By Amanda Painter
Looking at the astrology as we head into the weekend (approaching a New Moon in Scorpio on Sunday), a few things come to mind: incisive, insightful communication (which may or may not always be offered tactfully); the ability and desire to get beneath the surface of things; the potential for surprising outbursts due to frustrated urges; discovering new solutions to new challenges.
Drummers at the Oct. 16, 2016, Sacred and Profane festival, Peaks Island, Maine. Photo by Amanda Painter.
If that sounds like a lot of energy looking for constructive expression, you’re right. The beautiful thing is that the current astrology could help you to go deep, get creative, and renew some facet of your life.
The tricky thing? As with so much in our lives, awareness is the key. The more aware you are of things like others’ viewpoints and feelings, any sense of staleness or stuckness in yourself, or the ways in which your needs, desires and sense of self have recently changed, the easier any necessary communication and action will be.
And by “easier,” I mean being direct, empathetic and balanced rather than passive-aggressive, being honest and intuitive, and being willing to do the work to create positive new situations. “Easier” here does not mean passive, detached or even necessarily “nice” in the sense of putting on a falsely happy face. We’re in the land of being real.
At the same time, “real” does not mean wantonly cruel, thoughtlessly self-absorbed or immaturely explosive. There’s a middle ground. Emotional maturity helps in finding it; acknowledging that it’s up to you to decide what it means to be yourself helps; the willingness to listen, learn and perhaps take some notes may help.
Astrologically speaking, what would these pointers be helping you with? Up first is a conjunction between the Sun and Mercury in Scorpio, exact at 12:16 pm EDT / 16:16 UTC on Oct. 27 (today).
Also simmering is Mars in Capricorn square Uranus and Eris in Aries, exact beginning Saturday at 12:06 am EDT (04:06 UTC). Since Mars aspects can usually be felt most strongly before they’re exact, this is an important one to keep in your consciousness beginning now.
Mars-Uranus squares are classic accident astrology — particularly when it comes to accidents that occur due to repressed anger, frustrated desires or perceived threats to one’s ego. So watch out for road rage (yours and others). If you’re upset, breathe, calm down and focus before operating heavy/hot/moving/sharp machinery or anything you drive or ride.
This is not to scare you or make you paranoid; it’s to increase your awareness so you can be proactive. It applies in other ways, too. For example, if you’re feeling like you want to be free of certain restraints or that you’re not getting noticed in some way, rebellion or revolt might be attractive. Astrologer Robert Hand suggests that the way to approach such urges and desires is to create for yourself a situation of ongoing change.
That is, rather than waiting for things to reach their limit, you can work little by little, ongoing, to reinvent, renew or redirect them. Think taking a class part time rather than abruptly quitting your job; rearranging a different room over the course of several days instead of suddenly taking a sledgehammer to a wall; introducing incremental, direct, meaningful requests into your sex life rather than shouting, “Why do you always do the same damn thing?!” at a delicate moment.
True, sometimes a bold wake-up call is necessary. But the more you stay in touch with what’s building up within you, the better you can articulate your needs and desires and take some action well before the point of crisis.
Speaking of communication, that brings me back to Sun-Mercury in Scorpio. On the obvious, surface level, this could totally mean that you spend most of today thinking deeply or talking to a lot of people — especially about topics like sex, money, death and secrets.
But especially in combination with the Mars-Uranus-Eris aspect, I see a more general reminder to come up for air once in a while, as you delve and penetrate, to notice where those around you are coming from. They might be coming from almost the exact same place as you are. But if you don’t stop to listen, you might never notice that their ‘hidden’ story is similar to yours. Once you discover that, the pressure may well ease enough to find unexpected solutions to your latest challenges.
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I came across this quote by Martin Luther King, Jr. while working on this column: “We who in engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive.”
Somehow it spoke to me of the combination of Mercury-Sun (approaching New Moon) in Scorpio combined with Mars square Uranus-Eris. Can anybody else relate?
The hidden tension was also alive when President Lincoln and his son came to Richmond, Va.
Admiral Porter said: “He came instead as a peacemaker, his hand extended to all who desire to take it.”
“Over time, the event faded from public memory. Interest returned on April 5, 2003, when the National Park Service unveiled a statue at the Historic Tredegar Iron Works commemorating Lincoln’s 1865 visit to Richmond. The life-sized sculpture by Louis Frech features the President and his son Tad, resting on a bench in front of the words “To Bind up the Nation’s Wounds” – a phrase taken from Lincoln’s second inaugural address.”
Amanda and Glen: i wonder whether the Reverend Doctor King somehow had Lincoln in mind when he referred to the hidden tension. i would not be surprised if those two great souls were deeply connected in ways the standards of our material world cannot account for. It is also interesting to note that a separation of 45 degrees is often referred to as a “hidden square” by astrologers. As Eric has recently noted, Uranus and Neptune are currently just two months into a nearly three-year process of oscillating into and out of FIVE hidden squares (the last of which will not take place until Beltane eve of 2019). Given the “Tarnas” orbs evinced by Uranus and Neptune, it would be fair to consider those five exact events to be one long (and historically significant) continuum. Perhaps on the other side of that continuum, our mutual experiences will have given us a greater understanding of our more subtle connections which have previously been accessible only through unsubstantiated parables, which in turn have all to often been dismissed out of hand by the narrow-minded. Maybe then the sheer, yet essental gossamer of hope on which President Lincoln and Dr. King built their inspirational messages will no longer be disparaged.
Glen and Len: I just now noticed your offerings to this post. Thank you.
Although I’m not sure what to make of three years of “hidden squares” between Uranus and Neptune! Sounds potentially very challenging; hopefully we can all meet and channel them with creativity, love and the determination to serve the higher good.