by Robert Wilkinson
Today we explore specifics of the Superior Conjunction of December 19, 2020 at 29 Sagittarius and what it promises for the rest of December and January. This “fusion of life and mind” will impact the rest of the Mercury direct period, as well as the first part of its next retrograde up to the Inferior Conjunction on February 8, 2021 at 21 Aquarius during Mercury’s retrograde between 27 and 12 Aquarius in February. Of course, all previous Superior and Inferior Conjunction points, as well as Mercury’s retrograde and direct stations, are triggered by subsequent transits long after Mercury was there.
As we covered yesterday, the superior conjunction occurs when Mercury (mind) conjuncts the Sun (life) when in direct motion, while the inferior conjunction is when Mercury (mind) conjuncts the Sun (life) when Mercury is retrograde. Each operates as a fusion of Life and Mind, but in each “Mind moves in a different direction.”
When either conjunction happens, it indicates that signals, messages, and ideas from either outer sources or subconscious sources will fuse with the life principle. This sets the tone for the lessons involving how our minds are relating to our lives during the weeks which follow the inferior conjunction.
Since its last retrograde, Mercury in direct motion has been moving faster than the Sun. It has now caught up to the Sun and making a “superior conjunction,” beginning a several week period when mind will race ahead of life, heralding things to come when the Sun transits the span Mercury will show us over the next few weeks. The degree of any superior conjunction shows how our perceptions have caught up with our lives, which can bring forth a new expression of our light.
The Sabian Symbol for the Superior Conjunction
The Solar-Mercurial degree symbol for the Superior Conjunction falls at 29 Sagittarius, and it is said that the last third (decan) of any sign deals with the individual, mental, and spiritual levels of life, and being the third decan of Sagittarius it has a sub-influence of Leo with an additional Saturn tone. While I've given you a sense of this degree up to now, this is where we go into depth.
The symbol for the 29th degree of Sagittarius is”A fat boy mowing the lawn.” In the original Marc Jones class notes on the symbols published in The Astrology of Personality, Rudhyar says this is a degree of “Desire for fitness inherent in all living beings,” “consciously built, thus dependable determination,” and “persistent endeavor.”
In The Astrological Mandala, he says this degree involves “the need to attend to everyday tasks which both ensure social worth or respectability, and benefit one’s constitution.” This is a symbol of our need to “get in shape” or “stay fit” in some way. It is the technical degree of the sequence which began with the selfless dedication of the flag bearer and led to our ability to give ourselves to some work.
He continues, “the ‘fat boy’ suggests that constructive working habits are needed to compensate for self-indulgence in the amenities of social living” and “the need to maintain social respectability.” He says it falls in the span of Detachment, and it’s the technique on the individual mental level of the scene of Transference in the Act of Group Integration.
According to Dr. Jones, creator of the Sabian Symbols, the degree is one of “the contribution of familiar experience to the refinement of selfhood” by “the full self-expenditure required for any satisfactory acceptance into a fellowship with others.” Here we prove our “broader competency” by attending “to the immediate needs of the individual as a member of a group.”
He states “social incentives inevitably come to overbalance the more primitive instincts and appetites,” and offers us the keyword PARTICIPATION. He says when operating in a positive manner, this degree is "the calm efficiency which enables (us) to pour all of (ourselves) into the mastery of any situation arising to challenge (us).”
Given the themes of this degree, we'll use the ”fusion of life and mind” through the next Inferior Conjunction to see the light of prior and current ways to become more spiritually “goal fit,” and do what we have to do in our society to refine our persistence and determination. Use the coming period to show your “broader competency” in service to some group need.
Who Leads the Great Light Now That Mercury is Ahead of It?
At this conjunction, Mind is no longer following Life, trying to catch up to it. Now Mind races forward as herald, catching glimpses of knowledge, perception, and understanding that shows us where Life is headed in the near future.
When Mercury outraces the Sun and moves ahead of it, it no longer "leads the light." Now "Life" leads "Mind" even as Mind blazes the trail the Light will follow these next few weeks. This is the time when we stretch out into the future, with a period of looking back coming in late January at the next Mercury retrograde.
In this chart, now that Mercury no longer leads the Sun, it leaves Venus in Sagittarius as the “entry to the Light.” Our relationships and values can lead us to illumination! This is the adventurous well-balanced Venus admiring different value systems gatekeeping for the Great Light.
As Venus is on the same degree as the Sun/Mercury Inferior Conjunction in November 2018 it offers us an ability to connect the dots between that “backward turned fusion of life and mind” being forwarded into the future at this “forward fusion of life and mind.” Be open to seeing “the rules of the game,” and any interactions as giving us the chance to become more skilled at playing whatever that game is. This is the planet of affection in open minded Sag, so be a good sport as you dance into the future.
Venus will lead the Sun until the Sun conjuncts Pluto on January 14, at which point Pluto will lead the Sun until the Sun conjuncts Saturn on January 23, when Saturn will become the gateway to the Light. The study of which planet leads the Sun is a crucial but often overlooked part of the study of how the planets work in sequence.
What’s Ahead?
This Superior Conjunction can fuse foresight and life experience to see how new forms of light, life, and perspectives can come forth these next few weeks. Because this “fusion of life and mind” takes place in the last third of Sagittarius, we enter a time of getting in shape for some social function. As Sagittarius is “Fire by Friction,” we are offered a way to transfer our “spiritual idea” into spiritual practice once we do what we must to get ready.
