What Does Pluto Square the Nodes Mean?

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Join Amanda Walsh and Rick Levin in our latest podcast episode, as they take a deep dive into the meaning of Pluto and its upcoming Nodal Square.

On this episode, you'll learn…

🌖 The significance of Pluto in astrology and how it impacts individuals and society. This includes understanding the mathematical halfway point between two planets in our chart called midpoints, and how transiting planets, especially Pluto, can impact us.
🌕 The historical context of Pluto's movements and its impact on global events. This includes the Uranus-Pluto conjunction in the mid-60s, the square of Uranus to Pluto in the 2010s, and the Saturn-Pluto conjunction in Capricorn in January 2020.
🌔 The current and future events that are making Pluto prominent in our lives, both individually and collectively. This includes the rare square from the nodal axis to Pluto happening at the same time that the nodes are changing signs, and how these movements interact with your personal chart.

☠️ Join Astrology Hub favorites Rick Levine, Divine Harmony, Adam Gainsburg, and Mychal Bryan for this very special premium panel discussion on America’s Pluto Return!

This webinar is meant to give you the rundown on this historic event from 4 top astrologers and will address: What a Pluto Return is and why this a big deal for the United States, what you can expect during this time, & how you can prepare and work with it. Click here to learn more.

[00:00:00] Welcome to the Cosmic Connection presented by Astrology Hub. I'm your host, Amanda Poole Walsh, founder of Astrology Hub, here with Master Astrologer Rick Merlin Levine. This is your place to explore the order and beauty of the cosmos, and your connection to it all.

Intro

Amanda: so great to be here with all of you. Today, we are going to be doing a deep dive on Pluto. So Pluto is absolutely the highlight of the astrology right now, but Rick is going to tell us about why that is probably true all the way into 2024. So no matter when you're tuning into this, we're going to be talking about Pluto in general, and then we're going to be highlighting some of the current events and future events that are making Pluto really [00:01:00] prominent in all of our lives right now, both individually and collectively.

And, uh, Rick, I'm so

Rick: happy to be here with you. Nice to be here with you. I'm, I'm, as we just mentioned before we went live, I'm out on Cape Cod, on an east coast lecture tour and somewhat peppered with a little vacation time. I have a little bit of the sun because I was at the beach today and it's nice to be here.

Amanda: Nice. I love your traveling ways. I mean, I just like pick up and go for months at a time.

Rick: Yeah. Now, if I could just figure out a way to pick up and go and not take my work with me, I'd be all set.

Amanda: All right. Well, we'll give you some time off, Rick.

Rick: Thanks. But no one, but no one else will. I don't know how to tell you this, Amanda, but you're, you're, you're not the only woman in my life.

So before we get going, I just want to say. That you said, we're doing a deep dive on Pluto. Actually, we're doing a deep dive [00:02:00] about Pluto on Earth, but I'm just being technical. But when it comes to doing a deep dive about Pluto, we, we need to acknowledge the fact that Pluto is the Marianna trench.

Of the planets. In other words, that's, you know, the Mariana Trench is the deepest point on all of Earth. It's the deepest point on Earth in the Pacific Ocean. And to do a deep dive on any other planet. Or about any other planet. Now I need to watch how I say it each time. To do a deep dive, about the subject of any other of the planetary archetypes does not compare to doing a deep dive about Pluto, because Pluto itself is the archetype of deep.

Hmm. Yes,

Amanda: all right. Well, and we're going to be talking about how Pluto is inviting greater evolution, transformation, how Pluto plays out in [00:03:00] regards to power in our lives and in the world.

The Significance of Pluto in This Moment in Time

Amanda: So why are you especially keen to be talking about Pluto right now?

Rick: Well, there's right now meaning today, tomorrow, and yesterday.

There's right now meaning 2020, July of 2023. There's right now meaning 2022, 23, 24 is a sweep because, because Pluto is highlighted in each of those. Separately, and of course, when you add them all together, it does pack quite, quite a wallop. And so, there's a few different levels of Pluto. Remember, we're still coming off of a 20 to 2015, actually 2012 to 2015 square.

of Uranus to Pluto, which was the crisis and conflict [00:04:00] about all those things that went down at the Uranus Pluto conjunction in the mid 60s. So that's a Pluto setup right there because Pluto, Uranus aligns with Pluto really only every other century or so, every century or two, depending on the speed of Pluto, which varies significantly.

So that's, that's the first thing. And the square of Uranus to Pluto in the 20, in the, in the 2010s, 2012 to 2015, the high focus of that was potent all around the planet, but that was immediately followed up by the first Saturn Pluto conjunction in its own sign, Capricorn and Saturn's own sign, Capricorn, in January of 2020.

And of course, we know this January. 2020 story, not only with Saturn lining up with Pluto, but also Jupiter lining up with Pluto and its relationship to the whole, you know, [00:05:00] process that was, you know, tied, uh, to, you know, first the Wuhan virus, uh, Uh, whatever we want to call that whole thing that, that resulted in, in quarantine and in a somewhat of a shutdown of, of, um, business as normal around the planet.

And so that was the next piece of Pluto, which was rare because the last time that Saturn joined Pluto, in Capricorn was around, was the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. Um, I mean, that would happen within a month or so of Martin Luther, not Martin Luther King. But Martin Luther, nailing the theses on the wall of the church in Württemberg, that Germany, that basically started the breakaway from the absolute power of the Pope or of the Catholic church.

So these are all things that are feeding now. And now in 2023, we're basically experiencing a very [00:06:00] rare Square from the nodal axis to Pluto that's happening at the same moment in time that the nodes are changing signs from fixed Taurus Scorpio into Cardinal Aries Libra. And, and although the nodes, will square Pluto about every nine or 10 years, because the nodal axis is about an 18 year, cycle, which means halfway through it, the nodes will have flipped.

