Lessons from the Underworld for a Brighter Future

Listen here:

Amanda Walsh & Astrologer Adam Gainsburg discuss ways to use the Pluto Return of the USA for personal growth.

On today’s episode, you’ll learn…
🌒 How to grow and evolve through change and challenge, and the importance of allowing and inviting these elements into your life.

🌓About the concept of the moon’s nodes representing the entire Karmic-Dharmic axis of one’s life, and how understanding ourselves better can lead to personal growth and change.

🌔The importance of acknowledging and feeling places in us that are uncomfortable and resistant, and how meeting these feelings can lead us towards greater joy and fulfillment.

➕ To join Adam’s upcoming webinar, The Dark Cross of 2023, go to https://astrologyhub.com/darkcross

☠️ 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.

Working with USA’s Pluto Return for Personal Evolution

[00:00:00]

Intro

Amanda: Welcome to the Astrology Hub podcast. We are here live today, so I’m really looking forward to saying hello to all of you, answering some live questions. And I just want to say, if you’re listening to the recording, it is going to be perfectly relevant and amazing for you also. This isn’t one of those live broadcasts where if you miss the live, then you miss out.

This is going to be amazing content for you no matter when you’re tuning in. So I am really, really happy that you’re here. I’m so happy to be joined by Adam Gainsbourg, who is an incredible astrologer. And before we get rolling, I just wanted to invite you to hit the subscribe button if you haven’t already done that so that you don’t miss any episodes that we post here.

And one ask that I have, and one way that you can help support this podcast and our YouTube channel our Facebook channel as well is by wherever you listen. Just give us five stars, hit that subscribe, and [00:01:00] if you have the time to write a written review, we would really, really appreciate it.

It helps us get this show out to more and more astrology lovers throughout the world. All right. With all that said, let’s dive in and go down the astrological rabbit hole together Today,

Significance of the US Pluto Return

Amanda: Adam, you reached out to me because you have a really important thing that you want to make sure that we are all aware of, and I know that it has to do with Pluto opposite the sun, indirect square to the lunar nodes, and how this is creating a forced meeting of our unconscious shadow, self, and our life.

Purpose and how this cross ties into the origin of the United States and Pluto. So the US Pluto return. So Adam, why do you feel like this is so important to be bringing up to our community right now?

Adam: Great, because in my opinion, we have never been more available to make the most important changes in our lives.

Normal things that have always worked in our lives. Aren’t working as well, aren’t [00:02:00] or aren’t working in the same way, or we have to stretch or change things in order to get them to work that systemically, systematically.

And so that’s a sign that we’re actually more malleable. Our set ways of thinking and doing things kind of gets scabs built up over them over time. And those scabs are composed of confidence that what has worked before Will, will work, will keep working. It can also be built, the scab can be seen as a kind of composed of a kind of getting lazy, a little bit of laziness in the path of true transformation, because transformation is relentless.

I always like to say transformation doesn’t see us. It doesn’t really care about us and our personal wants and needs. Transformation is the nature of the universe. I have a whole phrase in another area of my work, I call it the universe evolving, growing. That’s the universe evolving [00:03:00] and growing. That’s consciousness evolving and growing.

This is time for this. This square, which I’ll explain, is like, an amazing opportunity. Like, wow. Because the last thing we think about, two things that are like, really connected within us, is our deepest like shadow unconscious self with our exalted life purpose, what we’re really here for.

But in this square, they’re coming head to head. And so that head to head in astrology, we call those hard aspects, conjunctions. oppositions, squares, and you can go for some of the minor aspects too, but those are the basics. This one has both the opposition and the square.

Sun Opposite Pluto and Shadow vs. Light

Adam: So Amanda, sun opposite Pluto. Let me just briefly start there.

When an outer planet is opposite the sun, it means that that outer planet is closest to earth. When a, when a planet is closest to [00:04:00] earth, that’s like being on a very crowded train car and you’re standing next to someone that you haven’t, you don’t know. You don’t have anything in relationship with them.

You don’t want to have anything really driven, but you’re just shoved against them because of the sheer volume of bodies in the car. So you’re really, you’re like in their energy field. Maybe you hear the music playing through their headphones, or you can smell their breath or something. Like exactly that, right?

I can feel it. It’s

Amanda: uncomfortable.

Adam: Exactly that. Right. Right. So this is what we call earth proximity. A planet’s earth proximity is not something you’re going to find on the round astrological chart wheel. You have to look at the sky. So that’s a big plug I wanted to make here when astrology students really.

get serious about astrology, you got to start understanding the sky movements of the planets, not just what the charts shows you where things are. That’s, that’s a, that’s a critical starting, but the sky stuff. So this earth proximity, so Pluto is an outer planet. [00:05:00] Technically these days, it’s a dwarf planet.

Um, and so it is closest to the earth. Now in distance, it doesn’t mean much because Pluto is already so far away, but we know astrologically that physical distance doesn’t limit astrological effect. You know what, you know what increases astrological effect? Time. In other words, outer planet transits. How many times does Pluto cross a particular degree of the Zodiac?

