Uranus Transits

Uranus Transits

The Constant Invitation of Uranus Transits

“We are constantly invited to be who we are….”

R.W. Emerson


'When I'm sixty-three'…or twenty-one, forty-two, sixty-three or eighty-four years old, something rather magical happens---or can happen. Uranus transits happen to everyone at approximately these ages and we play them out 'well' when we savor the epiphanies and opportunities rather than trying to maintain the status quo. It may feel like we're falling or coming apart, but Uranus aspects are truly opportunities to 'soar' rather than dive. These are the years of radical new beginnings that give us the chance to become more of who we really are. Henry David Thoreau once noted: "We are constantly invited to be who we are." Uranus transits are the constant invitation.

Whether you're falling down, waking up or dancing to your own drumbeat, there are times when you may wonder—isn't there a different way to do this? 'Diving gracefully' is always a good option if you are falling, but there are times when if you want to soar you're going to have to break the rules. These periods of Uranian liberation call for you to challenge the status quo---but how do you know when you should 'color outside the lines' and when you should respect 'the lines' that others have made?

Although it's a bit simplistic, we could say that we respect the limits during Saturn transits and break the limits during Uranus transits. Look to see what area of your life—what house-- Uranus falls in on your natal chart. This is where you have divine dispensation to break the rules! One might even say that you are not only given permission to do things differently in this area of your life, but that you must do things differently and authentically here—you are called-- in this area of your life-- to be radically honest and a little more daring than ordinary.

For example, if you have Uranus in the Fourth house there is a subtle divine imperative that you rebel against your family of origin in some way. You don't have to do it dis-respectively and you don't have to stop loving and communicating with them. However, you are called to break the rules of the family myth here—as the family myth may sound like this: 'Isn't it funny how all the men on this side of the family are bi-polar?' Or 'Isn't it funny how all the women of this family marry abusive men?’ With Uranus in the fourth house you probably have heard some variation of a 'not-so-funny’ theme like this handed down the family line and you're going to need to make a conscious effort to break this family legacy.

For you to survive spiritually there are times when you need to learn to stand up to authorities and separate yourself from what has been culturally ingrained in you. You may think you are already aware of these influences and that you did the work of rebelling against these cultural imperatives when you were 21 ---or before. Yet it may have taken you to the Uranus opposition at the age of 42 to realize how deeply you were programmed to be a certain way. Maybe it took that long for you to divorce the wrong person you married, and to reclaim your Soul. Uranian times call for you to challenge yourself and rebel against your own assumptions about what’s right for you.

Radical acts of reclaiming ourselves and daring to break the rules can happen at any age and are specific to you alone. However, it's almost as if the Universe gives you a chance for enlightenment or liberation at those ages when Uranus metaphorically 'turns the lights on and off' in your life. What was going on for you at the Uranus waxing square at 21? The opposition at 42? What could happen at the waning square at 63 and the return at 84?

At 21 years our culture says we are now an adult, but in fact, most of us have been in school or in less-than-empowering positions for most of this time. Our parents and the culture have exerted pressure, overtly and covertly, to mold us into something. Now we have the first chance to say---"but this is now my time and I want to find out who I really am." So we summon our courage—often with the help of our peers and abundant sources of alcohol—to dare to move out on our own into whatever may await us. But it's usually not till we're close to thirty, and have the first responsibilities of true adulthood—at the first Saturn Return, that we commit to a deeper level of our truth and make major and usually sobering ‘Saturnian’ life-style changes. But that's only part of the story.

In the process of living our adult lives, parts of us never get a chance to be expressed. In order to raise the family and/or pursue the career, we live our lives with parts of our essential nature sacrificed. We tell ourselves that some day we will take up singing/painting/writing again, but at the moment we have to handle 2 kids or 2 jobs and we have to make enough money to pay for the cell phones as well. But when we approach 40, the awareness comes to us that we're at mid-life and we're closer to our death than our birth---and by 42-ish the lights have been blinking on and off just enough to remind us that if we're going to do 'it' we better start now or we may never do it at all. So we have the first classic mid-life epiphany of waking up to the preciousness of time. Many people will marry, divorce, move across country, or take up ‘guitar playing’ at this time.

We may be shocked by how liberated we finally feel when we act on what appears to be impulse at the Uranus opposition. But that impulse has had years of pressure building up behind it. And yet if we should miss this chance, we get another chance for living our deepest truth at the waning square of Uranus at age 63. We may have thought that the time for new beginnings has ended. Not so!

