Jupiter-Uranus: Televising the Revolution

2024
APR
14
April 14 2024
Posted by Brian Allemana in General Astrology, History | 7 Comments
Art generated by AI

Art generated by AI

You will not have to worry about a dove in your bedroom
The tiger in your tank or the giant in your toilet bowl
The revolution will not go better with Coke
The revolution will not fight germs that may cause bad breath
The revolution will put you in the driver's seat...
The revolution will not be televised

Gil Scott-Heron recorded those now famous lyrics during the Jupiter-Uranus sextile of 1971. The central idea behind the song's poetry is that the cultural revolution shaping the country at that time wasn't something that was broadcast over any normal channels of carefully procured media, but was instead happening in real life, under our feet, around our homes, and on our streets. The revolution can't be sold to us, made pretty, and solve meaningless problems.

During a similar Jupiter-Uranus sextile in early 1903, McClure's Magazine published its famous January issue that launched the muckraker revolution in journalism. This was the beginning of in-depth, scathing articles detailing the corruption and neglect in American society and in the secret halls of the behemoth corporate trusts. Muckraking was crucial to kicking off the Progressive Era, a deeply transformative period that ushered in some of the greatest reforms of American civil life, from food and drug regulation to national parks and legalizing women's right to vote.

Most of those reforms are better correlated with the Uranus-Pluto opposition of the time, as is the Uranus-Pluto conjunction with the reforms of the 1960s, just before Scott-Heron's famous poem. But Jupiter and Uranus together evoke more specifically the widespread dissemination of a social realization, a cultural shift made apparent, if not real, to everyone. Jupiter-Uranus alignments can bring about cultural epiphanies and creative solutions that catch the collective imagination like wildfire, because their time has finally come.

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Chiron and the Healing Power of Horses

2024
MAR
09
March 9 2024
Posted by Brian Allemana in General Astrology | 6 Comments
Heartsong

Our boy Heartsong ❤️🎶

My wife and I have become very involved with horses recently. While she has had a good deal of experience with them, as a lifelong city dweller horses are completely new to me. I have revered them for their symbolic power, but until recently I had not had the kind of direct experience with horses that is medicinal and even mythical. Their massive size, terrifying power, friendly countenance, and helpful purposefulness make them seem impossible to exist. Interacting with a horse feels like interacting with a dream creature, some wild thing from another dimension, five times my size, that looks me in the eyes with equal puzzlement about me. And yet, despite seeming so otherworldly, the horse has been a partner to human civilization for millennia.

Domesticated horses have been essential to everything from transportation and farming to policing and the military. Now that technology has largely supplanted their traditional roles, we are discovering that horses have a new way to partner with us — as healers. Research has shown that equine-assisted programs help with healing war trauma, depression, substance abuse, and can help improve motor skills. Our relationship with horses is transforming from domination to alliance in our mutual journey towards healing.

The centaur — a creature that is half human, half horse — is a central image in Greek mythology, and also in astrology. The symbol for the constellation Sagittarius is a centaur, and the half-comet, half-asteroid centaurs that orbit our solar system, such as Chiron, Chariklo, Pholus, and Nessus, carry meaning in astrology of their Greek mythological counterparts. While most centaurs from Greek myth were bawdy and gregarious, possessed as they were by their instinctive, horsey nature, these more exceptional centaurs lived in balance with their human side, with care, artistry, and spiritual grace.

Chiron is of particular interest, as he represents a kind of pinnacle of centauric evolution. Chiron was a master of art, music, archery, and medicine. He mentored many of the great heroes, including Achilles, Heracles, and the god of medicine, Asclepius. Despite Chiron's wisdom as a healer, when he was wounded by an arrow dipped in magical poison that pierced his leg, he could not heal himself and suffered greatly. Eventually, with the help of Heracles — whose arrow had accidentally wounded Chiron — he exchanged his immortality to save Prometheus, and was elevated to the stars, given unto the constellation Centaurus.

Astronomically, Chiron is a celestial body with an eccentric orbit that cuts across the orbits of Saturn and Uranus. Astrologically, in resonance with his myth, Chiron represents our own journey as a "wounded healer." A question we can apply to Chiron in our own charts is, what core wounds do we carry that, by virtue of carrying them, have taught us wisdom that can help heal others? How does that wisdom bridge the hard tests of life (Saturn) to an awakening of inner liberation (Uranus)?

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2024: The Year Ahead

2024
JAN
01
January 1 2024
Posted by Brian Allemana in Forecasts, General Astrology | 4 Comments
2024 Pointing to a veiled sunrise.

AI-generated by DALL-E.