How many times is, let’s say Pluto is coming to your whatever planet, your Jupiter, your natal Mercury, whatever? How many times is Pluto going to cross that point? At least five, maybe seven. How long is that going to take? A year and ten months, all the way to two and five months, two years and five months.

That long, living for two years approximately with that planet on the same point, crossing and going and crossing and going. The amount of time it is, that’s what intensifies the [00:06:00] effect of a transit. That’s why a lot of us don’t really feel Mercury transits because he’s quick silver. He just so it’s time how slow or what we say methodical a planet is going through the zodiac.

Okay so what does Pluto represent? This is a whole conversation that’s like three hours long. What does Pluto represent in astrology? I made a point because I have a bad habit of waxing long winded. Let me give people here the thing to take away in the context of this dark cross. Which is my name for this grand cross between Pluto and the sun and the lunar nodes.

Pluto can be understood in this context to, to signify the central theme at the base of our personal shadow or our unconscious self. Again, not going into a long winded thing, Amanda, but essentially when I’m using the [00:07:00] word shadow, I am, what I’m speaking of specifically is those aspects of myself that I was born with.

These are not things necessarily that happened to me. Let’s say, you know, very difficult times as a child or later, betrayals or whatever. These are fundamental qualities that I was born with that stand in opposition or counterpoint to what my life’s about. So the human shadow is the deepest level of our unconscious.

This is really important to understand. Because that deepest level holds such gems. for becoming powerful and empowered and embodied in our life who we’re supposed to be. Unfortunately, most of us, genetically, I would say, are very afraid of what we don’t know. We get very [00:08:00] scared with things that scare us.

We leave our truth and our center when things rock us, but the shadow rests underneath all of that, depending on your time zone, the 21st or the 22nd of July, Pluto will be directly opposite the sun. Okay, so what’s the sun? It’s what I call the flavor of vitality that runs through my circuits. We’re all infused with an enormous amount of life force vitality. I have a, my sun sign, let’s say I’m Taurus.

I have a Taurus vitality. You have a Sagittarius vitality. They, that group over there, when you do their group chart, they have a Cancer vitality. But the sun is the vitality that runs through us. So now you get this idea that the opposition here is not just oh, Pluto’s going to reveal to me things that I’m ready to see, or the sun’s going to shine light on my shadow.

It’s that these things are in [00:09:00] opposition to each other. In the terms of our charts, They’re like the most opposite. They’re the furthest away from each other zodiacally. So that means they’re kind of trying to, it’s a tug of war between my shadow and if you will, my light. Maybe just take a moment and even hit the pause button or whatever and close your eyes and just, just reflect like open and just see where am I in a little bit of a conflict between my light self and my shadow self.

In other words, where am I over relying on my light and I don’t want to see my shadow? Where am I spending too much time in my shadow and not honoring my light? Whatever it is for you, you know, each of us have to dial this in specifically for us. But that’s a, an easy way to understand this opposition between them.

Amanda: So, Adam. Yeah. Can you give some examples of what the shadow might be for people? Is it [00:10:00] those thoughts of like, I’m not good enough. I’ll never amount to anything. Or is it fears about. You know, actually shining that and or is it gifts that we have that we are not acknowledging because we’re even afraid of what that might mean for our life.

If we were to pursue certain aspects of ourselves, like can you just give us a few examples? Yeah, great.

Adam: The shadow again, man, just to start here is. is the under, under, underlying beliefs that I hold about myself, that I just take to be. So what I’m trying to say by, by, by, what I’m trying to point to you by saying that is to say that the shadow, the true shadow in a person can’t be usually begotten.

to by normal thinking or self reflecting or journaling [00:11:00] or hypnosis or lots of healing work. The shadow is a fundamental, it’s kind of like as essential to us as our physical bodies is. So examples of my shadow, it is impossible for me to accomplish what I’m here for because I am deficient. That would be an example of a shadow.

Another one. I will never find the love of my life because I’m not beautiful. That’s an example of a shadow. I’m not kind of bringing these or offering these, Amanda, out of thin air. I work with a lot of people over many years. Often down here in the depths of people’s shadow, and it is very, it’s consistent across the board.

Most people who really start diving deep into this, they’re, they’re very, very surprised at how many layers there are to be able to get to this layer. [00:12:00] Okay, so, the shadow is the things that I hold about myself. that actually block what my life’s about. So let’s say my life is about my life’s about improving astrology on the planet. I don’t personally believe that’s my life purpose, but I’m an astrologer. So let’s just pulling that out of my my mind. My life is about. improving astrology, the practice of astrology, the receptivity of it, the usefulness of it.

Okay. And how it can appeal to everyone, no matter what culture doesn’t matter. The shadow, my shadow then will be something around. I’m not smart enough to be an astrologer. I don’t have the language skills to be able to speak to people effectively enough. I always get stage fright or nervous every time I get on the computer to speak to a client, or I, I’m scared to write a paper or present in public my work, like in a lecture or a conference, [00:13:00] because I’m going to be laughed at or ridiculed.

Amanda: I’m wondering why you said we can’t get to these things through reflection. I’ve noticed as I normally find these things, these little, uh, there’s like these annoying little gremlins in our mind, you know, uh, I find them through experiences, like I’ll go to do something and all of this stuff comes up or I’ll be in a situation and I realize.

