By Henry Oliver Walker – This file was donated to Wikimedia Commons as part of a project by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. See the Image and Data Resources Open Access Policy, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57367065

Today reality itself has the drawing power of a drain, and our choices are: circle around it and go down by disrespecting our own values and by struggling to keep the future at bay (good luck with that!), or embrace that what you once thought sacred needs review and revision. It may seem sacrilegious, but even values must change as experience accumulates, morphing perceptions, and so our beliefs. The future is foreseeable, if we are willing to squint and adjust; this foresight can give us the power and judgement to affect real-world events in smart, even genius, ways. Take advantage of this to make your reality at least a little more as you’d like it to be (Pluto semi-sq Vesta, Saturn nov Ceres, Sun qnx NN and nov Saturn)

Setting the table for your year ahead. Art by Peter Ilsted {{PD}}

Happy Solar Return to those born with the Sun at 26 Aquarius! (this year roughly in effect late afternoon Pacific time of the 14th through late afternoon of the 15th–see your birth chart for your Sun degree!) Your instincts and sense of inner knowing are both your bête noire and your saving grace in the year ahead. If you can ignore that shadow right behind you, ignore that the past still lingers like a bad taste, and concentrate on willingly adjusting your Path so that the future you’re heading toward matches all the positives you sense it can be, you can make this year one of the most fortuitous and productive you’ve ever had–and you’ll end up going very much in the right direction, surrounded by what you need in the present, as a bonus.

By rinia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=54452030

Wow, the past seems so much shinier than the present, doesn’t it? We make the mistake of thinking we can and should re-create a previous environment–but the problem is we do so under the impression that, since our past shaped our current outlook and values, we can ‘go back’, in a sense, and do ‘it’ so much better, this time around. 1) we don’t have this prerogative, and 2) this points out what we’ve forgotten: that in this particular period we are thinking of, we were not as empowered as we are today, and that we learned those valuable lessons because we had to deal with the totality of circumstances in effect at the time. Now our instincts scream at us not to alter the reality picture to more resemble a partially-understood fever dream, and we’d be smart to listen, rather than muffle the inner voice. Instead, concentrate present efforts on communicating power needs and in formulating plans to transform what’s unsatisfactory–much better than succumbing to a shiny but flawed revision of history.

(Vesta nov SN, Saturn sesq Juno, Mars enters Taurus and semi-squares Neptune, Merc semi-sq Pluto, Sun sq Sedna)

Setting the table for your year ahead. Art by Peter Ilsted {{PD}}

Happy Solar Return to those born with the Sun at 25 Aquarius! (this year in effect evening Pacific time of the 13th through evening of the 14th–see your birth chart for your Sun degree!) You may see crises around you this year, but have the distinct feeling they don’t really involve you–but do they? What you’ll observe is in anticipation of what you’ll soon experience a version of yourself–so pay close attention to what works, and what doesn’t as a response. If you’re willing to face the hard stuff head on you’ll gain considerably, and by the end of the year emotional harmony, and a refinement of the intuition as a conduit for information, will be yours.

‘Children acting the ‘Play Scene’ from “Hamlet,” Act II, Scene ii’ By Charles Hunt 1863 {{PD}}

We may be so distracted by the drama going on over power, desire, ambition, who cares about whom, who’s in charge of what (and whom), and who’s aggressing with their words (and probably denying it), that we may miss the actual impact of a particular aggression. We may lump all the kerfuffle together and so miss the one event or thrust of some action or assertion that really should be getting us up in arms, mustering our originality, accessing philosophy and Higher Mind in order to cope, and for which we are equipped with a clever and unique way of handling the circumstance. Stay calm; be the eye of the storm, and keep your focus attuned to spot that one, truly significant howl that will rise above the rest.

(Ceres sits at the midpoint of the Zeus-Pluto square, Vesta is sq Ceres and sesq Zeus and so also semi-sq Pluto, Merc contra-parallel Mars, and, saving the biggest punch for last, Mars conj Uranus)

Setting the table for your year ahead. Art by Peter Ilsted {{PD}}

Happy Solar Return to those born with the Sun at 23 Aquarius! (this year in effect evening Pacific time of the 11th through evening of the 12th–see your birth chart for your Sun degree!) Will it feel like the shining essence of who you are goes behind a cloud this year? Yes, just a little–but it’s for good reason. You’re getting ready to show the world who you are, getting ready to take the lead in your own life, listening to Higher Mind to see if those plans are as good as they seem to be–and you’re measuring everything to see if it’s practical and smart–you’ve got your hands full! So it doesn’t matter so much if you get overlooked or passed by this year–because like the caterpillar in the cocoon, you’re healing wounds, making amends, honing your original expression, and readying yourself to make a fabulous debut. Just one caution: don’t allow others to name you the ‘bad guy’ when all you’re doing is getting yourself together–the process of metamorphosis makes you an easy target for projection, and any such labeling may arise out of pure jealousy from those stuck in the mud.