The year 2024 begins a crucial turning point. It is the year that initiates a set of major astrological alignments that will define the next couple of decades. I've coined this period The Radical Era, which, if we look at the astrology more holistically, stretches from 2020 until 2050.

The first alignments to define this era began in early 2020, including Saturn conjunct Pluto and Saturn square Uranus, as well as the centuries-long influence of Saturn and Jupiter meeting at 0º Aquarius on the December Solstice of that year. When we consider the difficulties the past three years have brought — Covid, January 6th, culture wars, international wars, democracy in peril — we can easily see correlation with those particular alignments. But when we look forward past 2024 we see a more optimistic astrological landscape, where concentrations of power are broken and liberating new ideas and technology flourish.

One major transit of this year is the ingress of Pluto into Aquarius. This could be the defining transit of these times that colors, shades, and underpins everything else. When we take a macro view of these middle years of the 2020s, we see that Pluto's entrance into Aquarius is accompanied by a trine from both Uranus and Jupiter. This grand alignment of planets is quite the herald for Pluto's new ground. It evokes for the coming years a decidedly Aquarian political landscape — that is, progressive and democratic — along with surprising technological innovation and social change.

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A New Year’s Non-Forecast

2023
DEC
28
December 28 2023
Posted by Brian Allemana in Forecasts, General Astrology | 5 Comments

Happy Artificially Intelligent New Year!

It is a tricky business, yet often expected of and reinforced by astrologers, to give an astrological forecast each year. Correctly interpreting planetary transits is a fiendishly challenging practice. The astrologer must be disciplined not only in astrology, but also in world history and human nature. Even then, the best any of us can do is speculate on how planetary alignments might manifest in the world, based on our understanding (such as it is) of the world and its history to this day. Or we can play with our imagination of the symbols, seeking out meaning and a sense of grounding in a turbulent world. To do all of this requires a real discipline of intellect and emotion. We astrologers are, if we are being true to our craft, martial artists of the mind.

Such a statement is almost eye-rolling from a Mercury-in-Aries native like myself. But I don't mean to be trivial: An astrologer must keep a constantly vigilant eye on what they say and write, being very clear to themselves when they might be invoking confirmation bias, cherry picking, psychological projection, or one of many other dangers that are inherent to the craft.

Part of astrology's value is in stimulating conversations around what could be, to transform and elevate our perspective so that we may see that there is reason to keep going, that whatever vexes us is temporary, and that a cosmic story is unfolding in this world, in our own lives, that is far grander than anything our limited senses can tell us. This is why intellectual and emotional discipline are so important to the astrologer. No transformative perspective can be given if we are weak in mental understanding or emotional honesty.

Those of you who seek out astrological understanding must also be fiercely discerning in what you choose to consume and believe. Yet at the same time, we must carry enough openness to be surprised, challenged, and changed.

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2023 November Update

2023
NOV
11
November 11 2023
Posted by Brian Allemana in General Astrology | Be the first to leave a comment

After weeks of Saturn slowly retrograding back into range of squaring Uranus — an alignment linked with social chaos and a break down of traditional norms — Saturn finally turned direct on November 4th. Then on November 7th, as the Virgo Moon (a symbol of female fertility) came into trine alignment with Jupiter, voters scored another victory for women's reproductive rights in Ohio. The outcome of that election day rekindled hope, even if briefly, that the defeat of an autocratic movement in the United States is possible. The astrological picture supports that hope, yet we are not clear of the woods. Events at home and abroad continue to vex our longings for a more peaceful world.

For example, in correspondence with the long running Eris-North Node conjunction in Aries, the war in Israel continues to rage. That war was sparked by the Oct 7 Hamas attack that occurred just days before a solar eclipse on Israel's Libra Ascendant that was at opposition to that Eris-North Node conjunction.

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Cosmic Hints for the 2024 Election

2023
JUN
04
June 4 2023
Posted by Brian Allemana in General Astrology, History | 21 Comments

Solar eclipse of July 1860, taken by Warren De La Rue using the Kew photoheliograph.

On July 18, 1860, a total solar eclipse in the sign of Cancer enchanted the Western world. It was visible throughout the United States as well as France and Spain, where the first ever photograph of a solar eclipse was taken by astrophotographer Warren De La Rue. It was the most dramatic and scientifically important solar eclipse of the century.

But even more dramatically, two days later a major meteor procession burned across the night sky of the Eastern United States, recounted by witnesses from Catskill to Asheville.