Pluto will have moved a little bit on. But the fact that this is doing at the time that that they are changing signs is, is incredibly rare. And then you add to that the fact that Venus recently opposed Pluto, and now at the moment that Pluto is making the square in, in mid, uh, July, here we are around July.

You know, 18th through the [00:07:00] 28th in that period of time, not only is Pluto squaring the nodes, but the Sun and Mercury are opposing Pluto, meaning they're squaring the nodes from the other side. So we have different levels of the importance of Pluto. One is today, one is this week, one is this month, one is this year, and one is the sweep of 2010, all the way up through 2025 or so.

It's a. A big picture kind of dive that we're taking

Impact of Natal Placements & Midpoints Related to Pluto & the Nodal Shift

Amanda: and Rick, there's people asking, like if they're Pluto's in Libra or if they're, if they have the same nodal axis, if they're Aries, Libra, no axis, is this especially pronounced for people with those placements?

Rick: Like any movement of planets through the sky, if they're making an exact conjunction, opposition, square, for that matter, trine, sextile, for that matter, you know, even if you're like me and look at quintiles [00:08:00] and subtiles and semi squares and sesquic whatever aspect a, a, a planet or an event in the sky is making, if it does interact with your chart, it kind of indicates that Your name is on the event that there's some personalization, but oftentimes we miss the fact that the mathematical halfway point between two planets in our chart called midpoints, that also is an active point.

And they're not as obvious. So sometimes the, the transiting planet, in this case, Pluto at, you know, at 2829, degrees of Capricorn 01 degree of Aquarius as it moves forth and back and forth and back and forth. Um, you know, if you have planets at any of those points, yes, they're going to, it's going to impact you.

It's likely to impact you more. And it depends upon how that planet in your chart [00:09:00] aspects, other planets in your chart, how it's integrated. But again, there are many other ways for an event to impact your natal chart. And even just noting where in your natal chart is the cusp between Capricorn and Aquarius, because that's where Pluto is, or where is the cusp in your chart between, Aries, between, Aries and Taurus, or between, between Libra and Scorpio, because it's the points and the opposite points between Cancer and Leo, because that's opposite Pluto in the sky, which is where the Sun and Mercury, are here in, in mid July.

But again, what we're talking about is much larger, it's a larger perspective than just that. So the thing is to look in your chart and see where these points are, you know, where did the, where did the, where does the axis, um, intersect? Um, of these points, uh, land in what houses in your chart, because [00:10:00] Even if you don't have a planet at those points, Pluto is still moving through a particular house in your chart.

And that can be an aspect or that can be a transition that'll last for 10, years, depending upon the mathematical size or width of your house and the speed of Pluto, which is relatively fast right now.

What Pluto Represents, and How it Operates in Astrology

Amanda: If, if you're seeing that it's, it's hitting certain like sensitive points in your chart and or if you're just looking at what house it's passing through, what is the invitation?

Like, what does that mean? How do we interpret that?

Rick: So this is, this is like an invitation from a mafioso Don. It's it's Pluto. Basically, when it makes the transit, it's an invitation that you can't refuse. And the more that you refuse it, the harder it's going to be on you. The idea of Pluto is, as far as we know, [00:11:00] there's always new planets being discovered that are farther and farther away from the sun that deepen and widen our perspective on life and death and everything.

But remember, for thousands of years, Saturn was the limit. And even though modern astrologers use planets that are farther out than Pluto, whether it's, Eris or Sedna or Makemake or, or other, objects that are way, way, way out there. Pluto is kinda the most distant planet that we astrologers seem to have integrated into our regular work.

I mean, there are others that are in that process. But as such, Pluto represents those things that we're still striving to understand. Because as each new outer planet is discovered, there's a process where we have to then assimilate that, [00:12:00] that archetype into our consciousness. And Pluto's archetype, Pluto is Latin for Hades, which is Greek.

for hell. And so Pluto is sometimes referred to as the Lord of the Hell Realm. But here I have to do what I call, and for those people who have listened to me teach a lot, you've heard me say this probably in almost the identical words, when we talk about Pluto as the Lord of the Hell Realms, We have to clarify the fact that we're not limiting our understanding to hell to the Judeo Christian tradition, where hell is a rather nasty place where you get punished for, you know, for being a human, you know, born of original sin, you've fallen from the grace of the divine proportion, and Pluto is the price we pay because we have to die.

And if we when we die, we haven't lived a perfect life. Well, [00:13:00] then we get to spend eternity in hell. This is not what we're talking about. We're talking about the more complex version of that, which is hell, meaning that which everything is not apparent on the surface, everything that's hidden, everything that's underground, everything that's unconscious.

And as we now know, unconsciousness doesn't exist in the brain. Unconsciousness exists In every cell of our body, that unconsciousness is dispersed, and in fact it may even be wider than that, because consciousness probably doesn't only begin and end in our body, consciousness actually goes out to the reaches of the cosmos.

So as we talk about Pluto, we have to understand that if we're going to do a deep dive, we have to go deep enough and wide enough that we move beyond our normal realms of perceptible experiences. This is not about the [00:14:00] five senses of touch, taste, you know, smell, seeing, seeing is believing. Well, with Pluto, seeing is not believing because, believing has to do with experience. And we may experience something that is extra sensory beyond the five senses. And when Pluto works, it works so slowly. You know, we can see change happen if lightning strikes a tree and sets a forest on fire.

That's instantaneous. We can see it. If Neptune creates change and creates a swell in the ocean and a tidal wave, it's not as incredibly sudden as lightning, but we still. can perceive it because it happens within our range of, of, of time, of, of understanding change in time. But if we were to watch the change that a glacier makes, as it takes down a forest and maybe even an entire mountain, and we kept looking at it and looking at it and [00:15:00] looking at it some more.

We would not notice the change because the change occurs at a level that is outside of our normal realm of time. Now, can you imagine trying to surf? on a leading edge of a glacier rather than the leading edge of a wave in the ocean. Well, that's why it's so difficult to understand Pluto because it's beyond our normal perceptions.

We can look at the dramatic transformation or metamorphosis that Pluto creates in life, not when we look at the leaves that change on a tree, As it gets to be the season of autumn, and the liquids begin to dry up, and the leaves change colors, and then they turn crispy, and then they die, and then they come back in the spring.

That's change, but that's not metamorphosis. That's a change that occurs. Cyclically every year, but because Pluto takes 250 years [00:16:00] to make one cycle, we don't ever get to experience the entire cycle of change. So typically, a half to two thirds of the Pluto cycle Remains invisible, even if we're paying attention to everything that's going on.

Pluto represents one time changes that can't be reversed. It's like a caterpillar metamorphosizing. Or is it metamorphosing? I'm not sure which it is. But cha not just changing, but, but completely transforming into a butterfly. What happens to the caterpillar? The caterpillar… technically dies. Something doesn't die because, because when the caterpillar goes into the stage of inside the chrysalis in the cocoon, I mean, it's bones and eyes disintegrate and melt, and it just turns into this pool of gunk.

And yet something in that [00:17:00] pool of gunk Has still has life and electrical sparks that kind of do you kind of connect and make new connections and a butterfly is created that has nothing in appearance to do with the caterpillar. But. There's some sort of continuity. And this is really what Pluto represents.

It represents those changes in our lives where everything that we thought was us, just like the caterpillar thought everything was the caterpillar, everything that we thought with us was us. Individually changes. It's like the person who spends 20 years of their life practicing to be an Olympic figure skater and then has an accident that that breaks their ankle in a way that can't be repaired enough that they'll never skate again and the entire identity or self identity of that person was tied up in this idea of who they were as this figure skater and the person goes on to Is You [00:18:00] Become an engineer and learns how to create some new bridge that's never been built before and makes a contribution.

That's totally different to what their original idea of their self identity was. We all have these experiences that happened to us, whether it's the loss of a parent or the changing of something within our living situation, um, or some sort of illness. I mean, often Yeah. Often, we note these things through trauma, but it's not the only way we get them.

But they're things that we can't change, and we have to respond to. And often, these things take not just weeks or months or even a year or so, like a serious Saturn transition, often Pluto transitions can take a decade or so to fully, \ unfold. And so, the Pluto is about the… the real deep, deep, deep things.

You know, Pluto is associated with death because hell is associated with [00:19:00] death, but it's not necessarily, well, a, a, it's not necessarily our death. It can be the death of something or someone else, um, in our world. And it's also not necessarily associated with physical death. Uh, I recall William Blake who wanted as his epitaph, he wanted on his gravestone.

To say William Blake, born 1757, died many times since, you know, we all go through a death experience every time someone says no to us, every time we have a disappointment, every time we experience a loss, and Pluto is about the process, not of death. But of death and then being in the space and then rebirth because nothing happens to us.

That's new without something old falling away or being pulled away amongst, my astrology friends. And I think I saw [00:20:00] Gail on the line, Gail, my longtime Which friend, editor, and sometimes partner in astrology crime, not that there's any real crime committed. We sometimes refer to Pluto as Roto Rooter, because when Roto Rooter, um, in the United States, for those listening in other countries, Roto Rooter is a plumbing franchise that pretty much wherever you live, you can call Roto Rooter if your drains are clogged, then they come in with their special equipment and they clean the shit out of your drains. Doesn't matter what's there, Roto Rooter makes it go away. I think there was an old quip in the Roto Rooter, something, um, called Roto Rooter and away you go troubles down the Well, the problem is That when that happens in our life, Roto Rooter or Pluto doesn't take any prisoners.

Anything that's in the way has got to go. And so in a way, Pluto isn't always [00:21:00] apparently friendly. Although there's nothing bad about Pluto, it's just part of a process of cleaning out the, the drains, the septic tank, the, the shit. Because really, Pluto is the planet of elimination, but elimination has a purpose, and that purpose is to create the health of that which has eliminated the toxins.

So, and there's another aspect of Pluto that's very important, because Pluto, as the lord of the hell realms, is always considered to be down. It's, it's underground. Now, we know in, in modern psychology, That Pluto as the realm of realms of the unconscious is not just down directionally, it's in because it's within our own mind where we hold our hell realms, our unconscious, those things which are not on the surface, but they do have power.

And in fact, [00:22:00] one of the great understandings or edicts of modern psychology that come from both Freud, Jung, and other psycho, uh, dynamic psychologists is when something is hidden, it has more power over us than once the light is shined on it. That's why we do therapy, is to shine the light in the darkness of those things that we don't see, those things which are buried, those things which are in denial, those things which are hidden, those things which are unconscious, whether we're aware of hiding them, that's called suppression, or whether we're totally unconscious about what it is that we're hiding, that's called repression.

And so the point here is that Pluto being underground, it's hard to fully understand. By the way, Pluto also is associated with wealth. And when I say wealth, I don't mean the millionaire. I don't even mean the person who has a hundred million dollars. I mean [00:23:00] immense wealth. wealth because Pluto is about underground and to the ancients didn't matter how much money you had.

You weren't as wealthy as the person who owned the silver mine or the gold mine or the diamond mine or the copper mine or the tin mine. And all of these rare and precious Emeralds or rubies or diamonds, all of these things are underground, they're all hidden, but that's where the real wealth is. And let's make the point that more so than any other time in history, the United States, and I would venture even to say the entire planet, is run as a plutocracy.

We hear that word, the United States is a plutocracy. What does that mean? It means that it's run. Not by the ultra wealthy, but by the ultra wealthy who are so wealthy we can't even see their wealth. Why? [00:24:00] Because it's hidden. It's plutonic. It's underground. And what does that mean? It means it wields a huge amount of power, partly because we can't see it.

So that's the setup to why Pluto is so important and why Pluto in astrology is so important. Remember, it was Jeff Green's book back in the, I think in the, um, late six, maybe early seventies, called Pluto, the evolutionary journey of the soul. That was really the first book that brought Pluto into the realms of astrology from this perspective.

