The Biggest Challenges in 2019

2019 is a year you'll always remember. Massive bedrock changes are on the cusp of unfolding globally as life and the world as we know it face powerful cosmic forces operating at a very fundamental level. 
Two of these - Saturn and Pluto - are covered in this post.
 They both produce conditions which can be the most demanding ever. As 2019 opens both continue to transit Capricorn. 

 By year's end these two powerhouses will come to near exact conjunction, just over a degree apart but every step towards early 2020 is one to use well as you climb your personal mountain.

Matterhorn

Why is this significant?

Saturn and its relevant zodiac sign Capricorn are strongly connected to government, business, corporations, banking, structures, infrastructure, history, ancient things, senior citizens, rules, regulations, conservatism, cost-saving, austerity, walls, fences, borders, boundaries, limits, rules, regulations, controls...and the flow on effects have economic impacts..these are just some of the standout manifestations of Saturn energy in our daily lives

Pluto which expresses most authentically through Scorpio is not totally at home in Capricorn -but it does share the control-freak tendencies with Saturn and it likes structures in the context of restructuring - but by demolition. Both Saturn and Pluto have a connection to end of life, broken things, people who are wrecked or worn out - because both energies harnessed positively can work to rebuild, restore, regenerate.

Saturn energy often functions as the methodical fixer due to the application of well-defined boundaries, limits, a clear management plan that has rules and responsibilities acknowledged and factored in.

Pluto energy works more dramatically and extremely to break down a person or thing in body/mind or to the core - in order to transform the dross material into a superior version: Pluto's task is evolutionary and the same relentless approach is applied in aspects of life that come under this planet's gaze.

Since 2008 Pluto has been eyeballing governments, corporations, business, banking, infrastructure, democracy & the global economy and let's not forget -that very Capricornian institution - the Patriarchy. Does anyone believe that #TimesUp and #MeToo are finished?

Pluto and Saturn together are megaforces from the cosmos set to deliver changes at the bedrock that allow whole new structures to permeate global human institutions and people to make enormous growthful changes.

Saturn in Capricorn reinforces the energy of retaining ancient practices, institutional power and traditions -such as practised in fundamentalist faiths.
Pluto in Capricorn is the energy to annihilate these and or replace then with updated versions that meet current societal conditions.

All the talk about taxation [especially capital gains tax and mega corporates having to confront tax liabilities] is totally reflective of the Capricorn restructuring under the pressure of Saturn and Pluto energies converging and combining.
No amount of political whinging and whining will prevent both a massive restructuring of taxation and of banking sector practices - the beginnings already  underway and processes of change extending through the period up to 2022

18 year old Saudi woman Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun fled her family in January 2019 to seek a new life. By fleeing a life where she claims physical and psychological abuse from her father and brother she personifies the essence and zeitgeist of the deep global change that is clearly underway as a consequence of Saturn and Pluto converging in Capricorn. The timing is reflected by these combined forces being in conjunction with the early January 2019 Capricorn New Moon eclipse.

Frazey Ford's treatment of "Done" also spells end-times for the patriarchy.

Saturn came again into Capricorn at the tail end of December 2017.

These 2 planets combine forces strongly in 2019 and remain close in Capricorn for some parts of 2020.
There is definitely a power struggle aspect to these two forces being combined. Each one is most comfortable being boss and so in your resolution of these planets in the areas of relevance, you are likely to meet some opposing force that seeks to block or delay your process. This blocking force could come from within you or from an external source.

In the world of politics Brexit, The Wall and the Federal Shutdown are all classic examples of high stakes power struggles between opposing forces.

See links below for the global aspects of these two planets in Capricorn.

The following information is related to individual personal development in 2019

Not many people will call Saturn or Pluto their friend or favourite planets - but we are all best advised and clearly forewarned to cosy up to both of these forces and say Yes to the processes that will unfold for all of us and have significant impact on all of us. There is truly nowhere to hide when these two come to town - but they will work with you and for you if you commit to working with them.

Each of us has two areas of life that will resonate strongly like tuning forks to the profound need for rebuilding and regenerating. Capricorn is a slow-paced sign -treat this period as careful steady progress with periods of delay, blockage and frustration. 

• If you have a personal chart based on your birth-time you will look at where Capricorn is placed -specifically the range from 11-23 degrees for 2019.
• If you know your zodiac/sun sign you can identify the other significant area for this process
• The 2 planets together in Capricorn ask you to enter a new phase of adulthood or maturity -no matter what your chronological age. First you may need to find out what adult and mature actually mean. You will also be pushed to adopt practices of self-management -not relying on others or society at large to set the rules and limits for you. Capricorn is a sign very suited to solitude. This space in which to reflect will prove to be very beneficial as you tackle the challenges set for you. Great courage is being demanded as you face having to firstly dissemble, destroy, lose or abandon what you have built, acquired or a lifestyle you have clung to for a long time before the replacement can be put in place. What begins in 2019 will be extended into 2020

For Aries it is about career goals or ambitions. For those functioning more spiritually it is about vocation or calling 

For Taurus it is about expansion and exploration -mind/body/soul - and can involve travel, formal study,  professional sport

For Gemini it is about death and transformation which are both very related to Saturn and Pluto. Maturing, finding a deeper state of empowerment, developing advanced metaphysical abilities based on working with energies

For Cancer it involves powerful shifts in relating to others, being able to function in relationships.