During that cosmically eventful week, Saturn was at a direct opposition to Abraham Lincoln's Sun. Fittingly, Lincoln was keeping a low profile as the Republican Party stumped for his presidential campaign. From a broader astrological lens, the combination of the solar eclipse with this Saturn transit implied a major life chapter was about to unfold for him. The added ingredient of the country being grazed by a massive meteor lends an almost biblically prophetic feeling for what was to come. Four months later, as Jupiter crossed the exact same point where Saturn was during the eclipse, Lincoln won the presidency, the most significant election in American history. Five months after that, the country was embroiled in its bloodiest war on record.

The most dramatic solar eclipse, meteoric procession, presidential election, and subsequent war in American history, all occurred within less than a year of each other. Today we are, again, entering a cosmically profound election cycle whose outcome likely will determine the long term path of the United States.

While astrology cannot predict meteoric events, we can see that on April 8th, 2024, the path of a total solar eclipse will cut across the United States, up from Mexico, through Texas, and up through Maine. This eclipse is a kind of bookend paired with the US-centric eclipse that cut across the entire country in 2017. We may recall a presidential election with major political consequences occurred just nine months before, handing the presidency to a man whose Ascendant coincides precisely with the degree of that eclipse.

Major eclipses wipe away something from the past — a mode of thinking, a style of being, a social, political, or cultural paradigm — and initiate a new phase. Think of the 1860 solar eclipse's proximity to the war that ended slavery, or the 2017 eclipse's proximity to Trump's presidential term. Given the 2017 and 2024 eclipses focused on the U.S., along with a set of rare and politically charged upcoming outer planet alignments, we are clearly in the long-running throes of a cultural and political reboot.

The best keynote I can offer for this election cycle is: trust the unexpected. Whatever we think is happening is never the entire picture, and whatever does happen may be more positive for the future of the planet than we think. Taking in new perspectives is an important part of psychological health, and something astrology excels at giving us. Let's dig in.

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Past and Future Renaissance

2023
APR
23
April 23 2023
Posted by Brian Allemana in General Astrology, History | 12 Comments
The Triumph of Galatea, fresco by Raphael

The Triumph of Galatea, fresco by Raphael

Among the many radical astrological shifts coming in the next few years, perhaps the rarest and most important is that all three outer planets — Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto — will change signs within a few months. Taken individually, each sign change refers to a prominent shift in consciousness. Taken all together, we can scarcely imagine the scope of what is occurring, and it may take decades before we can look back and cognize the broader changes taking place.

Adding more depth and intrigue is that as these planets ingress into their new territories they will be aligned at important geometrical degrees. These particular alignments are referred to as "aspects of flow," meaning that the energies these planets represent are in harmony with each other rather than in conflict.

To throw in one more impressive factor, when Neptune re-enters Aries in 2026 it will be accompanied by Saturn, the two planets meeting at 0º Aries. This is a highly symbolic point as it is the first degree of the zodiac, corresponding with the Spring Equinox, the moment that represents the fate of the world for the year.

We are looking at an astounding confluence of astrological change and alignment within a very short time. This is both frightening and exciting to contemplate, and like all periods of major consciousness shift, such as the fall of Old Egypt, the European Renaissance, and the world wars of the 1900s, the birth of a new world entails some extent of destruction. The good news is that, due to the harmonized alignments of 2024-2028, we are looking at a more graceful and less destructive process that has a real potential to result in a more unified world.

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2023-2030: The Radical Era

2023
APR
05
April 5 2023
Posted by Brian Allemana in General Astrology, History | 6 Comments

There's no getting off the change bus.

American history is replete with era names that evoke strong impressions of the times: The Era of Good Feeling, the Era of Reform, the Progressive Era, etc. Each era is referring to a shift in the national consciousness, typically brought on by unexpected innovations in art, technology, politics, and wealth. A good illustrative example is the Progressive Era, from about 1900-1920, which brought us the FDA, monopoly breakups, the 19th Amendment codifying women's right to vote, and the National Park Service. Before 1900 such innovations would have been unthinkable. By the 1920s, they were woven into the fabric of the country.

We might also include eras of Industrial Revolution, such as the Third Industrial Revolution that began after World War II, with large scale investments by the government into technologies that eventually gave us the microchip, the PC, the internet, and the smartphone. These technologies would have seemed like miracles a few decades ago but are commonplace today.

As we enter the middle of the 2020s we are entering another era that will bring changes that today we can scarcely imagine, let alone believe could come to pass. I'm calling this period the Radical Era, partly in reference to political radicalism that has historically advocated for suffrage and equal rights for all, but also to evoke the radical changes that will be brought about by technology, politics, and culture between now and 2030.

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Pluto in Aquarius

2023
JAN
29
January 29 2023
Posted by Brian Allemana in General Astrology, History | 2 Comments

King John extorted into signing the Magna Carta, the basis for eroding his and his heirs' divine rights.

