Saturn times…

In our last episode, we went all Jupiter. Jupiter entered Aries. And now some of us are just bounding along, some are looking around and considering (or reconsidering), and some of us are setting about changing the world.

Well, at least our world. And yes, maybe the world.

With that shift now in progress and it’s prompting being felt far and wide, the next thing on the cosmic menu is that which happens but a couple of days from now: Saturn going retrograde.

Part one, that this is going to happen around dawn UT time on Wednesday means we are now heading into the pre-station ‘station zone’ which is so famous for its effects.

The last couple of stations have been helpfully illuminated by worldly events: Jupiter went direct and as we came into that station, the UK’s Prince William announced his engagement. We came into the Uranus station. In the US, President Obama cast his tax proposal upon governmental waters and up boiled a fracas. In London, Parliament voted to raise college tuition and riots broke out in the city streets.

This is exactly what stations are about. They don’t cause anything – they’re alarm clocks telling us when things will happen. What happens is delineated by the planet going on station, the degree in which the station happens, and (where you have a chart) how that station affects said chart.

And not all charts are going to be aspected by all stations. But if the station does aspect your chart, the event will happen to you, or in your life. If it doesn’t, you’ll hear about it happening to friends or in the world.

I’ve had clients (and yes, even family) who protest, but if I hear about it, isn’t it happening to me? My simple one word answer to this is “boundaries.” Though we may enjoy Prince William’s engagement, it’s not our life being affected. And even if you live in the US where you’re going to be affected by what the President and Congress does, this is not your life.

And to those who say but it’s my taxes! It IS my life! the astrologer answers evidently not. We are people. Money is, in essence, a tool with which we all have agreed to barter for things. They may be essential things like food, they may be unessential things like the latest electronic toy.

This may strike you as a metaphysical splitting of hairs, but at some level metaphysics just says we are not a concept. We are flesh and blood and life force. Money may help us, but it is not who we are. It famously cannot buy us love, nor can it in the end often even buy us health.

Learning where we end and where the ‘outside’ begins is a very Saturn thing. Astrologer Robert Zollar once wrote that Saturn, in defining our individuality, dooms us to loneliness. With that privilege of individuality comes all the cost of being individuated.

All that becomes more apt now with Saturn going retrograde at an emotional degree of Libra, the question is how’s the world treating you? Personal or professional, we are the ‘cause’ in our personal ‘cause/effect.’ So are things good, mediocre, luke warm, bubbling hot, painful, lonely, filled with joy, iffy, exciting, rewarding, daunting, paralyzed, giving you a giant Excedrin headache…or another variation on some exotic but in the end, all-too-human theme?

People seem to think that Saturn in Libra is about relationships. That’s sort of right…but it’s really about the attention, effort and focus which gets put on relating. Or not relating. Or putting up walls. Saturn symbolizes all we build, all which we are limited by, all we limit ourselves with, all the effort we put into getting past our personal challenges. Saturn is the symbol of time – and all we do with our time in this world.

And all we don’t do, too.

Saturn is associated with fear because we fear that we can’t have. Or that we won’t make time in our lives to do and thus never end up being, having or experiencing. We fear our mortality – it’s an insurmountable limit. We fear deprivation, however you personally define that kind of term.

And of course there is that individuality versus loneliness thing cited above – which is very much why Saturn is not only the sole ruler of Capricorn (sign of individual achievement) but has always been the primary ruler of Aquarius. The individual who much define themselves in order to fit in somewhere in society must then transcend that aloofness in order to become part of their society or their work world or their social network…or whatever.

And if only by being part of that world can they then reap the benefits of that world - including income, acceptance by others, support/assistance of others in this world be that personal or professional…

…that rather tells us why Saturn effort, dedication and self-discipline both in the ‘self development’ phase and the networking/integration phase (replete with all the social morays, habits, hierarchies et all which may be) is so essential.

That’s important to us why, what with Saturn going retrograde in Libra?

That’s a good question, to which I have a good answer. That answer is that Aquarius being the 5th house/sign from Libra makes Aquarius – and all arenas Aquarian – where we express ourselves.

To figure out what zodiac 'harmonic' you're dealing with, 

start with the first sign and count counter-clockwise

around the wheel (that being the direction of the natural

zodiac pictured on a horoscope) until you reach the

second sign. The originating sign counts as "one."

And this, fair friends, is why as the incoming Aquarian Age has dawned among us, that such Aquarian things as computers and networking and corporations and social groups – all Aquarian things – have come to be such primary outlets for relationship and relating (Libra) expression.

Those of us who are doing well in either the Libra or the Libra/Aquarian departments (relationships versus relating to/in one’s world) will tend to ‘regroup’ and consolidate as this time come upon them. Those who aren’t doing so hot in these arenas will either meet up with challenges, be confronted by problems OR be presented with situations which force them to reconnoiter not necessarily as much in the world as in their own psyche.

Direct motion: things happen in the world, we respond in a worldly arena. Retrograde motion: things shift inside, we challenge long-term standing ‘personal realities’ and notions.

This is also one of those curious moments of station. There will be another post on Saturn coming up in a couple of days, but that being then, the now of the conversation is how tomorrow (at 9:11am UT/+0) there will be a conjunction of Hera, Lust and Scheat.

Approaching this like a painter might, the broad brushstroke is fixed star Scheat. All stars being part of our solar system’s celestial background, astrologically, they a ‘bright points’ which like stationary traffic signs along the highway of life, we are called upon to heed.

In Scheat’s case the term ‘bright’ may be a bit misleading however. Scheat is not about brilliance or a ‘bright spot’ in life – far from it! Scheat is ‘bad receptions.’ And in (very) late Pisces, it’s emotionally driven bad receptions – or at least a reception which sets you up to feel badly. Scheat can be disappointments, disapprovals or out-and-out rejection.

This being part of the Saturn station, the question becomes whether the station represents your meeting up which makes you feel like rejecting something…or what you’re doing or how you’re going about being you – having that trigger someone else’s negatives.

To have Lust (focus) and Hera (leadership/power over a personal group/relationship) conjunct Scheat tells us something more about the area(s) of life most likely to be triggered. This ‘lust’ being not carnal but being totally focused on something (‘lusting after’ a goal, aim or focus, whatever it may be), to combine it with Hera and Scheat suggests this may be a turn in relationships with someone…and not for the better! Or that the (Hera) protection of a singular focus (Lust) provokes a nasty reaction.

The other end of this dynamic may be that something which has been difficult or on-the-outs in your world may take a turn and become more palatable. Or more functional.

With Saturn in the mix the real question is what you have been doing about/with the question at hand. If you’ve been all about you…or disregarding the rules or maybe even the morays of those in your community and family, things could get tough. But if you’ve been standing for standards and fair play and someone else has been being a miserable so-and-so, things may turn forward.

Either way, this becomes a moment in which you realize or recognize what works and what doesn’t/won’t/hasn’t work(ed). And since Saturn will soon be retrograde until June 2011, this is either the start of a ‘working out’ and moving forward in areas where you’ve ‘got it right’ or the start of a long period of bumps and knocks, all of which are meant to cause you to reflect.

No, not on others – though that will be what you probably want to do. Saturn in Libra, whether we like it or not, is for good or ugly, ultimately all about us. 

So ends part one of this Saturn station chat. Since the planet of honor hasn't actually pulled into the station as yet, we are still standing by. But if you listen, I pretty much guarantee you that you can hear the Saturn dynamics coming down the track!