Our Days of Fluctuation: Pandora, Huya and Chaos on station

Pisces by Mikalojus Konstantinas Ciurtionis (1907)

Last week, Chiron entered Pisces, marking a substantial shift in not so much what happens, but how we feel about what happens. In the astrological ‘pantheon,’ Chiron is always difficult simply because we can’t define what it is. All we know is that it’s difficult for you. And for him. And for that other person – and that each and every difficulty is defined by what is hard for each person to bring themselves to deal with.

Or each country.

Or each company.

Or each governing body, regime, ruler or administration.

We all have something of a ‘case of Chiron’ at the moment. That’s natural.

In the week or two ahead, you’re going to hear a lot about planets entering Pisces. Any time a ‘bunch’ of celestial bodies traverse a single sign, that’s an indicator that said sign’s precepts are more and more the focus of life’s process.

In this case, the sign is Pisces. So the ‘subject’ is the experiencing of our own feelings and/or our ability to tolerate our feelings (or reactions to the feelings of others) realistically….without abandoning all to hope, without acting out in a frenzy of venting, without simply saying ‘I don’t want to deal with that.’

Pisces is a sign of spirituality, yes. But it’s not about blind faith: it’s about acceptance. While optimism and a good attitude are good, it’s what you do with that which counts. And if you’re going to do, you had better be doing with one eye on the realities of life.

That duality is Pisces…the idealistic, optimist fish and the rational reality fish.

(Among other things – but more on that in other Pisces-oriented posts.)

Meanwhile, here we are in the latter part of Sun in conceptual Aquarius with the world posing all sorts of questions and quandaries in the attempt to get us to see what is right or wrong with the systems set up to run our life and world.

You can look at TV and it’s there. You can look in your mailbox – it’s there. You can talk to your friends and family and say ‘what’s up?’ and you’ll get an earful on what isn’t working in this world.

Somewhere along the line it may occur to you that it’s one thing to bitch and moan and another to do something about the problems. No, they’re not easy to fix, but if you don’t fix them, should you go on complaining about them?

This week, a couple of issues come into focus – mostly because we’re going to be getting some idea that we haven’t really been properly focused on those things.

Uh-oh! Oops!

The first will be represented by Atlantis retrograding back into Virgo as of February 16th at 22 minutes past midnight (UT/+0). Virgo is the sign of ‘the method.’ It’s about health, work and service and as such, involves everything from the job which you have to do (or need to get) in order to keep the lights on to health care and everyone in this world who proverbially “keeps the lights on” (i.e., runs, designs or builds infrastructure) or who works in some ‘serving’ or ‘service’ capacity in order to keep our lives going. Medical workers, members of the military, civil servants, and every support member of any corporate process is included in this group.

In some way…probably most of us (if not all of us!) fit in this group. But yes, some more than others – certainly!

The story of Atlantis is an interesting one which starts with this person feeling like an outcast with regards to the group they really, really want to feel part of. Along comes the magical chance: give all this up and surrender utterly to that you think will prove your destruction and you will find happiness. 

In the story, the person gives in (yes, tearfully) and they not only survive walking into the ocean’s depths, they find in those depths the very society and company they had been longing for….and thus they come to live happily ever after.

Anyone notice the similarity between this story and Chiron? Both ask that we do the thing we don’t know how to do…or think we can’t do. And through doing what we apparently need to do instead of what we want to do or feel comfortable doing, we discover the thing which actually makes us happy.

Atlantis is moving back into earthy, earthly, real life, real deal Virgo. Chiron has just moved into watery, emotional, self-confrontational Pisces.

In Virgo, we face how to deal with the thing, the other, the process or the world. In Pisces, we face dealing with ourselves and how we feel about life.

And for now, that’s all I’m going to say about that!

But we’re not done…come 10:33am on February 17th, asteroid Pandora goes direct at 3 Cancer, a degree which talks about the ‘misfit in one’s own home.’

That’s what we need…more problems with alienation, right? Yet considering what’s going on in the world, there’s a distinct tone of aptness to this ‘turn of eventualities.’

Remembering how celestial bodies in direct motion suggest prompting which comes through external means and that Pandora is about ‘every ill in the world’ we can expect to feel like life and people and things are trying to inflict stuff on us. But is the reality simply that we haven’t dealt with our own ill feelings? That which isn’t in us to be provoked doesn’t arise, right? So what is all this Pandora stuff about?

 /

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Pandora by Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1881)
 

Where we are dealing with ills, this would be where they would surface, particularly as that concerns not feeling ‘at home’ in some part of our life, our world, or in our own skin. Conversely, it’s a good time to deal with same since the last thing in Pandora’s box is hope.

