T-Squares and Grand Crosses

Margery asks what it might feel like when a Natal T-Square is “Completed” by a Transiting planet to make the T-Square into a Grand Cross. The answer is really the same when a Transiting T-Square is Completed by a Natal planet.*

* Astrologuese to English: “Natal” means at Birth. “Transiting” or “Transit” means in the Sky now, or if you’re looking at a different time, in the Sky at that time. A “T-Square” is two planets on Opposite sides of the Zodiac, with a third at a Midpoint between them. A “Grand Cross” is four planets more or less equally spaced around the Zodiac. “Completed” means that, when added to a chart, a planet from another chart converts an Unstable Configuration like a T-Square into a Stable Configuration like a Grand Cross. The additional planet can be from any other chart, including another person’s chart, a chart for the current moment, or any other moment. The Completed Configuration applies to the “Group Soul,” ie, the Entity Created by the Combination, in psychic time or space, of the Entities represented by the two charts.

The “Native” is the Entity represented by a Natal astrological chart. Note that for a Transit, the Native is the Moment for which the chart is drawn. The “Missing” planet, or the place where the Completing planet would be, is called the “Vacancy” of the Unstable Configuration. The “Sabian or Chandra Symbol” is a reading for an individual Degree; see for instance Dane Rudhyar’s An Astrological Mandala, or Ellias Lonsdale’s 360 Degrees of Your Star Destiny.

A Self-Resolving T-Square, aka a Diamond Star, consists of a T-Square and a Finger of the Goddess both having their Focus at the same place in a chart. It looks a little like an Angel, minus the Halo. The Focus of a T-Square is the planet that’s halfway between the other two, the one that’s at the 90° Degree Angle. Both the T-Square and the Finger are triangles with a third planet at the Midpoint between the other two.

In a T-Square, usually drawn in red, the “other two” are 180° apart. In a Finger, the “other two” are only 60° apart (a Sextile) and the Midpoint used is the Far Midpoint, the one that’s five Signs from each end of the Sextile. We usually refer to a Finger as a “Wedge” because it’s a very Acute Triangle. We usually draw them in green. The Focus of a Finger of the Goddess is the Far Midpoint. The picture illustrates a Diamond Star.

The T-Square has two fundamental Challenges. First, it’s Unstable or Unbalanced.

A Stable Configuration is one that “Fills” the Zodiac. If you “flip” a T-Square by rotating it through a third Dimension (up or down relative to the two-Dimensional chart surface) around its Opposition or long axis, you get another T-Square, pointing in the opposite Direction from the original Focus. It’s a Ghost of the original T-Square, like the missing half of a Twin Soul. The Ghost resides in the Unconscious. Adding the Ghost to the original T-Square, you get a Grand Cross, four planets approximately equally spaced around the Zodiac. It’s Stable or Balanced because it has no Ghost. A Diamond Star is also Stable or Balanced, because it also Fills the Zodiac. You can rotate a Grand Cross or a Diamond Star any way you like, and the Configuration doesn’t change.

Stability or Balance applies to both astrology and to the Entity to which the chart applies, so a T-Square is astrologically Unstable or Out of Balance, and can be interpreted as an Emotional Instability, though in No sense is it pathological or worthy of anybody’s DSM. The Instability in a T-Square is usually Chronic Dissatisfaction, though of course that can have subsequent consequences, depending on the planets and Signs involved, the rest of the chart, the Cultural Milieu, and the Entity’s Reactions to the Chronic Dissatisfaction. Since the Chronic Dissatisfaction dates from the Birth of the Entity, we can assume it’s Karmic, or an Inertial Habit Pattern brought in by Choice by the Entity’s Soul, as a Heuristic, or Learning Device. The Instability is an Attention-Getting Device, to make sure that the Ego doesn’t Ignore that Element of their Constitution which the Focus of the T-Square indicates, as modified by the nature of the Debate between the other two planets that Oppose one another.

Stability is Created astrologically by Completing the Grand Cross. The Moon does this for several hours every month, and the Native can Learn what the Completed Configuration, and relative Satisfaction, feels like by Remembering what they Feel when the Moon fills the Vacancy. Similarly, the Sun, Mercury, and Venus Complete the Grand Cross annually, Mars every two years, the asteroids every four years, and so on, providing more Opportunities for the Native to Grow their Consciousness.

The Native can also Play with Consciously providing the Energy of the Vacancy, or Integrating the Ghost, by Learning the Sabian or Chandra Symbol (or both) of the Vacancy, and Applying it to their Dissatisfaction. One can use the Direct Opposite of the T-Square’s Focus, or one can use the Actual Midpoint. For instance, a T-Square may have planets at 7 and 9 Degrees in it’s base, and at the Focus a third planet at 10 Degrees. All three are within our usual 3 Degrees of Orb or Sensitivity. The Anti-Focus would be 10 Degrees, while the Actual Midpoint would be 8 Degrees. Both Degrees would provide useful information.*

There are thousands of asteroids, so it makes little sense to include them all. We for instance Choose only the asteroids which directly apply to our Enlightenment or Ascension, or which are well known and well connected to the chart we’re examining. But all of the other asteroids are in the your chart, whether you look at them or not, or at least as soon as you look at them (to use a Quantum distinction). So if you can find a new (to you) asteroid that Fills your Vacancy, and Study its Energy, you’re likely to also Learn more about the Ghost in your Unconscious.

The Native can also Plan their Activities to take advantage of a Transiting planet filling the Vacancy for a short while, in hopes that it will provide greater Satisfaction. However, since the Spiritual Purpose of a T-Square is to bring Attention to the Karmic Expectations, this may, to their Chagrin, Illuminate the Dissatisfaction and Compound it. From the Educational Perspective, that’s Excellent, as the Native’s aim “should be” (if they’re at all concerned with their Self-Knowledge or Enlightenment) to replace their Dissatisfaction with Appreciation for the SuperPower that the T-Square represents. As an Apparently Unsolvable Problem for the Native, they have more Experience with the Issue, and therefore know more about How Not to Approach it.

I’m sure it’s not the only, but one Powerful interpretation of the Chronic Dissatisfaction associated with a T-Square is that the Native is born with Unrealistic Expectations or Perfect Pictures about the Element of their Constitution and the Issues surrounding the Focus and the ongoing Debate in the T-Square’s base. Perfect Pictures are really Easy to pick up from one’s Programmers, especially when we’re Punished for not Conforming to our Programmer’s Perfect Pictures. The closer they are to our Karma, the more Challenging they will be to dislodge.

There is a recognition in modern Management Theory that Failure provides the best education possible, providing one Responds to Failure “appropriately.” Modern Management Theory embodies the worst facets of the Patriarchy, however, so needs to be taken with a bucket of Salt. Like any other Theory (Thoughts about the World rather than Feelings about it – therefore Love is never involved, and as Darshana is so wisely wont to say, Love Is the Answer, No Matter What the Question), it can be useful, but like any other Thought, with great care that Assumptions are Known and Realistic, and Values are not Violated.

But if the Native can Appreciate the Educational Value of meeting Imperfect Reactions to their Perfect Pictures, and eventually come to Realize that the Underlying Problem is that Perfection is a 2D Thought Ideal based on Separation that will never Match the Unitary and Multifarious (≥5D) Nature of Reality, they will Honor every “Failure” of their Perfect Pictures and every Dissatisfaction of their T-Square, as more Experience with the Issue – more Grist for the Mill as Ram Dass would put it. The same could be said for any Expectation, though it takes a lot more Ascension to Achieve No Expectations At All. Eventually the Native may Learn to Live through their nD Heart instead of Surviving through their 2D Mind.

A Native might even eventually Choose Yintegrity over Yangtegrity, and add their Energy to the Cumulative Death of the Patriarchy. Yangtegrity is when we Do what we said we were going to Do, when we said we were going to Do it. Yintegrity means that We Do what we damn well Feel like Doing When we Feel Like Doing it. That is, we Trust our Intuition. While the World is still trapped in Yangtegrity, this means that we have to Minimize our Commitments, Renegotiate when we can, and Make Amends when we can’t, if the Relationship is Worth the Effort. There is a thread in the Radical Integrity literature that avers that we should also Say what we Feel Like Saying, when we Feel Like Saying it. In most cases, that’s a great way to collect Enemies. We much prefer an NVC-like approach, which takes a lot of Retraining and Practice, but is Worth it; see Bibliography under Marshall Rosenberg.

The second fundamental Challenge with the T-Square occurs in Western Civilization and its Clones, where Dominion is misinterpreted to mean Control. The T-Square is a Fourth Harmonic Angle (360° / 4 = 90°). The Corresponding Principle in the Tarot Major Arcana is The Emperor. The namesakes of the asteroid Damocles and the dwarf planet Pholus illustrate the difference between Dominion and Domination or Control.

Damocles was a courtier who was so impressed by the Luxuries that the Emperor Enjoyed, that he asked the Emperor if he could for one day sit on his throne. The Emperor agreed, but before Damocles could sit, he hung a sword above the chair, suspended by a single horsehair. Damocles was too terrified by this to Enjoy his Sojourn. The Emperor was illustrating the other side of the Coin of Luxury that he Enjoyed – the hard work of Managing the Territory under his Dominion, Resolving Conflicts among the People under his Dominion Fairly, and Defending the Territory and People against External Threats. In other words, Dominion hangs by a thread, and Failure is Catastrophic. Sounds familiar, but we aren’t even Doing Dominion, we’re trying to get by on Control!

Centaur Pholus hosted Heracles while Heracles was one of Zeus’s Hit Men for remnants of the Matriarchy as Zeus made Space for his Patriarchy. We can hardly Blame Pholus for not thinking of Everything, but failing to Lock Up the Wine that was Sacred to his Fellow Centaurs was a fairly serious Betrayal to the Mission his Compatriots had entrusted in him. While Pholus was running errands, Heracles found and Opened the Sacred Wine, Intending to refresh himself (or Intending as a Hit Man the eventual result!). The Centaurs smelled the Opened Wine immediately and went Ballistic. A terrible war resulted, with the Death of many Hupers and most of the Centaurs, and the Unhealable Wounding of Chiron. Control might work for a while, but it’s impossible to Control Everything.

Dominion means Taking Care Of, while Domination means Assuming Autocratic Control Over without even Soliciting Consent, including Uncaring Control over Life and Death. The Early Popes Declared that so-called “Christians” were to have Domination over All who would not Submit to their Old-Testament God. That included Hupers and All Others. Often the Missionaries read the Popes’ Proclamations to Indigenous Tribes in unknown European languages, and their Iron-Clad Companions summarily slaughtered all who didn’t immediately take a knee.

Consequently, we grew up with Patriarchic models for our T-Squares. We’re Programmed to Bully our way through Chronic Dissatisfaction through Blame and Abuse of the Scapegoats whom we’re Programmed to Choose by propaganda from our Patriarchic Masters. Like Abandonment and Suffocation, the Feeling of Chronic Dissatisfaction is never our Feeling, it’s always “Caused by” someone or something else. Like 🦨Pootin’ or 🦖T.rump, or if you’re otherwise inclined, Choose any Demons in Faux News Denunciations like AOC, or those coming out of the pieholes of the MTG and LOB Karens in Congress, or Governors Abbot and DiCostello, or “Woke” weirdos like us.

Then there’s the Grand Cross, which we make when we Complete a T-Square. We Expect that Completing our T-Squares permanently, one way or another (as suggested above), to Convert our basic Attitudes toward the Issues Focused by our Natal T-Squares and their underlying Debates, will be a great Boon to Raising our Vibration and Contributing to the general Élan that we bring into our Manifestations.

Remember that the Content of our Manifestation Exercises is just more Thoughts About Our Feelings, and what we’re most likely to Manifest is More of What We’re Feeling While We Express Our Manifestations. We don’t want to Manifest the Red Convertible or the Big Payoff, we want to Manifest What We Expect to Feel When We’re Driving Around in Our Red Convertible, before it breaks down again, and What We Expect to Feel When We Harvest the Big Payoff, before we have to Spend it all on Fixing our Red Convertible.

Our Most Important Manifestations are always What Our Natal T-Squares Make Most Difficult. As long as we Manifest from Chronic Dissatisfaction, guess what we’re going to Co-Create More of! This is why Dane Rudhyar regarded the T-Square as the Evolutionary Edge for Huperity. Look at what “our” Cultures are Manifesting – more Genocide, more Famine, more Inequality, more Extreme Weather, etc. etc. Our Chronic Dissatisfaction Contributes to this. Think about how many times you’ve Felt too Cold, versus how many times you’ve Felt too Hot or Just Right. Assuming all of the other Several Billion Unconscious Manifesters on the planet have been Feeling similarly, could just that have made a Contribution to Global Balming et al?

So a Grand Cross is four T-Squares Cozied up to one another like they were at a Swingers Party. Four Chronic Dissatisfactions Dissatisfying one another. But the Grand Cross is Balanced, Stable. It doesn’t suffer from those many shades of Problem that the T-Square faces from its first Challenge. It’s Self-Resolving, it Fills the Zodiac. Each of those T-Squares, rather than Big Chronically Dissatisfying Problems, become much smaller Irritating Hassles. And if we Leave Them Alone, the Irritating Hassles Balance one another, and we end up being an Irritated Multitasker. And since Multitasking is Admired in our Patriarchic Culture where we have so Much to Do, most Multitaskers are Proud of it, and long since past their Irritation. It becomes Eustress, Positive Stress.

Yes, you can gain Self-Knowledge by Examining each of the four T-Squares, but the Focus of the original T-Square is far more Important, because in the case of a Transit Completing a Natal T-Square, the other three T-Squares are Ghosts. Yes, you want to Know your Ghosts, because eventually you’ll have to Integrate them. But the Transiting Planet is Temporary and Singular, it may not well Represent the Totality of the Vacancy, and it may lead you to Focus on the Temporary Impact of its two T-Squares more than on the Ghost.

I’m reading Lonsdale’s Chandra Symbols for the Degrees of the Vacancy in my major Challenge of a T-Square, one I’ve over the course of my Life only partially been able to Honor as a SuperPower. Writing this makes me Realize how Not-Done I am with this task, as I’m seeing how several Chronic Anxieties fit in where I hadn’t Noticed the Connection before. There are several planets involved, so there are several relevant Degrees, including their Average. I haven’t yet read the Degrees of the Squares to the planets in the base of this T-Square.

From two of the three Symbols I read, I had the Reaction that, OMG, I really Do That! I’d never Thought of it That Way Before. I Felt more Trusting of Myself after reading each, as the Readings organized for me what were scattered fragments of my Self a few minutes ago. The third Symbol, I wasn’t sure that I Recognized myself in it while I was reading it. But as I got to the end of the Symbol, it was more OMG, I need to read this many more times! It seems to point to a part of Myself that I don’t even Recognize, but which at the same time appears to be part of Me.

This third Symbol Opposed the Ignored secondary asteroid that’s Merged with the Major Planet whose Impact on the Challenge I so Clearly Recognize. So I’ve never given it much Attention, and it seems appropriate that this “Sub-Vacancy” hold Promise to Open Myself up to an almost-totally Unknown part of Myself. I haven’t looked at Rudhyar’s Sabian Symbols yet, but based on this Experience I highly Recommend at least Londale’s interpretation of your Vacancies.

I did find one asteroid – an obscure recently-discovered Trans-Neptunian Iceball. In addition to Opposing the “Ignored secondary asteroid” in the Max-Challenge T-Square at my Birth, at its Discovery it Conjoined my Natal asteroid Karma. The three Diamond Stars in its Discovery chart did add information to the Surprising third Lonsdale reading, the one for the Vacancy Opposite the same Ignored secondary asteroid. More than Coincidence, so that’s one Independent verification of the Unknown-asteroid-Filling-the-Vacancy thesis.

Self-Resolution

The “T-Square” in astrology – a third planet at the Midpoint of two other planets that Oppose one another, without a fourth planet Opposing the third – is the source of some of the most Challenging circumstances for Hupers. Once we realize that every Challenge is also an Opportunity, our natal T-Squares are also the source of some of our greatest SuperPowers, as we come to Understand that we have more Experience with a Complex Challenge than anyone else has. T-Squares are like graduate seminars – there are no Answers, only more Intriguing Questions and Explorations. Our Frustration with them is Created by our a priori Expectations of Relative Perfection rather than Gradual Improvement.

We Feel the Tension in a T-Square through its Focus planet and its Sign and House. We don’t use Houses here because they’re Location-Dependent, and we write for anyone, no matter where they are on the planet. Like the Signs, the Houses divide the Zodiac up into 12 units. Where planets determine what sort of Energy is afoot, Signs determine how we’ll Experience the Energy, and Houses determine which arena of our Life we’ll Experience it in. The Source of the Stress derives from the two planets that Oppose one another and are engaged in an Argument. They usually stand for Values of ours that are Competing with one another in Obvious or Subtle ways, and the Winner of the Argument will get to Deploy the Energy of the Focus, threatening to leave us Grieving the Loss of the Value that won’t Win the Argument.

Once we have some Understanding of what our T-Squares are about, one way to Appreciate them is to Compare our current Frustration with them to our degree of Frustration twenty years back. Chances are we’ll see how much we’ve Learned. We develop Muscles by Exercising them till we huff and puff, then resting them for a day or two, then repeating. We accept a Challenge that Stretches us but does not Exhaust or Injure us, followed by Relaxation. This is true of just about any form of “Muscle” – Physical, Mental, Emotional, Spiritual, Existential.

Lately almost all of our T-Squares have been Self-Resolving, as part of the Descension of Soul into Matter (Uranus in Taurus), aka the Upgrade in the Evolution of Planet Earth and in the Vibratory Frequency of the leading edge of Huperity. Or so we tell ourself, hoping on the one hand to move closer to Enlightenment rather than just Fattening our Ego, and on the other hand to Fatten the Accumulation of Higher Frequencies that Raise the Collective Consciousness of Huperity at least as rapidly as Climate Change et al Collapses Patriarchic Civilization. It’s important to Remember that the first stage of Sustainability is Sustenance, eliminating the unnecessary. As the Patriarchy Collapses, the Suzerainty of everyone’s Inner Female must rise. The Inner Female, aka the Heart or astrological Venus, is the Home of Values. Without Heart, the Inner Male and hence the Outer Male, Serves Mammon, not Huperity or Gaia. American Culture Serves and Worships Mammon, which we need to eliminate in Ourselves, since Ourself is ultimately the only thing we can Change.

In an astrological chart, a T-Square looks like the picture at right. If we had drawn the lines to connect each planet to the center rather than each planet to the others, it would look like a “T,” hence the name. It’s “Square” because the planets make right angles – add a fourth planet Opposite the Focus, and you’d make an actual geometrical Square (which astrology would call a “Grand Cross”). Maybe T-HalfaSquare or T-RightTriangle would be a better name. My First Mentor Dane Rudhyar referred to the T-Square as “the Evolutionary Challenge for [Huper]kind.”

It represents the Fourth Harmonic (360°/4 or 90°), which in Tarot is the Emperor. Literature is full of stories about how the Emperor was either Fair or Corrupt, and how much impact that had on people’s Lives during his Reign. As they say, Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, and the Evolutionary Challenge for Huperity lies in either Preventing that or Perfecting Communication and Collaboration enough that Outside Authority is unnecessary (think 5D). We need only look to the Terror that Damocles, who after all these Millennia is still Running, Felt when he Realized that he would be Accountable for his Actions and Decisions.

When we draw a chart, red lines represent Tension or Stress. It was Canadian endocrinologist Hans Selye MD that first referred to Constructive Stress as “Eustress.” The Boundary between Eustress and Distress is beyond Comfort, but closer to Comfort than to Severe Discomfort. Severe Discomfort causes Backlash, producing the Opposite of Growth, which is an important consideration around Ego Growth. There is Power in Repetition, till it becomes Karma, which is simply Repetition used indiscriminately, whether it’s appropriate to the circumstance or not. Breathing is very Beneficial, for instance, till we walk into a room full of Carbon Monoxide.

On a chart, green lines represent Curiosity or Mystery. The green lines on the chart at right (they may look blue) are called “Quincunxes” – Quin- because they connect planets that are Five Signs apart, and -Unx for 1/12 or One Sign. The “c” just eases the transition. A Quincunx represents the sort of Curiosity that causes our jaw to drop, as in Awe. If we Allow it to creep into the sort of Curiosity which Inspires a Search for Answers, and Limit ourself to our current Concept Set, we short-circuit the potential Growth. Searching for Answers that Stretch our Concept Set is good, but Accepting Apparent Contradiction as Paradox is better, because it drives a wedge into our Concept Set.

That allows a Higher-Dimensional Tool like Intuition to Heal the Wound in our Concept Set, rather than Letting the Two-Dimensional Mind Cement our Either/Or Judgments into Karma. A rift in our Concept Set often Inspires an Ego Death, so we usually prefer to search for Answers that leave our existing Concept Set intact, often by resorting to Blame in order to do so. We accelerate our Consciousness Expansion by retraining ourself to not just Tolerate Ego Death, but to be Excited by it because like the Emotion of Confusion, it Signifies Growth. We can then Celebrate Temporary or even Permanent Gaps in our Apparent Understanding of how the World works.

When a third planet sits at the Far Midpoint of a Sextile it creates a green wedge, and that third planet is said to be the Focus of a “Finger of the Goddess,” symbolizing the admonition to Pay Attention! We can think of it as parallel to when “God” (or “Sphere”) put their Finger on Flatland in the story from introductory Physics classes…

Blue lines on a chart symbolize Grace or Blessings. When the Focus of a Finger of the Goddess is also the Focus of a T-Square, we naturally Pay Attention to the Focus of our T-Square, increasing the odds that we’ll Embrace it as Eustress and manage to interpret it as a potential SuperPower. After all, Noticing is the first step toward Converting Karma to Expansion of Consciousness.

Once we fill in the Trines (two planets separated by Four Signs) and Sextiles (two planets separated by Two Signs) – the blue lines – the result is what’s called a “Diamond Star,” as pictured above. The “basket of Grace” under the T-Square Resolves the Tension in the T-Square, while the Finger of the Goddess, if we can keep the 2D Mind from Freezing our Growth, Opens us to the possibility of an Expanded Concept Set.

Hence, a Self-Resolving T-Square, namely a First-Order Self-Resolving T-Square. Second-Order Self-Resolution results when the Focus of a T-Square is also one corner of a three-cornered Trine, as in this picture to the right. We can gain additional Orders of Self-Resolution when multiple T-Squares are in Grace-Full Relationship to one another. The Foci of the two T-Squares in the last picture, for instance, Sextile one another, and the ends of the Oppositions Trine-Sextile each other, making the two T-Squares Complement one another. Where one Disrupts, the other Heals. The second T-Square appears to also be a Diamond Star, but it may not be, as Sensitivity may Prevent it. We may be allowing two Degrees of Sensitivity, and the Angles to the Finger of the Goddess may be three Degrees.

With all Self-Resolution, we’re ahead of the game when we Endure and hopefully Embrace any Discomfort that arises, rather than Intervening to Reduce it. The Endurance and Embrace provides the Eustress that maximizes our Growth. When the Configuration itself provides the Resolution, it will be Multidimensional and Unitary, the Paradox typical of Higher-Frequency Reality. When we Intervene, it’ll almost always be 2D or 3D, and usually more Separating than Unifying, and so may well interrupt the Chain of events that the Self-Resolving Configuration Intends.

Self-Love and Confusion

I try to hide most of the astrologuese in the footnotes because so many folks have complained that it Confuses them. Yes, Confusion is the First Stage of Growth, because it indicates that the Conceptual Bars in our Mental Birdcage have come loose, Granny isn’t home, and we’re expecting Sylvester to notice our Broken Cage any minute. Almost all of the educational systems in Western Civilization are Dictatorial and Dualistic, with a great emphasis on Right and Wrong, and a Strong Multi-Pronged Enforcement System on the Right part, including the liberal application of Shame. Shame is an excellent Enforcer, and many of us grew up under its thumb – or its knee on our neck.

I’m making a frequent exception for Moon Out of Bounds, which makes us more Vulnerable to Freakout, because it so dominates its 22-year Cycle, where for eleven or so years it goes Out of Bounds for several days every two weeks, then for the next ±11 years it stays In Bounds the whole time. Classic examples from the first Moon OOB of the prior and current Cycles – the first Moon OOB of the previous Cycle occurred at 9 am on 11 September 2001, which you may remember. The first Moon OOB of the current Cycle began when “On 16 or 17 March 2020, we find out whether the Coronavirus is the Headliner, or just a Teaser, as the Moon begins going ‘Out-of-Bounds’ (further away from the Equator than the ‘Tropics’ of Cancer and Capricorn at 23:27° N or S of the Ecliptic) in earnest.” (https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2020/03/16/truth-or-dare/)

https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2020/03/20/what-if-our-visitor-could-talk/

And it makes sense to make exceptions for the classical planets, which are probably familiar to most everyone, at least by name. Such as Neptune, which signifies Material Confusion and Spiritual Clarity, and which is Lit Up Bigtime (Standing Still in the Sky) until at least 12:54 am PDT 28 June 2022.¹ The impact of planets on us Hupers and our Planet, is Greatest when they Stand Still.² Neptune also symbolizes Everything Bigger Than the Individual Ego, but of course any Recognition that something larger than the Individual Ego Exists is likely to dump a Huper into Confusion about the Nature of Matter, so this is merely a Corollary. Spiritual Clarity moves us Beyond the Ego, but the Ego has to have enough Presence to remember to Request it.

The Neptune Station “features” two Challenges³ (known in the astrovernacular by the quaint geometrical term “T-Square”). They’re both Self-Resolving, but not Doubly so.⁴

One of them is a Contest between two Rival Compulsions.⁵ We Crave Rebirth, to Liberate us from our Limitations. But our Limitations are founded in our Security, and the Ego does nothing if not Protect our Security.⁶ So we Really Want to Clear that Brain Fog, so we can Focus more Intensely on our Enlightenment. But our Limitations are even Stronger, so they Really Want another Cookie, so we can Space Out and Avoid Facing the Sources of our Limitations and Clearing them! Besides, they’re very Deep, and we may not be able to Clear them! What if we’re able to Dredge them up out of the Dungeon, undo all those decades and Lifetimes of Conscious Suppression, forgo all that Hard-Earned Comfort, and they still won’t Leave? Our Life just becomes a Huge, Uniform Bummer again! Right?

