©2007 Lisa Dale Miller
astrowisdom.com
All rights reserved
PERMISSION MUST BE GRANTED BY THE AUTHOR
FOR USE ON WEB SITES AND FOR OUTSIDE PUBLISHING

 

"Only a life lived for others, is a life worthwhile." Albert Einstein

On September 2, 2007, Saturn will enter Virgo and remain there until July 21, 2010 (with five months in Libra from October 28, 2009-April 7, 2010.)

So let's do a quick recap of what we learned or didn't learn during the last two years of Saturn in Leo. Frankly, I think as a species we failed miserably at integrating the following lessons posed by Saturn in Leo: releasing our attachment to narcissistic self-cherishing, revisioning power-over as power-with, committing to responsible leadership in government, business and education, problem-solving with creativity rather relying upon war and hatred, kicking the oil habit, caring more for the needs of our children and elderly populace than the single-minded drive to acquire wealth, beauty, fame, and power. Unfortunately, we can't redo the "give up on self-cherishing" course for another 28 years, so we will move into Virgo, ill-equipt to cross the Leo/Virgo threshold from personal to transpersonal concerns and lessons.

Virgo marks a critical evolutionary shift from the most developed relationship with the creative self (Leo) to an initial opening up of individual consciousness into its communal/transpersonal responsibilities. Shifting the focus away from the personal (Leo) toward the transpersonal (Virgo) is a critical part of our spiritual evolution as a species.

So a word to the wise for all you "LOA" devotees: having everything you want is not the goal of spiritual evolution. That is the egoistic spiritual-speak of Leo; not Virgo. Yes, it is attractive. Yes, it might even feel good to hear it and imagine it to be true. But the real secret is when we loosen our attachment to "unending wanting" we step onto the transpersonal path of real liberation and total freedom for ourselves and all other beings. Rumi embodied Virgo practicality at its best, with these lines from one of his poems,

"Don't grieve for what doesn't come.
Some things that don't happen
Keep disasters from happening."

"Look deep, deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better." Albert Einstein

Virgo rules science, medicine, health and healing, engineering, teaching, working for the common good, and aiding the poor and sick through research, development, and humanitarian aid programs. Virgo resonates to three main themes: greater understanding, service, and healing. All that Virgo is revolves around a desire to clearly comprehend in order to better educate, serve, heal, and problem-solve—not for self-gain—rather for the upliftment of society.

Clear comprehension requires questioning. Virgo does not take information at face value; searching ever deeper to find truth. Virgo requires discrimination, testing, and analysis to draw informed conclusions. Virgo is the ultimate engineer (work with what you've got) and a visionary scientist/researcher (seek new solutions that are as yet unfound.)

Saturn rules fear. Virgo rules clarity, discrimination, and research. At its best, these could be three years of throwing off the chains of ignorance and laziness which have kept the American public in a docile state of fear. At its worst, Virgo's penchant for self-doubt, self-criticality, and hypochondria could create conditions for fear to so fully penetrate our daily existence that the populace becomes completely inert. And we cannot afford inertia! Our survival depends upon clear comprehension of our essential interconnectedness with all things and a revolution against fear, hate, greed and separation.

Virgo rules the human body and its relationship with Earth, the planetary body we rely upon for our existence. Saturn in Virgo will be a tough taskmaster when it comes to environmental issues. Saving our planet and its inhabitants from extinction will rank high on the agenda during the Saturn in Virgo years. The periods of opposition with Uranus (trauma) in Pisces (water) will hopefully stimulate great technological advances to stem the tide of global warming. If the old guard in the science world and the hierarchy in the oil world will heed the call to change, Saturn in Virgo can help strengthen the global move toward alternative energies throughout 2009 when Jupiter joins Chiron and Neptune in Aquarius.

Virgo realizes that each of us has a duty to heal ourselves by reaching out to heal others. Another real secret is when you heal the pain around you; you end up healing your own pain. The time has come for us to turn our gaze away from self and toward those less fortunate and in need of help: they are our salvation and the true path to healing our own internal suffering.

