The USA

In the pre­vi­ous three essays, I have exam­ined the recent past, present and near future of Uni­ver­sal Astro­log­i­cal con­di­tions, (what are termed “tran­sits to tran­sits”), that form the over­all Ener­gy-Forms pre­vail­ing dur­ing any par­tic­u­lar peri­od of time. In this essay, I will pro­vide some analy­sis of the more impor­tant tran­sits and sig­nif­i­cant fea­tures of the Charts of the USA. In the fol­low­ing essay I will exam­ine the chart and tran­sits for Don­ald Trump.

The repeat­ed align­ments of a par­tic­u­lar plan­et to a fea­ture in any chart will always exhib­it a spe­cif­ic qual­i­ty. But the exact nature of the expe­ri­ence will change depend­ing upon what oth­er astro­log­i­cal aspects are in effect for that chart, com­bined with the influ­ences formed by the gen­er­al astro­log­i­cal con­di­tions that are also in effect.

The most impor­tant tran­sit in the chart of the USA for 2016 was the Square of Uranus to the USA Mer­cury. The cir­cuit of Uranus around the zodi­ac takes approx­i­mate­ly 84 years, so that Uranus will form a “hard” aspect to Mer­cury in any chart every 21 years or so. More­over, the inter­pre­ta­tion of these effects will vary with the exact type of con­tact (Con­junc­tion, Wax­ing Square, Oppo­si­tion or Wan­ing Square).

The cur­rent cycle of Uranus to the USA Mer­cury began with the con­junc­tion of 1954–55, lead­ing to the wax­ing square of 1973–74, arriv­ing at the oppo­si­tion of 1994, and final­ly to the wan­ing square of 2016–17. Every time this con­tact occurs, the thought-forms and the forms of com­mu­ni­ca­tion in the USA are shook up and trans­formed. But in terms of the same moment in this cycle, (the wan­ing square), the last occur­rences were in 1933–34 and 1849–50.

The pre­vi­ous sim­i­lar tran­sit of 1933–34 accom­pa­nied the many trans­for­ma­tion­al efforts and reac­tionary push­backs to FDR’s “New Deal”, with many gov­ern­men­tal pro­grams invented/instituted to deal with the cri­sis of the Great Depres­sion accom­pa­nied by stri­dent oppo­si­tion from those opposed to gov­ern­ment expansion.

The 1849–50 tran­sit, saw the tumul­tuous strug­gle to “solve” the prob­lem of slav­ery with the “Com­pro­mise of 1850”, regard­ing the admis­sion of the ter­ri­to­ries secured in the Mex­i­can War as to whether they would be a free or slave state. Part of this com­pro­mise also wit­nessed the enact­ment of the “Fugi­tive Slave Law” requir­ing free states to return escaped slaves, and the Supreme Court made slav­ery a pro­tect­ed insti­tu­tion. This “com­pro­mise” only served to delay the inevitable show­down between two incom­pat­i­ble and dis­parate ways of life, between a soci­ety found­ed upon free­dom for all or bondage for many.

Real­ly, in both cas­es, the thought-forms of the time were put to the test with regards as to whether the peo­ple of the USA accept, under­stand and share with one anoth­er enough com­mon­ly held beliefs, which are the spir­i­tu­al-intel­lec­tu­al-emo­tion­al bonds to hold them to one anoth­er in mutu­al under­stand­ing. Each peri­od brought into sharp relief, the dif­fer­ences between groups and regions of the coun­try. Old forms of think­ing were chal­lenged by new ones, and attempts to return to the “old ways” ver­sus leap­ing into new ones caused fric­tions and frac­tures in the society.

