I've read different takes on this subject, but this is new to me:
]]>In assessing talents I go straight for Venus and Chiron in the natal chart. Venus represents our assets, sometimes quite literally; these are traits and abilities we can pull out of our pockets and use, the best examples being Venus-ruled gifts such as singing ability or artistic talent. Venus attributes always carry an undefinable je ne sais quoi that shines through and designates the result as talent, rather than mere effort. Venus is like ability currency we can spend as we like; it draws admiration, and marks us as naturally skilled, whether we work to develop that ability or not.
Chiron is another kind of attribute entirely, a much more subtle ability that is highly unique and personalized to our Beingness and experience. The Chirotic skill has the quality of being channeled through us, and because of this it’s an asset we can freely offer to others, while this specific aid remains unavailable for our own use. We can profit from Venus; the profit we derive from Chiron is personal and spiritual, for the most part, with the goal being to take the Chirotic experience from a personal to a transpersonal level.
Read this for some comparisons. Chiron on the descendant people are really chiming in here.
]]>People with close Sun-Chiron conjunctions often are healers, and this is all the more true for you with your eighth-house Sun. The conjunction with the North Node tells me that this is your destiny, and it’s about to be triggered by the cardinal T-square in 2010. The trick is that we first have to heal ourselves, and planets on the South Node often give us clues for how to go about this. You may want to think about how you view material possessions and whether you would be prepared to give it all up if fulfilling your purpose in life depended on it. Moreover, you may want to meditate on how past and future are balanced in your present.
So...I took a RAD self-defense weekend course for the second time. The first time I took this thing, I went in there pretty much thinking I was going to be Buffy the Vampire Slayer. (I said this to someone who's 20 years old this weekend and she was all, "Isn't that show off the air?" Um, yes, and that prevents me from watching it how?) I was going to BEAT THOSE GUYS' ASSES! ROAR! I like taking kickboxing classes, I love punching, and this was the class to teach all the little short girls how to do it. Huzzah!
My Mars on the midheaven, well... I'm not a jock, not an athlete, sure as hell not a soldier in this life, but I definitely have that desire to be physically MACHO that I pretty much miss out on because I'm a short wittle girl. I've pondered taking martial arts to satisfy that urge, but it's too big of a time commitment for me and I suspect I wouldn't like the rigidity and uniforms and whatnot. RAD class, on the other hand, pretty much satisfies that urge. I loved the punching and the kicking and learning how to flip people over and yelling...good times!
But when it came to the simulation last year...well, short of injuring myself or the guys, it didn't get much worse. I forgot all the moves, I attacked them before they attacked me (a no-no), I fell down...after the first go I just hid in the corner while everyone else went. And then beat myself up about it for a year, of course, because I do that.
I was well aware that I needed more practice at this, because a weekend's worth of class is not enough to get it ingrained in you in the event of emergency. So when they offered it again, same time and place, this year, I went back. As I did the first time, I enjoyed the punching and kicking and drills, but this time I really dreaded the second day and simulation.
I kept thinking, "What's going to be different about this year? I totally bombed last year and I KNOW it, I can't forget it..."
My list of what's different this year:
(a) I already know what to expect from the simulations and know approximately how it's going to go
(b) I meditate for ten minutes a day now, and that's already had effects on me not panicking so effing bad after doing it for a month. And I've been doing it for about 130 days (started April 1) now...
So I meditated during lunch on both days, and did as much deep breathing as possible in the hour before the simulation (as much as was possible while learning to flip people over on the floor, anyway).
And that...fixed it! I stayed calm and rational and in the moment, didn't forget everything, happily pounded guys in the face and kicked them in the crotch. I actually fell down after beating up the last guy in the last simulation, but wasn't fazed because I knew I could get up and run this time. Yeehaw!
I guess that's a Chiron sort of thing: knowing what broke me last time, figuring out how to fix it. I kind of want to become an instructor now. though I asked about how to do it and apparently that involves paying a lot of money for certification later, so I don't know how much of a long-term goal that is. They now have a self-defense club, which I am hoping that I will be able to join so I can get that practice in.
But if I were teaching the class, I'd tell them all about the time I bombed out, and how even if you bomb out today (I was the only one who ever bombed in any class I took so far), you can come back from it. Odds are you won't be worse at it the first time than I was!
I was teaching a beginning sewing class this summer. I didn't particularly want to do this because it was a very long class that ran for most of the summer and I can't even get paid for it (long story, legal issues), but every other instructor didn't apparently feel like doing it any more or was out of town, and since that's a class that always runs/is full, the organization would be losing money if I didn't do it. As far as I'm concerned, "I don't wanna" is not a good enough reason to lose money for other people, so I said I'd do it. It actually went pretty well, students finished a project and seemed pretty happy with it. Mostly I was teaching them how to read patterns and deal with the annoyances of sewing, and reiterating things like "Don't sew when you're angry or crying, it'll only go worse" and "Machines are buggy, don't take it personally" and "Everyone sews the wrong side out plenty of times, I do it a good chunk of the time myself," and "Yes, gathers really do suck to have to make."