And so it's, it's important to understand that we're really the first or second generation of astrologers who have even had this archetype to work with.

What is the Current Invitation from Pluto?

Amanda: So with the current and future transits, I know you want to bring in some about the U S Pluto return and with this emphasis on the square to the no axis and with Venus fresh with all these things happening.

And with this understanding [00:25:00] of Pluto, this, the depth, the unconscious, the roto router, the things that are hidden, what, again, how do we translate that into what's happening in our lives right now? What? What are we being asked to do

Rick: right now? We're being asked to stand up to a very dark and hidden force that we've seen rise before.

I mean, certainly in, in the history of our planet, there's rarely a time when there isn't a recycling of this energy that whether you call it, Remember, when Pluto was discovered in 1930, planets seemed to be discovered at the same time that their energy is, having cultural import. Uranus was discovered, you know, around the time of the American and French revolutions when independence was, individual independence, was overtaking [00:26:00] the concept of royal power, um, absolute power by, by, by family, by, by genetic inheritance.

also the discovery of electricity because Uranus is electrical in nature. And this was around the time that you had people like Faraday and Hertz and Ben Franklin look saying, Oh my God, you know, lightning is electricity. And Galvani was saying, Oh my God, the nervous system is electrical.

I mean, this was all part of those times. Well, Pluto, discovered in 1930, was somewhat akin to the rise of mass fascism that arose in Germany with Hitler, in Russia with Stalin, um, in Italy with Mussolini. I mean, it was that kind of absolute power that, um, that is associated with Pluto in, in, in general. And I think now as Pluto is squaring the nodal axis, and as [00:27:00] Pluto has been, um, joined by Uranus back in the 60s, where we saw some flourishing of the resistance to that, because Uranus was like, The lightning bolt striking the hidden and bringing things out into the open very abruptly and radically.

And then during the squares of 2012 to 2015, we had a replay on many of those energies. But what we're seeing in, in, around the world, but certainly in the United States, is not just the rule by the ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra powerful and rich. That's not new. What's new is like video cameras in phones have made things obvious that have been around for a long time, but now everybody's recording them.

By the same token, we, we are seeing Pluto. We, we, we are seeing it again and again. People are talking about it, bringing it into the open, and we're seeing it as a struggle of the, there's been no time in history [00:28:00] when the divergence Between the average person and the ultra ultra ultra wealthy person has been greater that the ratio of CEO, payment, um, salaries, in the United States compared to the worker is the distortion of that ratio is greater than it's ever been.

And again, And again, I'm not here to, to either create political division or to come up with an idea of how this is solved. All I'm saying is, this is the problem and our facing this hidden power structure, hidden Pluto, power Pluto. This is, this is the call. How do we face this? How do we respond, uh, to this totalitarian, potentially, You know, fascistic regime.

And I understand, although I certainly, um, and many of us probably share a [00:29:00] similar perspective politically, there are people who have a very different political perspective. But what's intriguing is that everyone thinks that the other side is, are the fascists. So, you know, the problem here is not making the divisions more divisive.

It's basically. Trying to figure out a way to combat the, , allegedly purposeful division or divisiveness by coming together by finding common cause or by finding common goals, even if how we might want to get there is differently, in being compassionate and finding a way for, for love. And here we come to Venus and we can talk about Venus in a few minutes and what this has to do with all this.

But using love to overcome, hate, or fear, because hate is really a, I think, an offshoot of, of fear. And so on one side of the [00:30:00] spectrum, I think we have the sun and Venus. Shining light. And on the other side of the spectrum, we have Pluto and maybe Saturn in cahoots of somehow, you know, holding that energy back for one reason or another,

Amanda: you know, just what you just said made me think this question of who is the real enemy.

And since it's something hidden or a force that's hidden, it's probably not your neighbor, your coworker, your sibling, your spouse. It probably is something bigger that we're not even aware of.

Rick: I think it was the cartoonist Pogo who said, we have seen the enemy and it is us.

Amanda: Right. Although it seems like basically what we're saying with this Pluto thing is it is it's beyond it beyond our five senses perception, whatever this Force is and I'm just thinking that, you know, if, if we are in the, the, the microcosm and the macrocosm and it all [00:31:00] being this holographic mirror that finding those places within yourself and all the, the, the work on ourselves of where we have things hidden.

Where we have internal power dynamic struggles, control issues, you know, all these things, at least I'm not saying it's the only thing we can do, but it's definitely seems like it would be part of the equation

Rick: of what we could do. Yeah, I mean, I think that, you know, if this was an algebra problem, the solution would be compassion.

And I know that's easier to say. And to find ways in which to hold that against a force that seems to be evil, that we are afraid of, because the, the, because in a way, our media, right, left, center, I don't care what, our media in some way is worked, has continued. To work everyone into this sense of being afraid of something, uh, of the other, uh, of the opponent [00:32:00] of, you know, of the future of AI, of pollution, um, of global warming and don't get me wrong.

I'm not saying any of these things are necessarily unreal. I'm just saying that we get pumped up with rather than a feeling like there's something we can do about it to engage it and, and, and fix the situation instead where our power is minimized and we are told that we should be afraid. And therefore, if we're afraid, then we project hate onto whatever it is that's scaring us because we don't have any way of facing it.

And I think that we do. And I think that as we look around, we can in fact see that. We see glimmers. We see, you know, we see pieces of it. And yet we're fighting an uphill battle. Um, in a way, it's like, you know, paddling, uh, a, a rough [00:33:00] class a whitewater rapids river. Um, but instead of shooting the rapids downward, we're actually trying to find our way back to the source of the, you know, the river upstream.

And so that's what it feels like. And sometimes it's just easier, you know, to go home and turn on the TV to overeat, over drink, you know, over smoke, over whatever it is that we do and go into denial and say, I can do about it. Uh, but there is then, you know, and the result. of what we do in our individual world, and for those who, you know, know my work outside of Astrology Hub, you know that I end almost everything that I do with Think Cosmically, Act Locally, because astrology is really about thinking cosmically, but if we just think cosmically, who the hell cares?