Uranus is known as the “Awak­en­er”, whose thun­der­bolts of “new ways of think­ing and of new ideas”, serve to shake you and your world. Mer­cury rules the Mind and com­mu­ni­ca­tions gen­er­al­ly, and so their com­bi­na­tion is very apro­pos. In a mun­dane chart (like a cor­po­ra­tion or in this case a nation), the natal plan­ets will denote spe­cif­ic qual­i­ties of that enti­ty. Mer­cury rules the Thought-Forms of the peo­ple in gen­er­al, the Com­mu­ni­ca­tions and Trans­porta­tions of a coun­try, the Lit­er­ary world and the Intel­li­gentsia, the Press, Edu­ca­tors and Edu­ca­tion­al Institutions.

Mer­cury indi­cates for a nation, the over­all capac­i­ty to form a con­sen­sus for under­stand­ing Real­i­ty, the means for acquir­ing infor­ma­tion, and the abil­i­ty to dis­cern fact from fiction.

Cer­tain­ly, the US expe­ri­ence of 2016 is one that shook up the ordi­nary in what we “heard, thought and shared” with one anoth­er. The nor­mal bound­aries of speech, the agree­ments of com­mon­ly shared assump­tions and truths, the con­sid­er­a­tions of social dis­course that depend upon our tol­er­ance for one anoth­er ground­ed in mutu­al respect, these “norms” were bro­ken down or even shattered.

Lit­er­al­ly, the ner­vous sys­tem of many, and the men­tal­i­ty of the times, was rocked back and forth lead­ing to a grow­ing con­di­tion of spir­i­tu­al dis-ease, with men­tal, emo­tion­al and phys­i­cal exhaus­tion becom­ing the norm and bane for many.

In the chart of the USA, the most impor­tant aspect of Mer­cury is the oppo­si­tion to the plan­et Plu­to, the ruler of Will-Pow­er. The com­bi­na­tion of Mer­cury with Plu­to cre­ates a “men­tal­i­ty” with great pow­ers of obser­va­tion and con­cen­tra­tion, unique­ly endowed with a capac­i­ty for research, with the abil­i­ty to delve into greater depths of under­stand­ing and equal­ly extend the range of comprehension. 

But equal­ly, when mis­ap­plied, as is often the case with an oppo­si­tion, this com­bi­na­tion of the Will and Mind can lead to obses­sion­al think­ing, a will-full­ness and deter­mi­na­tion that can lead to the attempt to bend oth­ers to a cer­tain belief or thought. When Might makes Right, then rea­son, con­sid­er­a­tion, under­stand­ing and our tol­er­ance for one anoth­er will fail.

Our democ­ra­cy depends upon the free exchange of ideas, where there is a mutu­al respect and tol­er­ance for one anoth­er to under­pin and pre­serve our free exchange of thoughts, so that our ideas may com­pete with one anoth­er, and from this we may find the best and bright­est ideas to bring about the most benef­i­cent effects for one and all. It is this very cru­cible of forg­ing bet­ter under­stand­ing with and between one anoth­er that will face an even greater chal­lenge in 2017.

For as much as 2016 was char­ac­ter­ized by the surg­ing dis­qui­et and dis­rup­tion in thought-forms for the USA with Uranus over Mer­cury, it was already eliciting/activating the plan­et in oppo­si­tion to Mer­cury, Plu­to. In 2017 Uranus, will be exact­ly squar­ing Plu­to (while still influ­enc­ing Mer­cury). Uranus is the Avatar of Free­dom and Indi­vid­u­al­i­ty, and Plu­to is the Avatar of Will and of Pow­er. Much as the world in gen­er­al has been under­go­ing the strug­gle of Uranus Squar­ing Plu­to for sev­er­al years now, it will now take cen­ter stage in our very own nation­al chart in 2017.

There has been much dis­cus­sion of late, and obser­va­tions here and around the world, of the rise (and seem­ing) appeal of Author­i­tar­i­an­ism. Cer­tain­ly, the con­tin­u­ing align­ments of Uranus and Plu­to, (much as their sim­i­lar square her­ald­ed in the 1930’s, and many observers have not­ed how our time mir­rors that one), and the unease and uncer­tain­ties brought about the “end of an age” with Plu­to swing­ing through Capri­corn, have led some to seek a sim­pler answer to their trou­bles, they look for their sal­va­tion in a “strong” leader.