For Leo the challenges involve routine work commitments as well as health conditions related to diet, nutrition, digestion as well as structural skeletal and bone. Skin and teeth are also related to Saturn.

For Virgo it involves the ability to love and to create. A mature phase is on offer in these areas as well as regarding children

For Libra the past has to be dealt with - family especially - roots, origins, ancestry - and how to deal with family challenges with a new level of maturity. The influence of Father will be very relevant for many. Home and its responsibilities and commitments are a major area of focus

For Scorpio the way your mind has functioned and your way of communicating are both up for a major makeover. You are pressured to go deeper, be more serious and insightful as well as recognising the need to have a more mature outlook, meeting your responsibilities or being a source of knowledge when it comes to communicating. This could involve becoming an educator or having a word-related career

For Sagittarius it really is time to face the responsibilities of income and assets. Either make plans to manage these better or abandon the material world as much as you practically can. Looking after your body is a big requirement -recognising limits - or the big defects will start to arise in the skeletal system in particular.

For Capricorn -you get potentially the best [or least aggravating] deal - you should know lots of ways in which you are already quite typical of your zodiac sign -but wait - there's more: clearly all the Capricorns in the world have to do more work -and this may not be defined so much as employment - but work on yourself -self management - since you are already a talented boss or manager you can now direct those skills at that face in the mirror. Maybe you have been too Capricorn - too restricted, repressed, too conservative or conventional, too stingy, too negative, too cautious: now's time to look at Capricorn at it's best - being a guiding, mentoring parental type person, happy to support and nurture others and to contribute to a benevolent society where government has those same ideals underlying policy. The basic guide for your sign is: whatever version of Capricorn you have been is set to be upgraded to an advanced version fully ready to become the sort of role model that all human societies need to function well. Teeth, skin and bones may all break down under the pressure.

For Aquarius the commitments and responsibilities you now have involve personal isolation. At best this involves self-selected retreat and solitude - a necessary retreat from the world in order to gain new insights and growthful qualities. The other common isolation environments are more challenging: hospitalisation, imprisonment or being kidnapped. It is far better you go willingly rather than attract an enforced period away from the everyday world. Look at whether your unconventional or rebellious ways have let you get into difficulties with authorities or the system 

For Pisces big things will be happening in friendship relationships. Longstanding connections may have to be annihilated in order for new qualities of friendship to be developed or current friendships restructured if they have started to crumble. Other arenas for this activity are in group/community/networks - including digital/social media housekeeping where friends may need to be let go off and some culling of alliances by unfollowing. Overall a transformed notion of friendship should evolve & you will know better how to function as a friend due to understanding the role, responsibilities and commitments.

The other very significant influences in 2019 include:

• The shift of planet Uranus into Taurus for a 7 year period from week 2 of March 2019
• The combination of Jupiter and Neptune which creates another set of blended forces - evident in extreme environmental effects [such as intensified rainfall and flooding] and excesses in human behaviour [substance addictions, lack of self control] 

Watch 2019 periods of strong Jupiter-Neptune activations: weeks 3 and 4 in January; the Full Moon period, end of March; around June 10th and the 3rd week of June; week 2 and week 4 of September; week 4 of November

Also on this blog:

for further major planetary influences in 2019 read Astrology of 2019 global forecast and 2019 Zodiac in a nutshell

Theresa May = True Grit

 We know that Saturn is exalted or operates with great nobility in Libra -so the challenge of Saturn in Capricorn in 2018 to anyone with a Libra Sun between 1-11 degrees during the course of this year - is to function with the utmost grace and measured management of self and others whilst facing enormous opposing forces.
Libra is typically an accommodating, mediating energy that prefers peace over war, keeping the calm over causing any disturbance - but in the cold harsh winds of politics which is represented by Saturn - and Saturn in Capricorn can deliver a great freeze, a lockdown, a showdown, a complete impasse.
Theresa May received all this and more in the context of the Battle of Brexit: great disaffection, being widely criticised and disliked. But she stood firm and has passed the point of the last Saturn square to her sun for another 30 years..which she is likely to avoid.
Saturn on Dec 12 2018 was at 9 degrees -just a degree away from her birth Sun at 8 Libra. But though moving comparatively slowly, it is moving away from her, giving some release from the intense adversity.
Mars will oppose her Sun in mid January - which is an oppositional force which demands further skillful manoeuvering - but overall the worst is over...for some time.