I think the thing the students liked the most about the class was that I was reassuring about the bugginess of sewing, acknowledging that sometimes this crap is hard and things go wrong, and there's ways to fix it without going crazy. Sadly, I couldn't get any of them to fill out a class evaluation to verify that for the management :P, but that was the impression I got.
I think that's a Chiron thing: acknowledging that there are issues, that everybody does it including the authority figure in charge here, and that you can improve from here, you're not a failure at sewing or self-defense forever.
]]>Your chart has significant challenges literally written right into it. Your moon is in challenge aspect to the asteroid Chiron, a potent symbol of issues that cry out for healing. Your Moon is opposite the planet of your survival instincts, Mars, and Mars is also in challenge aspect to Chiron. What this symbol says to me is that you are driven by powerful emotions that are often at cross purposes with you own best interests. In other words, you let your heart rule your head. While we are often admonished to listen more to our hearts and less to our heads, in your situation this is rather like doing too much of a good thing. Why? Because Chiron is sitting there, challenging your heart and your survival instincts to make some intrinsic changes in how you operate.
How do you operate? With three planets in the sign of Leo in your tenth house of career and public image, you like to work from center stage. You take great pride in how you handle your life, and you can be prideful in the choices you’ve made. You need the attention of others, and when you don’t get it in the measure you feel you deserve you tend to feel let down and even depressed. There is nothing sadder than a Leo who feels that they aren’t appreciated. Certainly, in a situation where you hauling all the freight, doing all the work in and out of the home, taking care of the emotional, physical and financial work of taking care of a family, there literally is not enough appreciation in the world that is going to feel like you are getting what you deserve. Yet you can, from the challenge from your Moon to your Uranus/Venus combination sitting in the the tenth house close to your Sun, be quite stubborn in insisting on keep on a course of action, even if it is apparent that course simply isn’t working."
I have some of this myself, but mainly this letter reminds me of a friend of mine with two autistic kids and a similarly difficult life, with Chiron issues.
I have seen numerous other cases in which Chiron was prominent in the charts of people who were intellectual or spiritual leaders. Among our most recent charts I can mention Rollo May and Roberto Assagioli, both famous psychotherapists, who have Chiron conjunct their Ascendants within a one degree orb. Rollo May also has Vesta just over one degree from his MC. Another well-known but controversial psychotherapist, R. D. Laing, has Chiron in his first house opposite his Mercury. Werner Erhardt, founder of EST, which might be considered a controversial form of psychotherapy, has Chiron conjunct his Ascendant, though not as closely as May and Assagioli. But since Chiron squares his Sun and Venus (the latter exactly), and opposes his Moon, it is given additional emphasis. John Lilly, another prominent mind-explorer, also has Chiron opposite his Moon exactly, and it is sextile his exact Sun-Mercury conjunction. Still another mind-worker, Jose Silva, the founder of Mind Control, has Chiron widely conjunct his MC but exactly quincunx his 3rd house Sun and exactly semisextile Jupiter on one side and Moon on the other, Jupiter in the 9th house and Moon in the 11th. And Uri Geller, well-known mind-controller of material objects, has Chiron very widely conjunct his Ascendant but conjunct his East Point within 3 minutes of arc.
Among a variety of religious leaders in my files we can include the new Roman Catholic Pope with Chiron exactly trine his Jupiter-Neptune conjunction; Billy Graham with Chiron in 29 Pisces in his 12th house, exactly square his Sagittarius Moon and more widely square Mars and Pallas, exactly trioctile his Scorpio Sun, trine his Mercury, and quincunx his Saturn in Leo. A former Baptist minister who left the fold to become a psychic, Paul Solomon, has Chiron conjunct his Ceres-Sun-Antivertex in Cancer in the 11th house. Another formerly orthodox minister who moved into the psychic area has Chiron widely conjunct his Ascendant and square his Sun-MC conjunction. The founder of a new religion in Indonesia, Pak Subuh, has Chiron conjunct his Jupiter, opposite his Sun, and trine his Moon, though the orbs are wide. Three Hindu gurus with widely varying teachings and followers include Yogananda, founder of the Self-Realization Fellowship who had Chiron widely conjunct his Ascendant; Muktananda, current leader in the Shakti approach who has Chiron in his 10th house square his first house Sun; and Maharaj Ji, the young leader of mostly young followers who has Chiron trine his Ascendant and octile his Sun-Saturn conjunction.
