Tag: Saturn

44. (Eng.) Outlook for 2023

~ Maj Ridder ~ Plaats een reactie

If you are open to the idea that what happens on Earth is related to the positions of the sun, moon and planets, read on. As you know, I try to understand and “translate” insights from astrologers.

They expect this year 2023 to hold very different potentials to previous years. However, to make those potential changes a reality, our decisiveness should contribute to the developments we desire.

In recent years, well-intentioned people have been quite challenged: it has been difficult to keep a cool head and stay positive. This year, it becomes easier to do so, as the planets create better energetic conditions, so to speak.

The potentials lie in a shift from the dominant patterns of “power over”, control, greed and polarization to a situation of more sincere, balanced patterns of cooperation, openness and mutual respect. These changes may well occur faster than we think is possible.

However, I would advise you not to expect that all the heaviness that still burdens the world will be gone by the end of this year.

Still, at an individual level, you will have the chance to let go of outdated patterns of thought and behavior. You can expect enlightening insights as you attune to the renewing energies offered to us Earthlings from the Cosmos.

Everything within us may be touched: our body and our psyche, as well as our spiritual consciousness. Negative beliefs and feelings need no longer dominate us. Our ego becomes a powerful tool that enables us to operate meaningfully on Earth.

Picture Wim

Behind the scenes, opportunities for improvements are beginning to announce themselves. One major opportunity is that the aspect of tension between “form planet Saturn” and “freedom planet Uranus,” will come to an end in early March. I described this square aspect in blog 40. (Eng.) Saturn and Uranus in 2022.
For three years, this constellation has had an imprint on many problem areas in the world: first it was Covid, then the war in Ukraine, followed by numerous abrasive issues between people and institutions.
Opportunity: from ‘thinking in dualities’ to ‘seeking commonalities’.

Then, towards the end of March, we might start seeing the first glimmers of the Aquarian Age, when the “transformation planet Pluto” enters the sign of Aquarius, temporarily for a few months. In this period seeds can be ‘planted’, as it were, for desired transitions in all kinds of areas, seedlings that may come to maturity in the coming years.
Opportunity: from feelings of ‘separation’ to awareness of ‘connection’.

A clear aspect of the Aquarian Age will be the search for balance between the (currently predominant) masculine and the (suppressed) feminine in all its facets. The planetary positions will foster this, starting in the month of May.

Softer, feminine forces will manifest, which will make more and more people truly concerned about the precarious condition of continents and oceans. The protection of biodiversity, soil and nature will be better addressed. All of this is essential for our survival.

To make this possible, it is important that people like you and me reflect on that necessary shift from masculine to feminine values. So, we participate in the ‘indigenization’ of those values into the collective field.
Opportunity: from ‘thinking of dominance’ to ‘being active from compassion’.

I encourage you to make space in your mind, to be able to receive the new energies and to allow your mind to be charged up with them. It is a matter of tuning in. This works better when you first “clear” your own energy, by spending time in nature, taking time to rest, meditate and come into your core.

Finally, enjoy the good sides of life as the days grow longer and we receive more and more visible light — as well as ‘invisible’ light. What is that invisible light? The higher frequencies of energy, vibrations that – if we are open to them – will help us take a step forward.

If you want to learn more, you could view the Astrological Overview of 2023 as given by Heather Ensworth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wNMDl1plUE, or Themes for 2023 as given by Pam Gregory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SEP8w_AX1s.
Or let yourself be inspired by Heather’s conversation with Pam Gregory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnSsqrKXZM8.

40. (Eng.) Saturn and Uranus in 2022

~ Maj Ridder ~ Plaats een reactie

There is war in Ukraine. This gives a perspective on everything we think, do or fail to do. Ordinary life goes on, and yet it is different. It began on February 24, 2022. In my immediate environment, several health issues were added, accompanied by considerable uncertainties.

That is why I want to cover the fleeting of time (Saturn), while anything can change at once (Uranus). Present time forces us to take each day as it comes. The planets Saturn and Uranus represent yet other characteristics, that are poorly compatible or even mutually exclusive.

Saturn represents: time, regulations, formation, past, tradition.
Uranus represents: change, freedom, fusion, future, upheaval.

For a long time now, the positions of Saturn and Uranus have been triggering the tensions and polarities, which Earth’s inhabitants currently have to deal with. Planets in general, and Saturn and Uranus in particular, help determine the zeitgeist.

Saturn and Uranus act on each other’s energetic radiation. What does the Saturn-Uranus cycle look like according to astrology?

Both planets make their orbits around the sun: Saturn in about 28 years and Uranus in about 84 years. There is a reason for this substantial difference: Uranus moves at a far greater distance from the sun than Saturn. Therefore, Uranus moves apparently three times slower than Saturn.