Her astrological string of pearls is Pluto-Mercury-Neptune-Saturn all hovering at or close to 29 degrees in the range from Leo to Scorpio. This means that all 4 forces get detonated at the same time -for better or worse. Pluto next to Mercury gives a laser-like mental insight. Neptune next to Mercury brings in the collective vision, the capacity to see the Big Picture; Neptune next to Saturn puts that vision up against cold harsh realities but when merged these forces are formidable in their sheer determination. Bundled energies like this will always deliver periods of crisis in a person's life. Since November 2018 and including up to May 2019 all the New Moons in the 15 and 14 degree positions activate all the 28-29 pearls so this sequence of solar-lunar positions has reinforced and amplified the intensity of the crisis she has faced.
It is hard to suggest that any post-war leader in Britain has had even a whiff of such a Herculean experience.



BBC reporting

BREXIT astrology - the world has changed

June 2016 saw the UK deliver a LEAVE vote in terms of membership of the European Union
Most of the debate has been immigration focussed -but it is the political, economic and financial causes and consequences which are possibly more significant.
Astrological cycles are a powerful guide to historical events and in 2016 the essence of the current Saturn-Jupiter cycle has been awakened.
[May 2000 the last Saturn-Jupiter conjunction at 22'43 Taurus
Note also: Pluto in that chart was 11'38 Sagittarius]
Fast forward to 2016
June 23
Saturn -the classic signifier of separation being by this stage at 11'40 Sagittarius triggers a transformational freedom [Pluto in Sagittarius] foreshadowed in the conjunction chart of May 2000

this quickly released image from the Leave sector

[Mars at 23'23 Scorpio on 23/6/2016 activates the original conjunction - Saturn and Jupiter play out the classic tug-of-war - Saturn = separating, versus Jupiter = being part of a big socio-political territory.]
But Saturn in Sagittarius requires a blending of the two motivations - and freedom through leaving seems to have captured a few more million people in the UK referendum

Pluto energy signifies that much has has to break down and burn to the core in order for a new version to arise out of the ashes.
This is transformation, this is healing and renewal - exactly the intense change that most people dread and fear right through to the cellular level, when it affects any aspect of life - but when a whole nation is collectively put on the bonfire, it's a powerful rebirth that's on offer.

Faith and trust are called upon more than ever that something better could arise -better than propping up dysfunctional plutocratic governments, the privileged and comfortable sectors who have been the clearly identified beneficiaries of neoliberal politics across the world, the architects of austerity, the engineers of inequality.  
[ The June New Moon with the mutable grand cross -Gemini Sagittarius Virgo Pisces served as a significant trigger for this momentous change -with Saturn, [leave] Jupiter, [stay combined] Neptune,[faith] Venus,[financial issues] Sun and Moon all in a battle for resolution: the Brexit vote has displayed what the majority wanted in the UK]
So June 2016 marks a very significant stake in the ground in the European and global arena.

In terms of energy shifts -which are essentially the role of astrology to identify and explain - we, globally and collectively are sitting, in 2016, on the fringes of the biggest shift in 200 years

excerpt from Saturn-Jupiter analysis*

So, in the most recent cycle, aside from 1980-81, our global humanity has been locked increasingly and highly dysfunctionally, into a very materialistic, money-oriented mindset since 1802.

In 2016, the world is again being put on notice, given a forewarning, a wake-up call, courtesy of Brexit and the obvious financial ripples, shudders and crashes.
A bright light is illuminating the coming transition towards the end of 2020 - the beginning of 200 years shift in focus - focus away from money, possessions, mass indulgence in greed, accumulating, collecting, storing. THINGS, objects, stuff, clutter.
And because nothing happens in a vacuum - global effects with mass consequences are the expected conduit through which humanity's relationship to money, possessions, accumulation is in many ways forcibly changed.
People en masse are simply not going to wake up in this transition period and beyond 2020, and say words to the effect I'm over this materialist shit - though a few already are and people in the 1960's hippy era did embrace this philosophy 
-[Saturn and Jupiter conjuncted in 1961]
So global events are the obvious precursor crisis that enforces less materiality -and yes, less money,- due to conditions of deprivation for many-rather than a pre-selected personal philosophical choice.

The hard way is enforced change.
The easier way is working out in advance where the flow is going and making personal decisions that create a shift away from so much extreme dependence on a materialistic existence - eg renting versus owning property, public transport versus personal vehicle, reducing the quantity of consumer goods purchased in favour of using just what you need or sharing/borrowing/hiring appliances/tools/equipment.
Being prepared to live on a lower income.
Getting rid of clutter, stored possessions. [The minimalist style is an early flavour of what is to be much more prevalent]
Downsizing -literally reducing the scale of the things you choose to keep - housing, transport - house to apartment; from car to a scooter.

Because we have already entered the transition period there are many indicators of these shifts in consciousness about materialism.
More is to come because it is a collective shift that will capture the essential mindset of humanity -and many will not be interested in making a change. But the flow cannot be resisted. Standing in a growing flood is simply the sign of a delusional ego.
Global financial crises have been continually anticipated again in the years after the 2007 GFC and the odds have arguably been increased with the Brexit Leave vote.
Brexit itself is not the world changer, Brexit happened because the world is in transition for even more change.

Some opinions:

References and Other Reading
Glen Greenwald sums up Brexit as anti neoliberalism
A call for transformative politics
 Why Working class voters headed for Brexit
*Cycle analysis : Saturn-Jupiter
The Great Conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter