in April, and the conjunction can be troubling as it requires us to endure something like a trial or tribulation, it has a gauntlet energy which we have to push through and so it fosters toughness and a harder shell or skin. Poor Pisces is practically defenseless and so the arrival of the threat of Mars, which always brings pressure and a need to act, can act to spook some souls. However the positive potential of this conjunction is that we will find a way to convince ourselves and/or others that we are a force to be reckoned with. It may be time to stand up to danger rather than evade it. Their next encounter is a sextile with Mars in Taurus in July, the companion of the January sextile. This time however the energy is warmer, Taurus being ruled by Venus rather than Capricorn, and the output of the sextile is therefore more towards taking care of others rather than ones own interests, but overall it is good for making tangible progress towards a dream or vision. The big challenge from Mars to Saturn comes in August with Mars in Gemini, a square which throws a spanner in the works and invites mishaps, accidents and general chaos as things fall out of shape or get behind schedule. Be careful of what you say as words can have long-lasting consequences now. Moving into late September we see Mars in Cancer smoothing over any potential trouble that may have been caused in August, finding ways to calm things down and pacify, but this aspect can also be used to put across our emotions forcefully and strongly but gently and considerately enough that they are heard.

The seasonal path of the Sun interacts with Saturn in easy and flowing ways, opening up the connection to it, around February 28th, May 11th, July 11th and November 4th. In late February the Sun in Pisces conjuncts Saturn, bringing its principle to life and allowing us to experience it more vividly. Use this time to buckle down, tighten your belt, discipline yourself, work persistently, meditate and stabilize your feelings. In mid May the Sun in Taurus can help us to make money or secure ourselves both physically and emotionally, it can be fruitful in connection with the land and enables us to put the wisdom we have learned into practice. In mid July the Sun in Cancer opens up the emotions and allows us to feel very acutely and precisely what the people closest to us are feeling, it stimulates devotion and care giving and can be good for family and home improvements or restructuring. Finally in early November the Scorpio Sun enables us to feel what Saturn in Pisces desires, what drives us more deeply and what we must overcome, it gives us the spirit we need to tackle those things and can be profoundly positive for all spiritual progress. This trine also shines light upon any threats or dangers on the path and helps us to flow around them.

The Sun creates challenges with Saturn in Pisces on and around June 9th (with Sun in Gemini), September 8th (Sun in Virgo) and December 4th (Sun in Sagittarius). These can be hard-going, uphill periods in which we are carrying a lot of heavy emotional baggage and weight, many worries and anxieties feel more burdensome or serious, we experience blocks and it is that much harder to perceive any glimmer of hope in the gloom. Chaos, instability and lack of cohesion or consistent direction may also be causing changes.

CHIRON in ARIES

Chiron begins the year at 15° of Aries in direct motion, goes retrograde in July at 23°, and turns direct again just before the end of the year at 18° where it finishes the year. This emphasises 15 to 23° of Aries with special emphasis on 18 to 23°, which includes everyone born as an Aries in any year between April 5th to the 14th. During this journey Chiron has one major interaction with Jupiter in Gemini in October, a sextile. It has five interactions with Mars in January, March, May, August and October. The interactions in January and October are challenging while the interaction in May can be quite forceful and direct. The interactions in March and August are easier to handle.

Chiron in Aries is a wounded warrior seeking healing, a classic myth in which the heroism is not just about defeating some titan but also enduring a tragedy or injury (see for example the Greek story of Theseus). We are shown the injuries and wounds of war and conflict – within and without – in often graphic detail, the blood, fire and rubble it leaves behind, the broken spirits and aspirations, the terrible marks, and individually we experience an acute and sharply piercing awareness of the battle scars we carry. These should spur us into restorative actions, deeper into the desire to be whole, to be healed. We are seeking to mend broken confidence, to harness the power of light, to burn like a torch leading the way, to be pioneers through pain. I am reminded of the struggle for the recognition of being that many people now fight for in the sexual identity arenas, the talking points around toxic masculinity, the need for us to recognise our own love of things being exploded and set alight (not just physically but socially too), the sense that many people feel broken in their power to act and the corruptive influence of the military-industrial complex (war and the influence of overpowering force in the economy). Aries is a sign of leadership, like Leo and Capricorn, but of a leadership which is bent on kicking against something. It needs rivals and competitors to prove its mettle because it does not possess the charisma of Leo or the wisdom of Capricorn to win people over. Yet with Chiron here, these approaches bring pain, they split and sunder, they divide to conquer, which is ultimately a self inflicted wound that diminishes power. In 2016 I wrote a detailed journey into the meaning of Chiron in Aries, so you can read more about what this placement means if you take a trip back in time.

When Chiron is direct (until July 26th) we can more easily connect with external sources of healing – we can find the right healer, the right medicine, the right path to where we want to be, we can externally transform ourselves into the more whole being that we have reached internally, while when it is retrograde the road leads inward, we must dig in the dirt to find the places we got hurt, the integration that needs to happen to be whole (or more holy), in other words we must identify the need for healing in this phase (from July 26th to December 29th).

Major Periods: In October spilling into early November Chiron in Aries meets with Jupiter in Gemini by sextile, a stimulating and positive influence for healing. Healing though Jupiter/Chiron involves understanding natural laws, coming to mercy or forgiveness, putting faith in your own beliefs, understanding the bigger picture and how it all fits together, appreciating the growth that suffering and pain bring and finding the lift needed to move on or rise above. This sextile is an extended one due to Jupiter retrograding at the time, this means it is building up in September and does not really fade out until the very end of the year. This also means it has two exact hits this year, one on October 12th and another on Nov 2nd, and that there will be a third one in 2025 (May 18). Therefore this is quite a long story being told by Jupiter and Chiron, one that will not reach a full conclusion until mid 2025.

Minor periods: Mars brings progress and the motivation needed to heal when he interacts co-operatively with Chiron on March 7th (Mars is sextile from Aquarius), May 29th (conjunct Chiron in Aries) and August 24th (sextile from Mars in Gemini). These three months are very good for any kind of healing progress but can also provide creative momentum for any kind of quest. Patience may be running thin everywhere in late May, though, as this conjunction has something of a ‘reached my limits’ breaking point. More troubled interactions with Mars arise around the weeks of January 25th (Mars in Capricorn squares Chiron) and October 13th (Mars in Cancer square Chiron). These two squares form a pair, a kind of hinge around which the years healing energy pivots. At these points, sharp turns are forecast as the healing path must break away from prior momentum, which means these can actually be dynamic turning points in which our focus shifts from being ill to getting better. Quests of all kinds also reach various challenges, the first type being more emotional (Cancer), the second in October being more material or physical (Capricorn). These two signs also both emphasize family matters.