Unless we do something with it, and what that is that you could do, or I could do, or he could do, or they could do, That's, that's our job to figure that out and do something.

Bringing in the Aries/Libra Nodal Shift

Rick: [00:34:00] What

Amanda: does the nodal axis shift into Aries Libra. What does that add to the equation?

Like, how does that further color this Pluto time

Rick: we're in? Well, remember, the nodal, the nodal axis is in Aries Libra. for about three years out of every 18 years, one and a half years, and then nine years later, one and a half years again. So it's, I, although I know astrologers around the globe have been writing a lot about the importance of the nodal axis shift, it's there.

But I think that it's subtle enough that it's, that that's not the main game. Um, I mean, I do think it's important and if anything, I think that it being in Aries Libra, the first sign of the Zodiac. It emphasizes the dichotomy between me and you. And when I say you, I don't mean you, [00:35:00] Amanda. I mean you, everything out there that's, that's contrary to me, everything in here.

It, it emphasizes the Aries self.

Um, and so in some ways, it exacerbates this crazy bifurcation that planet Earth is going through more apparently obvious than maybe ever before. It's certainly not a new issue for humanity, but it's one of the that was predicted by the 20th century, thinker, inventor, scientist, Bucky Fuller, where he wrote a book, called Utopia or Oblivion, where he said that culture would go through increasing waves of synchronization as the electronic media allowed instantaneous, simultaneous, coherence of thought, and that we would go through Waves of positive, waves of negative, waves of positive, and these waves would continue to get larger [00:36:00] and larger until we ended up either in utopia.

or oblivion. It's a horrific and yet apparently unavoidable truth. And I'm of the belief that we can get to utopia or utopias of some sort. But you know, the alternate route, uh, oblivion is not off the map. I mean, it's not, it's, it's, it's not as, unlikely. To the intellectual, as it might have been 50 or 100 years ago, or even 20 years ago for that matter.

Timing of the US Pluto Return

Amanda: So Rick, you're one of the, maybe, maybe the only astrologer, but one of the few astrologers that I know. Who has argued that the U. S. Pluto return wasn't actually when most people thought it was that it's actually still hasn't happened yet that it's going to be in 2024 and I know not all of our friends are in the U.

S. But just bringing [00:37:00] this Pluto theme into this Pluto return because at least for the United States.

Rick: That's a Um, let's face it. The U. S. Has a, um, what's the word I'm looking for? An overbearing impact on pretty much, you know, countries around the world. And so there is some import there. And the thing is that If you go back to, what most astrologers consider to be the birth of the United States, there's a lot of differences to the time of day or even whether it should be the Declaration of Independence or the signing of the Constitution.

But most astrologers use the July 4th, 1776 at about 5 10 PM, which was, right in the midst of the [00:38:00] signing of, of the declaration of independence. And if one looked at that chart, that's sometimes referred to as the Sagittarius rising chart with the moon in Aquarius and obviously the sun in, uh, cancer on July 4th.

But if one looks at that chart, one can see that Pluto was at 27, let's say 27 and a half degrees of capital, 27 degrees, 33 minutes. And if one wanted to look at the Pluto return, remember Pluto, NASA tells us that Pluto is a 248 year orbit. And so if we run a chart for the United States and then run. You know, the, uh, computer program and say, tell us when Pluto returns to where it was when the United States was born.

Well, Pluto is back at 27 degrees Capricorn, 33 minutes, um, in 2022. And it happened three times on February 20th, July 11th. Um, which were [00:39:00] just about at a year anniversary of and December 28th, but pretty much it went direct retrograde direct over the point at which it was on July 4th, 1776, three times in 2022.

The problem with that, which is a problem, a greater problem with astrology, and, and, and I hate talking about this because I hate talking about things that confuse us as astrologers, and this, I have to say, confuses the hell out of me, but we modern astrologers use what's called the tropical zodiac because of the Earth's wobble, Um, the point at which, um, what rises, um, in the east on the first day of spring, uh, varies by one degree.

Every 72 years, it slips backwards. This is what creates the 2100 year ages. [00:40:00] Um, we are leaving the age of Pisces and entering the age of Aquarius, probably in about 100 years. Um, but the point here is that if you look at the birth of the United States as being in 1776, and we know that the orbit of Pluto is, um, 248 years, Well, that means two.

That means that 1776 plus 248 is 2024, not 2022. What gives? And what gives is that in 250 years, The precession of the equinox changes one degree every 72 years, so it's about two and a half degrees different from where it was then. Normally, when we're looking at natal charts over the lifespan of 30, 50, 70 years, that doesn't impact us all that much.

It does a bit, and I don't know anyone who's done real research on it, but [00:41:00] that's not where I'm going with this. Where I'm going with this is that if you look at the um, the true position of Pluto mapped against the stars. That's called sidereal zodiac or the sidereal mapping of the stars. The word sidereal means stars.

And this is the astrology that is used by Vedic astrologers. This is why Your sign changes if you go see a Vedic astrologer, but if you take that 248 year cycle and add it to the 1776 birth chart of the United States, Pluto doesn't complete a full cycle. 360 degree run around the sun until February 22nd of 2024.

And then because of the retrogradation, it reaches that same point again on July 16th, 2024, and then a third and final time on [00:42:00] December 30th, 2024. So it's my contention, and I'm not saying that the tropical astrology doesn't work, and I'm not saying that we haven't. I know the double negatives, and I believe that we have, in fact, entered into this phase of what one would imagine a Pluto return to be.

I mean, we all live through a Saturn return or two or even three at age, you know, 29, 57, 80, you know, two or three or somewhere in there. Um, and of course, we live through a solar return once every year on our birthday, but none of us live through a Pluto return. And yet. The United States is in that phase, and what would one expect that to be?