Seen from the earth, Saturn at some point catches up with Uranus. There, the planets form a conjunction: they are at the same degree of the zodiac in the sky.

One cycle covers the time between two conjunctions, which is about 44 years. The last conjunctions of Saturn and Uranus were in 1942 and in 1988. The next one will be in 2032.

In the meantime, however, Saturn and Uranus make aspects with each other, i.e., they interact because of certain connections. Such aspects can either be harmonious or create tension. Tension is caused when Saturn moves at about 90° from Uranus in the firmament (called a square aspect). This has been the case since spring 2020.

During the year 2021, Saturn and Uranus made an exact 90° aspect three times and in 2022 they are still in interaction. Still another square aspect will take place almost exactly in October. The reason the same aspect occurs several times in a row is that planets sometimes move “retrograde”: seen from the earth in an apparently retrograde direction. When they start going direct again, according to their course along the zodiac, the aspect shows up again.

Painting Wim Ridder

This led to a prolonged impact on Earth of the tension aspect between Saturn and Uranus. The Corona conditions were not over yet , when we had to deal with the consequences of a seemingly sudden military conflict. What else will we experience? The tension aspect will not really become clear until March 2023.

The Dutch astrologer Hans Planje discusses the Saturn-Uranus aspect of 90° in detail over time. See his blog: https://www.hansplanje.nl/index.php/blog/155-het-saturnus-uranus-vierlant-van-2021. He describes what the impact of the colliding Saturn and Uranus forces has been in the past decades, on the basis of crises and conflicts worldwide. This way, you get a picture of the meaning of the aspect for what is happening on a global scale.

At the same time, such an aspect has significance on an individual level. Its suppressed tension has a subtle influence on each of us. It takes effort to feel relaxed.

What kind of feelings might you be dealing with? Everything is different to how it has been (Uranus). You are trying to regain control (Saturn). By making a new plan (Uranus). To do this, you have to take into account rules (Saturn), which don’t fit your new idea (Uranus). You become angry or irritated, or disappointed at least.

You might blame something or someone for the uneasiness you feel. However, if you examine yourself deeply, you may become aware that such an action makes no sense. Because everyone else also has to deal with this general unease.

Finally: during such a cycle of two planets there are also harmonic aspects (of 60° and 120°). In such cases, the combined energies of Saturn and Uranus may lead to quite good results.

Apart from Saturn and Uranus, there are still other planets engaged in an endless play of energies with the Earth. Next time I may cover the recent conjunction of Jupiter-Neptune.

33. (Eng.) Being aware of Oneness

~ Maj Ridder ~ Plaats een reactie

As I wrote in my latest blogs, we are living in dark times, where the trick is to ‘keep your head cool and your heart warm’. Opening yourself to unity consciousness can help. When you succeed, you can stand more firmly on your feet. You won’t be blown away by any threatening breeze.

For me, it is also more difficult now to think clearly, to feel lucid and to find words for my insights. That is, in this second half of 2020, because of the heaviness in the atmosphere. No one can escape it. An astrological interpretation I could offer for this:

Currently, Saturn, Pluto and Mars are still giving space to unimaginably distressing energies that are influencing mankind and the developments on Earth. Considering the positions of these planets, it is advisable to be (even) more conscious in life than in the past (See blog 31 and 32).

Let’s try to imagine what will come next, when 2021 begins. Saturn and Jupiter will (finally) have left the sign of Capricorn and entered the sign of Aquarius. This will make it easier to respect each other and be open to new, positive developments.

Try this by turning inwards – and not giving in to negative trends in mass consciousness. In this way you can keep (or get) in touch with the deeper layers of your personal existence. I concluded the previous blog with a reference to the planet Neptune which can help with this.

Neptune has been travelling through its own sign of Pisces since 2012 and this will continue until 2026. This is a long period of time, during which it will be easier to make contact with that large field of consciousness for which many names exist. Names that vary from those for a personified God to very abstract names. But what is most important here is not the name of this field, but the experience of it. Your eyes cannot see the oneness, but you can ‘perceive’ or ‘experience’ it.

Picture Wim

There are two ways to look at ‘unity consciousness’.
In the first place, I think of mystics and others who once had a spiritual peak experience – so profound that it fundamentally changed their lives.

Secondly, it could be a space of consciousness for you, an experience of oneness to reach out to. Even if you are not that far yet, it is more than worthwhile to consider it as your foreland, a level to align with.

Another way to familiarize yourself with unity consciousness is to use your imagination to create a platform that you experience as ‘your oneness consciousness’. Do it in such a way that you experience joy and compassion for many others … from that platform you can look with more distance at what is happening on Earth, and thus also at what is happening in your environment.

This is especially effective when – in meditation or in prayer – you become aware of that field of unity. As soon as you enter there and sense what you are perceiving, you’ve taken the first step needed to experience that specific energy. It can take you further along your path. Your mind becomes calmer and feelings of love, gratitude and joy present themselves – and let’s not forget the added benefit of strengthening your immune system!

