Mars square Saturn – Running headlong into a brick wall

Just a heads up for you all that tomorrow (9th September 2013) we see the exact square in the skies between Mars and Saturn, the planets of action locking horns with the planet of limitation. This time around Mars is in exuberant Leo and Saturn is moving in deep and intense Scorpio, two fixed signs which will precipitate a real stand off in planetary energy.

Mars in Leo wants to get things done and to do it in a flamboyant manner, it wants to make a visible statement to the world and to show off exactly what it can do. Running into Saturn is a problem for Mars, as Saturn is going to be in no mood to let Mars have it’s own way. Mars may well want to challenge the rule of law and fight against it, but Saturn will not yield this time. Saturn is like the proverbial brick wall in the way urging us to slow down, to stop and to think about our actions and why we are doing them. Maybe we are being too hasty, maybe we are not thinking straight, maybe our plans are all wrong and we need a correction in our progress? You say all you like about Saturn and you can hate his intervention in our lives, but he is there for a reason, he wants us to stop and reassess our progress.This will be a necessary correction that he is providing for us all, to stop us running away with ourselves. The faster you put your foot down on the accelerator, the more destruction you will cause to yourself and others if you happen to make a mistake and hit something solid.

You may feel a discernable frustration in the air now and in the next couple of days as the square hardens before it starts to dissipate. Some area of your life is going to be blocked or maybe new rules will be imposed on you. You may feel low on energy, find big bills now have to be paid, something may break down or severely delay you. Tomorrow on the 9th, the Moon comes along to make a conjunction with Saturn in Scorpio for a short while and this could bring an emotional element into the mix or a family or female intervention might be part of the whole picture. Might issues surrounding matters of the heart come to some sort of resolution right now?

Rather than fighting against the odds, it is probably advisable to back down and look at your options as they will appear once this aspect has passed through, indeed you will soon be asked to makes some important decisions once Venus moves into Scorpio in the middle of next week. Take your medicine and bide your time as the chance to make progress and get moving again is not so far off in the future.

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Venus in Scorpio – Putting your relationships and values on the line

Between 11th September and 7th October, Venus dives into the sign of Scorpio. Venus in Libra is all the search for harmony, sweetness and light and Venus is unlikely to make a firm decision as this combination is all about sitting on the fence. All that changes on the 11th September because Scorpio compels Venus to make one, even if that means that you have to upset someone along the way do so.

The sign of Scorpio is all about the ultimate truth and the journey you have to take to get to it. Whenever a planet enters this sign then I see it intensified to its ultimate extent. Scorpio concentrates it’s power in both good and bad ways, it strips away the veneer that has been built up gliding through Libra. Think of the craftsman with an old piece of furniture who has to use the paint-stripper to get down to the bare wood and metal. That is what Pluto is doing here to Venus, the planet of love, or relating and diplomacy, the planet of our possessions and values.

In relationships for this month we will get down to the bare essentials. Is this relationship working? If it isn’t, why isn’t it? When we find that out, we will then have to make a black or white decision whether to continue it, or not. Scorpio is about life and death, endings and new beginnings, it destroys you then empowers you. In Scorpio we find out your real values, what you really need and what you don’t. Scorpio doesn’t mind plummeting the depths and we may find sex and intimacy being used as a tool, as a means to an end to define where a relationship stands. Love is taken to a new intense level as Venus enters this sign. Just relating is no longer just good enough, we will want to get up close and personal, we will want to share and experience ultimate human emotions.

All this intensity will have spin-offs though, as the closer we get the more that these emotions are stirred in both good and bad ways. With Venus in Scorpio jealousy will be a by-product when we can’t achieve the control we want, because someone else has it. With Venus in Scorpio we may get obsessed in trying to wrestle that control and power back to us through manipulation and secret tactics. In Venus in Scorpio we will fight our corner because fear and survival is the name of the game now, it is either them or us who will come out on top, as compromise is no longer an option. With Venus in Scorpio we have to define who we are, our real selves are laid out in front of everyone for all to see.

You know there is a real honesty in where people stand that will immediately come out through this transit. This is the time when those with the power and the big money will make their move as they know that they can be bigger and stronger through making relationships and through merger, Scorpio is the ultimate sign of sharing. The weak will fall and the strong will get stronger, strong alliances will thrive and vulnerable ones will shatter, break or be consumed by the survivors.

The next month is going to see many issues resolved not only personally but internationally too as at the end of this intense and revealing period of time we and our fellow citizens on planet earth will know ourselves much better and what we want out of life much more clearly and concisely. I am not going to say it is going to be an easy ride as you will not be able to escape this process of purging and cleansing and the nature of Venus in Scorpio may dredge up all sorts of nasty secrets and issues that you probably didn’t want to see the light of day. I will say this though. Once all the toxins and poisons have been removed, we will have a clean bright and purified environment around us once again, one we can explore and expand into once Venus arrives in Sagittarius.

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Tony Abbott sweeps to victory in Australia

Tony Abbott is the new Prime Minister of Australia. In reports coming out of that country he seems to have won a large victory with his Liberal National coalition ousting the Labor party that had been in power under Juila Gillard and latterly Kevin Rudd in the past 6 years. I mentioned many months back that he might be the beneficiary of political infighting between Rudd and Gillard and that is exactly what happened. Is this a ringing endorsement of his own policies, or a backlash against the weakness and division in Labor. Let’s have a look at what the Astrology says.

Here’s the backdrop to the decision made by the Australian people on 7th September 2013. Change was always coming. On the morning of the election, transiting Pluto the planet of transformation was sitting almost exactly (orb 0:09 degrees) on the midpoint of Sun (the leader) and Saturn (the ruling administration) and making a trine to the chart ruler Mars. Change was coming and with transiting Uranus (ruling the Aussie Midheaven) also making a square to the natal Sun and a trine to it’s own position and to Venus ruling the money supply and relations with other countries and peoples, change at a rapid and decisive pace. Two of the main planks of Tony Abbott’s election drive were highlighted by Venus and her signs, firstly to sort out the economy (2nd house ruled by Taurus) and secondly to stop the flow of illegal boat people entering Australia (7th ruled by Libra). Transiting Neptune over the past year or two has been square to the Nodal Axis bringing confusion and drift to the destiny of the country and with transiting Saturn making a sextile to the Sun Saturn conjunction, it almost seemed as if the planets were urging more stable government and administration. That is what the Australian people in their vote have delivered.

The birth details I have about Tony Abbott come courtesy of eminent Australian Astrologer Ed Tamplin who has two sources for him being born at 4am in London on 4th November 1957. Tony seems to have been the right guy in the right place at the right time so far as Australia is concerned and with the lucky North Node having recently passed over his Sun/North Node conjunction, one which always favours a good and prosperous life, he has had fortune and luck on his side, indeed look at the position of Jupiter, the most elevated transiting planet at the moment in his chart having just entered his 10th house. With this kind of backing, he could have entered a nag in the Melbourne Cup horse race and won at a canter. His life is indeed changing shown by transiting Pluto making a close square to his Libran Ascendant and Uranus opposing from the 7th.

Now with his Midheaven at 11:56 Cancer, Pluto still has to make three more oppositions to the career point on his chart and with Uranus coming back to make a final square too before settling down into his 7th house. That does sound quite a tricky set of aspects to endure and I wonder if dealing with coalition partners is going to be easy, I think things might get a bit fraught early on in his premiership from time to time. Nevertheless, Tony does have Pluto making an empowering sextile to his Scorpio Sun from next December onwards and through 2014 and this may strengthen his hand in the job as Aussie PM. Pluto and Uranus finally finish their work on his Midheaven in November 2014 and a year and a half from now, assuming he has survived this first rather rough period, the transits against his chart seem to settle down quite nicely. I think he will have little to fear come 2015, especially as Australia herself will have finally seen through the nasty Pluto conjunction to her natal Sun.

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David Frost – A giant in the broadcasting world passes away

I know it is a couple of days since his passing but I haven’t yet had time until now to give my Astrological tribute to one of the foremost TV interviewers in British and international broadcasting history, David Frost. David was a wonderfully talented broadcaster with an incisive mind who did create history in his interviews with former disgraced American President Richard Nixon. His career spanned 50 years on both sides of the Atlantic and across the world. He died on a cruise ship before he was due to present a speech.

