AN AQUARIAN ERA FOR AQUARIUS | BY ERIC FRANCIS
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The simplest way to gather the power of Saturn in Aquarius, particularly in such a personal placement for you, is to take responsibility for your choices, your actions, and your feelings. This is a day-to-day, hour-to-hour thing. Saturn in your sign offers the opportunity and the quality of adult maturity. This is so rare in our society that few people know what it feels like.
This is an astonishing opportunity for growth, change, progress and reformation of your life path. There has never been anything like this, nor will there ever be again. And you are right at the beginning: the moment to do what you can to stay in balance, live closer to the ground, and focus inwardly.
With the momentous Dec. 21, 2020, conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in the first degree of your sign, a new world opens up for you. The conjunction is the gateway, or the trailhead. That is where the journey begins. Events through 2020 will gradually lead the way through, revealing that something else is possible, something more than the kinds of inner challenges that have dominated your life for so long.
Your inner healing adventure, which may have been more than a little chaotic and unpredictable, culminated with the Saturn-Pluto conjunction of Jan. 12, 2020. While the work represented by that transit (and other events in Capricorn) is not over, you have reached the tipping point.
The inner pressure leading up to this point was at times unbearable. You may have, in the past few years, experienced some form of inner violence and also violence directed at you.
Yet the purpose, or at least the effect, has been to push you toward a breakthrough, and you are close to that point.
There is a medical metaphor I’ve used a few times, which you may have experienced. Sometimes someone gets a shard of metal or glass embedded in their skin. For whatever reason, it’s impossible to get out, or cutting it out is not appealing. So the skin heals over the foreign object. But the body gradually pushes it to the surface, and finally one day it breaks the skin. It might hurt a bit, but not the way it did when it went in.
This is a little like what’s happening to you, as planets move from your 12th solar house into your sign. Yet you’re not exactly rejecting these planets; you are embodying them in a larger way. They are moving from the embedded and concealed realm of the 12th into the more open and visible realm of the 1st (your Sun sign or ascendant).
This is going to keep happening over and over during the next four years: first in a process with Saturn; then with Jupiter; and then with Pluto.
You want your mind somewhat more expanded than it is now, and you want to be in a more relaxed state than you are now, to handle the arrival of Pluto. Saturn and Jupiter are here to prepare you for this.
Meanwhile, all the fast movers (Sun, Mercury, Venus, Mars) will pass through on their regular schedules every year or two, touching territory made soft and sensitive by the action of the slow movers: Jupiter, Saturn and finally Pluto.
Note that current events are all preparation for Pluto’s entry into Aquarius, which begins in 2023, and this is particularly relevant to you. You are in the process of undergoing an actual transformational experience. You are changing. The change is preparation for growth. Everyone is invited on the journey, like it or not, though for you there is an intimate and individual calling.
Everyone is invited on the journey, like it or not, though for you there is a certain personal imperative, as it is so directly focused. For example, the “group” theme of Aquarius matters less for you because this sign is about you, an individual. So there is less emphasis on your seemingly outer environment and more on your inner territory. This is far less about other people and far more about understanding the patterns that drive your life.
You want your mind somewhat more expanded than it is now, and you want to be in a more relaxed state than you are now, to handle the arrival of Pluto. Saturn and Jupiter are here to prepare you for this.
And as I describe these transits and others, keep in mind that just below the surface of your awareness, but right with you, there has been the remarkable experience of Pluto through your 12th (considered one of the most difficult transits in all of astrology). And then this was met by Saturn through your 12th, and the conjunction between them in January. Next there is the extended conjunction of Jupiter and Pluto that spans all through midyear.
Eventually, one by one, beginning with Saturn, they break through the veil of the unconscious and enter your waking world. This is an astonishing opportunity for growth, change, progress and reformation of your life path. There has never been anything like this, nor will there ever be again. And you are right at the beginning: the moment to do what you can to stay in balance, live closer to the ground, and focus inwardly.
I strongly suggest you design your life not about what you want to accomplish in the world, but rather focusing on who you are becoming.
Aquarius: The Pattern Formation Issue
Aquarius is a fixed sign. That is the first thing to remember about it. Early on, I delineated it as “the only constant is change,” though that morphed into “the only change is constant.”
Aquarius is also the sign of energy patterns. All the stuff about groups is secondary. And there is nothing inherently liberal or idealistic about Aquarius. It is not the sign of peace and love. That is Pisces. Aquarius is the sign that fixes the patterns of energy. An example of this is the way the internet took over life, seemingly overnight. Once the pattern took hold, it really got a grip, and has worked itself into existence in ways nobody could foresee – and is continuing to do so.