It also pays to remember that where Pandora is concerned, it’s not just the ills she unleashes which are the point of the story – the story is really about our curiosity. So…how curious are you? Do you stifle your curiosity about the ills in your world …personal or global? If so, is that an ill right there?

Oh, that Dame Denial! She does get into us, doesn’t she?

This Pandora turn happens about twenty hours  before this month’s Full Moon. So emotions are on the rise anyway. And giving this station its two-day before-and-after ‘station leeway,’ that means Pandora’s station effects begin late on the 14th or early on February 15th, depending on where you live.

And no – that’s not all.

Come 6:40 in the afternoon on February 18th (UT/+0), TNO Chaos goes direct at 11 Gemini, an emotional degree, a mental degree, an expressive degree. Chaos itself is not the ‘messiness’ we associate with the modern word, but the sense of the Chaos – the primal well of undefined and unbounded possibility.

Hesiod and the Muse (Chaos)

by Gustave Moreau (1826-1890)

TNOs being defined as bodies which orbit way out there in the iciness realms beyond Neptune (hence the term Trans Neptunian Objects), like other TNOs Chaos refers to something we intrinsically ‘know’ exists, but which we get reminded of from time to time.

This would be one of those times.

Again, giving this station its two-day before-and-after station leeway period, the effects of Chaos going direct begin on February 16th and end on the 18th. That means they start just after Atlantis backs into Virgo and overlaps the highly emotional period of Pandora going direct and the Full Moon, too.

So far we have that Atlantis in Virgo/Chiron in Pisces teeter-totter going on…and Pandora going direct in Cancer, a sign which likes security.

Pandora denoting security? Uh…only if we’re really ready to accept and face ourselves.

But maybe that’s the point?

Those who can will like as not be able to see and use the TNO Chaos station/direct period as a time to really fuel their cause. Or bring together some idea. Or see where they are going and how to capitalize on what they now know, are learning, are figuring out.

And no, that’s not all either!

Come just after midnight on February 19th, the Sun will enter Pisces. (By the by…you can expect full blogs on the Full Moon and the Sun entering Pisces – we aren’t hardly covering those effects in this blog!)

This solar-Pisces ingress occurring in the wake of Chaos going direct but certainly still within the realm of its station allowance says one thing. In fact, it says a whole lot about what it’s possible for us to learn and/or realize about ourselves and others during this series of days.

But we’re not done yet! Come 1:29pm on February 19th (UT/+0), a certain TNO/Plutino named Huya will go retrograde.

Huya represents the energy of ‘the rainmaker.’ It’s about what we do for others which in the end, feeds us. I like using Oprah Winfrey as the near-perfect example of how Huya functions. (And no, Oprah, I’m not saying you’re an icy celestial body orbiting beyond Neptune!) It’s just that Oprah’s youth gave her the motivation to try and motivate others. And because she helps enrich their lives, they enrich hers.

 A rain shaft pierces a tropical sunset as seen from Man-of-War Bay

photo credit: Mary Hollinger for NOAA (1980)

That’s the rainmaker principle.

Going retrograde at 17 Scorpio, Huya is asking us what we can do for others. It begins asking us this on the 17th and continues prompting us all the way through the 21st – when though you don’t know it yet, Mercury enters Pisces.

Huya’s station enfolds the Full Moon. And Chaos’ going direct, suggesting that those who are involved in doing something ‘giving’ will see their lives (or efforts) prospering now.

Huya generally asks what we know about ourselves in a somewhat more factual way than say, Chiron does. But in the interactive sign of Scorpio (and in Scorpio’s most emotional decan) it does challenge us to ask ourselves whether our means, methods and most of all, goals are entirely valid.

Scorpio being emotional and interactive, it’s the sign of where we deal with others in all those many venues where we’re hoping to achieve our “desires” – whatever they may be. But where they don’t satisfy both sides (or everyone, in the case of a group), Scorpio inevitably leads to failure, rejection and alienation.

Often that’s bad. But just as often that’s merely a lesson about what we’re trying to do. Is it up to standards? Or maybe we need to examine our own motivations (speaking of Huya…!).

And all this happens as the Sun moves into Pisces and – (guess what?) – meets up with Chiron.

Thus we are back at the beginning of the story.

These are days of reconnoitering. Of reconsidering. Of fluctuation in our lives. Hopefully they’ll inspire fluctuations in how we see ourselves and our possibilities, and thus what we do with our lives.

If not…there’s always more Pisces to come. Where we join with others, Pisces embraces us. Where we live in a world of personal delusions or denials, Pisces captures us.

Which would you rather be: captivating or a captive? It’s all about who we are...and who that person is willing to want to become enough to decide that's who they need to dedicate themselves to being.