A Change of Seasons: The Cancer Ingress & Quarter

Astrologers pay attention to ingress charts because they literally picture  Earth's 'phases' vis-a-vis the Sun. It's all about the tilt of the planet - you know...global inclinations. 

This year, the Cancer ingress pictures two very different dynamics. The first is a challenging grand cross (above, in red lines). The other is a picture of possibilities called a 'kite' (look for the blue lines - the tail is at the bottom).

A grand cross (sometimes also called a grand square) is four squares put together. It's sort of like an intersection of streets. And to a great extent the same rules apply. Just like at an intersection, it's a matter of everyone obeying the rules, participating in turn. Which if you think about it, is really everyone working together. That's what allows us to get where we want to go. 

But I'm not going to kid you - astrological grand crosses have a nasty reputation for being endlessly challenging. People tend to bounce from one corner to the next like  dementedly undecided pedestrians. Or, to return to the actual traffic metaphor, to try to insist on having the right of way, screw the lights and traffic laws. 

And that just doesn't work. Neither does dwelling on any given corner of a grand cross!

So what are we working with here? Well, looking at each corner of the square alone and in isolation, in the first corner we have concrete problems - and an ongoing set of problems at that (Pluto-Charybdis-Orpheus in early Capricorn). We'd like someone to fix things...even if we have less than exquisite faith in anyone's ability TO fix anything (Ceres in late Sagittarius). If they don't fix it we're disappointed. If they do fix it, we don't like they way they solved the problem.

Corner number two is all about our not approving what people are doing or how they're doing it. On the other hand, we're all totally obsessed with doing what WE like to do, in spite of the fact it isn't really make us feel happily secure(d). But heaven forbid that anyone tell us that (or how) we should give up our established and unsatisfying ways! Yes, even if we know in the depths of our brains, spirits and souls (pick as many as apply) that's exactly what we should be doing, how DARE anyone tell us so!

Oh! And let's not forget how good we've all gotten at making excuses for why we shouldn't have to change. Such expertise! You'd think we were all working on a PhD in Personal Alternate Realities.

This last note (the alternate reality thing) is a tip off that there's a black hole involved in this corner - and if you guessed that, give yourself a gold star (or at least a collapsed gold star). And this black hole is one of the reasons why getting things done is going to seem so challenging over these next few months; feeling magnetized by forces beyond our control, we so often find ourselves falling into....? Right! A black hole.

In our minds, that is.

For those of the technical ilk, the list of points in this quadrant corner reads thusly: Byblis, (things old),  Eos (unstoppable appetite), Lust (fixations), Jupiter (growing knowledge), Uranus (change/anarchy), Scheat (bad reputation/reception), a black hole at 28 Pisces (probably a contributor to Scheat's bad reputation thing) and Tantalus, a perfectly delightful symbol of all which tantalizes but (groan here!) never satisfies.

So to review: thus far we have one 'threatening' corner replete with yearnings to be 'rescued' and a second corner filled with lack of satisfaction and reluctance (if not downright refusal) to give up our unhappy ways. 

Corner three is occupied with every method you can think of which we use as passive placation: the ever-popular sport of political protesting, eating, drinking, drugs and sex (very popular, these), the productive pacifiers known as exercise, work, cleaning house, doing errands and/or walking the dog (or being walked by the dog if you happen to own a really big dog)...and then there are the verbal forms which fit here too, including discussing, theorizing, taking meetings and praying. All these fall under the auspices of a Dionysus/Panacea combination made particularly strong because Saturn is exactly conjunct Panacea in a degree which is much theory and little activity, assuring us that we will all be tempted to talk ourselves into self-placation this season. And if that doesn't work, we may just stalemate ourselves.  

Corner four is where the Cancer Sun actually is. Now mind you, Sun in Cancer itself is a highly vital symbol. It holds vital dynamics important to planning and building for the future. But it does tend to be moody and very protective. And at times, certainly myopic. Cancer often beats a queasy retreat just when action would work and gets testy when supportive patience is the heart, soul and simple divinity of the answer. 

Most of all, we must remember that this is the corner facing off (opposing) against the threats. And if you want the world to be a better place you can't do that by retreating from the problem. Cancers are very big with worrying about the future of their family and going home (to that family) instead of working on worldly problems so the world is a better place for that family.