If you are familiar with the concept of Ice-nine from the Kurt Vonnegut novel Cat’s Cradle, that is an example of the kind of crystallization pattern associated with Aquarius. Any flexibility in the environment is consumed by the ever-expanding energy pattern.
The denser your mind is, the harder these transits will be. The less dense, the easier and more pleasurable. The first ingress of Saturn into Aquarius will give you a sense of where you stand. Simply put, the lesson of spring through early summer 2020 is learning the concept of your density level. You might also call this your vibration level.
Now here is the catch, the single thought at the middle of all of these transits over your ascendant or solar ascendant. Your patterns have become very entrenched. It’s difficult to see this. The intensity of the pressure you’ve been feeling from within is, however, a testament to the tightness of the weave of those patterns you’re living in.
Three planets will enter Aquarius in the coming four years, each taking a different approach to a pattern shift. So you will get to try out options. This whole transit experience is front-loaded, through 2020 and 2021. That is your time to get the most work done. By work I mean personal work, and by that, I mostly mean learning the art of flexibility.
This is also about the art of controlling your density level. One of the ways you hold patterns in place is to make your mind dense or concentrated. I do not mean focused. I mean over-focused, or resistant to alteration. The thing you are now working against is being “set in your ways.”
The denser your mind is, the harder these transits will be. The less dense, the easier and more pleasurable. The first ingress of Saturn into Aquarius will give you a sense of where you stand. Simply put, the lesson of spring through early summer 2020 is learning the concept of your density level. You might also call this your vibration level.
Saturn in Aquarius
Saturn visits your sign briefly between March 21 and July 2, in preparation for a much longer stay that begins Dec. 16 and lasts into 2023. When you think of Saturn in Aquarius, this is not Saturn in its usual manifestation as described by astrology. Saturn is another planet entirely in Aquarius, or you might say that Aquarius brings out its best properties.
The simplest way to gather the power of Saturn in Aquarius, particularly in such a personal placement for you, is to take responsibility for your choices, your actions, and your feelings. This is a day-to-day, hour-to-hour thing. Saturn in your sign offers the opportunity and the quality of adult maturity. This is so rare in our society that few people know what it feels like.
Some know in part of their lives, and grant themselves excuses in others. Make a special note of the exceptions you make. These are most likely to come in the area of money. The presence of Neptune in Pisces has made it difficult for you to focus the project of getting your books to balance, and your financial records in order.
This may come in several forms, including difficulty prioritizing, wanting to do what you want to do, not really caring that much, feeling like you just can’t pull it off, forgetting about it, the project being too difficult, or a general fog over the subject matter. If any of this is true, you will need to wake up from it sooner rather than later.
You need structure around your finances. Saturn in your sign will give you the ability to organize and structure your affairs; you will need to consciously apply that to money. People tend to have a mystical or magical belief system around money, as if it’s somehow guided by luck or the god of fortune. I suggest you take a more practical approach to the subject matter. Make sure you know your balances at all times.
Another is connecting your priorities to your choices and your actions. When you hear yourself say that something is important to you, immediately study when and how you act on it. Many people’s ideals go in one direction, and their actual choices go in another direction.
Saturn in Aquarius is not so much about setting patterns, but rather about noticing them and letting them go. You are going to have a taste of that this year, and then over the following years of Saturn in Aquarius, you will gradually build new routines. Ideally, this will happen slowly.
Jupiter in Aquarius: Considering New Ideas
Aquarius is the sign whose motto should be, “Know when you don’t know.” I suggest you be extremely cautious around any assumptions related to your intelligence. I am not implying that you’re not intelligent. Rather, the difference is your ability to monitor your thoughts, your thought process and the conclusions that you make.
You need to ask yourself constantly the fundamental question of the fact-checker: how do I know that? This is the assumption-busting question – and the one that few people want to ask.
While you cannot solve the problem of the whole society, you can certainly resolve it for yourself, in the sphere of your own life. You can dedicate yourself to what is meaningful because it’s true.
This is particularly true in our era of pretend knowledge, bubble thinking, and group ideation that is taking over the world. If you can keep questioning yourself, you will start to catch your leaps of imagination that pass for intellect. By all means use your imagination, though you must be able to distinguish it from the truth. This is “convenient” when the truth is uncomfortable. It’s also extremely dangerous.
While you cannot solve the problem of the whole society, you can certainly resolve it for yourself, in the sphere of your own life. You can dedicate yourself to what is meaningful because it’s true.
Now, this is different from the introduction of new ideas, which is what Jupiter is about. It’s also about the expansion of your thought process, and of your sense of who you are. They are all related. While you are not strictly your mind, your personality or your brain, they tend to be holograms of one another.