David was born on 7th April 1939 at 10:30 according to his memory in Tenterden in England. He was an Aries with his Moon in searching Scorpio and he had a Cancerian Ascendant. I find it really interesting that this chart had no planets in Air signs at all despite the fact that his career was all about communicating with people. With this type of case, the rest of the chart has to work overtime to compensate for the lack of air and I wonder if this is why he was so brilliant at what he did. His Mercury, the planet of communication sits retrograde in Aries square to Mars contributing to him a very sharp and critical mind which would have loved a debate yet one where he held his opinions to himself. His Aries Sun was shielded by Saturn so that he could remain rather aloof and unemotional, like placing a brick wall in front of the personality. This position always says about the person that you can come close, but not too close. Interviewers stand back and reveal nothing while the person being interviewed opens themselves out, their comments bounce off the questions you ask. These three planets exactly explain his approach in his work.  Of course they were all sitting in his 10th house of career and public image, so you can see the influence of public speaking and communicating (Mercury in 10th), ambition and being in charge of the situation (Saturn in 10th) and making a mark on the world (Sun in Aries in the 10th) as well.

There was much more to David Frost though than these three 10th house planets. His Scorpio Moon was very powerful and influential too. Through his protective Cancerian Ascendant this Moon ruled his chart and in Scorpio it gave him a need to be in control and to know everything going on around him. The emotions are working at a very deep and subliminal level here and although you might think that the emotions were being shown on the surface and in the 5th house David would have been quite an expressive person, beneath the surface he was working on a different level entirely. In his work he would have been incredibly well prepared, that Scorpio Moon would have impelled him to do his homework extremely thoroughly. He would also have know the power of saying nothing; those with Scorpio prominent in their chart know the value of silence and keeping things under wraps. This Moon sitting on the fixed star Toliman made him passionately tied into his work and making trines with Pluto, Jupiter and the Midheaven (point of career) we have a very talented and powerful grand water trine on his chart that guaranteed that he would be publically known and very successful.

He was always going to do well with Jupiter sitting in conjunction with the star Markab (in the constellation of Pegasus) exactly at the top of his chart trine to Pluto which attracts big career opportunities your way. The Markab connection is really interesting as this star is a point of steadiness, representing the saddle on the winged horse. Traditionally it shows someone who could stay cool under the most enormous of pressure, and when the eyes of the world are on you, this influence is crucial in live TV situations. That Jupiter conjunct the Midheaven in Pisces indicated an international (Jupiter) career (Midheaven) in TV and broadcasting (Pisces) and the grand trine indicated a store of individual talent in the entertainments world (Moon in 5th) and  a wholehearted and passionate personal focus on being someone special (Pluto in 1st house). People with Pluto in the first house can unite or divide and sometimes they can be rather difficult to deal with, then again you will never be able to ignore them because of the powerful intensity and passion they exude.

With Mars in Capricorn in his 6th house, David was an incredibly hard and focused worker wanting to do his very best all the time, indeed he probably pushed himself too much at times. He was direct (Mars square Sun) yet very compassionate and sensitive too with Venus sitting in gentle and intuitive Pisces allowing to use a more soothing approach when he need to. This would be extremely useful in lulling his interviewees into a false sense of security before landing a killer question on them. Neptune sat in his 3rd house of communication opposite to David’s Midheaven and trine to Uranus in his 11th. The 3rd is a fascinating position for Neptune as it can bring insight into one’s thinking, you can pick up on the nuances being said to you and the meanings behind the words. Neptune in the 3rd house is very open to talking, for studying voraciously (Neptune in the planet of no limits) and for listening to people and hearing all kinds of opinions. Being trine to Uranus, this Neptune is turned up another notch making it very attuned indeed and also spiritual too. David when young trained as a preacher, no doubt influenced by his father who was a priest.

