To boldly go where we’ve been before

Dear Friend and Reader:

If you haven’t already noticed, we’ve entered eclipse time again — in Aquarius — and the theme of this eclipse is the stuff of science fiction. Or to paraphrase an enduring legacy of an earlier Aquarian age, we’re on a mission to “boldly go where no man has gone before.”

An model kit from the original Star Trek series, c. 1967. AMT, manufacturer.
An model kit from the original Star Trek series, c. 1967. Photo courtesy of AMT, manufacturer.

Today’s solar eclipse, in the sign of Aquarius, arrived at 2:55 am EST, Jan. 26 and peaked over the Indian Ocean, where sailors surely got a terrific view of an annular eclipse’s thin ring of sunlight in the early morning sky. It won’t be visible by those of us in the northern hemisphere, but we’re sure to notice its effects.

This solar eclipse, with its Sun, Moon, Jupiter, Neptune, Chiron, Nessus and the North Node in Aquarius, should give us a big new lesson about the currents of time. Aquarius brings the future to us. It’s innovative, quirky — unconventional. Aquarius brings revolutions to us, too. With seven planets or points in Aquarius, this chart is unmistakably a giant shove into the future.

Eclipses shut down old ways of being to make way for the new. This is a simple way of saying that according to the laws of nature, something’s gotta give so something else can take its place. Your Christmas tree, for example, probably looks a little forlorn if it’s still around today. And it’s likely that if you didn’t pull the weeds from your garden bed last fall, you’re facing a stiff clean-up job before the tulips re-appear next April.

But what if the “old” is a job, a loved one, a friend, a dream — making way for the new? We usually look backward to know who we are. Our identity is embedded in comfortable old habits: we always meet at that one diner, take two creams in our coffee, dependably joke about the recalcitrant Xerox machine on the third floor, count on that friend to call us when she’s got to move her three-ton sofa-sleeper — again. These patterns so define us, that when we’re called to give one up we feel as if we’re forced to give ourselves up. If we let go of that job, that lover, what will become of us, we ask? Who are we then, if not a reliable note in a dependable 4/4 beat of life?

The loss becomes a surrender, like a little death. No wonder the ancients viewed eclipses with morbid fear. However, another tradition describes eclipse points as a different time signature, where life embraces an alternate rhythm and our notions of a “timeline” blend into the larger stream of past, present and future together.

We western thinkers have trouble with this idea. We prefer the A, then B then C linearity of measuring time and success, preferably with some “justice” doled out at regular intervals.

Other cultures find this totally foreign. The first time I read a novel by a Native American, I was in college, and the ending completely baffled and annoyed my classmates. You call that an ending? Everything just started all over again — just differently! We wanted the bad guys to get hauled off to jail and the good guys to get voted Mayors for Life.

As much as I’m thrilled for the new Obama administration, I hear a lot of that linear thinking now. As grown-ups, we too want a clean ending, with the bad guys doing hard time and the new sheriff in town confidently polishing any speck of previous turpitude from his tin-star badge. Eclipses remind us that life, and endings, are hardly a straight line to anything.

The second theme of this chart says we’re also looking back at a the past. We’ll look at these two plot lines — past and future — as separate stories that converge today. It’s important to see them apart and together because as we rush into the future, we need to know what parts of us we want to pack for the journey.

Let’s begin by looking at the last eclipse, Aug. 1, 2008, which happened in the sign of Leo. That eclipse allowed us to take back some form of personal expression. Leo loves creativity and self-expression. Creativity is much more than just messing around with a box of watercolors: it’s about making a personal imprint upon life. “I made this!” is the shout of proud Leo, no matter if “this” is a quarterly report for the hardware store or a soft, wiggly little baby. But the world generally doesn’t reward our deepest sources of pride and self-expression unless it benefits them. The investors want to know they’re getting good returns, and your mom would be so proud if you finally made her a grandmother.

This past summer we got an opportunity to tap deeply into something that is authentically true about us. It was probably something we denied ourselves because we usually feel our hearts’ deepest desires are worthless to others. It may have been something as simple as saying, I prefer to be kissed this way. Or, since graduate school I’ve wanted to specialize in sub-saharan botany. Or I love you, and you can’t make me like Quentin Tarantino movies. Of course, the choices may have been major: I can’t do this work anymore; I can’t be myself in this relationship; I can’t pretend to be this person anymore.

