Post on the Reversed Nodes on Northnode Astrology

Elizabeth Spring kindly asked me to guest post on her blog, North Node Astrology, this week and I choose to write about the Reversed Nodes in synastry. I'm going to put a snip on this blog and encourage you to read the rest on her blog. She has other wonderful posts on the Moon's Nodes and usually adds one a week!

snip "What I found after looking up all my extended family’s birth dates was very interesting. Out of all the couples in both my parent’s generation and mine, only ONE had Reversed Nodes! In fact, only a few parent/children had Reversed Nodes and most of the time it was the mother, not the father, involved. These were children that left home at the first opportunity, usually going off to school halfway across the country.

It is my aunt and uncle who live closest to us who have the Reversed Nodes. They will have been married for 55 years this year and it has been a stressful relationship most of that time. My uncle is 10 yrs older than my aunt (my mother’s youngest sister) and they have 5 children, the oldest of whom is 9 years younger than I. I don’t have birth times for either person so I will just review the astrology using the shorthand method.

My aunt is an Aquarius Sun, Capricorn Moon and my uncle has a Taurus Sun and very likely an Aquarius Moon. If this is the case, the Luminaries form a trine and conjunction by sign – very compatible! Their Moons would be semi-sextile (Capricorn to Aquarius) and that does seem to fit. My aunt is extremely well organized and always had neatly written lists of chores for her kids posted about. =grin= "snip

This is the Three of Swords from the Lover's Path tarot deck and is obviously about the pain we can experience in our relationships.

Book Review: Relationships & Life Cycles by Stephen Arroyo

This is the book that changed the way I looked at relationships from an astrological point of view. Stephen Arroyo, a fellow Libra, offers a fair and un-judgmental look at the astrology of relating. He clearly describes how energy moves between people as shown by the charts in synastry. I have used the guidelines he lays out in this book for many years with very consistent results.

The concept I call “intra-aspects” (same planets in aspect from both charts) is one Stephen came up with and these sets of aspects are invaluable in pointing to a major theme in the relationship. There are several examples of how these work in this book. He also demonstrates how he lays out the information from both charts to find these aspects. The software I use will produce a grid making it easy to find the intra-aspects.

Stephen is also one of the few astrologers who don’t make Saturn a “bad” guy and in fact he talks about the frequency Saturn/personal planet aspects by conjunction and square show up in chart comparisons of couples who have been together for years. He refers to Saturn aspects in synastry as stabilizing and my experience concurs with this assessment. Another valuable insight for me in regards to “hard” aspects in synastry is his assessment of individual charts and their tolerance for challenges in relationships. What is overwhelming to one person may be the spice of life to another.

Another concept Stephen discusses in this book is how parallels between two charts work. For example, one person has Sun in Aries and another has Sun conjunct Mars – they tend to relate well because Mars plays a big role in who they are as individuals. When two people have a number of these types of parallels in their charts they will find it easy to understand the other even without many of the classic synastry aspects.

The downside of this book is the way it is written. Most of the material is from a series of lectures he gave and while very informative this makes the presentation uneven and disjointed in places. However, compared to the value of what he offers this is a minor issue! If you are at all interested in the astrology of relationships, this is a must have for your astrology library . . . at least in my opinion. =grin=

The Composite Chart and Lifestyle

Madeline, Skylight Astrology, asked me about the lifestyle I have with my SO and started me thinking about the possibility our Composite chart reflecting it. We live in the farm house in a rural area in central Washington. In fact, it’s the much remodeled house I grew up in and left many, many years ago. When I was single, my pattern was to move every couple of years or so – and my relationships tended to be short lived too, so looking at the composite charts for those relationships wouldn’t be too informative.

Within a year after my Aries and I became a couple, we bought the property and house we still live in 17 years later. In fact, we got married and signed our mortgage a couple of weeks later! Our composite chart has Sun conjunct Venus in Capricorn and Jupiter in Capricorn all in the 12th House – we are a very private couple and both of us prefer it that way. Aquarius is Rising and Mercury is conjunct the ascendant in the 1st House. The Moon is in Cancer in the 6th House and sextile Saturn in Virgo in the 8th. The thing is neither of us have any planets in Earth in our natal charts yet it is strongly represented in our composite.