You may happen to make contact with the oneness consciousness – even if only a hint of it – and to experience which panoramas open up on what the future might bring. At the same time, you could tap into sources that provide you with the insights and energy that prepare you for that new world, so that you may undertake actions that resonate with your personal energy.

There is something that fills me with hope, namely that this is already happening: after this year’s events, so many people have been ‘waking up’. Large numbers of men and women are making different choices to reshape their lives — or they create something, an initiative, that is completely novel. While this may seem to occur independently, there are always personal processes underpinning these projects.

In everyday practice, unity consciousness turns out to be a point of reference. Over and over again, you realize that all people are essentially connected at the level of the quantum field, or of the ‘psychic internet’. The fact that Neptune is travelling through its own sign for a longer period of time certainly provides support in this matter.

31. (Eng.) Astrological Perspective I

~ Maj Ridder ~ Plaats een reactie

Imagine – history takes place in great cycles of over 2100 years. We are currently in a time of transition from the last era to the next one. Isn’t that something special to witness and experience? So should it be any surprise to us that the world is upset and that people are feeling uncertain…?

Lately, I’ve been wondering if a connection can be made between the events of 2020 from an astrological perspective. Can the turbulence we are experiencing in these Corona times also be observed in the current position of the planets? And what about the sequence of those eras? In my interpretation here, I have been inspired by American astrologer and writer Heather Ensworth.

In a video she made towards the end of May, she told a.o. that we are at the beginning of the Aquarian Age and that we are now going through the contractions of that new era. This transition is characterized by all the turmoil, uncertainty, fear, resistance, rebellion, violence, denial and discord we are now experiencing — collectively, but often also within ourselves. At the same time, there are positive developments and new opportunities!

Image Wim Ridder

According to astrologers, the era type in question lasts 2160 years. The age that is now coming to an end, named after the sign of Pisces, started around the beginning of our era. Christianity, among other things, has been of crucial importance during this period. While the Age of Pisces will only come to a close sometime in the next century, the dawn of the Aquarian Age can already be felt.

The determination of such a period has to do with Earth’s orbit around the sun –  in other words, with the position of the sun on the firmament on the 21st March in a certain sign of the zodiac. The spot shifts very slowly, in a ‘backward’ direction, through a certain zodiac sign (now Pisces), until it reaches the next sign (Aquarius).
Astrologers are not sure when exactly that will be the case. The Age of Pisces followed the Age of Aries (about 2100 B.C. – the year zero), which, in turn, came after the Age of Taurus (about 4200 B.C. – 2100 B.C.), and so on.

The schematic drawing below represents part of the zodiac. In addition to the shift of the vernal equinox in a ‘backward direction’, it is visible that the sun, the moon and the planets are moving in a ‘forward direction’. We see the ‘slow’ planets, Jupiter and Saturn, and the ‘very slow’ planet Pluto at the end of Capricorn.
It is mainly the position of slow planets that influence what happens on Earth over longer periods of time. In a way, they determine the Zeitgeist.

Here we are looking at Jupiter, Saturn and Pluto. All three of them have been positioned at the end of Capricorn for months now and that will remain so for the time being. Only on December 19st of this year, Jupiter and Saturn will enter Aquarius on the same day (which is something very special). Pluto will follow in November 2024.

Pluto is the planet of transformation and of great revolutions. Because of its current position in Capricorn, we are going through an intense period of planetary transformation now, after which we will probably reach calmer waters in 2024 and 2025.
While the Pisces Age is mainly characterized by paternalism, competition, duality and materialism, in the Aquarius Age we may expect other qualities, such as community spirit, a sense of justice, idealism and cooperation.

The Pluto-Saturn combination, particularly in a sign like Capricorn, allows plenty of room for distress, illness, sorrow and economic malaise, such as we experienced it through the Covid-19 pandemic – which is not over yet! Under the surface, there is so much more brewing in the world …
However, Jupiter brings a breath of fresh air into this Pluto–Saturn constellation, reminding us that there is also room for joy and enthusiasm, and that we should keep in mind our human destiny: spiritual growth and expansion.

Before December 19st arrives – when Saturn and Jupiter enter Aquarius – we will see a lot of turmoil and agitation in the world. ‘Keep your head cool and your heart warm’ and stay centered, or descend even deeper into yourself, in order to reap the inner benefits of this special time.

The next blog will discuss the workings of planet Pluto in more detail.

The video of Heather Ensworth can be found at:
https://www.risingmoonhealingcenter.com/healing-and-rebirth-guided-by-pluto-jupiter-and-saturn/
(What I discovered: you can bring up her words on the screen simultaneously by clicking on a square: the left of the three icons at the bottom right).