I’m feeling very uncomfortable and not good because of these things. Is that what you mean by we can’t really get them just by like sitting with a pen and paper and deciding we want to journal on our shadow?

Adam: Great question. Great. Great. Amanda. Yeah. Um, no, here’s what I would say just to use that example.

Okay. Those annoying things. You know, it sounds like they’re pointing to some places where you’re uncomfortable. Okay. Now you sit with your uncomfortability and you’re going to find other things about yourself that are not the little annoying things, these other things. Now[00:14:00]

that’s not the shadow yet. That’s what I call the medial or the deep subconscious. Sitting with those things and unpacking those things. Unpacking means revealing and getting really honest and clear about yourself and taking ownership and responsibility for those things, then starts to reveal the deeper layer of the shadow.

If you’ve ever watched a movie and the character kind of leaves the regular world and is in like this world of shadows, literally, or like is in this alternate reality on another planet or a different dimension, Kind of thing. That’s the analogy. The shadow is a whole other dimension of myself, but it is so infused with life force.

It’s so infused with vitality. It’s just being that vitality in our in our unconscious selves. Each of us is being used to keep. our greater light [00:15:00] and our gifts and our beauty and our pleasure and our genius away from the world because we’re too scared to get hurt. Is that, is that landing? Is that making sense?

Yeah, totally.

Amanda: I, I, as you’re speaking, I’m thinking of a buried treasure chest. Yes, it’s like way deep underground. And if we can get to it and, and actually get it open, there’s so much beauty and gems and value and radiance, but that is really deep. And yeah, absolutely. Okay. So you’re saying we have this, this dark cross as you’re calling it, this cross with the opposition between Pluto, which you’re saying is the aspects of myself.

I was born with. That stand in opposition to what my life’s about. Deepest level of, of unconscious, the gems of who we’re supposed to be. Most of us are afraid of what we don’t know. So we, we, we don’t really go into those, that dark, [00:16:00] deep place in order to find it, you’re saying that is in direct opposition with.

Our son, I love how you say this, the flavor of vitality that runs through my circuits. So if your son is in Capricorn like me, then it’s my flavor of the sun. My vitality is, it has a Capricorn flavor. Exactly. Or if you’re a cancer, if you’re Aquarius, it has that kind of a flavoring,

Adam: right? Yes. Perfect.

That’s exactly

Amanda: it. Tug of war. Tug of war, especially this week and through the end of the month. Correct. We’re in this moment. Okay. Continue. So I, I know I took you on some, like, let’s unpack that a little bit

Adam: more, but no, we needed to. Great. Great. Great. Okay. Now, I don’t mean to confuse, but I got to be, you know, um, thorough with explaining this.

Pluto in astrology, in certain kinds of astrology, the deeper kinds, is also the symbol for what [00:17:00] our soul is. is doing here. Not what are necessarily what our human life is constructed as, but Pluto is not just a symbol for our shadow. It’s also the symbol of our soul specifically. And this is a big phrase that I coined many years ago, and it’s a partial title of two books of mine.

The soul’s desire. Pluto represents what my soul wants to experience in this life through being who I am.

Now think about this. This is Pluto. Now, not as the shadow, but as the soul opposite the sun, which is my flavor of vitality that runs through my circuits. So now you’re seeing a little bit more, or I hope feeling, a little bit more of the dynamic of why this is such a stressful time for a lot of us. A lot of us.

And by the way, I might be really stressed. But I might have amazing coping [00:18:00] mechanisms that don’t allow me to ever feel any of it. So I never admit any of it. But it keeps working against my nervous system. It keeps working to disrupt my homeostasis. It keeps degrading my immune system, or my happiness, or my whatever.

But I’m just not aware of it because I’ve developed this coping mechanism to not feel stress, to not get… Worried.

The sun opposite Pluto as my soul’s desire. This is the time when we, a lot of us, are having things in our life. Like forced into our, like right here, like right in front of our face to say, Hey, this is up, please. Universe is saying, look at this in yourself, please, please address this, please learn from this.

That’s another dynamic that this Pluto opposite sun is giving us.

Third thing, when you look at Pluto opposite the sun,

boiling it down, Amanda, in very pragmatic way, our reality [00:19:00] is changing folks. If we’ve developed and built a wonderful bubble. filled with great resources and a lot of fun and no stress. Fantastic. I love it. Stay in the bubble. And there’s another option, which is open oneself up to basically how is my reality changing?

And am I going to stay in step with the changes? Maybe not the changes landing on my shores in my personal life, but I have to interact with others. There are systems that I have to interact with. And give my information to or receive information from, it’s called a computer and an online account and a phone and, uh, business colleagues and family, uh, relations and all kinds of things that we’re interacting with.

So reality is changing. Sun opposite Pluto. It’s up to us how much we’re going [00:20:00] to allow our eyes to open, or are we going to stay with what has always worked. Speaking like this, Amanda, with you publicly, there’s no way to give like, like specific examples for everyone. I would say this. If you’re listening or watching this, and this resonates with you, do an honest inner self assessment.