The seasonal path of the Sun interacts with Chiron in easy and flowing ways, bring healing vital energy, on and around February 5th (Sun in Aquarius), April 8th (Sun in Aries), June 13th (Sun in Gemini), August 15th (Sun in Leo) and December 10th (Sun in Sagittarius). As far as these interactions go with Sun in Aquarius we can find new and original sources of energy and motivation, be inspired to take on new quests, invent something extraordinary, bring invigoration and refreshment and find ways to motivate a crowd. Sun in Aries can bring healing Fire, an enthusiastic embrace of the adventure of life with all its risks, a reset determination to overcome crippling situations and the motivation to shine. Sun in Gemini brings healing words and information, advice and opinions that move a quest forwards, the discovery of new paths, allies or sidekicks, welcome changes and exciting news or movements. Sun in Leo repairs confidence and inspires us to take command, it emboldens, encourages and shines light upon what needs fixing and how to fix it. Sun in Sagittarius brings healing journeys and visions, the ability to focus on a remedy, the light of truth, integrity and honesty, optimism, good cheer and the spirit of battle (often much needed in the shopping period!).

More difficult days/weeks occur January 6th (Sun in Capricorn), July 15th (Sun in Cancer) and October 14th (Sun in Libra). Things hurt more around these times, but we can also make very big adjustments towards Chiron in Aries in these periods.

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That’s all for this month, come back next month for Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Eris. Thank you for reading and supporting my work and astrology and let me know in the comments if you have any questions about next years astrology.

A Hermetic Meditation on the Triple Awareness

Greetings, and welcome back to Journeys!

October is my birthday month, the 31st to be exact, and it’s a personal tradition for me to give gifts on this day as a way of saying thank you to life. This months journey, like previous years for October, is that offering. I received it myself yesterday while in meditation, and it is itself a guided meditation that explores the triple awareness of mind, body and soul and its importance in a very Halloween appropriate subject – magic.

In this meditation you will explore the mental, astral and physical awareness that you have and the relationship these three types of awareness have to one another as well as the nature of the inhabitants of the mental, astral and physical realms that your awareness is focused in and the relationship your awareness has to them. You should be able to accomplish some degree of success in this meditation regardless of your degree of initiation but if you are at higher degrees of initiation your experience will be more nuanced and complete. The meditation is a conscious breathing meditiation that also trains the awareness to be magically effective while also being adaptable to specific needs that you have for improving your circumstances.

We can call the combined influence or focus of the three types of awareness we have a triple awareness or power focus. The majority of the time uninitiated people move the focus of their awareness around between the three types in response or reaction to changing circumstances. For example, you might be walking down the street thinking about something that isn’t happening yet and thus mainly focused in your mental awareness while your astral and physical awareness become more subconscious to you, until you suddenly trip and sprain your ankle at which point your focus immediately shifts to being physical (and then probably astral as you react emotionally). In other words we move our awareness around between these three types of focus (as well as from subject to subject within them) depending upon whether we are mostly thinking, feeling or doing things that draw or need our attention, and while we are focused on one type of awareness the other types of awareness fade slightly into the background. A true triple awareness or power focus is one that has been trained to combine all three focuses into one focus. This means you are aware of your physical, emotional and mental state simultaneously, and at advanced levels also in control of it, at all times you choose to be. It’s not as difficult as it might seem on paper. A main way in which magical initiation trains this capability is by strictly advising the seeker to stay focused on the present now moment, as this focus and kind of concentration naturally leads to a merging of perspectives into a triple awareness – you can easily observe what you are doing, feeling and thinking in the now without splitting your focus. The trick is not to think about it (which focuses you in mental activity) but to observe it, to witness it as it arises without being attached to it. Thoughts occur to your consciousness and feelings arise in your soul and things happen in and around your body but you simply watch them play out and do not identify with or dive into them. Gradually this replaces your drifting focus with a still, observant one, and the still mind, emotions and body make it easier not to drift in focus.

The triple awareness, like the astral equilibrium, is one of the key requirements for being able to work true magic. All magic is performed with the triple awareness and the astral and optimally also the mental equilibrium in place. This is what makes it effective, what makes it work and elevates the acts involved beyond mundane gestures. While this meditation does not provide you with the necessary training and practice to attain these things by itself, it will help you to explore them and understand them and it will indirectly assist you in attaining them if you are practicing Initiation into Hermetics, which does provide you with the training you need to attain these essential requirements or milestones on the path.

This meditation is quite long and so you may be concerned that you will not be able to remember it all when you come to practice it. Don’t worry, this isn’t necessary. The meditation is presented in simple steps that you must memorise, and each step has a commentary that you do not need to memorize, only read. The step is presented first, then the commentary. The commentary is part of the guided meditation but you do not have to explore it all in one sitting, you can pick and choose which parts of the commentary you explore in each sitting or work through the commentary in the order I present it. Just follow your creative intuition about what feels right. Each time you do the meditation, however, follow all of the simple steps.

Preparations: Un-clutter your space, or go outside to an area where you feel the energy is good. Sit or lie down comfortably. Relax. This meditation is easier on an empty stomach so you may wish to fast beforehand or make sure you are not full.

Step: Centre yourself in your mental body by focusing on the now moment, releasing attention to thought and placing focus only on the presence of consciousness within you, the awareness.

Commentary: This is your true mental body, which has all the thoughts. The thoughts are not the mental body, but the mental body can shape, gather and form thoughts as an expression of the activity of consciousness. Thoughts are properties of your astral awareness because they are personal, but ideas or notions are properties of the mental realm and occur to consciousness as connected sets or patterns of meaning. You true awareness is a peaceful, still one. It is not the idea of peace, but the idea of peace points towards it because it stills activity.

Select an idea and observe and contemplate the fact that when your mental body or consciousness focuses on an idea, for example the thought of how a rose looks, other ideas that match it quickly come to add to it, for example the smell of the rose, the feel of the petals on a cheek, a sprinkling of beautiful rain drops, thorns, etc, and as focus is maintained these components intensify and seem to come alive merely through the maintenance of your attention. You may find matching memories being conjured too, and sometimes beliefs, because these are all things we have thoughts about too. You have observed the law of attraction on the mental plane, where like notions are drawn together, as well as how this conjures a response from you on the astral plane (conjuring specific personal responses).

If you continue observing your rose, or whatever idea you selected, you will begin to experience empathy with it through your connection, and then it will not only feel alive but also more like you, and this awareness will grow until you have the sensation that you are the rose. You have become your own creation and thus your own Creator. The fact that with an imagined rose we can become our own creation and Creator is a demonstration of the co-creative power of consciousness to create its own experience of reality. Even if you cannot achieve this yet, you can observe the empathy growing.

It is possible, with the appropriate training and a focus that is placed upon the presence of a physical thing, for example a real rose on the table in front of you, to transfer your own awareness into that of the rose and you may even begin observing yourself from the perspective of the rose, although the observations your consciousness makes will not be made through a brain attached to a nervous system, etc., but through the senses of the world around it that are available to the rose. You will sense light, warmth, touch, sound as vibration, etc. This is an example of the magic of mental wandering and transference. You may not be able to focus so deeply yet to be able to transfer your consciousness from one form to another, but if you select an idea with which you already experience an enormous degree of empathy, for example your pet, you may start to get glimpses of this through experiences of telepathic communication, or shared perspective. Try to build empathy with your rose or whatever topic you have chosen to focus on, by which I mean try to feel what it feels, to walk in its shoes as it were. You can have a sense of what the other is experiencing, and full mental transference of consciousness is just a development of this natural faculty. What this should make clear is that the development of this faculty leads to an enormous and ongoing growth in empathy towards all things. This empathy is a large part of what reduces the innate curiosity of the human mind to pry, because this not empathic and the reduction of empathy leads to the degradation and eventual temporary loss of the ability to transfer awareness. The Mystery always protects itself!

