This year, I have experienced intense transits, and I have noticed how my understanding of transits has enabled me to deepen intimacy in 5th house, 7th house, and 6th house relationships. Immense insight: by understanding how transits’ energies are affecting me and the people in my life, I can increase our understanding of each other’s behavior, and I can have more empathy for them. I can help them increase their understanding, too. Here are some cliff notes and reflections on how I have experienced this miracle.
Who Are You, Who Am I?
In Subtle Transformational Way to Experience the Self, I discussed how I had discovered that the generally accepted idea that each of us has a certain defined character was largely false. I experience people more as rivers than as statues.
Our being rivers seems even more obvious when I think in terms of astrology: if we are defined by the astrological energies of our natal charts, those very same energies, in constantly changing patterns, can change our expression of our energies considerably.
Of course, our birth charts are “set” when we take our first breath, but transits stretch those patterns into different shapes. We can appear quite different from “normal.”
Ego and Relationships
Ego is the default of incarnated experience. I imagine that what we call “ego” is our experience of a bundle of behaviors that stem from Reptilian Brain and our need to survive in the earthly world. The fact is that we are individual incarnated beings. I die and you go on living. Each of us has a physical body that has physical needs, and most of our physical needs involve physical things are are innately zero sum: if I have this steak, you cannot have it, too. Our marriage laws prevent physical love outside the marriage and promote a sense of “ownership” over the spouse.
I have experienced Ego as being predisposed to defining people as statues because he wants people to satisfy his wants and needs, and it’s a lot easier to imagine being satisfied when people are defined as constants. In the Six People in Every Couple, I explored this more in detail. In fact, most of us don’t relate to each other at all; we relate to our images of each other. Ego thinks this enables him to live in less fear—when he can expect predictable behavior from others. I think that our egos play that game with each other; we pretend that we are statues. It is too frightening to perceive each other as constantly changing. Reptilian Brain cannot stomach uncertainty, so ego creates a facsimile of certainty, the statue of the self and the images of others.
When we arrive at a place from which we can let go of needing or expecting anything from an other, we can start experiencing a new level of freedom in ourselves—and we can flow with others however they are in the present. I can experience my self much more openly and honestly now that I have come to recognize some of my shadows and other fantasies that scare Ego to death. I can also, through my interactions with others, signal to them that their behavior is okay, even when wildly different from the “norm.” We can start to experience each other as rivers.
How Understanding Transits Can Help to Deepen Relationships
The default in all societies I have experienced is that we are statues, so most of us expect statue behavior of our selves. Most of us know nothing of transits, but we are affected by them and experience them externally, through situations and other people.
Intimate relationships, as I think of them, are those in which we have a fairly high degree of vulnerability. 7th house relationships are famous for that (marriage, partners, rivals, professionals): it is obvious that we are vulnerable. I am also experiencing amazing intimacy in a 5th house relationship: intimacy is independent of social pattern. By casting your composite chart, you gain insight into your relationship’s energies, too. This is immense because, let’s say your composite chart indicates a very strong earthy component, and you relish each other physically. Further, the planetary pattern that indicates that physicality is transited by Saturn, so your physical relationship becomes very difficult and rare. In many couples, this would result in breaking up (“You don’t find me attractive any more! You must have someone else!”). And your other has not changed in his/her love for you; it’s just blocked right now. But ego wants to be fulfilled and is quick to blame the other.
When you know about the Saturn transit, you can experience the blockage for what it is, the weather, and you can give into it. You can ask yourselves what you can learn from it. By enduring the transit together, you can become even closer.
Another very common situation is that you each experience transits individually that demand much attention in your individual lives. So your relationship goes into the background. One partner may take this personally, but if you know about the transit, you can experience it together; if your other is really involved in his 10th house, for example, you can empathize by understanding its significance to him, and you can give him space, knowing that he doesn’t love you less, and it will pass (depending on the transit, this may take a while). If you talk openly about this, you can deepen your intimacy because he can be grateful for your understanding and giving him freedom to do what he has to do.
Intimacy in 6th house? Yes! I have seen the effects of the major Aries energy we’ve been experiencing, the conjunction of Chiron and North Node, and Mercury’s entry into Aries. It’s so hard to have meetings at work because everybody’s talking at once and not listening. It can be comical but also frustrating when you’re involved in high-pressure, detailed work that requires collaboration. That can be a disaster with Aries because it acts through initiative. Listening and consideration are given scant attention.
Example: Aries Transit March 2024
Chiron conjunct North Node in Aries is especially poignant because it combines Chiron’s wound to our ability to start things, to take the initiative, to be autonomous, with North Node’s intention. North Node in Aries indicates spiritual individual growth through taking the initiative, to being first, to starting things. This leads to an environment of insistence on starting our ideas. It can be quite strong and can easily lead to conflict. Subjectivity is heightened. When Mercury entered Aries just before Pisces New Moon, our perceptions, thoughts, and communication started resonating with this subjective insistence. When Sun enters Aries this week, it will amp up the energy even more.
By knowing about these transits, I can be empathic, and I can help people, even without going into the astro, feel heard and considered. I can help people understand each other, too. Work situations can become quite heated when your projects, or your team’s projects are high-stakes and very visible. That’s when you are vulnerable; it’s where you can create strong work relationships. I am supporting several high-visibility projects now, so knowing about the Aries transits really helps me to keep perspective.
Practiced Ignorance 