What, if anything, do you need to change in the way you do things in the world that can more align you with the uncertainty in the world? Because there’s an increasing amount of uncertainty as well. That’s not a bad thing, that could be an incredibly exciting thing. But to align ourselves with the uncertainty.

Does that make sense?

Amanda: It does. I’m actually, I’m trying to… Wrap my head around what that might mean for us. No. So what do you need to [00:21:00] change in the way you do things in the world that aligns with more and more uncertainty? So, so, so basically things that we’re doing that maybe are stuck or rigid or don’t have enough flexibility or are reliant on knowing, like we have this, you know, perfectly planned five to 10 year, you know, life.

And if it doesn’t go that way, we’re going to lose it. Like that, that kind of thing that needs to be looked at and adjusted to put flexibility into it or or account for uncertainty. Yes, so that. We can move forward.

Adam: That’s right. Yeah. Beautiful. Beautiful, man. I love it. And there’s two ways to account for uncertainty or to, or to address it.

One is externally, as I’m suggesting, the other is internally. And the way we address [00:22:00] uncertainty internally is we look at where we are attached to the way things are, like emotionally, psychologically. We look at that, not just in our minds. We really open ourselves. To see, wow, I’m kind of stuck here. And one way we know we’re stuck is we have, we have some judgment about how other people do things.

Another way we can identify we’re stuck is when there’s fear, when there’s fear or anxiety that immediately comes when something changes that we weren’t expecting, like a little anxiety is good. A little apprehension, a little uncertainty is good, but when it sticks around and sticks around and sticks around, and now it becomes its own thing that we have to deal with, that’s more pointing to like a deeper issue.

Okay.

Amanda: Okay. That makes a lot of sense. Recently, Adam, I’ve, I’ve noticed that pretty much everything. That I’ve ever said, I will never do,

it’s like, Oh, okay. I guess that’s actually a signpost. Anything. I’m like, I will [00:23:00] never do that. Or I will never be that way. Or I will never say it’s like, maybe not. And just allowing space for that. And it’s like, well, why, why do I have so much judgment around that? Why am I so resistant to that? You know?

Right. And what is that showing?

Adam: I love that, Amanda. That’s really all that’s needed for us to admit, I, like, I might be close minded about or close hearted about this thing. Go and try it. Like, consider it. And then find out, okay, now I’ve tried it. I hate it. Now I know why I don’t like it. But at least I know.

A lot of, a lot of understanding the shadow is understanding how afraid we are to even find out about ourselves.

Amanda: Adam, it’s so interesting. And I’ve just I’ve noticed this so much because we have our new astrologer connect our reading platform. And so I talk about, you know, I’m talking about it to people in my life. And [00:24:00] one of the things that I just noticed over and over and over to what you just said is people going, well, what if I find out something bad?

Right. Or is the person, is the astrologer going to tell me something horrible about myself that I don’t want to know or horrible about my future or just what if they tell me that I’m bad and it just makes me feel Adam that there’s some collective. radio station that we are tuned to at birth that has this message of you’re bad, you’re wrong, you’re not good enough, you don’t deserve to be here.

I mean, it’s so universal. It seems so universal

Adam: exactly. And why does everyone have them? What does everyone, what do we all share? We all share media. We all share, maybe certain foods when we were growing up or infant.

We all share a certain psycho emotional availability. immaturity or maturity of our parents who themselves were raised by [00:25:00] parents who, who themselves were raised by parents who, this is what we all share. I, I love your thinking. It’s so logical and solid, Amanda. I’m of the same mind.

There’s something we all share. There’s something else happening that is unraveling. And it’s not just our personal story or personal path, our personal shadow, uh, coming up. It’s, it’s the collective and that’s a whole other level of this whole, uh, dark cross. Is the collective shadow of humanity and this is exactly why when it what was that like a year ago year and a half ago I came to you and said let’s do something on USA’s Pluto return and that’s where I for the first time my career I presented on that and Where you can like, okay So essentially my analysis of the United States chart, the United States is not made to be a world leader It doesn’t have the astrology.

It doesn’t have the chops It’s, it’s too much aligned or [00:26:00] wired for innovation and experimentation and being out on the, not exactly the edge, but trying new things. It’s not made to be the stalwart center of human planetary stability. But look what happened in the 60s and 70s when we went off the gold standard.

Look what happened before World War I when the Grand Canyon was closed off. Certain areas of the Grand Canyon were closed off. Like, all these other things that happened. It’s like, hmm. So that’s why I made that whole point about the United States was like a Trojan horse. The creation of the country was like a Trojan horse to get into, to unify the world in exactly what you’re saying.

We’re all kind of like this. We all kind of deal with the same fears or doubts about ourselves. What if they tell me, what if he tells, what if she tells me there’s something bad? Like that thought that itself is self limiting. It’s like, if they tell me something bad about myself, it doesn’t mean that it’s irrevocable.

It means, Oh, [00:27:00] now I have my instructions. Now I’m going to go work on that. That’s what it means. Well, and

Amanda: nobody ever says, what if they tell me something amazing about myself? Exactly. It’s always like, what if they’re going to tell me something bad? That’s where the fear is okay. So we’re in this moment where we’re sort of revisiting this, the U S Pluto return.