In the deepest core of the rose, in the place where its inner being dwells, you will find the same thing you find within yourself – consciousness or awareness, presence. The different ways in which humans and roses experience the world due to their different sensory forms are mere expressions of the inner awareness of that ‘I am’ or ‘I exist’, just different ways in which that beingness explores and experiences existence. Ultimately, everything is One. It is not easy to observe this without training the mental body sufficiently, but if you consider the fact that literally everything is ultimately an idea, an expression of some kind of meaning, and that the core idea in everything that exists is ultimately ‘existence’ or ‘I Am’ (otherwise it could not exist in any form), then you can catch glimpses of it from this perspective. In the example, consider the fact that the rose exists, even if it is just in your imagination, and contemplate all these things.

The fact that ideas are part of this Oneness of existence or being is not only what draws them together so quickly but which also gives them consciousness or a life of their own. They are also beings, beings who dwell in the mental realm. They come in infinite forms. Some are ancient, some are just being born, others timeless. In kabbalah these are the beings of the Sun, Mars, and Jupiter spheres. Some are human created, others not because they are part of nature (physical and metaphysical). The human created ones are fed and birthed by human focus, made to swarm and cluster into larger and grander notions, to weave more intricate webs of connection, and their survival instinct (all things want to continue to be because consciousness is eternal) leads them to draw our attention towards them, sometimes in very powerful and manipulative ways, depending on how we resonate with them. The beings of fearful ideas are especially good and active at this, because as beings of fear they fear for their own survival. We sense their pull on our astral bodies, on our emotions, in the astral plane when we focus our consciousness on their ideas or wander through locations where they have accumulated as thought-forms. The rose is a notional entity, it is an idea first. The idea of the rose is part of the idea of flowers, which are part of the idea of plants, and so on. There is a hierarchy of meaning here. The rose is also an assembly – it is made of component ideas (colours, petals, thorns, leaves, water, roots, etc.) gathered and arranged into a specific and unique form. Everything is like this. You are utterly unique and cannot ever lose your innate specialness. Nor can anything else. It is all equally beautiful in this way, as it is all a unique expression of the One consciousness. The more any individual thing expresses this unique beauty alongside an awareness of the same in all things, the more it fulfills of the Great Work.

Step: Now centre yourself in your astral body by noticing what all those thoughts have made you feel. Contemplate these feelings. If these feelings are turbulent or upsetting, try to release them and focus on being calm.

Commentary: The ideas you conjured in the mental plane have resonated into the realm below, the more personal expression in the astral, as specific thoughts and in particular as emotional responses. You may have imagined a specific rose, given to you by a lover in the past – a very personal thought arising from the idea of ‘roses’. The rose or whatever you chose has certainly conjured a certain feeling, a certain mood, and this mood is very much dependent on the idea you selected and also the personal circumstances you have regarding the idea, the story you have with it, in fact your feelings are the indicator of the personal significance that idea currently has for you. If you chose the idea of sleep, for example, then you might have thought of bed, and pillow, and night, and stars, wife or husband, lover, bedsheets, and your cat or dog, for example. And if you have been having trouble sleeping lately and you have been very upset about it, then the mood these thoughts will have conjured will likely be an upsetting one. Notice also that some of the thoughts associated with sleep, in this example, are pretty much universal ones, at least for humans (bed, pillow) while others may not naturally occur to some people but which others think of almost immediately (cat, dog, water because of a water-bed, a specific book because it is kept by the bedside, etc.). There is a relationship between the mental and astral which has to do with how the specific meaning of ideas draws in a significance matching the thoughts and emotions we have about the idea, which in turn summon associations to more personalized ideas with potentially branching and variant meanings, and so on in a cycle. Try to observe all this going on within you in the meditation and notice how you feel about all the different associations that come up for you in the meditation. Observe how the dots connect just for you.

You are not only unique, you have a unique relationship to everything else. You resonate with everything in a totally unique way although you may share some things in common with others, and this resonance is your unique astral vibration. This vibration fluctuates, it rises and falls with your moods. What we call ‘heavy’ moods are ‘lower’ or more dense in astral vibration while what we call ‘light’ are ‘higher’ or more subtle. Your moods are your indicator of your vibrational reality, your current astral location. Elevated moods like joy, unconditional love, satisfaction, peace and ecstasy lift you to locations in the astral that are more in resonance with the meaning of things in the mental plane that they are expressions of because they are at the astra-mental boundary. The truth or meaning of things becomes clearer from these astral perspectives. Therefore bringing these elevated perspectives to all of our unique relationships is a key to enlightenment. Try to bring such a perspective to the subject of your meditation.

In the astral where ideas resonate as emotional reactions these feelings act as the power source or dynamo which draws thoughts together, they power the law of attraction on the mental plane where like things are drawn together. Emotion or desire, in other words, is the driving force and fuel of this law of attraction, and when there is a strong desire or emotion the ideas gather momentum very quickly. If you have focused very strongly on something that bothers you and with a strong emotion, then you have put a great deal of attention onto something that has gathered a lot of force into itself and will continue to manifest so long as you continue to place your attention on the unwanted things, and it will need to come up so that you can continue to diminish its power until it is resolved. The habit of worrying about problems not only lowers our astral resonance, making it harder for us to see or attract the solutions to things, it also keeps us trapped in vicious cycles as the thing we do not want keeps gathering more and more force. As an example, express a desire to understand the subject of your meditation and note what feelings you receive in response as well as how strongly and easily they flow (or not) depending on the strength of your desire to understand it and your absence of worry about it. Try to let go of any kind of reaction and just be still waiting in stillness for a while for a response that registers as a feeling.

In the astral, every desire for something we wish for (and these are endless because life is ongoing change and so new desires are always arising) is immediately matched through the power of its emotional resonance with the exact thing it resonates with (i.e. with the fulfillment of that desire) and its opposite, and at the same time a vibrational path is laid out from where the desire originated to where it finds its manifestation in the physical universe. The path to the manifestation of that desire can then be perceived and acted upon in a timely manner, i.e. according to the schedule required for the journey to be made, a timing which is always perfectly calibrated, through maintaining focus upon that desire and a feeling of expectancy or peace or some other ‘higher’ astral frequency concerning it. The spiritual laws then ensure that we will be inspired by the ideas, thoughts and actions that are required to manifest that desire and that we will be lovingly guided in precise ways whenever it is necessary. The journey will be one of enlightenment and this will ultimately be the true treasure of the manifesting desire. However, if our attention is not upon the fulfillment of the desire but instead upon the absence of that thing in our lives or on something of a low astral frequency we will serve to block this manifestation because we will be focused in opposition. Note how your desire to understand the rose, or whatever the topic of the meditation happens to be, is affected by these things. For example, note how your desire to understand it leads to further desires, and also that there is introduced an opposite idea that you will not understand it or do not understand it currently, or cannot ever, and that when you focus on that aspect you feel yourself in a state where it feels like it will not happen. However, the moment you shift your attention to the idea of how you will feel in fully understanding the rose, the more things start moving in that direction.

