I would like to write about the planet Chiron. I use the term planet loosely, as there has been some difficulty in regards to what this celestial body actually is. Lying between Saturn and Uranus, Chiron first came to notice in 1977 by astronomers when it suddenly appeared in our solar system, and there is speculation that it can disappear the same way. Having said that, I would like to simplify matters and call it a planet that is noteworthy - while it is still within our immediate realm.
In Greek mythology Chiron was the bastard son of Chronos and Philyra, with whom he carried out an illicit affair while they both shape-shifted into horses. When Chiron was born, Philyra rejected her child outright and committed suicide. The reason was because Chiron was born with the upper body of a human and the lower body of a horse. Abandoned from that point onwards, Chiron fended for himself as an outsider. From this early experience Chiron learned the art of healing, which raises an interesting point as to why a lot of astrologers work with this planet in various ways, including delineating a natal chart and observing mundane events for the long term.
Chiron takes about four years to travel through each zodiac sign so we’re looking at a period of 48 – 50 years before its planetary return in any one sign. The amount of time varies as we must include periods of retrograde – along with the size of the zodiacal constellation through which it passes.
Enough of that, though. Let’s get to the nuts and bolts of why Chiron can be seen to be important. Chiron was wounded by rejection from his mother, and through his metaphysical training over the course of his life he was able to assist others who have been through a similar experience, along with his ability to heal.
Chiron currently sits at 0 degrees in the sign of Pisces, the spiritual thinkers who hide their emotions in the deepest waters. It’s an interesting placement at this time, because if there have been long-term memories of trauma which are otherwise submerged, Chiron will move his way in, as a way of lifting up these memories from the deep, in an effort for the person concerned to address them.
I’ll give you an example of how this can play out. My natal Saturn is 1 degree of Pisces and transiting Chiron is pretty much exact, give or take a few minutes. The alignment of these two planets coincide with the reconnecting of high school friends and reawakening of childhood trauma that I experienced. It’s been more than 30 years since I left school and I left in a very unhappy phase of my life, due to some full-on bullying that was ceaseless.
I was, in time, able to continue with my life and learned many valuable lessons along the way. I had not kept up very much contact with people I knew from school because I had left that part of my life behind me. I had carved out a relatively happy and stable existence when fate has dealt a rather big hand for me to deal with – a hand connected to my past.
Now, with the alignment I currently have, Chiron is giving Saturn a nudge. Saturn is stolid, dependable, and quite ambitious, not allowing emotions to get in the way. Now is no longer the time for me to keep a stiff upper lip and pretend that this didn’t ever occur. I have an opportunity to address this situation for what it really is – to learn from these experiences, to heal, and to finally move forward to the next phase of my life.
This opportunity has brought up an array of emotions. I have been angry that people can behave in such a diabolical fashion towards another human, and that I allowed such things to happen. I have been very emotional because the submerged trauma has returned in painful ways. I didn’t understand why I was given such a task to learn from. After experiencing these feelings, the truth has slowly begun to dawn on me.
People from all walks of life experience various degrees of bullying and other traumatic experiences. We need these experiences as a way of coping with what life throws at us, as a means to survive. If we had it great all the time, there would be no real appreciation for what that would feel like. Bullies tend to get bullied themselves and a lot of the time they do it as a means of acceptance among their peers. During childhood and teenage years, that would be particularly prevalent, due to peer pressure. Some of them, unfortunately, take it to extremes.
In my current existence with these reconnections from school, there is every possibility of meeting with people I didn’t always like, especially those from whom I’ve had the hardest time. From an adult perspective, however, there is every chance of those feelings changing. I’ve come to realise that I haven’t been the only victim - it just felt like I was as a kid when this was all happening.
This is Chiron’s purpose astrologically, in that we have the opportunity to not only heal ourselves, we can assist others who are experiencing similar issues in their lives. Everyone’s experiences at this time will greatly differ, depending on how it transits in individual charts. For those of you who don’t fully understand the fundamentals of astrology, that’s okay. Intuition will guide you. Another purpose of Chiron’s is to remember that nothing is ever really forgotten. Fate - or Wyrd as I call it – has a way of presenting these forks in the road for us. The direction we choose is ultimately our own.
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