And what it’s bringing up for us collectively and individually,

Adam: that’s right, exactly. And I just want to make a point here, Amanda. This is not limited to people of the United States, either born there or living there. This is a symbol. This is a, this is a symbol for the entire planet. Because of the role that the United States has played it for the last two, three hundred years.

That’s why it covers everyone. Because the dollar has been the standard around the world. English has been the standard language around the world. It didn’t come from England, it came from the United States. [00:28:00] So, that’s why we have such a strong effect. Now that’s changing. There are powerful countries forming alliances that are not English based, not dollar based.

Which as someone who’s born in America, I don’t like it, but I love it because that’s more in the direction of how the world should be in my astrological view. So I think we’re getting there, but it’s going to be a lot of, I think there’s going to be a lot of change. Let’s put it, putting some breakdown of, of legacy systems.

And if we’re not agile and able to respond well, then I think, there could be some tough times for a lot of us. Coming up.

Amanda: Okay. So I know that probably elicits some fear for people., so agility, flexibility, acknowledgement of [00:29:00] potential, you know, places where we’ve relied on certain things to be as they are now and will always be like being aware of where we’re attached to that or some of the things that you’ve brought

Adam: up.

Exactly. That’s it. That’s the most important being aware of Being aware of what I’m doing, being aware of my limiting thoughts and all of that. That’s a start, but being able to access the place in our bodies where they are actually being held as limitations. That’s where the change happens. This is the difference between.

Give us

Amanda: an example

Adam: , let’s say I have stage fright, but I’m in the public. So of two choices. Either I look at the stage fright and I go into my, what, what is the fear? Oh, the fear is that I’m not good enough. And then I feel that I don’t just acknowledge that and do art about it, [00:30:00] express it and share it with a therapist.

I actually go into the reality of that fear in my body. with courage and an open heart. And what I’m going to find inside of that fear, only I find it in here. I do not find it in my mind and understanding of myself. I will find, Oh my God, I love expressing myself. I’ve just been so afraid to. So what I’m afraid of is not the stage fright.

I’m afraid of expressing myself. I’m afraid of feeling that good, doing what I love to do. That’s the fear. So pick anything, everybody, like pick something that, you know, You’ve been afraid of a long time, doesn’t matter what it is, go into it with an open heart, let go your open mind, go in and really feel, you can’t get this with thinking, you can’t get this with, with using the mind’s ability to assess and correlate things.[00:31:00]

That’s the start, but that, that doesn’t get you the change

Bringing in the Nodal Square

Adam: This is spot on to what this dark crosses Pluto opposite sun square moons nodes, because the moon’s nodes to me represent the entire karmic Dharmic access of one’s life. So how this works is in very, very brief terms. And my whole second book is about just exactly this. We start out completely identified as our South node self.

Over time. If we choose a life of growth and change and increasing love and positive and contribution and embodiment and you know, growth, then we d we discover more and more of our, of ourselves as our north node qualities by sign, house, and aspects. Eventually, if, if we keep turning the dial on the future and we, we keep learning about ourselves, our north node selves, then what we find kind of miraculously is [00:32:00] some of our south node qualities re arise.

And now we’re starting to do the alchemy between who we’ve been karmically, let’s say past lives, number one. Number two, everything that we inherit, that I inherited genetically from my parents or epigenetically from my ancestors, and everything I got in the earliest, earliest pre verbal stage of infancy.

imprinted me by my parents and the energetic emotional environment. So all those three, karma, inheritance, and earliest life imprinting, that’s the start of my life. Dharma, the north node, is the, what I’m here for. But the real alchemy is when those become merged and that becomes this whole alchemical principle of one plus one actually equals three.

Because you retain the lessons and the wisdom of both, but now they merge and they create something new. And now you have access to the new and the [00:33:00] individuals. This is a very short way of saying it, but I’ve learned in public agenda, uh, public areas, Amanda, that just by describing like that quickly, something will trigger in the brain.

Something will trigger in the, in the knowing, Oh, okay. This is how it works. Okay. So essentially when the, when the moon’s nodes are square, the sun Pluto that we’ve talked about a lot already, it’s putting this shadow light conflict. Into direct square with my life purpose. Look, everybody has Pluto on their chart somewhere, right?

Means everyone has a shadow. Everyone has, was born under one of the suns. Everyone has a certain flavor of vitality. But there are millions and millions and millions and millions of people denying their sun sign. Their, that energy, because it scares them, because they don’t like it. There’s millions and billions of whatever people just, uh, ignoring their Pluto [00:34:00] energy.

Because it scares them. They don’t want to go there, but the nodes you can’t ignore. This is just kind of like when you wake up, when you close your eyes and go, what do I want in my life, you’re essentially tuning in to some equation of the South and the North node, and that plays out how, how your local conscious mind makes pictures of that.

Is through your planets, so let’s say you have Venus in the first house in blah, blah, blah sign and that’s square to this, but that’s trying that and then you have this Yod over here. Okay, so that’s like the that’s like your body, the body that you have, but the body itself in its in your form right now is taking its deeper cellular genetic instructions from the lunar nodal axis.