Well, one would expect there to be a death and rebirth, a, a re envisioning, a metamorphosizing of whatever that was. And so, it seems From a wider perspective, regardless of what political [00:43:00] stripes you happen to wear, regardless of what level of assertion or denial you may be in over one of 20 different topics, um, the fact of the matter is that we're all being faced with this Plutonic Roto Rooter like cleaning all the shit out and everything being exposed, and, and, and some sort of process where caterpillars may end up being butterflies, but while the time between the caterpillar's death and the butterfly's birth, it just looks like bleh.

There's, there's, there's not a lot to see, and it's hard to tell where we are, where we were, or where we're going, and that's part of where we are right now.

What We Can Expect, and What We Can Do Now

Rick: Rick,

Amanda: one of the questions that I remember asking astrologers over and over in 2020 was how long is this going to last? How long are we in this, this metamorphosis phase?

And from what I'm hearing from you, it's, it's longer [00:44:00] than, than what even a lot of astrologers were saying at that 2024,

When do you think the butterfly begins to emerge?

Rick: Okay, so, I'll answer that question in a moment. But before I do, I just want to make sure that we understand. That when the butterfly emerges, we don't know what that butterfly is going to be. In other words… Or

Amanda: it's a beautiful orange and black and amazing

Rick: butterfly.

That's right. Or is it going to be some venomous moth? We don't know. No, I'm serious. And I'm not saying that to strike any more fear than we already have or any more than we need. Having said that… I would suggest that as we move into the phase of Uranus trining Pluto, remember Uranus joined up with Pluto begin, like a new moon [00:45:00] beginning of the cycle, mid 1960s, 65, 66 was when it was exact.

Pluto as, as Uranus was moving through Aries. Uranus was squaring Pluto in Capricorn, and that was exact 20 12, 13, 14, 15. And you know, that was the Arab Spring and the Occupy Wall Street and the reaffirmation of, um, global warm warming, a and, and, and, and the stimulation of the global client denial.

It was also, Ferguson, Missouri culminating, you know, in all kinds of, uh, awareness or media awareness around what we might call, you know, uh, racial disparity or civil rights or, and certainly gender issues with, in the mid sixties, it was, you know, the, Ms. Magazine and burn your bra and the rise of, you know, feminism, at least in that phase.

And [00:46:00] then at the square, it was the legalization of, of gay marriage and the blossoming of the gender fluidity that we're dealing with now and or at least becoming more aware of. So all of these things. are, are, are part of the cycle and they were, and they can be connected to the Pluto Uranus conjunction of the mid sixties.

And then the Pluto Uranus square of the 2012 to 2015. And then the nodal connection with Pluto, the South node, Pluto conjunction, The Saturn Pluto conjunction and the Jupiter Pluto conjunction of 2020 ish, and the next major piece beyond this Pluto squaring the nodes is Uranus, as it moves into Gemini, will trine Pluto, having just moved into Aquarius, and I believe it's the [00:47:00] Uranus trine Pluto that will.

Lift us out of this, stage of, being lost in conflict into some stage where things will, where the future will come to us much quicker and we will realize that we are in it. It's here. We can't resist it. And we're not going to fight it as much. And whether that's good news or bad news, whether that's the underlying archetypal energy of, um, of AI saying humans aren't in control anymore.

I am, you know, or whether it's the, um, ETS basically landing and saying, you humans have screwed it up one too many times. We're in charge now. Or whether it's some technological breakthrough on the energy front that's giving us the immediate ability to, um, to sidestep, you know, petroleum, um, and, and, or whether it's a solution to this problem or that problem.

I don't know. But I do know [00:48:00] that it's going to take until that trine, until Pluto, um, is, uh, trined by Uranus, until Uranus moves into Gemini. And having said that, and that's basically 20, 26, 27, 25, 26, 27 is when that kind of begins to play out. And what, um, and, and, and, and what I also need to mention though, is that every 84 years, Um, when Uranus returns to Gemini, the United States has been involved in.

Now, that doesn't mean we will, and the war can be strictly an information war, which obviously is largely the war that we're already involved in. I mean, you know, if you want people to talk about a potential civil war, the United States is in the midst of those involved

on the periphery. It's being fought by control of thoughts. That is a war and it is a civil war. And so, um, you know, but, but I think that that's going to take [00:49:00] that long. And I also think that ultimately, whether it's the tropical Pluto return in 2022, or the sidereal Pluto return in 2024, Pluto moves so slowly, slowly.

That unlike a Mercury transit, that's a day coming, a day here and a day going Pluto transits are two or three years coming a couple of years here and a couple of years going and I don't have the exact dates. I just know we're in the midst of it

Amanda: or people who feel, discouraged or afraid or for people who are just wondering what they can do.

About all this. I I, earlier in the comments, someone was saying that they have, they're in a Pluto transit and it's really scary and Yeah. What, what do you, what do you say?

Rick: Drugs. . No kidding.

I know how in, I have Uranus. I have Uranus in [00:50:00] my first house. I get to be inappropriate and shocking. No, I don't mean that. I don't mean that at all. Love that actually. Um, and um, by the way, Julie just posted. Um, uh, something about one of my favorite things, which I know we've talked about before here and I could talk about for hours, but Julie wrote the media is the message and actually the title of the book is the medium is the message, but the title of the book, although when, when Marshall McLuhan first wrote this in a book called the Gutenberg Galaxy, uh, understanding media.

Rather, he wrote The Medium is the Message. The title of his book, though, was The Medium is the Massage, and he was a great fan of James Joyce, who was the champion of complex puns and twisting language, and The Medium is the Massage, basically, the concept is, It doesn't matter what we're watching on TV.

It's that we're watching TV that counts. It [00:51:00] doesn't matter what we're reading in books. It's that we're reading books and that with the Gutenberg galaxy, we entered a period of several centuries where seeing is believing. We were reading books. We were looking at things from a distance and taking reality in with our eyes.