It's worth taking a moment to think of what makes 'an elder' an interesting and vital person. What gives charisma to an older man or woman? Could it be that they don't care so much about what other people think about them any more? This Uranian attitude is one part simple acceptance of themselves and others, and one part 'detached wildness.' This quality of wildness looks more like a wide smile and a quick laugh than a purple hat with a red feather.

At each of these Uranus cycles—at 21 and 42 and 63 and 84 we get a new chance to answer the voice within us that calls for more unique individuality. Even at 84 when Uranus returns to its birth position, there’s a part of us that opens up to ways of seeing things differently. Personal epiphanies abound at age 84 and people often notice a renewed sense of well-being and a feeling like a ‘breath of fresh air has come into their lives’. Some people, such as Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell ‘completed’ their lives at this time.

The closeness of death itself stimulates us to recover our core individuality. You are being called at these Uranian ages to allow a radical honesty to arise within you---and to take up the 'yoga of doubt and questioning' and turn questioning into 'questing'. Being true to yourself requires courage, but life helps us as we approach these 'Uranian times.' You don't have to know all the answers and figure it all out yourself. These are the times when you can expect help from the Universe by the occurrence of unexpected events--- unusual feelings, new opportunities, and paradoxical situations. Not all will be pleasant, but the effect will be to move you to the next stage of your life journey.

Uranian transits are times to answer inner restlessness with a 'Yes'! Try something liberating and freeing---make a little noise; cause a little havoc, give up trying to be too self-sacrificing. (If a child is always 'too good' don't you become suspicious? What is being repressed? Why are they saying they're bored?) At these ages you have a ‘divine dispensation’ to break the rules-- so ask yourself: how have I allowed life to dampen my energy? What's inhibited me? What still resonates and stimulates me when I think of it?

Einstein once said: 'God doesn't play dice with the universe.' I don't think God plays dice with us either, and no event is without the potential for using it for creative liberation. The writer George Eliot wrote: 'It is never too late to be what you might have been.' Experiment with that idea, and let your mantra be: ‘Let's do something different.’ And if you should fall or fail then 'point your hands in the direction you are going, and dive gracefully. At the very least, you may inspire someone watching you.' But chances are, you'll soar.

Elizabeth Spring © April 2008
www.elizabethspring.com
Elizabethspring@aol.com 401-294-5863

Elizabeth Spring MA is an astrologer and psychotherapist working in Wickford and Newport, RI. She has a degree in Counseling Psychology with an emphasis in the work of Carl Jung, and teaches astrology workshops at the Boston Jung Institute. She has written many articles for newspapers and magazines which can be read on-line on her website at www.elizabethspring.com Elizabeth’s bio, teaching, and speaking schedule can be found on her website as well. This article originally appeared in the ezine: Star-IQ in April, 2007.

Archetypal Astrology

Archetypal Astrology

Archetypal astrology is another name for Jungian astrology, a “creature” that Carl Jung never invented, but a name that astrologers like myself use to describe the way we work with the symbolic language of astrology. Archetypal astrology is a movement away from quick predictive astrological answers and a continual calling to track the movement of the Soul through time. It’s a blend of the best of both worlds, and an attempt to move away from the worst of each.

By honoring the planetary symbols we honor the gods and goddesses within us, and we can call these parts of our inner psyche by whatever name we choose—planet or mythological symbol—but we’re still following the same gods home. Astrology’s foundation is in mythology and psychological observation, and Jungian psychology is grounded in symbolic mythological thinking. The conflict or difference between the two appears to be mostly a matter of language, style and respectability.

Astrology has had a bad reputation throughout history because of its connection with fortune telling, and it is because of this taboo quality that most Jungians have chosen to focus on astrology’s sister: alchemy. Although alchemy is rooted in astrological thinking, it doesn’t carry the taboo and therefore can be presented in more respectable circles. Jung was warned by his colleagues to not venture forth into the world of astrology and mysticism or he would risk his credibility. So he astutely chose to examine the symbolism of the unconscious through the avenues of dreams, myths, and alchemy.

Archetypal astrologers, evolutionary astrologers, and Jungian astrologers are all delving deeply into the inner world of archetypal symbolic images…to the Soul. This is the language we all use no matter what we call ourselves. There are many paths to the Soul and to self-knowledge, and the simple advantage of astrology is the speed at which we can learn about ourselves---if we are open to hearing. That’s the catch. Astrology can open insightful doors quickly but most of us are not able to hear. Jungians would say that we have this “resistance” to hearing as an egoic self-defense, and theories abound about the rightness of this resistance. That’s probably why most astrologers have a certain blindness about their own charts….we can see our client’s complexes and t-squares but not our own. Well, granted we do see them, but how much do we really allow ourselves to know about our own shadow qualities? It’s not an easy quick process.