It’s not really genetic is taking its evolutionary instructions. So it’s a kind of a high way of saying it, Amanda, but this [00:35:00] square is trying to give us it’s like trying to take stuff that is really hard to reach in our daily lives like Pluto and Bring it to the surface so we can touch it so we can like wake up and sometimes not all of us but sometimes this is gonna we’re gonna wake up through change and challenge and fear and Whatever, because that’s, look, the truth is, well, I don’t know the truth, my opinion is that the human species, the whole species in our consciousness We’re quite young as a species.

We’re not very awakened. There are amazingly awakened people. You’re one of them, Amanda. Like, awakened, embodied, you’re just a light to, like, every direction in your life. There’s a lot, but as a species, we’re not very awakened. So how do we learn? How do we grow? We don’t [00:36:00] go, grow, through staying and living in our parents house our whole life.

That’s a metaphor. We don’t stay in our familiar behaviors. That’s not how we grow. We grow through change and challenge. And so this is a cross that will challenge and change us if we allow it to. The key is we have to allow it and a lot of us are so well developed in keeping fear from change away. And here is a time when we have to allow it.

We have to invite it and participate in it.

Okay. Big, big stuff. I know. But that’s what this is. That’s what this cross is.

Amanda: Okay. First of all, thank you for the amazing compliment. I don’t want to just brush past that. Thank you. Thank

Adam: you. It’s so, it’s so just self evident for anyone who even knows you half way.

Amanda: Thank you, Adam. You’re welcome. Okay. And I would say that this community is also, and [00:37:00] that’s why they’re here.

That’s why they’re here. They’re awake, they’re aware, they’re asking questions, you know. Okay. So if, so taking the, the moon, the lunar notes as. Sort of the evolutionary direction impulse. Yes. So people can look to their North Node to be like, Okay, this is kind of the direction that my soul is wanting to go.

Adam: Who am I becoming as a human being to greater and greater degrees?

Amanda: Great. Okay. Who am I becoming as a human being to greater and greater degrees? Okay, so using that North Node as that compass. Right. Pluto representing… The shadow aspects that are well and our soul like so like at the bottom at the deep part of Pluto is like the true soul impulse as well, but it also has within all the shadow things that are holding us back.[00:38:00]

Yes. And then the sun being the, the way in this lifetime that we want that vitality to come forth.

Adam: Yes. Yes. It’s the flavor of our vitality, but since you’re asking the question, Amanda, it’s also, it’s the way that consciousness, remember, remember everybody, the sun is not a planet. It’s a star. It’s of a whole other caliber than a planet.

Like we live on or Jupiter or Pluto or something. It’s a solar consciousness. So it’s also consciousness itself. When galaxies explode and they create the the compost for new galaxies and stars to form What’s exploding is star stuff? Planets are a glutinized star material.

Amanda: I can hang out with you forever and I don’t Totally understand what you’re saying. There’s like these I can like taste it for a minute and that’s like [00:39:00] What did you say? But it’s beautiful and it’s resonant. I mean like I don’t know that that’s what I want Because I can feel it And, and I’m, I’m hoping you all can too.

Finding Unfathomable Joy Through Shadow Work

Amanda: Okay, so in a nutshell.

Adam: Yep. Yes.

Amanda: This period of time. Yes. Is giving us this opportunity to propel even, like really catalyze towards this evolutionary impulse that’s within each one of us. Also, that’s held within the collective of humanity.

Adam: Totally.

Amanda: Each one of us contributing to that by acknowledging the things in us.

Not only acknowledging, but feeling places in us that are uncomfortable and resistant and even painful when we go in the direction of that impulse. We can be aware of what that impulse is, and I’m, I’m putting these words in your mouth. Tell me if you agree [00:40:00] by what brings us joy and what brings us alive and what excites us.

It’s like that place in you that’s like, Ooh, I want to go there, but that’s super scary. Like, oh my gosh, I, I, I, I, I get lit up when I think about doing this, but it freaks me out, whatever that is.

Adam: That’s right. That’s exactly it. That’s what we want to go towards, but we don’t want to just jump off a cliff.

To the things that we that bring us joy that we’re scared of we want to meet the fear and by the way, everybody sometimes it’s not fear. Sometimes it’s anger. Sometimes it’s deep, deep grief and sadness. Sometimes it’s resentment. Sometimes it’s jealousy. Sometimes it’s my collapse pattern or my arrogance.

We will meet some negative quality in us that is standing literally blocking me from my greater joy. That’s here just waiting. [00:41:00] And that’s what shadow work is. So

Amanda: I recently had an experience, Adam, of expressing myself as vulnerable and truthful as I know how. Okay. I was met. With so much misunderstanding and judgment that I ran and it hurts so much.

It was like, Oh God, I like that person can’t see me. Can’t hear me. Can’t feel me. Like they, they so misunderstood what I was trying to communicate. And one of the things when you were saying purpose, oftentimes I think of my purpose as to. Spread love with my words, with my voice, you know, and so to have that experience of like, okay, here I am like being as truthful and honest and vulnerable [00:42:00] as possible.

