Wild and Wooly World
Welcome, one to the new www, the Wild and Wooly World!
Gun violence (at least in the US) is up, way up, so that there isn’t a day that goes by when there isn’t a report of someone being gunned down keeping the world safe for people wearing tin-foil hats to have Smith & Wesson wet dreams.
As if that weren’t enough, heads are exploding on the right as visions of a world ruled according to 16th Century strictures, scriptures, and governance of behavior evaporate before their very eyes. And on the other side of the aisle, heads are exploding on the left as hard-fought gains for social justice and economic fairness get hacked at by the very people in whom they placed their trust to protect them. And not to be left out, (write out?) anyone who dares stands in the middle is the target of slings and arrows from both directions.
And it’s not all limited to political and cultural battles.
Individually, you may have noticed people increasingly restless, frustrated, and angry. Fuses are shorter. Explanations are not tolerated, alibis hollow, and apologies not accepted. It’s “shoot first and ask questions later.” Our collective patience is at an end, our minds are made up, we’re tired of waiting, and know what we want, but just don’t know how to get there.
If you see someone smiling and happy, they’re either not paying attention, or check the back of the head to see how that mask is attached.
The most likely expression of all this pent up energy is with passive-aggressive behavior: covert accusations, sarcasm, and honey-laced words surrounding decorated tablets of arsenic.
With Mercury, Chiron, and Neptune all still in Pisces, few are willing to come out and actually say what they mean. Everything is veiled, hidden, and meant to misdirect — lest their vulnerabilities you suspect. If you feel misunderstood, outcast, or alone, you’re not at least, alone in feeling so.
And with Uranus, the Sun, Venus, and Mars still marching through Aries, we feel more willing to take chances, step out on that limb, and push for what we want. Aries is forceful, direct, pioneering; an initiator, instigator, and inventor. They are a resourceful, energetic, spirited, and forceful. When fully charged, they are a dynamo incarnate, relentless until the task is done — or they lose interest. And ruled by Mars, god of war, they shirk from battle on pain of death.
With all that feisty energy, sometimes Aries needs a chill pill, nor are they are known for sitting still. Brusque, abrupt, and in your face, sometimes they don’t realize how strongly their actions affect others. But they’re not mean, in fact there isn’t a mean bone in their body. But they are upfront, frank, and honest. In their eyes, they tell it like it is — and to blazes if the rest of us see things differently.
Which a point of caution, There is one thing that Aries abhors more than any other — psychological games. Mind games give most Aries people the eebeejeebees, so be careful. The best approach during this time (until April 20th, when the Sun enters Taurus) is to play it honest. No ulterior motives, no hidden agendas. If you must hold your cards close to your chest, do so with a minimum of fuss and drama. You don’t want to be butt in the butt by the horns of an irate Ram!
For more about Mars in Aries, you might want to check out the March 2011 edition, “From Pillar to Post” when Mars last entered the sign.
So, if there are so many forward directed energies , why aren’t we making better progress?
Usually it’s Saturn that acts the villain, and he is sitting in Scorpio twirling his handle-bar mustache chortling at our struggles below. But in this position, especially retrograde, the biggest danger he poses is that we make the same mistakes as have made in the past, fall for the same pitfalls, stumble over the same rocks.
If you find yourself faced with a problem that did not turn out favorably for you, and you manage it in the same way, you are heading toward Saturn’s trap. Especially in the emotionally charged sign of Scorpio, he will tie you up like a spider and roast you over the flames of your own remorse.
Leos, Scorpios, Tauruses, and Aquarians are the most in danger here; Cancers and Pisces least likely to feel the flickering of the fires.
Why? Because the Leos, etc are being prodded to be different because of the lessons they should have learned from the past, and take actions that stem from a different attitude about the situation as a result of personal growth, insight, and development over the past several years. Cancers and Pisces are less apt to feel this effect because rather than grow, Saturn is nudging them to express themselves more clearly. And usually, expressing one’s self is an easier task than growing up.
That doesn’t necessarily mean that a new approach will lead to rainbows, candy canes, and lollipops, but it will form a new foundation from which you operate that, even if it doesn’t provide immediate rewards, will be substantially beneficial in the long run.
But no, Saturn is not the villain here, Pluto is.
Pluto is sitting and playing in in the “Toys in the Ward of a Hospital” portion of Capricorn, and it doesn’t want any pesky Aries planets around grabbing and trying to play with his toys. He needs them for healing. A healing that will end dysfunction, on political, social, and personal levels, and help us all prepare for the next phase, coming in early 2015 in which we need to be able to work together to jointly solve our problems and move ahead.
It isn’t going to be easy, and there are likely to be bruises on all sides of the battle field, but in the end, it’s highly likely that we’ll all be better off for it.
So right now, Pluto is acting like the old school game of Space Invaders, taking aim at the Aries planets and shooting down those aims and objectives that keep us apart and make us more dysfunctional.
If you’ll notice in the image (which is only mostly tongue-in-cheek), you’ll notice Uranus at the back of the pack. The planets are arranged in order of increasing speed up front, and Uranus, plodding on in the rear is by far the slowest of the lot.
But there’s an added symbolism to the image in that Pluto and Uranus’ conflict is at the heart of many of the meta issues we face. As mentioned before in this blog, the Pluto-Uranus square is the result of the conjunction in the mid-60’s that kicked off the civil rights movement, youth rebellion, sexual revolution, and same-sex acceptance and integration.
As the first square after the birth of this social progress, the first square represents a moment of crisis for each. Asking the question: “what is at the core of what you are trying to accomplish?” puts each under the scrutiny of our culture as a whole, and a reformulation of its purpose, meaning, and scope. Some, like the civil rights movement, which may have been coasting along on substantial success without reformulating its purpose and may begin to feel like future progress may be stalled. Similarly, young people may no longer feel the need to collectively rebel against their parents. And some, like the gay rights movement, may feel more energized as they have been forced to reformulate their goals and objectives due to their own success and changing circumstances.
There’s much more coming about this astrological configuration as we get closer to the next incidence of it on May 20th.
Meanwhile, closer to home, is the New Moon on April 10th at 2:36am PDT. It is in the part of Aries in which there is substantial energy for manifesting your desires. Just be careful what you wish for, and are willing to carry the responsibilities of getting what you want.
The Moon’s potency grow from a few days after New, until it reaches its peak during the Full Moon period starting on the 24th.
In other astrological news, the Sun and Mars are locked in a tight embrace that will last until the end of this month, so on the whole, our vitality should improve and we should have plenty of energy for the items on our to-do lists. Whether we want to get to them, though may be a different story.
And speaking of wants, Venus is now an Evening Star, setting ever so briefly after the Sun. However, she will rise in the night-time sky throughout spring and summer, reaching her peak in late October. With Venus setting after the Sun, there is a predisposition for us all to take our relationships more seriously, and be more deliberate in our interactions with others. We also tend to want our relationships to better fit our expectations, and can therefore be a little more critical than we were with Venus ahead of the Sun.
Some of you may notice the blog has a new look, I hope y0u enjoy it. This is my interim solution until I migrate the blog to another host. Be sure to check out the Blogroll, there are some interesting sites in there! If you have a site you would like me to add, let me know, I’d be glad to oblige, if it’s germane to the site.
That’s it for this post, be sure to check out the Mercury Mall, and test drive some of the new features of the blog!