In 1297 the Magna Carta and its companion, the Forest Charter, were passed into English statutory law. The passage of these charters, which for the first time granted rights to people who were not royalty, has long been considered the foundation of today's liberal democracies.

During the 1530s - 1550s the Church of England was established to separate England from the papal authority of Rome, turning England Protestant. This was the heart of the Protestant Reformation, established by Martin Luther's rebellion against Catholic tradition based on the declaration that each individual receives God's grace through faith alone.

In September of 1787 the United States constitution was signed, the first Western government to organize around democratic principles guided by the declaration that all people are free by birthright. This was followed in 1789 by France's Declaration of the Rights of Man, establishing a basis for freedom for all citizens. Its companion, the Declaration of the Rights of Woman, was published in 1791. This was the heart of the Enlightenment, when kings and popes were stripped of their traditional autocratic powers, and superstition became superseded by science.

All of these historical periods refer to eras of revolutionary change that resulted in greater freedoms for common people. In each case, power traditionally concentrated at the top was theretofore distributed more evenly throughout the populace.

And each period occurred during a transit of Pluto through Aquarius.

A terse translation of Pluto (power) in Aquarius (humanity) is "power to the people". But what power, and to which people? Clearly, none of the events mentioned above resulted in anything close to an ideal society. Gross inequities across race, class, gender, and religion continue to this day. Yet we can clearly see that there is a progression of general social mobility across the centuries. We are all inheritors of the rights established from the Magna Carta to the U.S. Constitution, both of which were great and unlikely innovations of their time and have influenced the shape of political institutions around the world.

Pluto in Aquarius is an apt symbol for these events because it symbolizes the dissemination of power throughout a populace. Every time Pluto transits through Aquarius we see an increase in the enlightenment of sociopolitical policy grounded in values of individual liberty built upon what came before.

Pluto enters Aquarius again this year, on March 23rd, 2023, the first time since 1798. It will reverse course and regress into Capricorn in June, then will enter Aquarius again in January 2024 and transit there until 2044.

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Uranus-Pluto: The Next Phase

2022
DEC
18
December 18 2022
Posted by Brian Allemana in General Astrology, History | 10 Comments
Ocean Whale by AstralSeed

Artwork by AstralSeed.

During the summer of 1851, an extremely rare conjunction of planets took place in the first 3 degrees of Taurus. On the very day that Mars joined Saturn, Uranus, and Pluto there, Harriet Beecher Stowe published the first in her popular series of articles that, a year later, became her nation-changing novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. That same year, Melville's classic tale of excessive ambition, Moby Dick, was also published.

In a single year these two literary firebrands stamped the world with the two primary themes that were to define the second half of the 19th century in America: The abolition of slavery and, less directly in Melville's case, the extreme rise of industrial capitalism.

While Mars and Saturn certainly play a role in understanding these themes and their place in this moment of history, it is the Uranus-Pluto cycle that speaks most directly. Uranus is connected with technology and social concerns. Pluto represents deeply hidden power and wealth. Whereas Uranus corresponds with sudden, explosive change, Pluto is akin to the compressed magma under a volcano, hidden from sight yet roiling with an unfathomable energy. Pluto's intense potency requires a catalyst to encourage its cathartic release and allow its hidden power to become incorporated on the surface. Uranus's sudden, electrifying strike often provides that catalyst. Like the coming eruptions of war and avarice hinted at by Uncle Tom and Moby Dick, Uranus and Pluto acting together give us a sense of an erupting volcano that forever transforms the face of the planet and even the fate of humanity itself.

As Uranus and Pluto come into significant alignment certain themes repeat themselves with impressive regularity. A prominent example in recent centuries is the emergence of industrial revolutions. Like the Uranus-Pluto trine (120º) of the 1760s/70s that kicked off the First Industrial Revolution, the Uranus-Pluto sextile (60º) of the early 1870s kicked off the Second Industrial Revolution. The following sextile almost 80 years later, the end of World War II, marks the beginning of the Third Industrial Revolution.

This is appropriate to the astrological symbolism: Uranus is specifically correlated with cultural revolutions along with new technologies and their dissemination throughout society. Pluto correlates with the deep underground power sources that fuel these technologies, be they coal, oil, or steam (or venture capital). The sextile and trine alignments typically give functional form to whatever is aligned, so that, in this case, the power inherent in the Plutonic energy is harnessed and utilized by the newly architected Uranian inventions.

Today, we are on the cusp of entering just such a period. The Uranus-Pluto trine of 2024-2030 will no doubt bring into the forefront new technologies that revolutionize travel, commerce, and energy, creating what is thought to become a Fourth Industrial Revolution.

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