My favorite image of Chiron and Achilles, c1922-25 By John Singer Sargent {{PD}}
I believe we need to expand the definition of the astrological Chiron. Yes, it’s our wounds, especially that primal one that lives in the core of our Being. And it holds that special gift, that thing we can do like no one else. Chiron also shows where we can offer healing to others–and my own personal theory, that since 2012 we’ve been able to offer that healing to ourselves–that year didn’t bring the end of the world, it brought the end of a world where we weren’t able to give ourselves, to do for ourselves, that soothing and knitting together we’d wished to have but found we could only pass on to others. Now we can give that healing to ourselves, provided we can access our Chirotic energies consciously. So, Chiron covers a lot of vital ground, and I’m not proposing a change in what it signifies so much as a shift in how we think of it.
My recent work has been pointing more and more to the isolating way we’re thinking of Chiron. It hurts! It’s over there! It’s tricky to understand, to access! We’d rather not think about it, probably because Chiron in healed form asks us to be thoroughly responsible for ourselves–and most of us would rather leave a little room for excuses, blame, and a wee bit of slack–and I don’t blame anyone for that.
I’ve concluded we need to think of Chiron not as the wound or the gift or that special healing energy, but as the sum of all experience–because what informs our remembrance of things past as thoroughly as those things that wounded us, or that healed us, or that we excel at? Those are all core components of unique identity, a kind of anti-karma: it’s not the total meaning of what we do, it’s the total meaning of what we undergo, the times we bump up against the world and the world bumps back, leaving a mark, changing us through hurt, through helping define our particular talents, or through a growing understanding of what it takes to recover and go on.
I ask you, then, to think of Chiron as a collection of results, gleaned from experiences that shape us. They feel like facts, like things we’ve been presented with, whole, but they are actually malleable, changing with our changing exposures and interactions. Chiron needs to be seen as the sum of all experiences that change our core concepts of our weaknesses (the hurts) and strengths (original talents and gifts). In that sense, this body informs us, in very clear terms, about where we might be susceptible to pressure that skews our motivations and perceptions (to protect the wound) and where we should hold an unusual amount of confidence (when utilizing our very particular talents), and it shows us precisely where we have a kind of magic touch when it comes to helping others. And those are all pretty useful things to know.
Hi Julie, We’ve talked about this a little (this is from a client), but I’d like to know more about my Venus conjunct the south node in my 2nd (Chiron there as well). How this affects my friendships, love and money. How can I work with these energies better. Also maybe more about the south node/north node in general. Thank you!
Hello! First we need to note how your Chiron in Aries in the 2nd sits in the 29th degree; this may be the most important thing about it, as it invests the sense of Self-worth, talent expression, and earning ability (2nd), and the sense of autonomy and agency, and the ability to act, choose, and do (Aries) with a perpetual dual aura of woundedness and of giftedness, which is under continual and enormous pressure, on the one hand to simply survive, and on the other hand to prove itself, once and for all.
The result of this influence of extremes may be confidence that periodically collapses into Self-questioning; a sureness in the possession of unique talents that fluctuates with a feeling that either those talents will never be appreciated, or that you will never be able to adequately express them; and possibly a too-strong idea that you are responsible for everything that does and ever has happened to you, that alternates with a belief that your circumstances would be different, if not for the influence (and sometimes persecution) of others.
Chiron here is a very tender spot, a wound always open to injury as well as a belief in unusual giftedness that is one’s greatest asset, and being conjoined the very close South Node-Venus conjunction, it draws the varied facets of the Chirotic nature directly into the values, the sense of yourself as a woman, into your ideas of Love and Money and relationships as a whole, into matters of the 3rd (thought processes, communication, agreements and contracts, sibling relationships, the early and local environments) and 8th (other people’s resources, cooperative ventures, particularly those where you are subordinate to or dependent on someone else, what you share with others and they with you, and some matters of human nature that may be secret or ‘hidden’) Houses ruled by Venus, and imbues it all with a sense of knowing or experience drawn from the past (SN).
One of the issues may be a perpetual mix-up in your own perceptions: is it me, or is it them? you may ask yourself–and essentially, it’s both! though of course, your own perceptual nature drives how you react to both your own thoughts and outside Chirotic influences.
So this may be a heavy, always-on-your-mind influence that presses you to act, to show what you can do–and we see this pressure principally channeled in Chiron as apex to a Fist of God with the very close Neptune/Midheaven-Zeus square as its base. Zeus is in Virgo in the 7th=fastidious attention to goals and ambitions, controlled expression through the Arts, the desire for a discerning audience, a vulnerability to criticism and critique that could separate you from your most inspired plans; and Neptune/ MC are only one minute apart in Sagittarius in the 10th=you want to share your factual knowledge and your inner ‘knowing’, to reach out, to bring disparate elements of the world together, to teach, to impart, with an awareness of the width of human experience, and you want to be known for this, you want it to be seen as your vocation/ career in the forms your ambitions dictate, to be seen as manifesting pure creativity–and yet the square says that they’re conflicts here.