Health and healing is the domain of Virgo. Saturn wants us to get serious about seeking medical attention for symptoms or illnesses. Saturn in Virgo doesn't mess around. Saturn is the planet of mortality. It is not fond of excuses, denial, or other ways human beings find to ignore the realities that stare them in the face. This is a three year period when many people will be called to account for their excesses and continual failure to recognize how their destructive behaviors contribute to the physical and mental suffering of themselves and others.

There are many resources available to help one get healthy; even in a country like ours where making war continually takes precedence over providing health care for all citizens. Institute dietary changes, daily exercise programs, get more sleep, and learn relaxation techniques. Choose to walk instead of driving to work or to the store. Join AA, OA, NA and other support groups and get help for your own addiction while healing the addictions of others.

I do believe that Saturn in Virgo will usher in the transformation of America's dysfunctional health care system. Jupiter/Chiron/Neptune in Aquarius and many of the transits described below will have a large role in how this plays out; for better or for worse.

So let's look at the transits of Saturn in Virgo. I only want to highlight one inner planet transit: Saturn will conjunct Mars in Virgo from July 2-25, 2008 and be exact from July 10-11 during which time there will also be a beautiful air grand trine. During this time our personal and global actions should follow a cautious and considered path.

Now on to the transits Saturn in Virgo will make with the other outer planets.
From October 15-26, 2007 Saturn will make a conjunction to the nodal axis (North Node in Pisces/South Node in Virgo.) One of Virgo's qualities is the desire to compartmentalize as a way to gain understanding. Sometimes this can lead to getting mired in the idea that the diversity in manifestation represents the ultimate nature of things; or that reliance upon descriptions of the physical world can lead to a total understanding of the nature of existence. Hence, we get Virgo's practical analyticism, idealism, and perfectionism. The South Node in Virgo represents a Virgoan bias toward empirical means of gaining knowledge, and a resistance to the Piscean intuitive, numinous, consciousness-expanding tools for knowing.

When Saturn (restriction) conjuncts the South Node and Venus in Virgo, it will form a Yod with Mars in Cancer (acting with compassion) and Chiron in Aquarius (finding alternatives to heal old wounds.) Along with the opposition to the North Node in Pisces, October 15-20, 2007 should unleash a wave of global frustration and bring a powerful desire for alternatives. Since Virgo rules science, technology and medicine, it is possible that release of new energy technologies or medical advancements will be hindered in some way during this time. However, since it is a Yod, and Yods represent frustration on the way to removing blocks to advancement, the hindrance will not be lasting. On a personal level, the conjunction of Saturn with the Nodal Axis and Venus should be a very powerful time to buckle down and put the finishing touches on any creative endeavor that involves the arts, technology, medicine, engineering, or research.

Saturn in Virgo is in an exact trine with Jupiter in Capricorn from January 18-23, 2008: expect to see optimism about the economy and probably the usual January bounce in the markets during this time, but don't expect it to last much beyond this. Because…

January 26, 2008 marks the first entrance of Pluto into Capricorn (listen to the podcast!) As this occurs, Pluto trines Saturn in Virgo in various amounts through June 14, until it retrogrades back into Sagittarius for about five months.

This will be a time when the world will get its first taste of Pluto wreaking havoc on the global economy, which is ruled by Capricorn. April 14-26, 2008 will be a very volatile time with the Pluto/Saturn trine, Jupiter in Capricorn, Chiron/Neptune/North Node conjunct in Aquarius, and Sun/Venus/Mercury in Aries/Taurus. Oil (Neptune) and (Aquarius) energy alternatives, terrorism, war (Aries) and security (Taurus) will figure prominently in the global psyche. One can only hope that the restricting nature of Capricorn and its ruling planet Saturn combined with the "no nonsense" practicality of Virgo, and Mars in compassionate Cancer can keep the escalation of danger at a minimum. Saturn goes direct on May 3, 2008 and moves off the conjunction with Pluto by the middle of July.

Saturn will once again make an exact trine to Jupiter from September 5-12, 2008, a time when Mars/Venus/Mercury are posited in the peacemaker sign of Libra. With Jupiter going direct on September 8, this could bring an inspiring period of negotiation in world conflicts of all kinds.

