Midlife Transits

I saw this as a news headline somewhere–that President Obama’s ‘honeymoon’ period is over. I don’t know about Obama, but for the rest of us there’s a ring of truth to that.

Jupiter is now retrograde, as is Neptune and Chiron. These are the 3 placements that conjoined each other in May and June and half of July, giving us all a nice bump of unearned optimism and confidence. The time period has had its harrowing moments, at least partly due to energetic eclipse action, but the media’s relentless pushing of bad economic news eased up.

It was as though everyone forgot for a bit that we are in serious trouble and that our fundamental institutions need to be rebuilt.

Well now Jupiter’s zooming away from Neptune and our collective confidence is scheduled to wane. I know mine took a noticeable dip as soon as Jupiter went retrograde. If your confidence is waning a bit these days, there’s a reason for it.

And this is not necessarily a bad thing. We can all step back a bit. We can get more clear-headed with Neptune not fogging things up. We can prepare for what we need to do instead of jumping in all deluded. After all when the honeymoon’s over, the real marriage begins.

If you want to know in what areas of your life a dip in confidence or a need to step back might be indicated, look to see what house the sign of Aquarius represents in your solar chart (or natal chart if you know your rising sign). They are listed below.  You can visit my other site Practical Astrology to see what the houses mean. (Scroll down the page.)

Aries: 11th house

Taurus: 10th house

Gemini: 9th house

Cancer: 8th house

Leo: 7th house

Virgo: 6th house

Libra: 5th house

Scorpio: 4th house

Sagittarius: 3rd house

Capricorn: 2nd house

Aquarius: 1st house

Pisces: 12th house

Here’s a link to something Mashable is promoting, a Summer of Social Good. The goal is to raise money for charities this summer through social media like Twitter.

To me, this is a prime example of the influence of the Jupiter/Neptune/Chiron conjunction in Aquarius this summer. Aquarius as a sign is often hot for social good. Furthermore, Aquarius is the sign of social networking through technology.

Put Jupiter and Neptune into this sign, throw in Chiron and mash them all together and you get something like this. Neptune provides the idealism; Jupiter provides the incentive to do good through economic means, and Chiron provides the urge to heal something grand–like society. And yes, this is a summer phenomenon, this conjunction. By the fall, we’ll have other astrological things to worry about. Like Saturn in Libra being in a bad mood with Pluto in Capricorn.

Another example of the conjunction zeitgeist, I think, is the fact that NBC is launching a show with the improbable title of “The Philanthropist” about a globe-trotting philanthropist who just wants to save the world and blow up some cars or stuff.

Stop Poverty

And in celebration, early-bird horoscopes for May have been posted. Yes, you can ask questions and make comments.

By the way, in many of the sun sign horoscopes I mention a triple conjunction of Jupiter, Neptune, and Chiron in the sign of Aquarius. It occurs toward the end of May. I mention it because I’m all excited about it.

Whether it’s worth getting all excited about remains to be seen. Still, semi-newshound that I am I have seen flurries of activity relating to this conjunction all over the place.

These flurries of activity mostly relate to experty-type experts on various economic matters getting cautiously optimistic about the economy. In my astrological brain, they are getting cautiously optimistic because a Jupiter/Neptune conjunction just wants people to get optimistic and have hope again. Jupiter, by the way, deals with the economic matters.

So in my reading, the recent stock market upticks and whatnot are signs that Jupiter/Neptune is kicking in.

The downside is that Neptune is a notorious liar. It promises hope and then does its darndest to eventually deliver disappointment. That’s why cautious experty-type experts are keeping  a mindful eye on Pluto in Capricorn. When they keep their mindful eye on Capricorn they say things like “it’s still a long road to recovery.” Because that’s Pluto in Cap’s opinion, and Pluto is usually right.

So…I think Neptune and Jupiter are going to try to do their darndest to give us all a necessary break from gloom and doom. They’ll let us enjoy the summer, before Saturn in Libra squares off with Pluto in the fall and puts us in a bad mood with world affairs again. Sort of like that; there is some play in the dates.

Neptune’s already at the degree he will station at–26 degrees. Jupiter will hover around this degree, so will Chiron. Uranus will hover at the same degree in Pisces. If you have planets at 26 degrees figure that they will be energized, hopeful, surprised, and confused. So will the rest of us probably.