Conjunctions are everywhere. Let me start by saying I am using the solstice points as the 2020 framework. Why? I have come to the conclusion that the solstice points are the best way to look at the real beginning and end of the year. Take the situation last year. The solstice point was on Dec. 21, 2019. From this point to the solstice point on Dec 21, 2020 is the way I calculate a year. Try it and see what you think.

Using this as my annual solstice time measurement, let’s take a look. The result is we have Saturn conjunct Pluto one time, but Jupiter makes three conjunctions to Pluto. Two eclipses, which are, after all are conjunctions of sun and moon. This makes six conjunctions. Add the eclipse on Dec 25-6 2019 and we have seven conjunctions of significant for the solstice-to-solstice year. (I am not including the lunar eclipses, which are oppositions, and in their on way add emotional concerns to an already complicated situation.)

Conjunctions are a squeeze play in the Zodiac (to use football lingo.) The thing is that one of the heralded conjunctions is Saturn to Pluto is contraction. Echoes of their conjunction in Capricorn in 1518 should be considered a trying and significant time . The three Jupiter Pluto conjunctions are expansion the eclipses are conjunctions.
This is what I mean about the big squeeze in on.

What is the result of this? What I call the pulse. All this expansion and contraction is like a pulse of energy in and out.
Saturn in its own sign is powerful throughout the year. However there is a time between March and September when Saturn is in Aquarius (0 to 1.9 degrees) this is the spice, Saturn sending the liberating and rebellious of Aquarius into the pulse. At the end of the year Jupiter and Saturn conjunct at Dec 21 at 0 degrees Aquarius. Hopefully indicating some release for all the pounding earth element. Will the air element of Aquarius, intellectual, bring solutions? I hope so.

January, April, June, November and December are times of the big squeeze and I advise people to watch these dates carefully and this is the most logical time to expect things to get, well, a little more dicey and usual.

Everyone with planets in the last ten degrees of a cardinal sign will be especially exposed to the energy. Be ready for it. Things will happen that can be best understood by looking at your personal chart

Anyone with fixed sign planets in the first decant will feel the energy of Uranus. More spice for the year. Change will be rough in this area, more dynamic because they have the great pulse to deal with.

The one thing that may help is that Jupiter makes tree sextiles to Neptune in Pisces, which hopefully will add some visionary element to the tensions as the pulse continues to move through 2020. Note all this is sandwiched in between two total eclipses, which underlines the idea that there is a lot action to be had this year.

The end of 2019 will be like a diving board, springing the whole world into the heralded year 2020 which as everyone has projected will be one for the ages. I will analyze 2020 at another time. Right now I am predicting that it will be a Jupiter/Uranus trine that puts the energy that propels the show down at the Capricorn corral, featuring Jupiter Saturn and Pluto, I use this old west analogy to point out that Jupiter will be a catalyst for a huge amount polarizing energy in most pragmatic element, earth. This will be with the help of Uranus so we know something exciting is going to happen

Jupiter will bring all the energy of transiting through its home sign of Sagittarius when it ingresses into Capricorn with it trine to Uranus in mid December 2019. With all the conjunctions in 2020, it is worthy to note that this is the power in springboard. Uranus has been stirring up Taurus for a while and that electric energy which is shaking up this fixed sign of the bull and emitting the news that change is coming.

The energy of these two planets will supply a thrust for shaking things up. Uranus is the rebel, the desire for independence, the inventor, the progressive, the seeker originality and uniqueness, the resourceful, and the free. It can at times also be the radical, the impulsive that needs to be reigned in. That is its polarity to Taurus. It wants to make the fixed sign change. This will then be passed on to cardinal sign of Capricorn.

Jupiter is coming full of the expansive energy of Sagittarius which it rules. It wants openness, optimism, higher law, spirituality, liberal values, idealism, cross cultural awareness, confidence, dignity, humanness, and benevolence mention a few of the planets many traits. It brings the mutability and a flexible approach to maters of self and individuality. It aims high, to the stars, even.