At this point, the American Presidential campaign will be in high gear. The Saturn/Jupiter trine will remain anywhere from 0°-2° orbs (+ or -) through the Fall of 2008 until December 9. In case you are wondering about Election Day November 6, 2008, conservative and practical Saturn in Virgo will be opposed by peaceful, transcendent Uranus in Pisces, and borne down upon greatly by an inconjunction with North Node/Moon/Chiron/Neptune in utopian/rebellious Aquarius, and the transformative power of Mercury/Mars/Sun in Scorpio. Hopefully change for the better will be the outcome.

One of the deepest and most intense Saturn transits will be the opposition of Saturn in Virgo with Uranus in Pisces, from September 12, 2008-April 7, 2009, July 29-2009-October 28, 2009, and April 8-May 27, 2010. This opposition will be exact during the following times: November 3-4, 2008, January 30-Feb 11, 2009, September 10-17, 2009, and April 23-30, 2010. In order to understand this transit, we must look deeply at the Virgo/Pisces duality.

Virgo rules the body; Pisces rules the transcendent mind and deep psyche. Virgo is classical physics; Pisces is quantum physics. Virgo is healing the body with medicine, surgery, healthy lifestyle habits, and diet; Pisces is healing the individual and collective soul or psyche through energy medicine or the development of consciousness itself. Virgo is engineering and technological advancement through research and development; Pisces is the flashing, intuitive brilliance of revelation and abstract mathematics. Bring together the Virgo/Pisces duality—the mind/body connection—and you get the total spectrum of inner and outer knowledge. Mistakes are made when how we gain knowledge arises from a need to unnecessarily favor one to the exclusion of the other.

The power of the Saturn (the system) in Virgo/Uranus (the revolutionary) in Pisces opposition lies in the integration of conscious awareness in all areas of human life: government, business, politics, health and welfare, entertainment, communal and familial relationships. If we all experienced ourselves through the lens of integrated Virgo/Piscean conscious awareness, we would experience existent transcendent reality in every cell, in every life form. Therefore fear would cease to exist. Violence would cease to exist.

For Virgo, holiness is achieved through transcendent embodiment and Saturn asks each of us to take responsibility for the condition of our physical form; the temple of enlightenment. For Pisces, holiness is achieved through the awareness of pure consciousness and Uranus asks each of us to awaken our Buddha nature for the enlightenment of all other sentient beings.

So the Saturn in Virgo/Uranus in Pisces opposition is a cosmic call for each of us to abandon negative behaviors, like harming other living beings through war and violence, fueling fear and separation, addiction to substances, wasting time watching violent and meaningless TV shows, and engaging in the narcissistic pursuit of material possessions at the expense of nurturing all life.

Saturn in Virgo can see reason and Uranus in Pisces wants to love and heal all beings. If we allow ourselves to be serious about caretaking all other beings, as Saturn in Virgo's highest aspiration call us to do, then the next three years could bring about the dawn of an age of enlightenment. THERE IS NO SEPARATION: ONLY LOVE. YOU HAVE A CHOICE: LIVE IN FEAR OR LIVE IN LOVE.

However, if we fail, if we continue to live with our minds and eyes closed, as we have done these last two years of Saturn in Leo, the celestial messengers Pluto in Capricorn, Saturn in Virgo, Neptune and Chiron in Aquarius, and Uranus in Pisces, will heighten the unfortunate human propensity toward ignorance, as we continue to act as agents of trauma and destruction in the name of hate, fear, greed, and separation.

Retrograde Saturn in Virgo will oppose Jupiter in Pisces from April 29-June 5, 2010 and be exact from May 18-23, 2010. Jupiter's movement into Pisces on January 19, 2010 will mark a one year period where we will have as good a chance as any to make peace happen around the globe. We must take this very seriously, as the chance of staving off all out global warfare lessens greatly once Uranus joins Jupiter in Aries on March 12, 2011.

So do your part: Use your mind and question everything, meditate daily, bring compassion and love to all your interactions; forgo hate and anger in favor of love and forgiveness; shun shallow materialism and open your eyes and heart to the beauty of the natural world; spend less and give more to those who are in need; use your creative talent to uplift rather than oppress; be a light to those in the dark; use your heart wisely—love yourself and everyone else completely.

©2007 Lisa Dale Miller
astrowisdom.com
All rights reserved
PERMISSION MUST BE GRANTED BY THE AUTHOR FOR USE ON WEB SITES AND FOR OUTSIDE PUBLISHING