We can also encounter our own astral karma here, in that some ideas will conjure painful or traumatic memories, or reactions like anger, depression, and fear, and we can keep fueling these thoughts and adding more emotion, so that these things have a lot of power and seem difficult or impossible to escape. When we think of these things they immediately arise with great force and can be overwhelming because they are the accumulation of everything we have put out, all at once. They become so strong because we maintain our powerful astral and mental focus upon them for long periods of time, manifesting them again and again until we are sure we are right about them, and then they become beliefs. In astral transformation we can then need to encounter these beliefs as disappointing experiences that we need to move through in order to manifest what we really want. Usually these are beliefs about ourselves or beliefs about others but they can be beliefs about life or beliefs about any topic, any notion. They can also stem from other lives, other souls we have been. Try to observe any astral story you have with the topic of your meditation as part of these things. If you observe anything that feels ‘heavy’ in that story, try to enlighten or lift that feeling so you can see beyond the blockage in your perception. Try to believe that you are going to understand the topic of your meditation with absolute clarity, including all the aspects you are unaware of. If you cannot believe it yet, repeat the thought that you will until you do.

Every human being has these issues with doubt and resistance and character blocks, which is why the astral equilibrium is so important, and why meditation is so good for us, and a magical practice. The calm mind does not offer any resistance and is both alert and receptive to messages. It is able to follow the path and perceive the meaning of it. Self knowledge not only brings clarity to what we really desire, allowing us to make better choices in what we co-create with our great power of focus, but also the transformation of our astral character removes many obstacles to the paths we walk, making the journey from desire to manifestation not only shorter but more enjoyable and meaningful. This is what we call synchronicity. We come into synchrony or alignment with the goal and with the path to it because we continue to match its frequency and it is drawn to us in remarkable ways. Part of the intelligence which lays out the path leads us to make all the necessary character transformations we need to undergo in order to match the vibration of the desire. Repeat your meditation with the desire to understand the topic of your meditation regularly and observe these things occurring in response.

All the emotions and thoughts that occur to us at the level of astral response have a life of their own like the ideas we interact with, since again all these things are expressions of a One consciousness, a unifying presence. These beings, similar to the beings of the mental realm, are vastly numerous and varied and express every kind of thought or feeling that humans have access to and many more that they do not currently have access to. They are very important in the work we do together with them which is everything because everything requires thought and feeling. They differ from mental plane beings in that they are vibratory, they have their own unique astral resonance, and so they form more personal connections with us. Since they are also all ideas themselves they represent that meaning to us in a way we can resonate with and understand (in fact, only we can understand that form) . This means they take symbolic forms that communicate in a very personal way the ideas or meaning they represent, in other words the shape of such beings is adaptable and they appear in whatever symbolic form is most appropriate to the perceiver. Angels, for example, do not really have wings, these are symbolic to humans of their connection to the airy realm, the mental plane, as they express astrally the meaning of the highest virtues. The symbolic form astral beings take is always very precisely calibrated to the unique astral resonance of the perceiver, so they can change shape as we change shape within, and every detail is significant for us in terms of self knowledge. This also means one person can perceive them very differently to another, but they will be perceiving the same thing, and that the forms they can take can seem very bizarre. In kabbalah these are the beings of the Moon, Venus, and Mercury spheres as well as the Earth Zone. During your meditation simply acknowledge the reality of these beings and see where it leads while meditating on what I have written.

Step: Now centre your attention in your physical body by focusing on your breathing.

Commentary: The physical body is the container or vessel which unifies everything into a material form for us to experience it in. The astral and mental body are the energy field of the physical body, the consciousness of its cells and organs and all the power and complexity of its life. The physical can be thought of as a transceiver through which the senses perceive the material world and in that perception cause it. The physical body has an enormous binding power because it is the nexus or culmination of expression for the subtler bodies. The breath is a key part of this binding power because it is driven by the solar plexus, from which the mental body is connected to the physical. When breathing stops, the mental body (consciousness) is separated from the physical. In other words, your breathing is binding your consciousness to your body, enabling it to function. Contemplate this as you breathe.

Since the mental body is bound to the physical body through breath, focusing our consciousness on the breath brings clarity of mind, and ideas can be easily attached to the act of breathing and inhaled along with oxygen. This is the practice of conscious breathing described by Bardon in his first book in the first step of initiation. In fact this process of consciousness influencing the body is what we call the mind-body relationship, a field of science we are only just beginning to explore. The reality is that we rarely stop thinking about things that worry us or concern us and that with every breath we take holding these thoughts and feelings in our astral body we draw in with our breath the very thing that is worrying us and this is transmitted throughout all the cells of our physical body by the blood. Positive minded people are more healthy and vital because of this. Concerning the topic of your meditation pick a positive quality you perceive in it and imagine that you are breathing this in as you meditate upon it.

The subtle bodies that power and give life to the physical body, the astral and mental bodies, can be felt within the physical body through its warmth, degree of comfort, sensations and so on. The physical body is packed with energy of all kinds – electrical, thermal, chemical, rhythm and pulse, etc. It organises and directs all of this energy, much of the time without your notice. Take a moment to notice and appreciate this ongoing orchestra as you breathe and continue your meditation on the topic, you may be able to sense a vibration or a feeling of melting in your hands or feet, or some other indication that you are sensing energy rather than physical form.

Note that your skin breathes too. It is the largest organ in your body and not only serves as a barrier protecting you from the environment around you but also becomes part of the physical mechanism binding your consciousness to your physical form like your solar plexus, lungs and diaphragm. Take note of the energy within your skin, the temperature, the flow of blood to every surface point, the sensitivity it has to touch, the pores that allow the passage of oxygen, and breathe your idea, chosen from the meditation, into your entire body so that it begins to fill up to capacity. Do not overstretch yourself, just continue until you reach a sense of fulfilled satisfaction.

Ideas and emotions (mental and astral focus) manifest in the physical body somewhere. Specific organs and parts of the physical body have specific meanings and thus roles to play and so embody specific principles (for example, the solar plexus and diaphragm control the expansion and contraction of the lungs). This is all according to the natural working of the body when it is healthy and fully functional. However, the creative power of consciousness and emotional thinking also leads to manifestations in the physical form. When there are ‘heavy’ accumulations the body attempts to discharge them and we may grow unwell. For example, stress can manifest in the body as acne. Obsessive worrying about health or particular health issues going wrong with our bodies is very damaging for them. On the other hand, positive attitudes enable the body to recover, repair and defend itself more effectively. Try to sense the health of different areas in your body by noting any tension or lack of freeness, and imagine breathing directly into any such spots through your skin.