Of course there is some chance that the answer really is in someone's living room. If so, we sure do hope they'll share it with the rest of us, right?

Okay...so that's the grand cross. As the 'answer' to its puzzle may not be all that apparent, let's look at the kite, as the answer to one is found in the format of the other.

The tail of said kite, to be precise.

But what is an astrological kite? Well, the recipe goes like this: take one grand trine (ongoing, nearly unstoppable energy) and stand that on end (the blue triangle at the bottom of the figure). Then add two supporting sextiles reaching to and supporting the top of the kite. These are the opportunities. 

'Solving' or 'gaining control of' whatever is at the the top of the kite (those problems and threats?) is the goal of a kite, and as said, the bottom - the tail - is the key. And seeing that that tail is expressed here by Betelgeuse-Sun-black hole, you start with a plan. A Cancerian plan, which means everybody pulling all together, each one of us marshaling ourselves to do what we should do in the long run, not just what feels safe, convenient or habitually natural. 

Cancer is the home, and our individual family, yes. But it's also the community, the nation and the family of man. It's the sign of this world and our planet - Mother Earth. So if we want to solve the problems in our world, we need to solve the problems in the world.

As for Begelgeuse, as a sign of easy accomplishment (if we put our minds to it), that's a plus. But in a grand cross world of negatives, threats and reluctance, let's be real - the easy way to think is in terms of one's own and our own little world. But with the problems coming from across the zodiac from the ingress, the problems (and thus the solution) are not 'inner,' they're 'outer' - or more particularly, how we do or don't connect to Things External. 

So much for those of you who think you can just ignore society and the news, right? 

But why would not helping or not joining not work? 

Answer: a little galactic thing called a black hole. Maybe you've heard of them - able to bend light? Possessed of inexorable gravity? To remain in your personal quadrant this season is to be swallowed up thereby. So will you allow yourself (or even volunteer) to be sucked in by your own reluctance? Or are you going to use the power of a black hole to 'visit' the alternative reality and harness that power to do the 'alternative' thing - which is to say something different than what has been done up until now?

But there's all that threat! And reluctance! And tendency to talk ourselves out of doing anything about it? Why would we do anything else and what 'anything else' shall we do? What works here?

The answer lies in the nature of the kite - the other two trine points of the 'unstoppable engine' of endless potential we are being gifted with this season. One point is Chiron-Lilith-Neptune, a sign that we can either take our challenges on or be driven ever harder by ever increasing bad behavior and necessity. 

This is good....why? Well, think of it this way: how else is the universe going to get us moving (and to shift us out of old habits) except to make it too uncomfortable to sit still?

The key to this is that with Chiron and friends we also get Athena (wisdom) and royal Fomalhaut - the premier signature of ideals and dreams which come true IF (big IF) they are not corrupt or corruptive. So we not only have to 'do,' we have to 'do' intelligently and without cutting corners or compromising ethical morals (and moral ethics - yes, those too). 

Bearing this in mind we look to the other side of the grand trine...and there we find an  elegant combination of a critical degree Libra Moon (the need to negotiate, compromise, reach agreements and join with others), Pallas (the other form of Athena and thus wisdom) and Scylla, a monster representing forces which can either eat you, or provide you with the impetus to bring all your skill to bear and to keep trying no matter what.

By the way - nobody said this was going to be easy, merely that there is a way to turn negatives into positives. 

And it is in the end these two forms of wisdom (Pallas and Athena) which really give us the clue: these two upper corners of the grand trine are also the keynote structures upon which our opportunities (to better things) are founded. So the way forward is through use of intellectual faculties, not emotional or spiritual resources. The 'ease' promised by Betelgeuse is in Gemini - a sign about choice. The whole grand trine is in air signs (theory and concept). So we do need to think things through and we do need to conceptualize what we're going to do. We just need to resist getting sucked in by our fears, by emotionalism, by inertia or temptations.

Apparently it's all doable. So says this very remarkable chart which comes to us in an astonishing, unsettled time filled with upheavals. We shouldn't think nothing bad (or more bad) is going to happen - things are going to happen. And why would that be?

Because only through challenges and trying times do we ever learn the truth of our potentials. In other words, trying times aren't about the state of our world, they're about the nature of our trying. 

Thus do we learn.