By the time Jupiter arrives, Saturn will have made an opening where some new material can find a home. These transits occur in the perfect order. Saturn, by that time, will have cleared a little space, not a lot, but enough so that you can notice the pattern.
Jupiter also comes with the risk of thinking you know more than you do, so in this sense, you will need to be particularly careful, and to slow down. Saturn will help with that, presenting a natural boundary for you to work with. The idea is not to be a skeptic, assuming it’s impossible to determine what is true (this is the purview of many liars; they can play into skepticism and make up something that sounds good).
You must be careful here where ideas are concerned. While the kinds of ideas Jupiter is likely to offer may not be provable, they are testable. Mostly, they are testable through experience. And with both Jupiter and Saturn in your sign, your ideas may come quickly, but you want to give them plenty of time to bear themselves out, under a diversity of conditions.
You will, no doubt, have brilliant theories. You must put them to work if they are to be worth anything.
And Then There is Pluto
Aquarius is the sign of energy patterns, and it has a lot to do with electricity and hence the internet. It was Uranus through Aquarius (1995-2003) that sprayed the planet with the original dialup internet, in its commercial manifestation. This was like an alien creature landing on the planet. Rick Levine has a name for it: Aquarion.
It was then Neptune through Aquarius (1998-2012) that gave us the wireless internet, the iPhone, and the “internet of things” (proving my one-time joke about the rice cooker with an IP address).
Now comes Pluto in Aquarius. Not tomorrow. Not next year. But soon – sooner than you think. The phase-in is 2023-2024, but it’s already apparent.
Pluto is the planet of maximum density. Pluto is coming. It’s coming to Aquarius and it’s coming to you and it’s coming to society. The signs are everywhere. I have a friend who keeps sending me articles that demonstrate this. Let’s see: there is synthetic biology. There is the takeover by augmented reality. There are mind-reading bracelets, now being sold by Facebook. Think of the potential in the interrogation room. (“We read your thoughts as impure, and you are now going to be punished.”) Facial recognition technology is all over China. You cannot walk down the street or take a subway ride anonymously. Then there’s 5G technology, which is the ultimate digital stalker and life within the world-as-microwave-oven/total electronic matrix.
Pluto in Aquarius (which extends way out to 2044) seems likely to focus the power of the digital technology as a tool of oppression and control. We are already most of the way there.
You, personally, need to be careful about this. You need, as well, to have cultivated sufficient wisdom during the relatively brief visits of Jupiter and Saturn to be prepared to live in a whole new world. You want your mind somewhat more expanded than it is now, and you want to be in a more relaxed state than you are now, to handle the arrival of Pluto. Saturn and Jupiter are here to prepare you for this.
Your Main Utility and Continuity is Chiron
Remember we are talking mostly about the posture of your mind. One thing about Aquarius is that you identify so strongly with your thoughts and your ideas. This is related to having Aries on the 3rd house – the sign of “I am” in the house of cognitive process. It will help if you’re aware of the power of this association, whether there are planets in Aries or not. You basically live with the notion that you are your ideas.
Chiron describes a learning process. It is a learning process. It will help you focus on both your intellectual maturity and also clarify for you that you are more than your thoughts. Really, the paradigm is about shifting from identifying with, to actually being. You might say this is the conversion from the symbol to the reality.
This is a very powerful association. It’s the origin of the cliché that Aquarians think they’re geniuses. The thing is, identifying with your thoughts does have a way of helping you concentrate them. But this is part of the shift that you’re going through: to have a wider idea of who you are; a greater notion of your mental power; and also, a new level of self-awareness, which will help you doubt yourself in a way that facilitates self-correction.
You have a teacher here, which is Chiron. You’re not in this alone, and the learning goals described by planets transiting from Capricorn into Aquarius have already been begun by Chiron in Aries (2018-2027). Whatever this represents, one thing to consider is that it presents you with continuity that spans from the old era (planets all in Capricorn) to the new era (planets in Aquarius and beyond).
Chiron describes a learning process. It is a learning process. It will help you focus on both your intellectual maturity and also clarify for you that you are more than your thoughts. Really, the paradigm is about shifting from identifying with, to actually being. You might say this is the conversion from the symbol to the reality.
This can be a critical transition, because it involves giving up something you may think is true but which is really blocking your actual truth. Be patient with yourself.
As is written in A Course in Miracles, “Symbols stand for something else, and the symbol of love is without meaning if love is everything. You will go through this last undoing quite unharmed, and will at last emerge as yourself.”
So be it.