Well, Life is Risky. I always suggest appending Lovingly and Gently to our PIAVAs, because if we bite off more than we can chew, it can set us back. Natha Jay advises, “Two coping skills stand out for this passage: remember to rest and be careful what you wish for” (https://medium.com/@nathajay/and-were-off-d5c27c7ad203). I’m already violating the first Skill, by exercising (successful) new Denial Skills to push away Brain Fog so I can Strive to finish these essays while the Energy is still Current. I know we’re Eager, but using another of Natha’s Metaphors, we don’t need to “Push the River.” We have All the Time in the World. Linear Time is an Illusion, one we Create.⁷ The secret door to this My-Own-Time Universe, according to Gay, is to Ask yourself, “What Am I Not Owning? ” I sounds weird, but it works.

The other Self-Resolving Challenge revolves around Neptune itself. As it Stands Still, it’s Merged with Guilt and The Brutality of the Patriarchy.⁸ If you were raised Catholic or one of the other Autocratic or Guilt-based Religions, you’re probably dealing with a good deal of Ancient Anger these days. Lord Knows there are ample Present-Moment Stories to Focus that on, potentially Losing the Opportunity to Dump a Solid Load of Karma.

Neptune is the Outlet for these Stresses. The complex Source of the Stresses⁹ Revolve around our Feeling that we’re Stuck with it, that we’re Powerless against the Patriarchy. While that may be True in the short run, it’s not at all True in the long-term TimeLine. Remember that it will be 2081 before the New Pholus-Quaoar Cycle Climate Change Energy reaches its Waxing Square¹⁰ and becomes Mainstream, two generations hence. The demise of the Patriarchy will take at least that long as well. Like the Medieval Cathedrals that took generations to build, we’re putting in a foundation here, not a Rose Window. It will be our Great Grandchildren who will Witness the Results. Our job is to Hold the Vision and dig the basement.

• ¹ in 26 Pisces (Letting Go of Limitation). Of course it’s “Coincidence” that Neptune chose this Degree to Stand Still in, just when we’re being Asked to Let Go of Any Limitations We Have in the Quantity and Quality of our Self-Love (Chaos Initiating Sappho; see previous post). The Neptune Station is Exact at that time and date (meaning it’s still moving ever so slightly before and after); the Strength of the Energy usually Builds to a Max at the Exact Station, then Falls Off sharply. If however we Get Lost in Our Stories about the Energy (particularly Easy around Neptune) and make a Decision about it, to counteract it for instance, then we Extend the Energy in our own Lives.
• I remembered for example that Black Radish and Lemon, with Food and much Water, might reduce the Brain Fog that the Neptune Station (in combination with other things, such as dietary shortcuts) is Triggering for me, so I tried it and it seems to be working. I didn’t want to resort to Caffiend, which only seems to Quicken the Fog, and it’s too late in the afternoon for a large dose of Vitamin B, which would be Healthy but keep me awake longer than I want. It would be better to Meditate on the Fog, that way I may be able to pick up on what it’s trying to Teach me, rather than just Learning how to Suppress it.
• ² Fortunately, the Earth doesn’t Stand Still, or we’d Fall Off. It spins at over 1,000 mph on the surface at the Equator, 700 mph at my Latitude (you can Feel the Breeze blowing your hair off your head, right? No wonder Flat-Earthers don’t Believe – think of the haircut money we could save!). So to actually Notice in “Real” Life that a planet is Standing Still, we have to take a dddddsnapshot of the same chunk of Sky every night at the same time. From our Perspective, it’s the fact that a Star stays in the same place in such snapshots, while, usually, planets move. So a Stationary planet is pretending to be a Fixed Star, trying to Fake us Out, pausing to wag a finger at us for ignoring it the rest of the time.
• The Earth is also whizzing around the sun at 67,000 mph, and the Sun is zooming around the Milky Way at 448,000 mph. Tell your Dog to keep their head in the car, okay? Not to mention that the Dairy Queen is moving around the Local Galaxy Group at 216,000 mph, all of which is moving toward Leo at 1⅓ million mph. These numbers mean nothing of course, they’re just a Story. We all know we Live in a Snow Globe that moves only when Shaken.
• ³ Known in the astrovernacular by the quaint geometrical term “T-Square” because lines drawn from each of the three planets involved to the center of the Zodiacal circle forms a “T.”
• ⁴ Self-Resolving Hassles leave everyone Living Happily Ever After, if Everyone is able to Leave Well Enough Alone and patiently Endure any Discomfort that the Challenge Triggers (it’s still a Hassle, even if it’s Self-Resolving – we just have better odds of Surviving it Enhanced). On the contrary, Doubly Self-Resolving Hassles turn out to be basically Easy. Even if the Hassle itself produces Discomfort, the Self-Resolution process more than makes up for it.
• The Crux of a T-Square falls on the planet at the base of the stem of the “T,” while the other two planets are three Signs away, a Graduate-Seminar sort of Angle, Teaching Rare Skills, but Asking us to Adjust our Identity in the process (ie, not as Fun). A Self-Resolving T-Square adds two more planets, each five Signs from the Crux planet, making a Wedge that astrologers call a Finger of the Goddess, or, in the case of Muggle astrologer, Finger of God. These Focus our Attention and add Context that makes it Easier for us to Adjust our Identity. A Doubly Self-Resolving T-Square adds two additional planets, each four Signs from the Crux, making an equilateral triangle called a Trine and meaning Dumb-Luck Blessings. The Trine makes both the Learning and the Adjustment Effortless.
• That’s seven planets all together. We’re really talking about positions rather than planets, because each position can hold several planets. But we’ll continue to imagine that there’s only one planet in each position, as it’s easier. Adding an eighth planet Opposite the Crux planet, called the Vacancy of the T-Square, converts our T-Square into a Grand Cross – four planets more or less equally spaced around the Zodiac. Four is the number of Dominion, and the Grand Cross is Balanced, converting it from a Challenge and a Hassle, to a series of Irritations that Complement one another. We may still have to Endure some Discomfort while we patiently await the Complementary Actions, but a Grand Cross is much easier than a T-Square, as we know that we’re In Charge – we have Dominion over it.
• Notice that any Natal or Birth planet(s) we have that fill any Vacancy in the T-Square “in the Sky Now” (called Transiting planets in astrologuese, as opposed to Natal or Birth planets) Count! So if we have two natal planets five Signs from the transiting Crux planet, We Are the Self-Resolution. That puts us in an excellent position to help others Expand their Identity and Learn from the T-Square. Similarly, if we have two natal planets four Signs from the transiting Crux planet, We Are the Double Self-Resolution. If we aren’t Arrogant about it, people will come clamoring for our Help.
• Now suppose we also have two Natal planets that are each two Signs from the Crux. Combine these with the two planets four Signs from the Crux, and we have a Grand Sextile, one of the best Configurations in astrology, because it makes the whole process Full of Grace, and it includes the Crux of the Challenge. There’s only one Caveat with a Grand Sextile – we have to take the first step. If we’re willing to do that, the Goddess will handle the rest.
• We’ve now filled ten positions. Suppose we happen to also have two Natal planets one Sign from the Crux planet. Added to the other ten, that now fills the Zodiac with a planet in each of the twelve positions, one in each Sign, in more or less the same Degree. Some will be Transiting, some Natal. With twelve planets Aligned and no Vacancies, we have what’s called a Grand Unx, an “Unx” meaning one twelfth of anything. A Grand Unx is like having Two Cats in the Yard, Life Used to Be so Hard, Now Everything Is Easy Cuz of [the Grand Unx]. The Unx Angle, which Muggle astrologers unromantically refer to as a “Semi-Sextile,” is the Twelfth Harmonic, symbolizing Pattern-Breaking. So Adjustments to Identity suddenly become Easy, as the Universe Unlocks all of the Patterns that Connect and Bind the Energies of those twelve planets.
• ⁵ The Crux planet is Pluto – Compulsion, in 28 Capricorn (Letting Go of a Lifetime of Negativity). The base of a T-Square is an Opposition, the Second Harmonic, home of Duality and Argument.
• ⁶ The Rebirth side of the Argument is dwarf planet Haumea (Rebirth), daughter of Pele, making new Land as her Fiery Lava – molten Stone – hisses into the Sea, in 28 Libra (Integration of Extremes). Rebirth into Ascension, Ego Death Be Damned.
• On the other side of the table is dwarf planet Eris (Revelation of What’s Been Denied ), she who threw the Golden Apple into the dinner party with For the Fairest of them All written on it, generating a War-making Contest between the Classical Beauties – Aphrodite, Athena, and Hera – to claim the Golden trinket. None of the three Confronted their Vanity (Paris had to Decide, creating the War), so we have to do it for them.

By Anton Raphael Mengs – Steffi Roettgen, Anton Raphael Mengs 1728-1779, vol. 2: Leben und Wirken (Munich: Hirmer, 2003), plate 12b.Scan:James Steakley, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11012041

• Worse, Eris is Merged with Mars (Action, Anger), who’s likely to Struggle mightily to Defend Ego’s Role as Protector, and Keep in place the Subterfuges that we use Unconsciously, Semi-Consciously, and Consciously, to keep our Demons chained to the wall of our Sub-Dungeon. I’m guessing we’ll be working mostly with the Semi-Conscious and Conscious but Actively Resisted Energies in our Psyche.
• Both are in 26 Aries (Union with All ).
• Paradoxically, the base of the Self-Resolving Finger of the Goddess is a Sextile (Grace) between Koronis (Coronavirus) in 25 Leo (Discovering Soul Inside Convention and Codependence) and the Out-of-Bounds Moon (Vulnerability to Panic) Merged with asteroid Sisyphus (Perpetual Fruitless Effort ) and dwarf planet Asbolus (Intuition), all in Gemini 28 (Union with Evolving Energies), with Sisyphus and Asbolus also both Out of Bounds.
• ⁷ Gay Hendricks, The Big Leap: Conquer Your Hidden Fear and Take Life to the Next Level, pp.159-184. See also O. Fred Donaldson, Playing By Heart: The Vision and Practice of Belonging, pp.192-195.
• ⁸ Stationary Neptune Conjunct asteroids Nemesis (Guilt ) in 27 Pisces (Union with the Basic Design of Life) and Herakles (Assassin of the Sacred Symbols of the Matriarchy in Service of Zeus’s Patriarchy) in 28 Pisces (see note ¹ above).
• ⁹ The base of the Neptune T-Square, which describes the Source of the Challenge, is the OOB Moon-OOB Sisyphus-OOB Asbolus grouping that was part of the Self-Resolution of the first Challenge (see the end of note ⁶ above) Opposite asteroids Klotho (New Karma) and Atlantis (Demise of a Civilization) in 26-27 Sagittarius (Klotho in 26 – the Prenatal Decision to End All Karma in the Lifetime; Atlantis in 27 – Awareness of Many LifeTimes, Disguised as Everyday Knowledge). Sagittarius 26 is home to the Fixed Star Aculeus (Abuse that Strengthens Us), while 27 Sagittarius is adjacent to the Fixed Star Acumen (Destructive Gossip).
• ¹⁰ See the Getting Wild Again series of posts, starting at https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2022/03/04/getting-wild-again/, especially Ian Smith’s generous comment in https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2022/03/15/getting-wild-again-7/#comments.
• The Self-Resolving Finger of the Goddess in this second Challenge of the Neptune Station is based from the Sextile between asteroid Koronis at 25 Leo and dwarf planet Haumea at 28 Libra (see note ⁶ above).

The T-Square 1

I Believe that one of the most powerful things we can do in Life is to convert our T-Squares from Lifelong Frustrations to Learning Opportunities.  The model I use is that our T-Squares Illuminate what our Soul Intends to Teach “us” in the current Lifetime.  Learning is Infinite – we re-Learn the same Lessons over and over again, in different arenas of Life and at different Levels, till we finally have enough Experience with the Curriculum that we can be said to possess Wisdom.  In this process we re-Train our Instincts.

Our Minds are two-dimensional instruments, but the World alas is Unitary and Multidimensional.  So we constantly try to Improve our 2D models of the World, to Improve our Perception and Collaboration with the World and its Forces.  The result is the Mess we Create on the Planet.  Our Instincts and Intuitions on the other hand are Multidimensional and Unitary.  They don’t have the same narrow Goal-Orientation as our 2D Minds.  Instinct and Intuition Operate through Education.  If we try to use them to Manifest something, what we’ll usually get is a Teaching about what we need to Change in our Orientation in order to Manifest it.  We usually interpret that as a failure, since it doesn’t directly produce what we Intended to Manifest.  But in fact, it’s the fastest route to Wisdom, and Wisdom will Manifest even better than Intention.

Another way to see this, is that All Prayers are Answered.  However, our Conscious Prayers are always paired with our Unconscious Limitations.  So when we “PIAVA” – Pray, Intend, Affirm, Visualize, or Ask (or Command or Expand or Wonder or several other terms – see https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/category/manifestation/piava-review/ ) something and it doesn’t Manifest, what will Manifest is an Illustration of the specific Unconscious Limitations that stand in our way.  This often Manifests as a Riddle, especially when we PIAVA many things in rapid succession, or several things at once.

