One Step At Our Time

By Len Wallick

This must be the day that somebody told us about. As previewed earlier in the week, first Jupiter, then (about four hours later) Venus, station direct in signs that they respectively rule.

The timing and the placement in combination implies a rarely compounded optimization of positive potential. On the other hand, the angular relationship between the two is awkward. It’s as if a healthy child is learning how to walk. For spectators, a celebratory and auspicious occasion of joy to be long remembered as a milestone. The participant, in the meantime, is subject to a strong, unaccountable motivation to attempt the unfamiliar by risking the uncomfortable.

One might reflect on our own current experience and consider whether the observer or the actor prevails.

Two major planets flipping forward would seem to be a slam dunk for headline news. Today, however, it’s just part of a squeeze for column space on the front page. Check off the list of what is going on at pretty much the same time. The Scorpio Sun is in a flowing water trine with Uranus, the only major planet still retrograde. The Aries Moon is conjunct retrograde Eris. Mercury is taking its Sagittarius turn in conjunction with the Great Attractor.

Then there’s the double-duty details. In addition to its water trine, Sol is feeling the ‘gotta move’ tension of a square with Chiron, recently direct and in its last Aquarius days. Uranus has been functionally conjoined with Jupiter for so long people are starting to talk. There is also an odd daisy chain linking many of the adjacent signs through that ostensible non-aspect known as a semi-sextile.

Attempting to make sense of all that is enough to make a body go back to bed with a request to be briefed when it’s all over. For those inclined to participate and make a difference, however, there is the alternative protocol we all follow when learning how to walk: stick with the basics, one small step at a time.

Where to begin? When in doubt, look at the Sun. Be sure to wear eye protection. Sol is entering the end of its time in Scorpio for another year. This approach to the anaretic degree(s) — nearing the end of a sign — is often expressed as a combination of fatigue and stress. Fatigue because the energy of even the most simpatico sign eventually overstays its welcome with just about anyone. Stress because of the feeling that the most challenging qualities of any sign or house seem to accumulate as if in a sump, concentrated and insistent, demanding our attention in the last few days before ingress to another sign.

Because the Sun is the source from which all astrology is ultimately derived, its presence at the end of a sign or house is felt all over. If Sol is not in aspect to any other body, some would invoke the “king’s-crosses” avoidance of consequence that a void-of-course scenario implies. But that does not play so well anymore. Not now that we are aware of a large number of minor planets, asteroids and almost-comets. Not now that we all know on some level that we are obliged to assume responsibility for that which we are aware. Better to take care of ourselves so as to endure this solar trough without taking ill. If possible, we can either gain an education or opportunities overlooked by others.

The transformational properties and go-there attitude of Scorpio would seem to indicate where the knowledge can be gained or chances found. If you find resistance coming up, push back and see what happens. The thing is to be present to what feels like darkness without being convinced or consumed by it. By the time the weekend is over, there will be a shift. Try doing what work you can in the present and take it easy on yourself. While you are either working or struggling, the landscape is changing.

After the Sun, there’s the Moon to inform us of developments on another level. In Aries that level would seem to focus on our relationship to youth, our own and that of others. In conjunction with Eris, to be followed by Sedna a few days later, there is an image of being out on the edge of our consciousness, where awareness is growing and taking shape. This is beginning to sound like learning to walk again. Seems that between the two luminaries we have an implied theme developing.

After the luminaries, the next step is to look at the planets where the theme continues. One step at a time. First, a potential stumble of Mercury conjunct the Great Attractor. Among other things, Mercury is about experience through the mind. If you attempt to apply the intellect to a phenomenon at an unimaginable distance, an incomprehensible scale, and with very little verified as fact, that’s asking to be confounded. But the context of Sagittarius, representing the highest maturation of the element fire, can help us to stay on our feet. What cannot be apprehended by the senses or proven empirically is still accessible in thought. Some might call it faith although more and more it is the realm of science to sit with the great thought and seek verification.

One thing that requires no verification is the human capacity of desire. It is at the root of curiosity and achievement. Without it, we would simply survive. The separate journeys of Mars and Venus are making the next baby step apparent. Like the mystery hidden in the darkness of the chrysalis that is the Sun in late Scorpio, the key to apprehending desire is to first acknowledge it, then to explore it. Over the course of two seasons these two planets, seemingly on their own paths, will meet near where the Moon will be in two days. That place is the edge where our explorations will take shape as a new awareness with a new season.

The final small step is represented by Jupiter, moving towards the Aries point again for a second time this year. Today it begins the conclusion of its time in the final house of Pisces where it rules and where all things end to begin again. This is actually the first big step, culminating our walk through the luminaries and personal planets into the extended time and consciousness of the interpersonal. There is a lot of suffering in this world. Some of you reading this are enduring suffering beyond the imagination of others, but we all will have to deal with it sooner or later.

Maybe a way can be found for us to carry the benevolence of mythological Jupiter from the end of all things to a new beginning — one of compassion shared just as we have shared suffering for so long. Maybe we can sit with that great thought and go about our daily lives not seeking but providing the verification through our behavior. If that can be done then our time of wanting to walk without understanding the source of our desire to do so will have finished and we will be taking strides instead.

Uranus remains in retrograde until early next month when, for a few precious days, all the major planets will be in direct apparent motion. Those days, beginning the next rendition of the cardinal point epoch, will be a good time to see those strides in our minds, if not actually taking them. If we and our descendants are to experience the next couple centuries on our feet and under our own power, it will be because we were able to be one with each other and get there together.

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