Even things seemingly separate from the physical body have a resonance in our astral body which our physical can feel. The rose that we imagined or placed in front of us for this meditation in the example has a resonance with the human heart, for instance. You may also have noted from the previous paragraphs comments that certain areas of your body respond to certain issues in your life. Try to identify in which area of your physical body the topic of your meditation resonates.

Take a moment to appreciate the fact that every physical thing, every animal, every plant, every rock and mote of dust on the planet, is just like you – it has a mental, astral and physical form or body, a being that vibrates and is conscious, and experiences this in a physical way. The physical beings we share the physical with on this planet are not just animals and plants but its water, light, mountains, wind and fire. Realise that you are part of this grand physical creation in which everything is made in this way and try to sense your physical body as a connected part of it, not only in the way you share the oxygen you breathe or the connection this brings you with trees, but the entire thing, the heat in your body for example is transferable too, and there are minerals in you that are also part of the mountain. Your physical body has resources but it is not limited to the resources within it, it can gather resources into itself from this vast storehouse of energy, and it does (it eats, drinks, translates light into vision, etc.). You may not be able to eat a fire, but you can breathe in the essence of its energy.

Step: Now select a positive idea that you want to being into your life and repeat all previous steps by first examining all of its positive aspects with your mental awareness, letting thoughts gather momentum as you contemplate how all these positive aspects inter-relate and what they all mean, then with your astral awareness, how all this makes you feel and the symbols and positive desires it awakens in you, and then bring all of these things together by imagining that with each breath you inhale these properties into your physical body where it distributes them through your lungs and blood to every cell in your body, which begins to throb with the energy. Maintain the triple awareness by just focusing on your breathing in this way.

Commentary: As an example, let us imagine that we want to feel more courageous in life. First, contemplate and conjure all the ideas you can related to the positive aspects of being more courageous in your life, what it will mean to you. Keep doing this until you begin to feel things strong enough that you begin to feel an increasing desire for it. Allow this desire to gather momentum by continuing, eventually you will actually start to feel courageous, let this gather and when you are ready begin breathing all of this in, staying conscious of all the positive aspects and the feelings this brings to you. With practice this simple triple awareness becomes easy to maintain.

Focus on the now moment and be alert and ready for the magic to happen as a result of what you have done. This means after the meditation be alert for symbols and signs and the inspiration that the path to the manifestation of your desire requires you to take. Repeat the exercise often but avoid doing so because it has not yet manifested in the way you wished. Do so only to increase the energy you put out and because you enjoy it. Let the timeliness of things pass out of your hands. Try to focus on the path and not the manifestation because the path is the true reward. You may be led through character transformations by experiences that arise, each of which is an essential step on the path to the manifestation of your desire. Witnessing this occur is how our self awareness clarifies and our desires purify as well as manifest.

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That’s all for this month, thank you for reading! This journal is provided free of charge to the public through the generous donations of my Patrons, who also receive a private monthly newsletter with a forecast if they donate 5$ or more. If you would like to join them and support more journeys like this one, please come along!

The Three Voyages of Being

Greetings, and welcome back to Journeys! This month I explore the three voyages of being, including a discussion of what happens to us after death.

For Tina, Amber and Ben

What we call life is in reality just a portion of it. We do not come into existence at birth, only into physical existence, and we do not go out of existence at death, only out of physical existence. The portion of our existence that we call life is really the middle part of it, the second voyage in a linked set of three. The first voyage is the descent into form, the second voyage is the journey through form, and the final voyage is the journey from form. In this respect what is meant by form is more than just physical embodiment in flesh, it is embodiment in the mental and astral realms as well. Hence life is a voyage in three parts with three integrated vehicles, the physical, astral and mental bodies. Since what we call time and space arise as consequences of the mental and astral plane (i.e. they do not apply in the same way that they do in the physical) the voyage into and out of form is also a voyage into and out of the dimensions of time and space.

What we are, ultimately, may go by many names, faces, personalities, styles and individual expressions, but it is essentially consciousness, an indestructible and timeless presence that dwells in and of the Eternal Now moment. It chooses to ‘voyage’ into form, entering time and space, in order to develop its expression in the mental, astral and physical universe, willingly and confidently choosing to encounter hardships and troubles on these voyages as a means to develop the spiritual maturity of its unique, incarnated expressions. I say “voyage” because to this essence of us there is no time or space to voyage through, instead it must project itself through focusing on a particular point in time and space, condensing its vibration until it manifests itself as a physical being. In other words, we have a picture of eternity and we pick the ideal moment for each specific incarnation and as our eternal awareness focuses on that moment we condense first a mental presence, then an astral presence, and finally a physical presence into that moment, all of which leads to birth. This process takes no time from the perspective of eternal consciousness but the mental, astral, and especially the physical do experience time and space in different degrees, and so from the perspective of ‘being alive’ i.e. being physical, it takes time – 9 months in the womb in human beings, different units of time for different physical beings. Likewise, while our physical form experiences time, aging and decay, the eternal consciousness within us does not experience these things except as a way to measure its progress.

When death occurs the consciousness is released from the physical form, first into the astral body and then into the mental, before returning to the source of One eternal consciousness. This lack of a material form immediately makes it impossible to measure any progress while simultaneously revealing to the awareness that the purpose of life is not the pursuit of material aims but the pursuit of spiritual ones. The awareness longs to return, despite all the hardships it will face, in fact because of them, because it knows they offer opportunities for great advances. A powerful transformation occurs immediately as the astral and mental awareness are no longer occulted by physical sensations and this makes the deceased aware of the spiritual reality of life and the unconditional love which operates the workshop of the universe in every moment.

In this journey, dedicated to the memory of my sister Tina who died last month, and her two children, I will attempt to share with you some of my understanding of these three voyages in the hope that it will be both instructive to readers and comforting to those who are grieving.

THE FIRST VOYAGE

The first voyage is epic and it is a voyage of Creation. The eternal essence of awareness, what we call the Greater Self or Holy Guardian Angel in hermetics and occultism, essentially a discrete expression of the One Self, is involved in a Great Work with other Greater Selves. Together these Greaters possess a collective awareness of eternity, in other words they are aware of everything, everywhere, all at once, and they incarnate literally countless expressions of themselves throughout time and space, weaving the Great Work. Ultimately what this leads to is the full embodied awareness of all their individual expressions at once, so that every physical thing in the universe is fully consciously united with its Greater. This process requires an infinite amount of time, which means the Great Work will only continue to grow forever in beauty and complexity, but individual parts of it may reach completion ‘before’ others do, at least from our perspective as physical beings subject to time and space. In other words, it is possible to leave the cycle of incarnation in physical form having attained enough maturity, but beyond this physical universe there is still further expansion possible. From the perspective of the Greaters it is possible to witness the unfolding of time and space throughout eternity as well as its ultimate completion. This is a principle of the Akasha, the dwelling of the Greater awareness.