And this person just totally like taking it and like construing me as this thing that I’m like, Whoa, I don’t think that’s who I am like that, but, but then to feel in me how uncomfortable that is and how much in the past that. Has shut me down from even trying because, because it’s like, Oh, well then no one will ever get me.

And like, that’s it. This person like knows me kind of well, like in the fact that, so what would, what would a perfect stranger even say about me?

Adam: You know, exactly, exactly. That’s the strategy of the shadow.

Amanda: Yes. And all that came up in that one little experience. And I’m thinking that’s kind of what you’re

Adam: meaning.

It’s exactly what I’m meaning. What it sounds like, I don’t know, but it sounds like from that experience, you didn’t return back to, okay, I’m never doing this again. I am never expressing myself as vulnerably because if this is how it feels, the next time I really open my heart and open myself to someone, and this is what I would possibly could happen, could come back at me.

No, thank you. [00:43:00] You’re not doing that. But most people on the planet do. This is, there’s a, there’s a phrase I use, Amanda, in another area of my work. It’s called pre scaring yourself. Hmm. So, here I am, there’s a situation there, doesn’t matter what it is, that I’m afraid of. So I’m going to really scare myself and build up all the reasons why I’m not going to go do that.

But I haven’t even done it yet. I don’t know what’s going to happen. So that’s what we’re talking about here. This is the depth of the, this is just the beginning of the shadow work. Shadow work is the most intense, inner transformational work, and it takes a long time to even access the space. Why? Not because it’s so hidden and so dark and it’s so evil.

Not at all. It’s because we are so uncertain. We are so unpracticed to be in that much of our power. Amanda, my one word to my astrology students that I give them when introducing Pluto is, Pluto [00:44:00] represents your power, period. It’s your relationship with how powerful you are willing to live. This is not force, this is your true power that arises through your vitality.

And exactly what you’re pointing to. Now, what you do now, after this experience with this person, that entirely will determine what you’re next available for or not. And there’s no wrong answer. There’s no wrong answer. If you say, okay, screw that. I’m never doing that again. Great. Then that’s your choice.

Then the vitality will look to find its other way to go to come out. Or you choose it as a using as an example to keep, keep at it.

Amanda: It’s amazing to feel that the, the, the knee jerk tendency to shift it. Like, and you’d be so easy. And like you said, so understandable, just like, okay. And I’ve done it a million times, taking that kind of feedback and been like, okay, well, then I’ll just go back in my little cave and I won’t say anything.

But the thing is, [00:45:00] the thing is our power is, and like you said, not force, but power it’s. It’s wanting to come out anyway. So if we’re not owning it really fully, it’s getting misconstrued anyway, misunderstood and twisted and contorted. And it’s like, at the end of the day, we probably really don’t have a choice as to whether or not we’re going to eventually just accept it.

And yes, be who we are, but there’s this whole winding path to getting there, which I think is just part of being

Adam: human. Exactly. It is part of being this species at this current stage of our evolution. Yes. Yes. Most, I don’t know, most, but a lot of friendships are based in unconsciously agreed upon distorted self images.

And when one person starts to change and gets more honest with themselves, like, I don’t like feeling like this. And when I’m with you, some of the times I feel like this and then says something, it’s very easy for the person, the other, the other person to [00:46:00] go, wow, like you’re totally accusing me of like being this and you’re the one changing and you’re the one changing the rules of the friend.

Why does it have to be enemies? Stop othering. I’m changing. You’re changing. I’m feeling hurt. I’m feeling not seen. Let me go away for a while and I’ll come back to you when I’m clear in myself. Why does it have to be like, like always blaming like you’re, you’re at fault and you did this because the moment I start doing this, oh my God, I become the very thing that I’m blaming you for.

Amanda: We had our inner circle new moon ceremony and one of our beautiful members was, was talking about. More and more herself and what that was the impact that was having on her marriage. And it’s, it’s true. It’s like, and that is another reason why I think a lot of us hold back. Cause it’s like, what are the ripple effects?

Like what’s going to happen to my relationships? What’s going to happen? You know, another, actually this came up a lot yesterday. Another one talking [00:47:00] about how being in her truth was going to impact. Her relationship with her children and just the fear of that, it’s like simple, but then not because when we go to apply it in our lives, it’s like, that’s when you feel really complicated.

Adam: Exactly, exactly. The deeper one goes into one’s unconscious. It actually get at first, it gets even more complicated. You’re confused. You need help. You need a guy. We all do at certain point. And at some point we hit a place around a particular issue where it’s like, I, I get it. I get what I did. I get what I didn’t do.

I get what I wasn’t. I get where I was this, that, and the other thing. It’s in other words, it becomes so simple all over again. Once you hit that level of that much clarity or that much vitality.

The Golden Opportunity We Have

Amanda: Yeah. So Adam, if you were to, again, to like sum up the opportunity. Right now. And then also I’d love to hear, are there more ways that we can work with you?

Or like really, [00:48:00] if anybody’s out there going, this sounds amazing. And it’s like, I know it’s just scratching the surface, and I want to go deeper, and I love Adam, and I’d love to go deeper with him. Right. How do they do that? Great. So, I mean, I know he, yeah, go

Adam: ahead. So the first thing, most importantly, this square, everyone, this is a grand cross, it’s not just a square, it’s four squares and two oppositions, right?