This Jupiter/Uranus energy is a trining energy, which hopefully will bring some type of amelioration to the darker Pluto/Saturn that lurk deeper in the waters of 2020. Think of it as a shoehorn that helps slipping into Capricorn a little easier. It will certainly make December 2019 one to remember. With all this energy at two degrees of earth, certainly the winter solstice might pick up a little of this momentum and make the ingress to Capricorn a little special.

Solar Return, Two Eclipses,Planets at Crisis

When one is seriously thinking about the stars of fortune coming up, it appears to be a stressed configuration. A mix of heavy duty, polarizing energies are going to be released and the solar return of President Trump could well be a topic of interest. The solstice June 21 is coming up, right after the president’s birthday, June 14th. Trump is such a powerful man that his chart has been talked and written about by the best of astrologers trying to get some perspective, so lets start with him. At one frightening level the idea could well be argued, that as Trump goes, so does the country.

If you are into studying the planetary patterns, then Trump’s chart is a field day because there are three triangular configurations, two yods and a mutable T square with Neptune in Pisces at the focal point in second house which makes me worry about the softening of the economy as his political vision will be stretched to a point that boundaries in national and world affairs are going to come to such flux that aggression will dominate the national tone. This Neptune T square finger is part of a grand water trine as Neptune trines Moon in Scorpio and Mercury in Cancer. So the stress will be emotional, and hopefully will handled in blustering controlled negotiations. The kettle boils as issues with China, North Korea, and Iran. At home the state of the balance of the powers of the House of Representatives, the senate and the Supreme Court will be tested.

T square opposition is Mars and Saturn is exact at 18 degrees of Cancer and Capricorn. This is a powerhouse of a configuration. I don’t see how this cannot mean a large complexity of issues will cause a crisis. The solar return’s Saturn and Pluto are in the 12th that some large issue will come out. Maybe the Mueller report will be released? Perhaps. Yet I see the problem more in foreign policy where Iran will be an issue to be dealt with. Korea would be my next guess and China the last.

The summer solstice puts the powerful opposition of Mars and Mercury in Cancer in the 12th and Pluto and Saturn in the 6th into play and suggests that these problems will carry on for some time. The July 16th Lunar eclipse puts the continued power of stelliums in collision. Now we have the moon conjunct Pluto, while Saturn is in exact with Venus. Venus, sun and north node bring attention to the third and ninth houses. Venus in the third is in a wider trine to Neptune in the fifth. Communication, and flustering and saber rattling will be the norm. However the tight walk is close here because one slip could bring a war or some skirmishes which I fear will happen. Lets hope that the hot heads will cool down a little. Across the mundane playing field there are points that also place the US government in a constitutional crisis. Take your pick.

There are so many things happening it is a puzzle of power and personalities that exact dates are difficult to predict yet the zeitgeist is clear. We are headed into a few months where the United States will be the center of this looming storm. It is like a storm that will proceed to the problems brought on by the powerful conjunctions in 2020. The yods indicate that the way will not be easy and the resolutions will take a lot of insight and patience. It is a clash of cultures. Consider this time as a trailer to the main event of next year. The roller coaster we are on will then shift in high gear. More to come later. Late summer will be even more interesting as the retrogrades of the big planets will shift to direct and start moving. The game is on.

Eris is the goddess of discord and she will continue with her influence in 2019.
The year of 2019 will be a springboard for the great cardinal conjunctions of 2020.
Eris will be in 22-23 degrees of Aries, and along with Uranus transiting the end of Aries and the early degrees of Taurus will add the drive for more changes in women’s rights, and the LGBT movements. The drive for freedom from old customs and prejudices will expand as the year moves on.

Who is Eris? She is a dwarf planet beyond Pluto, but slightly larger than Pluto. She is the goddess of anger and revenge caused by not being invited to a meeting of the gods of Mt. Olympus. She shows up to the party and creates discord with her anger and revenge against the harmony of the gods’ party and manages to create discord and the final result is the Trojan War.