I have also seen my share of tragic cases with Chiron, including Martin Luther King who had it conjunct Jupiter, with progressed Jupiter exact to the degree when he was killed. In two cases of suicide, one young man had Chiron conjunct his South Node in Pisces and opposite his Pluto and square his Sun, among other aspects, while the other young man had Chiron on his Vertex so opposite the Antivertex, as well as square his Neptune-Moon conjunction. And finally, Dean Corll who tortured and murdered a number of teenaged boys in Houston, Texas had Chiron conjunct his Antivertex.
If we think in terms of the Jupiter principle, we can see that its manifestation can range from “I am God and can do anything I want,” to “I am separated from God and faith and might as well give up and run away.” Or we may run to some supreme value. Chiron and Jupiter both may symbolize the need for freedom to pursue their quest wherever it takes them. (Jim Eshelman, author of the article on Chiron in our last issue, mentioned that he has now observed one connection of Chiron to relationships. He has noticed it in the gaining of independence through the breakup of relationships.) There are an impressive number of close aspects to angles, Sun, and Moon in even this brief sampling, suggesting that Chiron has considerable potential value as a clue to our search for ultimates and the dangers if our faith is misplaced or missing but the high potential if we are clear about what we trust and have our faith integrated with reality. I am not surprised to find it associated with death and with extreme criminality. Gauquelin found that the group having the highest percentage of Jupiter near the Ascendant was the Nazi leaders. I have personally always seen an aspect to Jupiter at an individual’s death, natural or otherwise. It may mean simply a trip to a higher level of life or a supreme effort to escape misery in this life. In the end, it is our faith that determines the way we go in life. Take a good look at your Chiron. It is no accident that the universe has given it to us at this time. The faith by which we live will be a decisive factor in the days ahead, maybe the decisive factor on whether we learn to share the resources of the planet or we wipe out the mess and start over, here or elsewhere.
Then there's the usual cookbook stuff: house and sign placements and aspects.
]]>"Is it going to be easy or comfortable to do these things? Probably not; but hey, it's better to climb this mountain than keep feeling the pain of hydra's poison (in her case, a shame about not having gone to college or pursued advanced education of some kind) all of our life. This is not just about math, but about all of the small thinking and limiting beliefs from the past we have about ourselves that bind our lives and cause anxiety and frustration."
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I have that one, and that is exactly how it plays out. I don't believe too many people will do something or give me something if I have to ask for it.Chiron-Mars. The ability to assert ourselves and our desires, and to express anger, come into play with Mars. With Chiron in hard aspect to Mars, we are somehow ashamed of expressing our desires directly and confidently. Perhaps we don’t expect our desires to be met. My friend has a child who would rarely ask for anything from his parents directly. Instead, he would convince his sisters to ask his parents for what he wanted. Although mostly even-tempered, he would sometimes have huge angry outbursts with tears following the outbursts–nothing violent or alarming, but nevertheless choppy. When asked by his mother why he always seemed to enlist the help of a sibling to ask for something that he wanted, he replied that “you wouldn’t do it if I asked”. The mother didn’t think that was true, but the issue here is that it is a personal reality for him–that’s how he perceives things.
True dat.
Another child I know who has Mercury conjunct Chiron in Libra (and widely opposing Saturn) asked why it seems that every time she has the courage to state her opinion on something, it seems to completely backfire. She feels that others around her can easily express an opinion without negative feedback, but when she says something even slightly provocative, it’s met with raised eyebrows.So it’s a bit of a chicken-and-egg thing, and can very much be a vicious circle. If we’re scared of expressing ourselves, when we do summon up the courage to do it, it can come out either too aggressively or too emotionally–unnaturally–and is thus somehow ineffective. This then feeds the very feeling of ineffectiveness that is at the root of the unnatural expression.
With Sun-Chiron in hard aspect, there can be a feeling of embarrassment following a Sun-style expression of “shining”–of strutting your stuff.
I don’t think crying spontaneously is necessarily a signature of Moon-Chiron, but there is a deep emotional sensitivity there that is unmistakable and expressed in different ways. Similar to the outbursts of temper with hard Mars-Chiron I mentioned above, one of the challenges of hard Moon-Chiron aspects is to express the emotions naturally and evenly, instead of holding onto them in fear, bottling them up, until emotions come out in a dramatic moment, after which there is embarrassment and awkwardness. With Moon-Chiron, we can have a real feeling that others don’t care about our emotions, but this feeling is on some level self-fulfilling. It’s the vicious circle thing again. Holding onto your feelings to the point that when you express them, it comes out as an outburst, is baffling to others. They don’t know how to react, and this feeds the feeling of ineffectiveness or lack of validation that caused the pattern.