Saturn Return

I'm so sick of my Saturn Return I could punch something.

It's been over a year now, I thought I made it out home free. I thought I was on the other side of the mirror. I began advising my friends on the horrors that awaited them in the grueling task of self reflection only to hear from a friend of mine today, I've got another year to go. I told him I had to hang up the phone before I threw it across the room. Dramatic? Yes. Does it accurately represent my feelings about this? Absolutely.

They say that Saturn returns to your natal position every 29.5 years and is sort of a mid-term exam to test your integrity, morals and stability as a person. Saturn asks of us to really figure out who we are as a person and carve a path out of the stone we're made from to stabilize this persona and experience. It challenges all aspects of who we are so that we are able to better understand our strengths and weaknesses.

In my experience, I've found that my Saturn return started out like one of those old office rolodex files. I was casually flipping through the years of my life, starting in childhood, experiencing memories that impacted me in order from one age to the next. I'd find myself longing to watch an old tv show, or listen to music that was reminiscent of another era. I'd delved into the quirky habits I loved as a child, remembered dancing and baking cookies with my grandmother. I remembered the loss of my Grandfather, and eventually the entire paternal side of my family.

These patterns that started to emerge, started to tell a more concise story about how I've come to be who I am at this point. Except, in some ways, instead of the whole picture empowering me, it felt like it took my knees out with a baseball bat. I've been humbled. My ego has been quashed. I no longer find the same pride in my presence as I did in my naive years of the early 20's. I'm definitely proud of the struggles and accomplishments I've overcome and conquered, but, I ask myself, do I like this person that I've become?

Imagine it like your childhood bedroom. One day, you walked out of it, leaving behind all of the trinkets of yesteryears. You moved on to adult life of dating, adventure, work and independent struggles. Your Mom calls, she wants you to clean out your old room you've left like a time capsule. You wander in, excited at the possibilities of the finds of this retro egg hunt, and walk out feeling like an emotional hoarder.

You looked at all those old photographs and remembered a thing or two you wish you would have forgotten. You try to file it away in your mind, but, Saturn, he says "There is work to be done here". We look deeper into the photos and our trinkets and our scars and we ask ourselves, was there something left undone that needs to be tended to? Of course there is. We've shoved these aspects of ourselves down so tight, that all of a sudden we recognize the defense mechanisms caused by doing such, showing up everywhere uninvited.

I've spent the last ten years of my life working on my own self-growth through my own spiritual awakening, exploration and practice and now recognize that in that awakening, our problems, our coping mechanisms and our scars, don't magically disappear. We ignore them. We may shine some light on them, but, they are still there looking for resolve. I've practiced the art of letting go, I've showered the flames of forgiveness on those who've made me feel pain, and now I'm here, shoveling through it all asking "Does this thing still have value, or does it go in the donate pile?"

I feel all of my usual fight or flight triggers popping up, and as I make plans to run from all of these emotions, Saturn stands there like an overbearing parent telling you you're not allowed to go forward with your plans. He does not consent. He takes away your money, he takes away your options, he sends you back to your room to think about what you've done. Is he right? Probably. Am I childishly pissed about it? Most assuredly.

In my career as a psychic and intuitive counselor, people are often asking me if I'm very good as astrology. If I can help them figure out their astrological charts. I always tell them I'm at "Astrology Medium". Astrology "Light" is to me, the understanding of your sun sign and that your birth chart affects you- you might understand your compatibility of what signs you're supposed to attract or avoid, or which place to look in the newspaper to read your corresponding horoscope. I have moved on a bit from there to find out that I have a basic understanding of the sun sign, the ascendent (rising sign, the moon sign, venus, mars, and mercury. The more I learn about astrology, the more I realize that this is an area of study that could take a lifetime to perfect and understand accurately independent of some sort of computer or chart assistance.

As much as I've stared at these experiences of the grains of the sands of myself, I'm anxiously awaiting the period of time where the dark karmic cloud of Saturn moves on to another blessed soul who's made it to their Universal space of learning and tide turning, and I can feel like progress is being made without cautiously looking back at every scratch left in the swollen wooden door of my past. I'm sure there is a thing or two more I must take from this pile of primordial goo that makes up the universe of me before this gateway closes, but, I'm gonna light a candle and pray it ends sooner than later.