And that was the rise of perspective and ideologies and nation states where everything had distance and perspective, the age of enlightenment, where what man was no longer part of nature, but looked at it. It was from a distance. And McLuhan said that with the rise of radio and television and computers that we've, and he coined this term, flipped out, meaning that our nervous system.

is now an exo nervous system, just like a crab has an exoskeleton, we, humanity, now has an exo nervous system, and as such, we have de emphasized the seeing is believing, Wayne dyer, used to say That believing [00:52:00] is seeing because in the tribal culture and for, Marshall McLuhan and the name is not McLaren.

It's mC. Capital. L. U. H. A. N. Marshall McLuhan. Marshall McLuhan said that we with the advent of electronic technology. We are now in a post literate society, humanity is, and that we are no longer literate, we are post literate, which is actually a re tribalization, and he claims that the first electronic generation was the TV generation of the 50s that came into age in the 60s that basically the tribal jump drums was the music and that the whole rise of whatever it was that happened in the 60s was a re tribalization think Woodstock and even now with festivals and so on.

Um, and so, yes, Julie, I'm sorry. I got sidetracked because what she said is so important. Um, [00:53:00] and it's really, I think, ultimately important to understand where we are now, because we've basically externalized our nervous system and our brains were like little cells running around inside of a global, uh, global brain.

And with all that, Amanda, I have to admit, I forgot what your question was.

Amanda: The question was, what can we do? I mean, it's so interesting, Rick, what you're saying. Last night, I found myself. so frustrated with my daughters because they had spent like three, I was frustrated with myself for allowing about three hours worth of just straight movies, you know, movie after movie after movie.

And I felt so icky after, and I was like, God, just the onslaught of messages and programming. And it was, oh, it wouldn't, I was like, wow, that was just like three hours of garbage, basically.

Rick: So I will answer that. But I [00:54:00] also want to say one other thing about how things are moving so fast and how it's hard to keep up with change.

And that is, remember, if we look at the United States's chart, just as an example, Pluto was, you know, at a certain position, um, in 1776.

Pluto's opposition to that position occurred in 1937. That's like, 17, 18, 19, that's like 150 years to get halfway around the cycle. And then its second half of the cycle, back to the conjunction, is in 2024. In other words, Pluto is moving so fast right now, compared, because its orbit is so lopsided. And it gets so close to the sun and farther away, you know, through the 80s and 90s, Pluto was closer to the sun than Neptune was.

A lot of people don't even realize that. Neptune was moving slower than [00:55:00] Pluto. And so what that means is that time, aside from as you get older, time Pluto's

moving so damn fast. So what do we do? How do we manage this? Well, there's a few things. Anything that one can do to maintain their sense of balance is, is a step in the right direction, whether that is yoga, meditation, relaxation, swimming, whether it's a, you know, um, a karmic yoga where you're actually doing things engaged in something, whatever we can do to, to, whether it's psychotherapy, whether it's yoga.

You know, whether it's dance, anything that we can do to help us maintain our balance is is a step in the right direction. Secondly, um, I think there's this line that I'm not sure where it [00:56:00] comes from, but it's something that we've thrown around for a long time that I always say, as the great, as the great Swami said, I don't know who the great Swami was, but as the great Swami said yard by yard, it's hard inch by inch.

It's a cinch. And so from that standpoint, you know, I often say that we need to have one eye on the distant future, but we need to have the other eye on the ground where we're taking our next step. In other words, there has to be this, this sense of paying attention to what's going on and doing what we can do to keep, to keep alive.

And then, maybe the most important thing in all of this, Is what I would call compassion and and and maybe a better word is kindness. Maybe people have an easier time understanding that than some complex thing like compassion. But it basically means [00:57:00] seeing things from someone else's point of view and knowing that they're just trying to get by also.

even though they may have a terribly different way of looking at reality than you do. And, you know, and again, ultimately everyone's just trying to be happy, but many people are so afraid that their happiness is projected onto something that someone else is or isn't doing. And therefore we have people who are trying to control other people by preventing them from reading books.

You know, I read yesterday that, that the most recent victim of Florida's suppression of reading material was that Shakespeare, William Shakespeare's, um, Midsummer Night's Dream has been taken out of all of the libraries and made only available to juniors and seniors in high school because it's considered inappropriate.

Now, I don't want to fall down this or any one [00:58:00] political rabbit hole, I'm just using this as an example of people who have a fear, and therefore try to control it in other people, and typically deny it in themselves. Um, and so what do we do for that? We go to therapy. We, we, we learn about ourselves, we, we, we strive for ways to improve who we are and open up to new ways of thinking about things, knowing that whoever we're relying on for the truth doesn't know.

There's no one out there who has a corner on reality that has it all, whatever, in fact, the more, the more someone is certain about the truth, probably the less they know about it. And this is something that scares the hell out of people. But the. bottom line here is that we have to be open to new understandings.

And part of that begins with being compassionate and being kind. And that compassion and kindness is not only to [00:59:00] other human beings, but it's to animals. It's to the planet. It's to, you know, it's to the cosmos in which we live. Um, Mia Moa has referenced Andre Barbeau. Um, who is probably the first of the modern astrologers, um, who actually looked at the outer planet cycles, which so many of us do now with the advent of computers, um, you know, it's easy to just hit a button and get every Pluto Saturn, um, or Saturn Pluto conjunction in opposition since, you know, uh, since the birth of Jesus and, and begin to assign that to, you know, the history that was going on.

But Andre Barbeau talked about 2025 being the beginning of a new renaissance, and that goes back to the, um, Uranus to trining, trining Pluto. So, um, I don't know if that answered the question completely. There is no really one simple answer, but the, but, but I believe that the answer is facing [01:00:00] our own internal fears and learning, how to.

Manage and or to dissipate our hate by managing our fears without projecting them onto what others should or shouldn't do. And there is no political party or people that has, although I know that it seems like there is, but I would say that anyone involved in or most anyone involved in politics in one way or another is trying to suppress someone else.