Infinite individual expressions of each Greater are seeded throughout all of the possible timelines and universes at once, and each of these is continually guided and watched over by its Greater Mother. The point of access to receive its guidance while in physical form is alignment with the now moment where the Greater awareness dwells, so that this guidance is always available to all of its children. Voyage into form is one of condensing awareness through focus, first leading to the creation of an individual expression of the Greater in the mental realm (a spirit or mental body which in turn is assigned a set of temporal locations along a particular timeline/s of the Great Work), then to the formation of an astral body (a soul or personal expression of the spirit) and finally a physical form and its emergence into the material universe.

Since this is a focusing of the Greater awareness into denser and denser form it is also a voyage for that awareness as it dresses itself in layer after layer of meaning and descends from the subtlest (Akasha) to the most dense (physical) state of awareness, becoming more complex and defined as it journeys into time and space. As it journeys it descends through what magicians call spheres, dimensions of being that are the seats of these more and more dense collations of meaning. These spheres are literally infinite in number and are all universes in their own right with inhabitants where many of the same things that apply in the physical universe also apply. There is family, love, song, mortality, rivalry, and so on, although there are often differences in how these things are experienced. No complete description of these realms or their beings can ever be made, but models can be crafted by human ingenuity that serve as maps for the invisible world as it applies to our experience on this planet. One is the Tree of Life, another is astrology. The planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, the Sun and Moon, the zodiac signs and the mechanism of astrology all symbolically describe the influence of these spheres and the activities of their beings. The Saturn sphere is the realm of the Greater awareness, and so the movements of Saturn in the sky symbolically describe the Work of this being in our lives. The Sun sphere is where the spirit or mental body comes into form as an expression in time and space (for us, a type of Sun astrologically) and the Moon sphere is where the soul or astral awareness is born and has its seat. This all occurs pre-natally as the physical body is developing. Between the Moon sphere and our physical universe is a zone occultists call the astral plane but which Bardon also calls the Earth Zone. This is our next door neighbour, dimensionally speaking, and it is a complex realm which we inhabit immediately before being born and after we die. I will explain this zone in more detail in the third voyage.

In total, 8 spheres directly affect us on Earth – The Earth zone, the Moon sphere, the Mercury sphere, Venus sphere, Sun sphere, Mars sphere, Jupiter sphere and Saturn sphere, in that order of ‘closeness’ (which is a matter of density with spheres closest to the physical being more dense), although many others exist which do not affect us as directly and are not part of the spiritual agenda we are seeking to master on the physical Earth. Note that these are not the same as the physical planets they share names with. The relationship between Mars and the Mars sphere is like the relationship between blood and the colour red, for example – analogous but not synonymous. Going to Mars is not the same as going to the Mars sphere, but it does bring us closer in relationship to the Mars sphere. The spheres are universal principles with planets and stars and moons as just part of their physical expressions. In another solar system the Mars sphere might be attached to a very different planet (obviously not called Mars) that orbits in a very different position to where Mars lives in our system, and it may revolve around two Suns, and all of this symbolically describes the hierarchy and the spiritual teachings available to life in that system.

The Greater Selves utilize the beings or spirits of the spheres in the Great Work too – there are Greaters guiding them too. They utilize them in the creation of all physical phenomena and guide them to perfection in the specific thing that they do, that they are. This includes all the mental and astral beings, the muses, faeries, elementals, god-forms, etc. Some of these ‘spirits’ are not truly spirits but are physical beings and races who have evolved to dwell in the physical, astral and/or mental plane at will i.e. they have perfected that part of the Great Work and may now guide others in doing so. Others have developed technologies which allow them to travel between dimensions but in doing so have come to understand that they have neglected their spiritual development and now seek to correct this. There are many extraterrestrial peoples with these capabilities so that they must more accurately be called extra-dimensional beings.

In the first voyage into form, the Great Work will gather all the needed components for that incarnation together, meaning it will call upon the guidance and help of certain beings in the creation of the mental, astral, and physical forms and the experiences it needs to gather in order to mature. It will accomplish this through what we can call a kind of kabbalah, or magical utterance, i.e. it will introduce a causation into the Akasha of the mental, astral or physical plane that brings its intention about. All of this is done with perfect love and understanding. We are educated in what we are to achieve, given advance warning of the hindrances and tribulations, equipped with the necessary powers and abilities (for example, talent with dancing, vision to see with), meet with many guides who are assigned to us, and so forth. The spirit will understand all that is before it and all the guidance it can call upon. It will also understand that it will forget all of this, as knowing it ahead of time would remove its free will. The forgetting is a hindrance that, once overcome, leads to great advances for the soul and spirit and in the meantime provides additional challenge, which equals even more opportunity.

Many of these beings then regard us as family members and even as lovers following this voyage. They may have made many such journeys with us. These beings can follow us throughout our many incarnations, both learning and teaching as they experience with us. If they are able to condense their vibration as the Greaters do, such beings may be able to even physically manifest to guide us, if that is necessary. However in order for this to happen we have to have a matching vibration in our own awareness that allows the conduit to be opened in other words we have to be at a matching level of consciousness before we are able to receive such guidance. This is also how we deal with the negative beings we are destined to deal with – we have to raise our level of consciousness in that sphere so that we are no longer a match for the negative being, causing them to depart. The experience with that negative being is intended to provide the contrast and motivation that teaches you to transform that part of your being, thereby gaining mastery of it. There is no guarantee of course, you have free will but if you do not succeed you will simply have to reincarnate with the same lesson. Part of the paradox though is that the Greater Self already knows the outcome of all of your free will choices, but that again must be kept hidden. However, in exercising our free will we alter the fabric of the Great Work around us, causing timelines to ‘move’ in perfect and eternal equilibrium with everything else, and this resolves the paradox and preserves our free will. This is yet another reason why we need to forget so much.

The first voyage then is truly one of Creation but also one of alliance and cooperation as many components are gathered together in service to the Great Work. The pregnant mother can feel all of this within her. She is the vessel through which this magic occurs. The three trimesters of pregnancy are analogous to the three voyages and the accumulation of focus into the three bodies. Her struggle and effort at the moment of birth is what causes the physical form of the newborn baby to be separated from hers and reach the end of the first voyage. It is a physical manifestation and culmination of the concentration of the Greater Mother as it focused its being into form. At the time of a natural birth the consciousness of the mother joins with its Greater as there is no way to focus on anything else except the now. In this way, motherhood becomes a sacred act that changes the mother forever, and mothers become vessels for profound spiritual wisdom and insight. Many traditions of magical midwifery, most of them now lost because they were not recorded and only passed from woman to woman, once existed to attend to every part of the first voyage. Much of this honoured the Earth as Mother of all earthly life or some other representation of the Great Mother, but it also involved specific evocations of the beings of the spheres at astrological junctures. This wisdom remains inside all women, however, only waiting the right time for its reawakening, which is underway.