The combination of astrological insight and the slower process of Jungian counseling together allows for one to open up to insights at the right time and in a context of the safe “container” of the therapeutic relationship. Astrology may be too quick, and Jungians may be too slow (they can hold their client’s hearts forever!) but the combination of the two—what is called archetypal astrology—might just be the very best form of counseling and soul work. ~elizabeth spring

Interested in archetypal counseling? Inquire: elizabethspring@aol.com or browse: www.elizabethspring.com

Jung and Astrology

"Astrology represents the summation of all the psychological knowledge of antiquity." C. G. Jung

We often believe our true Self is housed in our personal myth; in the story of our lives. I think that's a mistake. I believe we're larger than that, and Carl Jung believed that too. He delved into the personal and collective unconscious and found that we are richer and deeper than we know. He understood that we are not as small as our life stories might imply, and yet I'd also add that we are "never quite as real or large as advertised."

Jung believed that we get to know ourselves, and our Souls, through rediscovery and reconnection with the archetypal world, and that we interact with this world through symbols. According to Jung, our Soul speaks to us in this language of images through dreams and through archetypal symbols. Astrological planets are archetypal symbols, and our birth charts are a unique “map of our Soul” that can illuminate the relationship between our conscious and unconscious mind.

By understanding the symbols in our unconscious through dreams--or through understanding our planetary archetypes in our birthchart--- we can take steps to break free of our more compulsive, repetitive, or “default” patterns of behavior. Astrologers believe that individual unconscious patterns are left as an “imprint” that can be read on the birth chart—as Jung said: “The individual disposition is already a factor in childhood; it is innate, and not acquired in the course of a life.”

When we think of Carl Jung today, we often think of him as representing the archetype of the “wise elder man.” He points us in certain directions---as if to say: “Look to the mandala, look to alchemy, look to your dreams, look to the images in your unconscious and in the collective unconscious, look to astrology.”

Like a good father or wise man, he points us in directions that are helpful, but he doesn't dogmatize or preach. He was an imperfect man too, who was a product of his time and culture, yet he was wise enough to say: “Where love rules, there is no will to power, and where power predominates, love is lacking. The one is the shadow of the other.” (From: On the Psychology of the Unconscious)

Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud were psychiatrists and theorists who were ambitious men. Freud counseled Jung not to delve into the astrological world view as it could destroy his reputation as a reputable and scientific scholar. (Ira Progoff in America also warned Jung in a letter that Americans would not take him seriously if he delved into the taboo astrological world. And although Jung was not one to be told what to do, we could speculate that he might have chosen to focus more on astrology’s younger sister, “alchemy” in order not to be tarnished by astrology’s bad reputation at the time as a fortune telling craft.) Jung and Freud eventually parted ways because of their many differences in opinions.

So did Jung believe in astrology and use it? The answer is yes, as we see here in Jung’s own words from a letter that he wrote to the Hindu astrologer, B.V. Raman on the 6th of September of 1947. Jung wrote:

"Since you want to know my opinion about astrology I can tell you that I've been interested in this particular activity of the human mind since more than 30 years. As I am a psychologist, I am chiefly interested in the particular light the horoscope sheds on certain complications in the character. In cases of difficult psychological diagnosis I usually get a horoscope in order to have a further point of view from an entirely different angle. I must say that I very often found that the astrological data elucidated certain points which I otherwise would have been unable to understand. From such experiences I formed the opinion that astrology is of particular interest to the psychologist, since it contains a sort of psychological experience which we call 'projected' - this means that we find the psychological facts as it were in the constellations."

The kind of astrology I practice is archetypal and evolutionary. I believe Jungian psychology is a rich foundation upon which to draw inspiration and knowledge, and Jung himself was a powerful yet invisible mentor in my life. I also draw from the “evolutionary” school of astrology with my background in Theosophy and as an apprentice to Steven Forrest’s School of Evolutionary Astrology. This evolutionary overlay on the Jungian base allows me to look at the possibilities of reincarnation and karma, and to construct a parable or myth about the past life lessons and experiences as shown on the birth chart now.

