angstoic.com Astrologer, Ang Stoic
Let us revisit the Jupiter/Saturn cycle as it provides a reference point for how our current ‘reality’ is unfolding, pragmatically and spiritually.
Archetypally, we generally experience Jupiter (expansion, optimism) and Saturn (frustration, delay) through our less personal, more interpersonal interactions with the world. Together, these two gas giants offer the individual some bearing as to how s/he is travelling in the broader context of life, its changing props and the ‘society’ to which s/he belongs.
Jupiter and Saturn also indicate the collective state of today’s culture – the subjective tier of morals and ethics against the objective structures that bind them. Their mutual relationship provides clues to where the opportunities and limitations lie for us in the exterior world. Their cumulative force helps us to build strength and patience and to achieve accomplishments through hard work and perseverance. Naturally, these qualities apply most purposefully in our career, education and business, politics and law.
Jupiter changes signs every year; hence, his changing relationship with Saturn, who moves two and a half times slower, also helps describe the incremental process of an emerging new reality. Since ‘reality’ is a consensus between conscious minds, a premise shared through our intersubjective relationships, Jupiter and Saturn become instrumental markers in our evolving agreements about what is true and real for us today. Their 20yr cycle, which commenced in December 2020 with The GREAT CONJUNCTION of Jupiter/Saturn at 00°29′ Aquarius is relatively new, and hence we are still only at the early stages of a brave new world.
In this article, we look at Jupiter and Saturn’s first stressful period in the cycle of growth and recession.
For simplicity, many astrologers observe only the major aspects might miss this very significant transit and its effects, generally regarding octiles (45º), or semisquares as minor and therefore insignificant. Like squares (90º) and oppositions (180º), which highlight significant disparities between the fundamental function of two planets, octiles – divisions of the planetary cycle by eight – indicate times of agitation, disharmony and friction, akin to two armies manoeuvring into battle.
Things are uncomfortable and disharmonious as the two parties size each other up. Yet, tension is critical for the developmental process of any relationship, highlighting weaknesses in how two different entities can work together and how to strengthen these.
The JUPITER/SATURN semisquare, which tightens after June 2022, is the first real tension in this dance between our two most giant planets. We shall see the effects upon our lives as the octile becomes partile on July 21, Sep 21, 2022, and Mar 21, 2023, instituting a slowing down of growth or relative recession.
If we look at the graphic below, we can see the first two instances of this octile. In the period between these, our two gas giants remain tightly interlocked (≤ 1º25′), and throughout July, August and September, we sense that our attitudes about our world start to crystallise. Any stresses felt are merely mirroring the sociopolitical and financial twists and turns that lay ahead for us all, as the sobriety of Saturn, now retrograding in the late degrees of Aquarius, seeks to restrain the runaway inflationary effects caused by Jupiter in Aries since their conjunction 18 months earlier.
Since the effects of Jupiter and Saturn aspects are primarily intersubjective, they play a significant role in the ‘reality-check’ function of the collective mindset. This ‘down-to-earth’ pressure chiefly impacts trends in the socio-economic system, hampering bloated growth in the financial industry, and limiting market growth, consumer confidence, and spending.
Psychologically they surface as emotional stresses and inhibitions, moral and ethical dilemmas, uneasiness, loss of self-confidence, apprehension and even pessimism about the state of the society we belong to and our respective place in it. Social isolation and distancing can be stressful, but necessary to fortify patience, perseverance, and soberness in our enterprise and ambition.
If this sounds like a bummer, then you probably resonate more with Saturn’s foreboding element of hesitation and fear rather than Jupiter’s promise that every frustration and delay is for a good reason.
Grounding pressures we encounter through this period push us to question where we have overstretched ourselves, invested too much time, money, enthusiasm and naive optimism. It is a time when we must pull back, define our objectives and justify our determination to carry through with our plans. We may need to relinquish some follies as we discover that only through sensible, dutiful, upstanding behaviour and being direct and honest in how we conduct ourselves and our business with others can we begin to feel confident that we will earn a place in tomorrow’s society.
Hard work is necessary, and throughout July, August and September, it might seem for many of us that no matter how much we earn, there is never enough money to acquire the things we desire. Some may become despondent, resorting to desperate measures, hacking into the resources of others or eating into their life-savings just to get by. Others will restrain themselves by tightening their purse strings and applying immense discipline to conserve the few things they have.
Outwardly, all of this results in a substantial slow-down of business and trade. Whilst we may experience a change of fortunes during this period, it is advised to guard against pessimism and self-destructive thoughts, anger and upset with others, or annoyance with society as a whole.
As individuals, we can accomplish much by keeping our butt down, our chin up, and remembering the following quote:
“You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.”
― Maya Angelou
By September, as a retrograde Uranus in Taurus enters the fray, it forms a near-perfect square to Saturn, with Jupiter in between them. By this time, wild and unpredictable disruptions begin to tear the fabric of our traditional socio-economic system to shreds. Many humans today aren’t equipped to handle the kind of shocks and upheavals to the system that lay ahead, although we have had ample examples as a warning during 2021 when Saturn squared Uranus on three occasions.
Jupiter’s involvement seeks to bring social justice and rectitude to a largely discordant system in an attempt to uphold basic standards of living. However, Jupiter in Aries seeks harmony through one-sided righteous conflict, asserting hyperinflated moral platitudes causing further discord in the proceeds. Upsets to the supply chain, cash flow and devaluation of properties can be expected as a means to relinquish failing systems and drive innovation to the next level.
In the past, wars and invasions, shocking societal upsets, stock-market crashes, and other significant crises became hinges on which our history has swung into dramatically new directions. Today, events on the same scale, or nearly so, may no longer hold that kind of power; financial interests may have become too entrenched, elites too self-seeking, institutions too feeble, and the public too ideologically polarised and passive for the world to be shocked into fundamental change.
By the September Equinox, Jupiter intersects the last instance of the Saturn/Uranus square, a significantly tense dynamic and, against the Libra New Moon, things can become exorbitantly out of balance. What follows can only be assumed to be a series of unprecedented phenomena.
Here, Jupiter in Aries overwhelms us with heady opinions, on-the-run policies and hasty legalities on how to effect changes to nearly everything we know. We will see many suggestions hurriedly rolled out into laws, imposing progressive modifications to the old norms. Traditional political structures are shattered by new and unexpected practices, and the war between conservatives vs. radicals escalates to outlandish levels.
Jupiter forms one final octile to Saturn, partile on the Aries Equinox, March 21, 2023.
Yes, the forecast is alarming as the physical, 3D world plunges into utter chaos and disarray. Righteous anger, judgment and hatred spread like wildfire, as society becomes seriously disrupted. Massive cracks in our reality ultimately alter our entire value system.
What follows requires tremendous strength, wisdom and perseverance, as many individuals are about to discover an aspect or dimension of themselves that they were formerly not aware of.
Jupiter’s potential to transform existing behavioural limitations through radical experiences becomes a crucial step in this, the first real crisis in the current Jupiter/Saturn 20-year cycle.
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Thank you Ang 😻