THE SECOND VOYAGE

The second voyage is epic and it is a voyage of Experience and it is life as we know it, but many things need to be said here. Our understanding of life is very limited and we (usually) do not comprehend the invisible world beyond the physical, having forgotten its existence shortly after birth or into childhood.

The purpose of the second voyage is, as stated earlier, spiritual development. In more detailed terms it is not only awakening to the presence of the Greater Self (your existence as timeless consciousness incarnating through eternity) but also doing full justice to and conscious expression of the birthright you have inherited from the first voyage. Additionally, you have to clear any karma you have taken on board for clearing in this incarnation, this being the consequences of your past free will choices. And you have to do this while being unaware of it, at least until you reach a point where you have the maturity you need to be able to remember.

I have already pointed out that the portal to the Greater awareness is in the present moment. Focusing on the eternal now brings us into alignment with it, which is why meditation is so popular. However, other things bring us into alignment with it too – the conscience is one, since it is the whispering perception of Greater guidance. Joy and unconditional love and gratitude are also powerful forces that align us with how the Greaters see literally everything. Giving ourself unconditional love, managing our astral and mental vibration so that we feel good and not bad regardless of conditions, also brings us into alignment because unconditional love is how the Greater sees us, and such character work allows the Greater to shine more vividly through us. This is really the essence of the Great Work in human form – shaping the soul and spirit and body to be perfect expressions of the Greater, the consciousness of the universe fully awakened in physical form and celebrating that in everything.

The clearing of karma from past lives is astrologically regulated by the planet Saturn as an emissary of the Saturn sphere in our solar system. As I explained, solar systems throughout the physical universe have specific arrangements of planets in orbit around their stars which match the hierarchy of the spheres for that system and its life. In our system Saturn enacts the will of the Greaters and the Great Work in the circumstances of our life, which are all precisely timed and calibrated. The greatest division is a threefold one that mirrors the threefold voyages – childhood, adulthood and elderhood, delineated astrologically by the Saturn returns. Karmic circumstances will be astrologically timed by Saturn in each of these trimesters. However, the whole of astrology will describe the influences accrued and the missions agreed to in the first voyage, right down to timing by transits and progressions. Somehow, astrologers have managed to create a workable system that symbolically describes the workings of the spheres. This is a testament to the power of the birthright that is placed in each of us, especially collectively.

Given free will it is possible for human beings to interfere with the intended missions of others, for example to kill them before their alloted point in time has been reached. In these cases it becomes the karma of the killer to provide the killed with all of the experiences that they denied them, in effect ensuring that their next life or lives will be one of service to that individual. They may need to provide the money, resources, opportunities and all the help that they would have received from others. This ultimately also enables the person they killed to forgive them, but if that soul does so on its way out (in the third voyage) it receives many blessings because this act of forgiveness leads to a deep maturation of the spirit and soul. Contemplation upon this leads to a profound appreciation of the gift of free will that has been given to each of us. Every human life is an attempt to do justice to the power and beauty of this gift and not to abuse it. It is part of the birthright I mentioned earlier, and it is the duty and ultimately the destiny of every human being to bring about its perfection. The second voyage is guided by shamans, magicians, nature itself and all those who know how to bridge the visible and invisible worlds.

Every physical life has a span in time and space along a particular timeline allotted to it in the first voyage, and when that time is up, the sand runs out and we die. This begins the third voyage.

THE THIRD VOYAGE

The third voyage is epic and it is a voyage of Assimilation and Unification, sometimes called the ‘2nd death’ although in reality it is truly an awakening to life wherein all of its Mystery is revealed.

Immediately following death there is sometimes a period of shock in which the now discorporate consciousness inhabits its astra-mental body and comprehends that it has died, but eventually comes the realisation that one still exists, which ends the shock. The awareness is now in the Earth Zone, the astral plane, which does not merely encompass the globe of the Earth but extends throughout the entire physical universe and has many bands of increasingly subtle density, which I will explain below. The soul immediately discovers that it is no longer bound by space, being able to travel anywhere it conceives instantly without impediment by any barriers, and it begins to perceive the spiritual laws and truths behind all experiences, especially its own. An immense release of worry and suffering occurs but the soul also realizes that all of its material achievements mean nothing because it can take none of it with it. Only the spiritual development matters. All of the souls relationships are transformed as the divine laws of love and truth become clearer to it – for many souls, this is the first time since childhood when they are able to feel unconditional love for themselves. Now it is obvious how they should feel, and they yearn to feel it while in a body. This is the presence of the astral light, the Akasha of the astral. It will work many such powerful magics on the third voyage.

Some souls fall into dark astral zones immediately, grappling with necessary demons before they can perceive this astral light, for example evil-doers who have caused great suffering. They need to experience what they have inflicted upon others so that they understand what they have done. No soul can escape the consequences of fully understanding its full effect on others, from the smallest action to the greatest. The discarnate soul perceives the ripple effect of all its kindness, the life changing consequences of every small mercy they granted another as well as the hurt they caused. For souls who have lived virtuous lives the third voyage is an exaltation of the spirit, for those who have lived cruel ones the voyage is very perilous indeed. Some lifetimes are truly ‘wasted’ in that nothing of value was learned, and only negative karma was accrued, but such lives exist in the context of an eternity of incarnations.

Many guides, including the Greater Self, draw close to the soul to protect it and teach it while it remains in the Earth Zone for a time. The length of time (as we measure it) that it will remain there varies greatly, sometimes it passes through instantly, other times it lingers for what we call decades or even centuries, although magic is often involved in these cases (see mummification). In ancient times, some of these guides were human, i.e. they were necromantic magicians and shamans who acted as psychopomps, guides to the dead like Charon of Greek myth. Such figures are often cloaked and carry a magic lamp which guides the deceased on its path, like the Hermit of the tarot. They could sometimes convey messages between the physical and astral world, but their main purpose was to guard and keep safe the pathways through what was termed the Underworld. Many offerings, rituals and prayers were also made by ancient cultures to safeguard the soul.

One reason for this is that there are numerous astral entities that seek to benefit from the vulnerability of the new arrival either by vampirizing its energy or using the astral body to deceive the earthly world. As the soul sheds its form by releasing its attachment to physical experience and draws forth the necessary lessons it becomes more and more transparent, eventually becoming only faintly visible, as the astral Elements that it is composed of are returned to the Earth Zone (this is why some spirits manifest in the physical as invisible or semi-visible forms and others do not while still being able to pass through solid objects). The astral body – the personality for that lifetime – is dying (it exists only as an intermediary between the spirit and the flesh) and the awareness of the deceased is moving from an astra-mental form to a purely mental one, a spirit. Some entities will then abscond with the discarded astral body and use it to impersonate the deceased. Only a person who has a strongly developed mental body and mental senses, i.e. someone with a high degree of maturity in the spiritual laws, can perceive whether or not the spirit of the deceased is present or some other spirit.