We aren’t just talking about Material Manifestations – we could be trying to Manifest World Peace, for instance, or Universal Food Security, or Healing someone.

We’re Frustrated by our T-Squares because we Expect Perfection in that area of our Life, and we never get there – we could define a T-Square as a Long-Suffering Desire for Perfection that we’re unable to Surrender.  No matter how many times we “Give Up” on the Obsession, we find ourselves coming back to it, often initially disguising it from ourself, as we Explore yet another arena or level.

I’ve fallen out of the Habit, but for a long time I referred to T-Squares as Mastery through Challenge, or Becoming Adept through Challenge – being Challenged by the Universe over and over again till we “Master” the subject of our T-Square. I now try to avoid the word “Master” because it carries so much Slavery Baggage.

Astrological Angles parallel the Major Arcana of the Tarot. A Square Angle spans one Fourth of the Zodiac (known as the Fourth Harmonic), and parallels the Fourth Archetype in the Tarot – The Emperor, which “represents the universal principle of power and leadership. This symbol is the pioneer, the leader, and the visionary, … the explorer whose curiosity and initiative is always on the forefront of human experience, … the ability to make things stable, solid, and secure” (Angeles Arrien, The Tarot Handbook, p.37). But it’s Experience, especially Challenging Experience, that hones the Emperor’s Wisdom and Vision.

The peak (90° Angle) of a T-Square is where the Energy Converges and Festers into Frustration, because when the Manifestation congeals, it so seldom meets our Expectations of Perfection.  The base (Opposition) of a T-Square is where our Evolving and Ever-Inadequate 2D Model resides.

🦦 Examples will help. Here are the two T-Squares in the current 7 May 2021 Exaggeration of Self-Doubt and Self-Confidence (Station of dwarf planet Chariklo)…

We use red lines to indicate Stress or Tension. The T-Square drawn in heavy lines Focuses on Using our Unique Genius to Respond to our Survival Instincts (dwarf planets Ixion, Pholus, and Quaoar). Or not – our Unique Genius is often our Forbidden Genius. Not being able to legitimately Express our Unique Genius already Triggers Frustration and Self-Doubt, even without the T-Square.

The T-Square just makes it more Frustrating. And even if we’ve already Recovered our Unique Genius, this T-Square is likely to Trigger Frustration when we to attempt to apply it to our Survival. I can hear the echo of my father Ranting about the incompetence of politicians who can’t solve obvious problems – I hear the echo in my own Self-Talk Ranting about the same thing, knowing that it’s beyond my Competence to convince anyone of anything, and beyond my Willingness to make a Spectacle of myself trying! Another form of Self-Doubt, along with an Opportunity to bring some Semi-Conscious Limitations into Awareness.

The base of this T-Square tells us about the 2D Model that we use to try to Improve our use of our Unique Genius and our Response to our Survival Issues. The base involves our Instincts about How to Manifest (Moon Opposite dwarf planet Makemake), and their Failures to help us promote our own Survival. The T-Square Illuminates these Failures so we can try to Improve our 2D Model, or get Motivated to use a Perspective with more Dimensions than two!

If this T-Square was natal (as it will be for anyone born this week and month), we’d probably have a Life-Long Insecurity and Frustration about our Survival, subject to the Caveats we’ll reveal later. How might we deal with this? We may be ahead to Recognize that Survival is not within the scope of the 2D Mind. If we Ego-Identify with the Mind, we’re stuck in an Existential Conundrum, since the Ego’s Job is to Assure and Continue our Survival. To find a model that works better, we may have to Surrender our Survival to a Higher Power.

🐲 The second T-Square, drawn in lighter lines, Focuses on our Enlightenment, our Graduation into 5D (minor planet Zhulong). The doorway to Enlightenment has many Portals and requires that we complete many Trials, most involving Transcendence of the Ego. The base of this T-Square contrasts Self-Confidence with the Life Force (Stationary Chariklo Opposite dwarf planet Varuna). I’m always a bit shocked when I hear people bragging about their own Enlightenment, as it always sounds more like Ego to me, though who am I to Judge. Self-Confidence is totally Personal, while the Life Force is totally Impersonal. How do we Juggle these two Energies in 2D? Maybe it’s not as simple as Surrendering our Survival to a Higher Power – maybe we need to make a Personal Contribution as well.

🃏 Very seldom does astrology stick us with a naked T-Square. They’re almost always embellished with Grace of some sort, which we’ll take up in the next post.

Charts of the Portals XII

We’ll be focused on the “25-Degree chart” for the next several weeks…

We haven’t Felt it since the 17 September 2020 New Moon and the 10 September Exaggeration of our Forbidden Genius (Station of Ixion), but it’s in our face now…

• Exaggeration of our Intuition (Asbolus Stationary in 26 Gemini) until 6am PDT 25 September.

• Focus on The Most Important Thing (Saturn Stationary in 26 Capricorn) until 10pm PDT 28 September.

• Which is likely to be Our Unlimited Potential (Chaos Stationary in 29 Gemini) until 2:30 am PDT 29 September.

We did talk about these, and about Changing our Karmic History, in the Charts of the Portals X post.

• A Huge Teaching about our Confidence (Chariklo Stationary in 25 Capricorn) till 1:20 pm PDT 3 October.  If we’re Open to it, the Teaching is likely to be that Self-Confidence and Self-Doubt are not Created by External Processes – they are products of our own Internal Decision Process.  The Teaching is Huge because it’s Merged with (Conjunct) and nearly simultaneous with…

• A Big Shift in the Underlying Trance through which We See the World (Pluto Stationary in 23 Capricorn) through at least 6:30 am PDT 4 October.

• A New Moon (in 24 Libra) on 16 October (12:30 pm PDT).  A New Moon will paint this Energy over at least the following two weeks.

• Emphasis on Sustainability and Sustenance (Ceres Stationary in 29 Aquarius) until 10am PDT 18 October.  The first step toward Sustainability is Elimination of the Unnecessary, the Superfluous, and the Self-Sabotaging.  This event also brings us back to the Global Climate Change chart.

• Learning to Have Respect for All Things (Station of Hopi in 26 Cancer) until 3am PST on 7 November.

• Two more New Moons (in 24 Scorpio and 24 Sagittarius) on 14 November (8pm PST) and 14 December (8:15 am PST) will carry this Energy through the Capricorn Solstice (2am PST) and the Dawning of the Digital Age (Saturn Initiates Jupiter in 1 Aquarius  at 9am PST) on 21 December.  Small wonder that we’ve been growing out our hair…

And we thought it was because of the Payolavirus.  We’ve Abandoned a lot of Dreams since 1969, haven’t we.  Time to call them back.

So, we should oughta take apart this chart pretty good, eh?  Shall we start with the T-Squares (Challenges), as we often do?  They’re pretty Profound.

When we introduced this chart we were remarking about how unusual it was that it contains five Stations (planets Standing Still and hence Strong).  The chart spans three weeks, but still, five is a lot of Stations.  But we were wrong.  There are actually seven Stations in the chart – we forgot to mark Chariklo and Pluto Stationary – and eight Stations if we count Hopi (Respect for All Things), who joined after we drew up the chart.

The T-Square (Challenge) that Focuses on three of the eight Stationary planets is the obvious place to start.

A T-Square is an Opposition (the “Base” of the T-Square) with a third planet halfway in between.  We draw it as a red triangle by connecting the planets, but if you instead draw lines from the center to each planet, you can see the “T.”   A T-Square puts significant Stress on the third planet, while the first two planets contribute hints about the Nature and Origins of the Stress.  By adding a fourth planet Opposite the third to create a “Grand Cross,” much of the Stress is relieved (or at least Changed), because the latter Configuration is more Balanced.

That would be

• Saturn (The Most Important Thing) Stationary 28 September,
• Chariklo (Self-Confidence and Self-Doubt) Stationary 3 October, and
• Pluto (Compulsion, Change, Formation of a New Background Trance that shifts Cultural Weltanschauungen or Milieux for Huperity) Stationary 4 October.

We might phrase this Triple Conjunction (“Stellium” in astrologuese), by itself, as something like The Most Important Thing is that we Maintain Our Confidence that we can Respond to the Changes Resiliently.

As the Focus of a T-Square, if we were intending to label Difficulties for us to Expect and Prepare for, we might phrase it as something like It may be Difficult to Maintain Our Confidence that we can Respond to the Changes Resiliently.

As the Focus of a T-Square, if we were intending to Coach ourself to Excel, we might phrase it as something like The Most Important Thing may be to Remember that any Sign of Self-Doubt will be a Red Alert that our Thoughts are leaning toward the Old Paradigm, just when we need to Remain Conscious that the Paradigm is Shifting and we need to Shift with it.

So, Shifting How?  Do we have any clues?  Before we look at the Base of the T-Square, does the Triple Conjunction itself tell us anything?

Well, a T-Square is in general about Perceived Problems.  We know we can’t Resolve an Apparent Problem without Changing the way we Think about it.  And Capricorn is about Mechanics.  It’s key phrase is Just Fix It! so Capricorn is about the Mechanics of How we’re going to Fix It.  Capricorn is about Creative Matter (the Cardinal Earth Sign), so we need a New Approach that’s Down-to-Earth, Hands-On, and involves Something Touchable.

So, maybe…

No, no, our “Problems” are bigger than that.  We have to worry about a Climate that’s Out of Control, an Economic System that’s Destroying the Planet and treats it’s Inhabitants (including us) as Expendable “Resources,” Staying Healthy amid for-profit “Medicine,” a Culture that worships Sociopaths and wants to reduce the population of us 99%ers, and the Danger of Techno-Atlantean “Solutions” that make things exponentially worse.  A lot more than darts might Fix.

If we take Capricorn apart to see where in Capricorn we are, the suggestion is that we already know How to do this (we’re late in Capricorn, at the 22½-25° Libra Duad and 25-27½° Scorpio Duad, which are about taking the Mechanical Solution we already know, and subjecting it to User Testing/Libra and Torture Testing/Scorpio).

(The Stages of Capricorn might be described as 0-2½° Capricorn Duad, the Mechanics of what we’re looking at; 2½-5° Aquarius Duad, Intellectual context; 5-7½° Pisces Duad, Reject attachment to old approaches; 7½-10° Aries Duad, Experiment with new approaches; 10-12½° Taurus Duad, Test same; 12½-15° Gemini Duad, Debrief testing; 15-17½° Cancer Duad, Review higher purposes; 17½-20° Leo Duad, Design; 20-22½° Virgo Duad, Critique; 22½-25° Libra Duad, User testing, 25-27½° Scorpio Duad, Torture testing; 27½-30° Sagittarius Duad, Deployment.)

Recognize that, if we aren’t the UN Secretary General, Solving The World’s Problems is just Mental Masturbation.  So, when we look at how (1) Climate and (2) Environment and (3) Food/Shelter and (4) Health and (5) Culture and (6) Survival and (7) Technology Impact us as Individuals and our Immediate Community, What Do We See?  We could actually make a list of our most pressing specific, tangible (Capricorn, eh?) Issues in each of those seven categories, Ask ourself What Do We Already Believe Might Help Us with This Issue for each of the seven, and start Testing each one to see How Well it Works.

Delegate (Libra Duad, eh?) parts of this Testing to other members of your Immediate Community, and when it looks like something might Resolve one of the specific tangible Issues, get your most Persistent Community member to “Torture Test” it to see how Resilient it will be in Changing Situations, and make adjustments accordingly.

There aren’t any Victims or Complainers in Capricorn, only Engineers.  It won’t look like they Expect it to in Engineering School, but we all have Inner Engineers – it’s just about Looking at a Problem, Imaging what that’s within our Span of Control might address it, and Trying them out to see if they work.

We do need to add a few steps that Engineers might not be used to, though.  Remember that we have to Change the Way we Think if we want to really address an apparent Problem.  One way to do that is to Ask, What if this isn’t Really a Problem, but a Spontaneous Solution to some other Problem that we haven’t Recognized?  For instance, the Zambonivirus “instantly” Solved the otherwise-intractable Problem of Stopping Predatory Capitalism from Rushing to Destroy the Earth, at least to some extent.  That might turn out to be The Most Important Thing that happened this year.

We’ll look next to see what clues we can glean from the Base of the Saturn-Chariklo-Pluto T-Square.

Vacancies

A reader Wonders…

“I just realized I am not well versed in the ‘vacant spot’ and how to read it; for example, 19 Virgo (near my Natal Jup) – Is the vacant point an important piece to incorporate Natal planet positions to understand creating the pattern within the transits?  Or is the vacant spot more an indication of what is to be understood from the pattern configuration?  If you have any references from your posts that I could study further?  Or maybe a quick explanation will do the trick.”

Yes, when you’re at https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/, there’s a long column of keywords (“categories”) to the right of the text.  If you’re looking at a specific post, it doesn’t show up.  I try to add a keyword to a post only when the post explains the term, but I’m not totally consistent about categorizing all posts.  I notice that there are two cubbyholes for “Vacancy,” one under “Planets etc.” and one under “Astrologuese.”  They should be combined, as there’s no difference in how they’re used – but it would take me about an hour to combine them, so I won’t bother.