Because the re-incarnational parable is not fact-based but instead is a largely unconscious emotional memory, I look to the nature and arrangement of the planetary archetypes to detect what the Soul in this life is trying to learn and experience. Usually, we repeat the same karmic patterns until we become conscious of these invisible energy patterns and choose to not to repeat them.

I believe that our life direction and soul purpose is to “heal oneself” and that we do this by “knowing” and “remembering” our Self on a very deep level. This is the work of a lifetime, and I do not believe we are fated to endlessly repeat old patterns, nor are we bound by any predestined hand of God. But we do come into this life with the mixture of past life karma, free will, and the spiritual curiosity to experience both joy and love, struggle and pain. It’s a mixed blessing for sure. ~ Elizabeth Spring © 2008 Curious for more info? Check my website: www.elizabethspring.com

Existential Astrology (Part Four)

So where does Existentialism fit in with astrology? Existentialism focuses on the process of becoming an authentic human being in a world that appears to be devoid of a benevolent God. It offers us a place to stand that doesn’t throw us into a place of philosophic despair, but instead tenderly holds our humanity and proselytizes courage instead of dogma. And in some ways, I see it as a precursor to astrological thinking.

If we see existentialism as an unsettling inquiry into the nature of life, and if we see it like many others have, as a sense of disillusionment and philosophic “dread,” then we might also see it as a beneficial stage in acquiring sound astrological thinking. In the past it has been seen as a dark night of the soul time, or a “morning sickness” or as Jean Paul Sartre said, nausea” in response to the inauthentic life of mainstream culture. I would venture to add that it feels like the place in our philosophic journey where we question our life and don’t try to insert easy solutions. We wait, we try to live authentically, and we work at becoming a person of integrity.

Existentialism can also be seen as a stage in the process of spiritual evolution if we see it as a reaction to the fantasy of ungrounded beliefs, hyped-up nationalism or pre-packaged religions. It can even perhaps be seen as a stage, like pregnancy, that is preparing for something greater. I see it as a philosophic stance between the naïve acceptance of unquestioned religion and the acceptance of the mystery of spiritual gnosis, or knowledge based on experience. This “existential” way of seeing and being seems to come before any openness to a “greater mystery” which could be described as the perennial philosophy that lies at the heart of every religion.

The willingness to be open to an experience of the “numinous” ---which could be understood as a sense of the holy or the presence of Spirit--- requires an attitude of both openness and critical discernment that existentialism often contains. (Although not all existentialists would agree---they’re an unruly bunch!) For those of us who do astrology, we struggle to discern what is real and useful and true, while also holding to the place of acceptance of the cycles, life rhythms, and the numinous idea of synchronicity. And we offer our clients an open “weltanschauung” or world view that allows them to place our ideas within their philosophy. So we can see astrology as not being a religion but an intuitive art of the Spirit where we can track the movements of Spirit in time.

I see astrology as being balanced between an attitude which is both Saturnian in its efforts at discernment and Neptunian. Existentialism is Saturnian in its no-nonsense approach to the harsh realities of life, and although the art of astrology is more Neptunian, it doesn’t make a case for a God of a certain creed or fantasy. Astrological thinking instead implies that in this Saturnian world we are poised and resonating in a balance between the heavens above and the earth below, and that here there are cycles, seasons, and predictable movements that allows space for Neptunian mystery.

Some people would say this is a ‘stretch’ but I like to think of the idea of existential astrology as the initial philosophic place we stand in, and from there one goes forward into one’s own Neptunian or astrological cosmology. I’ve chosen to embrace “evolutionary astrology” which posits the belief in reincarnation and the evolution and growth of the Soul through time---but this is not for everyone.

On my spiritual journey, existentialism played a crucial part in my transition from Catholicism to a belief in the Soul’s evolutionary journey. After leaving Catholicism I lived and waited in an existential space until life and astrology began to show me more. And what opened up for me was an awareness that the numinous spirit could never be bounded or understood completely by any one system or religion or even astrology. However, how delightful it was to find that there are prints left in the sand from the path of Spirit! That there are clues in the heavens and the seasons and the archetypes as to how to navigate a life. The markers are all around us, and astrology is one such pathfinder. The existentialists have a favorite mantra: “existence precedes essence” implying that we are always in the process of becoming who we truly are. I would add that living an astrologically aware life helps us to discern the essence of who we really are, thereby making the process of “becoming” a conscious one--and that is indeed a profound gift.
© Elizabeth Spring www.elizabethspring.com