This will give us a chance to articulate our Light fused with “the Guide of Souls” to find how we can BE the Light we are, expressed in larger truths, visions, and possibilities. As we’re still “before the beginning” of the next year, but also have now experienced both Jupiter and Saturn entering Aquarius, we are in the “in betweens,” with the promise of major life renewals for those who can “hear the call.”
The house this conjunction falls in shows where Mind now leads Life, and will open doors of perception wherever it falls, with many things “coming together in the Light of Mind. This need for getting in shape will yield unique intuitive powers and insights, even if there’s a hard edge due to Mars square Pluto. Stay balanced, stay sensitive, play good defense, and discuss possibilities as you prepare for the dawning of a new day. New heart strengths, new standards of performance, and new opportunities are on the way, so follow your “instinctive expansion of Self” in a balanced way and you’ll dance into a much broader future than you imagined!
This “fusion of Life and Mind” at 29 Sagittarius sets a platform in the house where this conjunction occurs in our charts. In blending these principles we will see a shift in our affairs, attitudes, and understanding about those things symbolized by Mercury in Sagittarius. Look for what you need to do to get ready for what’s coming, since this opens a vision of a new long term work to be done, with an eye to them being “spiritual touchstones” which will outlive us. This is the final moment when we look at the coming adventure into a new land while dancing at the intersection of Fate Street and Freewill Street on Eternity Boulevard.
The Backdrop to What’s Happening
Because of the shift of Jupiter and Saturn into Aquarius, Saturn is again the primary behind the scenes influence on this conjunction as well as the Solstice. Because Saturn has swapped residence in its home sign of Capricorn for its other home sign of Aquarius, it remains its own dispositor and very secure in its own self-awareness and self-expression. However, because there are three final dispositors, Saturn isn’t the only dominant force on the stage of life.
In this chart, the Superior Conjunction falling in Sagittarius makes Jupiter the ruler of the conjunction. As Jupiter is in Aquarius, it has Saturn as its ruler. So Saturn rules the Moon, Sun, Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, Uranus, and Pluto. Mars rules itself from its home sign of Aries, and Neptune as usual is a standalone.
The aspects are a mixed bag. The Conjunction is quindecile Venus, semi-sextile Jupiter and Saturn, binovile Neptune, and quindecile Pluto. However, the Moon quintile the conjunction while also in a double semisquare to Mars and Pluto indicates a bit of friction as we follow through on some things and heal a call to renewal in others. In a way, this conjunction is a type of “holding pattern” while we get our acts together and get ready to move forward after the Solstice.
The Lunar Influence
The Moon is at 8 Pisces for this conjunction. That means the focus is on renewals by “hearing the call,” where “tomorrow acts through today” to bring us all to forms of rebirth within a social context. This is a call to rally in some way at the end of something and the beginning of something new. The old must give way to the new! Coming weeks indicate our need to be diligent, determined, and dependable in our efforts at getting ready for some greater public activity.
As it falls in the first decan of Pisces, it’s a Crescent Moon, making the next few weeks a period of the need to make some sort of new impression on our world, and challenging old forms left over from previous cycles. We will need to become less personal and more concerned about what will shape the future. Once you get a new view of the whole of what’s happening, then assert yourself with confidence, since the future is coming at us like an express train!
Summing Up
Because it falls at 29 Sagittarius, this Superior Conjunction helps us do what we must to anticipate the future already presenting itself. Look at it all as a Divine Play, or Divine Dance, teaching us skill as we find the right attitude for what’s leaving and what’s here. A new vision is already there for those with eyes to see it; the Solstice brings “the victory of the Light,” and the promise of greater things to come in the Aquarian era than we’ve had to endure during the Capricorn era.
From here, even though Mercury will outrace the Sun for the next few weeks, it’s going to begin to slow down in speed, and will go retrograde on January 30 at 27 Aquarius, challenging us to take a look back at our commitments past and what we’re willing to do to add to that commitment in the future. That will give us a good look at past relationships, goals, and group involvements which will lead us to a new understanding of life’s great “evolutionary staircase,” seeing who we need to assist, who we need to assist us, and what parts of the past we need to let go of. The coming Mercury RX period will in some way give us a review or returns related to wherever we have Aquarius in our chart.
All significant Mercury events give us a chance to check in with our inner Mercury to make sure we’re listening to its knowledge so we may be guided to our Souls. By how our Mercury works, we are led to the “Active Intelligence” of Divine Mind, or scattered confusion because of the lower mind’s inability to know anything.
As I explained in my book Saturn: Spiritual Master, Spiritual Friend, Mercury’s duality is “Life/Death,” so we can get a new look at how our consciousness and responses are either creative, destructive, or both, to cite the venerable Kabalistic Arhat Paul Foster Case. Mercury is where we learn if our mental processes are creating chaos and disorganized scattered conditions through ambivalence, and thus come to see how to use discernment to coordinate various functions to bring forth perfect knowing how to do whatever needs to be done. Understanding its influence as a factor for weeks to come is crucial to the smooth operation of what moves forward from here.
Because we’ll be dealing with Mercury retrograde energies beginning January 15 when it enters its shadow zone, you should also take a look at the appropriate chapters in my book A New Look at Mercury Retrograde. You can find out all you need about the coming Mercury Retrograde in Aquarius or any other sign, as well as the houses it occupies in your chart. Of course I'll give you the details in late January.
Here's the Amazon link to where you can order your paperback edition of A New Look at Mercury Retrograde. You can also find it on Kindle or Nook. It’s a great reference source where you can check out possible ways the coming Mercury retrograde effect could play out between January and March 2021.
Copyright © 2020 Robert Wilkinson
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