But let’s go ahead with a quick explanation, as we never know what we’re going to find from the keyword list – I “improve” my astrology constantly, so I’ll just tell you how I use Vacancies now…

Configurations in a chart are combinations of planetary angles that, usually, fill the Zodiac (usually that means they add to 360 Degrees).  For instance, the Grand Sextille comprises six planets each two Signs or 60 Degrees apart, 6 x 60 = 360.  The Grand Sextile (and the Grand Anything) is considered to be much more Powerful than six Sextiles randomly placed around a chart or less well organized.

I consider it an Almost-Grand Sextile when five of the six Positions are occupied, because if we supply the missing Energy in the sixth Position, then we Complete the Grand Sextile and Enjoy the Benefits  (kinda like Bingo or the Lotteries, of a Full Hand in Poker).  It’s similar with other Almost-Grand Configurations – Quintile, Septile, etc. Occasionally, when it seems appropriate, I’ll consider a Configuration with two Vacancies to be Almost-Grand.  Like the four adjoining Septiles we had at the 25 April 2020 Pluto Station, where just for the heck of it we looked to see if there were Stars at the missing three Positions (still in my queue, Bob!).

Notice that an Almost-Grand Cross is a T-Square – the primary Benefit of any Grand Configuration is that it’s Balanced, including the Grand Cross.  It combines four T-Squares, but it’s In Balance, so it’s not considered as Troublesome as the T-Square.  The primary Challenge of the T-Square then is to Create Balance from it.  We don’t usually consider the Vacancy of a T-Square, but it wouldn’t hurt to do so.

We were looking at a 19-Virgo Vacancy in the Almost-Grand Sextile in the 7 May Full Moon chart.  I don’t have a way to check to see if a Vacancy may be occupied by asteroids (or even dwarf planets) that I don’t usually use – I wish I did, as it would help a lot.  If anyone has a way to do this, let me know.  So if none of the “planets” (meaning planets, asteroids, dwarfs, Lights, Nodes, etc) I use are there, I look for Stars nearby.  That’s an iffy proposition, as there aren’t that many Stars that are cataloged for use by astrologers.  However, if there’s a Biggie there, like Arcturus or Regulus or Sirius, that’s Huge.

Whether there’s a Star near the Vacancy or not, if you have a natal planet there, you automatically Complete the Configuration, without even trying.  So for you it’s a full Grand Sextile, because you Embody the Energies of your natal chart.  If you have natal planets near any of the other planets in the Configuration, that’s worth noting as well, because that natal planet will be Lit Up more than usual.  As Huminals (Huper Animals), we’re like Viruses, with those little Spikes all over, corresponding to the planets in our natal chart, each of which is an Antenna for broadcasting and picking up (and maybe getting Stuck on) Energies from outside of ourself.

So that Almost-Grand Sextile in the Full Moon chart comprised…

• Klotho – Beginning New Timelines
• Sun-Mercury – Awareness of our Essence
• Neptune – Our Relationship to Energies Larger than Our Own
• Hylonome-Veritas – Insights into our Codependence
• Moon – our Instincts

If we add a Jupiter to that in the Vacancy, which would apply only to you, we Expand everything.  A Grand Sextile itself is about fabulous Grace or Good Luck in combining the Energies in each Sextile, which in turn is about Projects where we take the First Step and the Universe takes over after that.  So for the next several weeks (Full Moon charts impact the following 2-4 weeks) we might be finding excellent progress around Expanding New Projects that involve Trusting our own Instincts more, and Listening More to (and/or PIAVAing the Assistance of) our Guides, instead of Playing to or Soliciting the Opinions of Others.

Now, for most of the rest of us, without a planet in or near 19 Virgo, we have to Consciously add the Energy of the Vacancy in order to take advantage of the Enhanced Grace of the Grand Sextile.  For a guess about what that might mean we’d read the Sabian Symbol for that Degree, 19 Virgo: “A Swimming Race.”  To me that means Efficiency at processing our Emotions.  So for the rest of us for the next several weeks we might find great progress with New Projects that involve Trusting our own Instincts more, Listening More to our Guides and Soliciting their Assistance more, and Trusting our own Emotions (as Opposed to our Thoughts About them of course), instead of Trying to Please Others.

For all of us, the Programming we received from our Mothers is likely to be particularly Lit Up, since the Saturn Station occurs on Mother’s Day.  And we can’t ignore the fact that the Moon goes Out of Bounds on Mothers Day, so it’s all going to be a lot more Emotional than it would be usually – though telling Mom to Butt Out of our Choices will probably always be a Chancy Conversation.  But its a Grand Sextile, suggesting very Positive Outcomes from any Project that we Initiate, so it may be the best time ever to Begin our Self-Liberation.

Or, you can take an Easier path, especially if your Mum is Difficult (or Deceased), and use your Mirrors instead.  Either way our Relationship with our Dear Mother is Changing, so we want to Make the Best of the Opportunity in whatever way Feels best to us – that is, by Trusting our Emotions.  If our Emotions are Conflicted, as they’re likely to be, what an Opportunity to Stay Present with our Confusion and Avoid trying to Fix it.

If your Mother is the type to Demand Commitment, what an Opportunity to Stand your Ground (Veritas-Hylonome) – “Mom, I hear that you’re Asking for a firm Commitment, but I’m not Ready to do that, so we’ll have to leave the whole Issue Dangling till I am Ready, and I don’t know when that will be.”  Then, while the odds of Success are Great (Grand Sextile), you get to Practice Not Trying to Fix or Manipulate your Mother’s Emotions!

You might think this all sounds Daunting, but it’s a Critical and Natural part of Claiming Your Power, and as we’ve said, there may never be a Better Time.  Trying to stuff your Mother’s Heavy Emotions into your Carrion Bag for the Ascension Flight won’t work.  They’ll bump you off the Flight for overweight.

Kegels 3

The other elements of Big Grace in the Juno-Sedna chart, and the upcoming Sedna Station chart, are two Diamond Stars.

A T-Square (drawn as a red triangle) is made up of two planets Opposite one another, with a third at their Midpoint (ie, three Signs from each).  It means a Challenge.  The ultimate aim is to become Adept at this Challenge, but it’s via the School of Hard Knocks.  If we haven’t Figured Out what we’re supposed to be Learning, we usually Experience a T-Square as Long-Suffering Frustration.

I mean, how would we know, if we didn’t have our chart drawn up?  And even then, an Ego astrologer would concur that we were screwed.  We’d just think it was horrible Karma!

That’s what I thought about my own T-Squares until I Realized that the Fourth Harmonic (a Square goes one Fourth of the way around the Zodiac) is about Dominion – Healthy Control, Mastery!  (Or, without the possible hidden implication of Slavery as the inverse of Mastery, Adeptness.)  Dominion is the Fourth Principle in the Tarot’s Major Arcana.

A natal T-Square is a Life-Long graduate seminar, where there are no real Answers, only better Questions, better because they lead to a fuller understanding of the Depth and Breadth of the Issue that the T-Square presents.  So when we Reframe it thus, each Bummer in our Life-Long series of Bummers, has taught us a new Principle, Subtlety, Corollary, Insight, or Breakthrough about the subject of our seminar.

Each time we thought we were going to get it “Right” this time!  We thought we could make External Reality match our Perfect Pictures.  And every time we Failed.  But each time we Learned more about it.  Each time we got a little closer to What We Want, though many times we’ve taken wide Detours into places we didn’t know were Related until we went there.  Truth is, we’ll never Achieve our Perfect Pictures, because Perfect Pictures are 2D Snapshots, while Real Life is a Hologram in an Infinite number of Dimensions.

Achieving our Perfect Pictures would be like trying to Grok the nature of a Butterfly by pinning it to a board.  The hardest thing about a T-Square is that we can’t give it up.  Dropping the class is not an Option, because What We Want is an Irrevocable Compulsion.  It’s What We’re Here For.  We often settle for an Addiction – we get so Frustrated by our Lack of Success, which we take as a Personal Failure, that we divert ourself with the small but Satisfying Pleasure that we can get from Sugar, Alcohol, MJ, Sex, or worse.  It’s Temporary, but by the time we Indulge, we forget our Frustration.

Let’s take an Example.  For instance, suppose we hypothesize someone who has a Life-Long Challenge (T-Square) to Figure Out how to set up Effective Boundaries (Haumea-Pallas-Aletheia) between their Soul (Uranus) and their Ego so they can Approach their LifeTime Mission (North Node).  Oh, gosh, that’s one of the T-Squares in the Juno-Sedna chart, isn’t it.  What a coincidence…

The North Node is symbolized by those earphones in the lower right.  The red triangle that points to the earphones is the T-Square.  Well, we know already that our Mission is like Differential Equations or Calculus – we never really get there, we just keep cutting the distance in half between us and it…

If What We Want is Water and it’s always just out of Reach, that’s the Picture of Frustration.  We need to Reframe it – we may never get any Water in this Lifetime, but we’re sure going to Learn everything there is to Learn about Striving for it.  And probably, literally, Die trying.  Which is Cool – we was gonna Die anyway, so why not Die for a Cause.  And there aren’t any Causes more important to us than What We Want.

So, this particular “Challenge to Figure Out how to set up Effective Boundaries between our Soul and our Ego so we can Approach our LifeTime Mission” isn’t Life-Long, it’s only temporary.  We’re using the Mean Nodes, and they move about a Degree-and-a-half per month, so this Uranus-Haumea-North Node T-Square will only be with us for a few months.  But meanwhile, here in the context of wresting Power out of Fear (Sedna Stationary), finding a Boundary  between Soul and Rebirth that Serves our Mission is a Challenge that Confronts us.

For instance, the best Boundary here between Soul and Mission might be no Boundary, and Surrendering our Sovereignty to that Degree might Scare the Living Daylights out of our Ego, not to mention how it could Frighten our Dependents, as we might be Compelled to Abandon them for some abstruse Project like Saving Antarctica for the Penguins.  Or it could Drive us to Drink.  Here’s how some folks might do these Boundary Games…

“Full of anticipation, we set off and when we had adjusted our consciousness to the high vibration, we found ourselves in the Fairy sector.  However serious the reason for our visit may be, first we must play.  This is a necessity and not a frivolity because, until we have rushed about as fast as we can, there remain clinging to us, Earth ideas, and until we are rid of them, we are unable to concentrate.  What fun this period is.

“We burst and reform only to disintegrate again almost immediately.  In this destruction, the atoms of our bodies change their positions and one of our amusements is to stop them from rejoining those of the person to whom they rightfully belong.  Of course we can never prevent them from doing this for long, but sometimes we keep them poised between the two of us, they look so funny that we begin laughing, our concentration vanishes until we are once more complete and ready to burst again.”

–Normus, “Travels,” in Daphne Charters, Forty Years with the Fairies, p.209.

♥ So, that’s a T-Square.  But weren’t we supposed to be talking about Diamond Stars?  Oh, ok, I remember now.

See the two green lines rising from the North Node?  That’s called a Finger of God, and it means Pay Attention to this!!  Some folks also call it a “Yod.”  In these charts, red lines represent Challenge, green Curiosity, and blue Grace.  Notice that when we connect the Yod to the T-Square, a web of blue lines is created on the other side of the central Opposition – literally, a Bowl of Grace.

This is a Diamond Star, and it means that the T-Square is a Self-Resolving Challenge because of the Grace in the blue lines, which make a double Trine Bridge, or two Easy Alternative Paths, across the T-Square.  Like an escalator up the side of the Cliff we Expected to have to climb.  So our two escalators in this Diamond Star are Suspending Disbelief or Allowing our Beliefs to Shift (Klotho-Vesta), and Trusting our Forbidden Genius (Eurydike-Ixion), which will require a Shift in our Values (Venus).

If we are to Trust the Genius of our True Self, we’re probably going to have to Give Up some Obedience to the Values of our former Masters or Programmers.  Recognizing that they were Doing the Best They Knew How at the Time, we just know that this is the time when we have to substitute Self-Trust for the relative Security of their Truth.

This is a Diamond Square, so this just happens, it’s not something we have to work hard at, though we may have to work a bit at Surrendering our Resistance to it – at least enough to enable us to Notice the Difference.  After all, the overall Work this week is Growth of Consciousness – Juno-Sedna.

So the Bottom Line of this Diamond Star is that both our Beliefs and our Values will Shift, or have already Shifted.  Have you Noticed any of that in your own Experience yet?  This is a big Change in our Identity, since Values and Beliefs are the Foundations of Who We Are.  And an Effortless Shift.  We haven’t mentioned Nemesis or Ego Death once, and they aren’t involved.

Well, not in an obvious way anyway.  Nemesis is Octile (Adjustment) to Mars (Action) and Trioctile (Rebalancing) to Pluto (the Underlying Energy).  Without the Diamond Star that would be enough to create some Ego Death, and at any rate no Change of Identity takes place without some Ego Death.  Death doesn’t have to be Unpleasant, however, if we Take Ourselves Lightly, like the Angels do.  That Mars-Pluto Square is about An Angel with a Harp, recall.