Closing

Amanda: Rick, thank you so much. This has been an awesome deep dive about Pluto. I think that it has given us tons of, things to, to really be with. And like you said, it's, it can take a decade for, for Pluto to work its magic in our lives. Some of the main things that you brought up here today that I just wanted to summarize, uh, you said an invitation [01:01:00] from Pluto is like an invitation from a mafioso don.

There's

Rick: like, you gotta say that really. Oh, well, it's the offer. You can't refuse. You know, most of us have been through some sort of plutonic changes in our lives. Although I have to say, you know, when you look at someone's chart and you see where Pluto was when they were born, here's a quick chart interpretation thing.

You look at someone's chart and you see where Pluto was when they were born. And then you see where Pluto is now. And the question that you should make in your mind, has Pluto in their lifetime crossed over their sun or moon or moved opposite their sun or moon? And if so, when? Because those are likely plutonic transitions that not everyone ever gets to experience in a lifetime because Pluto moves so slowly.

Yeah. Other people, other people, you know, are, let's say they're, they're, um, born, um, with their sun and moon [01:02:00] in, in Capricorn. And let's say they were born in the, seventies or eighties and Pluto was in Scorpio or Sagittarius. That means that that person has experienced Pluto transiting over their sun and their moon and maybe even their ascendant.

And so some people become old and, and maybe even hardened, maybe wise, but maybe also fearful by what they've had to face in their life because this is not about anything that's age dependent. I just wanted to throw that out there. I love

Amanda: that. I love thinking about Pluto, which ones of us have Pluto on our dance card in this lifetime.

Rick, thank you. I mean, there's so much here and I love the takeaway that we are each responsible to do the things that help us feel balanced, to practice kindness, to recognize that that the, I like what we brought up to about the hidden enemy here, that it's actually in coming together, [01:03:00] that we have more power against this, you know, hidden enemy that

Rick: it may have been Helen Keller.

I don't remember, but someone said alone, we can do. nothing or so little and together we can do so much. And that's part of what this is about is about finding community and making sure that the community we find is a community of kind and compassionate and people who are growing in awareness, not closing down because of fear.

People like you.

Amanda: If you haven't yet checked out Rick's classes with us, he has an entire astrology foundations suite. That is an incredible. starting point or revisiting point. If you've been studying astrology and you really want to get those foundations solid and you like Rick's approach, you kind of want to get into the way that he practices astrology because you resonate with the way that he does it.

Rick: Hey, and by the way, before we leave, I should say that there are still a handful of openings for my 10 [01:04:00] day retreat in Goa, India. December 6th through the 16th. , it's called initiation to Astr into astrology. It's, uh, work that I've done before in groups like this. It's gonna be incredible, magical. Go to Heaven and Earth, one word, heaven and earth workshops, all one word, heaven and earth workshops.com.

And there's a day by day curriculum and activities on there, and it's gonna be fabulous and it's gonna fill up.

Amanda: Yay. Awesome. Yes, go. Hang on with, you're coming, aren't you, Amanda?

Rick: What's, uh, I don't know. Yeah.

Amanda: Kids astrology have living in Hawaii. Yeah. There's a lot of things that are making it a little challenging, but as far as what Rick just said about community and being around kind people.

And I mean, I, I personally believe that. that people who are interested in understanding the mysteries of the cosmos and are exploring these things. Why are we here? What's the point of all this? That you're going to find some amazing [01:05:00] people to hang out with. So yes, go to India and hang out with Rick and some really cool people and learn some amazing things.

Someone else in the, in the comments also, said I would really love to have my chart done. So if you haven't yet gone to Astrologer Connect, which is our reading platform, where we have some amazing astrologers that you can book readings with, go check that out. That's astrologyhub. com slash connect.

Rick made a cameo appearance on Astrology Connect. I'll be back.

Rick: I'll be back. Yes. How was that for you? It was great. It was great. It was a, it was a lot of fun. And the people who, who I connected with, I got emails from most of them just, you know, uh, thanking me and it was, yeah, it was, it was good, it was, it was really good.

And as you know from the chart extravaganzas that we've done, the chart interpretations that we've done, that we have another one coming up in November. Um. That it's something that I don't get to do enough of and I love doing and I'm good at it. So it's a lot of [01:06:00] fun. And so, yeah, um, yeah, keep your eye out.

You'll, there'll be an email if you're on the list, uh, uh, from Amanda saying, Hey, Rick's going to be on tomorrow from blah, blah, blah, to when, and I don't to do

Amanda: was put one post in our inner circle

Rick: members. Kept me busy. Kept me busy.

Amanda: It kept you busy and people, it was almost like it broke the system, like people were trying to get on all at the same time.

So, uh, I'm really happy to hear that you're gonna do another cameo.

Rick: Yeah, I, yeah, I liked it a lot. It was a lot of fun. Yeah. Good. All right,

Amanda: everybody, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for tuning in for this deep dive about Pluto and we look forward to connecting with you. The next cosmic connection is gonna be our August.

Forecasts. Yeah. So make sure you're subscribed to the channel. You'll get a notification when we go live and also like what Rick just said, if you do want to be notified when Rick is doing a cameo appearance on Astrologer Connect, which by the way, he has like a three year waiting list for readings.

So being able to like jump the line and actually connect with him live is [01:07:00] definitely a treat. Um, make sure that you're signed up for our newsletter. That's astrologyhub. com slash insider. And, uh, you'll get lots of other cool goodies with that.

Rick: So thank you, Amanda, as always you're, you're, you're, you're my favorite interviewer.

Although sometimes I don't think I even let you ask the questions, but you reflect myself back to me in ways that really make me think. And I really appreciate that about you. Oh,

Amanda: that's so sweet. That's so, but in the beginning you told me I'm not the only one.

Rick: No, but you're the best. Oh, there we go. All right.

Amanda: I'll take it. Okay, everybody take care and we will catch you on the next episode.