David Frost set the bar for political interviews and he was the only man to interview every British Prime Minister since 1964 to the present day as well as every US President from 1969 until the one but last in George W Bush. He had a sense of fun too, was part of the rise of satire in the early 60’s on UK TV and before he landed a TV role he appeared in London cabaret, no doubt encouraged by his Venus in Pisces and Neptune in the 3rd house and the trine between Mars and Uranus, a triple combination of influences which is active, vivacious, shows great rhythm and loves colour, dance and music.

He leaves his wife Lady Carina Fitzalan-Howard, three sons and a lifetime of broadcasting memories.

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Astrology Readings with Astrologer Paul Saunders

We have just entered into September and my diary is very open if anyone wants a reading or a report right now. I am running a special offer for Skype and telephone readings  until the end of Summer with half an hour one costing just £25 (equivalent to 30 Euros or $40) and a full hour reduced to £35 (just over 40 Euros or $55). If you compare to other Astrologers out there in Astrology land, that’s a bargain…

I am also available to do written reports too, natal birth chart ones, ones looking into the future for you from 1 month up to 1 year ahead as well as more specialised reports looking at your chart against the fixed stars in the heavens and answering specific questions.

If you want more details, please go to my readings page (link below) where you can book all these reports and up.

http://www.solarisastrology.co.uk/yourastrologychart.html

Thanks for all your support…

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Obama facing a test of morals and ethics.

The chemical attack in Damascus, well I am assuming that there were chemical attacks and the evidence seems to be pretty conclusive has left the Western leaders with a big, big dilemma. We all know well that public opinion in the UK and the US has been quite anti-interventionist in regard to Syria, simply because of the long drawn out conflicts in Iraq and especially Afghanistan which dragged on for years costing thousands of military lives for little or no benefit or appreciable gain. The people just don’t want to see their brave boys and girls in the forces dragged into another Middle Eastern conflict with no exit strategy apparent if you get bogged down into it. Syria is a viper’s nest of one faction and tribe against another and within the country you have Kurds, Armenians, Assyrians, Turks, Christians, Druze, Alawitee Shias and Arab Sunnis all of who have their own personal agendas. You may please one side with any action you take but you may upset the others.

You know, often in these Middle Eastern countries you need a strong dictator to keep a hold over all the differing factions. It was the same with Saddam Hussein in Iraq, Gaddafi in Libya, Mubarak in Egypt. The thing is, what happens when that dictator gets above his station and starts persecuting the people? What happens when he bombs them with chemical weapons like Hussein did and now Assad seems to have done? Do you intervene and potentially get into another Iraq or Vietnam or do you stand back, shrug your shoulders and condone the use of chemical weapons on people? The parallels with Vietnam and the late 60’s when Uranus and Pluto were conjunct are rather striking and now those planets have come together in a square aspect. Could Syria turn out to be Obama’s Vietnam?

I raise the question because of Obama’s chart and where the planets are now in relation to it. Here is Obama’s natal chart on the inside ring and the transiting planets on the outside, set for the 9th September, the day that Congress will debate to potential of using military force on Syria. I focus on Neptune sitting in Obama’s 9th house, the house of overseas issues and affairs. As you will know from my blog, Neptune rules chemicals, gas, suffering sacrifice, all nasty toxic affairs going on hidden from view. This was one issue that Obama was always going to have to deal with at some point, it was sitting in his chart waiting to be activated, this was his Presidential dilemma.

Transiting Saturn from October 2012 just before Obama got re-elected was just entering his 9th house of overseas issues as was the transiting North Node moving clockwise entering his 9th house crossing his Midheaven from his 10th. These two influences are now converging on Obama’s natal Neptune. I said back in November 2012 just after Obama had one that his main focus would be foreign policy and potentially overseas conflicts in his second term as Saturn tests you and brings you difficulties to deal with and the North Node brings fate and destiny to bare.