If you’ve Noticed your Beliefs, Values, Identity Shifting in the last several days, have you Noticed any signs of Ego Death? Getting Lost in a familiar place, for instance, where it feels like part of you knows exactly where you are, but another part is Experiencing it as Brand New.  That’s an important kind of Shift to Notice as we Grow our Consciousness.

♥ The second Diamond Star (notice the double green lines emanating from the point of the T-Square) is focused on the Stellium in Libra – Haumea-Aletheia-Pallas, or Rebirth of True Boundaries.  If our Boundaries are Out of Balance with our Soul or our Goals or our Mission, we won’t know Who to Trust, or what to eat for breakfast, or when to Meditate and when to Act.  So this is a Big Deal.

The roots of this Yod are Chiron (Despair/Miracles) and Juno-Sedna itself (Bringing our Fears into Consciousness).  As we’ve said, when our Fears are Unconscious, they Control our Life.  In order to Overcome them (or rather, Love them into becoming the Power that they really are) we need first to Bring them into Consciousness.  Despair is totally appropriate when our Unconscious Fears rule our Lives, because we’re Powerless against them.

But fortunately, Chironean Despair is easy to fix – alls we gotta do is Poor-Sweetheart ourself.  We say to ourself, “You Poor Sweetheart, you’re Feeling Overwhelmed, aren’t you.”  That statement Shifts our Identity from Despair to Compassion.  If we don’t Change the Subject afterwards though, we may get sucked back into Despair (though we could always Poor-Sweetheart ourself again).

Once we slip out of our stiff, scratchy Despair shirt and pull on our soft, warm Compassion hoodie, we can Change the Subject – do something else entirely, and divert our Attention.  That will allow the Overwhelming Challenges that Triggered our Despair to Resolve themselves on their own, without the Interference of our Anxiety.  After all, We are now Compassion, not Worry.

All Prayers are Answered, and a “You Poor Sweetheart…” is a Prayer of sorts, a Surrendering of the Overwhelm to your Higher Power.  It’s also a Loving Moment like Gary Craig talks about in his Unseen Therapist process (https://www.emofree.com/), which is a very Powerful Healing technique to Learn.  It’s also Easy to Learn if you’ve been PIAVAing for a while (https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/category/manifestation/piava-review/).

♥ We don’t talk about them often, but the seven short green lines are also important, and you can take advantage of them in any chart you find them in.  They’re called “Unxes” because an “Unx” is one twelfth of something.  The Twelfth Harmonic is about Pattern-Breaking.  That’s one of the most Powerful Skills we can develop.  After all, Karma is just Patterns, so if we can Break those Patterns, we’re Golden.

In fact, the South Node (Karma itself!) has two Unxes, one to Trusting our Forbidden Genius (Aletheia-Ixion-Venus), and the other to Suspending Disbelief (Klotho-Vesta).  The implication is that these two Intentional Acts will shake a good deal of our Karma and Self-Sabotage Loose.  We won’t turn that down.

The other Unxes and Opportunities for some relatively Easy Pattern-Breaking are…

• Suspending Disbelief to Despair/Miracles (Chiron).  An excellent Example of that – when you encounter what feels like a familiar Bummer about to repeat, Suspend your Belief that it’s Inevitable.  It Aint.  Just don’t Grab it.  Just slip out the back, Jack; just get off the bus, Gus – there must be fifty ways to Leave your Karma.  And don’t for a moment think that your Kinship with your Karma isn’t a Love Relationship – how long have the two of you been Joined at the Hip after all?

• Despair/Miracles to your Soul (Uranus).  What keeps you from Uniting your Soul and your Ego?  You don’t even need to know it, you can just say to yourself, “You Poor Sweetheart, You aren’t Identifying with your Soul as much as you could be, are you.”  Then just Change the Subject and Enjoy!

• Soul to Consciousness of Fear (Juno-Sedna).  I mean, what would your Soul have to Fear, anyway?  Certainly not Annihilation, it’s Immortal by definition.  Abandonment might Sadden Her, but even that’s Doubtful, as She surely knows that Getting Lost is the first stage of Getting Found.  We may have already Resolved all of our Sedna Station Issues with that last Poor Sweetheart.  Wouldn’t that be great!

• Consciousness of Fear to Unlimited Potential (dwarf planet Chaos).  Of course we’ve already Kegeled our Fear into Power, but even then, Unlimited is pretty Scary.  Reminds us of when we used to Imagine walking off the Edge of the Flat Earth, or those Nightmares we used to have about the Grand Canyon.  Better to PIAVA our Unlimited Potential.  How else will we shake it free from our existing Limiting Beliefs?

• Unlimited Potential to our Mission (North Node).  How does that Feel – Exciting?  If it doesn’t, Breathe.  Better?  You should be Feeling a Surge of Energy up your Spine.  We may even be Wondering, what the Hell is my Mission, anyway?  If so, great – Wonder is a hidden PIAVA (don’t try to Figure It Out though – that will Limit it).  You could make it PIVAWA if you want, or even WIPAVA.

It’s really pretty Simple math – Fear Plus Breathing Equals Excitement, Fear Plus Kegels Equals Power.  We’ll probably get lots of Opportunities to practice both over the next week.

20-25 Degrees

Aa apparent newcomer has written to ask about their many natal planets at around 20 Degrees, in response to our October 2016 suggestion that we begin working with these Degrees now, since they will be Lit Up when our Home Planet begins Her Big Reorg in the early 2020s – see https://astrobuss.wordpress.com/2016/10/20/2020-b/ for our article and their comment. 

Of course, as we repeatedly point out, these Degrees continue to be Lit Up by many of our planetary Companions today.  As we write, one quarter of the planets we follow are in or adjacent to this Zone, which is only one sixth of the Zodiac wide.  It’s a useful question, so I’ll answer it…

Our approach is to intend to befriend the Unconscious because we Believe that the Power of the Ego is minuscule compared to the Power of the Unconscious, and because the Ego is usually Unconscious of that fact.

We also intend to work not with Qualities but with Energies and Relationships, and therefore we work mostly with what we call the “Angles,” though most astrologers would call them “Aspects.”  We prefer Angles because that’s what they are in plain language – the Angular Relationship between Planets (and other astrological Hot Spots such as the Nodes).

Unfortunately there is an astrological term “Angles” as well, meaning the Ascendant, Midheaven, etc., or the major House Cusps.  We can usually live with this ambiguity because we very seldom talk about Houses, since we write for the whole planet, and House positions vary with location.  Folks who commonly use the astrological term “Angles” may be confused by the way we use the word, alas.

Most astrologers I know would not argue that the T-Square (a third planet halfway between two planets that Oppose one another) is one of the most problematic Angular Relationships, largely because it usually seems to indicate a Sisyphean area where Success is not possible but the Compulsion to Keep Trying is unrelenting.  Consequently, the most appropriate keyword for the Ego’s Relationship to a T-Square seems to be Frustration.

We also Believe that, (1) on a Soul level, we Chose the Configurations of planets in our natal chart, because that’s what “We” (our Soul) wanted to “Work On” in the current Lifetime.  Many folks have difficulty with this concept; the easy path to it lies through shifting your Identity till you find a place from which it’s True.

We often also interpret the Configurations in our natal chart as (2) the specific Earth Energies where we Chose to help the Planet Heal. 

The first approach assumes that our Soul is using the Planet for its own Education, while the second approach assumes that we are in fact Cosmic Healers who came here to Help Earth Ascend.  Take your pick, though as usual, I recommend Both/And rather than Either/Or.

Since our reader has Uranus T-Square to their Nodes, I have no doubt that they’re in the latter category.

As Ascension Helpers, then, our T-Squares indicate the places where our task is to suck up all the Frustration (Fear, Anger, Despair, Separation, etc) that the Planet Feels, and Transform it (we are after all nothing if not Energy Transmogrifiers) into what the Planet Prefers to Feel (Joy, Bliss, Attunement, Excitement, Unity, etc). 

How do we know what the Planet Prefers to Feel?  Easy.  She and We are One.

Note that more or less implicit in that paragraph is that Emotions are not Personal, but more like Weather or a Virus.  We Attach our Identity to an Emotion when we Associate or Merge with it, which is usually part of our Karma, or, we would suggest, because we came here to Learn and Teach how to Detach our Identity from that Emotion (look up “Poor-Sweetheart” and “Held Emotions” in the Categories list to explore further).

So, in the planets our new Friend has listed, we’d go straight to the T-Square, Uranus Square the Nodal Axis.  The Egoic side of Uranus is Disruption, and the Egoic side of the Nodes is the Desire to Let Go of Karma.  So we would suppose that our Friend, on the Ego side, is (or was, if he’s since Grown) often Frustrated by Attempting and Failing to Let Go of sticky Karmic Patterns, or what we often call Self-Sabotaging Archetypes. 

For instance, our Friend might try over and over to walk a “straight and narrow” path, only to wake up and discover that they’ve strayed from it.  Or worse, they might find that other people are repeatedly screwing them over…

Now, let’s turn this around and look at it from the Soul’s Perspective.  First of all, what Uranus Disrupts is everything that Inhibits its Purpose. 

Since most of us were Programmed to Receive Truth from Outside ourself rather than Inside, the Karmic Ego will be constantly Frustrated by the Uranian Disruption of our frequent Attempts to ignore our own Internal Truth in order to be Loyal to our Programming and Programmers. 

Truth resides in the Heart, and it’s Different for everyone, so only by Programming someone to Trust their own Heart (Uranus) can Uranian Disruption be Loved as the Urge to Liberation that it is.

Now, again from the Soul’s Perspective, the Nodal Axis is not so much about the Desire to Let Go of Karma as it’s about a Decision over which Earthly trends to emphasize.  Contrary to the usual Interpretation, Karma does not Grasp Us, We Grasp It.  So all we have to do, to quote Paul, is to “Let It Be.”

The Signs will give us more specific information. Our new Friend’s South Node is in Aquarius and North Node in Leo, indicating that their Intended (Soul-level) path runs from Social to Personal Integrity.  Learning to Love themselves Unconditionally, for instance. 

Meanwhile, Uranus is in Scorpio, which is Fearless and Relentless.  So our Friend is likely to be Driven to stop at Nothing in their Effort to Learn and Teach Unconditional Self-Love.

Which is Fantastic!  Now, what if the Ego and Programming still get in the way and continue to Sabotage us with Downers?  (Which may never actually go away, just become more quickly seen through.)  Well, Reframing help a whole lot…

A T-Square Feels Like the Compulsive need to Achieve greater Perfection around some Goal.  In this Uranus-in-Scorpio case, that would be Permanent Soul Contact.  Or, if the Soul is Dismissed, then something like an Irrepressible Urge to Disrupt Untruth. 

But even the part about Permanent Soul Contact is the Ego and Programming speaking.  If you’ve taken graduate seminars in a good program, you probably Noticed that there are no “correct” answers, there are only “interesting” questions and examination of them that is thorough and creative.

That’s where you find the T-Square – on the Soul level you’ve Intended a Lifetime where you re-examine everything over and over again, with slight variations, each time from a slightly different Perspective, so you become uniquely qualified to Teach the subject, since you’ve Experienced it from all angles, inside and out. 

And of course the key to all that is Noticing that there are no “correct” answers and that your Perfectionist Quest, while essential, was not for the purpose that you earlier supposed.  That’s the way our Mission (North Node) operates – we have a Shadow to Pursue, till we pounce on it and Discover that it’s just a Shadow, like Ged in Earthsea.

Once you’ve done this Reframing, Frustration will continue to try to sneak back into the driver’s seat, and that’s where Poor-Sweethearting, Tapping, and PIAVAing (look them up in the Categories list and practice them) will be useful and Powerful.

The ultimate Goal for all of us is Unconditional Self-Love, so eventually you’ll be Teaching us all.  Which we eagerly anticipate!

Thanks for writing.  Namaste.

Cause an Defect Full Moon IV

Okay, more about the Full Moon chart and the Partial Eclipse that’s a Gateway to the impending Big Total Solar Eclipse that shines a spotlight on the USofA…

As with all Signs, we can run them Positively or we can run them Negatively.  Remember though that the World (and hopefully your segment of it) needs ultimately to be in Balance, and is Multidimensional as well, so don’t get stuck in Archetypes that worship either side of that Duality. 

(Actually, the World and yourself are always in Balance, it’s just that whatever is needed to Balance your Conscious side resides in the Unconscious.  Since the Unconscious actually rules us, then from this Perspective, the nicer you are, the meaner you really are – and vice versa.)

You’ve been to performances where you’ve been Exhausted afterward, and other performances where you’ve felt Energized after.  That’s the difference between someone who builds their own Confidence by sucking other people’s Energy (we can think of a prominent example who lives in a house that’s being remodeled at the moment), and someone who Shares their Abundant Leonine Self-Love broadly.  Abundance is having enough to Share, After all. 

This is the Duality often represented by Leo, where Sun and Mars and Atropos (Endings) are all parked at this Full Moon, along with the North Node (Lifetime Mission), Veritas (Truth), and Varuna (Life Force).  Varuna will be in Leo for the next quarter-century, which should put a very Auspicious carpet under this Planet for a long while.  As for Mars in Leo, if we wrote a song about our Anger, would it draw a cheering crowd?  And when we mingle with the crowd afterward, are they the kind of people we’d Feel at Home with?

