Well, it’s been a blast – in more ways than one. Uranus first entered Aries on 28th May 2010, exiting to enter Taurus on 15th May 2018, two days from now: his first visit there since the 1930s, where he will remain (apart from a brief dip back into Aries from 6th November 2018 to 6th March 2019) until 26 April 2026.
In recent times the Web has been awash with all kinds of speculation regarding what this shift may mean. Jessica Adams’ recent Astrology Bank Predictions is well worth a read on that one topic which concerns us all – money.
However, today I want to take a brief look back at the last 7/8 years both collectively and in our personal lives, to see what perspectives may emerge.
Kilauea Volcanic Eruption, Hawaii
The world certainly feels like a more turbulent, unstable place in the wake of revolutionary, high-tech, unpredictable Uranus’ fiery traverse of Aries, the first, Mars ruled, most intemperate and hot-headed of all the zodiacal signs. There has been so much; what follows are a few highlights. You will no doubt come up with your own list of key points I have left out!
It is also important to point out that the turbulence has been greatly deepened and amplified by Uranus’ long square to Pluto’s purging presence in Capricorn, which reached exactitude in 2012/3. If you wish to reflect on this in more detail, read HERE some of what I’ve written on that topic.
It started with a blast:
“…Following a major earthquake, a 15-metre tsunami disabled the power supply and cooling of three Fukushima Daiichi reactors, causing a nuclear accident on 11 March 2011. All three cores largely melted in the first three days….”(i)
This occurred just one day before Uranus re-entered Aries after several months’ return to watery Pisces…
And – as it ends:
“…(8/5/18) Cracks open in the ground. Lava creeps across roads, swallowing cars and homes. Fountains of molten rock shoot up to 70 meters (230 feet) high, setting treetops on fire. Last week, after a month of rumbling warning signs, Hawaii’s most active volcano began a new phase of eruptions.
Kilauea (Kil-uh-way-uh) spewed clouds of steam and ash on May 3. Lava gushed forth through several new rifts — openings — on the volcano’s east slopes. Clouds of gas laden with toxic sulfur dioxide also burst from the rifts. .. In all, some 1,700 were forced to flee homes directly in the path of the encroaching lava. As of May 7, activity had shifted to Kilauea’s southwest flank. That region continues to steam, although no new rifts have opened. Indeed, this eruption may be far from over…”(ii)
.One of the many fascinations of astrology lies in being able to observe how planetary shifts correlate with observable worldly upheavals – in the case of Uranus, the very fabric of the earth usually erupts, as can be seen from those two massive events bracketing Uranus’ entry to and exit from Aries. No doubt his entry to Taurus, sign of the very body of the earth herself, will produce more earthly shocks…
Revolution…
Uranus through Aries has also seen the fires of revolution burn through the Middle East, taking down unsavoury dictators such as Saddam, Gadaffi and Mubarak. Popular uprisings, and inept Western intervention combined with the rise of so-called Islamic State ie Isis, have all led to the dreadful seemingly endless civil war in Syria. A huge influx of refugees fleeing for their lives to Western countries, has created all kinds of social and political problems including the rise of the spectre of Fascism again in Europe.
Referenda:
It has also witnessed, in the UK, two referenda: one, in Scotland in 2014, where the people on a massive 84% turnout opted by a decisive 55% No vote not to break away from the UK. And two, the narrow 52% margin by which the UK in 2016 voted to leave the European Union in 2019, leading to Brexit – a process being conducted with shambolic incompetence by the most inept government many of us have seen in our lifetimes.
Trump and Kim Jong-un:
The USA has seen the biggest unforeseen upset imaginable in its political system – the election in November 2016 of Donald Trump, about whom millions of words have already been written; this continues on a daily basis. I do not feel the need to add to that tally here, except to say that the general feeling of being in an especially dangerous phase of world history has been very considerably amplified by this most unlikely – and in many quarters ferociously unwelcome – presidency.