My guess is those contrasts are seated in the friction between what you’ve been taught and what you believe, and the ways those have been contradicted by feedback and personal experience, all as it has formed your Self-concepts, especially as they refer to talent expression (2nd House)–and those shape both the experience of the wound, and the expression of the gift (both Chiron). But, since belief is the underpinning of both the Chirotic perceptions (via the lens they impose) and as they figure in to the creative energy, the public role, and the sense of empowerment (all through locating 10th House Neptune, the MC, and Juno in Sagittarius, ruled by Jupiter), we see that a look at Jupiter, as both belief and ‘the facts of the matter’, is in order.
Jupiter is late in Taurus in the 3rd, conjoined Black Moon Lilith (the mathematical point representing what we ignore or deny, or matters that enrage us at the way they violate our rights). This suggests that what you believe is strongly influenced by the mind, which we’ve seen is inextricably linked with both the Chiron wounds and the asset, talent, and Self-assessment picture. It also implies that those matters you’d rather not deal with, or that make you so angry you might explode, are thoroughly ignored, tucked away in a dark vault of the mind–probably so that they don’t spoil a perceptual picture that relies heavily on taking a positive tack to keep you both active, moving forward, and productive, without forcing the processing of the ways you’ve been hurt or feel put down–so overall, a likely healthy mechanism, and for the most part it probably allows you to exclude what could otherwise become obsessive or debilitating and overly critical Self-assessments.
The most striking thing about your Jupiter is that it sits sextile your Mercury-Sun in Pisces in the 1st, forming the base of a Finger of God with apex the Libra North Node. Aha! Suppression that would in other situations cause dysfunction in this case allows you to move forward in ways that are true to who you are and that allows cooperation and collaboration. So, what we can see around your Chiron is that it’s a kind of pivot point, connecting the sense of vulnerability and fear of being overwhelmed by others (your Aries Chiron–the last thing it wants is to lose autonomy!) reaching/ connected to other vital dynamics that allow you to balance influences in such a way that they optimize function. That is, you’ve got a well-oiled machine there–so digging at various parts or functions will only disturb what is already carefully balanced. Trust yourself, and the Universe, which will pipe up when you need to attend to something, and know that it’s not really necessary for you to excavate certain energies–just allow them to work as they naturally do.
Real-Life Symbols of Chiron: LeBron James
So I was contemplating Chiron (as we all do, in idle moments) and a commercial came on TV with LeBron James, whose bottom half was a motorcycle–and suddenly that clicked as a kind of modern-day Chiron figure! Though Chiron was a centaur, his parentage made him special; as the offspring of the Titan Cronus, who had taken equine form, and the nymph Philyra, Chiron was a Being beyond human and yet intimately familiar with many of humanity’s most painful experiences. He was abandoned by his mother, and it’s this part of the myth that likely led to him being representative of the primal wound, one so deep within the psyche that it figures in absolutely everything one does and is.
Chiron was unusual in that, unlike his fellow centaurs, he cultivated a life of the mind, beyond the lusts of the inherent animal nature, fostered by and tutored by the god Apollo. This represents that other major facet of astrological Chiron, its designation of one’s unique and very particular talent or gift, an area or process in which you’re innately educated and wise. And that leads us to how a basketball star (one who is unusually beloved, with little criticism or censure coming his way) may in some small way vibe to the Chiron essence.
LeBron James’s Chiron sits in Gemini in the Whole Sign 1st, but above the horizon, which in the Placidus system would place it in the 12th (birth data: 30 December 1984, 4:04 PM Akron, Ohio, USA). Right away we see someone with the facility to communicate through his own Beingness (the Chirotic gift)–he is the message, in a certain way–and this can carry a spiritual or ‘Cosmic’ knowing–and, we might surmise that his ability is rooted at least in part in an awareness of how much words can mean, of the impact they can have, with the significator of ‘the Wound’ in Gemini.
Ruler Mercury sits in the 7th, conjoined Uranus, ruler of the 9th, both in Sagittarius but not positioned in opposition to Chiron=communicating Higher Mind to all others, to an ‘audience’, through one’s Art (in this case, athletics, well signified by Sagittarius). Merc rules the 1st and 4th=there’s a harmony here between identity (1st) and the deepest inner Self (4th)–not to mention that James was raised to be what he shows to the world.
