A Season of Change
Experience has led me to believe the most significant need we all have in common is a felt sense of belonging. We rarely think about it but implicit in this primal need lies a a yearning for a connection to something larger than ourselves. To be connected to “something more.”
Astrology, and life, are full of cycles that are all interwoven. Astrologically, the smallest of these, the monthly lunar cycle, is mirrored in the cycles of the planets.
The core of astrology is mathematically based and what most people don’t know is that while the origins of the word math come from the Ancient Greek máthēma meaning "that which is learnt” or "what one gets to know” in Latin and English, until around 1700, the term mathematics more commonly meant “astrology.” I admit, I laughed out loud with delight when I first learned that little tidbit.
Mathematics is more than just numbers and equations, it’s a numeric language that connects things and demonstrates their connection. The sublime Golden Ratio, also known as the divine proportion, synonymous with the Fibonacci Sequence, is a number that appears repeatedly in nature's design, We see it expressed in honeycombs, sunflower seeds, the way a nautilus shell unfolds and the petals of a flower arrange themselves. We could say, nature speaks math fluently. If we look closely at the world around us, we’ll find this fascinating series of things connecting, belonging to this mysterious sequence all around us. And the sequence is endless from larger things to minutia we can’t even see with the naked eye. Cycles within cycles.
The same is true within your natal chart and the cycle of the planets both in the macrocycles, say for my purposes transiting Pluto, and the microcycles, the Moon.
Now, through November 19, Pluto has ingressed back into Capricorn for the final time in our lifetimes. A larger pattern, that began in 2008 is coming to a close in the next two and a half months and this presents an opportunity to distill the larger meaning the Pluto in Capricorn transit has held for us each individually.
From September 1 to November 19, we are collectively and individually closing a chapter that began when Pluto first entered Capricorn. Pluto is the God of death and rebirth, the cycle of endings and beginnings. What has transformed within your life during this period? What have you let go of? What have you gestated and is now ready to take on a life of its own? Perhaps it has already been born and now you are fostering its growth.
Have you created new structures in your life? A business? A relationship? New rules to live by? Capricorn, under the rulership of Saturn, is associated with the government and laws.
The alchemical gold at the end of the cycle lies in the seeds of its beginnings.
Collectively, in 2008 the US elected its first President who wasn’t a white male: Barak Obama. I admit, I find it rather stunning that unexpectedly we might be electing our first female President, a woman of color, as the cycle comes to its close. This isn’t a prediction, I am merely highlighting the cycle.
That’s the value of contemplating your experience; to do so can allow a glimpse of how all of your life is intertwined. Here lies the discovery of your personal “divine proportion” revealing, if you are willing to look, just a glimpse of the invisible pattern underlying it all. I believe this elegantly illuminates how you have belonged, and been a part of something larger all along, even in your darkest moments.
Personally, it was in 2008 that I first put myself out there as a professional astrologer, though I had been practicing professionally for 21 years prior. It was then that I approached Sedona Monthly about creating a monthly horoscope column and and authored that for four years. Now, 16 years later, I practice full-time, develop and teach my own classes and retreats, have a counseling practice, and more. But in 2008 I had no idea how those seeds were going to develop and flourish. My life today was beyond what I imagined as possible at the time.
Pluto is an outer planet, all of the outer planets, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto, take us beyond what we have imagined and experienced before.
As Pluto makes its last ingress into Capricorn we are completing a cycle within our lives. A period is ending and another begins both collectively and individually. It is a season of change.
I often hear people speak about the phoenix rising from the ashes, a very Plutonian image, triumphantly as though that is both the beginning and the end of the story but the truth is that is the middle. In the beginning, the phoenix must burn to ash, everything must be swept away and that process is painful. As humans, most of us don’t trust this dark space, it is threatening because everything we have known and are familiar with is being swept away and resistance is futile. Yet, this fertile void is a remarkably powerful place. New life, whether a seed in the soul or a woman’s womb, begins in darkness. Then, after it rises the phoenix must also once again learn to fly.
So, if for you it is a black period (the opening step in the alchemical process was referred to as the nigredo; the blackening) take heart that in the dark new beginnings are fostered. Consider what you’ve been gestating over the past 16 years. Look at how far you’ve come. And no matter where you are at this point in the rhythm of time, stand firmly in the knowledge that you too belong to this moment and are never truly alone.