Take a good, honest look at it. Not just with your mind, but with your heart. What is your current relationship between what you fear the most and what you know in your bones you are here for?

Really look at that everyone. Really look at that. And it won’t just be one 20 minute journaling session. Dream with this. Set your intention. Go to sleep. Ask your guides. Do a ceremony. Diet, workout, fast, do ceremony, whatever. What is that relationship for you right now? What you are actually here for and what you are afraid of the most.[00:49:00]

That’s, that’s how to summarize it.

Next Steps with Adam

Adam: Now, how to go next step. In a couple of days, I’m doing a live full on webinar workshop online about this whole grand cross that I call the dark cross of 2023. You can get it from the link that Amanda posted here

Amanda: we’ll also have it in the show notes or the description of this talk. So click on it there too.

Adam: Yeah, great. And that’s a two hour experience where I’m going to go very specifically much more in detail about basically Pluto, the sun, the moon’s nodes, and then each of the two oppositions and then the whole thing.

But I’m going to be speaking more English than astrologies because I want people to get this. This is an amazing, amazing opportunity, even though it’s going to be difficult for some of us. So that’s one. I would definitely check out if you’re like, if you’re liking this information, the USA Pluto [00:50:00] return, webinar, the, that whole video that I have.

You can, you can, you know, download that. You

Amanda: should be able to get that in our academy.

Adam: Oh, yeah, yes, absolutely. Go to Astrology Hub to get that the it’s called the USA’s Pluto return.

And this one was one that you and I did recorded together. Just you and I. Yes. This one that I’m talking about. Anyway, you can find it in astrology hub also, , the other thing I wanted to say was that a big push that I’m doing now is something called my chart is in my body.

This is my attempt, everyone, to remove the intermediary between my truth and astrology. Sometimes, our charts get in our way of seeing the truth. Do you know what I mean, everyone? You’re looking and looking and looking and looking at your charts and oh, that’s this, that’s this, but yet now I’m caught in my mind.

So [00:51:00] that’s something that you can access through my site. There’s a live workshop I did and it’s there and that’s a whole thing about taking the chart and actually placing it in, you know, with eyes closed in a sacred space, held in love, in your body. And then you can start to feel and see the feeling of that aspect.

Or that position of the planet or something in you and that’s a way to go right through to the truth of whatever you’re inquiring about in your life.

Amanda: I got to have just a little baby experience of that with Adam and it’s powerful. Check it out, look for the link in the chat and or in the show notes or the description of this podcast for the webinar that Adam’s doing this weekend, if they miss it, will it be, will it be available as a recording?

Adam: Yes, it will. Yes, it will. It totally will. Yeah, you can sign up. And if you [00:52:00] can’t make it live, it’ll be there. It’ll be uploaded, you know, a couple hours after it’s done. So it’ll be right there. It’ll be fresh for the rest of the month and then definitely afterwards. Amanda, it also occurs to me that there’s a Venus event I’m doing on August 13th because I’m such a Venus astrologer.

Venus is starting a whole new cycle with the Sun beginning on the 13th of August. And so that’s something also that they can take advantage of that. I’m going to be doing live. It’s it’s it’s it’s one in a series that I call Venus Mars embodiments. That’s, that’s a third thing.

Amanda: Beautiful.

Closing

Amanda: Well, Adam, I have enjoyed our ongoing communion that we get to share with all of our friends, and I love seeing all of your chats and your comments here and just how much this is resonating for you as well.

It sounds like we’re in a very. intense moment, but it feels to me, and like, this is sort of a, a destiny moment where we can make a decision to [00:53:00] really go in the direction of, of. The biggest reasons for

Adam: why we’re here. I love that the biggest reasons why we’re here, which is unique and beautiful for each of us.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Amanda: Beautiful. And, and it looks like there’s some, some work to do. Like there is, there’s a little bit of a processor, not a little bit, but there’s a processor journey to get there. So Adam, thank you so much for bringing this all to our awareness. Thank you

Adam: for having me, Amanda. Yeah.

Amanda: I mean, it’s so beautiful to be aware of the things that are happening so that we can really take advantage of it.

Doesn’t happen all the time. It’s not all the time that we have these these waves that we can ride to catapult us towards our destiny. So it’s like exactly take advantage of the

Adam: opportunity, right? Exactly. That’s how I try to live my life. I’m not always perfect, but I definitely aspire to live my life. I take advantage of what happens and this dark cross is like an amazing opportunity.

Amanda: All right, everybody. Thank you so, so much for being [00:54:00] here. Thank you for being a part of our community. Thank you as always for making astrology a part of your life. Can’t wait to catch you on the next episode. Check out the different things that we talked about here today. The webinar on Saturday is going to be epic.

Um, and I just really appreciate you, Adam. Thank you so much for reaching out to me and always being available to our community to help guide us through the different, astrological tides as they occur.

Adam: Thank you, Amanda.

Amanda: All right, everybody take care and we’ll catch you on the next episode.