It remains to be seen whether the much trumpeted impending meeting in July 2018 between Trump and Kim Jong-un of North Korea – who became Supreme Leader of that country in 2011 as Uranus re-entered Aries – will do anything at all to reduce current tensions. Who could have predicted that those two powerful men, after hurling insults at each other for months like a pair of especially malevolent primary school children, would as I write be preparing for an apparently world-saving (Trump’s rhetoric) summit in a couple of months?
As Dr Liz Greene gnomically observed in one of her seminars some years ago: “If you think you can predict Uranus, it’s not Uranus you’re looking at…”
New energy sources:
On the positive side, we have seen the world, expedited by major advances in technology, become increasingly inter-connected in a way which has been generally empowering of ordinary people’s ability to band together and stand up against all kinds of oppression. There have also been innovative strides forward in developing and using new sources of energy which do not depend on the despoliation of our planet. Big Oil, hopefully, is slowly on the way out.
Rise and rise of mobile banking:
The rapid world-wide spread of mobile technology during this period has enabled people eg living in remote parts of Africa to have bank accounts, which has in many cases hugely improved their economic circumstances, especially in the case of women…
“…Financial inclusion can be particularly powerful for women and other marginalized groups who have traditionally been excluded from the formal economy and had less control over their own finances…”(iii)
The Higgs boson, at last…
And of course, last but by no means least in this list – which will rapidly run to a whole book if I don’t stop now – the Higgs Boson ‘God’ particle has been found!!!
“…On 4 July 2012, the ATLAS and CMS experiments at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider announced they had each observed a new particle in the mass region around 126 GeV. This particle is consistent with the Higgs boson predicted by the Standard Model…”
What about me??!!
Yes, yes, we’re getting to you and me now!
“As above, so below”...each of us, at birth, is given a tiny ‘chip’ of the prevailing energy field into which we were born with which to work for the whole of our lives– our horoscopes or birth charts map this energy out in symbolic form. It’s then up to us to hand this chip back at the end of our days, metaphorically speaking. Hopefully it will be polished up a little from its original form, have some light shining through it. In this tiny way, we become co-creators of our magnificent, mysterious cosmos, where nothing is static, everything always changes.
Those energy patterns vary in intensity, ease or challenge. For example, I was born on the same day as the partition of India after World War Two resulted in the sectarian slaughter of millions: with an exact Saturn/Pluto conjunction also conjunct Sun, Moon, Venus and Mercury – fortunately for me, all squared by an irrepressible third house Jupiter! As you may imagine, getting the best out of that lot has not exactly been a walk in the park! But I’ve survived, grown – and would not now swop my ‘chip’ for anyone else’s.
Transits and progressions are ways of mapping the ever-shifting patterns of the vast energy field in which we exist. When a particular pattern, eg Uranus transiting through Aries, is reflected in events in the collective, it also impacts on us as individuals. We are always, whether we know astrology or not, being woven into the fabric of the current moment via our natal horoscope: this never changes. But we do – although we have no choice in the timing and patterns of energies coming our way.
However, we have a great deal of choice, dependent on our level of awareness, in how we respond to those challenges, even those grim events whose appearance is outwith our personal control..The gift of astrological knowledge allows us to make sense of the shifting energy patterns of our lives; it helps us, as it were, to set our sails to the prevailing winds of our times rather than attempting to sail against them.
S0 – what part of your horoscope has been challenged by this seven-year traverse of Uranus through Aries? How have you changed as a result? Here are a few speculative examples.
Midheaven/Uranus
If the ninth, Midheaven and tenth houses, your career and direction in life will have likely altered in ways you could not have expected. Hopefully you are enjoying greater freedom and autonomy as a result. You may even have relocated – or had to relocate as a consequence of unexpected changes in your parent or life partner’s career or vocational life.
Second house/Uranus
If your second house has felt Uranus’ impact, you may well have had a long period of material instability and turbulence, perhaps forcing you to downsize or to find alternative ways of bringing in money. Perhaps you’ve gone for the freedom of self-employment, despite the temporary loss of earning power which has resulted from leaving steady but unfulfilling work.