But through­out his­to­ry, and as our founders who wrote the Dec­la­ra­tion of Inde­pen­dence and our Con­sti­tu­tion knew all too well, (hav­ing them­selves thrown off a monar­chi­cal or absolute despo­tism), the end result of invest­ing one or a few with too much pow­er is Tyranny.

That is pre­cise­ly why our sys­tem is built and based upon a series of “checks and bal­ances”, so that pow­er is dis­trib­uted and not con­cen­trat­ed. The heart and cor­ner­stone of our self-gov­ern­ment is the prin­ci­ple of “Free Speech”. It is no acci­dent that this sacred prin­ci­ple is enshrined in the 1^st Amendment:

“Con­gress shall make no law respect­ing an estab­lish­ment of reli­gion, or pro­hibit­ing the free exer­cise there­of; or abridg­ing the free­dom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the peo­ple peace­ably to assem­ble, and to peti­tion the Gov­ern­ment for a redress of grievances.”

Uranus squar­ing Plu­to is the inte­gral strug­gle to bal­ance Free­dom and Will. It is a reminder to you that the true and Spir­i­tu­al use of your Will is so that you can become Self-Mas­ter­ful, and that you are here to learn to Respect one anoth­er and to exer­cise Self-Con­trol. It is a Spir­i­tu­al crime to abuse this pow­er, and the use of the Will to dom­i­nate or sub­ju­gate oth­ers is known as (Spir­i­tu­al) Tres­pass­ing. (Again, it is no acci­dent that it is one of the “Ten Commandments”).

There will be times, such as what you now encounter, where some will attempt to force their Ideas upon you, to “box” you in, to dimin­ish and dam­age the sacred Hier­ar­chy of Respon­si­bil­i­ty and attempt to divide you from one anoth­er. But as much as Plu­to and the Will may be used ille­git­i­mate­ly as the pow­er to bring unjust force upon anoth­er, know that it is equal­ly your Pow­er to Resist this too.

Do not let your­self be “boxed in” or divid­ed from one anoth­er. Do not accept the efforts by some to fos­ter a “False Real­i­ty”, as they seek to weak­en oth­er sources of Rea­son and Author­i­ty, and by so doing seek to break down the com­mon bonds which hold us to one anoth­er in Faith and Love.

Author­i­tar­i­ans seek to hold all pow­er, which depends upon their efforts to divide you from your lov­ing Spir­i­tu­al nature. They will attempt to cre­ate a “sim­ple real­i­ty” of “Us and Them”, of “Light and Dark”. They will whis­per (and shout) that only they have the answer…but your high­er self will remind you, that these are the shad­ow-forms of dam­aged minds and spir­its, these are the lies of lost and bro­ken souls.

Remem­ber who you are, and why you are here: Always main­tain the integri­ty of your own space of spir­it, which can only be achieved when you equal­ly respect, pre­serve and defend the sacred space of one and all.

Keep your mind Strong, yet equal­ly Sup­ple and Nuanced, by hold­ing to the high­est prin­ci­ples of Spir­it, the fore­most being this:

“You are all relat­ed, and what you do to the least of these you do to the One”.

Above all, do not be divid­ed from one another.

Remem­ber who you are, you are seek­ers and sto­ry­tellers, and from shar­ing your thoughts and wis­dom with one anoth­er you will pre­vail. Tell your sto­ries to one anoth­er, so that you may Strength­en your com­mon bonds and understanding.

By this you will pre­serve, pro­tect and defend your­self, your world and one another.

All this you will do if you hold in your heart the Pri­ma­ry Spir­i­tu­al Triad:

May you Speak with Wisdom…

May you Live by Love…

May you Be all for one, and one for All.

Next, Don­ald Trump