Prescient Pluto-Square Power Problems

2.22.11


On Friday (Feb 25), Jupiter in Aries forms an exact square to Pluto in Capricorn… an aspect that pits an expanded enthusiasm for immediate action-oriented thrusts of individual will (Jupiter) against imperiled power structures desperate to preserve their throne-like spot at the top of the food chain (Pluto).

Does such an astrological signature dovetail with what we're presently observing all around us? Check out the front-page news, and there's your answer.

Jupiter-Pluto squares are renowned for the manner in which they expose the bloat of blatant power-grabs, typically because one zone of enhanced excitement infringes upon the ever-hungry demands of another. Jupiter's involvement always invokes evidence that something has become bigger, transcended its prior limits, spread into new territory and/or grown beyond an ability to be contained. In a clash with Pluto, then, the main theme centers on the confrontation between (1) whatever's in the active process of growing and (2) the intense interests being threatened by said growth.

Jupiter and Pluto already faced this square last summer, when they remained in a prolonged nearly-exact standoff in late-July and early-August. At that time, this square comprised but a mere piece of the larger 'cardinal climax' astrology of mid-2010 (recapped here, with further links therein), at which point Jupiter was also conjunct Uranus, while Saturn further blocked both Jupiter and Pluto by opposition and square, respectively.

Though the nascent stirrings of what's now coming into clearer expression were surely active last year, Saturn's countervailing presence served to temper and cool the fieriest of these passions. Saturn, exalted in Libra, responded to every power challenge with seemingly calm-headed diplomacy. However, handling sincere challenges with compromise only works in certain circumstances and/or to a certain degree, and it also has its limits—too much of it, and we're squashing waves of creative progress beneath dulling moderation.

Saturn has since moved out of both its square with Pluto and its opposition to Uranus, and now can no longer serve to moderate the revolutionary surges. And since the sparks were let loose in December 2010, as a potent lunar eclipse coincided with a Mars-Pluto-North Node conjunction, a cascade of revolts beginning in Tunisia and spreading across the Middle East and North Africa (more at Wikipedia) has captured the world's attention, perfectly encapsulating the astrology of the moment, unleashing unbridled 'people power' to topple the rot of despotic centralized rulership.

As of last week, this swell had reached America's heartland, as workers in Wisconsin took to the streets to protest a state-government budgetary bait-and-switch which risks weakening the collective bargaining power of public employees ('What's Happening in Wisconsin Explained', Mother Jones). Comrades of the working people in countries all over the world, including Egypt, sent pizza to the Madison protestors… a highly symbolic sign, no matter how seemingly trivial, of global solidarity in the fight against abuses of authority.

Are we now witnessing the start of a worldwide anti-government movement? To hear the astrology tell it, quite possibly so.

The Jupiter-Pluto square, which remains within a 5-degree orb for another month, is only the opening chapter of the real story of revolution—the yet-to-fully-manifest Uranus-Pluto square. Jupiter is merely playing the role of a 'people's prophet', riding through the streets like Paul Revere, warning of what is still to come. While this concentrated upswing in power-challenge activism rolls over us, with Jupiter rushing through the assertive warrior-sign of Aries between now and early June, we must ready ourselves for a much longer haul than that—one which promises increasing instability, lightning-bolt surprises, and 'liberation at all costs' extremes.

On the personal level, many of us are facing a parallel swell of impatience with ourselves. Our impetus to grow into a wider concept of empowered self (Jupiter in Aries) is colliding with subterranean psychological imprints of 'how things are supposed to be done' that were drilled into us by parents, teachers, authority figures, and/or the superego-like mass media (Pluto in Capricorn)—and we are the battleground where expansive Independence fights against constrictive submission to Order.

Today's (Tue Feb 22) movement of Mars into Pisces, along with the Sun (last Fri Feb 18) and Mercury (Mon Feb 21), should hopefully help to couch Jupiter's exaggerated push to individuate from these deeply entrenched psycho-complexes inside a cushion of compassion for the pains involved in this struggle.

After all, these disempowering beliefs that lead us to nitpick, browbeat and persecute ourselves got in there a while ago… at formative instances in our younger years… often from the coercive mouths of people we loved and sought to impress… even as we simultaneously feared or hated 'em, sought to rebel against 'em or hopelessly fell short of their inhumane expectations. Can't we muster some kindness, for both ourselves and the countless others in similar spots, in the eye of our individuating power struggles? The path forward is necessarily unclear, so grant us the wisdom not to stress about the vast unknowns.

I want to tell you that the years of such despotic self-oppression (because, let's face it, we're the ones doing it to ourselves now) won't get overthrown overnight—but that might not be exactly true. As I said, the explosive Uranus-square-Pluto amplification of these anti-authoritarian vibes we're now seeing doesn't even hit its full impact until next year… and continues for several years following. Once Uranus gets more fully entwined with Pluto, the 'split-second epiphany' type of quantum-leap evolution becomes that much more common.

The work we do over these next couple months, to (hopefully) more moderately dismiss the inner dictator from its undeserved reign, will soften the agony of its eventual overthrow. Under the coming astrology, there will be no escaping the revolution, in one form or another.