Most interesting in the Chiron-themed picture, though, may be the way, if we’re generous with our orbs (as we often need to be in natal work, in order to get a truly complete picture), we see Chiron as apex to a loose Finger of God with base of Pluto in Scorpio in the 6th and Neptune (which is widely conjoined the Sun, symbol of the Self/ Soul) in Capricorn in the 8th. So, the Chirotic skills are perfect for supporting change (this may even be seen as a duty) in service to the ideal (Neptune) that benefits everyone (8th).
Did I say most interesting? Maybe this is even more compelling: Chiron is apex to a tight Fist of God with base of a Cardinal square (and those demand action) between Vesta in Libra in the 5th and Jupiter in Capricorn in the 8th=tension between the sense that one must honor others even as one observes the restrictions and disparities in the social order can be reconciled via the Chiron energies; that is, through communication that heals, and expression of the gift for communing and networking.
LeBron has recently been involved in promoting voting and educating others not just on right and need to vote, but on how to go about it to insure one’s voice is heard. That’s the ultimate communication, the ultimate Geminian networking, that lifts the Chirotic energy to a Transpersonal level: I use my gift to make sure you are heard.
A final thing of note is that transiting Saturn, Pluto, Pallas, and Jupiter are all for various spans of time conjoining LeBron’s natal Jupiter, encouraging him to share what he knows in the name of making permanent meaningful change to the reality picture, to transform with wisdom and ‘the facts’ so that things are closer to those principles of freedom and enlightenment through knowledge (both Jupiter) that we all believe in.
See my book, Chiron in the Natal Chart here. And to follow next week, a third installment on Chiron–plus, a little something for this weekend later today. Stay safe and healthy!
Just thought this was pretty–it has nothing to do with Chiron–fungi are very Plutonian! Watercolour depiction of the fly agaric, 1892. Likely painted at an art class near Bristol, England, the writing says “Agaricus muscarius” and “Leigh woods Sept/92” CC BY 4.0
In our ongoing exploration of specific natal aspects Readers have submitted for discussion (submissions are closed), we focus now on Chiron. Though initially considered an asteroid, it’s currently classified as a Centaur (it was in fact the first-discovered, lending its character to the classification itself), which is defined as an object orbiting the Sun between the asteroid belt and the Kuiper belt–and yet it behaves a little bit like a comet, so also carries a cometary designation (95P), and some even consider it a dwarf planet. All this variety (or is it confusion?) about how to categorize it hints at one of its most prominent characteristics: that what it designates in our natal charts has layers of meaning, an onion of hurt, experience, skill, and unique perspective, all of which can teach us about ourselves and our place within the world.
There is the Chiron hurt, something so deep and pervasive the individual can often be unaware of it; there is what we learn from the hurt, that we can then utilize, to help both ourselves and others; there is a Chirotic gift (or more than one) related to the sign and to our own processing and experience of it, which before 2012 we could offer only to others (and that we can now access–and so ‘do’–for ourselves); and there is a Transpersonal expression of this energy, one that takes the individual, cumulative Chiron knowledge and applies it to the Collective condition. So, Chiron designates qualities that are highly personalized, highly individual, and that with enough effort at understanding and re-shaping, we may at some point in life lift from the entirely personal, reactionary arena to utilization of the ‘gift within the wound’, to, finally, a transpersonal, Collective expression, one where our gift in some way answers a need found in the Collective or out in the world.
(Birth data redacted) I am interested in my Chiron, in Capricorn. I have had numerous struggles with structures and authority figures. I feel that this recent period has been sort of like a final exam or defending my thesis. I know that the wound doesn’t really go away but I feel stronger just putting all the past struggles into context now instead of feeling as though they are coming at me as a series of random tortures. I wonder what you would have to say about a broad now-moment and a future with Chiron in Capricorn. Thanks for choosing my inquiry–if you do!
You don’t ask about an aspect, but rather an entity, a single body, which is okay when it’s one that in the general astrological world still suffers from a state of too little clarity–that is, it’s difficult to see Chiron’s action in the natal chart when we see it in its most simplistic terms, ‘wound and gift’. That tempts us to want to reduce its effects to a clear-cut negative or positive, and that’s not only unproductive, it dismisses our need to look at how truly personal the manifestations of this energy are, how completely they have been tailored to our character, experience, and responses. Neither of those definitions of Chiron as wound and gift is wrong, but those labels do remove the nuances of what can be a very important, even vital, influence for the individual.