Expressing our Anger (Mars) can Create Community, and it can drive folks away.  While Communing with Everyone is a fabulous Aquarian goal (http://danielscranton.com/your-universal-family-%e2%88%9ethe-9th-dimensional-arcturian-council/), we may not actually be ready for such Sympathy and Understanding, Harmony and Trust Abounding.  And that’s all right.  We Are Who We Are, moment to moment (http://danielscranton.com/creating-experiences-%e2%88%9ethe-9th-dimensional-arcturian-council/).

We all need a place to return to where we are Understood and Respected and Loved for exactly Who We Really Are, so for all but the most Saintly among us, that first sort of Community is what we need to Create, to make a Safe Space for us while we put the finishing touches on our Saintliness.  While Anger tends to Divide, the presence of Atropos suggests that Expressing our Anger may help to Let It Go.

This is what the Leo-Aquarius Axis, which this Full Moon Illuminates, is all about, the Coin that unites the Duality.  Leo is the epitome of the Individual Self, Aquarius the epitome of Community.  Leo represents Fixed Fire, Stabilized Energy, or Spirit Manifested into Form.  Aquarius represents Fixed Air, Ideology, or Intellect Manifested into Form.  Michael Roads goes to great lengths to differentiate Intellect from Intelligence.  To him Intelligence derives from the Heart and Gut, while Intellect derives from the Left Brain. 

The Intellect is more than capable of supporting Intelligence, though in the Patriarchy, it’s more likely to support Morality, Politics, and the Preservation of Privilege.  Intellect is finely tuned for Logical Analysis, but Logic is a house of cards built upon Assumptions.  Propaganda manipulates your Logic without being Clear that its Assumptions may not be Universal.  To Transform Aquarius into Intelligence Manifested into Form, we need to Let Go of our Karmic Archetypes.  Our Archetypes and Limiting Beliefs are no more and no less than Unconscious Assumptions.  As long as they’re Unconscious, we can only see half of the Universe.

While Astrology deals with Dualities, it also deals with the Multidimensional.  Leo and Aquarius are not Complete without the other two Fixed Signs, Scorpio and Taurus (and of course the Fixed Signs are not Complete without the Creative and Mutational Signs).  Scorpio as Fixed Water or Emotion, and Taurus as Fixed Earth or Matter, represent the Stabilized Emotional and Material aspects of Reality.  Of course, depending on your Archetypes, Emotion and Matter can be Stabilized into either Constructive or Deconstructive Directions.

The Klotho-Sappho Conjunction (Creating a New Timeline Based on Self-Love), which is the Focus of the Full Moon T-Square, is in Scorpio, so we’re dealing with an Emotional version of Self-Love.  That means the tears that come naturally to your eyes when someone validates the parts of you that are Unseen – your Genius Project, for instance – and when someone perpetrates an Act of Kindness that your own Personal Values wish everyone would do All the Time.  And the Grace you Feel when someone Validates your Anger.  The Leo-Aquarius Full Moon is about the Dynamic between the Individual and the Collective – between You and Other.

Which means that the Taurus or Matter side of the Four-Dimensional Balance is Vacant – we need to Consciously Ground the Energy.  Dan and the Arcfolk concur – http://danielscranton.com/a-process-for-connecting-with-5d-energies-%e2%88%9ethe-9th-dimensional-arcturian-council/ .  The Vacancy is at 16 Taurus, “The inadequacy of past knowledge in times of crisis.”  Hmmm.  I’d rephrase that as “…in times of rapid Change” – in a Stable environment, traditional knowledge is actually very Powerful in a crisis.  But the point is that we need to PIAVA how to Ground ourself and our Milieu.  

There is, however, a Fixed Star in that location, Almach, which is the left foot of the Sacrificial Goddess Andromeda.  Foot as in Power, left as in Feminine Power.  Andromeda is a symbol of an Out-of-Power Tradition victimized by the Dominant Paradigm.  In other words it’s important to bring Self-Trust into Expression of our Anger, and to remember that our Intention is Self-Expression, not to be Understood.  If the Perpetrators Understand our Anger at their Oppression, their Dominance will be threatened, and they will be highly Motivated to torment us further.

Our Objective in Expressing our Anger is not Revenge or Restitution, but to Let Go of its Karmic Grasp of us.  Actually, our Karma does not Grasp us, our Ego Grasps it.  It’s a foundation for our Ego.  So to the Ego, it Feels as if it’s the Karma doing the Grasping.  We cannot Raise our Vibration until we Let Go of our Archetypes, including our Anger.  While it feels like we’re Angry at the Perps in our Present Life, it has Karmic Roots that will not be pulled out by striking out in the Present Life.

To Let Go of Anger or any strong Emotion, we need to start by Poor-Sweethearting it.  Strong Emotions are not Comfortable, and we need to Empathize with our own Discomfort.  “You poor Sweetheart, you Feel Angry, don’t you.”  It’s meant as a declaration of Self-Compassion, not an Accusation.  If being Angry makes you a bad person, find a substitute that isn’t.  “Your poor Sweetheart, you really Feel Irritated, don’t you.”  Or “Agitated,” or “Worked Up.”  Then Change the Subject, and see how long it takes for your Anger to return as a thought-stream.

The next time it arises, Tap it Out (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzVd6Ww0as4).  If it’s at all serious, it will take several Iterations.  Measure the Intensity of your Anger on a scale of 1 to 10 before and after each Iteration, so you can Witness your Progress.  Alternate Poor-Sweethearting, Tapping, and any other PIAVA you can Create, making sure to Change the Subject after each process.

We should note that the Full Moon and the T-Square occur on the Midpoints of the Fixed Signs, which are the Power Points of the Zodiac, symbolizing the Four Horsepersons of the Apocalypse – Apocalypse to the Ego, Liberation of the Soul. 

We mentioned Obsession recently in this context, as Obsession can make it particularly difficult to Change the Subject, and a reader wrote to ask us how one might address Obsession.  Well, the first question I’d ask, is how might Obsession be indicated in their chart?

If it’s really an Appropriate Expression of their natality, then they may only need to Learn to Love it to Death.  That may not stop the Obsession, but it would make it more Pleasant, as once they Learned that, Obsession would trigger Love and Pleasure for them instead of Discomfort.  Of course, Learning to Love Obsession will likely involve a good deal of Ego Death, as at least some part of them wants it to go away, and they probably have a big backlog of Other People telling them it’s wrong.  But that’s all just a map of where they need to go to Learn to be Loving with it.

So, is Obsession an Appropriate Expression of their natal chart?  What would we look for?

Well, the most obvious place to start looking is Scorpio, and to a lesser extent Taurus.  These signs, especially Scorpio, don’t Let Go when they get hold of something they don’t fully grok yet, especially something Emotional, and especially something that seems Unfair.  Does our friend have planets in Scorpio?

Well, yes. seven of them.  We work with 45 planets and other points, so the average Sign should contain less than four planets.  So seven is a whole bunch.

We can start by what we would tell any Scorpio that might help them Love themselves…

Scorpio is Compelled to Get to the Bottom of Things.  We first Meet Other in Libra, and it raises all kinds of Questions for us, about whether We’re Okay and They Aren’t or They’re Okay and We Aren’t, whenever there seems to be a Conflict or even Contrast between us.  This is how we first Discover that our own Childhood may not have been as Loving as it could have been, so it’s not at all trivial.

It’s not easy for Anyone to get to You’re Okay and I’m Okay, and for Scorpio it becomes a Compulsion.  It takes a great deal of Maturity to understand that the end point is You’re Okay and I’m Okay rather than You’re Okay or I’m Okay, which complicates the whole process until we Realize that.  We also have to Realize that just because You’re Okay and I’m Okay, that doesn’t mean I have to Tolerate you if you aren’t my cup of tea.

Also, Scorpio is Fearless in their Pursuit of Truth.  Fearlessness is the most prominent element of Scorpio.  Other people do not Trust Scorpio, partly because Scorpio asks penetrating questions that require them to examine themselves more deeply than they usually like to, partly because Scorpio has a tendency to make and hold eye contact longer than most people are comfortable with.  Other people often feel like Scorpio is Looking into the Soul (which it is), and if they aren’t fully in Self-Love, it makes them want to run away.

Because of these kinds of Reactions from Other, Scorpio is one of the most difficult Signs to Embody in Left-Brain-worshiping Western Cultures.  Remember we aren’t talking about folks with Sun in Scorpio, we’re talking about anyone with a strong emphasis in Scorpio – or Pluto, Scorpio’s “Ruler” – in their natal chart or even in their Transits and Progressions.

These kinds of influences often draw Scorpio toward Addiction, and Teaching them to Love Themselves Exactly As They Are is the first step to helping them get out of Addiction, as the most prominent trigger for their Desire to Medicate is the Anxiety produced by their Need to Get to the Bottom of Things that are Forbidden to them.  Strong Scorpio is a good indicator that a person’s Forbidden Genius lies in sophisticated Research of Private Investigation.

That’s the gist of what we would tell any Scorpio, or anyone with a strong Pluto, in a reading.

So, which planets are we talking about?  Ixion (Forbidden Genius), Quaoar (Survival Instincts), Ceres (Sustainability), Klotho (Plotting a New Timeline), and Vertex (Intuition) are all at the Midpoint of Scorpio, which just happens to be (there go those Coincidences again!) where Transiting Klotho and Sappho (Starting a New Timeline based on Self-Love) happen to be sitting as we speak, making their T-Square to the 7 August Full Moon.

Whoa, this is Big.  The Midpoint of Scorpio is one of the Four Horsefolk of Ego Death, so we probably have a case of chronic Self-Attack (that is Ego-Attack, not Soul-Attack).  Sir Self-Lance-a-Lot.  All very strongly Lit Up this week.  So we’d prescribe a strong ongoing dose of Poor-Sweethearts.  Can we even interpret a Klotho-Sappho Transit, Square to a Full Moon, sitting on a natal Ixion-Quaoar-Ceres-Klotho-Vertex Stellium?

Oops, have to interrupt again.  A Stellium (three or more planets in the same place) isn’t easy.  What would we tell someone with a Stellium in their chart, to help them Learn to Appreciate their Uniqueness?

Well, the Culture we grow up in has certain Differentiations that are an integral part of the Culture.  For instance, Boys are different from Girls, and never the twain shall meet.  What fireworks have been going on the USofA when that Differentiation is Challenged!  The youngsters understand that they’re both just People, but the Differentiation is so ingrained in the brains of the oldsters that they fight it all the way to the “Supreme” Court, and Obsess (!) on it.

So when we have two or more planets in the same place, we don’t know the Difference.  Folks who start a Life when Mars and Venus are Conjoined (in or close to the same Degree) have no idea that there’s any Difference at all!  So they have a difficult time Relating to, and Being Related to by, anyone who’s Obsessed with the Difference, because their brains are wired very differently.

And that’s just two planets.  With a five-planet Stellium, the difficulty of Communicating with Others is multiplied many times.  To start with, only 2.5% of us will have a 5-planet Stellium (using 45 planets), so we can expect to be able to Communicate at all with one person in 40.  However, what’s the probability that the next person with a 5-planet Stellium is going to have a Stellium that includes the same five planets?

Without breaking any blood vessels in my brain, I’d guess that would be something like 1/9 to the fourth or fifth power, or about one person in 60,000, although that assumes that the 45 planets are distributed randomly around the Zodiac, which is far from true.  You could start a worldwide club, advertising on the internet to connect with everyone who started Life with a Ixion-Quaoar-Ceres-Klotho-Vertex Stellium.  You might end up with just the people who were born on the same day and year as you.

And now you’re going to run into another problem.  Very few of these people will have ever learned to Love themselves, even if their Stellium isn’t in Scorpio.  When you meet a Soulmate, if your Self-Love isn’t Total, you’re going to Project your Self-Rejection all over one another, and end up hating one another, very soon.  I once introduced two people with very similar, very unusual birth charts, Scorpios even, and they became housemates.  That lasted about a month before they ran screaming from one another.

So until you Learn to Love your own Uniqueness fairly thoroughly, you may need to settle for non-intimate Relationships for a while.  Look for people who are already Ascended or Enlightened, who may be able to Accept you Exactly As You Are, even if they’re not like you at all – they may even find your Uniqueness fascinating.  There should be a reasonable number of those folks around.  You won’t be their Onliest…

Since you are a shining light
There’s many that you’ll see
But I have to deal with envy
When you choose the precious few
Who’ve left their pride on the other side of
Coming back to you

as Leonard Cohen put it, but at least you’ll be Accepted, and you’ll get a taste of what it will be like to Love your Uniqueness, till you Lesrn to Obsess on Loving your Uniqueness.

Well, we know that this person, on the Soul Level, Intends in this Lifetime to Get to the Bottom of Self-Abuse (and I don’t mean self-pleasuring) once and for all (Klotho-Sappho).  So they probably “hired” parents and other significant adults that programmed a good deal of persistent Self-Rejection (Ixion-Quaoar-Ceres) into them as Children.  That’s how we do it – whatever we Intend to Let Go Of permanently in a Lifetime, we on the Soul level make sure we get a big dose of it, so we’ll Recognize it and be Motivated to Change the Pattern.