The dis-integration of the astral body occurs alongside the dis-integration of the astral cord (silver cord, the astral matrix) that connects the astral body with the physical body at the naval, where the umbilical cord is cut at birth (the sacrum chakra in the astral form), and this is analogous to the attachment the soul has to being physical and having physical experiences, like eating chips, hugging your kids, feeling the Sun on your face, having a stiff drink, etc. While in a physical body this cord binds our astral and physical form together, but its usefulness is at an end once the physical dies. In other words we must let go of attachment to the physical world as part of the third voyage, and when we do so completely the process of moving on will accelerate. This is how the soul finally lets go of any addictions it has to physical things that it has not managed to overcome in life – there is simply no longer any opportunity. This process has a momentum that begins with struggle but ends with ease. This is because as the astral matrix is disintegrated the awareness becomes more fully aware of its spirit and of the eternal nature of being.

One of the most beautiful parts of this process is how our attachments to those we love and care for are resolved as the awareness of our eternal spirit reveals itself. For illustrative purposes let’s take the case of a mother who has died in childbirth and yearns to care for her still physical child. In the beginning her soul will feel strong needs to be with her newborn just as any mother on Earth would feel but without the ability or any chance to physically do so. She would still be to communicate with the physical world and perceive all that happens within it, but remotely, similar to our status when we watch things happening on a screen that occur live elsewhere. We can send messages to those involved but we can’t physically interact. In this time many guides and spiritual helpers will be drawn by their divine missions toward her, guiding her and protecting her as she experiences these things. Some of these may be members of her own family with a strong resonance to the situation, such as the spirit of her own mother.

The mother’s yearning for being with her child will naturally not cease, meaning it is an issue with respect to the disintegration of the astral matrix that could potentially bind her soul and spirit to the earth plane for a long time. Her love for her child is different to an incarnate mothers love, because it is tireless and able to watch over it wherever it goes at all times. With enough power and condensation of the astral Fluids she can even appear near to the child in the physical world for brief moments, either as a transparent ghost or as a seemingly solid figure (hands will pass through her, so touch is still not possible for her, but she can rock the cradle or move other objects like a wind chime or cause lights to flicker in alarm by an effort of will and love). If her will is very strong she may resist the disintegration of the astral matrix potentially for the rest of the child’s life, but this would represent a huge block in her own progress. In these cases someone in the physical world who knows how to persuade her to move on may need to be called in.

This process (or the gentlest one) is one of leading her attention away from focusing on her relationship with the child and guiding her to her own inner knowing that it is okay to let go of that relationship and of the child. She must be guided to look within her. With this more inner focus a natural process occurs in which her love for the child, once occulted by fears for its safety, is transformed and clarifies. As she focuses only on the love she has for her child within her, she begins to understand and experience for herself everything that will happen to it throughout the course of its life. In effect, the universe (specifically, the astral light) steps in to reveal what her spirit knows, that there is One consciousness shared by all forms, and she catches glimpses of what her spirit, on the timeless mental plane, already knows – she can never be apart, from anything. This realisation frees her from the need to stay and causes the astral matrix to finally disintegrate. This also means that the mothers spirit is in a very real sense never apart from the child, they are bonded completely by their love, forever, and this is how it is possible for her spirit to communicate with her child even after she has already reincarnated. The magic of the timeless mental plane makes it possible, as there all moments in time eventually converge into a single now moment, wherein lies the boundary of the upper mental plane and the Akasha, the realm of the Greaters.

This process of joining our awareness with things we love through empathy (mental transference) is the same for every attachment of love that we feel. It is one of the defining features of the third voyage, that all the individual expressions of love are collected together and it is also the explanation for the many native beliefs that their spirits will enter the land and sacred objects they used after they die. All of that love becomes transformed by the realisation that all love is an expression of the One self, which loves all its creations, all its forms, and is equally present with all of them for eternity. Love is perfect – a path to perfection – because it is what the One self does.

The mental matrix, the violet or gold cord connecting the spirit to its soul which is positioned at the solar plexus, must also disintegrate before the incarnation is complete. This attachment is not about attachment to the physical but instead about being a specific person – beautiful, smart, vain, poor, male, American, – whatever we think we are beyond an individual being and consciousness. A huge amount of ego attachment is transmuted here. It occurs often alongside and in rhythm with the process of detaching from physical experience and form, but sometimes it transpires later. Some souls remain in the astral for learning purposes or with specific missions to do there. However eventually the soul, being mortal, will perish and the awareness will enter the mental body, having returned all of the spiritual properties imbued into the astral body on the first voyage back to their astral sources – we part ways with many beings who have been with us, returning their gifts and sharing our learning with them. A similar process of returning the individual properties of the temporal spirit to their sources on the mental plane will also take place before the awareness rejoins with its Greater. This is the part of the entire journey where lessons and teachings are received and the next incarnation is formulated. There is a full reunion with all of those who have died before us in this stage and as much time as we need to enjoy it.

All the paths to perfection that have been delivered to the Earth have arisen through inspiration that has its origins in the invisible world, in the Earth Zone, and have their causes in the Akasha and mental plane. All genuine teachers and gurus have come with the same teachings in different forms that have universal principles – that we are eternal beings, that the purpose of life is spiritual development, that love is key, that there is more than we perceive at work in the physical universe, and that it is the destiny of all human beings to reach perfection. All of these things are revealed to be true by the third voyage,. During its time in the Earth Zone the soul will comprehend all of these things from a specific perspective, this being a band or region of the Earth Zone that corresponds with the sphere resonant with the maturity of the souls development. For example, the soul who has mastered the astrological energy of the Moon may be drawn into the band of the Earth Zone that is analogous to the Moon sphere and its beings. The Earth Zone is in effect a cosmic mirror of Creation as it contains bands for all of the spheres that our awareness must voyage through when seeking incarnation on Earth. We can think of these as being like the bands of the rainbow, for the rainbow is their analogy in the physical plane. The bands are bands of density, meaning that there is a hierarchy for the soul to ascend, with the Saturn sphere and its band representing full completion of the Earthly agenda. Souls that come to rest in this band of the Earth Zone may become teachers for all those still working on their perfection, or move on to whatever comes next. Because these are bands of density within the Earth Zone that connect with the various spheres beyond it the bands serve as portals between the spheres. However, it is not possible for a being of a lower density to stay in a band or sphere that is above its maturity, as it will just be drawn back to wherever it resonates with. Only a being of a higher sphere or band can use these connections to condense their form into a lower vibrational frequency (this is how travel between dimensions is made). A being on a lower level must petition one on a higher level to come to it. This is the reason why prayers are offered to the deceased. It is also the intention of the work of The Practice of Magical Evocation – the magician visits all of these bands and spheres and becomes astrally and mentally able to withstand their vibrations and hold them while at the same time befriending the beings that inhabit those spheres.

The path to perfection is long but the spirit understands that it has all the time it will ever need, and more, in the present moment. Each moment is precious and perfect because it offers us an endless opportunity to progress and measure that progress. When we pass from this world we do not truly die but instead return to where we came from, into the very heart of the sacredness of life, where we always were, and always shall be.

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