We live a frugal life (Capricorn Sun) and are happy homebodies (Cancer Moon). Taurus is the sign on the cusp of the 4th House and very descriptive of our rural home with a big yard and vegetable gardens and fruit trees. We have experimented with u-pick berries and still sell berries we pick in season. Having the Moon in the 6th also shows the connection between our vocation of gardening and an awareness of the seasonal changes. We often plant according to the phase of the Moon too. Ceres in the composite is in Pisces in the 2nd House and opposes Saturn in Virgo in the 8th . . . another tie to the Natural world and placing value on living close to it. We are very aware of the need to bring balance in the way we live close to Nature and have many discussions about the best way to do this. Heh, we’ve planted many, many trees and shrubs on our property (Saturn in Virgo)!

I see the Aquarius Rising in our determination to live our lives in the way we see fit and perhaps the close inconjunct from Uranus in Cancer on the cusp of the 6th House to the Ascendant reinforces that spirit of independence. Are we living an anachronistic life or are we ahead of the times? Whatever it is, it is our choice.

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I’d love to get more feedback on the composite chart and people’s lifestyles as a couple. Of course, for a good composite chart, you need accurate birth times for both partners. Astro.com will calculate the mid-point composite chart for you for free.

This is The World tarot card from the Goddess deck. Gaia is one of my most beloved goddesses . . .

The Inconjunct in Synastry

There has been discussion about the Inconjunct (150° degree aspect) in synastry and soul mates but I’m not going to go there since this is outside my personal experience realm. I’m going to discuss the possibilities inherent in everyday interactions when people have the personal planets inconjunct by sign in synastry. We are under the aegis of Earth now and it is nuts and bolts time, not ideology that is asked for.

A reasonably typical scenario is when two people are attracted to each other with red hot chemistry shown by strong Venus/Mars aspects between them. However when we look at the way the Luminaries and Mercury relate we find the inconjunct showing up. Let’s start with what happens when the Luminaries (the Sun & Moon) are inconjunct.

If person A has Sun in Gemini and person B has their Moon in Scorpio, the Gemini Sun will feel like all their efforts to relate are falling into a black hole of the Scorpio Moon. Gemini likes to keep things light and chatty and someone with Moon in Scorpio goes for brooding and secretive. There is a stark difference in style here and the possibility of the Sun person inadvertently offending the Moon person just by walking their walk and talking their talk is high. There is a better chance for the relationship to succeed if person B’s Sun is conjunct, sextile or trine person A’s Moon because it will give them a way to work around the differences shown by the inconjunct.

When the Moons are inconjunct, the greatest obstacle is the nature of the way the Moon operates in our charts. The Moon shows our habit patterns and our emotional response, often in an unconscious way. For instance, someone with Moon in Virgo is going to have difficulty living around a Moon in Aries person. Virgo is inclined to be very private about what they feel and slow to commit and fiery Aries just jumps right in and wants to know when they can move in! Earth and Fire have very different priorities around the home. Practical workarounds usually require lots of space, patience and negotiation. It’s also helpful if there are flowing aspects to the Moons from other planets in the synastry.

Mercury inconjuncts I do know a little about because that I have experience with. My Mercury in Scorpio is inconjunct my SO’s Mercury/Jupiter conjunction in Aries. The saving grace for me is Mercury is very strong in my chart and communicating well has been a long time focus for me, otherwise the frustration level would be much greater! Here’s an example: my mind is very slow to wake up, so telling me something important first thing after I wake up is usually not a good idea. Mercury in Aries wakes up totally engaged and ready to rock and roll. We learned to wait until I’ve been up for at least an hour before talking over critical matters – but it was tough to break our instinctive patterns of communicating.

Mars/Venus inconjuncts often indicates difficulties in timing. One person is exhausted or has other demands on their time, or they just aren’t in the mood, etc, etc. If the rest of the synastry is great, this can be consciously worked around even if it doesn’t feel very romantic.

Patience and a good astrologer can be very helpful when it comes to sorting out ways to work with inconjuncts in synastry. Knowing what’s going on is often the key to helping us be more understanding and considerate of each other. So if your lover is frustrating the heck out of you and you want to gain some insight as to ways to resolve it, collect your birth data and see an astrologer . . .

This is the Temperance tarot card from the Lover's Path deck. Vulcan and Venus are an excellent example of very different types having to find a way to relate.