The “war” that will continue into 2019 is the persistent clash between the status quo and the growth of the drive for freedom to minorities. The “#MeTo” will now become more focused on “#NeverAgain” movement to establish clearly defined laws on building a better legal structure to promote the ideals of personal freedom and fight the restrictions on civil liberties. We will see more women’s marches.

What will be a large energy of 2019? Jupiter is one of the big keys to creating the energy for propelling onto the vast implications of 2020. Already the astrological community is focusing on 2020 and kind of passing over the implication of Jupiter in Sagittarius, a sign of expansion, and emphasis of legal, religion, communication, and cross cultural values. With its energy it will square Neptune deal with the ideals of defining those values of cultural goals. The clash will become stronger as the year progresses. The trade wars may become more dangerous to the world economy, 2020 will expand this complex situation even further.

Mars and Venus will not go retrograde as they did in 2018 and this will help propel the energy of both gods as they make hard and soft aspects as they transit the zodic, which will make spots of excitement as they take their impact on a personal level, especially Sagittarius and Pisces.

I will continue this with further and more individual notes at the year moves on.

Venus goes retrograde from October 5th to November 15th. During this time Venus with descend from being the Setting Star in the West — disappear– and emerge as the Rising Star in the East. This cycle was not missed by the Chaldean Priests whose myth of Inanna takes this sequence and has Inanna descending into the darkness to see her sister Ereshkigal who is having a hard time as Queen of the Underworld. After a soap opera of sibling rivalry, Inanna emerges in the East rather upset. The myth actually says East Rising Inanna Inanna is an aggressive maybe nearly volatile. The Mayans go further and name this phase of the retrograde the emerging Venus is more like Mars. Go figure. Cross cultural myths are always so interesting.

Anyway, that myth aside, Venus retrograde should at first be looked at as the part of the “re” (add key word).
Review, rethink, reexamine re-plan,re-imagine,regroup. This method is helpful and can lead to some great renewed perspectives in this introspective journey into the self.

However, I would like to suggest write down key words for Venus that show the polarities of the energy field.
On the one positive side Venus: beauty, gentle persuasion, balancing, affection, flirting, love, social graces, etc. On the negative side can be: not so beautiful, unbalancing, overly ambitious, envy, jealousy, slut, all around problem child of moods and twisted passions. This examination of the polarities should be a clue as to the field or spectrum of the planet. Old lovers could calls, a dangerous affair might be broached, a back stabbing. Or it might be re-birthing and energizing. The Chi may be enlightening. This could be a time of discovering past mistakes and make plans to do better, to try harder, to be more sensitive, or not as sensitive.

Change will happen. First I recommend breaking up or seriously rethinking all relationships which have gone flat. Or worse relationships which are like a vampire of spirit, sucking you dry of energy and time. We all carry some freeloading friends who take much more than they give. Time to weed the garden and get the ground open for new seeds of growth.

There can be a karmic aspect to this time as in retrospect you identify particular karmic points in your life and the positive and negative energies you have gone through. Sometimes even a phone call, a chance meeting, remark, can have more meaning when re-examined from a retrograde and reflective period. It can be quite rewarding to see the pattern of the flow of one’s life. This can also lead to spiritual matters which yield insights for personal and spiritual growth. Mystical experiences brought on by reflection is know to have happened. Also the theme of passing through a time of darkness is very instructive to help when depression or bad moods hit. All will pass.

Let’s not forget that Venus starts at 10 Scorpio and goes to 25 Libra. Note your fixed and cardinal sign configurations in your natal chart to see what aspects the retrograde will make and the possible results. Remember, the Chaldeans would say that Venus rising in Libra will be a more aggressive goddess with some active plans for action on settling scores. Since this will be during the 2018 election cycle will prove more that interesting.