We needed that August eclipse to acknowledge where the fire burned no longer. It had to be an individual choice, a heart-felt choice, because we were preparing for this moment.

Photo from trekmovie.com
Photo courtesy of trekmovie.com

Leo is the opposite sign of Aquarius. Leo loves self-expression; Aquarius loves group expression. So these eclipses are connected. Whatever we learned about our own intrinsic creative needs, will be needed by others in this new Aquarian age. It’s a plot line about finding your heart-fire and then deciding who you want to share that heart-fire with. Who’s gonna be in the revolution with you, now that you’ve decided some part of who you really want to be?

Fast-forward six months. This eclipse is in Aquarius, and Aquarius is ruled by two planets very much in play right now: Saturn and Uranus. We can interpret this as two planets (not forgetting the seven in Aquarius — a total of nine planets, though two are centaur planets) speaking the same language, just in different dialects. Saturn, the traditional ruler of Aquarius, speaks Time, while Uranus, its modern ruler, speaks Awakening. They are opposing one another in this chart, within one degree, moving toward a precise opposition again on Feb. 5, like they did on Election Day.

This opposition is a plot with two people talking at each other from a distance. This particular conversation has been giving us a “back to the future” feel for months. Some Saturnian time-driven part of us, ancient and buried, is awakening and responding to the futuristic sparks of Uranus. Sometimes, like all oppositions, it feels like one side (our past) has got the better of the other side (our need for a different future). But other times the two seem to cooperate as a team.

For me, it recently looked like this. A couple of weeks ago, I got in my reliable little Honda CRV and hit the open road for a long-planned road trip. It was the sort of adventure I took for granted in my mid-twenties. But I’m now 40 and the mom of a seven-year-old little girl who was for several years very sick, so this was a special event for me.

My destination was 1,500 miles away, at the home of my best friend from college — someone I hadn’t seen in over 10 years. I took off thinking a lot about the past and who I would meet. I didn’t want to admit my anxiety about my plans. The first night I stopped to visit, and was invited to stay with a dear woman, a former professor I had barely spoke to in almost 20 years. Turns out, it didn’t matter. We talked easily about art and teaching, and I discovered she knows a few things about astrology, too. We laughed a lot. And we agreed this was the right time to be friends again. We had never not been friends, but we both felt a special purpose in our reconnection now. Long after midnight, I fell asleep finally ready to greet the future.

At my destination, I found another convergence of old and new. My best friend has transformed into a facsimile of her mother, plagued by a long recovery from a broken leg that resulted in a few pounds she’d rather not own. But she’s still got her unmistakably ironic wit, and her good laugh to go with it. During our days together I listened to her Aquarian hopes: she’s passionate about the local foods movement and dreams of a community center anchored by her local foods bakery and cafe. This, I love.

Places were as important as people on this trip. I also reconnected with a theater, loaded with old memories. It felt good and familiar, but a little smaller than I remembered it. I stayed in a shaman’s home and had a profound dream. That too felt good and right.

At one level, my journey was a veritable time capsule cracked open, and yet not once did I feel nostalgic for “old times.” As a Capricorn with Sagittarius rising, I felt more like Persephone emerging from her winter confinement. And I felt time, bending back on itself and connecting like a graceful mobius strip of yesterdays flowing into tomorrows. This, I realized, was always my path; these were always my people. The old and the new meeting at once point — Saturn and Uranus greeting me on the threshold of my Aquarian future.

Do I have a specific image of how this eclipse will push me headlong into this future? No. But like me, it’s possible that a few folks you once knew have popped back into your life this past month, showing you glimpses of what you’d like to do or become with your new heart-fire. These people will have changed; you will have changed. But you will likely share a common vision for our future — truly an Aquarian statement if there ever was one.

To boldly go where you’ve been before, that’s the real mission. The future is now. Engage.

Yours & truly,
Shanna Philipson

2 thoughts on “To boldly go where we’ve been before”

  1. Thanks, Jude.

    I just finished an astro presentation to a meditation class; it was a load of fun to talk with a group who really get this concept. Letting go is never really an end.

    Glad you liked the piece. 🙂

  2. Enjoyable read, Shanna — truly, we’re letting go of what no longer serves and finding new footing. Noticing the circles within circles of this holographic ride makes it easier to let the old go, if it needs to. Thanks for your insight.

Leave a Comment