For you, Chiron plays a fundamental role in Self-image, with its location in the 2nd of assets and talents, and in Capricorn, the wound almost certainly involves your relationships to and reactions to both structures in the life and the concept of authority, with the initial reaction almost always presenting in response to those who hold authority in your life. At least part of why you may be responding so strongly and personally to Capricorn life areas is this body’s location in the 2nd of Self-image–it may feel that what hurts you also, inevitably, defines you (and we might want to throw in rules, ways in which your Will or feelings have been thwarted or restricted, and matters where you feel it’s ‘all work and no play’, particularly when this stands in contrast to what others around you seem to enjoy).
Does it feel as if the drudgery always falls to you? Where Chiron sits can often seem to be a difficult place, one where we’re denied joy, and if it does for you, dear Reader, that’s not surprising, especially considering that the closest aspect Chiron makes to a major body is its opposition to Uranus–and that may feel as if every time you try to ‘be yourself’ or act spontaneously or think independently (Uranus rules the 3rd) you get a Capricorn response (which may sound like ‘Control yourself’ or ‘Sit down’ or even ‘You’re not allowed’ or ‘That idea’s crazy!’). Compound this with Uranus in the 8th suggesting that others seem to have all the freedom, are allowed to be as erratic, unpredictable, or unique as they want–and that you may feel you have to clean up after them–it may be the only initially perceived path that allows you to feel good about yourself, by complying with these ‘demands’ (and this is supported by Chiron’s semi-sextile to the Ascendant and its trines to Jupiter and Hygeia in the 6th, all possibly making you feel it’s your duty to serve the larger social order, and to modify yourself in order to do so, that being healthy depends on it–but really, being healthy depends on working out your relationship to Chiron and the social order that surrounds you, rather than just complying with it, as you’ll never find peace by conforming).
And, with Uranus in the 8th but ruling the 3rd (as well as the close assembly of Sun, Mercury, and NN–Whole Sign), you may have the feeling that others are either trying to control your thinking, or that they are assessing your mental processes and reasoning as flighty, unreliable, or ‘out there’–and so, by extension, calling you these things (Sun in Aquarius 3rd), reaching into the mentality and insulting the Capricorn wound, which demands adherence to and observance of the rules, the status quo, and authorities. It may seem you are being insulted, expected to be ashamed, every time you act in ways that feel original or unique to you–but that’s an internal mechanism, one that plays out in you but that is spurred by others, even though the message you may be getting is, ‘Who do you think you are?’
One of the most difficult facets of your placement is that this energy is in a highly personal space (the 2nd, the part of you that judges yourself) but doesn’t contact any of the personal planets. Without contact to the personals (Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars) one can feel adrift, as if the wider world, even the Universe, is targeting you, inflicting puzzling and unwarranted Capricornian penalties, suppressing your efforts at Self-improvement and earning (2nd)–and unless you can get some perspective, may trap you in ‘Me Against The World’ scenarios that play out over and over in new circumstances, but using old energies. Capricorn Chiron can bring a heavy sense of responsibility, and that’s difficult to fulfill when you feel that authority may consistently be against you (or that authorities have such high expectations or standards for your performance that you feel they’ll never be met).
Born just after a Lunar eclipse, hence the natal Sun and North Node are quite close, and may give a sense that accomplishment is a relentlessly difficult uphill climb, as if the prime moment for presenting what you know and feel has somehow passed. Re-frame this as a sense of completion in terms of being ready to pass things on to others or to cooperate with others in your efforts. A sesquiquadrate of Chiron to Ceres points out how tough the relationship is not just to external authorities but to your own inner sense of being in charge, of granting yourself permission to go forward. Become your own authority, in a sense, and this may offer the freedom you’ve (probably) been seeking.
Though this exercise was about natal aspects, not forecasts, I can suggest this: both personal security about who you are, and about making your way in the world, likely comes from disciplined expression of the talents, especially the creative ones, when applied to achieving specific goals with the cooperation of others (Chiron ruler Saturn conjoined Neptune in Libra in the 11th of goals, wishes, friendship, group involvement); look for others who support your originality and who are accepting of an individuality that’s comfortable for you–and there’s no ‘right’ model for this, that’s what makes it so hard–you have to trust yourself and stay firmly connected to the reality of things, even as you dream and invent. This may be an intense academic stance, may involve the sciences or futurism, may be about creative uniqueness, especially manifesting the imagined in real-world terms, or the way Higher Mind and spirituality are intertwined, and may involve a need to write, speak, or communicate your specific viewpoint to others.
Taking an intellectual approach (Sun and Merc in Aquarius) may initially cause internal conflict as Chiron demands a material response, but seeing that creativity in the current reality (Chiron ruler Saturn conj Neptune) is needed will resolve the tension, without too much conscious effort. Knowing healing is possiblewill go a long way toward repair of the wound; so will seeing the creative or spiritual take material form in the life.
Julie Demboski's ASTROLOGY 