Chiron/Uranus
Uranus may have traversed your sixth house, triggering Chiron on the way. That may well have resulted in a period of illness forcing you to change all your habit patterns as part of the return to full health. Or you may have had a call out of the blue to train as a therapist or healer.
Uranus in Aries: the essence
There are infinite possibilities: the impact of this period also depends on how far personal planets, Nodes and Angles have been affected. But at the core of Uranus through Aries has been the call to challenge limiting circumstances, to break free of constraint or restraint, and take initiatives in engaging with possibilities hitherto unseen or unknown. Choose radical change – or have it forced upon you, is the essence of the Uranus in Aries message.
And me, the writer?
2011-18 has been one of the most rewarding, exciting and changeful periods of my life. In sum, Uranus has been trining all my six Leo planets in the eleventh and twelfth houses from the eighth house, also sextiling natal Uranus in the tenth in Gemini for the last two years .
I began that time still recovering from a long period of burn-out and energy collapse, triggered by a long family crisis in 2001 which led to my having to completely give up a busy career.
In 2011 I returned to academe for a year, wondering if I had recovered enough energy to cope with early starts, commuting, and all the usual stuff involved in studying and attending lectures etc.Yes I had – but very much disliked how regimented, controlled and politically correct university life had become. Thus, having completed the study course, I was now clearly fit enough to return to my own work, which would actually be enjoyable, and free of petty restrictions and rules – apart from my own.
2012 thus saw me returning to consulting as an astrologer, having said twelve years earlier that I never would. (Jupiter Return, anyone?) Two years later, the week my progressed Moon entered Aquarius, I returned to astrology teaching, dragged back by a bunch of my former students who would not take “No” for an answer. It’s been great!
Having set up a blog in 2008 in preparation for promoting my first book “Jupiter Meets Uranus: from erotic bathing to star gazing” (AFA print version 2009, re-published and updated as an ebook in 2015) I went on to establish a niche on the Web initially through my blog “Writing from the Twelfth House” then a complete research study of the 2010/11 Jupiter/Uranus conjunction as a blog, then “Astrology: Questions and Answers” – my main astrology blog, set up in 2013 with its own Facebook Page which materialised (by accident!) in 2015.
Since then, up until now, my writing has appeared in the Mountain Astrologer Magazine, Mountain Astrologer blog, Astrodienst, and regular columns in Dell Horoscope Magazine, Infinity Astrological Magazine and the UK’s Astrological Journal. I have also published four ebooks. It’s also been great to be able to join the world-wide community of astrologers made possible by social media and the Web.
On a personal level, in 2011 my husband and myself became grandparents to the lovely Lola – another surprising event which has brought a great deal of joy and pleasure into all our lives.
In 2010/11, I had absolutely no idea at all that any of this was remotely possible, and I look back on the Uranus in Aries transit with amazement and gratitude.
Conclusion
We are certainly living through very unstable and frightening times. However, it is clear from the bigger planetary patterns shaping up over the next 5-6 years and beyond that a whole world order is coming to an end, as a new one slowly arises from its ashes. Throughout history, birth whether of a new world order or a tiny new person, has never been accomplished without turmoil, upheaval and pain.
As a baby boomer, my generation is unlikely to live long enough to see the shape of this world order settle, become clear. But in the unprecedented changes of the last few years, we can certainly see its turbulent beginnings as the old order crumbles. I have faith that the millennial generation, whose values are rooted much less in materialism than ours, will in the end be able to address the huge environmental and political problems currently facing our world, and come up with ways of living which run more with the grain of our interconnected lives than those of us gradually leaving the stage have been able to accomplish.
So – bring it on, Uranus in Taurus!
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Endnotes:
(ii) https://www.sciencenewsforstudents.org/article/how-long-will-kilaueas-new-eruption-last
(iii) https://www.huffingtonpost.com/footnote/how-mobile-banking-is-tra_b_12944438.html
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2400 words copyright Anne Whitaker 2018
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