Your Week Ahead: April 19 to 25, 2020 – Accepting Uncertainty: Sun square Saturn

The Hierophant, 5 of Pentacles, and Knight of Pentacles, from the Rider Waite Smith tarot deck. (click image for larger view)

Shining a spotlight on the week ahead, we have a rather dynamic aspect which occurs on Tuesday: the Sun in Taurus square Saturn in Aquarius. Meeting up in tension with the planet of authority, lessons, restrictions or confinement may have us working with boundary issues, or questioning those factors on an internal level. We may need to define them, or address them with people or situations that ask for our accountability and implicitness.

This could lead to a sensation that we are never good enough or are not meeting expectations. If there is some element that feels quarrelsome or lording, take a breath and don’t be afraid to ask for clarification. If a personal goal seems to feel chaotic or unachievable, again, relax and try to find some appreciation in what you have attained.

Squares can represent a check point where you observe or feel the flaws in things. This can be a good time to reassess your position or simply to apply a different perspective on things so that you can move ahead once the energy clears up.

How this aspect is felt will be different for each person. Certainly, in the current climate where rules are imposed by a small few over a great many people will be cause for much questioning. The application of such questioning can still be productive and suggests being spurred on to investigate whether something is true or not.

Incidentally, I offer that this aspect is a precursor to the Sun’s conjunction to Uranus in Taurus which is currently building and is exact on Sunday April 26. I am curious to observe how this will play out, and what the message may be in next week’s reading. Since both Saturn and Uranus are still very close to one another in their squared degrees, the Sun’s relationship to them is really about one event. However, it may feel like an echo, or a flash and then the thunder. If that’s the case, then we’re in the “action” phase. Next may be the “reaction”. Said another way: cause and effect. The question then becomes, who on that spectrum is reacting, and for what reasons?

This could well represent a moment of awakening where we are suddenly aware of something. This movement will no doubt be cause for some destabilization, so it is an opportunity to practice grounding and meditation that we may align with our core and operate from that footing.

I would like to write, “be calm.” However, the Sun conjunct Uranus is probably that statements antithesis. Thankfully, Saturn is close by. This will be our anchor and we will need to be at our best.

At the centre of our lives is a belief system. It could be spiritual, religious, or mundane. Basically, everything we experience is organized by a set of criteria that establishes a method for confirming the validity of how we interpret and process those events. If something good happens to us, we determine a reason for why it feels good and look to what we’ve learnt (or what we are learning) that corroborates the reasons for such things to come about.

We often bond with others about this and share mutual experiences. The exchange of these ideas is often light and harmonious. There is a feeling of flow and of ease, and we are stable. Said another way, we feel “in control” of what is happening. Even if we are challenged, as long as we stay within the parameters of thought that encourage our point of view, we feel supported.

There are indeed people who are more controlling than others, but that kind of stability can be deceptive, especially if some element doesn’t go as planned. If something is experienced as negative, we can quickly lose this stability and move into the sensation of a loss of control. The same principle of validation quickly sets in as we can be prone to reacting that leaves little room for self examination and more for coercion.

The climate we’re in is precisely the scenario which throws off any notion of stability we may have, and yet we must continue our productivity. Everything is spun around, thrown on its head, and we are processing information about an environment that we have never encountered before.

We are figuratively and literally thrown against the perception of our mortality. Everything is in flux and in movement. Any semblance of control has vanished. Any pattern or habit in our lives that gave us comfort has been redefined as to remove the certainty it once held.

Some of our attempts to find truth will be to define what is happening based on our beliefs or ways of interpreting experience. However, since we crave certainty, we will endeavour to find people who agree with our perspective so that we can validate the belief and our perception of the experience.

The tricky part comes when someone doesn’t agree with us. When our belief about something is important (ie. strong) enough, it is expressed as control. If we feel deeply about what is happening, we should be satisfied with our personal knowing and understanding of what is right for us and an individual.

“No matter how the wind howls, the mountain will not bow to it.”
Chinese proverb

The more we attempt to get others to agree with us, the further we move away from true certainty. Are we able to ask ourselves, “Is this really true?” Is it possible to allow ourselves to be tolerant of a differing view lest it expand our thought in some way? Can we find certainty in being at peace with change? Or are we holding much too tightly to something because everything around us is threatening its very existence?

This weeks reading describes this whole process of how we find certainty through the over-identification with our ego. The Hierophant (the Taurus card in the Tarot) represents the beliefs that are taught to us, either by someone in a position of influence or by life experience.

We are secretly guided through many layers of teaching as we apply each lesson, progressing and moving deeper. Some teachings are so profound, they only truly awaken later in life, stirred by an event or circumstance. Like a seal being broken on a secret scroll that has just been discovered buried in the desert.

As we read the newly revealed teaching, we feel a sense of isolation because we lack the voice of our teacher speaking in a way that we can understand directly. We are given symbols, not clear direction. Feeling as if we are drifting through life, we crave certainty, but our overwhelming sense of disconnection magnifies our isolation.

Specifically, we are being shown something new arising in our consciousness. We may be surrounded by the warmth of truth, but we may fail to notice it. If we can find a sense of acceptance in the uncertainty, we may find the key that will give us the clue to its message and fine the warmth and reassurance we are really on a quest for. If we can break through the illusion that we are separate from our inner wisdom or from this vast intelligent universe, then we can feel the power of true stability.

As a resolution to this process and to the week, we seem to reestablish some form of personal integration. The emerging knight suggests a renewed vitality and sense of purpose as he holds new meaning and potential in his hands. He is contemplating his life, grounded and rooted in something alive, like the dark nourishing soil of his newly tilled land.

You have emerged from a testing period as one vastly capable of maturity and decisiveness. Where would you like to go now? What would you like to plant and cultivate? What harvest would you like to reap for your future abundance? Certainly, you have time to figure that out.

Thanks for reading, and wishing you a wonderful week!

Daniel Palmo

If you missed last weeks reading, you can find it here.