The 9th September could prove to be a crucial day for Obama and his presidency. On that day there is a square in the skies over us as Mars, the planet of action, force and war makes a square to Saturn, the planet of ambition, and administration. On that day Congress votes whether to back Obama’s desire to send a military strike into Syria. That same square focuses in on Obama’s 9th house Neptune. The fact that Obama has passed the buck to congress to make the decision is indicated by transiting Neptune which is now opposing Obama’s natal Pluto and making a square to his natal Moon. Pluto (via Scorpio) rules Obama’s 9th and 10th houses, his overseas commitments and his public image, his career. Neptune is bringing doubt, doubt to his emotions (Moon) and to his Presidency. Neptune of course is transiting through his first house also weakens him as a person and is also the symbol as I said of the chemical attacks too. The dilemma (opposition) he faces here is death and destruction (Pluto) on a mass scale through chemical weapons (Neptune). Do you act, don’t you, do you let other’s make the decisions for you or do you act without their approval? The vote in the UK held over the Syrian crisis even though David Cameron lost has given Obama that get out clause that he needed. Yes it is a risky strategy to let others make the decision to act in a warlike manner even if you give the lead, but I think it is a calculated risk that Obama has decided to take. After all, he does not have to face another election in his life. If he loses he will still be President until 2016, but one I suspect one with a heavy heart if Congress does not back the use of force.

With the square aspect indicating from Mars to his natal Neptune indicating the intervention of another element to aid his handling of this overseas problem, I suspect that Congress will vote in the affirmative, after all Mars now in Leo does want to take action and will accept most if any challenges issues to it. Then the onus will switch to Obama and how to handle Syria. If you send cruise missiles in and destroy a few buildings will that stop Assad in his tracks? It will certainly upset the Russians, Iranians and the Chinese and what happens once the missiles have done their job and if Assad continues to use these horrible weapons again? Do you commit forces into Syria, arm the rebels who may have Al Qaida elements within them or continue to rain down air strikes on an already war torn country with the likelihood of considerable civilian casualties or send in special forces to try to eliminate Assad with no one in place to take over? Trust me this is not going to be an easy challenge to take on and one where I cannot see any solution, indeed this could be Obama’s Vietnam waiting to happen. 

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New Moon in Virgo – Cleanse the wounds and change your life.

We have a new Moon in Virgo forming on the 5th September 2013 and as always New Moon give us the opportunities and the chance to start some new energy into our life. Virgo is a sign of service, of tending to the details, of analysing and cleaning up anything mess or junk that is in our lives, Virgo can’t abide anything that is not in order. This new Moon lights up the Virgo Pisces axis of the sky above us and highlights the small but significant asteroid Chiron.

This is the chart for the new Moon in Virgo on 5th September in London. There are 4 significant aspects connected to this new Moon, a trine to Pluto an inconjunct aspect to Uranus, a sextile to Jupiter and an opposition to Chiron. Opposing the New Moon in Pisces is the wounded healer and as you will appreciate this is the serving and suffering axis in the zodiac. This new Moon I feel gives you the chance to bring a little healing into an area of your life where you have suffered recently. Ask yourself, what sits between 10 and 13 degrees Virgo, Pisces, Scorpio or Cancer in your chart, what part of your life is being affected here? Is there a significant planet or influence that has caused you pain and trouble over the past few months, a wound that seems never to heal, a person or situation that has affected your life very deeply? Now you may be presented with a chance to find a little healing to this influence in your life. Here we can analyse and correct what is going wrong and make some decisions. Do we discard this person or influence from our lives or do we transform our relationship to it or them into something fresh, new and beneficial that can take you forward.

Why do I say this? Well because of the other planetary influences on this new Moon in a mutable sign, a sign of adaption. Pluto here in a trine in easy change and transformational mode. Trines from Pluto bring forth change much more readily and less painfully than is normal and this Pluto influence combined with the careful and thorough nature of the Virgo new Moon can clear a path for you now. The Uranus inconjunct aspect shows you can make radical adjustments in your life in getting rid of the dead wood from any situation, in discarding the old to be replaced by the new and the easy sextile from Jupiter brings opportunities to try something new, to expand and to explore.

Remember that all we have here is an opportunity and to benefit from the energy present you have to make things happen yourself by being a little pro-active. If you can soothe that part of your life that has been hurting you, then you may find that this new Moon promotes a chance for a fresh start and a little bit of optimism where before there was none.

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