So, with Mars and Atropos on the Full-Moon Sun, it would be a fabulous time to start writing a series of Angry letters, that they don’t intend to send, to their Childhood Programmers, so they can begin Getting to the Bottom of their Abandoned Genius’s Real Feelings.  We can Learn about Blame and Responsibility later.

Oh, did I forget to mention that Jupiter (Amplification) and Sappho (Self-Love) are also in Scorpio?  So our friend is even more Determined to break out of her prison of Self-Admonishment, as she has Chosen (on the Soul level) to Obsess about her Amplified Desire for Self-Love!

Did someone say Obsession?  Damn Right!  Obsessed with this prison-break, and for damn good reasons!!!  It’s a central theme of their Soul-level Plan for the Lifetime!  So come Hell or High Water, they need to start Obsessing (and PIAVAing) on Learning how to Celebrate Obsession like it is the Incredible Gift to themselves that it truly is!  Set a timer, and Celebrate Obsession at least once an hour, every day.

Okay, with the preliminaries out of the way we can get down the the meat of the issue.  Their Ixion-Quaoar-Ceres-Klotho-Vertex Stellium is Opposed by Chiron (Despair and Miracle).  That’s like a dagger held by her Programmers, slicing little chunks out of her skin constantly.  To move from Despair to Miracle we need to Empathize with our Despair.  “You Poor Sweetheart, you really Feel Down on yourself, don’t you.”  Now, we know that Changing the Subject (which gets the mind and old Karmic Patterns out of the way so they don’t re-up the Despair) won’t be easy – that’s the whole issue, isn’t it.

So we can try building a strong practice of Tapping (YouTube link above).  “Even though I’m Obsessing about this Despair, I deeply and completely Love and Accept myself.”  Measuring the Intensity of Feeling (0 to 10) before and after each of many Iterations will be important – as long as you’re getting any reduction, keep Tapping, till you get close to zero.  If you aren’t getting reduction, try alternating with Poor-Sweethearts, or Dancing, or doing anything Different.  This is Multi-Lifetime stuff, so you need to be Obsessive about working on it, but then, that’s your specialty, eh?

Phew, that’s a lot, isn’t it.  Are we done?  Not a chance.  Mercury, of all people, makes a T-Square across the Opposition between the Ixion-Quaoar-Ceres-Klotho-Vertex Stellium and Chiron.  Now we have to interrupt again, since T-Squares are quite difficult, so we have to give our standard speech about how to Love a T-Square…

A T-Square is like a graduate seminar.  We Expect to be able to “get it right” once in a while, so we can feel halfway Competent.  But with a T-Square, there is no “getting it right.”  In a graduate seminar there are no right Answers, only clever and relevant Questions.  No matter how long anyone Lives a T-Square, they’ll never Feel Satisfied about it, until they Learn to Appreciate that on a Soul level they’ve adopted this Issue as a Lifetime Learning Opportunity, and each time it arises – which is likely to be daily – they’ll be working on a new, more subtle and broader, version of the same Lesson.

It’s pass/fail, and you only pass when you Recognize that this is your Lifetime Study Project, and Honor yourself for the Fact that you actually know a Hell of a lot more about it than most anyone else on the Planet, because you wrestle with it daily.  You begin to Change a “bad” Habit by Noticing that you’re Doing it again, and Congratulating yourself for Noticing rather than Cursing yourself for Doing it again – substituting positive reinforcement for negative reinforcement, because reinforcement is cumulative.

So when you Notice that you’re working on that Issue again, Congratulate yourself for looking at it from yet another Perspective, and Honor yourself for all of the Perspectives you’ve already Discovered, rather than Indulging your Frustration at not getting it Right yet again, you’ll shift your Perspective toward what is otherwise one of your greatest Frustrations.

That’s what T-Squares are all about.  Now, what about this Mercury T-Square?  Well a Mercury T-Square (until you make the shift we just talked about) means that your mind is always picking at you.  Anxiety ‘R’ Us, and it’s not just Worry, it’s Negative Self-Talk.  So we have to Learn to Notice that we’re Doing Negative Self-Talk again, Congratulate ourself for Noticing, and Honor ourself for how Skilled we’ve actually become at dealing with Negative Self-Talk.

If a friend complained to you about their Negative Self-Talk, I’ll bet you could give them a thousand suggestions for dealing with it.  You’re a World Expert on Negative Self-Talk.  You could write best-sellers about it.  You need to Honor yourself for that, even if it doesn’t Feel True at first.  I guarantee you, it is True.

Now, we’re dealing with Negative Self-Talk about Chiron Opposite a Ixion-Quaoar-Ceres-Klotho-Vertex Stellium, which isn’t chicken-feed.  With Quaoar-Ceres-Klotho-Vertex as part of your Stellium, a deep part of you (with strong Scorpio, Diving Deep is one of your greatest Skills) knows Intuitively (Vertex) that your Survival (Quaoar) is Assured (Ceres) once you Begin (Klotho) to Love Yourself Exactly As You Are.  You just don’t know where to start because no one has ever Mirrored your True Self to you.

Then we add Ixion. We have to interrupt again for our Learn-to-Love-Ixion speech…

Ixion was the Bad Boy of the Greek Pantheon, who was basically a sociopath who thought all rules applied to everyone else (like that fellow in the house that’s pained white and being remodeled).  Well, talk to any Accomplished Genius, and they’ll tell you they didn’t get there by following other people’s rules.  To live Genius you need to break as many rules as you can get away with.

But you’ll always be condemned for it.  So, not actually being a sociopath, you’ll need to develop a thick skin about Criticism from Others.  And with your parents and other Programmers probably very Critical people, you’re going to have a lot of Olde Reactions to Criticism, and probably “Leave your Body” (space out) when someone starts Criticizing you.  Well, you probably want to enlist some friends and Act Out a thousand Criticism scenarios, till you can Stay Present with Yourself when being Criticized, and Learn when Defending yourself is a waste of time that’ll just get more Criticism, and How to Defend yourself when it’s worth it (ie, with a Relationship you Want to Keep).

In Cultures that Value Conformity, Ixion is Rejected out of hand.  That’s why we refer to that part of ourself as our Forbidden or Abandoned or Pathological Genius, and refer to Recovery of that part of ourself as our Genius Project.  It’s a Big Project for everyone, but especially important for you.  Eventually, once you become the World’s foremost Psychoanalyst, or the World’s most Unique Artist who Communicates with parts of people that have never been Communicated to before ever, you’ll understand how Unique you are, and Honor it.

But meanwhile, there’s homework to be done, because you’re probably in the Habit of giving your Unique Genius more Negative Self-Talk than anyone.  So you’ll have to Learn to Notice that you’re Doing Negative Self-Talk about your Unmirrored Uniqueness again, Congratulate yourself for Noticing, and Honor yourself for how Skilled you’ve actually become at dealing with Negative Self-Talk about your Uniqueness. 

Lots of work ahead, but at least now you have a curriculum.

What’s that?  Oh, we aren’t quite done?  Oh yeah, remember that Jupiter-Sappho in Scorpio?  Well, it happens to be in a “Grand Cross,” Opposite a Stellium of Chaos (Unlimited Potential), Sedna (Fear), Chariklo (Self-Confidence), and Moira (Choosing Consciousness), with Sedna Stationary (Strong), Square to a Stellium of Sun (your Essence), Atropos (Endings), and Mnemosyne (Memory), which is in turn Opposite to a Stellium of Orcus (Breaking Vows), Hylonome (Escaping from Archetypes), and Lachesis (Duration), with Lachesis Exactly Stationary (very Strong).  All this is actually enormously Positive, but there’s a lot in it that needs to be Learned to Love.

We won’t take that up now, we’ll save it for after you’ve digested some of the earlier homework, which is more than ample.  The earlier homework is Lit Up Bigtime by the Full Moon, so it’s a more current assignment anyway.  This later Grand Cross is Lit Up only by the Transiting Conjunction of Varuna (the Life Force) and Veritas (Truth), which is actually quite a lot, but nothing compared to how much your Mercury T-Square and Ixion Stellium are Lit Up.

Oh, also, when you’re ready, remind me to talk about the “Vacancy” to your Mercury T-Square.

And, once you’ve started on the earlier homework in earnest, we can talk about that friend you mentioned, and see how they might, by virtue of their own birth chart, inadvertently trigger either your Mercury-Chiron-Ixion-et al T-Square or your Lachesis-et al Grand Cross, or both.  We’ll also need to cover Blame and Responsibility then.

Oh, and since Pluto (Transformation) is similar to Scorpio, and likely to be involved in Obsession, we should eventually look at that too.  It’s after all Conjunct Saturn (The Most Important Thing), so that’s a strong indication that Obsession is actually your Greatest Skill, you just need to Learn to Love it.  Also, Pluto-Saturn makes a T-Square across your Nodes (Why You Took This Lifetime), so that’s another indicator that This is the Lifetime you Chose, on the Soul level, to become the World’s greatest Expert on Obsession, and once and for all Let Go of your Ego Attachment to it, and Let Go of your Rejection of Obsession and of yourself. 

Plus, Nessus (Abuse and Privilege) is on your North Node (Your Mission in the Lifetime) and Moon-Venus (Your Instincts and Values) is on your South Node (The Karmic Impediments to your Mission that you Chose on the Soul level to help you Accomplish your Mission in the Lifetime, which Impediments happen to hide the Skills you need to Accomplish your Mission), further complicating this T-Square.

That’s a lot, but Remember that, as the Findhorn Transformation Game says, the Hardest Assignments are only given to the Best People.

Full Moon – The Rest

We don’t want to give short shrift to the 15 April Venus Station (3am PDT at 27 Pisces), so let’s finish up the Full Moon expeditiously.  Let me know if any questions come up.  Two other charts are fundamental to grokking the Full Moon, the chart of the Mercury (9 April 4pm PDT, 5 Taurus) and Hylonome (10 April 6am PDT, 9 Capricorn) Stations, and the chart of the Varuna Station (10 April 3pm PDT, 29 Cancer).

Here’s the chart of the Mercury and Hylonome Stations…

The big Grand Cross (red Square and Xes) and the two Grand Trines (equal-sided blue Triangles, which are actually Kites when we add the little triangles on one side of each of them) are the standout features.  I don’t think we introduced the Grand Trine earlier.

A “Trine” is the Angle between two planets that are one third of the way round the Zodiac, and the “Grand Trine”  is made up of three planets equally spaced around the Loop.  Put a fourth planet halfway between two of those, and you have a “Kite,” so named because that’s what it looks like.  A Grand Trine makes things so Easy that we refer to it as “Dumb-Luck Grace.”

The “best” charts are charts like this one, that contain major Motivation Configurations (Grand Cross) and major Grace Configurations (Grand Trines), because they Balance Work and Ease, so we neither exhaust ourself nor get lazy.

This is the chart of a highly Motivated Multi-Tasker who can learn how to Channel tons of Grace.  Grace is its own Master; until we Learn that others have their own Unique Skills, a Grand Cross often signifies Arrogance, as folks seem incompetent to us when they can’t do what’s Effortless for us.  The two Stations are both part of the Grace, not part of the Motivation, and the Complement one another very very well, being both in Earth Signs.

So we should be able to identify the Archeypes that we need to Let Go of relatively easily – don’t try to get hyper-analytical about it, just Ask your Belly what makes it Tense Up.

There are two Fingers of God, one pointing at Hylonome (Letting Go of Archetypes) and the other at Eurydike (Trust).  These are the two Energies that the Universe is Asking us to Pay Special Attention to.

The Varuna-Station chart is more assymetrical…

We can see the Grand Trine (big blue triangle) and two “T-Squares” (big red triangles pointing to the left and lower left).  A T-Square is half of a Grand Cross, and represents Mastery through Challenge.  We usually don’t appreciate the Mastery because we usually get stuck on the Frustration of the ongoing Challenge; we eliminate the Frustration by Paying Attention to how much Mastery we’ve gained.

All that Pressure (where the red and blue triangles converge, at the focus of the T-Square and a corner of the Grand Trine) focuses on asteroid Sappho, which symbolizes Self-Love.  We’ll be making our course Easier by exercising what Self-Love we’ve already Mastered, while we’re Learning more of it.

The other T-Square points toward a Stellium made up of Ixion (Our Forbidden Genius), Saturn (The Most Important Thing), Pholus (Taking Full Responsibility), Quaoar (Survival Instincts), and the Galactic Center (Instructions from Headquarters).  This is pretty serious; basically the Universe is telling us that we all need to get busy Taking Full Responsibility for Recovering our Unique Genius, or our Survival will be in Question.

But neither of these, Big as they are, is the dominant Configuration – that’s the Yin Gate, the two green Xs in the middle of the chart, enclosed in the blue rectangle, and intertwined with the red Ж (Cyrillic letter Zhe) in the center.  The bottom line of a Yin Gate is to Learn the Paradox represented by the central long red line.

Here that’s the Nodal Axis – the path of our Spiritual Progress during the Lifetime.  The Paradox involved here is that We Need the Skills Hidden beneath our Held (maximally resisted) Emotions (the South Node or earbuds at the bottom) in order to accomplish our Lifetime Mission (the North Node or stethoscope at the top).  That which we hate is our most Powerful tool, once we Learn to Embrace it.